Pictured left to right: Morgan Lamandre, Director of Advocacy and Legal Services at STAR; Racheal Hebert, Executive Director of STAR; and Professor Robert Lancaster, Director, LSU Law Clinical Education Program, attended the October 8 meeting of the East Baton Rouge Parish Metro-Council , where the grant was announced that will establish the Civil Legal Needs of Sexual Assault Survivors Law Clinic.
A new collaborative effort between the LSU Law Center and the Sexual Trauma Awareness and Response (STAR) organization will establish a new law clinic focused on civil needs of sexual assault survivors. The grant to the LSU Law Center was announced on October 6, and the new program will assist survivors in the Capital Region.
STAR received the funding via the Federal Office of Violence Against Women, and according to LSU Law Clinical Legal Education Director Robert Lancaster, the project will establish a Civil Legal Needs of Sexual Assault Survivors Law Clinic to train and educate student attorneys on working with sexual trauma survivors. The Legal Assistance for Victims (LAV) Program awarded STAR $500,000 over a three-year period to establish legal services to sexual assault survivors.
The project will provide holistic, free, competent legal services to survivors in matters resulting from the aftermath of sexual assault; the goal of the project is to enhance their safety, privacy, self-sufficiency and well-being. “The LSU Law Center looks forward to collaborating with STAR on this project,” says Lancaster. “The exposure law students will receive assisting survivors of sexual trauma will teach them first-hand how their work as lawyers can better people’s lives.”
According to representatives from STAR, “This is the first project of its kind in Louisiana intended to address survivors’ unique civil legal needs as a result of sexual assault, including matters such as education, employment, housing, immigration, privacy, crime victims’ rights, and family law issues.”
Read the recent media coverage on the new clinic and grant funding via STAR:
Sexual trauma center in Baton Rouge wins federal grants
STAR awarded $1 million in grants to expand services
Sexual assault victims in Baton Rouge to get access to free, better legal services
