Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough announces 15 North Carolina attorneys have been inducted into the 2018 North Carolina Pro Bono Honor Society by the North Carolina Pro Bono Resource Center (PBRC). Society members reported providing 50 or more hours of pro bono legal services in 2018 to clients unable to pay without expectation of a fee, an aspirational threshold set by Rule 6.1 of the North Carolina Rules of Professional Conduct.

The North Carolina-based attorneys are:

• Paul J. Osowski
• Lawrence J. Scott
• C. Wells Hall, III
• Fred M. Wood, Jr.
• Ramona F. Ortega
• Ariel Harris
• Anna Majestro
• Joshua Bryant Smith
• Cathy M. Rudisill
• Reed J. Hollander
• George M. Teague
• Joseph M. Lischwe
• Thomas Edward Kelly
• Cara Nateal Ludwig
• Donald Richard Pocock

The PBRC inducted 468 attorneys in total into the 2018 Honor Society and each member receives a certificate from the Supreme Court of North Carolina in recognition of their valuable contributions to the people of North Carolina. This group of attorneys provided more than 41,000 hours of pro bono legal services in 2018 to North Carolinians living in poverty. All 1,420 attorneys, or more than 5% of active attorneys in North Carolina, who shared information about their pro bono volunteerism together provided nearly 54,000 hours of pro bono legal services in 2018.

“The North Carolina Pro Bono Honor Society helps us as a legal profession to shine a light on those attorneys making outstanding contributions to North Carolinians who need, but cannot afford, legal help,” said Chief Justice Cheri Beasley of the Supreme Court of North Carolina. “By recognizing these important and valuable pro bono services, we celebrate our state’s lawyers committed to ensuring equal access to justice for all.”

The PBRC, led by Sylvia Novinsky, launched in April 2016 and began collecting responses from attorneys about pro bono involvement through the state's first voluntary reporting process in January 2017. The PBRC, a program of the North Carolina Equal Access to Justice Commission, works to increase North Carolina attorney pro bono legal service as a way to meet the legal needs of people of low-income and modest means in the state.

Committed to serving the most vulnerable in our society with legal, social, and economic issues through pro bono service, Nelson Mullins engages in complex pro bono litigation, policy, and legislative advocacy, and provides individual representation to a diverse group of individuals and organizations whose mission is to serve people with limited means. Our culture and multidisciplinary platform provides our community of clients trusted advice to meet a broad range of business needs. For more information, visit https://www.nelsonmullins.com.