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Pivot Legal Society staff
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Darcie
Bennett, Legal Researcher
Darcie came to Pivot in October of 2006
as research coordinator of the Child Apprehension and
Mothers in Poverty research project.
Darcie has been
active on the issue of mothers in poverty for ten years
and has been involved in community-based research projects
dealing with child care, youth homelessness, and the feminization
of poverty in Vancouver.
She holds Bachelor’s and
Master's degrees in sociology from Simon Fraser
University. Darcie is currently a doctoral candidate
in the department of sociology at the University of
British Columbia and is completing her dissertation
on private security work in Vancouver’s gentrifying
neighbourhoods.
She is also a mother of three and sits
on the board of the Strathcona Community Centre Association,
where she focuses on children’s programming.
E-mail dbennett[at]pivotlegal.org |
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David
Eby, Lawyer
David joined Pivot from the Federal Department
of Justice in June 2005 as a full-time lawyer just weeks
after being called to the B.C. bar. Graduating in 2004
from Dalhousie Law School in Halifax, where he co-founded
the Social Activist Law Student Association (SALSA)
and the IdeaLaw conference, David was awarded the Alistair
Fraser Scholarship, the G.O. Forsyth Prize, and the
Canadian Bar Association Scholarship.
During his second
year of law school, which he spent at Osgoode Hall Law
School in Toronto, David founded the Osgoode Law Activist
Association (OLAA), was a key organizer with the SPINLAW
conference and won the Charles Edward Woodward Award
for academic achievement and the WeirFoulds LLP Prize
in Administrative Law.
David is the author of The
Arrest Handbook: A Guide to Your Rights,
published in 2003 by the B.C. Civil Liberties Association
and has been an active volunteer with Pivot since the
summer of 2002.
E-mail deby[at]pivotlegal.org
Read David's Blog |
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Douglas King, Lawyer
‘Douglas joined Pivot in June 2008 from the Downtown Eastside Residents’ Association to head the policing campaign for Pivot Legal Society and is also an associate with Pivot Legal LLP. He graduated from UBC Law in 2006 and was called to the bar in January of 2008 after articling with the appeals section of the Legal Services Society’.
‘During law school Douglas worked as a clinician for UBC’s Law Students Legal Advice Program. |
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Karen Mirsky, Lawyer
Karen is an associate with Pivot LLP and a staff lawyer with Pivot Legal Society. She practices in the areas of criminal defence and driving law and has appeared before administrative tribunals, and at B.C. Youth Court, Provincial Court, Supreme Court and Court of Appeal levels. She is a member of the Trial Lawyer’s Association of B.C. and the Canadian Bar Association.
As a graduate from the University of British Columbia law school, Karen was called to the bar in 2005. During her time at law school, Karen received awards for academic achievement and honourable mention from the National Association of Women and the Law’s 2004 Essay competition for her research paper titled, “Trafficking and the Sex Work Debate: Agency as a Human Rights Model.” She has a Bachelor in Fine Arts (Creative Writing) and has been published in the Vancouver Sun, Geist Magazine, Vancouver Magazine and the Singapore Straits Times.
Since getting involved with Pivot in 2001 Karen has worked in administration, with the Rights Cards campaign, housing issues, and with the sex-work project as co-author and editor of Voices for Dignity. Karen is a past president of Pivot Legal Society’s board of directors.
E-mail kmirsky[at]pivotlegal.com |
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Michaela Montaner
Michaela joined Pivot part-time as the Development Officer in January 2008 after volunteering as an intern on the sex work campaign in the summer of 2007. She currently works on a variety of fundraising and development projects. Email: mmontaner[at]pivotlegal.com |
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Katrina
Pacey, Lawyer
Katrina Pacey is a partner with Pivot Legal LLP and a staff lawyer with Pivot Legal Society. She practices in the areas of criminal, prison, mental health and human rights law. She graduated from the University of British Columbia Faculty of Law in 2004 where she founded the UBC Law Students’ Social Justice Action Network. While in law school, Katrina was awarded the YWCA Woman of Distinction Award.
Katrina also received a Master of Arts in Women’s Studies and Gender Relations from the University of British Columbia in 2001. During graduate school, Katrina authored a number of publications including a legal handbook for immigrant and refugee women who are victims of domestic violence.
Katrina is past president of Pivot’s board of directors and has worked on many of Pivot's initiatives, including the sex work law reform project, the addiction campaign, and the policing campaign.
Katrina is a co-author of three Pivot reports, To Serve and Protect: A Report on Policing in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, Voices for Dignity: A Call to End the Harms Cause by Canada’s Sex Trade Laws and Beyond Decriminalization: Sex Work, Human Rights and a New Framework for Law Reform.
E-mail kpacey[at]pivotlegal.com |
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John
Richardson, Executive Director
John founded Pivot Legal Society with Ann Livingston in the fall of 2000, while an articling student at Sierra Legal Defence Fund. When he completed his articles in January of 2002 he began working for Pivot full-time as its executive director, a job that has changed constantly as Pivot has evolved and grown. In November 2005 John was awarded an Ashoka Foundation fellowship for his vision of strategically using the law to advance the rights of the most marginalized members of society.
