Latina Leaders in Law: A Discussion with Jenny Rivera, Arcelia Hurtado, and Hilda Galvan

CHLSA’s Latina Law Caucus and the Center for Women in Law hosted a special event featuring preeminent Latinas in the law:

Jenny Rivera – Recent nominee to the New York Court of Appeals, Professor of Law at the City University of New York School of Law in New York, and the Founder and Director of the Law School’s Center on Latino and Latina Rights and Equality (CLORE). CLORE promotes law reform scholarship, public education, and litigation in support of expanded civil rights, and focuses on issues impacting the Latino community in the United States. Professor Rivera is a former Administrative Law Judge of the New York State Division of Human Rights, a former member of the New York City Commission on Human Rights, and served as the Special Deputy Attorney General for Civil Rights for New York State Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo. As Special Deputy Attorney General she assisted in the development and implementation of the Attorney General’s civil rights agenda, supervised the Civil Rights Bureau and organized and held statewide outreach sessions on civil rights issues.

Arcelia Hurtado – Deputy Director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR), and AH Photofounder of the Women Defenders Fellowship. Immediately prior to joining NCLR, she served as the Executive Director of Equal Rights Advocates, a national women’s rights advocacy organization. She has also worked with numerous community-based organizations to secure the rights of working class and indigent people in the fields of employment, housing, criminal defense, and immigration. As a trial lawyer, she has litigated over a dozen jury trials representing juveniles and adults accused of misdemeanors and felonies. As an appellate lawyer, she has represented people on death row. She has argued cases before numerous courts including the California Supreme Court. In 2012, San Francisco Board of Supervisors President David Chiu appointed her to the Board of Appeals, a quasi-judicial 5-person body that hears appeals relating to a wide range of City determinations.

Hilda Galvan – Partner at Jones Day and University of Texas School of Law alumna. Hilda focuses on intellectual property litigation, chiefly patent litigation. Hilda has litigated complex, high-stakes patent infringement cases in a myriad of technologies, including semiconductor equipment and processes, telecommunications, computer technology, software and internet applications, and circuit design. Hilda has served as lead trial lawyer for technology companies in some of their most important intellectual property matters. She successfully represented IBM in its patent enforcement lawsuits against Amazon.com, Sercel in its defense against claims of patent infringement, and Mattel in its defense of a trade secret misappropriation lawsuit.

All students were welcome to attend this unique opportunity to meet these exceptional women, and be inspired as they share their experiences.