The Mexican American Bar Association

Transcription

1 The Mexican American Bar Association Invites you to attend MABA MCLE Day: "Hands Up: Don't Shoot and Don't Deport Me" Civil Rights Litigation & Immigration MCLE Day Date: Saturday, January 17, 2015 Time: 8:30am Registration 9:00am-3:30pm MCLEs Location: Loyola Law School 919 S. Albany Street Los Angeles, Parking Available for $9 Price: *25 Law Students with valid I.D. *$75 Government & Non- Profit Rate $100 MABA Members and Non-Members Rate *A redu ced rate of $75 will b e offered to MABA members w ho pay their dues on or before January 17, Eight MCLE Credits * One hour of Ethics * One hour of Substance Abuse *One Hour of Elimination of Bias *Five hours of General Limited Space! To Reserve Contact Maria Torres (213) mabalaco@sbcglobal.net Fax Reservation Form (213) Civil Rights Panel 1 9:00 am to 10:30 am Hon. Fernando M. Olguin, Jim De Sim one, Humberto Guizar 1) Presenting claims for excessive forc e i n State and Federal C ourt, benefits and burdens i n State and Feder al court, di ffer enc es related to discovery & trials, and recent case l aw 2) Motion practice, how to obtain the evidence to maximi ze your chanc e of success 3) Foll ow the rul es, from a j udg e s perspective Civil Rights Panel 2 Sam Paz, S oni a Merc ado 1) Proving supervisori al liability: how and why to target law enforcement officials at the hig hest levels in excessive force c ases 2) Recent case law and practical tools Civil Rights Panel 3 J ohn B urton, Ar nol do Casill as Agenda 10:45 am to 12:00 pm Immigration Panel 1 Saira Hussain, Asian Americans Advancing Justice ThomasA. Saenz, Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund 1) Exc essive policing i n the immigration context 2) TRUST Act gui dance Special Keynote Address on President Obama s Executive Action Felicia Escobar, White House Official Special Assistant to the President for Immigration Policy 1) Jur y selection and trials in shooting cases 2) Understandi ng how the tas er works and when its use may be actionable Substance Abuse MCLE Hum berto Gui zar, Richard C hac on Smell the coffee and get real: substanc e abus e and its effect on the pr actice of law 12:00 pm to 1:00 pm Lunch and Keynote Address 1:15 pm to 2:30 pm 2:30 pm to 3:30 pm Immigration Panel 2 (Ethics MCLE) Alvaro Huerta, National Immigr ati on Law Center (NI LC) How President Obama s Admi nistrative Relief affects your immigrant clients in Los Ang eles Elimination of Bias MCLE Alexis Nava Teodoro, ACLU, Eden Jequinto, UCLA Law Student, Edna Monroy, CIYJA, Hector Alessandro Negrete, CIYJA, Betty Jaspeado, DTLA Moderator: Ilse Escobar, MCF Understanding the unique issues faced by undocumented clients

2 The Mexican American Bar Association Invites you to attend MABA MCLE Day: "Hands Up: Don't Shoot and Don't Deport Me" Civil Rights Litigation & Immigration MCLE Day Date: Saturday, January 17, 2015 Time: 8:30am Registration 9:00am-4:00pm MCLEs Registration Form Please write legibly and fill out form completely. Registration form may be faxed to (213) or ed to Please provide full name and circle the payment category: $25 Law Student Government/Non-Profit $75 MABA Dues Paying Member $75 Non-Member $100 Location Loyola Law School 919 S. Albany Street Los Angeles, Parking Available for $9 Address (including city and zip code) Billing Address on credit card if different from above (including city and zip code) Eight MCLE Credits * One hour of Ethics * One hour of Substance Abuse *One hour of Elimination of Bias *Five hours of General Name as it appears on Credit Card Telephone Number Credit Card Number Type Expiration Date Cardholder s Signature Date Paying by check? Please make payable to MABA and mail to: Mexican American Bar Association (MABA) 714 W. Olympic Blvd., #450 Los Angeles, CA Event Generously Sponsored by Law Offices of Humberto Guizar

