Associate Attorney and Justice Catalyst Fellow
Leah Fessler (she/her) is a civil rights attorney dedicated to fighting state abuses, especially prisons and jails’ failure to care for people with opioid addictions and wrongful death actions. Leah is an associate attorney at KW and a second-year fellow with Justice Catalyst, a national organization advancing social, economic, and racial justice for communities exploited by our legal and economic systems. Prior to KW, Leah worked as an attorney at MacArthur Justice Center in St. Louis, where her practice included novel challenges to Missouri Department of Corrections’ unlawful denial of access to medications for opioid use disorder; a class action challenging extreme, unmitigated heat in prison; representing transgender incarcerated individuals in name change matters, and more.
Leah graduated from Yale Law School, where she spent three years working for the Yale Law Veterans Legal Services Clinic, and as a law clerk for Public Justice, New York Legal Assistance Group, Open Communities Alliance, and for Judge Lewis Liman on the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Prior to law school, she spent seven years working as a journalist covering civil rights abuses for Quartz, The Atlantic, and The New York Times. She brings journalistic curiosity and passion for storytelling to every case and investigation. Leah earned a B.A. in English and American Literatures from Middlebury College in 2015, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa. She is originally from Boston, and now lives with her partner and pug in South City, St. Louis.
Education
Yale Law School, J.D. (2024); Middlebury College, B.A. (2015)
Admissions
United States District Court – Eastern District of Missouri, Western District of Missouri
