ERA Board of Directors

Elizabeth Brannen
Barnes and Noble

Elizabeth Rogers Brannen is a seasoned intellectual property and commercial litigator. Prior to joining Barnes and Noble, she was Corporate Counsel with Oracle. Before that she was Counsel at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP in Palo Alto. Elizabeth served as a law clerk to the Honorable Arthur J. Gajarsa, United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. She is a 2000 graduate of Harvard Law School.

 

Christine Brigagliano
Van Der Hout, Brigagliano & Nightingale, LLP

Christine Brigagliano, partner at the San Francisco-based firm Van Der Hout, Brigagliano, & Nightingale, LLP since 1995, practices immigration law with a focus on employment-based immigration, non-immigrant visas, and complex family-based immigration and naturalization cases. A graduate of Smith College and UC Hastings Law School, she is a past NorCal Chapter chair and has been recognized multiple years as a Northern California “Super Lawyer”.

 

Darci E. Burrell
Levy Vinick Burrell Hyams LLP

Darci Burrell’s dedication to advancing the rights of society’s less powerful is equaled only by her devotion to the rule of law. An unyielding advocate for her clients, Darci’s innovative legal work has expanded the bounds of civil rights law. Darci is a partner of Levy Vinick Burrell Hyams LLP. She has practiced civil rights and public interest law since she graduated from UCLA Law School in 1995, beginning with a year serving as the Ruth Chance Law Fellow with Equal Rights Advocates. Darci then joined the NAACP Legal Defense Fund as a staff attorney. Darci returned to the Bay Area in 1998 to serve as a Civil Rights Attorney with the U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights, enforcing laws against discrimination in education on the basis of race, ethnicity, age, gender and disability.

 

Karen Carrera
Villegas Carrera, LLP

Karen Carrera is a partner at Villegas Carrera, LLP, a public interest law firm representing Plaintiffs in wage and hour class actions and discrimination lawsuits. She is also an Adjunct Professor of Law at University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She teaches Interviewing and Counseling Clients. Prior to becoming a partner at Villegas Carrera, she was a litigator at the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office. She has received several awards, including The La Raza Lawyer’s Association’s Unity Award for her legal assistance of low income communities and the Marin County Bar Association Wiley M. Manuel Award for serving pro bono clients. She has been on the board of ERA since 2009. She has two children and lives in Tiburon, California.

Simona A. Farrise
The Farrise Firm, P.C.

Simona A. Farrise, Esq., LL.M., founder of the Farrise Law Firm, P.C., is among the top lawyers in the country and a sought after national public speaker on a variety of legal topics. She has been featured in Southern California’s Best Lawyers®, and for each year from 2004 through 2012, San Francisco Magazine named her one of Northern California’s SuperLawyers™ and recognized her as one of the top 50 female lawyers in California. She has been co-counsel with ERA in a landmark class action employment case alleging sexual harassment, hostile work environment, and wage and hour violations for the approximately 2000-person workforce at the Thunder Valley Casino located north of Sacramento, California. In 2007, she received the prestigious Distinguished Alumnus Award of Golden Gate University School of Law.

 

Gay Crosthwait-Grunfeld, Vice-Chair
Rosen, Bien, Galvan & Grunfeld, LLP

Gay Grunfeld has been an ERA supporter for over two decades. She is an AV-rated litigator, received the CLAY award and Recorder Attorney of the Year in 2013, was named a SuperLawyer in 2012, and was listed as one of the 75 top women litigators in California in 2011. A tenacious and skilled advocate and problem solver, Gay and her firm, Rosen Bien Galvan & Grunfeld, specialize in complex litigation ranging from trade secrets to civil rights. Gay received a J.D. in 1984 from Columbia Law School and received a B.A. in 1981 from Wellesley College where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa and with highest honors. After completing law school, Gay clerked for the Honorable Jack Weinstein, Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York.

