My name is Olaseni Bello, Class of 2006- Hard to believe. After graduating from VLS, I clerked for a year in New Jersey, then I joined the JAG Corps. So I was in the army for most of my career so far. In the last three years, I've been working at Morgan Stanley financial services. I've been a compliance attorney for our FX business, the Americas. Leaving Vermont Law School, and the Masters of Law for the community in the world. So I left with a sense of when to have an impact. Military service was one way I chose to give back. But once you transition out, at least for me personally, you're you're always looking for a sense of relevance, like what can I do next? Not to say the corporate world isn't relevant in some way, but it may not feed your soul the same way, something very relevant, such as going to afghanistan or working on critical missions can. And so the power of law to me, I've utilized that through pro bono. Working on a case for a Vietnam era veteran, who had pulmonary fibrosis, and basically has asbestos exposure on a navy ship led to serious health condition. We're working specifically with the Veterans Affairs, they had denied his disability twice. And so a team of lawyers, including myself, here, Morgan Stanley, and a couple other lawyers at Davis Polk, got together and worked on his case. And I truly believe so as soon as the case came across our desk, I was, I truly believe we could help him and we were able to get him $140,000. That's $140,000 in back payment, because the VA twice denied his claim for disability. And the thing with veterans and disabilities that they don't usually have the resources to fight or challenge the VA. He had been denied twice and but for our pro bono efforts, I mean, most veterans will probably just give up and say, you know what, like, this isn't worth it. Because it's, it's full of red tape, paperwork, we have to travel to DC. And so those are intangible like, you can have your job your day to day and working on this case was the highlight. I gotta say the highlight of probably the last two and a half years. And so the power of law is alive and well in pro bono.
