Abigail Stepnitz

Speaking & Continuing Legal Education

Teaching the questions that decide these cases.

CLE sessions and practitioner training on human-trafficking identification, the credibility of survivor accounts, and institutional liability under the TVPA, built for litigators, clinicians, and students who encounter these questions where they are actually decided.

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Format

In-person or webinar, 45–90 minutes, with discussion. Longer half-day workshops available.

Accreditation

Presented through your organization’s CLE provider status; co-presentation with counsel welcomed.

Tailoring

Each session adapts to your audience and jurisdiction, whether trial bar, clinical, or classroom.

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Sessions on offer.

Four sessions, each available as a standalone talk or expanded workshop. Titles and emphasis can be adjusted to your program.

Signature Session

Proving “Should Have Known”: Trafficking Identification in TVPA Civil Litigation

For plaintiff- and defense-side civil litigators

Institutional liability under the TVPA turns on whether a defendant knew or should have known of trafficking. This session unpacks what the “should have known” standard actually requires of an expert and a fact-finder: which indicators were recognizable, what a reasonable institution was positioned to see, and how identification standards translate into a theory of the case that is either defensible or vulnerable.

Best for: trial-lawyer associations, bar litigation sections, civil litigation CLE programs
Session Two

Believing the Witness: Credibility, Trauma, and the Disqualification of Survivor Accounts

For clinicians, immigration practitioners, and law students

Credible accounts of exploitation are routinely disqualified for the very features trauma produces: inconsistency, delay, fragmented disclosure. Drawing on research and more than three hundred expert assessments, this session examines how credibility is actually constructed in legal settings, why standard assumptions about “reliable” testimony misfire, and how practitioners can present and defend survivor accounts with rigor.

Best for: law school clinics, immigration and human-rights trainings, NGO practitioner programs
Session Three

Standards of Care for Identification: What Institutions Are Expected to See

For a general bar, policy, and academic audience

From hotels to platforms to public agencies, institutions are increasingly held to a duty to recognize trafficking. This session traces where identification standards come from (national referral frameworks, GRETA and ECAT benchmarks, sector guidance) and how they are now used to measure institutional conduct in litigation and policy alike. A grounding session for anyone working at the intersection of trafficking, institutional duty, and law.

Best for: general bar CLE, policy convenings, academic and interdisciplinary audiences
Session Four

Identification in Comparative Perspective: Lessons from the UK and Europe

For litigators, policymakers, and academic audiences

The frameworks now used to measure institutional conduct in the US did not originate here. Drawing on direct experience as a UK National Coordinator on trafficking and a consultant to the European Commission, this session sets the British and European identification systems (national referral mechanisms, the Council of Europe Convention, GRETA monitoring) against the emerging US approach. It shows where US “should have known” standards are quietly converging with international benchmarks, and what a generation of European practice reveals about how identification succeeds and fails.

Best for: civil litigation CLE, policy and academic convenings, comparative and international law programs
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Audiences and Engagements.

The trial bar

Bar associations and trial-lawyer groups seeking accredited CLE on trafficking and credibility for civil and immigration practice.

Clinics & NGOs

Law school clinics and practitioner organizations training advocates who prepare and defend survivor testimony.

Law schools

Classroom lectures, guest sessions, and interdisciplinary convenings on identification, credibility, and institutional duty.

A note on accreditation

CLE accreditation rests with the hosting organization’s approved provider status, not with the speaker. As a subject-matter expert I present within your program’s accreditation, and I’m glad to co-present with an attorney where your jurisdiction or format calls for it. I can supply a session description, learning objectives, and a short bio in whatever form your accreditation paperwork requires.

Invite a session

Tell me about your program. I’ll tailor a session to it.

Available in person or by webinar for CLE programs, clinical and practitioner trainings, and law school sessions. Session descriptions and learning objectives available on request.