FFLA names Miami lawyer Jose A. ‘Pepe’ Villalobos and former FFLA President Maria Henderson 2025 Medal of Honor recipients
Jose A. “Pepe” Villalobos of Akerman has been selected to receive FFLA’s 2025 Medal of Honor Award for a Lawyer, and Maria Henderson, a consultant with Akerman, will receive the Medal of Honor Award for a Non-Lawyer.
The Medal of Honor is FFLA’s highest honor.
The Medal of Honor Award, sponsored by Florida Lawyers Mutual Insurance Company, is presented each year to a member of The Florida Bar who has demonstrated his or her dedication to the objectives of the Bar’s rules “to inculcate in its members the principles of duty and service to the public, to improve the administration of justice, and to advance the science of jurisprudence.” The Medal of Honor may also be awarded to a member of the public or a lawyer not actively engaged in the practice of law who has made outstanding achievements in improving the administration of justice in Florida.
FFLA will present the Medal of Honor Awards to Villalobos and Henderson at its award ceremony and breakfast at The Boca Raton on June 26 during The Florida Bar Annual Convention. Tickets are available at https://fundingfla.org/tickets/.
Jose A. “Pepe” Villalobos
Jose A. “Pepe” Villalobos
Villalobos is being honored for his “exceptional legal acumen, dedication to justice, and advocacy for higher education and judicial diversity, which has left a lasting impact on the South Florida community and the legal profession.”
“It is without reservation that the Cuban American Bar Association (CABA) hereby nominates its esteemed member and past president, Jose A. Villalobos, for the 2025 Medal of Honor Award,” wrote CABA President Amanda L. Fernandez in her nomination of Villalobos. “As impressive as his day-to-day professional practice is, the basis for this nomination is Pepe’s exceptional, life-long service and steadfast commitment to the betterment of the legal profession and greater community.”
Villalobos, who will celebrate 50 years of legal practice this June, graduated from the Universidad Catolica Santo Tomas de Villanueva Law School in Havana, Cuba, in 1959. His graduation coincided with Fidel Castro’s rise to power. Faced with the requirement to pledge allegiance to the Castro regime to be sworn in before the Cuban Supreme Court, Villalobos refused and chose exile in the United States rather than compromise his principles.
Upon arriving in the U.S., Villalobos supported his family through various occupations — as a longshoreman, farm laborer, freight loader, roofer, lecturer, and journalist of international affairs. Determined to rebuild his legal career, he enrolled at Biscayne College and obtained a bachelor’s degree while simultaneously participating in a newly approved program by the Florida Supreme Court for Cuban lawyers at the University of Florida. He was admitted to The Florida Bar in 1976.
Throughout his career, Villalobos has served the public through numerous pro bono positions and programs. During Florida Gov. Bob Graham’s administration, Villalobos was appointed to the Marketable Record Title Act Commission, where millions of acres of state lands and public funds were protected. Gov. Graham also enlisted his help in securing state and local business leaders for trade missions to Latin America and appointed him to a Judicial Nominating Commission. As chair, Villalobos championed diversity in the judiciary, advocating for the nomination of women, Black, and Hispanic judges to the bench.
During Gov. Lawton Chiles’ administration, Villalobos drafted a comprehensive treatise on Economic Development for the State of Florida. Previously, when Chiles served as a U.S. senator, he appointed Villalobos to chair the selection committee that recommended candidates to U.S. military academies.
“At a time when social division was at its peak, Pepe unsurprisingly emerged as a masterful bridge-builder, serving as vice chair of Miami-Dade County’s Community Relations Board to help heal deep-seated racial and ethnic divisions,” noted Fernandez. “Through his service and leadership, he systemically shattered false narratives of conflict between the Hispanic and Black minority communities while also championing unprecedented diversity in the judiciary.”
When the Cuban Mariel boatlift crisis brought some 2,000 parentless, unaccompanied children to Florida’s shores in 1980, Villalobos volunteered his time to provide pro bono legal representation for hundreds of the newly arrived minor children. His efforts earned the recommendation of the Chief Juvenile Administrative Judge Seymour Gelber to be awarded The Florida Bar’s Pro Bono Award.
Villalobos’ volunteer efforts span outside of the legal world into both education and health. He was instrumental in advancing education in Florida, volunteering to assist securing funding in Washington, D.C., for Florida International University. As chair of Kendall Regional Hospital, his contributions helped to establish a state-of-the-art trauma center, specialized burn unit, and emergency helipad innovations that saved countless lives and redefined healthcare standards.
“Pepe has admirably volunteered countless hours to improving the administration of justice from both an individual level of client representation as well as playing a role in the promulgation of fair adjudication and advocacy on an institutional level,” Fernandez wrote.
