Law students touch lives of incarcerated through Jail Outreach Ministry

This story was published in the spring 2026 issue of 'Spiritus.'

What started out as another pro-bono opportunity available to University of Detroit Mercy School of Law students reinforced Alexa Jones' and Diana Leybin's desires to become attorneys.

Jones and Leybin, who are 3L students, volunteer with the Wayne County Jail Outreach Ministry (WCJOM), a nonprofit that provides resources to individuals who are leaving jail and offers spiritual guidance to them while incarcerated. The organization, which started in 2020, operates out of Detroit Mercy Law's George J. Asher Law Clinic Center.

Not only has the work been rewarding, Jones said it has helped humanize the legal system.

"I think a lot of the times, the law accumulates people into numbers, and it's all about the statistics and numbers," Jones said. "And this is making an individual person who they are - they're a son, a daughter, a parent, a member of our community."

"They are trying to get the tools and resources to be able to do something with their lives."

The WCJOM uses a holistic "in-reach and outreach" approach to make a difference, according to Orlando Gregory, its executive director.

A group of ministers from different faith groups visits the jail twice each week to provide spiritual guidance to inmates. The organization also hosts regular interfaith services at the Wayne County Jail that dozens of inmates attend.

The outreach, Gregory said, occurs once individuals are released from jail and visit the WCJOM. From clothing, transportation and housing to employment, healthcare and other resources, the organization offers help so individuals can get back on their feet and return to society.

"Our motto is today's change, tomorrow's hope," Gregory said. "It's so impactful, because we show them that we care with the cadre of folks coming in from a spiritual perspective and ministering to them. At the same time, we show them we care when they get out of the jail.

"A lot of them get out and as soon as they hit the concrete, they don't have anywhere to go, nobody to help them out. And that's where we come in and try to be a rudder to turn that ship and get it to go in the right direction."

Finding space

The jail ministry needed a new place to call home.

It was 2024 and the organization had been a tenant inside the Center for the Works of Mercy, which was closing its old building and moving to a new facility.

But a conversation between old friends with UDM ties helped facilitate a relocation to Detroit Mercy Law's Riverfront Campus.

"I was talking to Julie Hein (director of development at Detroit Mercy Law) one day about the situation that we had with the jail ministry, and she mentioned that perhaps we could relocate to the law school," said Maura Corrigan '73, a former chief justice of the Michigan Supreme Court who serves on the WCJOM's board.

"We needed the space because we didn't know where we were going to go for several months."

The WCJOM continues to operate out of the Asher Law Clinic Center. It also has space in the new Center for the Works of Mercy, on Woodward Avenue in Detroit, where additional resources are housed.

"We looked at their mission, and it aligned with the work that we do at Detroit Mercy Law and the University - helping those that need help," said Rebecca Simkins Nowak, assistant dean of Experiential Education and professor at Detroit Mercy Law. "It was just a perfect alignment with our mission."

From there, another relationship with the University formed.

Students in Detroit Mercy Law's Access to Justice course are required to complete 30 hours of pro-bono work with a 501(c)(3) organization. In recent years, several students, including Jones and Leybin, have completed this requirement through the jail ministry. They enjoyed their experience so much that they continued to volunteer.

"I loved the work and everything it entailed," Leybin said. "I really wanted to find something where I could just give back."

Making a difference

Jones and Leybin help with client intake, where they meet with individuals who are referred to the jail ministry through a judge or as part of their probation. They assess individuals' needs during intake sessions and provide resources to help fulfill them.

Those involved said the intake sessions can become quite emotional. Last fall, one individual longed for a listening ear.

"He had served 20 years and just wanted a friend, someone to listen," Leybin said. "And that's so bare minimum of what we can do. He didn't have any transportation, clothing or food, but his focus was on someone to just listen to him."

Planning interfaith services at the Wayne County Jail is also part of Jones and Leybin's responsibilities. They work on identifying a unique theme - restoration, hope and love have been used previously - for the services, which feature a variety of religious leaders.

Jones also gained real-world legal experience from her time with the jail ministry. She helped the organization develop a memorandum of understanding for a partnership with the Pope Francis Center, an organization that provides services for those experiencing homelessness.

"She got the chance as a student to draft something that became a real partnership agreement," Corrigan said. "She saw the real role that attorneys have in advancing social goals and goods."

The importance of jail ministry work is not lost on those around the organization.

"They're incarcerated, they come out, and despite what you see on TV, there's no rehabilitation in prison," Nowak said. "There's no life planning for when you get out."

"Without an organization like the Wayne County Jail Outreach Ministry, I don't know what people would do. There are not an abundance of organizations doing this kind of stuff."

Before the WCJOM was created, Michigan's most populous county did not have a resource to perform this kind of dual-pronged work for incarcerated individuals. Macomb, Oakland and Washtenaw Counties all had similar ministry programs for their jail systems.

"We're filling a real need that exists," said Corrigan.

Filling this need as part of their legal education at Detroit Mercy Law has had an impact on Leybin and Jones.

"It reinforces our wants of being in this career field," Leybin said. "We want to do public defense work and seeing the impact that we're able to make - it's such a big part of their lives - is all the more why I continue to do it."