NCIP Staff

Kathleen M. Ridolfi, Director, Professor of Law

Kathleen "Cookie" Ridolfi is a tenured member of the SCU law faculty.

 

Professor Ridolfi founded the Northern California Innocence Project in 2001 and in 2004 co-founded the Innocence Network, a collaboration of 49 innocence projects in the United States and in four other countries. From 2004-2008, she served as Commissioner of the California Senate Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice.

 

Professor Ridolfi was a trial lawyer with the Defender Association of Philadelphia where she served in the Special Defense Unit. She was a pioneer and innovator in the early development and application of social science to jury selection and a leader in the development of expert testimony for use in cases of battered women raising claims of self-defense.

 

She had received numerous accolades for her classroom work including the prestigious Russell Galloway Professor of the Year. She teaches criminal law and a seminar on Righting Wrongful Conviction: Policy and Legislative Reform.

Linda Starr, Legal Director

Linda Starr received her J.D. from the University of Southern California Law Center and clerked for the California Court of Appeal upon graduation. She was an assistant district attorney in Brooklyn, New York, where she wrote and argued post-conviction matters before state and federal courts and was a supervisor in the Sex Crimes and Special Victims Unit. Ms. Starr worked as a staff attorney at the Sixth District Appellate Program in California and then privately represented indigent criminal defendants on appeal. In 2001, she co-founded NCIP.

Lee Raney, Associate Director

Lee joined the NCIP staff in 2008, after serving on the Advisory Board for three years.

 

Before joining NCIP, Ms. Raney was the founder and CEO of Pivot Point Strategies, a consulting firm focused on revenue acceleration for companies and non-profits. She has held senior management positions in a diverse array of technology and non-technology companies in Silicon Valley and the East Coast. In addition, she is a founding board member of EGGS for Foster Children, a non-profit that supplies educational gifts and grants to foster children in Massachusetts.

 

Lee is a graduate of Davidson College and holds an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Jill Kent, Supervising Attorney

Jill Kent joined NCIP in early 2002. She is a ’92 graduate of Santa Clara Law and received the Wiley Manuel Pro Bono Services Award for assisting victims of the Los Angeles riots after passing the California Bar Exam. She worked as a legal aid attorney in Southern California, focusing on family, landlord/tenant, real property, contract, consumer, estate planning, battered women, redevelopment, and elder issues. She was also an active member of the Southern California Housing Task Force and the Domestic Violence Task Force. In addition to her work with NCIP, Ms. Kent is a panel attorney with the Sixth District Appellate Program.

Rhonda Donato, Supervising Attorney

Rhonda Donato supervises students through the Innocence Project clinic at Santa Clara University and litigates post-conviction cases in Central and Northern California. Ms. Donato was previously a staff attorney for Justice Paul Haerle on the First District Court of Appeal. She also worked as a litigation associate at McCutchen, Doyle, Brown and Enersen in San Francisco. Ms. Donato served as an extern for the Honorable Melvin Brunetti on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal in Reno, Nevada. She graduated, cum laude, from Santa Clara University Law School in 1989 where she was a recipient of the Emery Law Scholarship and a member of the Law Review.

Paige Kaneb, Clinical Fellow

Paige Kaneb is a recent cum laude graduate of the University Of San Francisco School of Law and graduated from Hamilton College in 2000. Prior to working at the Innocence Project, Ms. Kaneb interned at the Contra Costa Public Defender’s Office as a law clerk and worked for the Institute for Global Justice researching ways to sue and prosecute oil companies and banks for corrupt practices linked to extreme poverty and human rights abuses in Equatorial Guinea.

Rhonda Dyer, Database Administrator

Rhonda Dyer only works at NCIP a few hours a week, but her contribution to the organization is felt full-time by the staff. Her experience in computer software has been an incredible help to the project. Although "retired" after a career at Hewlett Packard, she rose to the challenge of assisting an office with few high-tech skills. Ms. Dyer customizes, manages and troubleshoots all the database programs NCIP uses. Her expertise with Microsoft programs such as Excel and Access and her ability to customize other programs to suit NCIP’s needs have been invaluable. Much of her time is spent managing NCIP’s largest program, Amicus Attorney, which houses information on the 7000+ people and 3000+ files related to the project. In her spare time, Ms. Dyer and search and rescue dog Deja seek lost people in remote locations for local law enforcement organizations.

Amy Kennedy, Administrative Coordinator

Upon completing her Bachelor of Science from Santa Clara University in 2006, Amy Kennedy became a Jesuit Volunteer with the Innocence Project-New Orleans for a year-long placement. After completing her year in New Orleans, she returned to Santa Clara as an Administrative Assistant for NCIP. She is excited to be starting law school at Santa Clara Law in the Fall of 2008.

Sandy Lichau, Office Manager

Sandy Lichau has worked at the law clinic since 1971. Prior to joining Santa Clara University she studied at San Jose State University and worked at the law firm of Tunney, Carlyle & Bennett. Ms. Lichau provides direct administrative support to the director, legal director, development director, attorneys, and case manager, and guidance and support to the law students.