Duke’s legal clinics right egregious wrongs

When Melea Stoltenberg moved with her family to a new school district in the Sandhills of North Carolina, she noticed her two autistic sons were struggling in school.

In a school district overwhelmed with students and few resources, Stoltenberg struggled to get extra help for her sons. Add to that the family’s tight finances for hiring an advocate, and the mother didn’t know where to turn.

That’s when Stoltenberg heard about the Children’s Law Clinic at Duke Law School, one of 12 clinics where students work with supervising attorneys to gain real-world experience on cases in Durham or in nearby counties.

Duke Law students filed a complaint with the state Department of Public Instruction, in addition to filing petitions for hearings to receive appropriate special education services for both of Stoltenberg’s sons.

“I don’t know what I would have done without them,” said Stoltenberg. “Working with the clinic was life-changing.”

In 1931, Duke Law made history by opening the Duke Legal Aid Clinic, the first law school-connected program of its kind in the country, offering free legal services to people who couldn’t afford a lawyer.  ”

The 12 Duke Law clinics providing free legal advice and representation services for North Carolinians in need. The clinics are focused on key areas of advocacy including health justice, start-up law, wrongful convictions and immigrant justice, in addition to children’s law. Duke Law students work on cases in Durham and in 10 nearby counties within a one-hour drive of the city.

“These students leave our clinics well-prepared long after they leave law school and continue to make major impacts, both in the lives of the clinic and in the area of law,” said Kate Evans, a clinical professor of law and the inaugural director of Duke’s Immigrant Rights Clinic.

Evans has worked with students to successfully challenge their clients’ deportation before the U.S. Supreme Court, to end prolonged detention, to win asylum to be able to stay in the country with their children who are American citizens, and more.

Evans says she knows the value of the clinics—work that has been decades in the making.

In 1931, Duke Law made history by opening the Duke Legal Aid Clinic, the first law school-connected program of its kind in the country, offering free legal services to people who couldn’t afford a lawyer. 

The outcomes often are life-changing, both for clients and students.

Samuel de Sousa Dias Martins Bettini J.D.’24 volunteered his time with Duke’s Wrongful Convictions Clinic and worked on a landmark case reversing the conviction of Quincy Amerson, a Harnett County man who spent 23 years behind bars when he was wrongfully convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life without parole.

After taking up Amerson’s case, the Wrongful Convictions Clinic presented exculpatory evidence that led to a Superior Court judge finding that Amerson was denied a fair trial and exonerating him of the crime.

“I went through a bunch of lawyers,” Amerson said. “They sold the dream. But I just thank God, that I finally reached out to [Duke]. I don’t know where I’d be.”

Bettini says that working with Amerson to right the wrongs of the courts was a pivotal moment that changed him forever.

“Working on this case has been the most rewarding experience I have had in law school—and perhaps in my life so far,” he says.

Luke Mears J.D.’24, who also worked on Amerson’s case and called the outcome “25 years too long” to achieve, says he couldn’t agree more.

“To steal so much of someone’s life is just heartbreaking. We are happy and relieved with the result,” he says.

For Amerson, that happiness is unquantifiable.

Upon release he traveled to Georgia to visit his daughter, now in her 20s.

“I held her one time before I went to prison, and I never let her visit me,” he says.

Now Amerson is eager for his next stage in life—being part of his daughter’s everyday life and what he hopes will be the lives of future grandchildren.

“That’s what I’m looking forward to next,” Amerson says. “I can raise them. That will make me a grandpa.”