3 Humberto Guizar, Esq. Humberto also known to his friends as Burt and Hero overcame a very rough gang background and criminal record to become an attorney. He has been a lawyer for 27 years. His primary office is located in Montebello. He is also a principal partner in the law firm of Guizar, Henderson & Carrazco, in T ustin, CA. He specializes in civil rights litigation. He also represents injured consumers in catastrophic personal injury cases. Humberto has served as an elected Executive Board T rustee of the Mexican American Bar Association and for 12 years. He is the co-chair of the Civil Rights Committee for the current MABA Board. In 2000 Humberto was profiled in the Daily Journal for his role in obtaining one of the first 7 figure verdicts against CRASH officers from the L.A.P.D. T he front page story was entitled From Gang member to Attorney. Humberto was also the lead counsel in the U.S. Supreme Court case of Ceballos v. Garcetti. Humberto has continued to successfully prosecute significant and challenging civil rights cases resulting in repeated multiple 7 Figure settlements and verdicts for his clients. In 2012 Humberto was nominated for CAALA Trial lawyer of the year. In 2014 Humberto has resolved 4 significant civil rights cases by verdict or by settlement, in each of these cases he obtained multiple 7 figure amounts for his clients. Humberto is also the only known attorney any where that provides expert court testimony in the Southern California criminal courts as a gang expert. Humberto does this work pro-bono or when appointed by one of the courts. On April 26, 2003 he was honored by the La Raza Alumni Association at California State University, Northridge with a lifetime achievement award. Humberto Guizar is one of the founders of Brothers For Justice, a Consumer Attorneys Motorcycle Club. Established in 2014, Humberto is the Vice President of the Club. Hon. Fernando M. Olguin Judge Olguin be gan his legal career in 1989 as a judicial law clerk for a federal judge in the District of Arizona. In 1991, he was selected to be a member of the United States Attorney General s Honors Program, where he worked in the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice. After leaving the Department of Justice in 1994, Judge Olguin joined the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Educational Fund ( MALDEF ) as the National Director of the Education Program. In 1995, Judge Olguin became a name partner in the Pasadena-based la w firm, Traber, Voorhees & Olguin, a firm that litigated housing and employment cases. Judge Olguin was appointed to serve as a United States Magistrate Judge in He was the first Latino to serve as a United States Magistrate Judge for the Central District of California. In December 2012, Judge Olguin was confirmed as a United States District Judge. He maintains his chambers in Los Angeles.

4 Jim De Simone, Esq. Partner for twenty-five years with Schonbrun DeSimone et al. LLP, a civil rights law firm consistently attaining successful results for its clients in civil rights litigation, including employment discrimination, sexual harassment, wage and hour class action, and police misconduct cases. n 2014, Jim received the CLAY Award for California Civil Rights Lawyer of the Year. In 2013, he was honored as a T op 100 Superlawyer in Southern California. In 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, and 2014, Jim was honored as a California Top 10 or 25 Plaintiff Labor and Employment Lawyer by the Daily Journal. In 2008, Jim was a finalist for CAALA s Trial Lawyer of the Year. He is a Superlawyer in the area of civil rights and employment 2009 through Saira Hussain, Esq. Saira Hussain is a Staff Attorney with the Criminal Justice Reform program. Her work focuses on receiving, tracking, and addressing violations of the T RUST Act, a California law that prohibits local law enforcement from detaining noncitizens on immigration holds beyond the time the person is eligible for release from criminal custody. Saira be gan working with Advancing Justice - Asian Law Caucus as a Berkeley Law Public Interest Fellow in the Immigrant Rights' Program, where she focused on representation of immigrants in deportation proceedings. Saira graduated from UC Berkeley School of Law, where she participated in the International Human Rights Law Clinic to represent civil parties in a case against leaders of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and draft a preliminary report on conflict-focused sexual violence accountability in Uganda. She also served as an editor of the California Law Review and the Berkeley Journal of Employment and Labor Law, a member of the Board of Advocates (moot court), and co-chair of the Women of Color Collective. Saira received her B.A. in Public Health and minor in Spanish from UC Berkeley.

