Megan McLemore, attorney and senior researcher in the Health and Human Rights Division of Human Rights Watch, will give a public lecture at Stetson University, entitled “Crime, Punishment and HIV” at 7 p.m., Tuesday, Sept 23, in the Stetson Room, on the second floor of the Carlton Union Building, 131 E. Minnesota Ave., DeLand.

McLemore’s work focuses on access to HIV/AIDS and drug treatment, as well as healthcare in prisons and other detention settings in the United States. In her career as attorney, she has concentrated on U.S. civil rights issues and international human rights with a focus on prisoners, women, and persons living with HIV/AIDS. Her experience includes monitoring prison conditions for the federal courts, litigating class actions to improve prison medical treatment, and coordinating legal rights workshops for women with HIV/AIDS in Rwanda.

McLemore has a law degree from New York University and a master’s degree in law, with a focus on international human rights, from the University of Toronto. She has published widely on issues and policies such as drug dependency and treatments for veterans, Medicare policies and their effect on the disabled, HIV and AIDS prevention, and drug treatments in the U.S. and abroad in major national newspapers such as The New York Times, Huffington Post, San Francisco Chronicle and others. She has published several reports for the Human Rights Watch including “Chronic Indifference: HIV/AIDS Services for Immigrants Detained by the United States” on the practice of segregating HIV positive prisoners in Alabama and South Carolina, and most recently “In Harm’s Way: State Response to Sex Workers, Drug Users and HIV in New Orleans.”

“Megan McLemore’s lecture will be attractive to students and faculty with a wide range of academic interests,” said Elisabeth Poeter, Ph.D., associate professor of modern languages and literatures, who is also director of Stetson’s Gender Studies Program, one of the sponsoring organizations of this lecture. “McLemore challenges us to think about the complex relations between the culture of sex work, drug abuse and state and local government policies, police power and the abuse of human rights of some of the most vulnerable members in our society, sex workers, transgender women, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) youth.”

In addition to the Gender Studies Program, this event is sponsored by Stetson University’s Artists and Lecturers Series and the College of Arts and Sciences. It is a cultural credit event for Stetson students. For further information contact Elisabeth Poeter at [email protected], or (386) 822-7280.