Before starting Pivot, John attended Lester Pearson College of the Pacific, where he obtained an International Baccalaureate degree. From there, he obtained his B.Sc. (Hon) in Mathematics and Philosophy at the University of Toronto (Trinity College), and his law degree at the University of Victoria. While a member of the Environmental Law Centre at the University of Victoria, he co-authored “Civil Disobedience; a legal handbook for activists.” During his time at law school, he spent two terms as a co-op student at the BC Law Institute.
John is the lead author of To Serve and Protect: A Report on Policing in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, and has played a supporting role in many of its other publications and campaigns.
E-mail jrichardson[at]pivotlegal.org |
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Paul
Ryan, Manager of Publications and Hope in Shadows
Paul was editor of Montessori International magazine
in London, England for six years before moving to Vancouver
in 2004 and joining Pivot in 2005. Paul's education included living for a year as an AFS exchange student in Palembang Indonesia when he was 17 years old. After completing a
BA in Political Science from Victoria University of
Wellington, New Zealand, and a Journalism diploma, he
worked in communicatons and marketing in Wellington New Zealand. Paul is director of the annual Hope in Shadows calendar
project including the photography
competition, award ceremony and the annual exhibition in October. Training of 190 street sellers to sell the calendar on the streets of Vancouver is also coordinated by Paul. Paul is also responsible for communications for Pivot, including the editing and publishing Pivot Legal Society reports, the Pivot Post, the weekly Pivot podcast and
for managing the Hope in Shadows and Pivot Legal Society websites.
E-mail pryan[at]pivotlegal.org or pryan[at]hopeinshadows.com |
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Lobat
Sadrehashemi, Lawyer
Lobat joined Pivot in October of 2006
as a lawyer and legal coordinator of the Child Apprehension
and Mothers in Poverty project.
Lobat graduated from
the University of Toronto’s Joint Law and Master’s
of Social Work program in June 2005, which included
practicum placements at the HIV/AIDS Legal Clinic of
Ontario (HALCO) and the constituency office of Gerard
Kennedy, MPP. Lobat was awarded two fellowships during
law school to pursue social justice work at the Centre
for Equality Rights in Accommodation (CERA), a non-profit
dedicated to issues of human rights and housing, and
the Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic, a legal and
counseling centre assisting women who have experienced
violence with their family and immigration law matters.
Lobat articled and worked as an associate with Lorne
Waldman, an immigration and refugee lawyer in Toronto,
prior to moving to Vancouver. Lobat’s research
interests include income security rights, anti-discrimination
law, and national security. Lobat currently sits on
the board of directors of CERA.
E-mail
lobat[at]pivotlegal.com |
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Laura Track, Lawyer
Laura joined Pivot as a staff lawyer in May 2008. Before coming to Pivot she articled with the federal Department of Justice and clerked at the Supreme Court of British Columbia. Her interests lie in the areas of human rights, poverty law, and environmental sustainability, and her work at Pivot will focus mainly on housing issues.
Laura graduated from the University of British Columbia law school in 2006, and completed a B.A. (Hons) in Psychology in 2001. While in law school Laura was an active volunteer with Pivot, as well as with the Amnesty International Refugee Network and the Social Justice Action Network, co-authoring Pivot’s report Beyond Decriminalization: Sex Work, Human Rights and a New Framework for Law Reform.
E-mail ltrack[at]pivotlegal.com |
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Tina Tomashiro, Receptionist
Although her hometown is Chilliwack, BC, Tina has made Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside home, since 1997. She is a rollerblading enthusiast and is often seen rollerblading all over the DTES.
She began volunteering for Pivot in February of 2006. Since completing courses and an on-the-job training she has traded her Pivot Legal Society Board community representative position to be Pivot's full-time legal administrative assistant. She considers herself a humanitarian and loves working on the ‘front-lines’, especially when she can tell that she has truly helped someone; either by just listening or by actually helping them meet a need by finding them a lawyer or other more-suitable resource.
Before becoming involved with Pivot she was the Acting Program Assistant of the Forensics Department at BCIT; and was also part of the administrative team that digitized the entire aircraft mechanics program at its Aviation Campus. After BCIT, she spent some time in Calgary before returning to Vancouver to resume her career. |
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Peter
Wrinch, Director of Business and Development
Peter Wrinch came to Pivot after a decade studying Russian revolutionary history and art. A community builder at heart, Peter focuses most of his energy on building Pivot’s capacity through fundraising, social enterprise, event strategy and management and communications. Peter’s work at Pivot cultivates a widespread awareness of local social justice issues fostering support for Pivot’s work addressing social inequality in British Columbia. Peter is also a Board Member of Megaphone Magazine and a volunteer counselor at Vancouver Crisis Centre.
E-mail
pwrinch[at]pivotlegal.org |
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Updated December 18, 2008
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