Student Works with Supreme Court in Rwanda, Legal Aid in Uganda
- Oct 23, 2025
- Education Abroad
This past summer, Texas Law student Cassidy Winters traveled more than 8,000 miles from Austin to work at the Supreme Court of the Republic of Rwanda in Kigali. Winters spent May through July 2025 as a judicial law clerk for the court through the Sudreau Global Justice Institute, an international organization based at the Pepperdine Caruso School of Law.
As a clerk, Winters conducted legal research on how judiciaries worldwide are using artificial intelligence and made recommendations to the Supreme Court. She was supported financially through the Law School’s Summer Public Service Program and Texas Law Fellowships.
The opportunity gave Winters access to “brilliant legal minds, people who have overcome so much to build a justice system and have a different perspective on the law,” she said.
In 1994, the Rwandan genocide resulted in an estimated 800,000 people killed in just over three months.
“I had been to Rwanda previously, and learning more about the justice system and how it was rebuilt after the genocide was inspiring,” said Winters.
She’d first visited the country while living in Ghana after completing her global master’s degree in international relations at Webster University in St. Louis.
Today, Rwanda is “doing a ton of things right,” she says. “Their justice system — and especially the focus on reconciliation in mending communities — is beautiful.”
Halfway through the summer, Winters also spent an “intensive” week in Uganda working with Sudreau’s Prison Project. At a prison in the city of Gulu, she worked alongside a lawyer and two law students from Uganda, as well as a lawyer and two law students from the U.S.
Winters represented people on pretrial detention in plea bargaining negotiations to alleviate the prison backlog. Her team met with clients and reviewed files before visiting tents set up for negotiations with prosecutors. The experience taught her how to build trust with a client, negotiate with prosecutors and tackle challenging criminal cases.
Even while trying to alleviate the prison backlog, she said, “There was a focus on giving everybody fantastic individual access to legal services. It was incredible to participate in that and meet so many wonderful people through that process,” Winters said.
To learn more, read the original story on the Texas Law website.
