The first case Kayla Ghantous, a Senior Associate at Hogan Lovells, worked on as a newly minted attorney became a landmark civil rights lawsuit that helped secure a $6.75 million settlement and significant prison reforms in Massachusetts.
Recognized as a 2026 Leaders in the Law Lawyer of the Year, Kayla shares her perspective on high-impact litigation, the power of pro bono partnerships, and what young lawyers can accomplish when they’re trusted with meaningful responsibility.
This case was assigned to you on your very first day as a practicing attorney. Looking back, what did that experience teach you about the role junior lawyers can play on high-impact litigation teams?
Meaningful contributions come from every level on a litigation team when senior lawyers are willing to instill trust and responsibility in junior lawyers.
And when it comes to large-scale litigation or class actions, mastering the facts brings immense value. In civil rights litigation, those facts matter because they tell human stories.
The Souza-Baranowski matter involved years of investigation, discovery, and collaboration across a large class action. What aspects of the work were most challenging?
The sheer scale of the case. Discovery lasted almost three years and involved reviewing tens of thousands of pages and hundreds of hours of video, much of which our team analyzed page-by-page or frame-by-frame to distill the material facts and develop the factual record.
What moments most reinforced the importance of the case for you personally?
Sharing the news of the settlement with our clients. We heard from so many folks that they’ll use the money to rent an apartment, start a business, or take care of a child. Of course, no amount of money can erase the harm done, but it mattered to know that the settlement would help people move forward.
Many attorneys hope to do work that creates meaningful institutional change. What have you learned about what litigation can — and cannot — accomplish when laws or systems fail to adequately protect people’s rights?
Litigation isn’t a solution to systemic problems, but it’s an excellent tool to create accountability, transparency, and incremental change that brings us closer to a justice system that serves everyone.
The settlement resulted not only in financial compensation, but also extensive court-approved reforms within the Massachusetts prison system. Which reforms do you believe will have the most meaningful long-term impact?
Our prison system is deeply flawed, and no one settlement can change that. But this settlement requires policy reform that bring us a little closer. Here are a few:
(1) limitations on the use of K-9s and a requirement that K-9s be muzzled, which would have prevented severe dog bites that some prisoners endured;
(2) a prohibition on the use of kneeling as a “stress position,” which would have prevented dozens of clients from being made to kneel with their hands and ankles shackled for several hours; and
(3) a requirement that the Department of Correction automatically activate a video response team when activating a special operations team—in this case, DOC disbanded the video response team on January 10, the first day of the campaign of violence against prisoners at Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center, so that violence against prisoners went unrecorded by body cameras.
As someone being recognized early in your career for leadership in a landmark civil rights case, what advice would you give to young attorneys who are interested in pursuing impactful pro bono or public interest work?
Say yes to opportunities before you feel ready for them. I’ve been fortunate enough to work alongside attorneys who trusted me with meaningful work and who believed that a junior lawyer could play a leading role in an important litigation—in a lot of ways, my career grew up alongside this case because of that.
What role do large law firms and pro bono partnerships play in advancing access to justice in cases like this?
High-impact litigation, especially at this scale, requires immense resources, and large law firms have the ability and responsibility to make those investments. When large firms commit seriously to justice by partnering with pro bono legal aid organizations, they help make large civil rights litigation possible.