Monica Ip, Treasurer
Hemming Morse, LLP

Monica Ip is a Certified Public Accountant and a founding Partner at Evidentia Consulting, LLP, a Forensic Accounting & Consulting firm.  In addition to being Certified in Financial Forensics by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, she is also a Certified Valuation Analyst and a Certified Management Accountant. Monica has over 20 years of experience in performing forensic accounting investigations and economic damage analyses and has testified in federal and state courts as well as in arbitrations. Monica’s experience encompasses a diverse range of litigation matters including partnership disputes, breach of contract, intellectual property disputes, fraud investigations, and trust and estate disputes. Monica speaks regularly on economic damages issues and has taught graduate courses in forensic accounting and business valuation.

 

Joy A. Kruse
Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP

Joy Kruse is currently a partner at the San Francisco office of Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP where she is an experienced and accomplished securities litigation partner. She played a leading role in the day-to-day litigation and resolution of the highly successful Broadcom, McKesson, America Online, Peregrine, and Network Associates cases. Prior to joining Lieff, Joy served more than a decade as a criminal defense attorney, including four years as an Assistant Federal Public Defender in the Northern District of California and four years working in a white collar criminal defense firm in San Francisco. She is a graduate of Harvard Law School and Wellesley College.

 

Norene Lew
Fitness Anywhere, LLC

Norene Lew is in-house counsel for Fitness Anywhere LLC, owner of the TRX brand. Before joining Fitness Anywhere, she practiced commercial litigation at Coblentz, Patch, Duffy & Bass, LLP and spent ten years as an attorney with the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office. She earned her J.D. from UC Hastings College of the Law and her B.A. in Political Economy of Industrial Societies from UC Berkeley.

 

Beth H. Parker
Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California

Beth Parker, Chief Legal Counsel of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, has had an esteemed career of lawyering and dedicated pro bono and public interest service. PPAC provides legal, legislative, policy and regulatory services to the eight California affiliates, which combined operate 100 health centers and serve more than one million patients annually. Prior to PPAC, Beth was a partner and complex civil litigator at Arnold & Porter LLP in San Francisco. She specialized in intellectual property, complex commercial, constitutional, and civil rights matters and spent a significant part of her practice on pro bono matters. In 2004, she led the trial team in Planned Parenthood’s successful challenge to the first federal attempt to criminalize abortion since Roe v. Wade. Between 1997-2000 she left private practice to work as the Director of Program & Litigation at ERA. Beth graduated magna cum laude from Yale University and received her law degree from Harvard Law School. Beth has been married thirty years this spring, and has two children. In her spare time, she loves to travel to less visited countries and photograph markets.

Ghada Saliba-Malouf, Chair
Wells Fargo, Law Department

Ghada Saliba-Malouf is Managing Counsel in the Law Department at Wells Fargo Bank. She is based in San Francisco and provides legal counsel and advice to the Investment & Fiduciary Services business line of the Wealth, Brokerage and Retirement division. Throughout her tenure at Wells Fargo Ghada has been a leader on issues involving diversity. This involvement earned Ghada The General Counsel’s Award for diversity in 2012. Ghada has been involved in community causes in the San Francisco Bay Area for a number of years. She was a member of the San Francisco Human Rights Commission for eight years, serving as Chair of the Commission from 1999-2003. Ghada received her B.A. in Legal Studies from the University of California at Berkeley and her JD from Golden Gate University.

