Paralegal

Vacancy expired!

Responsibilities:

• Work directly with fact witnesses, for either grand jury or trial testimony, who are most often public citizens, to assist and support them to ensure appearance for their testimony in court, pretrial conferences, and reimbursement of their expenses.
• Provide witness management assistance before, during, and after trial.
• Keep track of multiple trials and multiple fact witnesses at a time.
• Communicate with the Trial Team (Prosecuting Attorney, Investigative Agent, and Legal Assistant) to determine the details of the witness scheduled for trial.
• Utilize critical thinking skills when fact witnesses present with difficult situations that may impede them from getting to court when they are expected to be there.
• Explain to fact witnesses what to expect in court when they testify and how the reimbursement process works.
• Work with travel agents to arrange air travel and call hotels to book hotel stays as needed for out-of-town witnesses.
• Be available to make last-minute changes to travel and working under time constraints.
• Obtain proper documents necessary to maintain records and to obtain witness reimbursements.
• Initiate contact/notify fact witnesses concerning travel arrangements, appearance date/time, and determine any special circumstances or needs of the fact witness.
• Use judgment to determine when the AUSA should be notified of special circumstances or needs of fact witnesses.
• Confer with the AUSA concerning fact witness appearance and special circumstances regarding witnesses (special authorizations, international witnesses, military/federal employee witnesses, or hostile witnesses).
• Complete and submit proper documentation for special authorizations and obtain prior approval before proceeding with travel arrangements.
• Before fact witness’ appearance, ensure all travel documents and appearance date and time have been provided to the witness.
• Make necessary arrangements for fact witness travel and lodging according to Department of Justice and USAO policies and procedures.
• Meet with fact witnesses upon arrival to assist them with finding the designated hearing or pretrial conference, offer and perform courtroom orientation, accompany witness to court, ensure a safe waiting area is available, and collect necessary documentation and signatures for fact witness reimbursement documents.
• Prepare and submit documentation for fact witness reimbursement, i.e. witness vouchers and other required documentation for fact witnesses.
• Furnish requested information concerning pending and completed fact witness vouchers.
• Gather required documentation and reconcile Government Travel Accounts.
• Obtain information, confer, and coordinate with the Court, Probation, Pretrial, U.S. Marshals Service, investigative agencies, and other counterparts, when necessary.
• Complete various aspects of recurring documents in conformance with the rules governing their style and format.
• Compose original letters that do not require legal interpretations, but require a good working knowledge of legal procedures and specialized terminology relevant to fact witness laws and regulations.
• Establish and maintain a variety of fact witness files, documents, and databases.
• Assemble documents and other information for fact witness file material and retention by established procedures and Department of Justice regulations.
• If requested, establish and maintain calendar and/or database of active and pending fact witness appearances; track hearings, trial dates, and scheduling conferences.
• Perform other administrative and logistical fact witness management-related duties as required/assigned.
• Provide a variety of ancillary office support functions.

Qualifications:

• The Contractor must have critical thinking skills, good communication, and organizational skills, the ability to deliver the highest quality work under pressure and changing deadlines, and knowledge of software used by the USAO (or the ability to acquire knowledge about the USAO’s computer systems).
• Provide word processing and data entry/retrieval.
• Ability to review and analyze data and information from multiple sources.
• Ability to establish case/project files.
• Ability to enter and retrieve data from databases.
• Ability to prepare, format, and correct management reports.
• Ability to manipulate, transfer, compute and print information.
• Schedule appointments.
• Answer inquiries regarding case-related information as maintained in the database.
• Answer inquiries regarding the case-related status.
• Obtain additional information from other agencies/organizations.
• Maintain internal status information on the disposition of designated information, files, and assets.
• Assure information is accurate and perform analytical computations necessary to process data.
• Provide administrative information and assistance concerning the case or file to other agencies or organizations.
• High school diploma is required; an undergraduate degree is preferred.

Vacancy expired!