Jackson Free Press

The Mississippi Women Lawyers' Association presented Assistant U.S. Attorney Pshon Barrett with its 2017 Lifetime Achievement Award at a luncheon during MWLA Day of Leadership, which is a continuing legal education seminar at Mississippi College School of Law.

"I was deeply honored, surprised and humbled when I found out I was going to receive this award," Barrett told the Jackson Free Press. "I looked up a list of people who have received it in the past, and each one of those individuals is someone I feel great respect for."

Barrett, who was born in Rolling Fork, Miss., and grew up in Grenada, Miss., has worked as an assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Mississippi for 37 years. Each federal court district in the country has a U.S. attorney, which the president appoints. Lawyers working under a district's U.S. attorney are assistant U.S. attorneys. Mississippi has two federal court districts in Jackson, Gulfport and Oxford, though the current administration has not made any U.S. attorney appointments at this time, Barrett said.

Barrett was born prematurely, weighing less than two and a half pounds at the time of her birth, and she was born blind. She attended the Mississippi School for the Blind in Jackson from first grade through high school and went on to Belhaven College (now Belhaven University) for two years before she transferred to Mississippi State University, where she received a bachelor's degree in history in 1976. She went on to the University of Mississippi Law School, where she received her juris doctorate in law in 1979. She became an assistant U.S. attorney in 1980. Barrett later received a master's degree in marriage and family therapy from Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson in 1988.

"I've always been interested in politics and current events and felt that I would want to pursue a political career from early on," Barrett said. "I went to law school to study that field because I felt strongly about constitutional law and the importance of disability laws."

To help perform her duties, Barrett uses technology such as JAWS for Windows, which is a program that scans material onto a computer screen and reads it out loud, along with a Braille printer and an optical scanner that transcribes words and images onto a computer.

Barrett's duties as an assistant U.S. attorney include managing cases regarding government debt collection, student loans and enforcement of the Americans with Disabilities Act. She also handles incidents of overpayment to individuals from Medicaid and Medicare, employment discrimination and recovering government money lost to fraud or other misconduct.

In 1992 and 1993 Barrett served with the U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Disability Rights Section, as a trial attorney in the enforcement of the Americans with Disabilities Act. From 1998 to 2001 she served on the American Bar Association's Commission on Disability Rights. She is also a member of the attorney general's Advisory Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities and holds lectures on the Americans With Disabilities Act. Barrett is a chairperson of the board of directors of Mississippi Industries for the Blind and a member of the board of directors for the American Association of Visually Impaired Attorneys. She is also part of the Mississippi Council for the Blind.

Barrett also teaches Sunday school, sings solo and plays piano at Christ United Methodist Church in Jackson.