Pro bono profiles: Kanysha Phillips
Many Davis Polk lawyers start pro bono work in their earliest days at the firm – as summer associates.
As a summer associate: Kanysha worked on several pro bono matters, including one opposing President Trump’s 2017 decision to end Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from Haiti, El Salvador and Honduras. “I also spent two weeks out of my 10-week summer program on a pro bono secondment with the Northern Manhattan Improvement Corporation, where we provided free legal services to immigrants. The cases I worked on were all in housing court. I worked with one woman whose landlord was attempting to wrongfully evict her from her rent-controlled apartment. I actually had the opportunity to argue a motion as a summer associate – it was a unique experience.”
Today: When she returned to Davis Polk as a full-time associate, Kanysha threw herself into pro bono work and received the Davis Polk Pro Bono Award in her first year at the firm. She has worked on a variety of pro bono litigation matters: “Through the Promise of Justice Initiative’s (PJI) Jim Crow Juries Project, I worked on the case of a client who was convicted of murder by a non-unanimous jury in Louisiana and sentenced to life in prison. I also worked with the Legal Aid Society on behalf of a client in his twenties who had received a seven-year jail sentence in New York City for what was essentially a fist fight. There were several issues with his case, the most significant being that the judge provided improper instructions to the jury, which had an irreversible, quite impactful effect on the court proceedings and outcome. In addition, a member of the jury was inappropriately dismissed and then brought back to serve on the jury after leaving the courthouse. Thankfully, our appeal was successful and the First Department reversed our client’s conviction last summer [2023].”
Why Kanysha does pro bono: Kanysha, a first-generation college graduate, emphasizes the importance of lifting others up and being the kind of person she sought out as a mentor while pursing higher education and a career in law. Also passionate about criminal justice reform and taking on wrongful incarceration matters, Kanysha says, “There are so many people who can’t afford quality legal services, so they are forced to rely on limited free resources. That was a major issue I saw in the PJI case I worked on – the lawyer who first represented my client in the underlying proceedings that led to his conviction ended up being disbarred. In my client’s trial, he didn’t even make a closing argument. By providing free quality legal services, we are making a world of difference in our clients’ lives and doing the work that underserved communities need.”
One World Middle School mock trial
Kanysha also spent three years as a leader of the law and mock trial program that Davis Polk runs at One World Middle School in the Bronx, New York. Every week, our lawyers teach a law course during the school day which culminates in an end-of-year mock trial presided over by a New York federal or state judge with an audience of the students’ teachers, family and friends. Students who take the course also spend a day at Davis Polk’s offices, where they learn about the many career paths possible for them at a law firm.