Throughout his career, Villalobos has served as a professional mentor to countless attorneys and leaders in the community, acting as a nexus for both the steadfast continuity of the profession’s legal principles and an advocate of advancement for the betterment of the community’s legal minds.
Villalobos has been recognized professionally many times, including by a Florida Bar Certificate of Merit for the Second Conference of Lawyers of the Americas; a Miami-Dade County Commission Proclamation of “Pepe’s Day” on September 18, 2019; with “For the Love of Law” recognition by the University of Florida; with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Cuban American Bar Association; and by the 11th Judicial Circuit Historical Society’s Legal Legend Award.
“I bore witness to countless public officials, judges, organizations, and individuals reaching out to Pepe for him to help right a wrong, raise others up, garner respect and dignity for persons, and gather a slice of the American dream across racial, gender and ethnic lines,” said retired Chief Judge Joseph P. Farina in a letter supporting Villalobos’ nomination. “Pepe dedicated his enormous talent, fortitude and perseverance, without compensation, spending thousands of hours broadening composition of our community while expanding his family of friends.”
Maria Henderson
Maria Henderson
Henderson is being recognized for her dedication to increasing access to justice for the vulnerable and her exceptional contributions as a non-lawyer advocate, making a transformative impact on pro bono efforts and Florida’s legal community.
“For decades, Maria Henderson has been devoted to helping the vulnerable,” wrote Gina DelChiaro, partner and director of Pro Bono Initiatives at Akerman, in her nomination statement. “This is not her full-time job, but it has been high on her list of priorities for such a long time, and it is central to who she is.”
Henderson, who has more than two decades of experience in the property and casualty insurance sector, began her career in banking, in the areas of operations research and corporate marketing. She graduated with a degree in math and physics from the University of Florida and a master’s degree in information management from American University. She gained invaluable experience working at the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, D.C., where she and a fellow colleague developed an automated system to evaluate bank mergers and acquisition market effects.
At Akerman, Henderson works with insurance companies and self-insured companies to navigate complex regulatory issues and create effective and compliant operations solutions. She also provides business support to Akerman’s Pro Bono Initiative, with a focus on communications and marketing, and increasing recruitment of the firm’s lawyers to do more pro bono work.
“For more than five years, not a single week has gone by when Maria has not done work on a pro bono matter or for the Pro Bono Initiative,” said DelChiaro.
In 2024, Henderson helped lead a team to a litigation win for a client fleeing persecution and seeking protection in the U.S. Over the course of five years, she donated her project management skills to steer the legal team, managing the task list, ensuring regular team meetings, and staying in regular contact with the client.
“I was totally devastated and all alone,” the client wrote in a letter supporting Henderson’s nomination. “Maria has been my source of information and support since I first came to America. She would always find the best information that I needed and share it with me in an understandable way. But she also did work on my case, helping find witnesses and other evidence for my case.”
Maria exemplifies the value that a non-lawyer can add to the litigation process – maintaining evidence logs and timelines, reviewing documents for factual consistency and being a trusted confidant of the client. She devoted more than 200 pro bono hours to the case and even traveled to meet with the client in person, funding the travel cost out of her own pocket.
Henderson has worked on a variety of other pro bono matters, including veterans’ clinics and other projects for Jacksonville Area Legal Aid and other legal services organizations.
From 2004 to 2014, Maria served on FFLA’s board, chairing grant committees and the Finance and Audit Committee, and led the organization as its first non-lawyer president in 2012-13. She received The FFLA President’s Award for Excellence in 2008 for her steadfast and enthusiastic support of the FFLA mission, and the clarity and strength of her convictions.
Henderson was also a member of Florida Legal Services’ Capital Campaign Committee and The Florida Bar’s Second Judicial Circuit’s Grievance Committee, and served on the Tampa Museum of Art Board of Trustees.
She also provided financial support in 2019 through seed funding for The Hon. William A. Van Nortwick, Jr., Impact for Justice Fund, honoring her late husband, which provided Southern Legal Counsel with legal resources, national experts, litigation expenses and needed technology to provide high-quality representation.
“Financial support like what Maria has provided every year is critical in helping Southern Legal Counsel ensure that those with the least power, such as low-income children, people with disabilities and older adults, have a critical line of defense in safeguarding their most basic rights,” said Jodi Siegel, executive director of Southern Legal Counsel, in a letter supporting Henderson’s nomination.
“Access to justice requires more than just lawyers,” wrote DelChiaro. “Maria Henderson is the embodiment of how crucial non-lawyers can be, and how they change and save lives.”
