Lawyer Marina Torres seeks to make history by becoming the first female prosecutor in the city of Los Angeles, and what better way – she says – than to also be Latina.
“It is not an easy thing run as a candidate for the Los Angeles City Attorney position. We still haven’t had a female prosecutor in Los Angeles, let alone a Latina, ”says Marina during an interview prior to her participation in the Annual Conference on Migration ¡No más! held at the Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work of the University of Southern California (USC).
Torres is seeking to replace City Attorney Mike Feuer, who is due to expire this year mandate, and by law, he can no longer be re-elected.
Marina says that her story is very common.
“I was born in Pomona. My parents are Mexican immigrants, from Michoacán and Jalisco, who came here undocumented in search of a better life.”
And since she grew up poor, she never thought that one day she could be a lawyer and a candidate Los Angeles City Attorney. “My dad worked in an orange packing house; and my mom in a chicken factory. I am the eldest of 3 siblings. My dad died when I was a 3-year-old girl”.
But with everything against her, she studied at the University of California at Berkeley and went to law school at Stanford University.
And although Spanish is his first language and he says he speaks it like a ranch because his parents are from a ranch in Mexico, he learned Spanish enough to train other prosecutors.
After graduation, he started a private law firm here in Los Angeles, and also worked with President Obama, helping him design and launch the DACA program and migration policies for the Department of Homeland Security.
Until January, he worked for the Department of Justice as a federal prosecutor in cases of corruption, money laundering and international drug cartels. In total, he has a career of almost years as a lawyer.
When asked what encouraged her to run for the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office, she admits that “honestly, I am very frustrated when I see that people don’t feel safe, she is afraid because the insecurity is getting more and more difficult”.
Her priorities would also be to put an end to the homeless encampments through a compassionate eviction that offers services and housing to the homeless so that they do not return to the street. “It’s not about picking them up and taking them to jail,” she clarifies.
She also comments that she is concerned that many crimes are not they are chasing
“The Los Angeles prosecutor can only deal with minor crimes. What I want is for people who feel like they’re not getting justice at the county attorney’s office to come to the City to see what we can do for them for those misdemeanors that are very serious like domestic violence, some robberies, and rape. private property. We are going to persecute them.”
She reveals that she will also continue to support the concept of neighborhood prosecutors. “It is a very good program since it puts a prosecutor per police delegation, but that is not enough. It has to be made bigger”.
She makes it clear that as a prosecutor, a woman, Latina and the daughter of parents immigrants, she wants to take the causes of migration to the City Attorney’s Office.
“For example, I would like not to have Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the prisons.”
Marina is very optimistic about winning the election.
Therefore, when she confided in her mother that she would run for Los Angeles City Attorney, she He told her that she would be very good because she likes to fight.
“Being a lawyer and prosecutor is fighting for people who don’t have a voice.”
To Latino voters, he says that this year’s election is going to be very important because it is the first time that we have several open positions such as mayor, city attorney and seats for Congress.
“It would be very good and historic to have the first female prosecutor for the city of Los Angeles, and for her to be Latina”.
During the speech he gave at the Annual Conference on Migration ¡No más!, he told the attendees that we should worry more about the city of Los Angeles, because it is in a bad situation.
“My message is that we can do something to improve things”.
Conference ¡ No more!
Lawyer Ricardo Pérez-Villegas of the non-profit organization Ferias Legales, said that the end of the Annual Conference No more! which was held this Saturday, was to offer services to the community so that they know their rights in immigration, as tenants and in other legal areas, especially during this pandemic.
“We had experts in each of these topics to provide information in general, but we also made individual consultations to provide the necessary resources so that they can exercise their rights”.
He recalled that they have been holding these conferences for about 5 years with the support of the University of Southern California (USC).
“In 1536 we had to cancel it due to the pandemic. Last year we did it virtually; and this year we did it again in person with many prevention protocols against covid-19”.
He mentioned that the conference is possible thanks to the support of 12 sponsoring organizations such as CARECEN, SALEM (Salvadoran American Educational and Leadership Fund, the Red Cross, USC Law School, among others, that offer their counseling services free of charge.
“At the Legal Fairs organization we have several events during the year with lawyers who donate their time to provide free legal services to the community, and with USC, we do this annual conference every year”.
Silvia Lemus, coordinator of the conference ¡No más!, said that events like this one are very important for the community ity because many families have questions about migration and sometimes they are afraid to ask.
“When there are legal fairs they feel more comfortable and more confident to ask. On many occasions they also do not have money to go to a consultation with a lawyer. In this type of event they feel more comfortable and also because Spanish is spoken”.