News Archive

Never say never.

Olena Protsenko, LL.M., ‘20, realized how this idiomatic expression rings true after getting a job offer from the Tippecanoe County Prosecutor’s Office.

“Even though I was skeptical about my chances as an international student to find a real employment opportunity at the law school job fair, I am happy to acknowledge that I was wrong!” Protsenko said. As a Ukrainian attorney, she won 12 cases at the European Court of Human Rights, so she knows a great deal about how to successfully prepare a case for trial.

Protsenko said she found her Indiana position by attending IU McKinney’s job fair and “simply by taking an extra step and initiating a conversation with the representative of the Tippecanoe County Prosecutor’s Office.” She worked in the Major Felony Division from September 2020 to February 2021. She engaged in legal research, analysis, and drafting of pleadings in criminal cases involving mostly sex offenses and controlled substance crimes.

In March 2021, Protsenko started working as a Post-Doctoral Research Associate in Psychiatry and Law of the University of Virginia School of Law’s Institute of Law, Psychiatry, and Public Policy, which is where she did her post-LL.M. internship. She said her research focuses on “the Soviet abuse of psychiatry and mental health law evolution in the region since the collapse of the Soviet Union.”

Protsenko came to IU McKinney as a Fulbright Scholar. She earned her LL.M. degree in International Human Rights Law with distinction. She also received the Norman Lefstein Award of Excellence gold-level honor for engaging in the law school’s pro bono program and contributing 200 or more hours of service.

“I only had two semesters at the law school and certainly did not plan on working in the field of criminal law,” she said. “Nevertheless, I can say with confidence that the knowledge I got at McKinney is helping me a lot in tackling my daily assignments at my new job.”

After graduating from IU McKinney in May 2020, Protsenko spent three months as a law intern at the Virginia Institute of Law, Psychiatry, and Public Policy under the Edmund S. Muskie Internship Program. “In Virginia, I studied correctional psychiatry and persons with dementia involvement in the criminal justice system. I also observed forensic evaluations of suspects,” she said. Once that internship was completed, she returned to Indiana to work in the Tippecanoe County Prosecutor’s Office.

Protsenko has a solid track record as a human rights attorney in Ukraine, handling cases before the European Court of Human Rights. She said she engaged in this “strategic litigation” in order to protect and promote “the rights of persons with mental disabilities in Ukraine.” She lectured about “Social Care Homes in Ukraine: Life Sentence without a Crime” during the law school’s International Student Speaker Series in Spring 2020. She talked about how judges, administrators of social care homes, and guardians abuse persons with mental disabilities in Ukraine. In addition, she won first prize during the Legal English Oral Presentation Competition at IU McKinney in August 2019, and served as risk manager of the LL.M. students’ Master of Laws Association.