Member Spotlights

Larry Valdez is a supervising attorney for the in-house counsel department at Kemper insurance.  Larry has been a member of OCAABA since he was first year in law school and has continued to be involved to this day.  As a board member of OCAABA, Larry chaired the Pipeline Committee paired attorneys with law students for OCAABA's mentorship program.
 
Larry is from Las Vegas where he received his Bachelor's of Science in Managerial Finance.  He attended and graduated from Whittier Law School in Costa Mesa.  Larry enjoys spending time with family, watching sports, and collecting sneakers. 

Jeannie Fu is in-house counsel at Neudesic, LLC, an IBM company, a technology consulting company with over 20 years of Microsoft partnership, delivering impactful business results through digital modernization and evolution. As Counsel, Jeannie assists with the negotiation of various contracts as well as supports various business units in day-to-day legal matters. As a board member of OCAABA, Jeannie has been involved with numerous committees over the years, including social committee, in-house counsel committee, and currently serves on its community service committee.

Prior to her role at Neudesic, Jeannie worked at an insurance defense litigation firm handling a broad range of matters from personal injury to COVID-19 insurance coverage, having worked with multiple managing partners from different offices of the firm throughout the United States. Jeannie obtained both her JD and BS degrees from Chapman University.  

John Kim is a litigator with trial experience in both Federal and State courts as well as private arbitrations.  Mr. Kim’s practice areas involve insolvency/bankruptcy, governmental affairs, banking, real estate, employment, construction defect, D&O litigation, and corporate/shareholder disputes.  Mr. Kim has represented government agencies, bankruptcy trustees, private companies of all sizes, high net worth individuals and law firms.

John completed his undergraduate education at the University of California at Los Angeles, (B.A., Political Scene, June 1998, Honors) and obtained his law degree from Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, California (Juris Doctorate, December 2001, Magna Cum Laude, Order of the Coif).  John has been nominated a "Super Lawyer" from 2008-2022 and also serves as a board member to the Diversity Committee and Insolvency Law Committee of the Business Law Section for the State Bar of California.  John is a member of Crossline Community Church and lives in Orange County with his wife and dog.  Mr. Kim enjoys travelling, attending musical events, visiting zoos and whiskey tasting.

Prior to his shift into philanthropy, Michael Le was a real estate and corporate attorney for 10+ years handling transactions, litigation, compliance and managing internal and outside counsel.  His curiosity and desire to shake things up led him to complete his MBA at USC in 2017.  This was a transformative experience being immersed in an academic and business community that guided him to his next North Star towards service and philanthropy.  While still advising family offices through their real estate transactions, risk assessment and compliance efforts, Michael was able to throw himself in the community to better the lives of ALL Orange County citizens. 

After working with projects that helped students with the tech employment gap, he is a director of Emilio Nares Foundation, a charity that helps kids with cancer in California.  He is also a board member of Project Vietnam Foundation, and collaborator for non-profits like Cancer Kinship, Veteran’s Legal Institute, Orange County United Way and Girls, Inc. Michael will again be serving as the Master of Ceremonies for this year’s annual dinner.

Justin Fong is General Counsel with AmWest Funding Corp., one of the nation’s largest Non-QM loan originators. As General Counsel, he has assisted his company with over $1b in loan securitizations and over $5b in loan sales.

Prior to joining AmWest, Justin was at a national law firm representing lenders in commercial litigation and transactional matters. As a Board member of OCAABA, Justin has co-chaired the COVID-19 Committee, Stop-Asian Hate Committee, Social Committee, and Community Service Committee. In addition to his work with OCAABA, Justin serves on the Costa Mesa Housing & Public Grant Committee, the Costa Mesa Cultural Arts Committee, ACC SoCal Well Being Committee, OCBA International Law Executive Committee, and OCBA Hate Crime Task Force. Justin obtained his JD/MBA from Washington University in St. Louis and his BA from UCSD.

