Unchained is making progress on its mission to end child marriage in the US: New York Assemblywoman Amy Paulin today introduced the first bill to end underage marriage (A8563).
Click here to read more about Unchained’s advocacy efforts on the issue of child marriage.
The South Asian Bar Association of New Jersey tonight presented Unchained At Last with SABA’s Public Interest Award, in recognition of Unchained’s work to help women and girls escape arranged/forced marriages.
Unchained’s executive director, Fraidy Reiss, and Unchained’s board president, Nina Lazar, attended SABA NJ’s second annual dinner to accept the award.
“Unchained is humbled and honored to receive this award,” Reiss said. She noted that Unchained is able to provide free legal services to its clients only because of the generosity of Unchained’s team of some 100 pro bono attorneys.
Some 60 attorneys attended today, as Unchained again gave its popular training course on family law, in partnership with Rutgers Institute for Professional Education. The course provided an overview of New Jersey matrimonial law, covering the major steps of the divorce process — from filing the complaint to addressing issues of equitable distribution, child custody, child support and alimony — with a focus on arranged/forced marriage and the legal and ethical issues involved.
*The course fee of $150 was waived for admitted attorneys who committed to representing an Unchained client pro bono as she flees from an arranged/forced marriage. (The course was worth 8 or more CLE credits in New Jersey and New York, and 6.5 credits in Pennsylvania.)
~ Deb Guston, Esq. | Guston & Guston
~ Ellen Gold, Esq. | Attorney at Law
~ Rachel Isaacs, Esq. | The Micklin Law Group
~ Fraidy Reiss | Unchained At Last
Unchained thanks the Jewish Women’s Foundation of New Jersey for the generous grant that made this CLE course possible.
NEXT COURSE DATE: November 11, 2016
CHECK BACK SOON FOR DETAILS
Meanwhile, click here to apply to join Unchained’s team of Pro Bono Attorneys, which will allow you to take the course for free.
Why should attorneys donate their time?
Attorneys who commit to representing an Unchained client pro bono receive:
~ Free access to this training course, worth significant CLE credits in NJ, NY and PA ($150 value)
~ Experience in matrimonial law
~ Mentoring from an experienced matrimonial law attorney
~ Valuable networking opportunities
~ Hours of service toward exemption from mandatory pro bono assignments
~ Unchained funds for expert witnesses and other court-related fees
~ The chance to unchain a woman or a girl from a marriage she did not choose
Attorneys with 5+ years of matrimonial law experience also can take advantage of these opportunities:
~ Mentor another attorney (counts in New Jersey as hours of service toward exemption from mandatory pro bono assignments)
~ Present a portion of an upcoming Unchained CLE course (earns double CLE credits in New Jersey)
Some 100 guests today joined UnWINED With UnCHAINED: An evening of goodwill and great spirits to benefit women and girls fleeing forced marriages. The guests sampled wine, filled up on hors d’oeuvres, enjoyed live music and bid on exciting auction items, including Giants tickets, tickets to The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and a Boston weekend getaway.
The UnWINED guests did more than have a great time. They also honored two women who have worked tirelessly to help Unchained in its mission of unchaining women from forced marriages: Naomi Eisenberger, executive director of the Good People Fund, and Susan Fleisch, MSW LCSW, who serves on Unchained’s board of advisers.
Additionally, the UnWINED guests helped to raise more than $15,000 to help the brave women and girls who are trying to resist or escape coercive marriages in the US.
Click here to view photos from UnWINED.
The New York Times today published an op-ed Unchained At Last’s executive director wrote, which revealed startling information about child and forced marriage in the US. Thousands of children, as young as age 10, were married in the US in recent years, Unchained revealed in the op-ed.
While most US states set 18 as the minimum marriage age, every state allows exceptions under which children under age 18 can marry. In New Jersey, for example, children age 16 or 17 may wed with “parental consent” — without any investigation into whether that’s actually “parental coercion” — and children 15 or younger may wed with judicial approval.
Unchained retrieved state health-department data and learned 3,499 children were married in New Jersey between 1995 and 2012. The youngest was 10 years old.
Shockingly, 91% of the children were married to adults, many of them at ages or with age differences that are considered statutory rape. And 90% were girls, underscoring that child and forced marriage here, like everywhere across the world, disproportionately affect women and girls.
Unchained also retrieved New York health-department data and found 3,853 children were married there between 2000 and 2010. In New York, too, the data show courts have issued marriages licenses where they should have issued charges of statutory rape.
Unchained has written draft legislation in New York and New Jersey to end child marriage in those states, and the op-ed called on legislators in every state to introduce and pass the same legislation.
Click here to read the op-ed, which was published online this morning and is scheduled to be published in print tomorrow.
Click here for more information about Unchained’s proposed legislation to end child marriage and about the petition Unchained has created to urge legislators in every state to pass it. Please sign the petition, and get everyone you know to do the same.
Gloria Steinem, the renowned feminist, journalist and activist, commended Unchained At Last today in her keynote address at a conference on gender equality.
Steinem mentioned Unchained by name as she spoke about how gratified she was to attend the conference, titled Rutgers Celebrates Beijing+20, and learn about the important work people are doing to advance gender equality.
Unchained At Last’s executive director, Fraidy Reiss, was a panelist at the conference, held at Rutgers School of Law – Newark. Shortly before Steinem took the stage, Reiss explained to the audience that legal exceptions allow child marriage in every U.S. state, and that Unchained’s research found that nearly 3,500 children – the youngest just 10 years old – have been married recently in New Jersey. Unchained currently is working on legislation to end child marriage in New Jersey and New York.
Steinem referred to Unchained’s findings and work in her keynote speech.
