As Big Law firms cut checks and pledge more pro bono to fighting racial injustice, some lawyers at smaller firms stepped up their own efforts to directly help protesters this past weekend.

A pro bono alliance to represent arrested protesters has lined up roughly 100 civil litigators, after Guizar, Henderson & Carrazco, a small civil rights firm in the Los Angeles area, partnered with Justice X, a social justice organization, to form the alliance. The group, launched June 5, is called the Protesters Defense Alliance (PDA), and most of its 100 pro bono civil litigators are located in California.

A key component of the alliance is how it has been training civil litigators who don't have criminal law experience about how to represent protesters in court, said Christian Contreras, an attorney at Guizar Henderson.

"It's not your usual cast of characters," Contreras said.

When the alliance launched, the lawyers were only representing 10 protesters, but the group will say yes to every case unless it's clear the protester was involved with looting, Contreras said,

Meanwhile, Washington, D.C.-based criminal defense attorney Joseph Scrofano opened his office for his six hours on Saturday to provide a respite for protesters on a day when temperatures reached into the 90-degree range. Scrofano provided water and snacks to protesters, as well as the opportunity to use the bathroom and recharge their phones.

Scrofano said his office isn't large—it only houses four lawyers, two administrators and one intern. That, combined with social distancing measures that were designed to halt the spread of the coronavirus, meant only one or two people could be in the office at a time, he added.

Still, he wanted to do whatever he could to contribute: "We're trying to find whatever ways we can contribute, to call attention to these issues," he added.

Opening his office to protesters was more about communicating his values to the community than drumming up business for the firm, Scrofano said. He said the firm hasn't been approached yet to represent any protesters who have been arrested since the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers.

"We're four lawyers who have seen the inside of the system and how awful it is and how it's treated as normal. We are in support of calling attention to that," Scrofano said.

For his part, Contreras said he is also committed to keeping a spotlight on criminal justice issues. The alliance held a press conference June 5 in front of the Los Angeles Police Department headquarters. From there, Contreras, his colleagues and others marched to the nearby office of Jackie Lacey, the district attorney of Los Angeles County, and demanded that she drop all charges against peaceful protesters.

"In California and Los Angeles, we're having thousands and thousands of protesters being charged with these crimes and it's overwhelming the criminal justice system," Contreras said.

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