Immigration Law Clinic
Our Story, Our Services
The Immigration Law Clinic (ILC) serves a unique role in the Capital Region, fusing its external partnerships with student energy to increase overall local capacity. Harnessing community connections and the talents and dedication of its students, the ILC supports local immigrant communities to respond to the ever-changing challenges affecting immigrants in Albany and beyond.
ILC students not only amplify the power of the existing immigration legal community, but also exponentially increase the number of immigration-trained lawyers in the region. Those students go on to serve our communities as skilled professionals who are well-versed in community-focused public interest work. Investments in the work the ILC does now pays off for generations.
Our Impact
Documentary Highlights Clinic Work
Albany Law School’s Immigration Law Clinic was featured in MSNBC Films’ “Guerrilla Habeas,” the latest installment of the documentary series “The Turning Point,” which aired in 2023 and was executively produced by Trevor Noah. The documentary looked at U.S. immigrants threatened with deportation and the fight to keep them and their families together.
In early 2019, Capital City Rescue Mission chef Kinimo Ngoran was taken into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during a routine check in. He spent six weeks at a detention center in Western New York. While he was detained, a team of lawyers, local organizations, law schools, and government officials mobilized to get him released and back home with his U.S. citizen wife. Professor Sarah Rogerson, Director of The Edward P.
Swyer Justice Center at Albany Law School and the former Director of the Immigration Law Clinic, along with six clinic students, fought for Kinimo.“ Cases in which someone is unexpectedly taken into custody happen all the time, unfortunately,” Rogerson said in a 2019 Albany Law magazine story. “Kinimo’s case was unique in terms of community intervention.”
Not only did local organizations rally around him but so did Albany City and County government and law enforcement officials. Kinimo was eventually released from ICE custody. His case remains unresolved, and, years later, the threat of deportation remains a constant presence in Kinimo’s life.
Kaitlynn Chopra ’23 Identifies Critical Interventions for Recent Immigrants
Thanks to work by Albany Law School’s Kaitlynn Chopra ’23, key data points and critical information about rights and processes for immigration screenings can empower newcomers to the Albany area to maximize access to resources needed to build stable and permanent homes.
As a student and eventually a Pro Bono Scholar in the Immigration Law Clinic, Chopra noticed that her clients did not always have important information about their rights or knowledge about accessing critical resources like a driver’s license, library cards, or public transit.
Working alongside Professor Sarah Rogerson, former Director of the ILC, and Professor Lauren DesRosiers, the ILC’s current Director and former senior staff attorney in the ILC, Chopra identified determinative facts and key information that would give immigrants the tools needed to self-advocate. She presented the proposal alongside Mayor Kathy Sheehan at the SUNY Rockefeller Institute of Government’s Local Government Lab in 2023.
“It’s been such a great experience dedicating myself to practice. One of the best parts of my law school experience already was the practical experience I got in the clinic,” Chopra said.
Continuing to Serve
Recent Albany Law School graduate Brooke Bacchus ’24 joined the largest class of Fellows ever welcomed to the Immigrant Justice Corps. Bacchus is now part of a group of 130 Fellows carefully selected from across the nation.
“I am most excited to explore a new area of immigration law, which is removal defense; we will be helping incarcerated individuals who are under threat of removal from the U.S.,” Bacchus said. “That is an area I don’t have experience in, but I am excited to delve into.”
This class of Fellows will serve as staff attorneys at immigrant legal service providers and community-based organizations nationwide for two years, representing low-income immigrants in removal defense and affirmative applications for asylum seekers. Specifically, Bacchus will be working at Prisoners’ Legal Services (PLS), but when she walked through the doors at Albany Law School in 2021, she didn’t think she would be thrust into a position to make such an impact so soon.
“I did not go into law school intending to practice immigration law; I wanted to be a prosecutor. I took an immigration law elective in my second year and was flooded with a wave of interest on the topic,” Bacchus said.
Recent Media
Director of the Immigration Law Clinic Lauren DesRosiers spoke with CBS6 for a July 17, 2025 story titled: "Tim Coll tells Saratoga residents to call ICE, Congress, in response to immigration raids."
Director of the Immigration Law Clinic Lauren DesRosiers was interviewed on WRGB for the story, "Immigration law expert breaks down impact of Trump policy changes on due process, deportations," on July 17, 2025
Director of the Immigration Law Clinic Lauren DesRosiers was interviewed on WRGB for the story, "Immigration attorney breaks down legal parameters of ICE in courthouses, Lander arrest," on June 18, 2025
Director of the Immigration Law Clinic Lauren DesRosiers was quoted in the Gothamist story, "How a shoplifting arrest in upstate NY summoned ICE and separated a family," on June 11, 2025.
Director of the Edward P. Swyer Justice Center Sarah Rogerson was quoted in the CNN story "ICE targets migrants for arrest at courthouses as Trump administration intensifies deportation push," on June 2, 2025.
Director of the Immigration Law Clinic Lauren DesRosiers was quoted in the WAMC.org story, "CANA hears from local officials about Albany’s response to changing federal immigration policy," on March 14, 2025.
Director of the Edward P. Swyer Justice Center Sarah Rogerson was quoted in the Reuter's Story "Trump administration's arrest of judge stirs debate over immigration courthouse arrests" on May 13, 2025.
Director of the Immigration Law Clinic Lauren DesRosiers was quoted in the Times Union story, "ICE detains immigrant, questions green card holder in Kingston" on February 27, 2025.
