Danielle Bunker wants to use AI for good.
A junior studying political science at NC A&T State University, Bunker has been working on a mobile application to help people navigate the legal system.
Hey Justice, which she conceived with her brother David Bunker, is currently in development.
“There is such a need for this, and I want to make it the best in the legal tech space,” Bunker said.
The idea came about when Bunker heard speakers at last year’s National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) convention talk about the need to blend justice and accessibility with the potential of AI.
“I instantly started thinking about social justice,” Bunker said. “I want to be an attorney and I started thinking, ‘How can I be part of the solution?’”
Bunker interned at NxtGen Law Group in downtown Greensboro for two years, where she saw firsthand the minor snags that could turn into major costs for clients.
“Clients would come in and because they didn’t understand their paperwork, they would pay anywhere from $200 to $300 to thousands of dollars so an attorney could break down their paperwork,” Bunker said. “These clients that don’t have the money are spending it all for legal clarification.”
Bunker started thinking: Couldn’t AI translate paperwork in a culturally relevant way?
She thought about other issues she saw, too. Clients would miss their court dates and rack up additional fines or warrants for their arrest. “I thought, ‘Why isn’t there anything to simplify and automate this process?’”
Her brother has a background in cybersecurity and IT, and together they came up with the idea for an app that can help clients track their court dates and understand what’s going on throughout the process. While there are other legal apps on the market, most of them are attorney-facing. There aren’t many that help the clients. Hey Justice aims to change that.
“This app is really a foundational approach to Danielle recognizing some shortcomings in terms of the technology to help people,” said Jason L. Keith, the founder and lead attorney at NxtGen Law Group. “It simplifies everything and makes things more convenient. It’s amazing, and I’m proud of her for doing it.”
Rather than waiting to get reminders in the mail, Hey Justice will allow clients to scan court paperwork to flag important dates. Clients then receive text messages informing them of their next court date, as well as the significance of the dates and what they’ll need to bring. Reminders go out as early as a month before and then two weeks in advance. It will also connect to the user’s digital calendar of choice so they have an extra visual reminder.
The app will also offer document translation, converting legalese to standard American English, Spanish, or African American Vernacular English (AAVE).
“This was so important to have in the app,” Bunker said. “There are a lot of minorities and African Americans who [don’t speak in standard English], and when people come to the law office, it usually wasn’t because they didn’t understand completely. The paperwork just wasn’t in a way they could understand.”
The writing in legal paperwork is often complicated, Bunker said, but attorneys can explain it in more casual language.
“It’s important to include people that look like me and communities of color in the conversation,” she said.
The last feature they are developing for the app is what Bunker calls “Witness Mode.” It will allow users to instantly share their live location with an emergency contact while streaming live video. It comes from Bunker’s own experiences in potentially unsafe situations, she said.
“It’s for people who need a witness,” she said, “who need an advocate in their pocket to let your emergency contact know what’s going on. It came from seeing a need that wasn’t being met.”
Bunker and her team got a boost in funding and confidence last November when they won $20,000 in the 2025 Black Ambition Prize Competition, a non-profit founded by musician Pharrell Williams that invests in Black entrepreneurs. Hey Justice was one of a handful of winners out of more than 2,500 applicants.
The funding will be used to for development and paying the app team, which includes two additional software developers and a social media strategist.
Bunker is still attending school full-time, but the rest of her hours are spent developing Hey Justice. The team hopes to have the first working version by May, and to begin pushing it out to local law firms and public defender offices.
“It feels like the work is never done, but I love the work,” she said. “And I’m dedicated to doing it. I’m dedicated to making it the best legal tech in the state.”