Page 36 - BusinessWest October 27, 2021

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Her Advocacy for Women and Children Has Taken Many Powerful Forms
LBy Joseph Bednar
iz Dineen was always a bit different from her young peers. During
the 1960s, when they were listening to the Beatles, the Beach Boys, and the Rolling Stones, she would scour her local library for famous speeches — in print and on vinyl — from the likes of Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Winston Churchill, and John and Robert Kennedy.
“I was very intrigued by the power of the word to mobilize people into action for good, and to motivate people to change,” she said.
At age 12, watching Bobby Kennedy’s funeral and procession, “I remember saying to my mother and father that day, ‘I want to be a lawyer. I want to make a difference.’ I’ve wanted to be an advocate for women and children my whole life, from when I was 12 years old, and I’ve kind of directed the rest of my life that way.”
fight in that legal arena for justice for women and children,” she said, specifically on wrenching cases involving physical and sexual child abuse, adult rapes, child murders, and domestic-violence murders.
“I’ve wanted to
be an advocate for women and children my whole life, from when I was 12 years old, and I’ve kind of directed the rest of my life that way.”
Women of
Dineen wasn’t interested in criminal law when she entered law school, but collection of evidence for trial, but also improved the medical care of the
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years, in fact. IMPACT time to step away. She had been teaching law in an adjunct capacity at Elms
an internship in the Hampden County District Attorney’s Office hooked her. victims, particularly in sexual-assault cases,” Spelman said.
So she kept working there, and stayed after graduation — for the next 27 It was critical, deeply gratifying work, but after 27 years, Dineen felt it was
“I just loved being an advocate, being a trial lawyer and being able to College and Bay Path University, and when an opportunity arose to chair
“Liz Dineen was the epitome
of a caring, supportive, and
compassionate champion for those
victims,” said attorney Stephen
Spelman, who met her while working
with her in the DA’s office in the
1990s, and later married her. “She
was a zealous advocate in the
courtroom, renowned throughout
the state, and the nation, for getting decades-long sentences on those
who had sexually assaulted children
and women, or brutally harmed them physically.”
Always thinking innovatively, she also began a series of lectures and meetings among various professional groups (nurses, doctors, law enforcement, and prosecutors) to ensure, while women and children were receiving medical care after being assaulted, that crucial items of evidence
were not tossed out or ignored. “These meetings not only improved the
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Photo by Leah Martin Photography
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