Fall 2026 Winner Of The Defenders Of Justice Scholarship

Imari Mariah Harris

Imari, a first-generation law student at New England Law, has been awarded $1,000 through the Defenders of Justice Scholarship. The immense losses she has faced throughout her life, combined with her experience in Teen Court, and internships at the State Attorney’s Office, have inspired her to pursue a career in law.

Read Their Essay Here:

Although I have always been drawn to a career in law and government, I never knew exactly what that would look like until my Aunt was murdered.

I am a first-generation law student. As supportive as my family is there are things about this process they will never understand because they haven’t had to experience it firsthand. My family has a wide range of careers mixed in. Cashiers, nurses, police officers, and business owners, but when we lost my Aunt Oceannette, we had no lawyers. No one that understood the course her case had to run. No one that could navigate the system in a way that made sense to a family that just had their world turned upside down.

It just so happened that the most caring and compassionate attorney was assigned to my Aunt’s case. He took the time to help my Mom, who just lost her sister and my Grandma, who just lost her daughter, navigate the courts for the first time. Through eavesdropping on their conversations, I became convinced that not only could I try my Aunt’s case, I could win.

For a long time after my Aunt’s murder, I had a lot of anger that was misplaced. Instead of seeing the criminal justice system as a place for reform, I saw it as a weapon. So, in high school when I started participating in Teen Court, I was always on the side of the State and always recommended the maximum penalties. It wasn’t until one of my teachers pulled me aside and told me that in order to graduate, I had to do defense. Knowing this was untrue I promised her anyway and took one defense case. A 14-year-old girl whose packet read “Possession of drugs with the intent to distribute and possession of a weapon on school grounds”. I immediately am thinking she has some kind of narcotic and the largest gun known to man, but in reality, she had Tylenol and pepper spray that her dad gave her because she walks home by herself most days. This is when my perspective started to change and I realized no one on the other side of the v. was deserving of my misplaced anger.

During my first summer internship in the State Attorney’s Office, I was assigned to the Felony Homicide Division and as heinous as some of the cases I got were the Attorneys in that division operated by one quote “Our defendants today can be our victims tomorrow”. This stuck with me. Everyone deserved a fair chance. A clean start to their case. Being blinded by misguided rage was not going to make me a better lawyer. It was damaging my judgement. Now during my second internship in the State Attorney’s Office as a Certified Legal Intern (Student Attorney) in the Misdemeanor Division, I perform all of the duties of an Assistant State Attorney. I review my cases without judgement and hold true to the phrase “Our defendants today can be our victims tomorrow”.