Michael Walsh, a Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom litigation associate in Boston, could have let the Clemency Project be a one-day engagement. He ended 2015 by helping his firm go through hundreds of applications for inmates seeking clemency under an Obama administration initiative. After working on several applications, Walsh took on the responsibility of filing eight petitions and ultimately earned five people federal clemency in 2016. His first client earned a shortened sentence in June and was released from custody in October.

Walsh's work made up one-fifth of the successes Skadden had in the Clemency Project last year, making the firm a major contributor to a nationwide effort from the private bar to aid inmates who were imprisoned because of laws the Obama-era White House deemed to be too harsh.

“There may have never been a pro bono effort broader or involving more people than this effort,” said Donald Salzman, Skadden's D.C.-based pro bono counsel. “I wish — and a lot of people wish — the president could have done more.”