Helen Vera is an attorney at the MacArthur Justice Center. She collaborates with teams in all MJC offices to develop litigation and advocacy addressing civil rights violations in prisons, jails, and policing practices. Helen’s work focuses on identifying strategic opportunities to address these harms in light of reduced federal civil rights enforcement.
Helen has extensive experience in investigations and litigation focused on systemic reform and accountability practices. Prior to joining MJC, Helen served as a Trial Attorney in the Special Litigation Section of the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice. In that role, she led the Section’s largest-ever pattern-or-practice investigation of a state prison system. She served on teams issuing thorough public findings reports, negotiating consent decrees and other agreements, monitoring compliance with agreements and court orders, and litigating contempt and termination proceedings subject to the Prison Litigation Reform Act.
Earlier in her career, Helen worked in private practice at a large law firm and as a fellow at the ACLU National Prison Project; she also clerked on the federal district court for the District of Columbia. She is a graduate of Yale Law School and Yale College. Before law school, Helen worked for several years as a reporter-researcher at Vanity Fair magazine.