Learning Lab

Decarceration: By Any Means Necessary

What does it look like to center freedom as the goal of public defense? This session will explore creative legal strategies and bold advocacy aimed at challenging incarceration and securing release for individuals in custody. Decades of excessive sentencing has resulted in a mass incarceration crisis that hearkens all advocates to explore avenues to liberate our people from cages, including post-conviction, resentencing, parole, juvenile lifer, second look, compassionate release and other avenues.

Olinda Moyd, JD

Distinguished Professor in Residence and Director of the Decarceration and Re-Entry Clinic

American University Washingtin College of Law

Olinda Moyd is a Distinguished Professor in Residence and Director of the Re-Entry Clinic. She was previously an Adjunct Professor and Supervising Attorney for the Re-Entry Clinic at the Howard University, School of Law. Prior to joining the Howard Law faculty, Professor Moyd was Chief Attorney of the Parole Division at the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia, where she was employed for three decades.

During her tenure, Professor Moyd provided direct representation to numerous individuals, both at administrative hearings and at proceedings in D.C. Superior Court and the United States District Court. As Division Chief, she supervised staff, including a team of attorneys, legal assistants, investigators and numerous law clerks. In addition, she oversaw the summer law clerk program and conducted skills training seminars for the CJA Bar, the DC Bar Association, the judiciary and local law firms.

Professor Moyd has a passion for expanding legal education through clinical pedagogy, especially focused on prisoner’s rights, parole and reentry challenges. For many years she trained and supervised clinical students enrolled in the Georgetown University Law Center, Criminal Justice Clinic as they represented parole clients and as they taught men and women serving life sentences through the Legal Research and Writing class in Jessup. Professor Moyd also coordinated PDS Parole Division’s partnership with Howard University Law School, Criminal Justice Clinic and she was a Visiting Clinic Professor at the University of the District of Columbia, David A. Clarke School of Law teaching the Prisoner’s Rights and Advocacy Clinic.

Professor Moyd serves on the Law Clinic Kuje Prison Advisory Committee with several other law school clinicians. This professional clinical advisory team provides mentorship and guidance to the Law Clinic Partnership. Through service on this committee, she has trained law students and clinicians at three law schools in Abuja, Nigeria as they provide legal aid services to detainees awaiting trial at Kuje Prison. In October 2019, she conducted a two-day training titled, Investigation 101 for over one hundred Nigerian law students from the Baze, Nile and University of Abuja law schools. She continues to serve on this advisory committee mentoring Nigerian legal fellows, facilitating the Student Peer Exchange Project and coordinating other exchange opportunities.

She currently serves on several boards including the D.C. Council for Court Excellence, The Maryland Alliance for Justice Reform and Panacea Media Humanized, a media format to build spaces for constructive dialogue to showcase humane solutions. Her most recent publication can be found in the

Washington University Journal of Law & Policy, 68 Wash.U.J.L. & Pol’Y (2022) Klein | Teaching about Justice by Teaching with Justice: Global Perspectives on Clinical Legal Education and Rebellious Lawyering, | Washington University Journal of Law and Policy (wustl.edu) and The American Bar Association, Criminal Justice Magazine, Spring 2021.https://www.americanbar.org/groups/criminal_justice/publications/criminal-justice-magazine/2021/spring/racial-disparities-inherent-americas-fragmented-parole-system/.

Erin Pinder

Executive Director

The Second Look Project

Erin Pinder is the Executive Director of The Second Look Project. She has dedicated her career to advocating for indigent clients, believing that everyone should be shown mercy and is worth a second chance. Prior to joining The Second Look Project, she was a Senior Attorney Advisor for the Department of Justice, Office of the Pardon Attorney.  Before joining the Office of the Pardon Attorney, she spent many years as a public defender. She served as an Assistant Federal Defender in the Middle District of Georgia and as a Visiting Attorney Advisor with the Defender Services Office (DSO) in the Program Operation Division for the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. At DSO she focused on program oversight and compliance and supporting the community defender organizations.  She also previously served as an Assistant Public Defender with Georgia Public Defense Council’s Appellate Division.  Her legal career began in New Jersey where she practiced criminal defense and represented parents in child neglect and abuse cases.  

Erin received her Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Science from Florida A&M University and her Juris Doctorate from North Carolina Central University of Law. In addition to advocacy, Erin believes proximity and exposure is an effective way to impact and help struggling communities break through systemic strongholds. Therefore, she serves her community through various organizations in her free time.

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