By Nell Gluckman, From The Am Law Daily

New Yorker Ramiro Ocasio was dubbed a “subway hero” for leaping onto the tracks to help a stranger at Lexington Avenue and 59th Street two years ago. After lifting the elderly man back up to the platform, Ocasio was reportedly hauled back up himself just seconds before the Q train pulled into the station.

Ocasio, a records assistant and former mailroom clerk at Kirkland & Ellis with nearly a decade at the firm, got plenty of attention for the 2013 rescue. But few stories mentioned that Ocasio was already a hero to many families thousands of miles away, in Honduras.

Now Ocasio is hoping to take those efforts even further, as president of The Foundation for Education in Honduras. On Saturday he attended a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the foundation’s first major project: refurbishing an existing school building and constructing new classrooms in Santiago Morales, a Honduras community of about 300 families.

The non-profit, which Ocasio helped found with fundraising and legal help from Kirkland, is dedicated to building schools in the country where he was raised.

“I never thought in a million years that I’d be building a school,” Ocasio told the Am Law Daily four days before heading to Honduras for the ceremony.

The project started—indirectly—when Ocasio was robbed during a visit to Honduras around Christmas time a decade ago. A little boy begging for food came into Ocasio’s friend’s house, where they were having dinner. Before anyone could respond, the kid grabbed a plate and ran way, Ocasio said.

Ocasio chased him down, and when he caught up to the boy, he saw a whole family eating his leftovers. Saddened by this scene, Ocasio and his friend brought the family about 10 proper plates of food.

Their response surprised him. “They only took the necessary food for them to eat that night,” Ocasio said. “The rest of the food, they went and shared with their neighbors. They could have saved the food for tomorrow, but that day they shared with the neighbors.”

Every Christmas thereafter, when Ocasio returned to Honduras, he’d bring money, food and toys to donate to rural communities throughout the country.

In 2009, that effort grew to include Kirkland. Ocasio was working in the firm’s mailroom at the time, and would often stop to chat with restructuring partner Jonathan Henes about sports or politics.

Ocasio told Henes about his upcoming trip to Honduras and Henes promptly wrote a $500 check.

“I was going to Honduras with [about] $1,000,” said Ocasio. “Then Jon comes out of nowhere and gives me $500. Now I’m going down with like $1,600. That’s a big difference!”

The following year, in 2010, Ocasio and Henes collected about $3,000 from other Kirkland partners for Ocasio to bring to Honduras. In 2011 he didn’t make the trip, but in 2012 they raised $9,000 from lawyers and support staff at the firm, which Ocasio used to help another organization refurbish a school. They got Kirkland to donate some computers to the school, as well, Henes said.

“Six months after that, Ramiro comes into my office,” recalled Henes. Ocasio told the bankruptcy partner that he’d just heard from the school’s principal that for the first time, no students had dropped out of the school.

“I said, ‘This has to stop—all this ad hoc,” said Henes (pictured right). “We’re going to start a foundation. You’ll be the president. Kirkland will do the legal work.”

Kirkland associate Andrew Kimball and then-associate Vincent Thorn, who was recently named partner, did the legal work to obtain 501(c)3 status for the organization.

The foundation has since formed a board, which includes former Weil, Gotshal & Manges bankruptcy partner Shai Waisman, who is now CEO of Prime Clerk. There is also a junior board that raises money and builds awareness for the projects.

The foundation’s first activity was to commission a local artisan to build desks and chairs for a school that didn’t have any, Henes said.

And in September, the foundation made a commitment to the Clinton Foundation to build five schools in the next three years. So far, more than $108,000 has been raised, about half of which came from Kirkland employees. Henes said it costs between $20,000 and $40,000 to build or refurbish a school in Honduras.

Some of the money also came from strangers who sent Ocasio checks after he appeared on ABC News to talk about rescuing the man in the subway. Henes said Ocasio put those checks towards the Honduras project.

About 90 children currently attend the school in Santiago Morales that Ocasio visited over the weekend. Once the new construction is complete, students from a neighboring community will also be able to attend, Ocasio said.

Ocasio also said he has his eye on two other communities that he thinks are good candidates for new schools. And he still keeps his eyes open when he takes the subway.

IMAGE: Ramiro Ocasio

For more on this story go to: http://www.americanlawyer.com/id=1202739576487/Kirklands-Subway-Hero-Tackles-Education-Crisis-in-Honduras#ixzz3oSkLk3Pj