Kimberley Motley
Founder
The Justness Project was created by Kimberley Motley who has been a practicing attorney and litigator since 2003 where she began her career as a public defender in her hometown of Milwaukee. Kim represented hundreds of clients for a wide variety of criminal defense matters in felony, misdemeanor, and juvenile courts. In 2008, Kim was one of a handle of American Attorneys who was hired to go to Afghanistan as part of a U.S. Department of State justice funded programs to help train & mentor criminal defense attorneys as well as to help capacity build the legal aid system throughout the country. After a year of working in this capacity, and finding that she had a greater role to play within the legal system, Kim quit the program. In 2009, she started representing clients in Afghanistan and became the first and only foreigner to ever litigate cases within Afghanistan’s criminal, civil, and commercial courts. Understanding the great need At the present, she is the first foreigner who has ever litigated cases in Afghanistan’s Criminal Civil, and Commercial Courts and has a strong litigious practice focusing on criminal, commercial, contract, civil, and employment law matters. In addition to her legal practice in Afghanistan and the U.S. she has also done extensive research work particularly in the area of juvenile justice that has been reported internationally.
Her Start in Afghanistan
Immediately prior to opening up Motley Legal, Attorney Motley worked with as a Justice Advisor with US Department of State funded project in Afghanistan. In this capacity she was given the remit to raise the capacity of Afghan Defense Attorneys and has trained of hundreds of Afghan Attorneys throughout the country.
Prior to working in Afghanistan, Atty. Motley was an attorney with the State of Wisconsin’s Public Defender’s Office since 2003. In this capacity she litigated hundreds of criminal, civil, and juvenile cases of varying misdemeanor and felony matters.
In 2004 Attorney Motley was crowned as Mrs. Wisconsin and competed in the infamous Mrs. America pageant. As part of her platform, she worked in promoting truancy abatement issues for juveniles in the justice system.
International Experiences
She has successfully handled many criminal and civil cases in Afghanistan. Of note she successfully litigated a case involving a British citizen in Afghanistan in the newly formed Anti corruption Courts. She has had many legal successes in Afghanistan which include achieving an early release through the Presidential Office for a client, successfully securing the exit of several foreigners who were victim to counterfeit visas, to name a few. She has spoken world wide on her experience and has been guest speaker to the US Embassy, Marquette Law, Emory Law, Charlotte School of Law, ISAF, UNICEF, European Union, etc.
Both the legal and research work that Attorney Motley has done while in Afghanistan has travelled all over the world and her work has been reported heavily in the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, CNN, BBC, Reuters, the Today Show, Weekend Update, ABC Australia and the London Times to name a few. She has internationally published several articles on juvenile justice, and legal issues in Afghanistan.
Education
Attorney Motley received her J.D. from Marquette Law School in 2003. She also received a Master’s of Science Degree in the area of Criminal Justice in 2003 and a B.S. in the area of criminal justice with a minor in political science in 2000 from the University of Milwaukee Wisconsin. In addition to this, Attorney Motley also has an earned an A.A.S. in Paralegal from Milwaukee Area Technical College.
LAWLESS
All proceeds of LAWLESS go to support Afghan Women and Children
To purchase a signed copy of LAWLESS $30 - soft copy or $35 hardcopy) please email : kmotley@justnessproject.com
In the summer of 2008 Kimberley Motley quit her job as a criminal defense attorney in Milwaukee to join a program to help train lawyers in war-torn Afghanistan. She was your lawyer, a former Mrs. Wisconsin, and a mother of three who had never travelled outside the U.S.
What she brought to Afghanistan was a toughness and resilience which came from growing up in the projects in one of the most dangerous cities in America, and a fundamental belief in everyone's right to justice - whether you live in Milwaukee or Kabul.
Through sheer force of personality, ingenuity and perseverance, Kimberley became the first foreign lawyer to practice in the courts of Afghanistan. Her legal work swiftly morphed into a personal mission - to fight for "justness." In the space of two years, Kimberley established herself as an expert on Afghanistan's fledgling criminal justice system, steeped in the country's complex laws but equally adept at wielding religious law in the defense of her clients.
Kimberley's story is both the memoir of an extraordinary woman fighting in one of the most dangerous countries in the world, and a page-turning non-fiction legal thriller.
Every human deserves protection under their country’s laws — even when that law is forgotten or ignored.
Sharing three cases from her international legal practice, Kimberley Motley, an American litigator practicing in Afghanistan and elsewhere, shows how a country’s own laws can bring both justice and “justness”: using the law for its intended purpose, to protect.
This talk was presented at an official TED conference, and was featured by the editors on the TED home page.
“Many NGOs have valiantly taken on [helping Afghan women] in the last decade, but no Western woman has actually gone on to litigate for them in the courtroom. [Kimberley] Motley did. She would take on desperate cases, often making them high profile by means of clever publicity and social-media tactics. She works these cases pro bono and has not lost a single one.”
— Vanity Fair
Speaking Engagements
The feature documentary about her work, Motley’s Law, won the Grand Jury Prize at DOC NYC, New York’s Documentary Festival. Her expert legal work and legal research and precedent has earned international attention with segments on CNN, the BBC, NBC, and Dan Rather Reports, as well as articles in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, The Guardian, The Washington Post, and The Huffington Post, among many others. Motley has also published several articles on juvenile justice and contemporary legal issues in Afghanistan. In her lectures around the world (including at TEDGlobal), Motley shares her breadth of international law and her experiences handling criminal, commercial, civil, and human rights issues. She is the daughter of a North Korean refugee mother and an ex-military African American father, and initially served as an attorney with the Wisconsin State Public Defender’s Office, where she litigated hundreds of criminal, civil and juvenile cases.
She is available for speaking engagements.
Google Zeitgeist is a collection of talks by people who are changing the world. Hear entrepreneurs, CEOs, storytellers, scientists, and dreamers share their visions of how we can shape tomorrow.
Kimberley joins Talks at Google - London to discuss her fascinating new book, "Lawless". She talks us through some of her most pivotal global cases, how she navigates the difficulties of operating in fractured and deeply religious societies with a fledgling legal system and much more!
Kimberley Motley's talk at the 2015 Oslo Freedom Forum.