The Thurgood Marshall Bar Association stands in sorrow and outrage at the senseless and tragic police killing of Sonya Massey. This atrocity is a stark reminder that Black lives continue to be devalued and threatened by systemic racism. Sonya Massey’s death is not an isolated incident but part of a persistent pattern of violence and injustice faced by Black communities across our nation.

Sonya Massey’s life mattered, and it is our collective responsibility to ensure that her death, and the deaths of so many others, spurs real and lasting reform. We call on Congress to honor her memory and take bold steps towards creating a fairer and more just society for all.

We implore Congress to take decisive action and immediately pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act. This vital legislation aims to address police misconduct, excessive force, and racial bias in policing, and its passage is crucial in our fight for justice and equality. It is imperative that we hold law enforcement accountable and implement meaningful reforms to protect all citizens, regardless of race.

 

Member Spotlight this month is on TMBA member Odera Ikenna-Obioha. Odera is the recipient of the Providence/Polsinelli Summer Associate Fellowship for 2022. His application was selected from 75 nationwide submissions!

Odera Ikenna-Obioha is a rising 2L JD candidate at Chapman University, Dale E. Fowler School of Law. He is secretary of both the Black Law Student Association and the International Law Society. He is also member of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Team at school. Odera graduated from the University of California, Riverside with a bachelor’s degree in Mathematics.

In his free time, Odera enjoys watching and playing soccer, going for runs, and being surrounded by friends and family. He has a strong passion for languages and learning about other cultures and he hopes to translate this affinity of learning about others into a great career.

Spitzer Statement.pdf

Statement on Anti Asian Racism.pdf

TMBA_Makai Brown Statement.pdf

TMBA JUNE 2 2020 PUBLIC STATEMENT.pdf

Hello TMBA Family!

It has been forty-one days since Governor Newsom issued a “stay at home” order to protect the health and well-being of all Californians and to help flatten the curve of COVID-19. Indeed, these have been challenging and uncertain times. However, in the midst of this pandemic, there are also so many beautiful silver linings! We have seen families strengthened, many of us—consumed by the hustle and bustle of the legal practice—have been forced to “slow down”, we’ve become more efficient and creative with technology and we’ve been more deliberate about checking in on our friends and loved ones!
 
Your TMBA board has been busy revamping TMBA’s programming for 2020 and finding creative ways to “virtualize” our programming. To that end, we are rolling out a host of programs for the month of May including but not limited to celebrating “Law Day”, hosting virtual legal workshops, celebrating “Lawyers Well-Being Week”, launching “Wine Down Wednesdays” and “Music time” for the kiddos, and much more! We’ve also dedicated an exclusive section in our newsletter for law students to keep our law student members up to date on resources and information regarding the bar exam. Our Law Student Ambassadors are also busy at work disseminating information to their respective law schools.
 
We want to hear from you! How can we help? What programming would be useful to you? Our law students spoke up and indicated that they needed a quiet space, equipped with high-speed internet and free of home distractions, to complete law school exams. We immediately reached out to our Village and in less than twenty-four hours, we were able to partner with LawWorks to provide a quiet space for law students to take law school exams!

There is power in Community and many resources contained within our Village! Please do not hesitate to speak up and lean on the TMBA Village during this pandemic. Email us at: info@thurgoodmarshallbarassociation.org and let us know how your TMBA leadership can best assist you during this time. We are in this together!

Best,

Keshia Dorsey
Thurgood Marshall Bar Association President

I am honored to be entrusted with leading the organization this year and excited about the opportunity to contribute to shaping the culture of our young organization.  TMBA's vision for 2020 is "Igniting the Village."  Some of the key characteristics of a village are (1) the members' ability to recognize the humanity of every member of the community while honoring their unique differences, (2) a shared culture and belief system understood by its members, (3) a joint-family support system and (4) everyone's unique gifts and talents contributing to the collective success of the whole.  We believe that the legacy of Thurgood Marshall and TMBA's founders embody these village characteristics.

This year's Awards and Installation Gala is representative of the "village."  The honorees, guests and sponsors are a diverse representation of members of our Orange County legal community, attorneys and judges from neighboring countries, OC faith leaders, community leaders, law students, pre-law students, professors, judges, other professionals, and community members.  

TMBA's programming for 2020 will be "Village Centered."  We want to know who our members are, and we want TMBA members to know one another.  To that end -- TMBA will focus on identifying the needs of the TMBA Village and creating a "joint family support system," in order to meet TMBA's mission of connecting, supporting and increasing the black legal community in Orange County.  To accomplish this, we will leverage monthly newsletters, social media and revamp TMBA's website to improve communication.  We will also seek feedback from members to help shape the resources, events and CLEs' we conduct in the 2020 year.

Finally, TMBA will launch our very own internship program and membership directory.  We will tap into the unique gifts and talents of each TMBA member to contribute to our collective success and create a safe space for attorneys, law students and judges of color practicing in Orange County.

Congratulations to Desirae Hutchison for leading TMBA through a successful year and accomplishing your vision of "building bridges" with the community.  It was a pleasure serving as your program chair!  To the incoming board, thank you for volunteering your time, energy and talents to serve TMBA and the OC community this year!  We're off to a great start and I cannot wait to see what this year unfolds!

Lakeshia Adeniyi Dorsey Esq.

When I was first sworn in to be President of TMBA, I set up an intention: to mobilize the Orange County community buy Building Bridges.  The meant forming meaningful partnerships with like minded organizations.  Our first bridges were with Christ Our Redeemer A.M.E Church, UCI School of Law, and the Public Law Center.  We discovered that our community was in need of more free legal services in Orange County, so we created a legal clinic.  we served nearly 100 individuals.  We also partnered with the NAACP to create a monthly legal workshop series.  Together we educated the community on their rights and ways to protect their assets.  With the National Coalition of 100 Black Women, we brought various black organizations together t discuss the needs of the community and the next generations of leaders.  These partnerships had a tremendous impact that will continue to grow in the years to come.

My next commitment was to provide a pillar of support to our local law students.  To that end, we awarded over $10,000 in scholarships.  We also created a new scholarship for bar takers and repeat bar takers.  Moreover, we raised funds for pre-law students who were in the foster care system.

Because mentorship is a core value near and dear to my heart, we provided opportunities for law students to receive mentorship through networking events.  Torklaw, our gold sponsor for the 2020 Awards and Installation Gala, funded and participated in an informal mentorship session at a luxurious suite during a Laker game.  Moreover, we sponsored events held by their BLSAs and our board members attended their graduations.  The lasting benefits from these relationships cannot be quantified.  we hope that these opportunities will contribute to more students staying in Orange County after graduation. 

We also created opportunities for attorneys in Orange County.  We hosted an MCLE discussion on closing the racial wealth gap.  We also held an intimate panel with two sitting judges discussing their pathway to the bench.

Finally, my last commitment was to bring people together in a way that they cold develop intimate relationships.  We created our first Juneteenth Celebration and Scholarship Brunch where artists from the local community performed spoken word, Neo-soul, and dance.  Our Keynote speaker provided s short history on the oft-forgotten celebration.  The afternoon ended with an impromptu shout and dance jam session that left everyone with joy.

Through building these strategic partnerships, we built strong bridges that will have long lasting effects.

I am grateful to have had a strong team who was committed to these goals in the form of the 2019 Board of Directors.  I am thankful to all sponsors that funded our visions.

I am confident that the incoming President Lakeshia Dorsey will take TMBA's mission even further.  Congratulations to TMBA's 2020 Board of Directors.

Desirae Hutchison Esq.