Maya Melissa Sorensen

Maya Sorensen has a long history in social justice, starting as an undergraduate when she worked as an intern in both the public defender and the district attorney's offices in Santa Barbara, preferring to represent and assist clients rather than prosecuting them. After graduating cum laude from UC Santa Barbara, Maya moved to San Francisco to attend law school at UC Hastings where she also volunteered at the General Assistance Advocacy Program helping Tenderloin residents obtain public benefits. In Maya's last year of law school, she moved to Copenhagen, Denmark to study International Human Rights Law at the University of Copenhagen. After law school, she began her work as a researcher for Amnesty International, Denmark, working with Afghan refugees and with the UNHCR to make recommendations to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. After more than a year of living and working in Denmark, Maya moved back to California to work at the California Appellate Project with California's death penalty population. She went on to work as a child welfare attorney in Los Angeles and San Jose, representing indigent parents whose children had been detained from them and with at-risk children. Maya worked six years with the Dependency Advocacy Center in San Jose where she obtained her certification as a Child Welfare Law Specialist. Maya has conducted well over 100 dependency trials, cross-examined scores of expert witnesses, and filed numerous motions and briefs on behalf of her clients. Maya joined Haddad & Sherwin LLP in 2016, where she now represents people fighting for justice from police misconduct and government abuse.