Description
Position Description: The Supervising Attorney represents clients facing deportation before immigration courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) and provides Know Your Rights (KYR) services to detained immigrants. The Supervising Attorney also provides mentorship, legal, and administrative supervision to colleagues, as assigned by the Managing Attorney.
Job Purpose and Activities:
Represents non-citizen adults facing deportation and detained at the Moshannon Valley Processing Center (MVPC) and non-detained immigrants residing in Pennsylvania. Cases include a wide scope of removal defense before immigration courts, the BIA, and the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. Cases selected fall under both a particular vulnerabilities model and a universal representation model.
Represents unaccompanied minors in south central Pennsylvania, in long-term foster care or released from the Office of Refugee Resettlement’s custody.
Conducts legal intakes and screenings of prospective clients for representation.
Provides non-representational legal orientation services under Know Your Rights (KYR) to detained adults seeking to self-represent.
Works with program coordinators to ensure all client data is properly recorded and entered into appropriate case management programs and databases.
Works with Managing Attorney to maintain and navigate relationships with governmental agencies, nonprofit legal service providers, community-based organizations, and other stakeholders.
Works with the Managing Attorney and Executive Director to ensure compliance with contractual and grant requirements for PIRC’s Removal Defense Programs.
Supervises a few direct reports and/or interns as assigned by the Managing Attorney, including providing mentorship, legal supervision of work product and legal strategy, and related administrative duties.
Requirements
Qualifications and Experience:
Law degree and licensed to practice law or pending application before the bar of any state in the U.S.
Excellent research, writing, and oral advocacy skills.
Effective communication and interpersonal skills. Ability to communicate with people of different racial, ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic backgrounds.
Ethic of serving clients with compassion.
Sense of personal initiative and ability to work independently with appropriate guidance and supervision.
Ability to balance competing priorities and communicate as priorities shift. Ability to meet deadlines.
Must be flexible and adaptable.
Commitment to PIRC’s mission, immigration advocacy, and legal services.
3 years of relevant immigration removal defense experience.
Preferred: Fluency (reading/writing/speaking) in Spanish and/or other language.
Other:
Must successfully pass NCIC, FBI, and State Criminal and Child Abuse Clearance background checks.
Regional travel required to provide legal orientation services, including overnight.
Performs in accordance with PIRC’s Core Values of integrity, adaptability, innovation, empowerment, collaboration and diversity.
Abides by all policies and procedures established by PIRC.
Other tasks as assigned
