New York State Pro Bono Opportunities Guide
Giving Thanks for Weil Gotshal
Law Firm Plays Central Role in Congolese Counsel's Odyssey From City's Shelters to Working Paralegal
New York Lawyer
October 29, 2004
By Thomas Adcock
New York Law Journal
During next Thursday's great American holiday feast, one of the most thankful families in New York City could be that of Batwamba Julienne Mukendi.
Known as Julie at Weil, Gotshal & Manges, Ms. Mukendi is a paralegal with a remarkable résumé. The well-traveled, highly educated daughter of a diplomat, Ms. Mukendi was also legal counsel to the prime minister of her home country, the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Her equally remarkable gratitude for her new life in a new land was born one day last year, when she first told the harrowing story of the past five years of her life, a period scarred by her family's desperate flight from civil war.
Her talk was given during the annual "Salute to Women Achievers" luncheon at the YWCA of New York, which happened to have been attended by some Weil Gotshal partners. At the time, Ms. Mukendi lived in a Manhattan homeless shelter, often with little to eat.
In an interview last week, conducted in a conference room of the firm that now employs her, Ms. Mukendi said of that day last year, "I could not imagine that my life would change. I got help from everyone — everyone.
"People here in the United States are very kind. You're American," she told a Law Journal reporter. "Maybe you didn't know that."
Consider the troubles that befell Ms. Mukendi, whose former position in the Congo was the equivalent of White House counsel:
• In 1999, she was obliged at gunpoint to leave her country. By means that must remain secret, Ms. Mukendi, then 44, was spirited out of the Congolese capital of Kinsasha, with her husband and four children left behind.
• Eventually landing in New York, she was granted political asylum. Ms. Mukendi was, however, homeless and penniless — her family a continent away, with no certainty of ever reuniting.
• As a graduate of a Paris law school, Ms. Mukendi's legal training is based in Roman civil procedure rather than British common law. Accordingly, she was unable to be an attorney in the United States without first obtaining a law degree.
• Her command of English was limited; her computer skills zero.
On the advice of a fellow Congolese refugee, she took work as a babysitter.
"I had no job, nothing," said Ms. Mukendi. "I missed my children."
In time, she became a nanny for a Manhattan family. But with the birth of a second child, the family moved to the suburbs. Ms. Mukendi lost her job. By that time, her children had arrived in New York. Living in a shelter, she remained determined to create a stable new life for her family.
Like so many immigrants, Ms. Mukendi became an avid reader of American newspapers to learn the language and culture. And like many immigrants, especially women struggling to hold a family together, she suffered setbacks.
"I was so interested in the media," she said. "I applied to Columbia Journalism School, but heard nothing. I let it lapse."
She then decided on computers, even though she had never learned to type. She found her way to a training program in Harlem for people with low-incomes. But when the director learned that Ms. Mukendi lived in a shelter, he told her that that somehow violated eligibility factors.
Once again, Ms. Mukendi shifted gears, this time turning to Baruch College and its paralegal training program. She paid what she had, but could not finish her studies for lack of tuition money.
A free computer training program at the YWCA led to the luncheon a year ago, where Ms. Mukendi received the YWCA's Spencer Scholarship Award — a $5,000 grant underwritten by Weil Gotshal and named for the late William I. Spencer, a Citibank executive and benefactor of women's causes. With the scholarship, Ms. Mukendi completed her Baruch course.
Ms. Mukendi's remarks on accepting the grant were heard by a table of Weil Gotshal lawyers, including litigation partner Mindy J. Specter and Stephen J. Dannhauser, chairman of the firm.
"We were all in tears," said Ms. Specter. "All of us, the whole table. I think it was in part because she was a lawyer. She was one of us. There but for the grace of God, you know?
As the group left the luncheon, Ms. Specter said she suggested the firm do "something. Something more than just the scholarship."
Since then, Weil Gotshal lawyers organized help for the Mukendi family, with assistance from clients and others.
First came the completion of Ms. Mukendi's paralegal training, then employment, and finally moving her family into a spacious, furnished apartment in a two-family home in Brownsville, Brooklyn.
By now, good fortune was multiplying for Ms. Mukendi. Her husband, Dibomba Jean-Marie Kazadi, a former banking ministry official in the Congo, had reached New York to find work at a Manhattan accounting firm.
The family's new home came thanks to Mr. Dannhauser's son Jess, who works as special assistant to Commissioner Linda Gibbs, head of New York City's Department of Homeless Services.
"We were in the right place at the right time," said Mr. Dannhauser. "And we're always looking to do the right thing."
But it is not routinely the case that a person worthy of a helping hand winds up on Mr. Dannhauser's payroll. "Well, then," he said, "this a case of first impression."
Giving Thanks
Next Thursday, Ms. Mukendi said she will roast a turkey — adding a few Congolese dishes to the meal, such as kasava leaves and plantains — and her family will talk of how far they have come since last Thanksgiving.
They will talk of dreams, she said, Ms. Mukendi's determination to enroll in the Foreign Trained Lawyers Program at Brooklyn Law School; her eldest son's plans to enter medical school in the United States; and an eventual return to the Congo, where her husband hopes to establish a first-class school.
The family will talk as well of Thanksgivings past, spent in homeless shelters.
"Even when we had to sleep without eating, it's having a roof over our head that is enough," said Ms. Mukendi. "In a country like mine, eating is not the priority. It's having a roof. To make Americans understand this, it's impossible."
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