Rom P. Watson
Rom Watson is a partner at Ropes & Gray LLP in Boston, where he has concentrated on international tax issues for over 30 years and currently serves as the co-head of the firm’s International practice group. His clients include investment funds, multinational companies, foreign governments, global investors, and financial institutions.
From 1988 through 1991, Rom served in the Office of Tax Policy at the U.S. Department of the Treasury where he was appointed Associate International Tax Counsel. Rom received his undergraduate degree in Philosophy from Stanford University in 1979, and his JD from the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, in 1983. He has announced his retirement from tax practice at the end of 2018, and he plans to continue his legal career working with pro bono clients.
During the last two years, Rom has joined pro bono teams at Ropes & Gray representing six clients on various immigration matters. One case involved a detained 16-year old who ultimately won asylum after spending 15 months in US prison facilities. His team saw first-hand the backlog and procedural hurdles in the Immigration Court system, the difficulty of asserting asylum rights from behind prison walls, and the critical role of lawyers in the successful resolution of any immigration case.
Rom plans to continue this work as an Access to Justice Fellow, working with the Political Asylum/Immigration Representation (PAIR) Project. He expects to focus on detainees, and to assist with PAIR’s “Know Your Rights” presentations and intake screening in the four immigration detention centers in New England. He also hopes to encourage Boston law firms and lawyers to support this work by hosting training sessions and signing up for the detention center visits. One of the goals of this program is that lawyers who complete the initial intake reports for detainees and directly experience the conditions of detention will be more likely to accept a pro bono case under PAIR’s supervision (or to encourage their firms to do so).