The Patrick D. Sheeran & Michael J. Crowley Memorial Trust launched a website, sheerancrowley.org, in April aimed at making it easier to help Texas lawyers, judges, and law students with substance abuse problems, depression, and other mental health issues.
Lawyers who find themselves suffering from depression or drinking too much often feel that they are alone, with nowhere to get help. A small group of lawyers realized that with proper treatment, these attorneys could return to a fulfilling life and practice. In 1995, they created the Sheeran-Crowley Trust to provide financial assistance to those in need who didn’t have the means to pay for services.
Today the trust has distributed nearly $150,000 in grants to attorneys who needed help. And as a recent study released by the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation and the American Bar Association Commission on Lawyer Assistance Programs showed, these services are greatly needed: 21 percent of licensed working attorneys are problem drinkers, 28 percent struggle with some level of depression, and 11 percent of lawyers have had suicidal thoughts at some point in their career. And younger attorneys are having a harder time than their experienced counterparts. The study found that 32 percent of lawyers 30 years old or younger have a drinking problem.