Attendee materials are posted in each day's section. We will continue to update this page as materials are received.
Join CPDA for afive-session series exploring how public defenders can responsibly and effectively use artificial intelligence, while also learning to detect and challenge its misuse in prosecutions, and surveillance of our clients. Sessions will cover practical uses of AI in defender workflows; prompt-building and secure tool selection; confidentiality and State Bar guidance; government surveillance of our clients using AI and how to challenge that; recognizing AI-generated evidence and law enforcement technologies; and the ethical and career risks to be well-aware of when using AI for legal research and writing. Designed for defenders and allied professionals, this series equips participants for practice in the era of AI.
If you cannot join for all classes, recordings will be made available to registered participants after the series concludes.
This class will provide at least 5 hours of participatory MCLE credits, including 5 Hours of Technology in the Practice of Law and 1 hour Legal Ethics.
Daily Agenda*
*subject to change
Faculty: Patrick Jensen, Alameda County Assistant Public Defender Heather Rogers, Chief Public Defender, Santa Cruz County
1.0 hour Participatory MCLE, Technology in the Practice of Law
Patrick Jensen is an assistant public defender with the Alameda County Public Defender’s Office and a felony trial staff supervisor in Oakland. He has been a public defender since 2006. His work now focuses on collaborating with and supporting public defenders handling serious felony cases and, more recently, on integrating the ethical use of AI and related technologies into client-centered, collaborative public defense practice.
Heather Rogers (she/her) has been a public defender for 20 years in the state and federal courts. Heather has handled cases at every stage of litigation, from arraignment through trial and appeal. She has represented clients accused of offenses from delinquency to homicide, defended detainees incarcerated at Guantánamo Naval Base in Guantanamo, Cuba, tried numerous cases to jury, and argued cases in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Heather is honored to serve as the first Public Defender of Santa Cruz County, her birthplace and home. Before her appointment, Heather served as a public defender in Santa Cruz and Monterey County and as a federal defender in the Southern and Northern Districts of California. Heather is a faculty member of the National Criminal Defense College, lecturer in Legal Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and frequent trainer at regional and national trial skills programs. Heather has also taught at California Western School of Law and Monterey College of Law. Heather clerked for the Honorable M. Margaret McKeown on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals before starting her career in public defense. Heather has an A.B. in English Language & Literature from the University of Chicago and a J.D. from Stanford Law School. Heather lives in the Aptos mountains with her husband, children, and pets. In her free time, Heather enjoys traveling, hiking, and snowboarding.
Faculty: Carson White, Civil Rights Corps Avi Singh, Santa Clara County
1.0 hour Participatory MCLE, including Legal Ethics
Carson White is a supervising attorney at Civil Rights Corps where she raises systemic challenges to the criminalization of poverty. She currently leads CRC's California Writ Project, which partners with over a dozen public defenders offices across the state to train defense counsel and litigate habeas petitions on behalf of indigent defendants unlawfully incarcerated pretrial. Before joining Civil Rights Corps, Carson worked with the Santa Clara Public Defender’s Office in San Jose, California, where she co-founded and co-operated its novel early-representation unit. In that role, she represented scores of people who were caged pretrial for no other reason than that they could not afford their bail, and raised successful challenges to the county’s pretrial detention schemes in California’s appellate courts. Prior to this, Carson was awarded a Stanford Postgraduate Public Interest Fellowship with the Habeas Corpus Resource Center in San Francisco, California. Carson is a graduate of Stanford Law School and the University of Texas at Austin.
Avanindar Singh has been a deputy public defender with the Office of the Public Defender in Santa Clara County since 2009. He is currently assigned to the Special Trials Unit. He previously worked as the supervising attorney for the Office’s Research Unit. He teaches advanced trial techniques at Santa Clara University School of Law and has worked collaboratively with community organizations in his courtroom advocacy.
