Monica represents clients in a diverse range of cases from civil rights litigation, including disability rights, housing discrimination, employment discrimination, and prisoners’ rights, to commercial litigation and business disputes, including breach of contract and business torts cases. Monica also represents blind vendors and state licensing agencies in cases involving the Randolph-Sheppard Act, a federal statute that gives blind licensed vendors priority in operating vending facilities on federal properties.
Monica has wide-ranging experience with litigation in state and federal court, as well as in administrative proceedings. She has successfully represented individual clients in employment discrimination, disability discrimination, prisoners’ rights, and Randolph-Sheppard Act cases. She has also successfully represented corporate clients in commercial business disputes.
Monica prides herself on the strong relationships she builds with her clients. She takes a client-centered approach to lawyering, counseling her clients on all their options, including, when possible, those that avoid litigation.
When Monica is not working on behalf of her clients, she is active in both state and local bar associations and in the community. Because of her commitment to bettering the legal profession and improving access to justice, Monica was recently inducted as a fellow into the Baltimore Bar Foundation. Last year, Monica was named a Leader In Law by the Maryland State Bar Association and The Daily Record.
Prior to joining the firm, Monica was a law clerk to Judge George L. Russell, III on the United States District Court for the District of Maryland and to Judge Sally D. Adkins on the Supreme Court of Maryland (formerly known as the Court of Appeals of Maryland).
During law school, Monica was the Executive Articles Editor for the Maryland Law Review. She worked as a student attorney in the Gender Violence Clinic, where she represented clients in family and civil law matters in state court. Monica was also a research assistant to Professor Donald Gifford, whom she assisted with researching and editing the sixth edition of Cases and Materials on the Law of Torts, Harper, James and Gray on Torts, and Keeping Cases from Black Juries: An Empirical Analysis of How Race, Income Inequality, and Regional History Affect Tort Law.
Monica received the 2016 Elizabeth Maxwell Carroll Chesnut Prize, known as the “Dean’s Award,” which is given to a member of the graduating class for excellence in legal scholarship and writing.
Prior to law school, Monica worked for Agora, Inc., where she focused on regulatory compliance for dietary supplements. She also taught English in Moscow, Russia.
Monica is an active member of the Bar Association of Baltimore City, and currently serves as an Elected Member. She previously served as the Bar Association of Baltimore City Young Lawyers’ Division’s Treasurer and as Co-Chair of its Public Service Committee. She also serves on the board of Maryland CASA Association, which trains volunteer Court-Appointed Special Advocates to speak up for the best interests of children who are under the protection of the courts. Monica was a member of the Maryland State Bar Association Young Lawyers’ Section Publications Committee. In addition, she served as member of the Uniform Bar Exam Maryland Law Component Committee, which helped design the new Maryland law portion of the bar exam.
Representative Cases
National Federation of the Blind of Virginia, et al. v. Virginia Department of Corrections (https://www.acluva.org/en/press-releases/settlement-reached-national-federation-blind-virginia-v-virginia-department) – Obtained injunctive relief on behalf of blind prisoners in the custody of the Virginia Department of Corrections.
Successfully represented a management services company in arbitration for breach of contract by a medical cannabis growing, processing, and retail business, with damages valued in excess of $25 million (2020).
National Federation of the Blind, et al. v. Los Angeles Community College District (https://browngold.com/news/bgl-laccd-verdict-lawsuit-victory/) – Part of a team of attorneys who secured a $240,000 jury verdict for two blind students in discrimination lawsuit against the Los Angeles Community College District.
Pevia v. Moyer, et al. – Obtained a declaratory judgment against the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services that its policy banning all maximum security inmates from participating in Native American sweat lodge ceremonies violates the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.
Mary Fernandez and National Federation of the Blind v. Duke University – Successfully represented an individual and the National Federation of the Blind in a lawsuit brought under the Americans with Disabilities Act and Rehabilitation Act challenging systemic discrimination against blind students and alumni at Duke University.
Planned Parenthood of Maryland, et al. v. Alex M. Azar, II, et al. – Successfully represented Planned Parenthood of Maryland, Inc. and five consumers in a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services challenging the Trump administration’s new rule, which was designed to make insurance companies stop offering coverage for abortion and would have forced insurance companies that sell plans in the Affordable Care Act individual marketplaces to send two separate bills to customers — one for the coverage of abortion care, and another for coverage of other health care.
Awards
- Lawdragon’s 500 Leading Civil Rights & Plaintiff Employment Lawyers, 2024
- Lawdragon 500 X – The Next Generation, 2023 & 2024
- The Maryland State Bar Association and The Daily Record’s Leaders in Law Award, 2023
- Maryland Super Lawyers Rising Stars, 2023 & 2024
- The Best Lawyers in America: Ones to Watch for Civil Rights Law, Commercial Litigation, and Litigation – Labor and Employment, 2022-2025
- The National Trial Lawyers Top 40 Under 40 Lawyers, 2021 & 2022
- The National Trial Lawyers Top 100 Trial Lawyers in Maryland, 2024
News & Insights
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Andy Freeman, Neel Lalchandani, and Monica Basche present on the Randolph-Sheppard Act protections at NABM BLAST Conference.
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Monica Basche presents at National Federation of the Blind of Virginia’s Annual Convention, discussing rights for blind prisoners and the future of disability rights.
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Monica Basche recognized in the 2024 Lawdragon 500 Leading Civil Rights & Plaintiff Employment Lawyers Guide.
Publications
Monica Basche & Michael Collins, Jr., Raising the Bar: Law Clerks Pay Tribute to Judge Sally D. Adkins, 78 Md. L. Rev. 691 (2019).
Blackburn Limited Partnership v. Paul: The Birth of Maryland’s Statute or Ordinance Rule and Its Ill-Defined “Targeted Class” Requirement, 74 Md. L. Rev. 621 (2015).
American Bar Association’s Media Alerts Project on Federal Courts of Appeals: Asylum Seeker Faces Challenge Proving a House Is Not a Home: Evidence of Firm Resettlement Is a High Bar to Clear (Oct. 5, 2015).
American Bar Association’s Media Alerts Project on Federal Courts of Appeals: “. . . And Access for All” – Fourth Circuit Vacates District Court’s Grant of Summary Judgment on Russian National’s Denial of Access to Courts Claim (Oct. 28, 2015).
American Bar Association’s Media Alerts Project on Federal Courts of Appeals: Just a Hunch: Fourth Circuit Vacates Conviction of Virginia Man in the Wrong Place, at the Wrong Time, for the Right Reasons (Dec. 3, 2015).
Presentations
National Federation of the Blind Jacobus tenBroek Disability Law Symposium, “Recent Advocacy for Prisoners with Disabilities,” (March 22, 2024).
National Federation of the Blind Jacobus tenBroek Disability Law Symposium, “Recent Advocacy for Blind and Low-Vision Incarcerated People,” (March 24, 2023).