In Defense
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Anobil was five years old and spoke only the Ghanaian dialect of Twi. Her father
sent them money whenever he could, while she and her mother drifted from state
to state, staying with relatives or in local churches. Within two years, they
had relocated 16 times before finally settling in Northern California.
Amidst a neighborhood rampant with drugs and crime, Anobil socialized with peers
who were more concerned with their popularity than their education. As Anobil's
grades and attitude tumbled, her parents began to worry. Consequently, her mother
bought her a one-way ticket to Ghana and enrolled her in the Herman Gmeiner
Secondary School. "I was like 'You're leaving me here? This isn't right,
I'm an American now,'" remembered Anobil. "I was bitter and didn't
study for the first three months of the semester. I couldn't accept what my
mom had done to me."
When the results of her first exam were posted on the public wall, they ranked Anobil dead last, and she lost the respect of her hard-working Ghanaian peers. "I realized this wasn't me," she explained. "These kids were working so hard even though they knew most of them wouldn't even get into the universities. I realized I had been so blessed to come to the United States, and I was wasting the opportunities it could offer me." It was a wake-up call that made her decide to turn her life around. Devouring Herman Gmeiner's rigorous curriculum for the next two years, she returned home with a new perspective-and a ninth place ranking.
Anobil arrived as a freshman at APU a year after her return from Ghana, seeking a place where she could earn her undergraduate degree and cultivate her relationship with Christ. "A Christian school was key for me because I wanted to grow spiritually as well as academically," she said. "I wanted an environment that would nurture my faith and APU was the obvious choice."
As an undergraduate, Anobil mentored teenage mothers and counseled young women through a local Crisis Pregnancy Center, administering pregnancy tests and coordinating free health care and housing opportunities. "My outreach experiences at APU gave me a better understanding of other people's experiences," she said. "They helped me to think beyond myself to someone else's misery." Recollections of her own experience as a teenager and her interactions with at-risk youth as an APU student, attracted her to a profession that would allow her to work on behalf of the neglected and hurting. "I returned from Ghana as a teenager with a keen interest in a career which would allow me to make a difference in people's lives," said Anobil, explaining her decision to pursue a career in law. "As an immigrant, I've learned that a great many are unaware of their rights."
Upon graduating from APU with a degree in English, she attended the University of California at Davis, School of Law, and participated in a clerkship for Justice Marvin R. Baxter of the California Supreme Court, preparing memoranda on petitions for review in civil and criminal cases. Just a month after graduation, Anobil is now a Deputy District Attorney for the Contra-Costa County District Attorney's Office, a position that is turning her dream to make a difference a reality.
"Victim's rights are very important to me," she said. "In hindsight, I can see that not everyone who does bad things is a bad person. Taking that perspective with me as a D.A. allows me to be more objective and more aware of human nature."
