Mission: The Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights (CAIR) Coalition is the only non-profit organization in the Washington, D.C. area with a legal services program focused exclusively on assisting detained immigrant men, women, and children in jails and juvenile facilities in Maryland and Virginia. CAIR Coalition’s newest programmatic initiative, the Virginia Justice Program (VJP), strives to ensure that non-citizens receive equal justice in Virginia criminal courts. We provide support to members of Virginia’s criminal defense bar in their representation of non-citizen defendants and also conduct litigation and advocacy at the intersection of criminal-immigration law. The Community Conversations Project is designed to provide holistic and culturally competent workshops on immigrants’ rights, defenses against deportation, as well as rights against gender and domestic violence. Our Gender-Based Violence workshop promotes awareness of gender-based violence and its impacts on legal status and eligibility for relief against deportation. All presentations include information for families through partnerships with local schools, community centers, and other nonprofits.
Website: https://www.caircoalition.org/how-to-help/volunteering
Volunteer Form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdHFpVhMPtnQUAv4_xTcycjNXGxYTECQ341rWsKLGHiMkr_SQ/viewform
Email: for jail visit, translation/interpretation, or detention hotline volunteer opportunities: Kelly Rojas at kelly.rojas@caircoalition.org for medical and mental health volunteer opportunities: Michael Lukens at michael@caircoalition.org.
Phone: n/a
What volunteers do:
- Help answer the Detention Line for detained noncitizens and family members. Help with initial intakes, provide additional information to the detainee/their family about the detention and removal process, as well as connect detainees to their attorneys. Detention line volunteers may also assist with preparations for our weekly jail visits, research criminal records and help with case follow-up and translations. Training is required.
- Help with jail visits. Assist CAIR Coalition staff with intakes, interpreting, and distributing information to the detainees.
- Translate/Interpret. Translate documents from a foreign language to English and /or interpret for staff and pro bono attorneys.
- Medical/Mental Health Evaluation Help. Refugees who need to apply for a special waiver in order to avoid deportation need a medical evaluation performed by a designated civil surgeon and to be up to date on their vaccines in order to complete the application for the waiver. If the individual does not have the resources to pay a physician to come to the detention center, volunteer medical professionals are needed who are willing to take the time to visit a detention center on a pro bono basis.
FYI:
- All volunteers must fill out volunteer application on the website.
- For the Detention line, CAIR Coalition is particularly looking for volunteers who speak Spanish, French or Arabic. Volunteers can sign up for one or more two hour shift a week, or as their schedule permits, between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. Ideally, we are looking for volunteers who could do more than one shift a week.
- For the Jail visits, additional training is required. No knowledge of the law is required. There is a particular need for Spanish-speakers. Also seeking volunteers who speak French, Amharic, Tigrinya, Somali, Arabic, Russian, Farsi, or Mandarin.
Mission: CIVIC is a national immigration detention visitation network, working to end the U.S. immigration detention system by monitoring human-rights abuses, elevating stories, building community-based alternatives to detention, and advocating for system change.
Website: http://www.endisolation.org/get-involved/become-a-volunteer/
Email: info@endisolation.org
Phone: n/a
What volunteers do:
- Staff national hotline for people in immigration detention.
- Become a pen pal with a detainee.
- Visit detention centers.
- Start a new visitation program.
- Consult on fundraising.
- Engage the public with stories about CIVIC.
Mission: The ACLU of the District of Columbia (ACLU-DC), with more than 8,500 local members, fights to protect and expand civil liberties and civil rights for people who live, work, and visit D.C., and in matters involving federal employees and agencies. Those who join us also become members of the National ACLU. ACLU-DC pursues its mission through legal action, legislative advocacy, and public education. In addition to representing clients in court, sometimes we work with government agencies to defend liberty without litigation. We also testify and lobby before the D.C. Council, and we educate the public through Know Your Rights trainings and materials, appearances on radio and television, social media activity, and meetings with community groups.
