Daunting Work and Small Victories: A Q&A with Jonathan Cohen ’20 and Natalia Friedlander ’18

Jonathan Cohen ’20 is a Resnik-Curtis Liman Fellow at the Rhode Island Center for Justice, where he focuses on criminal justice issues and the rights of incarcerated people, particularly queer individuals.

Natalia Friedlander ’18 joined the Rhode Island Center for Justice as the inaugural Resnik-Curtis Liman Fellow in 2018. Currently a staff attorney there, she represents low-income people in prison.

The Liman Center for Public Interest Law spoke with Cohen and Friedlander about their work, the role of collaboration, and the challenges and rewards of public interest lawyering.

Tell us about your current focus at the Rhode Island Center for Justice and how you came to be involved in this work. 

Jonathan Cohen: I left law school passionate about civil rights advocacy and hoping to work at the intersection of queer and racial justice. While clerking for a federal district court judge, I was exposed to the pleas of several individuals in prison who had no lawyers, as well as the significant constraints placed on their possibilities of obtaining legal relief. This solidified my interest in exploring work on the rights of incarcerated people.

It was really exciting to connect with Natalia at the Center for Justice. She was eager to support a criminal justice fellow and had countless ideas from clients and community partners about what that work might look like. Currently, I focus on helping identify and address the needs of queer people who are or were previously incarcerated in Rhode Island.

Natalia Friedlander: I started law school with the goal of working at the intersection of prisoners’ rights and criminal justice reform, and one of the things that excited me most about Yale Law School was the Liman Center’s work in this area. I have been extremely fortunate to have had the support of the Center for Justice and the Liman Center in launching and building this practice, which is now in its fourth year. 

At the Center for Justice, I aim to address the most pressing, underserved needs of our community. The criminal justice work is constantly adapting based on trends we see in intake letters and the needs of our community partners. Right now, major focus areas include solitary confinement, access to medical and mental health care, retaliation by custodial staff, and court debt. Since Jonathan joined our practice, we have been able to expand our work to serve a substantial number of new clients on a variety of issues. 

As a former Resnik-Curtis Liman Fellow and a current one, how important is collaboration or mentorship to the success of your projects?

JC: I can’t imagine how I would’ve navigated this work without Natalia’s mentorship and invitations to collaborate. This is my first experience advocating for the rights of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people, and at times the work has felt daunting and the learning curve has been steep. Natalia has made the transition much easier. She’s been an incredible role model for what an intentional and thoughtful practice in this space looks like, and she has been invaluable in advising me and helping me work through issues as they arise. She has also connected me with tons of other advocates and activists throughout Rhode Island, who have been extraordinarily generous with their time and support in shaping my fellowship.

NF: I was the only full-time staff member doing criminal justice work at the Center for Justice for my first three years there, and it was very lonely — but fulfilling — work. I am immensely grateful that Jonathan was able to join our firm for his fellowship. It has been amazing to have a colleague to collaborate with and learn from, especially someone who comes to the practice with fresh eyes and a different perspective and background. Although we still mostly work remotely, we call each other at least once a day and are constantly bouncing ideas and questions off each other. He’s a brilliant legal advocate and an intellectual powerhouse, which allows us to explore issues and solutions that we didn’t have capacity for previously. He has made me a better advocate and lawyer, and he brings a level of energy to the practice that has changed the whole tenor of our office for the better.

How has your work both challenged and reinforced your commitment to public interest lawyering?

JC: Prisons present a particular challenge to racial justice and queer liberation. As abolitionists have long pointed out, prisons institutionalize some of the most brutal indignities against queer, Black, and brown individuals, while often operating in the shadows of society and the law. Witnessing pieces of this reality through my work has felt both discouraging and emboldening, highlighting the limits of the law and legal advocacy. The inadequate rights and protections that our systems have retained for incarcerated people routinely prove to be inaccessible, if not illusory. However, this status quo has also reinforced the necessity of public interest lawyers dedicated to expanding and vindicating those rights, while working for broader social transformation.

NF: As usual, Jonathan said everything I would have wanted to, but better! I will add that every day, people come to the Center in enormous distress and — in the face of often manifest injustice — we have limited tools available under the existing legal, political, and economic regime to help many of them. Any small victory is followed the next day by a new set of crises, because our society is not designed to serve the needs of those living in poverty. But, like the boy throwing starfish into the ocean, we all get up every day and do as much as we can. Being able to do this work alongside colleagues like Jonathan has been an enormous privilege.

Jonathan Cohen interned at several civil rights organizations and helped direct the annual Rebellious Lawyering Conference while at Yale Law School. Following graduation, he worked as a law clerk for Chief Judge John J. McConnell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island. Cohen holds a master’s degree from Harvard Kennedy School and a bachelor’s degree from Brown University.

Natalia Friedlander was president of the American Constitution Society and participated in the Worker and Immigrant Rights Advocacy Clinic, the Criminal Justice Clinic, the Advanced Sentencing Clinic, and the Re-entry Clinic while at Yale Law School. She holds a bachelor’s degree in community health from Brown University. Prior to law school, Friedlander worked for several years in healthcare, public health, and international development.

Liman Fellowships are awarded to Yale Law School graduates to support a year working in public interest law in the United States. These fellowships are a component of the Arthur Liman Center for Public Interest Law, which promotes access to justice and the fair treatment of individuals and groups seeking to use legal systems.