This story was first published in the Miami Times. To view the story, click here.
On the passenger seat of Dawn Grace-Jones’ car lies a T-shirt that reads, “In a world where you can choose to be anything, choose to be kind.” For a nurse, attorney, magistrate, and health advocate who seeks to make the world a better place, it’s a perfect fit.
Though today she lectures to healthcare professionals and students and publicly speaks about self-care and workplace violence, her journey began as a sickly child who suffered from severe asthma.
Grace-Jones recalls spending a lot of her time as a child in doctors’ offices, and as she experienced the care they had for her, she decided she too wanted to comfort children suffering from disease and illness
“Becoming a pediatric nurse meant everything to me,” Grace-Jones said. “Up through college, that’s what I wanted, only.”
Upon entering nursing school, though, she soon realized that some of the young patients she would need to treat were being abused by their parents. As that thought took an emotional toll on her, she decided to step away from the dream she held since childhood.
Grace-Jones got her Bachelor’s degree from Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University and had started to work at what is now known as Jackson Health System when, out of the blue, a work colleague suggested she study law.
“I said, ‘I don’t want to go to law school! I don’t even like reading. Are you kidding?’,” Grace-Jones recalled. Still, her curiosity was piqued. Studying law, she figured, would offer another opportunity to help people.
After passing the bar exam on her first try, the University of Miami graduate became a medical-legal consultant under her own Miami-Dade firm, Dawn Grace-Jones PA, drawing on her medical expertise to deliver opinions on the medical aspects of legal cases.
After a colleague asked for her help in litigating an immigration case, she developed a knack — and a reputation — for handing out free advice, all while winning her own immigration and personal injury cases.
Grace-Jones would use what little free time she had to be outside the courtroom in the corridors, asking others about their cases and offering them pointers about what they needed to know. Although she would always say, “Alright I need to go now,” Grace-Jones recalls she would often fit one more person in to help, even when she had her own cases to prepare.
“I was breaking into this thing and I was feeling good about it,” Grace-Jones beamed, remembering how judges would commend her work.
While working as an assistant city attorney at the City of Miami Attorney’s Office, she developed severe spinal injuries while pregnant with her second child. Two major surgeries within four years prohibited her from working more than part-time as an arbitrator — a neutral third party who hears and settles disputes — and limited the duties she could carry out in her practice and nursing management.
But — “as God would have it,” she said — the Better Business Bureau offered to train her further as an arbitrator, allowing her to segue into magistrate work.
Now, Grace-Jones sits on the bench listening to cases as a magistrate, and her goal is still to help those who need it.
“I even find that in the courtroom, I will tell the defendant to stay after because I want to do some research into what I can do to help [them],” she said.
Grace-Jones recalls that the defendants she met with would often thank her, and how some would even cry when she helped them, causing her to become emotional as well.
“I think the most important thing we can give each other is kindness and our best, and whatever our talents and gifts are,” said Grace-Jones. “That’s what I try to do in every environment, and I think that is the most important thing I can do.”
