Kristen Shepherd

Kristen E. Shepherd is the staff attorney for the Community Health Law Partnership (Community HeLP) Clinic at the University of Georgia School of Law. In this role, she supervises students providing legal representation to low-income clients in the Athens area. Her work furthers the clinic’s goal to help underserved community members by addressing health-harming legal needs, focusing on immigration and federal litigation.

Shepherd has represented noncitizens in immigration proceedings since 2013. Most recently, Shepherd was an associate attorney at the law firm Socheat Chea, where she represented clients in affirmative, defensive, detained, and appellate immigration matters. She has also worked as a staff attorney at nonprofit organizations, including the nationally recognized Northwest Immigrant Rights Project in Seattle, Washington. In 2019, she traveled to Tijuana, Mexico to volunteer with the nonprofit organization Al Otro Lado and advise asylum seekers stranded by the “Remain in Mexico” policy. 

She earned her undergraduate degree from Arizona State University and her Juris Doctor from William Mitchell College of Law, where she received the Minnesota Justice Foundation’s Achievement in Public Service Award for completing over 600 hours of community service. Shepherd speaks Spanish and has studied abroad in Spain and Mexico. 

Shepherd maintains a membership in the American Immigration Lawyers Association and is currently an active member of the bar in the following jurisdictions:

Georgia State Bar
Georgia Supreme Court
U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia
U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit