Staff
Martha Bergmark
mbergmark@mscenterforjustice.org
Martha returned home to Mississippi in 2003 as the founding president and CEO of the Mississippi Center for Justice. For the previous 15 years, she was a national advocate for equal justice under law in Washington DC, serving tenures as president and executive vice president of the Legal Services Corporation, which administers federal funding for legal aid programs, and as senior vice president for programs at the National Legal Aid and Defender Association, where she directed the NLADA/Center for Law and Social Policy’s Project for the Future of Equal Justice. For the first 14 years of her legal career, Martha practiced civil rights and poverty law in Hattiesburg, Miss., where she was the founding executive director of Southeast Mississippi Legal Services (now Mississippi Center for Legal Services). She is a former Reginald Heber Smith Fellow and the 1990 recipient of the Kutak-Dodds Prize for her civil rights and legal aid work in her home state of Mississippi. In 2003, she was named the Stern Family Fund’s Public Interest Pioneer, an honor which came with a $200,000 grant to launch the Center. She is a magna cum laude graduate of Oberlin College, earned her law degree cum laude at the University of Michigan Law School and holds an honorary doctorate of public service from Millsaps College.
Bonnie Allen
Bonnie is director of training and foundation development. She began her affiliation with the Center as a volunteer immediately after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Mississippi Gulf Coast in 2005. Bonnie serves on the clinical law faculty at the University of Maryland School of Law where she teaches Ethics and Professional Responsibility and the Mississippi Summer Recovering Communities Clinic. In addition, she provides programmatic support in launching LEAD, the law school’s new Leadership, Ethics and Democracy-Building Initiative funded by the Fetzer Institute.
Bonnie previously served as president of the Center for Law & Renewal, based at the Fetzer Institute. She also held the executive director position at Just Neighbors Immigrant Ministry, Inc. in Arlington, Va., and she co-directed the Project for the Future of Equal Justice based at the National Legal Aid and Defender Association and the Center for Law and Social Policy in Washington, D.C. Bonnie served as director of the American Bar Association Center for Pro Bono. After graduating from the University of Florida College of Law in 1984, Bonnie served as a judicial law clerk for the Second District Court of Appeal in Fla., and practiced law in the areas of civil litigation and government contracts in Tampa for seven years. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in International Studies from Rhodes College and a master's in Theological Studies from Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary.
Denise Antoine
dantoine@mscenterforjustice.org
Denise is a Legal Assistant with the Mississippi Center for Justice, a position she has held since August 2006. In her capacity with the Center, Denise provides critical organizational support for clinic outreach, client in-take and processing and general case management. Denise has a long history of providing support to non-profit organizations, including experience with Back Bay Mission, South Mississippi Legal Services Corp., the South Mississippi AIDS Task Force and Moore Community House in Biloxi, Miss. Prior to joining the Center, Denise also gained valuable legal experience working with Gillespie & Blessey Law Firm on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Denise is also an active volunteer with numerous organizations that promote healthy choices for teens and youth.
Whitney Barkley
wbarkley@mscenterforjustice.org
Whitney serves as the Center’s Equal Justice Works AmeriCorps Recovery Fellow. In this role, she focuses her work on foreclosure prevention efforts throughout the state. Prior to joining the Center, Whitney spent summers interning at the Equal Rights Center and Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, where she worked on projects involving payday lending, fair housing and election protection. Whitney holds a Bachelors of Art in political science and communication from the College of Charleston and a Juris Doctorate from the University of Michigan Law School, where she was recognized as the UM Law and the Women’s Lawyers Association 2009 Woman Lawyer of the year.
Andrew Canter
acanter@mscenterforjustice.org
Andrew is an Equal Justice Works Fellow and Staff Attorney in the Center's Biloxi office. Andrew focuses on unmet housing needs in Hancock County. Most recently, Andrew has advocated for Mississippi Cottage residents seeking permanent placement of their units and Mississippi Cottage residents seeking extensions to finish their homes. He has also worked on a variety of other housing matters, including contractor fraud, eviction defense, and public housing preservation. Andrew has co-authored articles appearing in the Stanford Law Review and the BYU Education and Law Journal, and has been quoted in a number of publications, including The Wall Street Journal, The American Lawyer, and the ABA Journal. He is a graduate of Stanford Law School, the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and the University of Maryland.
Norman Chronister
nchronister@mscenterforjustice.org
Norman serves as administrative assistant in the Jackson office. Since coming on board in January 2005, Norman has provided invaluable support to communications, administration, grant preparation and policy advocacy functions. Prior to joining the Center for Justice, Norman spent his career serving in a variety of positions within state and federal government, including managing a Congressional office and service as public information officer to Gov. Ray Mabus. Norman lives in Jackson with his wife, Marlane, and their four Westies.
