I am Ziedah Ferguson Tyrie Diata. I am an attorney, a former Chief Administrative Law Judge, and a social practice artist certified in nervous system-based facilitation and trauma-informed clinical practice. I believe in, and advocate for, equal access to justice, restorative justice, and trauma-informed environments that support communities and servant-leaders navigating personal, professional and systemic stressors.  I train, coach and facilitate workshops for stewards and advocates committed to seeing and serving the unseen and underserved. My work, in its various iterations, has always felt deeply personal.

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I was born in Brooklyn, New York and grew up in Hempstead, Long Island. My mother, Stephany Ferguson, was a middle school teacher in the New York City public schools her entire career. She directed the church drama club and vacation bible school. My father, Carl Ferguson, was an auditor who, later in life, returned to school to become a social worker for a union. He ran a support group for new fathers and was a beloved regular volunteer at a food bank for many years. Both of them sang in the church choir.  My parents kept a bag of percussion instruments in a closet, just in case someone (or everyone) got the urge to play along to a Tito Puente album. Looking back on it, I would say our values were family, creative expression and community service. As a young person, I knew I wanted to make things better in the world, but I wasn't quite sure how. I was a serious student and, somehow, a Girl Scout even in high school. I was also a theater kid, and had a creative spark that would dim at times, but would not be extinguished. I went to University of Maryland at College Park for journalism, and, immediately afterward, Georgetown University Law Center. 

 

I worked in public service in several capacities over the years, and began adjudicating for the New York State Department of State in 2008.  In 2017, I became the Chief Administrative Law Judge and the Director of the Office of Administrative Hearings. I led a statewide tribunal overseeing adjudication across more than 30 licensed occupations--and launched the agency's first Access to Justice Initiative, making it easier for ordinary people to understand the process, find legal help, and participate meaningfully in hearings that affected their livelihoods. I steered the tribunal through the hardship and instability of the pandemic--including leading the transition from in-person to virtual hearings. This was some of the hardest, most stressful work I had ever done, especially as I navigated the uncertainty and communal grief of the pandemic with my own family.

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Just as some of the most painful parts of the pandemic were beginning to ease, my parents passed unexpectedly in a car accident in early 2022.  In 2023, after much soul searching, I left my role as Chief because I could not conceive of healing any other way.  Although I set out on a very private and personal journey, as I researched trauma and trauma recovery, I realized my friends and colleagues--who were attorneys, judges, facilitators and advocates--absolutely needed to know what I had unintentionally discovered; compassion fatigue and secondary traumatic stress were impacting our bodies and (personal and professional) relationships in ways we had not fully understood.

 

The bad news was it is a lot worse than we imagined in terms of the sheer breadth and depth of the toll. The good news is there is a lot we could do make our bodies, our homes and our professional spaces, places of repair--even when we are doing the hard work of supporting people in crisis and distress. Not only can we help people without hurting ourselves, there are steps we can take avoid re-traumatizing others through our ignorance and neglect. We can prioritize creating trauma-informed environments including trauma-informed courts. 

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My commitment to access to justice and restorative justice comes with a commitment to building a foundation that can hold the stewards and servant-leaders with care and compassion, while also serving communities in ways that are sensitive to dynamics that can exacerbate and activate trauma responses in proceedings. Justice work is a long game that requires training the mind and body alike. I became certified in nervous system-based facilitation and trauma-informed clinical practice so I could expand my capacity to support justice-sector institutions more holistically. 

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I believe attorneys, judges and other non-attorney justice workers do their best work when they are healthy and whole. I am eager to share accessible practices and slightly less accessible science with anyone who will listen. I have led many community practice sessions and taught continuing legal education trainings for the New York County Bar Association and the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary. My perspective on the relationship between well-being and ethical performance has also been featured in the Fordham Urban Law Journal's article "In Right Relationship: Practice and Teaching Trauma-Informed Restorative Advocacy" by Amy Dallas (Vol. LIII, 2025), where I discuss how practitioners' own nervous systems influence their interactions with their clients, creating, in my view, an ethical obligation for practitioners to understand and care for their nervous systems as part of serving their clients' best interests. 

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