5 Sonia Mercado, Esq. Sonia Mercado, received her B.A. in French Literature, from Atlantic Union College, Mass. and Séminaire Adventiste du Salève, France, in 1971; her M.A. in French Literature from U.C.L.A. in 1976; her Ph.D. was in progress when she entered U.C.L.A. Law School and obtained a J.D. in She was U.C.L.A. Law School s first participant in its International Law Judicial Externship Program in the Superior Court, Mexico City, Prior to founding her own law firm, she worked at Cummins & White doing defense, business and professional liability litigation. Sonia specializes in the area of Civil Rights with a focus on inmate s right to medical care and reasonable security. She has successfully obtained seven published opinions, including two District Court opinions on issues of jail medical care and a novel opinion regarding internet jurisdiction. She successfully represented a class action and obtained an injunction and a consent decree regarding the unconstitutional (tortuous) use of a restraint chair in jail, which disproportionately punished and injured mentally disabled detainees. It resulted in a first national opinion by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal prohibiting this unconstitutional use. She successfully represented families in wrongful shootings, police brutality, and failure to provide inmates access to medical care. She has lectured in legal education seminars and symposiums to students, lawyers, judges and NGO at the Summer Institute on International Human Rights, Oxford University, England; numerous law schools nationwide; the International Society for the Study of European Ideas (ISSEI), Haifa University, Haifa, Israel; the "Institute of Jurist, Judges and Prosecutors from Argentina," at Southwestern School of Law; and the National Police Accountability Project. Some lectures include: Protecting Civil Rights Under Section 1983; Civil Rights in a Growing World Economy; Human Rights: a Comparative Study of French and U.S. Human Rights Developments; Deliberate Indifference to Medical Condition; Symposium on Public Interest Law in Eastern Europe and Russia; The Distinction Between Deliberate Indifference and Medical Malpractice; Civil Rights Procedure/Discovery in Federal Court; Discovery in Medical Malpractice Actions. Professional success is based on whether the case she undertakes enforces the Constitutional Rights of all. In 2006, she was nominated as one of the top women litigators in the State of California by the Daily Journal Legal Newspaper and has received other awards for her work in civil rights. Sonia s volunteer work focuses on the medical and educational rights of mentally disabled children. She has volunteered as a Member of the Board of Directors of the Los Angeles Child Guidance Clinic (providing educational and mental health services to inner city indigent children); a Member of the Learning Rights Project, (which provides free seminars to parents and free legal services to indigent children with educational disabilities). She also was a member of the Board of T rustees for Vistamar School (a school dedicated to a diverse student population and a global perspective), and also volunteered on the Inglewood School District Bond Oversight Committee ensuring adequate school facilities, and received an award from the State Bar of California Board of Governors for her contributions to pro bono work.

6 R. Samuel Paz, Esq. Mr. Paz is a native of Los Angeles, and since 1974 has practiced law for the community in Los Angeles, specializing in civil litigation of civil rights and selected criminal defense cases. He has represented civil rights plaintiffs in the Southern, Central and Eastern District Courts of California, and argued before the Ninth Circuit and the U.S. Supreme Court. In the 40 years he has been a lawyer, Mr. Paz has a recipient of approximately 30 honors for his legal work. Some of these are: selected as a T op Attorney In Southern California in Civil Rights, by his peers in the legal community and Super Lawyers; the 2013 Culture of Liberation Award from the Center for the Study of Political Graphics; 2013 Certificate of Recognition from City of Los Angeles City Council-member Gilbert Cedillo; 2013 Commendation from the County of Los Angeles, Supervisor Mark Ridley-T homas for dedicated service to the affairs of the community; selected as a 2010 Social Justice Visiting Practitioner at University of Santa Clara Law School; the 2008 City of Los Angeles, Award of Congratulations for being one of seven prior graduates selected for induction into the Benjamin Franklin High School Hall of Honor; the National Lawyer's Guild s highest award, the 2007 "Honorable Robert W. Kenny Award" for being a pioneer in litigation involving the constitutional rights of persons in jails. Other honors are ACLU s highest award, the 2003 Eason Monroe Courageous Advocate award; the University of Southern California Law School s 2002 Inspirational Alumnus award presented by La Raza Law Students; selected as Santa Clara University School of Law s 1999 Distinguished Advocate in Residence, for distinguished advocacy of human rights in the United States; the 1998 Pillars of a Just Society Award presented by Miller Brewing Company s as one of the twelve leading Hispanic legal professionals, judges, lawyers, and law professors in the United States; the 1995 Civil Rights Advocate of the Year Award, presented by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund; the 1995 Clarence Darrow Award, presented by the People's College of Law, for outstanding advocacy of civil rights; and, the 1995 Outstanding Advocate for Social Justice Award, presented by the National Lawyers Guild. Mr. Paz has lectured in Europe and Israel on human rights. He has publish over 30 articles and is a frequent guest lecturer on civil rights and litigation at legal seminars and conferences throughout the U.S. Mr. Paz has also served in a leadership capacity in a number of community and legal organizations including the National Police Accountability Project, the ACLU of Southern California, the National ACLU, the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, the Mexican American Bar Association of L.A. County, and the Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles. In 1971, he graduated with honors from UCLA and received a Juris Doctor from the University of Southern California in In 1978, in Myerson v. LAPD, Mr. Paz obtained what is considered the first substantial civil award against a police department for illegal spying activities. Shortly thereafter he was a principle member of the ACLU litigation team that obtained a $2,000,000 award and injunction against L.A.P.D. preventing infiltration and illegal collection of information on community and political organizations.

