Rishmil Patel, left, Alejandro Vera and Angela Corso talk Wednesday about a new Immigration Law Clinic that has opened at Roger Williams University.

The Providence Journal / Kathy Borchers

PROVIDENCE — Roger Williams University School of Law on Wednesday celebrated the launch of a new Immigration Law Clinic that aims to provide legal aid to immigrants who would otherwise have none, and train a new generation of immigration lawyers.

Prof. Mary Holper, the clinic’s director, is supervising an inaugural class of 10 students who started last month.

Dean David A. Logan said the need for such a clinic “has never been greater” in Rhode Island and Southeastern Massachusetts, because of their fast-growing immigrant populations. He called the clinic “one of the very special ways we can make a difference.”

Logan, and others who spoke at the RWU downtown campus yesterday, said those who are most in need of complex legal representation are frequently the least able to afford it. Their needs span the gamut: from basic education on how the immigration system works; to legal aid and/or representation in naturalizations; reunifications with relatives; asylum cases and criminal proceedings.

That includes citizens, legal permanent residents, those with quasi-legal status, and undocumented immigrants alike.

For example, “You’d have to be living under a rock" in the past few years not to have known about the dozens — the hundreds of people swept up in [immigration] raids in New Bedford and Rhode Island,” who had a relatively small pool of lawyers to draw from and few financial resources, Logan said.

Carl Krueger, immigration lawyer for the International Institute of Rhode Island — the state’s largest immigration agency — said there is “a crying need for accurate, competent immigration representation, for a very vulnerable” and often needy population, whether documented or undocumented. “For them, navigating this very complicated system” which at times affords few protections, “is very, very daunting.”

Holper, who ran a similar program at Boston College Law School before she joined the RWU faculty this summer, said deportation cases will be a focus. The students will also handle asylum cases for immigrants “fleeing harm, persecution and torture” in their home countries, and relief under the violence against women act. And, they will give “know your rights” presentations.

Holper said the students “can already tell you that immigration law is hard. It’s the equivalent of the tax code,” in complexity. But she said she also wants the students to “see the face of the person who needs you,” and be prepared

Rishmil Patel, one of the 10 in the inaugural class, said his visits to federal immigration detainees at the Bristol County House of Corrections have been “an eye-opener.” Patel said he’s working on the deportation case of the son of naturalized U.S. citizens, who is uncertain of his own legal status in this country.

Rhode Island Supreme Court Chief Justice Paul A. Suttell and Associate Supreme Court Justice William P. Robinson III were among those attending the clinic dedication at the Providence campus.

kziner@projo.com