Tides Foundation Death Penalty Mobilization Fund
Fall 2015 Requests for Proposals
Strategy Area 3: Severe Mental Illness Exclusion
Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
Funding Request - July 27, 2015
Attachment 3 - Bios of Key Individuals
VADP Staff
Michael Stone
Executive Director
Richmond, VA
Prior to joining VADP in January 2015, Michael worked
as a Field Organizer and consultant for the National
Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. In that role, he
worked with abolition organizations in Virginia,
Missouri, South Dakota, and Pennsylvania
Michael has spoken about capital punishment to faith
communities and organizations across Virginia. He has also identified
opponents to the death penalty among “unlikely allies” - including political
conservatives and violent crime victims.
Michael also worked for 25 years in social ministry for Office of Justice &
Peace for the Catholic Diocese of Richmond from 1984 to 2009. He has
earned Bachelor of Science degrees in Economics and Urban Planning from
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an M.A. degree in Pastoral
Ministry from Boston College. Michael is a former board member of the
Virginia Catholic Conference and the Virginia Interfaith Center for Public
Policy. He currently serves on the board of directors for the Richmond Peace
Education Center.
VADP Board of Directors
Matthew Engle, Esq.
Current Board President
Charlottesville, VA
Matt is the former director of the UVA Law School’s
Innocence Project Clinic. In that role he helped students
identify innocence cases and worked with students to
represent the wrongfully convicted. Before arriving at
UVA, Matt worked at the Office of the Virginia Capital
Defender, a public defender office that specializes in capital murder cases. In
that role he represented indigent clients facing potential death sentences in
trial courts throughout northern Virginia and on appeal to the Supreme Court
of Virginia.
Matt, a Cleveland native, graduated from Washington and Lee School of Law
in 2001. Afterward, he worked in Charlottesville at the Virginia Capital
Representation Resource Center, where he represented Virginia death row
inmates in state and federal habeas corpus litigation, appeals and clemency
proceedings. Matt is now building a private law practice representing those
accused of capital murder.
Kent Willis
Incoming Board President
Arlington, VA
Born and raised in Virginia, Kent worked in
Richmond as an advocate for nearly 40 years,
first for environmental reform (Bay Committee),
for the rights of persons with disabilities
(Goodwill Industries), and racial fairness in housing (Housing Opportunities
Made Equal, where he was Executive Director for five of his ten years of
service).
From 1987 to 2012, Kent worked at the American Civil Liberties Union of
Virginia, the last 23 years as Executive Director. In 1998, he secured a grant
to produce the first comprehensive study of the death penalty in Virginia,
Unequal, Unfair and Irreversible, which was followed by Broken Justice, a
second critique of the death penalty by the ACLU. The ACLU provided free
office space and clerical support for its Richmond operations for nearly ten
years as a means of advancing the shared objectives of the two organizations.
Kent is a 1971 graduate of William and Mary with an AB in philosophy.
Mary Atwell
Roanoke, VA
Mary Atwell is Professor Emeritus of Criminal Justice at
Radford University where she also chaired the Criminal
Justice department. A Virginia citizen since 1972, Mary
grew up in St. Louis, Missouri and attended Webster
College and Saint Louis University.
Much of her research has involved topics related to
capital punishment She has published Evolving
Standards of Decency: Popular Culture and Capital Punishment (2004) and
Wretched Sisters: Examining Gender and Capital Punishment (2007). Her
newest book, An American Dilemma: International Law, Capital Punishment,
and Federalism (2015), examines six cases in which the death penalty violated
the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.
Mary served on the board of VADP from 2003 to 2008. She also serves on the
Board of Directors of the Women’s Resource Center of the New River Valley
and of Bethany Hall, a residential drug treatment center for women in
Roanoke.
Michael Hash
Culpeper, VA
“I was a juvenile at the time of the crime, so I wasn’t
given the death penalty, but it could have easily gone a
different way. I was falsely convicted and I can tell you,
the only hope an innocent man has in prison is that the
truth will come out some day. That is why I’m proud to
join the Board of VADP - because I know they are
fighting for justice. How can there be justice when there is an irreversible
penalty? Government doesn’t always get it right; I’m living proof of that.”
Beth Panilaitis
Richmond, VA
Beth earned a Bachelor of Social Work from
Virginia Commonwealth University and a Master
of Social Work with a concentration in policy
from the University of Connecticut. From 2008-
2010 she served as the Executive Director of
VADP which included conducting statewide public education on the death
penalty, organizational oversight, development, serving as spokesperson and
media contact and serving as the organization’s lobbyist in the General
Assembly. She was also an Advisory Board member of the Dreams Project of
Witness to Innocence.
Beth currently serves as the Executive Director of ROSMY, a Richmond based
nonprofit that provides support groups to LGBT youth in Richmond and
Charlottesville and conducts trainings for human services providers
throughout Central Virginia on working with LBGT young people. Beth’s
policy and direct service experience has included working with homeless
individuals and families, “at-risk” youth, incarcerated individuals, and
individuals who are dually diagnosed.