7 R. Samuel Paz, Esq. Mr. Paz has garnered many victories in cases involving injuries or death caused by police misconduct, including a then record high $8.75 million verdict in Altamirano v. L.A.P.D. (L.A Sup. 1991) for the shooting of a L.A. Coliseum gardener, a $1.5 million award in Mendoza v. County of Los Angeles, (C.D. Cal. 1995) arising from use of restraints and denial of medical attention of a mentally ill person in custody for a misdemeanor offence; Placencia v. County of Los Angeles, (L.A. Sup. 1984) the first verdict in excess of $1 million ($1.4 million) in California against deputies arising from the New Year shooting of a father who was allegedly pointing a rifle at close range at two deputies, Sotero v City of Riverside, a federal civil rights award of $1.8 million case of Alicia Sotero, and Enrique Funes, Mexican immigrants beaten by two Riverside policemen, and Estrada v. City of Riverside (C.D.Cal.) $ 1.9 million award in a federal civil rights case of stemming from a beating during arrest and denial of medical attention also brought many significant litigation victories. The first was in Baca v. Starr, 2012 U.S. LEXIS 3289, 9th Cir. July 25, 2011) cert. denied 132 S. Ct (2012) where the U.S. Supreme Court denied Sheriff Baca s petition for certiorari that let stand a Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that found L.A. County Sheriff Baca can be personally sued in connection with the wave of jailhouse violence. Dion Starr sued Baca, alleging that the sheriff showed deliberate indifference to complaints of violence inside the Men s Central Jail. Starr was stabbed 23 times by Latino gang members in This was followed by a federal jury verdict in October 2013 finding Sheriff Baca personally liable for an award of punitive damages of $100,000 in a case involving abuse of Tyler Willis an inmate in the Men's Central Jail, meaning the sheriff could be required to pay $100,000 out of pocket. It is the first time a jury has held Baca personally at fault in a deputy use of force case. Other cases were Anderson v. County of Siskiyou County, a $1.6 million award for deliberate indifference to suicidal detainee by deputies causing death; Roshodesh v. City of Pasadena, a $2.75 million award for denial of medical care in the Pasadena City Jail, where police refused to believe the complaints of the plaintiff who was suffering a heart attack; and, a $821,000 award in Estate of Jonathan Najera v. County of Los Angeles, arising from the failure to provide reasonable security causing the death of Jonathan Najera, then a juvenile, who had voluntarily cooperated with the investigation of a shooting by providing eye-witness corroboration which resulted in the convictions of two accused adult defendants.

