MAYA SøRENSEN
Maya developed an interest in social justice early in her education. As an undergraduate, Maya interned 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 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 graduating law school, she began her work as a researcher for Amnesty International Denmark. There, she assisted Afghan refugees seeking asylum in Denmark and drafted recommendations in partnership with the UNHCR to the minister of foreign affairs. After more than a year of living and working in Denmark, Maya moved back to California and began working at the California Appellate Project where she worked with California's death row population. Later that year, she obtained a position as a staff attorney at Los Angeles Dependency Lawyers inc where she worked for two years representing indigent parents whose children had been detained from them.
Wanting to move back to the Bay Area, she accepted a position as a staff attorney at Dependency Advocacy Center where she worked for six years and obtained her certification as a child welfare law specialist. After 8 years of practicing child welfare law, Maya became a civil rights lawyer where she handled dozens of federal civil rights cases against public entities whose law enforcement personnel had violated her clients' constitutional rights. She helped to settle wrongful death lawsuits and enacted reforms to better train officers in their use of force, and in reporting child abuse. Since the beginning of 2020, Maya has been representing clients in employment law cases in addition to practicing police misconduct law.
Admitted 2007, California.
EDUCATION
Law school: UC Hastings, Juris Doctor
Undergraduate: UC Santa Barbara, BA Law and Society, Minor English
MEMBER
National police accountability project
National Association of Counsel for Children
PERSONAL
Maya lives with her husband and daughter in San Francisco. She enjoys reading and playing the piano. She stays active by running 10ks and half marathons, playing tennis, and swimming. Her personal heroes are Michelle Obama, Elizabeth Warren, Cesar Chavez, and Michael Faraday.