Fighting For The Laguna Beach Community: Local Hero

LAGUNA BEACH, CA — When times are tough, heroes emerge. We all know someone who's making a difference right now as we live through unprecedented and changing times.

Here at Patch, we've launched an initiative to help recognize these heroes making a difference in their communities. We’re working to let all your neighbors know about these outstanding people and their stories.

This submission comes from Miles Bupta who nominated Kirsten Kreymann of Laguna Beach.

Local hero’s full name

Kirsten Kreymann

Local hero’s home state

California

Local hero’s Patch

Laguna Beach

How do you know the local hero?

Former Client

What does the local hero do?

She is a free lawyer

Why do you believe the local hero should be recognized or honored?

Kirsten has a law firm where 50% of the total work is given to the community for free. This is remarkable because she is not a legal aid type group - She is a regular business that gives more back to the community then any other business I have known.

Kirsten helps human trafficking victims, domestic violence victims, people who have been sexually assaulted, Asylum Seekers, people in danger of homelessness (she deals with a lot of landlords trying to kick people out so they can get more rent during the housing crisis), and senior victims of elder abuse. She makes sure people who would otherwise go without a lawyer, get one, so that justice prevails.

Kirsten is a first generation American. Her family has been in Laguna Beach for 5 generations. (Her great grandparents, I think, immigrated there from Denmark). Kirsten is the first person in her family to go to college. She always knew she wanted to do this type of work because she saw too many injustices growing up, and her family did not have money so there were lots of times they weee taken advantage of. She has been a lawyer for 20 years and has always done a lot of pro bono, or worked for nonprofits that do all pro bono. She makes our community a safer, more just place for everyone.

What's one thing you want everyone to know about the local hero?

Kirsten has devoted her entire career to ensuring access to Justice for everyone. That is 20 years she has been fighting for the rights of people with little money, victims of crimes, seniors who are being abused, and many others. She has helped 1,000s of people so far in her career and says she plans to help 1,000s more.

She has a case right now against a slumlord type person who evicted 15 disabled seniors at the holidays and told them to go live in their cars. She stopped the eviction and is fighting with the landlord to fix everything up and give money back to the tenants. He is trying to sell the place to a very rich guy who will tear it down so he can build a baseball diamond for his son. During the housing crisis we should be building more homes, not tearing them down.

Thank you for all you do, Kirsten Kreymann!

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Know someone making a difference in town?

Nominate them here.