8 Felicia Escobar, Esq. Special Assistant to the President for Immigration Policy In this role, Felicia develops the President s strategy for building a 21st century immigration system. This work involves coordinating efforts across the Executive branch to strengthen the current system and working toward passage of meaningful, comprehensive immigration reform legislation. Felicia previously served on U.S. Senator Ken Salazar s legislative team, working with him to develop his legislative agenda on a host of issues including labor, civil rights, judicial nominations and immigration. Felicia advised Senator Salazar during the comprehensive immigration reform debates of 2006 and 2007 in which Senator Salazar was a key member of the bipartisan group pressing for reform. Prior to this, Felicia was Associate Director of the Senate Democratic Steering and Outreach Committee. In this role, Felicia helped cultivate relationships between Democratic Leader Tom Daschle and key stakeholder groups, including Latino, immigration and education advocacy groups. Felicia started her career as a State Policy Analyst working for the National Council of La Raza. She represented NCLR and its network of affiliates in the T exas State Legislature, testifying before legislative committees to advocate for education, immigrant access to benefits, and hate crimes legislation. Felicia is a native of San Antonio, T X. She received an undergraduate degree from Yale University, a Masters in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and her J.D. from UCLA School of Law. Arnoldo Casillas, Esq. Arnoldo Casillas is the principle in the law firm of Casillas, Moreno & Associates. He joined the firm, originally founded in 1975, shortly after graduating from the UCLA School of Law in The firm specializes in civil rights/police misconduct litigation and catastrophic tort litigation. As the firm s lead trial attorney, Arnoldo has had many successes, including a recent $24 million-dollar jury award which stands as the largest single-party police shooting jury verdict against the City of Los Angeles Police Department. Arnoldo is active in local bar activities and served as president of the Mexican American Bar Association of Los Angeles County in Arnoldo also often speaks on the subject of trial skills and strategy in police misconduct cases. Recently, he gave a keynote speech at the ACLU annual luncheon in Northern California entitled From Shield to Sword, The Constitution s Role in Police Misconduct Litigation. Arnoldo was a finalist for Trial Lawyer of the Year in 2013 for the Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles, the largest trial lawyers association in the country.

9 John Burton, Esq. Mr. Burton graduated from UCLA with a degree in Anthropology, 1976, and a juris doctor from Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco, Class of He was admitted to practice in California May Mr. Burton s practice has always concentrated on litigation involving the public interest and civil rights in both state and federal trial and appellate courts, focusing for more than thirty years on the representation of plaintiffs in police misconduct actions. He has maintained his own law offices in Pasadena, California, since In 1989, Mr. Burton earned an A-V rating from Martindale-Hubbell, and for the last six years has been listed as a Southern California Super Lawyer. Mr. Burton has litigated hundreds of police abuse cases in both state and federal court throughout the United States, including approximately 40 that have reached verdicts. He was lead or co-lead counsel for teams of lawyers who recovered $3.5 million against the Los Angeles Police Department (a record amount at the time) based on the notorious Dalton Avenue raid of August 1988, $7.5 million for a class of plaintiffs, along with significant institutional changes in the Los Angeles Sheriff Department Lynwood Substation, and $27 million in a series of related class-actions to recover damages for people over detained and strip searched in the Los Angeles County Jail System. Individually, Mr. Burton has represented police misconduct plaintiffs in several high-profile and high damages matters. In June 2008, with co-counsel Peter M. Williamson, Mr. Burton obtained the first products-liability verdict, over $5 million, against T ASER International, Inc., in San Jose, California. On July 19, 2011, he obtained the second such verdict, $10 million, in Charlotte, North Carolina. Mr. Burton is counsel of record in reported decisions in the California Court of Appeal, the California Supreme Court, the Fourth, Eighth and Ninth Circuits, and the United States Supreme Court. Several are particularly helpful for plaintiffs pursuing civil-rights and T ASER injury claims. E.g., Montiel v. City of Los Angeles, 2 F.3d 335 (9 th Cir. 1993) (Christopher Commission report admissible to prove Monell violation); Greenstreet v. Cnty of San Bernardino, 41 F.3d 1306 (9th Cir. 1994) (no qualified immunity for submitting search warrant that does not establish probable cause); Streit v. Cnty of Los Angeles, 236 F.3d 552 (9th Cir. 2001) (establishing County as local actor for Eleventh-Amendment immunity); T atum v. Moody, 768 F.3d 806 (9th Cir. 2014) (liability for false imprisonment based on pre-trial suppression of exonerating evidence); and Fontenot v. TASER Int l, Inc., 736 F.3d 318 (4th Cir. 2013) (affirming failure-to-warn verdict in wrongful death claim against stun-gun manufacturer). Mr. Burton is a member of the Board of Directors of the National Police Accountability Project (NPAP) and a former President of the Board of Directors of Police Watch: the Police Misconduct Lawyer s Referral Service, in Los Angeles, California. He is an active member of the Consumer Attorneys of California and the Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles. He is frequently quoted in local and national print and broadcast media on issues relating to police misconduct litigation and the use of T ASER products. He regularly speaks to audiences of attorneys and other professionals. Mr. Burton s publications include John Burton & Peter M. Williamson, Representing Clients Injured by T ASER International Electrical Control Devices 26 Civil Rights Litigation and Attorney Fees Annual Handbook pp (2010), and numerous articles and commentaries in The Los Angeles Daily Journal and the World Socialist Web Site, many of which can be found on his website