Scott Colom
Scott is a Skadden Fellow in the Center’s Jackson office. Scott’s fellowship is aimed at combating the growth of payday lending by exploring litigation strategies, launching an outreach and education program, and, most importantly, creating an alternative loan product for short term loans. Scott is from Columbus, Miss. and received a bachelor's degree in English and History from Millsaps College. After college, Scott spent a summer teaching in Guyana, South America. He is a 2009 graduate of the University of Wisconsin Law School. While in law school, Scott interned with the chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Arusha, Tanzania, and was a summer honors intern with the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice.
Monica Galloway
mgalloway@mcenterforjustice.org
Monica Galloway serves as Operations Director for the Mississippi Center for Justice, a position she has held since the Center’s founding in 2002. Monica oversees the Center’s financial, administrative and operations functions. Monica is a native of Jackson and graduate of Jackson State University’s School of Business. Following graduation, Monica was hired by Atlantic Richfield Corporation's Dallas-based oil and gas division. During her career with ARCO she lived in Texas, Colorado, and California working in various corporate divisions in the areas finance, business process engineering and system implementations. She also worked on various projects in Australia and Mexico. Monica is the proud mother of one daughter, Paige.
Sharon Garrison
sgarrison@mscenterforjustice.org
Sharon serves as communications director of the Mississippi Center for Justice, a position has held since April 2008. Prior to joining the Center, Sharon served as press secretary for the 2007 John Arthur Eaves’ gubernatorial campaign in Mississippi. Her previous experience includes serving as communications director of The Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi, the statewide nonprofit organization that received national acclaim for its campaigns to reduce youth and adult tobacco use across the state, as well as marketing associate for BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee. She holds a B.A. degree in English from Mississippi College.
Sharon is a member of the 2010 Top 50 Leading Businesswomen in Mississippi, is a 2010 Opportunity Agenda Communications Institute Fellow and is a graduate of Leadership Mississippi. She is an active volunteer in the Jackson area and contributes time to the Junior League of Jackson, Stewpot Community Services, Champions for Children Mentoring Scholarship program, the Jackson Symphony League and the Greater Jackson Arts Council. Sharon is a member of St. Richard Catholic Church.
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Annette Hollowell Simons-Jones
ahollowell@mscenterforjustice.org
Annette serves as a staff attorney with the Mississippi Center for Justice. Annette’s work focuses on elder housing issues and asset building, community and economic development and grassroots community advocacy. Annette holds an undergraduate degree in Political Science from the University of Mississippi and is a 2008 graduate of the University of Mississippi School of Law where she received the Dean’s Distinguished Service Award and the Adams & Reese Pro Bono Award. While attending school in Oxford, Miss., Annette served as project coordinator for the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation at the University of Mississippi, and worked a summer internship for the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law Fair Housing and Community Development Project. She is a member of the executive board of William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation, a supporter of ongoing efforts to develop a Mississippi Truth and Reconciliation Commission, an organizer for the Welcome Table Project, and a former member of the national advisory board for the Student Hurricane Network. She has conducted several oral presentations regarding civil rights education, youth activism, Story Circle trainings and community dialogue, and interviewing techniques for oral histories.
Kiya Jones
Kiya Jones serves as a legal assistant in the Mississippi Center for Justice’s Biloxi office, a position she has held since August 2008. In this position, Kiya provides research and file preparation support, and leads the Center’s case management organizational system. A native of Dallas, Texas, Kiya holds a B.A. in Government from the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to joining the Center, Kiya served as a paralegal intern with DLA Piper in Washington, D.C.
John Jopling
jjopling@mscenterforjustice.org
John is the managing attorney for the Mississippi Center for Justice office in Biloxi, Miss. John is a 1983 graduate of the University of Mississippi School of Law. He is a founding staff member of the Center’s Katrina Recovery office, which opened its doors in October 2005 to provide legal advocacy to tens of thousands of residents whose homes were damaged or destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. In 2006, he received the President’s Award from the Mississippi Bar young Lawyers Division for his legal work on behalf renters in the immediate aftermath of Katrina. John’s pre-Katrina solo practice in Ocean Springs focused on consumer, housing, employment discrimination and personal injury law. John previously served on the pro bono panel of the Mississippi Volunteer Lawyers Project and was project manager of the Fair Housing Education Outreach Project funded by HUD at South Mississippi Legal Services. During his 10 years with Southeast Mississippi Legal Services in Hattiesburg, John was a housing and consumer law specialist and served as litigation director. From 1994-95, John was a clinical professor in the University of Mississippi School of Law Housing Law Clinic. John began his legal career as a law clerk to Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Lenore Prather. John is the author of “Two Years After The Storm: The State Of Katrina Housing Recovery On The Mississippi Gulf Coast,” 77 Miss. L. J. 873 (2008). John is a graduate of Louisiana State University and the University of Mississippi School of Law.
