The ASBPE Educational Foundation has recognized Julianne Hill with its 2024 Stephen Barr Award, the organization’s highest honor for journalists writing for a business-to-business publication. Hill’s ABA Journal article, “Parental Penalties: Collateral Consequences Reverberate through Families Long After a Sentence Has Been Served,” tells the moving story of women whose past incarceration impacts their ability to have an ordinary relationship with their children because of rigid school rules. 

“This story had a profound impact on me,” said one Stephen Barr judge. “Learning about the challenges and tribulations faced by women who have completed their sentences was eye-opening. Julianne was able to capture the spirit of these moms through their photos with their families and narratives, and it demonstrated how they continued to live in the shadow of prosecution long after serving time.”

For more than 20 years, the Foundation has honored individual writers — rather than news organizations — with the Stephen Barr Award for Feature Writing. The award recognizes inventiveness in reporting; insight and balance in presentation of a complex subject; investigative depth, and impact among readers.

“Julianne has written a moving and impactful piece that demonstrates the power of business-to-business journalism,” said Robert Freedman, president of the ASBPE Educational Foundation. “We congratulate Julianne and the ABA Journal for their inspiring work.”

“It was my honor to tell the stories of the mothers who returned to their children after serving time in prison only to find themselves in a lifetime of collateral consequences,” said Hill. “I’m thrilled, and still a little stunned, that this story was chosen for the Stephen Barr Award.”