10 Thomas A. Saenz, Esq. Thomas A. Saenz, a nationally recognized civil rights attorney, leads MALDEF as President and General Counsel. Previously, Saenz conducted civil rights litigation at MALDEF for 12 years. During that time, he was a leader in the successful challenge to California s unconstitutional Proposition 187, and he led numerous civil rights cases in the areas of immigrants rights, education, employment, and voting rights. Saenz achieved several victories against ordinances unlawfully restricting the rights of day laborers, served as lead counsel in the 2001 challenge to California s congressional redistricting, and initiated the employment discrimination lawsuit resulting in a $50 million settlement with Abercrombie and Fitch. He served as MALDEF s lead counsel in two court challenges to Proposition 227, a California English-only education initiative. Saenz was also the lead drafter of theamicus brief on behalf of Latino organizations supporting affirmative action in the Supreme Court case,grutter v. Bollinger. Prior to rejoining MALDEF, he served as Counsel to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. As part of Mayor Villaraigosa's four-person executive team, he provided legal and policy advice on major initiatives. Saenz was born and raised in southern California. He graduated summa cum laude from Yale University, and he received his law degree from Yale Law School. Saenz served as a law clerk to the Honorable Harry L. Hupp of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California and to the Honorable Stephen Reinhardt of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. For eight years, Saenz taught Civil Rights Litigation as an adjunct lecturer at the University of Southern California (USC) Law School. His board service includes the Alliance for Justice (AFJ), Los Angeles County Board of Education, Alliance for Children s Rights, ENCOMPASS and the Impact Fund.

11 Alvaro Huerta, Esq. Alvaro M. Huerta works to defend and advance the rights of low-income immigrants and their family members through litigation, administrative advocacy, and community education. His work focuses on ensuring that low-income immigrant families are not wrongly denied access to quality health care as states and municipalities implement federal health care reform. His practice also includes litigation on due process, equal protection and civil rights, and he is currently co-counsel on cases challenging anti-immigrant state legislation. Before joining NILC as a Skadden Fellow in 2011, Mr. Huerta clerked for Judge Harry Pregerson of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Prior to law school, Mr. Huerta worked at the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, where he directed the organization s communications, community education, and advocacy strategies on various local, state, and federal immigration issues. Mr. Huerta holds a B.S. from Yale College and a J.D. from Stanford Law School. He is the son and grandson of Mexican immigrants to the United States. Follow Alvaro on T Richard Chacon, Esq. Richard Chacon graduated from the USC Gould School of Law in In addition to his Juris Doctorate, he received a Master's in Communications while receiving awards from both programs. At USC Gould School of Law, he received the Shattuck Award for "Most Promise in the Legal Profession" and at Annenberg School of Communication he graduated "With Distinction". In 2010, the USC Latino Law Students granted him the "Inspirational Alumnus Award". Richard is currently a criminal defense attorney handling all types of criminal matters through trial. He is also on the Hollenbeck Police Business Council, the USC Law Alumni Board and is the Secretary for the Criminal Courts Bar Association. He will be a T rustee on the Mexican American Bar Association in 2015