Eric Fanchiang is an associate in Crowell & Moring’s Orange County office and is a member of the firm’s Antitrust & Competition Group. His practice focuses primarily on antitrust litigation for both defendants and plaintiffs and on government investigations. He has experience across a broad range of industries, including technology, transportation, and digital media. Eric represents his clients on a wide range of antitrust issues including standard setting, trade association policies, misuse of patents and trade secrets, and price fixing.

As a partner with Constangy, Brooks, Smith & Prophete, LLP, Thy Bui defends employers in lawsuits alleging causes of action for discrimination, retaliation, harassment, wage and hour violations, and other statutory and common-law claims arising from the employment relationship. Her clients include public and private sector employers in a broad range of industries, including technology, retail/hospitality, healthcare, higher education, and real estate.

Thy previously served as President of OCAABA in 2017-2018 and has served in a range of positions in NAPABA - National Asian Pacific American Bar Association - Labor & Employment Committee Co-Chair, Southern California Regional Governor, Young Lawyers Network Co-Chair, and At-Large Board Member. She is on the Board of Directors of the Community Action Fund of Planned Parenthood of Orange and San Bernardino Counties and the Inner City Law Center.

Thy’s hobbies include sailing, yoga, and indoor cycling. She loves animals and has dogs named Sir Rupert Woofington and Senator Fred Thompson.

Harrison Le is a personal injury attorney and the principal and founder of The Le Firm. He was born in Hawthorne, raised in Sacramento and has settled in Orange County. Before practicing Personal Injury Law, Harrison began his legal career as a criminal defense attorney as a Public Defender at the Orange County Public Defender's Office as well as in private practice. He's litigated 18 jury trials and 2 bench trials during his time. These trials involved criminal allegations that ranged in severity from simple misdemeanors to felony strike offenses.

Harrison now specializes in Personal Injury Law representing Plaintiffs in actions involving motor vehicle and trucking accidents, wrongful death, sexual assaults, catastrophic injuries, premise liability and more. He's volunteered for various community-based organizations such as the Little Saigon Foundation of San Diego and Underground GRIT. Outside of the law, Harrison spends the majority of his spare time learning to golf and convincing his wife and baby daughter to watch UFC and 49ers with him.

Fred Thiagarajah is the founder and principal of a Right Choice Law, a criminal defense law firm that covers most of Southern California. Fred has been practicing criminal law exclusively since 2000. A graduate of USC's Gould Law School, Fred served as a Deputy District Attorney for four years before opening up his own law practice. Fred has been selected as a Super Lawyer for criminal defense every year since 2016 and has conducted approximately 90 jury trials to date.    

Denise Crawford is a Deputy Public Defender IV trial lawyer with the Orange County Public Defender's Office. During her career, she has handled all manner of criminal matters from simple misdemeanors to complex felony cases. As a senior lawyer in the office, she mentors younger deputies, conducts hiring interviews and provides training. She began her career under the expert tutelage of preeminent trial lawyer Jennifer L. Keller. When she transitioned to the Orange County Public Defender's Office, not only did she handle criminal matters, she was assigned to Mental Health, LPS, Probate, SVP, Guardianship and Juvenile units gaining extensive experience in niche areas of practice. By far, however, Ms. Crawford is most at home in front of her juries. She travels to conduct trainings on trial practice both domestically and abroad with international partnerships. Most recently, Ms. Crawford provided trial training to the Public Defender's Office equivalent in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. She also writes and publishes on the topic of trial practice.

Ms. Crawford is a frequent speaker and most recently (April 2020) spoke on panel with Congressman Gil Cisneros and Congresswoman Judy Chu. To read about her cases in the media, awards and honors - just Google her! She was elected to the Board of Directors of the Orange County Asian American Bar Association (OCAABA) in 2013 and has served as co-chair of the Judicial Evaluation and Community Service Committees. She finished her term as President of OCAABA in 2021 and currently serves as the Immediate Past President while also serving as the NAPABA Southern California Regional Governor. She loves a good fight (in court) and in her spare time is an avid scuba diver, sport motorcycle rider, political news junkie and pug dog lover.