General Practice Section, 50+ Section and Committee on Professional Discipline

2025 Jonathan Lippman Pro Bono Award Winner

Carolyn A. Kubitschek, Esq.

Co-Founder, Lansner & Kubitschek

Carolyn started her legal career at the storefront offices of MFY Legal Services, Inc., a neighborhood-based federally-funded program which provided free legal representation to indigent people with civil legal problems, where she worked for 12 years handling cases involving the interaction of families and the government, especially with respect to foster care and accusations of child abuse and neglect and representing disabled individuals (in both individual cases and class action litigation) who had been wrongfully denied Social Security disability benefits. After teaching for five years, Carolyn and David Lansner founded the firm of Lansner & Kubitschek in 1991, www.lanskub.com, a law firm in the private sector dedicated to public interest work.

Her ground-breaking case, with David – Nicholson v. Scoppetta, 3 N.Y.3d 357 (2004); 344 F.3d 154 (2d Cir 2003); 203 F.S.2d 153 (E.D.N.Y 2002) – established the rights of domestic violence victims and their children, when both a federal court judge and the New York Court of Appeals ruled that the government may not remove children from their mothers, or prosecute the mothers for child neglect, simply because the mothers are victims of domestic violence. That decision has caused States around the country to change their approaches to domestic violence and child protection, and to cease re-victimizing battered women and their children. In connection with that 7-year-long class-action lawsuit, Carolyn and David defended, pro bono,  many individual domestic violence victims who had been charged with child neglect in the Family Court for “allowing” their batterers to assault them in the presence of their children.

In private practice, Carolyn has continued to represent disabled individuals who have been wrongfully denied Social Security benefits, and serves as a volunteer lawyer with the New York County Lawyers Association Pro Bono Social Security Project in the Southern District of New York, which provides legal representation in federal court appeals on a pro bono basis.

Carolyn briefed and argued pro bono the case of Camreta v. Greene, 563 U.S. 692 (2011) in the United States Supreme Court, concerning an important Fourth Amendment issue regarding interviewing of children.

She also won the case of Doe v. New York City Department of Social Services, 649 F.2d 134 (2d Cir. 1981), which established the right of children in foster care to be free from harm, and to sue for damages the agencies that fail to protect them from abusive foster parents.

Carolyn worked as an adjunct professor at Cardozo Law School for six years, and taught full-time at Hofstra Law School for five years. Carolyn is a graduate of the University of Chicago Law School and Oberlin College.

Tezrah Nasser, Esq.

Remote Volunteer Support Staff, Senior Legal Advice Helpline

Center for Elder Law & Justice

An attorney with over 28 years of municipal government experience with an emphasis on buildings, health, housing, transportation and various environmental and infrastructure related matters.  Currently serving as a remote volunteer support staff for the Senior Legal Advice Helpline at the Center for Elder Law & Justice through the New York State Attorney Emeritus Program.  She received her J.D. from Pace University School of Law (now Elisabeth Haub), with certificates in Environmental Law & in International Law, an M.S. in Environmental Health Science from Hunter College (C.U.N.Y.), School of Health Sciences (now Health Professions) and a B.A. from the University of Rochester.