2025 Rookie of the Year - Ellen Boland Monroe

The 2025 Rookie of the Year Award was presented by Caitlin Boland Aarab to the FDOM/MTACDL conference in Chico on March 13, 2025:

It is such a privilege to present this award. And before anyone accuses me of nepotism, keep in mind that I don’t have a vote on the awards committee. I just happen to share a last name with the recipient. And at the risk of ruining the surprise, Ellen, you are the recipient of Rookie of the Year. I just couldn’t keep the suspense going for another 2 minutes.
 
I nominated Ellen for this award because what she achieved in 2024 is remarkable. Ellen graduated from law school a semester early, took the bar last February, was sworn in to the bar in April, and tried a homicide to an acquittal with me in June. It was her first trial. That by itself would make for one hell of a rookie season. But what Ellen demonstrated during that trial is that she has all the qualities that make for a truly great criminal defense lawyer: empathy, humor, tenacity, and a healthy dose of righteous indignation. 
 
Ellen had two primary roles in this trial: one was the client manager, and one was to argue the evidentiary motions that we were expecting to crop up throughout the trial. Client manager was a really important role in this case because our client, Charlotte, was a 19-year-old girl who spent a year in custody awaiting her trial on the charge of accountability for deliberate homicide. And she didn’t do it. 
 
But she didn’t have parents, or older friends, or teachers in her corner. She just had us. And Ellen knew that. Ellen would put a full day of work in at the office and then go straight to the jail where she would talk to Charlotte about books and music and the bad poetry floating around the jail. She shopped for her clothes before trial, and laundered her clothes each night of the trial. She brought her snacks that she stashed at counsel table. She treated her like a human, and as a result Charlotte trusted us.
 
The other reason I nominated Ellen for this award is her legal work. I will spare you the war story of this trial. But here’s the highlight: my client was stabbed in the face by a total stranger. She punched back in self defense, and during the three-way tussle between the woman, Charlotte, and Charlotte’s co-defendant, the co-defendant stabbed the woman, either with her own knife or his pocket knife. But Charlotte didn’t have a knife. She was the first stabbing victim. Didn’t prevent her for being charged in the death, though. We learned in discovery that 4 minutes before this stabbing, the woman texted her brother that she wasn’t going down without a fight, it was going down in the park, she would end up dead or in prison, it was nice knowing ya. 4 minutes before she died of stab wounds in the park. We moved in limine to admit those text messages because: DUH. The Court said no. The Court said no because Charlotte was unaware of them. That was consistent with the JUOF caselaw prior to March of last year. Ellen of course understood how essential these text messages were to the defense, and she just didn’t let it go. She showed up to the first day of trial with a point brief ready, just in case the State gilded the lily in opening and asked a rhetorical question like, what would a 50 year old woman be doing in a park at 2am fighting with a couple of drunk kids if they didn’t start it? And that’s exactly what the state did. Ellen was ready for them. She renewed our motion to admit the texts and to her very great credit Judge Best changed her ruling. The State opened the door. So in come the texts and the rest is history. 
 
Ellen, one of the reasons Charlotte is free today is that you managed to be a good lawyer and a good human at the same time. I can’t wait to see what your second season brings.