Support Pro Bono Net with the Purchase of "Golden Venture" DVD

NEW YORK  (July 8, 2009) -- Supporters of Pro Bono Net, a leader in innovative programs that increase access to justice, have the opportunity to support the organization’s mission by purchasing the DVD of the acclaimed documentary Golden Venture. 

The film follows the struggles of the 286 passengers of the infamous immigrant smuggling ship that ran aground near New York City in 1993.  For every DVD purchased, Pro Bono Net will receive half the proceeds. 

Pro Bono Net’s co-founders first met while working on pro bono asylum cases resulting from the Golden Venture.  As the passengers were sent to detention facilities around the country, the need for a technological solution to enable collaboration among far-flung advocates became apparent.  Today, Pro Bono Net’s online platforms, probono.net and LawHelp.org, help millions of people receive high-quality, free legal assistance.

Golden Venture, narrated by Academy Award winner Tim Robbins, was an Official Selection of the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival as well as the 2006 Amnesty International Film Festival.  Amnesty International called Golden Venture “a global epic, a story of stoic perseverance and unexpected grace, played out in the shadow of national politics and the continuing failure of ever-harsher US immigration policies.”

Director Peter Cohn was inspired to make the film when, four years after the Golden Venture ran aground, he learned that many of the passengers were still in jail.  Cohn followed four passengers, each of whom ends up following a different path after being imprisoned following the shipwreck.  “They survived the voyage, imprisonment and worse -- and went on to face more trials and heartbreak that doesn’t end,” Cohn says. “At the same time, they’ve been touched by amazing measures of grace.”