Arlene Violet
Arlene Violet, a native Rhode Islander, was a Sister of Mercy nun for 23 years, working in the inner city of Providence and other areas, on behalf of the poor. She concluded that she could do more to help others if she became a lawyer, so left the Sisterhood and entered Boston College Law School from which she received her Juris Doctor.
As a public interest attorney, she practiced consumer, environmental and developmental disability law. The case precedents she established, along with her election as the first female Attorney General in the United States, earned her a place in the book entitled The 50 Most Influential Women in American Law, along with Hillary Clinton and Supreme Court Justices, Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsberg. For almost 18 years she has been a top radio talk show host, and along with Dom Imus, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity, was selected as one of the top 100 talk show hosts (out of over 4000) in the U.S. Ms. Violet is also a member of the inaugural class for induction into the Rhode Island Radio Hall of Fame.
Making regular appearances as a legal and political commentator on NBC, CBS, and ABC-TV local affiliates, Ms. Violet has also been a guest on NPR and PBS television as a commentator. She has been featured on Sixty Minutes, Larry King Live and Crossfire. Random House published her autobiography, Convictions, in 1988 and her book on the Federal Witness Protection Program is scheduled for publication in 2010. Furthermore, her weekly political column allows her ideas to extend into every media.
Her work in the community and on diverse Boards of Directors, such as the Rhode Island Family Shelter, Opera Providence, Board of Governors of Rhode Island Hospital, Board of Trustees at Roger Williams University and the Board of Directors of the Initiative to Educate Afghan Women has resulted in her selection as Woman of the Year by numerous organizations. Among her awards, she was the first recipient of the Jefferson Award for Public Service. She received the local NAACP Humanitarian Award and was inducted into the R.I. Hall of Fame in 1996 and in 2007 elected to the Board of Directors of the Hall of Fame. She is also honored to serve on the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors of the Woman’s Campaign School at Yale Law School. As Attorney General, her colleagues in the U.S. Department of Justice honored her as the Law Enforcement Professional of the Year. Her pocket manual became a model for other Attorney Generals to use and was given to every Rhode Island police officer.
Other publications include her co-authored first manual on law as well as a school curriculum on law, which has been used in many Rhode Island high school classes. She participated in a joint program at RISD and Brown University as an adjunct professor of environmental law.
Ms. Violet helped judge the Miss America Pageant and was in the off-Broadway production of Nunsense in 1996 and 2004 at the Providence Performing Arts Center. She also wrote a musical with famed composer/lyricist Enrico Garzilli in 2007.
Contact Ms. Violet