Agne Ona Jomantaite

Agne Jomantaite, attorney, advocate for the oppressed, and artist of Brooklyn NY, aged 34, passed away in her sleep from a brain thrombosis on May 31st 2024.

An immigrant from Lithuania to New York City at age 14, Agne lived a peripatetic and full life, excelling at everything she did. Very quickly after her arrival into the cultural dynamo of Brooklyn she'd learned both English and Russian. Four years later she was named the valedictorian at the Brooklyn High School of the Arts. She won a scholarship to Occidental College in Los Angeles where she earned a BA in Religious Studies with Honors. After graduation she traveled to Britain where she received an MPhil From Cambridge University in Economic Development and International Relations. She returned to the US to attend New York University Law School. There she was the Senior Online Editor of the NYU Law Review and earned her Juris Doctor. She worked for a time with a major law firm in NYC, but then, eschewing a career in "big law" she returned to her native Lithuania, where in collaboration with Vilnius University, she conducted ethnographic and archival research on Lithuanians exiled to Siberia during the Soviet occupation. Soon she returned to her adopted home of NYC and took a position in the City of New York's Office of Civil Justice, providing free civil legal services to low-income New Yorkers facing eviction, in landlord-tenant disputes, immigration issues, domestic violence, and worker-rights claims. Agne was a profoundly ethical and deeply compassionate person whose belief in justice, commitment to equity and equality, and love for humanity defined her life practice. In all the circles in which she moved throughout her too short life, she exuded warmth and kindness. Some might find her playful, poetic, and even enigmatic, ways confounding at times but, fully attentive to the possibilities of others, her generous spirit drew out other people’s best qualities, and she made all who spent time with her feel valued and important. Indeed, to be in her presence was a like a divine gift. The tenderness of her spirit lives on and continues to comfort those who knew and loved her.

Her profound empathy for all livings things and organic connection to the natural world was also manifest in her artwork in which she combined all manner of natural materials - flowers, leaves, feathers and bones etc - in a range of media. She leaves behind her mother Zina and many, many friends who'll cherish her memory. Her mother asks that you say a simple prayer and light a candle for her beautiful and loving daughter. In lieu of flowers her mother would like to invite anyone interested in planting a tree in Agne's name to do so at this website: https://www.irishheritagetree.com