12 Edna Monroy California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance (CIYJA) Edna Monroy was born in Iguala Guerrero, México. She came to the United States at the age of 12 in 2001 to reunite with her family. She grew up in Westmont, an unincorporated area of South Los Angeles. Despite her language barrier as an ESL student while in middle and high school, she managed to graduate with high honors, and attend UCLA. Edna joined IDEAS at UCLA, a campus-based organization for undocumented students, where she served as an AB540 Project Director. After the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) victory in the summer of 2012, Edna joined Dream T eam Los Angeles (DT LA) in August 2012 where she helped lead DTLA s DACA outreach efforts. Monroy has participated in various actions where she empowered her community through social justice and activism, while simultaneously informing immigrant and inner-city youth about resources, and the power behind community organizing. Monroy is currently Southern California Regional Organizer for the California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance (CIYJA), a statewide network of immigrant youth organizations. Hector Alessandro Negrete California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance (CIYJA) Hector Alessandro Negrete is a queer immigrant of color who arrived in the United States at the early age of 3 months from Manzanillo, Colima, Mexico. Growing up in the South Los Angeles and Boyle Heights neighborhoods, Alessandro, as he is known to folks, learned and witnessed firsthand the disenfranchisement of communities of color. While attending Cal State Los Angeles, he read a biography on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and was moved by his words, Injustice Anywhere Is A T hreat T o Justice Everywhere. Having started as a grassroots organizer for the LGBT IQ Community, he learned the importance of fundraising in social justice work. He has developed curricula around fundraising, event planning, and foundation outreach. All the growth and determination has brought him to be part of the biggest projects involving the migrant communities housed at MALDEF, with him serving as Development and Administrative Director for the California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance (CIYJA). Alexis Nava Teodoro Ame rican Civil Libe rties Union (ACLU) Alexis Nava T eodoro is a formerly-incarcerated inmate originally from Guerrero, Mexico, but raised in the neighboring state of Michoacán in the town called Guacamayas. He has been organizing in immigrant rights for over 6 years. He is a volunteer organizer with migrant-led organization, Immigrant Youth Coalition (IYC) and RAIZ in Santa Ana, Orange County. His work over the years has focused on immigration enforcement and organizing to stop deportations through legal casework and extra-legal direct action tactics. He also has contributed to national, state, and local policy changes that have increased protections for the immigrant community and slowed down the deportation/incarceration industrial complex. He currently is the Community Engagement and Policy Advocate for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Southern California.

13 Eden Jequinto UCLA Law Student A child of pilipina parents who migrated as a result of shifting US immigration legislation regarding the Philippines, Eden graduated 2004 from UC Santa Cruz. Eden is a proud alumnus of the Filipino Student Association, Rainbow T heatre, KZSC Radio Station, Third World and Native American Student Collective Press, Colors in Action (organizing against the prison industrial complex), Student Union Assembly, Educational Opportunity Program, and the Ethnic Student Organization Council. Eden remains a core member of EastSide Arts Alliance in Oakland, CA as the founder of ESAA s Guerilla Youth Theatre Project and Leadership program, returning often to the bay to continue her work as an educator, cultural worker, and organizer. Eden has served as a cultural worker, organizer, and educator for 14 years in the Bay Area. Grounded in her own transformative practices, Eden is committed to ensuring that our communities unite, heal, transform, and (re)build on a personal, interpersonal, and systemic level. Eden graduated from UCLA with a Master s in Urban Planning in 2013, prior to starting law school at UCLA. Ilse Escobar Mig uel Contreras Foundation (MCF) Ilse Escobar was born in T lalnepantla, Mexico and her immediate family is from Guerrero, Mexico. Ilse understood very early on the social ramifications of living without papers. With luck, work, and community support, she was able to attend Pasadena City College and transfer to UCLA. In college, Ilse became involved with the immigrant rights movement-- the source of her learning and growth. C urrently, Ilse works with the Miguel Contreras Foundation in engaging high school age youth through the MCF Freedom School, which Ilse co-created. This is a high school curriculum that activates youth by highlighting the intersections of the immigrant, labor and civil rights movements. Ilse is a longtime organizer with DREAM T eam Los Angeles (DT LA), where she focuses on efforts against the growth of mass incarceration, especially in the area of detention and deportation. Bettty Jaspeado Dream Te am L.A. In 1993, Betty Jaspeado immigrated to the United States as a result of emotionally traumatic events she experienced in Mexico. After twenty-one years of living as an undocumented, lowincome mother of three in the United States, Betty was compelled to take on leadership and advocacy roles within the immigrant rights movement. While Betty learned from immigrant youth organizers about campaigns and actions, she shared her knowledge as a mother who knows exactly how being undocumented negatively affects a person's health, income, and education. Betty is a significant presence in social justice: she is always involved at rallies, press conferences, and picket lines for immigrant and workers' rights. Betty continues to join her voice and energy as an organizer with groups including DREAM T eam Los Angeles, and the California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance (CIYJA).