We, at Amara, know well how our legal system, rooted in systemic racism and discriminatory laws, can destroy lives and decimate communities. We look at the work we do through a racial equity lens to provide free trauma-informed legal services, access to the continuum of care and legal information to empower survivivors of sex tafficking and inidviduals harmed by the commercial sex industry. Most of Amara’s clients are African-American, U.S. born cis- and trans-women between the ages of 18 and 30, who are also survivors of sex trafficking. We promote criminal justice reform at the local level in the three jurisdictions of Maryland, Virginia and Washington, DC, and we advocate on behalf of our clients legal rights.
We focus our efforts on addressing the intersectionality of social issues that impact the lives of our LGBTQ+ clients and other at-risk, vulnerable populations by providing trauma-informed training for professionals and advocating for policy change to stop the criminalization and stigmatization of individuals.
Your donation helps us to support our clients through expungement of criminal records, name and gender marker changes, civil protection orders, family law, victim-witness advocacy, and more.