Reid Porter always knew he wanted to use his law degree to “right wrongs and bring about justice in a broken world.”
He just thought that would happen overseas – not in West Dallas, helping residents use civil litigation to rid their neighborhood of drug houses.
In 2009, while attending Park City Presbyterian Church in Dallas, Texas, Porter started Act for Justice, a nonprofit that works to end violence in Dallas-Fort Worth by shutting down drug houses. In the last 15 years, the organization has seen transformation begin in its community, helping more than 400 individuals take legal action against 256 crime-ridden properties.
“Act” stands for Advocates for Community Transformation. The organization’s approach is informed by both an understanding of how crime spreads and the church’s role in cultivating justice.
A New Approach to an Old Problem
Most people think that bringing drug traffickers and dealers to justice involves undercover investigations, drug busts, arrests, and criminal convictions. It can.
But it can also involve lawyers writing letters to the owners of drug houses, asking them to end the illegal activity on their property. If owners do not comply, lawyers can threaten litigation.
Traditional law enforcement – with drug busts, arrests and charges – has an important part to play in ending drug crimes, but targeting individuals involved in these crimes often isn’t enough.
“These [drug] houses tend to reopen within days, if not hours,” said Porter, who worked in a private civil litigation practice for seven years before Act opened. “It’s this game of Whac-A-Mole.”
Act is the only organization in the United States that uses civil litigation to shut down drug houses. Community residents hire Act to represent them in legal cases against owners of drug houses. Act has community advocates – a position Porter describes as “part investigator, part pastor, part social worker” – who help connect residents with Act.
Act has a network of lawyers who work for free to secure a legal remedy on behalf of these residents. The lawyers pursue injunction, court orders, that typically require the owners of drug houses to cease the illegal activity on their property. The lawyers can also threaten lawsuits against owners of drug houses.
Most cases settle without a trial – Porter estimates that only four of the 256 cases Act has taken on have resulted in a full trial.
Removing Crime’s Hiding Place
Act’s work is grounded in an understanding that most crimes in a neighborhood are concentrated in a few locations.
“[Crime] really needs a place to hide,” said Porter. “Much of the crime in our cities can actually be pointed back to a place that harbors the crime.”
Porter did not learn about place-based theories of crime just through reading sociologists and criminologists. He saw these theories play out with the people he met while serving in West Dallas with Park Cities Presbyterian Church (PCPC).
In the 2000s, Porter and other PCPC members served with a ministry that mentored young people in West Dallas, a historically poorer area of the city. But they quickly learned that crime and violence were hampering their mentees’ personal and professional prospects.
“It was very clear that there were still drug houses they had to walk past, that there was crime of other kinds as well, that was resulting in blight in the community,” explained Dennis Roossien, an elder at PCPC who was part of the mentorship ministry.
When crime and violence from drug houses spill out into the surrounding neighborhood, residents often feel like prisoners in their own homes.
Roossien and Porter were in a small group Bible study together at the time. Many young professionals in the group were trying to discern how to use their professional skills to serve God and others. The men, both lawyers, began to talk about the ways they could use their legal training to solve some of the larger problems in the neighborhood.
Realizing the role that civil litigation could play was an “epiphany,” Porter remembers. “You feel like the scales fall off your eyes, and it’s this beautiful opportunity where you really feel God speaking to you.”
PCPC has been involved with Act ever since, encouraging members to volunteer with Act and financially supporting the ministry. Roossien was an original member of Act’s board and now serves on an advisory board for the organization. He’s also been a lawyer in several Act cases.
Filling Gaps
Act is unapologetically Christian. A page on its website describes the theological reasons for its work and social media posts regularly focus on Jesus. All of its staff members are Christians, and while the lawyers who volunteer with Act are not required to be Christians, many are. Act was certified as one of the Best Christian Workplaces each year from 2018 to 2023.
Act is also deeply involved with local churches in Dallas-Fort Worth. Pastors often connect Act staff to community members who want to rid their neighborhoods of drug houses. Act staff often meet neighborhood residents at churches. This helps protect community members from drug dealers who may want to harm them for disrupting their business.
Twice a year, Act staff, volunteers, and community residents gather to pray for the work.
Act does not just empower neighborhoods, it also empowers churches, said Porter, by “really enabling them to live out their calling that Christ has given us to love him and love our neighbor.”
Act provides unique opportunities for Christian lawyers who want to use their professional skills in a ministry capacity. Lawyers can often feel like there isn’t a place in the church for them to use their skills and training, said Roossien.
“If you are a handyman, you get all kinds of opportunities to apply your calling to ministry buildings that need cleaning up, or widows and orphans whose needs need addressing,” he said.
The service opportunities for lawyers aren’t as straightforward. Most of the pro bono legal work that impacts people who are experiencing injustice is work for family lawyers and criminal defense attorneys – two very specialized fields of law.
But Act is different. Lawyers who take on cases for Acts’ clients are often drafting demand letters to owners of buildings, or explaining how they’ve broken the law.
“These are all things that people who do litigation work know how to do,” said Roossien.
It’s important that all Christians know they can use their professional skills to bring about God’s wholeness and redemption to a broken world, says Porter. A pastor’s kid, he grew up watching his father minister to people’s tangible and spiritual needs. He always wanted his law career to do the same, to apply the command in Micah 6:8 to “do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with your God.”
“I think too often, men and women feel like they have to be pastors or missionaries to participate in the good work that God is doing,” he said. “And yet, God’s gifted us all uniquely to bring about his glory and for our good.”
At its best, the legal system can be a “peaceful way to resolve conflict” until Jesus returns and brings full justice to the world, he said.
Robust Responses to Injustice
Churches should not be afraid of discussing or pursuing justice, especially when it requires them to work with people significantly different from them, said Roossien. West Dallas is a racially-diverse area, with many low-income residents. PCPC, on the other hand, is a mainly white, affluent congregation, he said.
“Outreach to the poor is one of the core values of the church,” Roossien said. Each congregation just needs to determine how it can best serve in this way.
He knows some churches have concerns about how social justice is discussed.
“We often associate some of these social, cultural ideas that drive justice with liberal theology,” he said.
But that isn’t always the case. A robust, thoughtful theology, like Reformed theology, can naturally lead to robust responses to social problems.
“I would argue that the sensibilities of people who are rigorous in their thinking are also rigorous in the way that they actually bring to bear solutions to these social problems,” he said.
Looking to the future, Porter and his team are planning for growth. In 2025 they plan to pilot their model in two additional cities outside of the Dallas-Fort Worth area. By 2027, they want to operate in three to five cities besides Dallas-Fort Worth. They want to be a national organization in the next 15 years.
“We’re really empowering people to make neighborhoods safer and stronger,” Porter said.