Naomi Beth Rosenfeld
Lovingly known as “Nomi”
14 February 1936 — 7 October 2021 · aged 85
Labor and immigration lawyer who read every client's whole file, and a mahjong shark
Miami, United States Born in The Bronx, New York Resting at Mount Nebo Memorial Park, Miami, FloridaAbout Naomi
At seventy-nine, Naomi Rosenfeld argued her last appeal before Florida's Third District Court of Appeal, for a Haitian family facing deportation, in a borrowed blazer because her own was at the cleaners. She won. Then she spent twenty minutes in the courthouse hallway quietly telling the young associate who had assisted her exactly which of his three best arguments he had buried.
Born in the Bronx in 1936 to a Yiddish-speaking tailor and a bookkeeper, Naomi was the first in her family to attend university: Brooklyn College, then NYU School of Law, class of 1960, where she was one of eight women among three hundred students. Firms offered her a secretarial job. She declined and went to work as a staff attorney for the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union on Seventh Avenue, where she spent twelve years representing seamstresses and pressers, billing nobody and winning more than anyone expected.
In 1972 her husband Harold, a high-school math teacher, took a job in Miami-Dade, and Naomi followed with a legal pad and a plan. She opened a small practice near Biscayne Boulevard, represented hotel workers in Miami Beach, and from the 1980s took on asylum cases, mostly Haitian, Cuban and later Venezuelan families, which she handled with coffee, patience and the conviction that everyone deserves at least one person who reads their whole file. She taught immigration law as an adjunct at the University of Miami School of Law for twenty years and volunteered for Legal Services of Greater Miami well into her eighties.
She was also, famously, a mahjong shark, a daily swimmer, and a poor driver whose neighbors learned to wait at stop signs. Friday nights meant candles, her own challah and a table full of clients, neighbors and strays. A note on her refrigerator read: Did you help someone today?
Naomi died on 7 October 2021, aged eighty-five, at home in Miami, with her children beside her. Harold died in 2010. She is survived by her daughter Rebecca, her son David, four grandchildren and her sister Sylvia. May her memory be a blessing.
“Did you help someone today? If not, there is still time.”
- Faith
- Jewish
- Place of birth
- The Bronx, New York
- Resting place
- Mount Nebo Memorial Park, Miami, Florida
- Passed away
- 7 October 2021, Miami
Funeral Service & Shiva
Saturday, 9 October 2021 at 08:00 UTC
Add to calendarLife journey
B.A.
Brooklyn College1953 – 1957 · Brooklyn, New York
Studied history and worked nights at a Bronx pharmacy.
Juris Doctor
NYU School of Law1957 – 1960 · New York
One of eight women in her class of three hundred.
Staff Attorney
International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union1960 – 1972 · New York
Represented seamstresses and pressers on Seventh Avenue.
Married Harold Rosenfeld
1962 – 2010 · New York
Forty-eight years of marriage, most of them spent arguing happily about baseball.
Attorney, Private Practice
Law Offices of Naomi B. Rosenfeld1972 – 2016 · Miami
Labor and immigration law, one client at a time.
Adjunct Professor of Immigration Law
University of Miami School of Law1985 – 2005 · Coral Gables, Florida
Taught a generation of lawyers that a client is a person, not a file number.
Pro Bono Service Award
Dade County Bar Association2004 · Miami
For decades of free legal help for asylum seekers.
Tap an organisation to find others who studied or worked there.
Family & connections
Naomi is survived by
- Rebecca Rosenfeld-Katz· Daughter
- David Rosenfeld· Son
- Sylvia Weiner· Sister
- 4 grandchildren· Grandchildren
Tributes & memories
6 people have shared a memory of Naomi.
Knew Naomi? Share a memory with the family and everyone who loved them.
Sign in to write a tribute- YR
Cousin, Haifa
Naomi visited us in 1988 and corrected the lawyer at the next table in a Haifa café while he was speaking Hebrew. She did not speak Hebrew. She just knew he was wrong. We are all better for her certainty.
- HW
Former law student, now an immigration attorney
Professor Rosenfeld told us on the first day of class, “If you ever stop being outraged, change careers.” Eleven years in, I'm still outraged, still practicing, and still using her legal-pad system. She wrote me a letter when I passed the bar. It is framed above my desk.
- LG
Mahjong partner for thirty years
Naomi cheated at mahjong exactly once, in 2003, to let me win on my birthday. She confessed forty-eight hours later in tears. I told her I'd known the whole time. We laughed until the tiles fell on the floor. I will miss her more than I can say.
- CM
Colleague, Legal Services of Greater Miami
Naomi worked case files at our long table well past eighty, with a magnifying glass and a pencil. She could spot a missing date in a hundred-page declaration from across the room. We called her the Human Highlighter. She called us “darling,” and meant it every time.
- JP
Former client from Port-au-Prince
Mrs. Rosenfeld read all four hundred pages of my case and then asked about my daughter's drawings. I stayed. My daughter is now an architect in Miami. When I tried to thank her she said, “I'll take a mango.” I brought twelve.
- RA
Rabbi
Every Rosh Hashanah Naomi sent me a list of people who needed a call, with their phone numbers. Not because it was my job, but because she knew mine. She taught our congregation that tzedakah is not a gift, but an appointment.
