Merle Kahn (she/her)

Senior Contract Attorney, Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC)

Merle has been exclusively practicing immigration law for over 30 years. She is a senior contract attorney at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC) in San Francisco where she focuses on asylum law, removal defense, and criminal immigration – including providing legal advice to criminal defense attorneys and immigration attorneys on the immigration consequences of pleas and on obtaining post-conviction relief where applicable. At the ILRC she organizes and presents at webinars and trainings, writes practice advisories, and updates immigration practice manuals in addition to providing legal advice to immigration and criminal defense practitioners. Prior to joining the ILRC she was Of Counsel at Daniel Shanfield Immigration Defense, PC, where her practice focused on removal defense, criminal immigration issues, appellate practice before the Board of Immigration Appeals, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, asylum and refugee law, naturalization, and family-based immigration.

Onyx Starrett (they/them)

Criminal-Immigration Specialist, Santa Barbara County Public Defender

Onyx works as the criminal-immigration expert at the Santa Barbara County Public Defender Office. They advocate for clients at the trial level and through post-conviction relief motions. They also practiced for six years in New York. After clerking for the New York Immigration Court for two years, they started the immigration unit at Nassau County Public Defender Office and worked at Brooklyn Defender Services, providing advice to non-citizens accused of crimes and representing them before USCIS, the New York Immigration Courts, and the BIA. Additionally, they initiated the Deported Veterans Project at Public Counsel in Los Angeles, successfully advocating for veterans to return to the U.S., many as U.S. citizens.

Rachel Keast (she/her)

Crim-Immigration Attorney, Marin County Public Defender
Rachael has been working on crim/imm issues since she first became an attorney in 2005. For the past eight years, she has been in-house immigration counsel in public defenders’ offices, first in Alameda County and currently in Marin. Prior to that, Rachael was an associate at the Law Office of Michael K. Mehr in Santa Cruz, a staff attorney at the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project, and an Attorney Advisor at the San Francisco Immigration Court. Prior to law school, she was an immigration paralegal.

Carla Gomez (she/her)

Criminal-Immigration Attorney, Marin County Public Defender

Carla is a Crim-Immigration Attorney at the Marin County Public Defender Office. Carla brings twenty years of criminal defense experience, as both a federal and county public defender, and extensive experience as an immigration deportation defense attorney to the Marin County Public Defender Office. Carla started her career as a Federal Public Defender in San Diego where she tried federal felony cases and argued before the Ninth Circuit. Carla then became a San Francisco Public Defender where she practiced for over 15 years as a felony trial attorney. She was one of the three attorneys that spearheaded the Immigration Unit out of the SF Public Defender Office in 2017. Carla successfully defended challenging cases in immigration court where her clients with serious felonies have won asylum, withholding, the Convention Against Torture and readjustment of status. Carla developed an expertise in post-conviction relief for noncitizen clients to prevail in immigration court. After the San Francisco Public Defender Office, Carla joined the Immigrant Legal Resource Center as a senior staff attorney where she honed her expertise of the intersection of criminal and immigration law creating policy, training attorneys throughout the state, and co-authoring publications on crimmigration including post-conviction relief for noncitizens. Most recently she created a Crim-Immigration Unit for the San Mateo County Private Defender Program where she trained and provided the panel attorneys with Padilla consultations and provided technical assistance for attorneys pursuing post-conviction relief for noncitizens.

Allison Klein (she/her)

Deputy Public Defender, Los Angeles County Public Defender's Office

Alison joined the LA County Public Defender’s Office in 2007, after graduating from Loyola Law School, first as a senior law clerk and then as an attorney. During her 15 years as a Deputy Public Defender, she has worked in various branch assignments throughout the county – Compton, Downey, Bellflower, Long Beach Juvenile and Adult, Juvenile Appellate, Central Felonies, and currently in the Immigration Unit, housed in the Long Beach Branch. She has been in the Immigration Unit since its expansion in December 2018. Her role in the Immigration Unit includes performing Padilla consultations for defense attorneys, conducting trainings, and responding to and pursuing motions for immigration-consequence-based post-conviction relief.

Brooke Lautz (she/her)

Padilla Attorney, Ventura County Public Defender

Brooke advises noncitizen clients on the immigration consequences of their criminal cases and works with community partners to advocate for the rights of immigrants. Hailing from Chicago, Brooke studied international human rights law and worked closely with several nonprofits prior to devoting herself to the practice of immigration law. In private practice, she represented noncitizens seeking family-based and humanitarian relief in both affirmative cases and in removal proceedings. As a community advocate, she conducted Know-Your-Rights trainings and she participated in free legal clinics for underserved populations. After moving to California, Brooke worked with a nonprofit that supports indigenous rights as their first immigration staff attorney.