Legal Aid Society of Eastern Virginia

Legal Aid Society of Eastern Virginia, Inc. (LASEV) is a nonprofit law firm whose mission is to help balance the scales of justice by providing free civil legal assistance to low-income individuals who are otherwise unable to afford an attorney. LASEV assists the poorest individuals, families, disabled, and elderly, with civil legal issues such as debt collection, consumer, education, employment, family, insurance, housing, and public benefits law.

While a right to counsel exists for the poor who are charged with a crime, no such law exists for low-income civil litigants. There is an evident and immediate need for the availability of equal justice for everyone, not just for those who can afford counsel. LASEV is here to meet that need.

As a result of LASEV’s services, clients have a better understanding of their civil legal rights, and have obtained unemployment and other public benefits to which they are entitled, child support, civil orders of protection where an individual has been the victim of domestic violence, powers-of-attorney, wills and assistance in re-establishing legal identity when all identification has been lost.