Partner Lisa Pirozzolo will be honored on during the prestigious 2024 John Adams and John Quincy Adams Pro Bono Publico Awards Ceremony at the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. The awards honor those in the legal profession who have demonstrated outstanding and exceptional commitment to providing unpaid legal services to those in need.
According to the Supreme Judicial Court, Pirozzolo was selected for “her career-long dedication to pro bono service, including her leadership in a class action seeking accommodations for deaf and hard of hearing people in the custody of the Massachusetts Department of Correction.”
Throughout her career, Pirozzolo has created and participated in pro bono programs that expand legal services to underserved segments of the population and fill previously unmet needs. Every year of her career she has done significant work on pro bono litigation, the outcome of which has benefited persons of limited means.
In the past year, working alongside a number of non-profit legal services organizations, Pirozzolo has led WilmerHale teams on significant pro bono matters.
In November 2023, the City of Boston paid $2.6 million to settle a longstanding federal discrimination lawsuit alleging that a “hair test” used by the City to identify drug use on its police force was discriminatory, unreliable and scientifically flawed. The City eliminated the test in 2021 as part of its Movement To End Racism and has now paid damages to three Black officers and a cadet who were terminated or disciplined as a result of the test.
Also this year in a long-awaited class action victory, incarcerated people who are deaf or hard-of- hearing will now receive life-saving emergency notifications in Massachusetts correctional facilities, thanks to a trial win by Pirozzolo and her team. The clients are a class of approximately 600 deaf and hard-of-hearing prisoners in the custody of the Massachusetts Department of Corrections who faced significant risk of death or serious injury because many housing units and common areas in DOC facilities rely exclusively on audible alarms.
Pirozzolo’s commitment to pro bono and public service has spanned her entire career. She has worked with Prisoner Legal Service, Lawyers for Civil Rights, Washington Lawyers for Civil Rights and Greater Boston Legal Services, among others. She has served on the Board of Lawyers for Civil Rights for many years, including as co-chair of LCR’s Board of Directors from 2014 to 2024.
Pirozzolo and three other honorees will be recognized during an awards event on October 30 before a full sitting of the Supreme Judicial Court in its main courtroom at the John Adams Courthouse in Boston.