Karin Huber-Levy

President

California Youth Defender Center

As Board President of the California Youth Defender Center, Karin brings senior corporate legal and executive leadership experience, including service as General Counsel and Corporate Secretary of a pharmaceutical corporation. In that role, she advised executive leadership on governance, enterprise risk, regulatory compliance, and long-term strategy, and as a member of the senior management team, oversaw legal operations, managed departmental budgets, and coordinated domestic and international legal strategy. She began her legal career practicing corporate-commercial and securities law with Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP in Toronto and London (UK) after earning her J.D. from the University of Windsor (Canada). Having lived and worked in Canada, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Germany, and the United States, she brings a global perspective and collaborative leadership style to her work.

Karin’s commitment to youth defense and justice reform was shaped by five years of service as Vice Chair of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Commission of San Mateo County. In that role, she advocated for alternatives to youth incarceration, promoted equitable diversion pathways, and provided oversight of education and programming in the county’s juvenile hall and short-term residential treatment programs. She worked to strengthen the programs and services available to system-involved youth and to support community-based approaches that reduce reliance on detention.

For more than two decades, Karin has focused her volunteer leadership on expanding educational opportunity for youth, including school-based advocacy, and advocating for access to high- quality, affordable after-school programs in San Mateo County. She is a graduate of the Leadership Corps Program of Leadership Council San Mateo County and is committed to advancing a strong statewide youth defense community that ensures young people who encounter the justice system receive specialized, high-quality representation and meaningful opportunities for growth and transformation.