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Author<\/h2>\nJoyce Hutchens<\/p>\n
Joyce Hutchens has served in education for over 20 years. She is a National Board Certified Teacher in secondary English\/language Arts and holds multiple Illinois high school and middle school teaching certifications. She has received numerous awards for her excellence in teaching.
\nHutchens also has enjoyed a successful career in the private sector where she worked in various administrative and management capacities.
\nBetween 1999 and 2002, Hutchens owned her own training and consulting firm, JDH Training & Communications Group. Because of the \u201cperseverance, commitment, creativity and unequaled strength she demonstrated in expanding her business and helping others succeed,\u201d Hutchens received the Entrepreneurial Woman of the Year Award from the Women\u2019s Business Development Center of Chicago and was inducted into the organization\u2019s Hall of Fame in 2000.
\nA native Chicagoan, Hutchens holds master\u2019s degrees in education and journalism from Roosevelt University and a bachelor\u2019s degree in journalism from Columbia College Chicago.<\/p>\n
How a Pro Se Won Justice is the remarkable story of one woman\u2019s disturbing but valiant eight-year legal fight against a clout-heavy school district. It is corroborated by court records and other legal instruments. It also contains a link to the parties’ oral argument, the names of all key players, and includes excerpts from court hearings, deposition transcripts, district and appellate court briefs, letters, memos, emails and the Seventh Circuit’s entire opinion, which was written by Judge Richard Posner.
\nThis memoir is a must-read for every pro se litigant, educator, legal professional, law school student, indeed, every American taxpayer, as it addresses significant issues related to ethics and the professional practice, conduct and behavior of public servants and those who serve in the legal arena. What occurs during the entire eight-year period shocks the conscience.
\nJoyce Hutchens, a veteran and highly accomplished English, journalism, and business teacher at one of Chicago\u2019s leading public high schools, leaves the classroom to become president of a training and consulting firm before returning to education three years later\u2014this time at Consuella B. York Alternative High School, located in the Cook County Jail.
\nAfter the principal retires and is replaced by the assistant principal, Hutchens is unjustly targeted and disciplined. She transfers to the school district\u2019s Professional Development Unit, and one year later, she and every other black employee in her department are laid off. Within one week, a white staff person assumes her former position.
\nAlleging race discrimination and hoping for justice, Hutchens files a federal lawsuit against the Chicago Board of Education. But after several long years of court delays, and despite Hutchens’ evidence which supports her claims of discrimination and proves the testimonies of the defendants and their witnesses are fabricated, the judge assigned to her case excludes her evidence in his court opinion and rules against her\u2014twice.
\nWith no money, no legal training, and abandoned by two attorneys, Hutchens proceeds pro seand appeals the judge\u2019s ruling, writing her own appellate briefs and engaging in an oral argument against the Chicago Board of Education\u2019s attorney.
\nHutchens describes step-by-step how she wrote her two appellant briefs, prepared for and presented her oral argument, and won the appeals court’s unanimous decision reversal of the district court’s decision in her federal lawsuit without a lawyer.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s inconceivable that lies can sully the names, character, and reputations
\nof people, destroy the careers they spent a lifetime planning and building, and
\nultimately ruin their lives. But that\u2019s precisely what happened, and resulted in
\neight consecutive years of legal proceedings between my former employer, the
\nChicago Board of Education, (\u201cthe Board\u201d) and me. What began as lies from
\nthe mouth of a mentally disturbed Cook County Jail inmate, snowballed into
\nmultiple legal proceedings, including a union grievance and state and federal
\ncomplaints against my former principal, a lawsuit against a correctional officer
\nafter more lies were told, and two lawsuits against the Chicago Board of
\nEducation during which deposition testimony was fabricated almost in its
\nentirety.<\/p>\n
Although Hutchens v. Chicago Board of Education did not include a last-minute
\nstay of execution for a death row inmate, the impact and outcome of my federal
\nappeal were the same: With God, US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
\nJudges Richard Allen Posner, John Daniel Tinder, and Michael Stephen Kanne
\nsaved me from my own death row. They literally saved my life. I thank each of
\nthem for carefully examining the evidence I presented to the court, allowing
\nmy voice to be heard, shunning Chicago\u2019s infamous politics, fairly applying the
\nlaw when reversing US Northern District of Illinois Court Judge Edmond E.
\nChang\u2019s July 3, 2012 decision, and rendering their opinion expeditiously.
\nAlthough the entire litigation process was the most stressful and excruciatingly
\npainful period of my life, it showed me how strong, how determined,
\nhow resourceful, how resilient, and how fearless I am.<\/p>\n
My friends, family, and other supporters repeatedly asked me during
\nthose eight horrific years, \u201cTell the world what happened to you;
\ntell the world what they did to you.\u201d Initially, I refused to consider their
\nrequests\u2014never thinking I ever would want to put pen to paper and relive
\nthis unbelievable and unimaginable nightmare. However, the pain and
\ntrauma those eight years caused me was so real, so raw, and so unfathomable,
\nI had to tell this story because I do not want a another person to endure
\nthe injustices I did\u2014ever!<\/p>\n
Taxpayers deserve to know the entire story behind my eight years of legal proceedings
\nagainst those whose salaries they pay, and not just what was published in
\nthe March 24, 2015 opinion of the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n