Reilly Morse
Reilly is a senior attorney and a founding staff member in the Biloxi office where he focuses on housing policy and community development. Hurricane Katrina destroyed Reilly's office in Gulfport, where he maintained a solo and public interest practice for nine years, including six years as a municipal prosecutor and judge. Before opening his solo practice, Reilly spent 11 years in insurance and commercial litigation practice, including eight years as a partner in a Biloxi law firm. He received the first Katrina Legal Fellowship from Equal Justice Works, the 2006 Edwin D. Wolf public interest lawyer award from the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the 2009 Hugh White Award from the Episcopal Network for Economic Justice, and was voted into Mid-South SuperLawyers for 2006-2009. Reilly has testified on disaster recovery programs before five Congressional committees and is an invited speaker on disaster recovery, environmental justice, and community lawyering in the Gulf region. Reilly is a co-founder of the Steps Coalition and board member of Gulf Coast Renaissance Corporation. Reilly is author of "Environmental Justice Through the Eye of Hurricane Katrina" (Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, 2008), Katrina anniversary reports for the Steps Coalition (2007-09), and co-author with Karen Lash of "Mitigating Disaster: Lessons from Mississippi," 77 Miss. Law Journal 101 (2008). Reilly is a magna cum laude graduate of Millsaps College and earned his law degree from the University of Mississippi Law School. Reilly is married with two daughters.
Beth Orlansky
borlansky@mscenterforjustice.org
Beth serves as advocacy director with the Mississippi Center for Justice. In this capacity, Beth manages the Center’s policy campaigns and oversees the work of the staff attorneys. Beth is also the Center’s child care advocate, working closely with the Mississippi Low-Income Child Care Initiative to improve access to child care subsidies for low income Mississippi parents. She holds a bachelor's degree in Anthropology from Stanford University and a law degree from the University of Tennessee. Prior to joining the Center, Beth practiced law with Butler Snow, Ott & Purdy, and McGlinchey Stafford law firms in Jackson, and she has been involved as a volunteer with a wide variety of organizations. She and her husband Steve, also an attorney, have raised three sons, Abram, Jonathan, and Benjamin.
Linda Dixon Rigsby
lrigsby@mscenterforjustice.org
Linda is the Center’s health law attorney, a position she has held since November 2008. She received a bachelor's degree in Criminal Justice from Southern University in New Orleans and received her law degree from Mississippi College School of Law. After graduating from law school, Linda worked as an associate attorney with Thomas Prewitt Law Firm. In December 2006, Linda was appointed assistant secretary of state for elections for the state of Mississippi by Secretary of State Eric Clark, and previously held the position of senior attorney and director of elections training and education for the Mississippi secretary of state’s office. Linda was reappointed assistant secretary of state for elections under the administration of Secretary Delbert Hosemann.
Linda's professional associations include the Mississippi Bar Association, Magnolia Bar Association, National Bar Association and Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated. She is married to Dr. Reginald Rigsby, and is the mother of one son and two stepdaughters.
Paheadra Robinson
probinson@mscenterforjustice.org
Paheadra joined the Center in August 2006, and leads the Center’s economic justice work that focuses foreclosure prevention and payday lending campaigns. She attended Jackson’s Lanier High School and is a graduate of Tougaloo College and the University of Mississippi School of Law. In addition to private practice, Paheadra’s experience includes serving as legislative counsel to three House committees: Conservation and Water Management, Juvenile Justice and Municipalities. Her knowledge of the Legislature and its players has helped the Center open important doors at the Mississippi Capitol.
Paheadra’s interest in social justice and welfare led her to co-found the Mississippi-based Fresh Start Foundation to provide direct financial aid to victims of Hurricane Katrina. Recognized for her commitment to community activism, she was recently selected to attend Jackson’s Parents for Public Schools’ Leadership Institute. Paheadra and her husband Mike, also an attorney, live in Jackson with their three young children.
