Soros Justice Fellowships

Ohio Justice & Policy Center

Ohio’s system of providing counsel to indigent criminal defendants is inefficient, ineffective, and in need of significant improvements. At the same time, Ohio jail and prison populations are soaring, with low-income individuals and members of racial and ethnic minorities imprisoned in disproportionate numbers. Recently, the American Bar Association criticized the state’s inadequate qualification standards for counsel appointed to death penalty cases. Through her Ohio Indigent Reform Initiative, Janet Moore will build a coalition demanding a state-wide, standards-based, politically independent, fully funded indigent defense system; conduct a public education campaign directed toward opinion-shapers and policymakers; and promote model programs for recruitment, training, and placement of qualified indigent defense attorneys and mitigation specialists who can work together to advocate for clients at all levels.

Moore received JD and MA degrees from Duke University, an MA in Divinity from the University of Chicago, and a BA in Religion from Kalamazoo College. At Duke, she served as Editor-in-Chief of Law & Contemporary Problems, the nation’s first interdisciplinary law journal. She has clerked for the Honorable J. Dickson Phillips, Jr., on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. She spent seven years litigating death penalty cases in North Carolina, winning some form of relief for about 70 percent of her clients. Moore has also contributed to criminal justice reform through teaching, publication, community organizing, and drafting legislation and attorney performance standards. In 2006, she joined the Ohio Justice & Policy Center, where she serves as Director of the Race and Justice Project.

Cincinnati, OH |