ABA Highlights Ohio Prisoner’s Successful Transition to Lawyer
On October 29, 2024, the American Bar Association’s ABA Journal highlighted a former “jailhouse lawyer” who succeeded in becoming a licensed attorney after release. Damon Davis, 47, is now a lawyer with the Hamilton County Public Defender’s Office in Cincinnati. But when released from a 47-month federal prison term for selling drugs in 2013, he was homeless and had just $26 in cash.
Davis was the first in his family to finish high school. While in prison, his relatively high literacy drew requests from fellow prisoners for help in researching and writing legal briefs. Discovering the poor quality of lawyering reflected in their case records, Davis decided to become a lawyer himself.
After release, he took a job in a peanut butter processing plant because it offered tuition reimbursement. Working at night and studying by day, he completed an associate’s degree at a community college and finished undergraduate work at the University of Kentucky before finally getting a law degree from the University of Cincinnati in 2022. Before he could obtain a law license, he had to pass the Ohio bar exam and also satisfy requirements for former prisoners set by the state Supreme Court’s Board of Commissioners on Character and Fitness.
“If you’ve done it as an inmate, you’re really practicing law, but it’s not official,” Davis said.
Source: ABA Journal
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