When 26-year-old Mandel Moore was called to the bar on Thursday afternoon to take his oath as an Attorney-at-Law, it marked the realization of a dream not just for him, but also for his parents.
Mandel holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Sociology as well as a Law Degree from the University of Guyana.
Last Saturday, he added one more educational achievement to his résumé, when he graduated from the Hugh Wooding Law School in Trinidad and officially began working at the Chambers of the Director of Public Prosecutions in Guyana.
His journey to become an Attorney has been one filled with challenges, but with no regrets.
During an interview with News Source, in between constantly pulling his black suit jacket together and straightening his tie, Mandel explained that he has never allowed being differently abled to make him disabled.
Mandel was born with only half of his left arm developed and one of his legs shorter than the other. He also has a number of toes missing, but has never allowed a walk with a limp and an underdeveloped arm to slow down his walk towards accomplishing his dreams.
He explained to News Source that he was born in the interior district of Region One and in the early stages of his mother’s pregnancy, she was unaware that she was pregnant when she started taking medication for a malaria infection.
The effects of the medication on the developing fetus resulted in one arm and one leg not being fully developed.
Today, the young man who stands ready to prosecute cases in the High Court said though he was aware as a child that he was different, he never allowed that to stop him from going after dreams. He said he believes he has to thank his parents and teachers for that, since they never treated him any differently.
“From Primary School straight into the Central High School, they never treated me any way different. When licks was sharing, I got my share too”, he joked, as he recalled his early school years.
Welcome: Justice Sandra Kurtzious welcoming Mandel Moore to the local Bar after accepting his petition
He said he always loved looking at law related television programmes and when his father said one of his children should be a lawyer, he knew it was a message to him.
As a preparation to begin his law degree, his parents encouraged him to first go for a Diploma in Sociology. According to Mandel, after completing the Diploma, he decided to go all the way and attain his degree in Sociology before going on to law.
He said completing his law degree was not as difficult as he expected but called for lots of research and presentations in front of the class.
Being a “behind the scenes” type of person, he said he had to pull together the courage to start standing in front of the class to make presentations. But he is happy he was able to overcome that challenge before graduating and heading to Trinidad to complete his law studies at the Hugh Wooding Law School.
At Hugh Wooding, Mandel confessed that it was tougher than he expected and “it was none stop work all of the time. Even when you decided to take some time off and go out with friends, you are standing there and thinking about your work and thinking about cases and about presentations’.
The young lawyer said he was able to get all the work done and complete his studies at the law school.
“To walk across that stage on Saturday, it felt unreal. All of the sleepless nights and all of the hard work paid off and it made me realize that all of the hard work was worth it”, he added.
He told News Source that he felt an enormous amount of pressure to be successful when he entered the Hugh Wooding Law School.
“When I got into Law School, that was when I realized that other persons were looking at me and that was when I realized that I was an example and persons were looking at me to see if I could do it, because then that would mean that other persons with disabilities could do it. And that created lots of pressure because if I failed, I worried that people might say that I should not be doing this in the first place. But I kept pushing because I knew this was not just for me, but it was for anyone with a disability”.
Law Peeps: Mandel and some of his UG and Hugh Wooding classmates
Back in 2014, Mandel Moore was granted a full scholarship by the Public Service Ministry to pursue his Hugh Wooding Law studies.
He said at first, he was told that scholarships were not available for law students but after he was recommended for a scholarship by the National Commission on Disability, that he had worked along with over the years, his scholarship was approved.
Mandel is now back in Guyana to fulfill his side of the agreement by working in the DPP’s Chambers as a State Prosecutor. He will remain there for the next five years as part of the scholarship contract.
Over the past weeks, he has been in the courtroom assisting other Prosecutors with their cases. Now that he has been admitted to the bar, he will be assigned his own cases and he is excited about that.
He said, “it has been a great experience so far and I cannot complain. I love working at the DPP and I love going to Court and I love being an Attorney. This job that I am doing, I enjoy doing it and I look forward to going to work everyday”.
According to the Attorney, he is not sure if he will continue on as a Prosecutor when his contract ends in five years, but he knows for sure that he will be involved in criminal law.
He said Senior Attorneys, Nigel Hughes and Attorney General Basil Williams, are two criminal lawyers that he admires.
Asked whether he would look forward to taking on either of them in a courtroom, a confident Mandel Moore pulled his jacket together again and said, “not right now, but sure one day I would look forward to it, but I would have to spend many nights up preparing my case. I will not sleep”.
Away from the law books and studies, Mandel admits that he lives a life that would be considered boring for some.
“I like watching Law and Order and any crime related show and so I would spend hours just soaking it all in when I get free time, but I’m all about work and working hard to eventually have a more than comfortable life for myself”.
He added, “This is my calling. I can’t be a carpenter or a mason or a labourer. I can’t do those jobs well with my disability but nothing affects my brain and I have thinking power and I am educated and that is what I will use non-stop in this life”.
As he turns the page on another chapter in his life, Mandel Moore said he is grateful to his parents and family for always being supportive of him.
He encourages parents of children who might have a disability to never treat them differently, point out that “they should give their children a chance because for me personally, I just have a physical disability. Nothing is wrong with my brain. I think the same way like everybody else thinks, I want the same things in life that everybody else wants, and I have the same feelings. It is just that I have a physical disability and so you should never treat me differently, and parents should not treat children differently because of a disability, because if they do, they will feel different and will act different. Treat them just like a regular child and they are going to act regular and behave regular.”
Mandel’s mother, Elsie February, leans in to offer a kiss and advice
“And to those children out there with a disability, I would say to them to believe in yourself and I honestly believe that you can achieve anything if you pray and work hard. Because that was what pushed me. I prayed hard and I studied hard”, he added.
Pulling on his long black robe as an Attorney-at-Law marks the start of a new journey for Mandel Moore. He has moved on from the boy with undeveloped arm and leg to an Attorney with two University Degrees and a career as a State Prosecutor.
In all the celebration, Mandel pauses and reflects that his only regret is that his father, who also earned degrees in Sociology and Law but never completed law school, did not live to see his dream of having one of his sixteen children become a lawyer, come true.
His father, Carland Moore, died three years ago.
But Mandel said he knows he would be proud of the man and Attorney that he has become. (by Gordon Moseley)
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