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Karen Pita Loor was born and lived as a child in Ecuador, arrived in the United States as an adolescent and made Miami her home until her move to Washington, D.C., where she attended law school and, since 1998, has been an attorney at the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia. In her five years at the Public Defender Service, which is widely regarded as the leading public defender program in the nation, Professor Loor worked her way up the ranks of the Juvenile and Felony Trial Divisions to her position as an Appellate Attorney. As a trial attorney, Professor Loor had responsibilities in all areas of indigent criminal defense and tried a variety of cases, including first-degree murder, serious assaults and drug trafficking cases. As an appellate attorney, Professor Loor prepared briefs in criminal cases dealing with both constitutional and evidentiary issues and argued before the District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

Her responsibilities also included mentoring and assisting with the training of beginning attorneys at the Public Defender Service. Professor Loor also served as a staff attorney at the Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center in Miami, where she represented homeless immigrants seeking public benefits before the Social Security Administration. While in school, Professor Loor was a student attorney at the Washington College of Law’s International Human Right’s Clinic, where she successfully represented a Sudanese woman seeking asylum in the United States with a gender-based claim. She earned her J.D. degree cum laude and her B.A. degree magna cum laude.

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