Some 130 people attended the conference, which examined “continued challenges in achieving gender equality since the groundbreaking Beijing Conference” of 1995.
Click here for more information.
Calling all attorneys who want to help women escape from arranged/forced marriages.
Unchained again is offering its popular FREE* training course on family law, in partnership with Rutgers Institute for Professional Education. The course is worth valuable Continuing Legal Education credits in New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania.
NEXT CLE COURSE DATE:
Tuesday, November 3
9a to 4:30p (free breakfast and lunch included)
Newark, New Jersey
DEADLINE TO REGISTER: October 30
NJ: 8.1 credits (including 1.2 ethics)
NY: 8.0 credits (including 1.0 ethics)
PA: 6.5 credits (including 1.0 ethics)
The CLE course provides an overview of New Jersey matrimonial law, covering the major steps of the divorce process — from filing the complaint to addressing issues of equitable distribution, child custody, child support and alimony. The course focuses on arranged/forced marriage and the legal and ethical issues involved.
*The $150 course fee is waived for admitted attorneys who commit to representing an Unchained client pro bono as she flees from an arranged/forced marriage.
Instructors:
DEB GUSTON, ESQ.
Guston & Guston
ELLEN GOLD, ESQ.
Attorney at Law
KOMAL ULLAH, ESQ.
Weinberger Law Group
RACHEL ISAACS, ESQ.
The Micklin Law Group
FRAIDY REISS
Unchained At Last
Register HERE and enter promo code PROBONO. Unchained will contact you with instructions on submitting a Pro Bono Attorney Application.
Attorneys who represent an Unchained client pro bono receive:
~ FREE access to this CLE training course ($150 value)
~ Experience in matrimonial law
~ Mentoring from an experienced matrimonial law attorney
~ Valuable networking opportunities
~ Hours of service toward exemption from mandatory pro bono assignments
~ Unchained funds for expert witnesses and other court-related fees
~ The chance to unchain a woman or a girl from a marriage she did not choose
Attorneys with 5+ years of matrimonial law experience also can take advantage of these opportunities:
~ Mentor another attorney (counts in New Jersey as hours of service toward exemption from mandatory pro bono assignments)
~ Present a portion of an upcoming Unchained CLE course (earns double CLE credits in New Jersey)
Unchained helped Jamie, Syeda, Esther and others to break their chains.
Unchained is the only nonprofit in the U.S. dedicated to helping women and girls leave or avoid arranged/forced marriage. Your generous donation to Unchained will directly and significantly impact a woman or girl who might otherwise remain chained in a marriage she did not choose.
Unchained, founded in 2011 as an all-volunteer organization, has helped some 100 women and girls from across the U.S. Donors like you have made that possible.
Thousands of others need help unchaining themselves — and Unchained needs your help to provide the services they need.
Unchained is expanding its team of pro bono attorneys and therapists, increasing its outreach and advocacy efforts and hiring staffers, so the organization can unchain more women.
And you can help. Every donation to Unchained, no matter the amount, makes a real difference to a woman or a girl like Jamie who is trying to leave or resist an arranged/forced marriage. Here’s an idea of how your support can Break a Chain:
~ $50 buys a week’s worth of groceries for a girl who has fled a forced marriage
~ $100 means a winter coat for a woman who escaped a forced marriage without any of her personal belongings
~ $250 covers court fees so a woman can file for divorce and end an unwanted marriage
~ $500 pays for a mover to help a woman move away from an abusive arranged marriage and into her own home
~ $1,000 gives medical care to a forced-marriage survivor who is not eligible for Medicaid
~ $5,000 provides a custody evaluation to save a woman from losing custody of her children as she flees a forced marriage
Unchained At Last is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, and all donations are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
You think coercive marriages aren’t a problem for women in the US? Think again.
That was the message that PRI’s The World sent yesterday, with a segment on arranged/forced marriage that aired on more than 300 stations across the US and Canada. The segment featured Unchained At Last’s founder and executive director, Fraidy Reiss, as well as an Unchained client who gave only her first name, Syeda.
Fraidy and Syeda talked with host Marco Werman about their personal experiences: Each woman was pressured into marriage as a teenager — Fraidy in an Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn, and Syeda in a Muslim community in Pakistan. And each woman was shunned by her family when she left her abusive arranged marriage.
The two women’s friendship developed after Syeda approached Unchained, the nonprofit Fraidy founded, and asked for help ending her marriage and rebuilding her life.
“I just feel the same passion Fraidy has to just put a smile on some woman’s face,” Syeda said at the conclusion of the interview, with a surprise announcement that she wants to join Unchained’s almost all-volunteer staff. “I think I would like to spend the rest of my life doing that.”
Click here to listen to the PRI’s The World segment.
About Syeda
Syeda was forced into marriage at age 16 in Pakistan. She went along with the marriage to her first cousin, a stranger to her, only after her father told her that was the only way she’d be allowed to attend college.
After her wedding, Syeda continued to live with her own parents, without her husband, and the family moved to the US. But when she was 25, her husband followed her to the US and moved in with her and her family — and he subjected her to unspeakable physical and sexual abuse. He also demanded that Syeda move with him back to Pakistan.
Syeda endured seven weeks of her husband’s abuse before her family threw her out of the house, because of her refusal to return with her husband to Pakistan. Syeda fled to a shelter.
Despite what she has been through, Syeda has taken control of her life. She is a college student, close to graduating with a bachelor’s degree, and she has a job. She managed to move out of the shelter after only a brief stay, and she has her own apartment. She owns her own car. She speaks English fluently.
Unchained now is working with Syeda to help her get divorced and end, forever, her forced marriage.