Website: https://www.acludc.org/en/volunteer
Volunteer signup form: https://action.aclu.org/secure/dc-volunteer
Email: n/a
Phone: (202) 457-0800
What volunteers do:
- Help with community organizing, grassroots lobbying, research, writing, and online activism.
- Provide fundraising assistance, multimedia support, translation, and graphic design.
- Monitor protests, and take photos/videos.
Mission: Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of the Deaf (HEARD), is an all-volunteer nonprofit organization that promotes equal access to legal system for individuals who are deaf and for people with disabilities. HEARD primarily focuses on correcting and preventing deaf wrongful convictions, ending deaf prisoner abuse, decreasing recidivism rates for deaf returned citizens, and on increasing representation of the deaf in the justice, legal and corrections professions. HEARD created and maintains the only national database of deaf, hard of hearing and deaf-blind detainees & prisoners.
Website: http://www.behearddc.org/get-involved/get-involved.html
Contact: http://www.behearddc.org/contactus.html
Phone: n/a
What volunteers do:
- Visit deaf and deaf blind prisoners in your area
- Become a pen pal for a deaf or deaf blind prisoner
- Help us raise awareness about wrongful arrests and convictions of deaf people
- Become a "Know Your Rights!" presenter after completing your training with HEARD
- Testify at a legislative hearing in your area
- Donate stamps, envelopes, and old or new ASL dictionaries
Mission: The Innocence Project, founded in 1992 by Peter Neufeld and Barry Scheck at Cardozo School of Law, exonerates the wrongly convicted through DNA testing and reforms the criminal justice system to prevent future injustice. The Innocence Project's mission is to free the staggering number of innocent people who remain incarcerated, and to bring reform to the system responsible for their unjust imprisonment. The Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project works to prevent and correct the conviction of innocent people in DC, Maryland, and Virginia. We have one of the highest success rates in the country for exonerating those who have been wrongfully accused.
Website: https://exonerate.org/
Volunteer form: https://exonerate.org/get-involved/
Email: volunteer@exonerate.org
Phone: (202) 994-4586
What volunteers do:
Help currently needed from law students, attorneys, and people with expertise in fields related to forensic science, criminal justice, and social work for work on prisoner appeals.
Mission: PEN America stands at the intersection of literature and human rights to protect open expression in the United States and worldwide. We champion the freedom to write, recognizing the power of the word to transform the world. Our mission is to unite writers and their allies to celebrate creative expression and defend the liberties that make it possible. The Prison Writing Program sponsors an annual writing contest, publishes a free handbook for prisoners, and provides one-on-one mentoring to inmates.
Website: https://pen.org/about/programs/prison-writing/
Email: penmentor@gmail.com
Phone: (212) 334-1660, ext. 117
What volunteers do:
- Mentors read and edit submissions and provide written feedback. If possible, PEN encourages mentors to suggest or forward reading materials or exercises pertaining to their student's work. When sending material back, the mentor will either request new work from the prisoner or ask for a revision. There is a minimum of three exchanges between mentor and writer.
- Volunteers also serve as judges in the program's annual prison writing contest.
FYI:
- The level of anonymity in the correspondence is entirely up to the mentor: you may use your own name, a pen name, or initials.
- Both the prisoner and the mentor should expect a response no later than five weeks.
Mission: The Petey Greene Program supplements education in correctional institutions by preparing volunteers, primarily college students, to provide free, quality tutoring and related programming to support the academic achievement of incarcerated people.
Website: http://www.peteygreene.org/volunteer/
Volunteer form: http://www.peteygreene.org/volunteerapplication
Contact: http://www.peteygreene.org/contact/
Phone: n/a
What volunteers do:
- Work one-on-one or in small groups with students in correctional facilities in order to support their academic achievement.
FYI:
- All tutors are required to be over the age of 18, and have or be working towards a Bachelor's degree. Additionally must be able to provide a social security number and government-issued ID.
- This opportunity requires a 3-4 hour weekly commitment.
- Shift times and locations listed here: http://www.peteygreene.org/washington-dc/. (note: program follows academic calendar, so runs between Sept-Dec and Jan-April):