 

Roberta Steele
Goldstein, Borgen, Dardarian & Ho

Roberta Steele is Of Counsel at Goldstein, Borgen, Dardarian & Ho in Oakland, California, representing plaintiffs in employment discrimination and wage and hour class and collective action litigation throughout the country. She is the Employee Co-Chair of the CLE/Institutes and Meetings Committee for the ABA Section of Labor & Employment Law. From 2002-2010, Ms. Steele was the Employee Co-Chair of the Complex Litigation Subcommittee of the Employment Rights & Responsibilities Committee, ABA Section of Labor & Employment Law. Ms. Steele was an Executive Editor and chapter reviewer for Lindemann & Grossman, Employment Discrimination Law (5th ed., 2013). She is a frequent lecturer and panelist on subjects relating to class and collective actions, litigation practice and procedure, and the fair employment and wage and hour laws. Ms. Steele received her B.A. degree, summa cum laude, in 1990 from the University of Massachusetts at Boston and her J.D. degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Law in 1993 where she was an editor of Law Review.

 

Jessica Tipton
Ruckus Wireless, Inc.

Jessica Tipton is Corporate Counsel at Ruckus Wireless, Inc. She is responsible for corporate compliance across the company. She joined the rapidly growing company to oversee the compliance issues facing public companies. Previously, Jessica was Associate Counsel at Visa.inc. She was responsible for contract negations and also worked on privacy and social media matters. Prior to her time at Visa, Jessica was a litigation associate in the Palo Alto office of Morrison & Foerster. Prior to attending law school, Jessica served as a judicial extern for the Honorable Judge Kay Tsenin in the San Francisco Superior Court, and worked in Mozambique implementing heath care education programs. Jessica received her J.D. from Santa Clara University School of Law and her B.A. in Spanish and Philosophy from St. Mary’s College of California. In addition to her studies at Santa Clara, she worked for the United Nations at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia.

 

Kim van Voorhis
Morrison Foerster LLP

Kim van Voohis focuses primarily on high stakes medical device patent and trade secret litigation. Kim began her career in trademark litigation by working with companies on ICANN domain dispute and Trademark Trial and Appeals Board proceedings and district court enforcement. She continues to use that experience in cases that have overlapping technical and trademark-related issues. Kim received her J.D. from Loyola Law School, where she was articles editor for Loyola Law Review, and a B.S. from University of California, Irvine. She is active in leadership for the American Intellectual Property Law Association, currently serving as the Chair of the Trademark Law Committee and is a past Vice-Chair of AIPLA Trademark Relations with the PTO Committee and past Chair and Vice-Chair of the AIPLA Young Lawyers’ Committee.

 

Julie Veit, Secretary
Hanson Bridgett LLP

Julie Veit is senior counsel at Hanson Bridgett, where she represents a variety of public sector clients, including state agencies, cities and counties, transit agencies, special districts, and regional planning entities. Julie frequently litigates torts, civil rights, and other land use cases and also provides risk management advice to public sector clients. She handles issues arising under the First, Fourth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments, as well as under Title II and VI. Julie chaired the firm’s Pro Bono Committee for over six years. Julie clerked for the Honorable Edward C. Reed, Jr., United States Senior District Judge for the United States District Court in Reno, Nevada. Julie graduated cum laude from Amherst College, and magna cum laude from University of San Francisco School of Law. Julie first was introduced to ERA when she served as a law clerk in 1999.

 

Michael Greenberg
Law Offices of Michael L. Greenberg

Michael Greenberg is a solo practitioner specializing in employment law who litigates on behalf of employees and assists small to mid-size employers with transactional and compliance issues. He has participated in numerous local and national political campaigns, including the 2008 Obama-Biden and 2004 Kerry-Edwards presidential campaigns, in a variety of capacities. Michael earned a B.A. in Political Science from the University of California at Davis in 1987 and a J.D. from the McGeorge School of Law in 1992, where, upon graduation, he was awarded the Order of the Barrister for excellence in oral and written advocacy.

 

Emily Katz Kishawi

Emily Katz Kishawi got an early start in marketing, growing up in rural California where she rode door-to-door selling her school’s fundraising gift wrap by horseback.  She’s spent the interceding decades helping organizations find their voices to make the world a better place and ruthlessly slaying the demons of jargon.  She’s focused her management positions on advancing the rights of people to live dignified lives and fulfill their greatest potential.