Chanda Roby
Chanda is a native Mississippian from Mendenhall. Chanda joined the Mississippi Center for Justice as an Equal Justice Works AmeriCorps Fellow in November 2007; at the end of her two-year fellowship in 2009, she became a staff attorney specializing in education advocacy. After majoring in journalism and receiving her associate’s degree from Hinds Community College in 1999, she went on to graduate from the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss). Chanda double-majored in journalism and business communications and received a Bachelors of Arts and a Bachelors of Business Administration, respectively, in May 2004. Chanda received her law degree from Ole Miss Law School in 2007. While a student, Chanda was active in various organizations, including: National Association of Black Journalists, Black Law Student Association, American Marketing Association, American Advertising Federation, and Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., and an occasional writer for the Daily Mississippian, to name a few. Admitted to practice law in Mississippi, Chanda is currently working on an education project that she hopes will result in the adoption of conflict resolution methods in discipline policies that reduce the number of student cases that make it to the disciplinary hearing level throughout Mississippi’s public school system.
Theodora Rowan
Theodora handles the accounting needs for the Mississippi Center for Justice. She is a licensed Certified Public Accountant (CPA) and a Certified Internal Auditor (CIA). She holds an undergraduate degree in accounting from Florida A&M University, and a master’s degree in business administration from Alcorn State University. Theodora is a member of the American Institute of CPA’s, the Mississippi Society of CPA’s, the National Association of Black Accountants, the Institute of Internal Auditors, and the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners.
Theodora has more than 20 years of accounting experience. She has been employed in the areas of state government, public accounting, nonprofit and higher education. Prior to coming to the Center she was employed as the Comptroller of Alcorn State University.
Theodora is on the ministerial staff at Pearl Street AME Church in Jackson, MS. She and her husband, Warren, have one son.
Crystal Utley
Crystal serves as pro bono counsel. Crystal obtained an International Business Degree from the College of Charleston and her JD from the Mississippi College School of Law. She practiced law in Charleston, South Carolina before returning home to Mississippi to coordinate Katrina-related legal aid for the Mississippi Center for Justice in 2006. Crystal is also state site supervisor for all Mississippi AmeriCorps attorneys. Crystal serves as a liaison to state and federal agencies on disaster relief and represents clients facing foreclosure as well as community organizations needing community advocacy and development. Crystal is on the Delivery of Legal Services and Disaster Response Committees of the Young Lawyers Division of the Mississippi Bar and is a member of the steering committee for the newly integrated, statewide Legal Services Call Center.
Crystal has been published in the NLADA’s Cornerstone and The Mississippi Lawyer Magazine, and is a recurrent speaker for the NLADA and ABA’s Equal Justice Conference. Over the past several years, she has received special recognition from the State of Mississippi, American Red Cross, and United Way. In her spare time, she is a yoga student and instructor.
Lauren Welford
lwelford@mscenterforjustice.org
Lauren is a communications and development specialist for the Mississippi Center for Justice. Lauren holds a B.A. in International Studies from the University of Mississippi and is a graduate of the Croft Institute for International Studies where she completed a thesis concerning gender and contemporary slavery. In 2006, Lauren interned with the special events department at The Carter Center, former President Jimmy Carter's nongovernmental organization. Her previous experience includes working as a regional field organizer on the Musgrove for U.S. Senate campaign in 2008 and serving as a policy analyst for former Governor Ronnie Musgrove.
Part Time Consultants
Karen Lash
Karen is a private consultant for law schools and nonprofits. She has worked with the Mississippi Center for Justice on pro bono and advocacy efforts since Hurricane Katrina. She also works with Equal Justice Works, American Constitution Society, and the new University of California, Irvine School of Law. Prior to serving as vice president of programs and a board member of Equal Justice Works, she was associate dean at USC Law School, director of Public Counsel's Child Care Law Project, associate at Tuttle & Taylor, and clerk to U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Warren J. Ferguson. Karen has served as co-chair of the California Access to Justice Commission and on numerous committees dedicated to expanding legal services. As an ABA Rule of Law Initiative legal specialist she helped establish law school legal clinics in Moldova, Ukraine, Slovakia and Cambodia, and helped launch a judicial clerkship program in Bahrain.
Norman Rosenberg
Norman Rosenberg is a private consultant based in Washington, DC. The centerpiece of his practice is organizational and fund development, with primary emphasis on creating or strengthening major donor programs for progressive non-profits.
For 25 years before beginning his consulting practice, Rosenberg was the CEO of three national public interest organizations: the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, Parents’ Action for Children, and the New Israel Fund (NIF), an Israeli-American philanthropy that promotes equality, peace and tolerance in Israel. Prior to embarking on his public interest law career, Rosenberg was an Assistant Professor of Law at the State University of New York at Buffalo.
Annual Reports
People, Empowered
People, Empowered (6.82 MB) - Voices of Hope and Determination
Download (2.29 MB) - Voices of Change Download (1.75 MB)
