Wiley’s Theodore Howard Accepts Outstanding Achievement Award from the Washington Lawyers’ Committee

June 26, 2023

Washington, DC – Wiley Rein LLP, a preeminent DC law firm, is pleased to announce that Wiley’s Pro Bono Partner, Theodore A. Howard, accepted an Outstanding Achievement Award from the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs at the Wiley A. Branton Awards Luncheon.

The award was in recognition of Howard’s work on the case Doe v. Shenandoah Valley Juvenile Center Commission, in which he advocated on behalf of unaccompanied immigrant children from being held in unlawful and inhumane circumstances at the Shenandoah Valley Juvenile Detention Center.

The Washington Lawyers’ Committee praised Howard’s efforts, saying, “Since 2017, Theodore A. Howard, Wiley Rein LLP, and the Committee have fought the pattern of excessive force, unnecessary and punitive seclusion, and deprivation of adequate mental health care at Shenandoah. In January 2021, the Fourth Circuit ruled that a facility detaining unaccompanied children must take into account the needs of these young people and provide services consistent with professional standards regarding mental health care. This year, the immigrant detention unit at Shenandoah was shuttered and immigrant children are no longer being held there.”

Other Wiley attorneys who assisted in the children’s representation include partner Sara M. Baxenberg and counsel J. Ryan Frazee.