Faculty: Patrick Jensen, Alameda County Assistant Public Defender Heather Rogers, Chief Public Defender, Santa Cruz County
1.0 hour Participatory MCLE, Technology in the Practice of Law
Attendee handouts above, in Monday's Pt. 1 section
Faculty: Juliana DeVries, UC Berkeley School of Law
1.0 hour Participatory MCLE, Technology in the Practice of Law
The above advance copy is for attendee use only. Do not distribute.
Juliana DeVries is a clinical staff attorney at the Samuelson Law, Technology and Public Policy Clinic, at the UC Berkeley School of Law. There, she focuses on criminal justice and civil liberties issues related to technology, including AI technologies used to surveil people on parole and probation. She also practices appellate and criminal defense law as a solo practitioner.
Before her work at the clinic, Juliana was an associate in the Supreme Court & Appellate Group at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. She also served as an assistant federal public defender in San Francisco. DeVries clerked for Justice Leondra Kruger on the California Supreme Court and for Judge Alex Kozinski on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Faculty: Avneet Chattha
1.0 hour Participatory MCLE, Technology in the Practice of Law
Avneet Chattha is a Deputy Public Defender with the Los Angeles County Public Defender’s Office, currently serving as Deputy-in-Charge of the Lancaster branch. He’s been practicing criminal defense since 2019 and has spent the past few years on the felony trial team. Prior to joining the Public Defender’s Office, he worked at the Law Office of Carol Sobel on class action civil rights cases involving the First Amendment, the criminalization of homelessness, and quality of life offenses. But when he’s not in court, you’ll find him deep in the weeds of AI research, vibe coding projects, and figuring out how attorneys can effectively incorporate new technologies into their current practice. That passion led him to start BearisterAI as a side project, something he’s been building over the past year with friends and family to create practical AI-powered workflows specifically for criminal defense practice. Avneet holds a J.D. from Loyola Law School Los Angeles and a B.A. in Political Science and Communications from the University of Washington.
Heather Rogers (she/her) has been a public defender for 20 years in the state and federal courts. Heather has handled cases at every stage of litigation, from arraignment through trial and appeal. She has represented clients accused of offenses from delinquency to homicide, defended detainees incarcerated at Guantánamo Naval Base in Guantanamo, Cuba, tried numerous cases to jury, and argued cases in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Heather is honored to serve as the first Public Defender of Santa Cruz County, her birthplace and home. Before her appointment, Heather served as a public defender in Santa Cruz and Monterey County and as a federal defender in the Southern and Northern Districts of California. Heather is a faculty member of the National Criminal Defense College, lecturer in Legal Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and frequent trainer at regional and national trial skills programs. Heather has also taught at California Western School of Law and Monterey College of Law. Heather clerked for the Honorable M. Margaret McKeown on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals before starting her career in public defense. Heather has an A.B. in English Language & Literature from the University of Chicago and a J.D. from Stanford Law School. Heather lives in the Aptos mountains with her husband, children, and pets. In her free time, Heather enjoys traveling, hiking, and snowboarding.
Carson White
Juliana DeVries is a clinical staff attorney at the Samuelson Law, Technology and Public Policy Clinic, at the UC Berkeley School of Law. There, she focuses on criminal justice and civil liberties issues related to technology, including AI technologies used to surveil people on parole and probation. She also practices appellate and criminal defense law as a solo practitioner.
Avneet Chattha is a Deputy Public Defender with the Los Angeles County Public Defender’s Office, currently serving as Deputy-in-Charge of the Lancaster branch. He’s been practicing criminal defense since 2019 and has spent the past few years on the felony trial team. Prior to joining the Public Defender’s Office, he worked at the Law Office of Carol Sobel on class action civil rights cases involving the First Amendment, the criminalization of homelessness, and quality of life offenses. But when he’s not in court, you’ll find him deep in the weeds of AI research, vibe coding projects, and figuring out how attorneys can effectively incorporate new technologies into their current practice. That passion led him to start BearisterAI as a side project, something he’s been building over the past year with friends and family to create practical AI-powered workflows specifically for criminal defense practice. Avneet holds a J.D. from Loyola Law School Los Angeles and a B.A. in Political Science and Communications from the University of Washington.