Beth has a long history within the Episcopal Church including helping to found
the VCU Episcopal Campus Ministry, serving on the Episcopal national
Standing Commission on Domestic Mission and Evangelism from 2003-2009
and serving as an elected deputy to the Episcopal National General
Convention from 2000-2006.
Virginia Podboy
Richmond, VA
Virginia is a Richmond native who recently launched a
legal practice to provide legal services to those in the
community. She attended George Mason University and
graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts
degree in Government and International Politics. She
spent an extended semester at Oxford University’s New
College, where she studied the European Union.
Virginia attended the Columbus School of Law at the
Catholic University of America.
During law school Virginia interned at the Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission in the Appellate Division where she assisted attorneys in writing
briefs and preparing oral arguments. She also clerked at Washington D.C.
labor law firm Mooney, Green, Saindon, Murphy, and Welch, P.C., where she
assisted attorneys preparing federal court pleadings as well as ERISA
compliance oversight over several major pension and health plans.
Additionally, Virginia served as Executive Editor of the Journal of
Contemporary Health Law.
After graduating law school, Virginia worked for two years as a lobbyist for
the Virginia Catholic Conference in the areas of poverty/public benefits, health
care, housing, and criminal justice.
Rev. Lauren Cogswell Ramseur
Richmond, VA
Lauren is a 1996 graduate of James Madison University
with a BA in Interdisciplinary Social Science and a 2000
graduate of Candler School of Theology of Emory University
e with a Masters of Divinity. She was ordained as a minister
in the Presbyterian Church (USA) in November 2000.
Lauren became involved in the anti-death penalty movement while pastor at
the Open Door Community in Atlanta, GA where she worked to end the death
penalty and led execution vigils at the state capitol. She provided pastoral
care to men on death row for five years and accompanied Jack Alderman and
Curtis Osborne to their executions. She served on the board of directors for
New Hope House, a ministry to people on Georgia’s death row and their
families.
Following that work, Lauren became a victim outreach specialist, working
with family members of victims in death penalty cases. She served as the
Project Coordinator for the Council for Restorative Justice and assisted in the
training of defense attorneys and victim outreach specialists in the work of
Defense Initiated Victim Outreach (DIVO). She has served as a victim
outreach specialist on death penalty cases in Georgia, Florida and Virginia.
Lauren is Interim Pastor at Lynn haven Colony Congregational Church in
Virginia Beach. She also served on the leadership team for Virginia
Organizing, South Hampton Roads Chapter.
Helena Cobban
Charlottesville, VA
| Rotating off board on August 31, 2015
Since October 2009, Helena has been Executive
Director of the Council For the National Interest, a
nonprofit that advocates for more fair-minded policies
in the Middle East. She had a long relationship with
The Christian Science Monitor, working as a Beirut-based correspondent for
the paper during 1976-81 and contributing a regular column on Middle
Eastern and other global issues during 1990-2007. She has written for many
other outlets, including the Sunday Times (London), The Nation (New York),
and Boston Review, where she is a Contributing Editor. Four of the seven
books she has published since 1984 have been on the Arab-Israeli issue, and
one on retributive versus restorative justice. Since 2003 she has published an
international affairs blog, “Just World News.” Ms. Cobban is a member of
Charlottesville Friends Meeting.
Jerry Givens
Richmond, VA
Rotating off board on August 31, 2015
Jerry worked for the Virginia Department of
Corrections for 25 years. From 1982 - 1999 he
also served as the chief executioner for the
Commonwealth during which time 62 executions took place. Since his time
with the DOC, Jerry has become an outspoken advocate for abolition of the
death penalty and is currently writing a book about his experiences, Another
Day is My Promise. He is an active member of Cedar Street Church in
Richmond and is a truck driver at LS Lee Inc.
Incoming Board Members
Three year board terms begin on September 1, 2015
Nicholas Cote
Arlington, VA
Nick is the founding President of Right Way Forward
Virginia, a nonpartisan libertarian advocacy
organization dedicated to promoting liberty,
dynamism, and equal rights. He works at the Director
of Donor Communications for the National Right to
Work Legal Defense Foundation and a former board member of the
Republican Liberty Caucus of Virginia. With experience and networks in
libertarian and conservative politics, he is particularly interested in engaging
the political “right” about alternatives to the death penalty. Nicholas
graduated from Providence College in 2008 with a B.A. in political science and
American studies.
Charles Williams
Richmond, VA
Charles Williams is a native Richmonder who attended
Howard University and St. Leo University. He left a
corporate career in IT after nearly 30 years for a simpler,
more meaningful life.
Charles lived and worked for seven years at Richmond Hill,
an ecumenical retreat center active in racial reconciliation
and anti-poverty work. He recently retired from Boaz and
Ruth, a non-profit working with formerly incarcerated men
and women to build healthy, productive lives.
Charles was ordained as a permanent deacon in the
Catholic Church in 2013 and serves at the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in
Richmond.
