About Us

Who We Are

Ollin Law seeks to reimagine the legal profession, with our lawyers serving as healers and peacemakers as well as legal representatives. Our team of attorneys, staff, and consultants works with the aim of helping our clients, who are members of our communities, transform their lives and discover their life purpose.

Our Mission

Our mission is to use our legal expertise to address systemic injustices and to help bring about a just and equitable society rooted in the indigenous principles of compassion, interconnectedness, and hope.

Our Team

Executive Director – Salomon Zavala, Esq.

EMAIL: szavala@ollinlaw.org

Attorney Salomon Zavala graduated from the University of California at Berkeley’s School of Law after earning a Bachelor of Arts degree with honors in Sociology from Amherst College. During his academic and legal studies, he immersed himself in restorative justice and criminal justice reform pedagogy and death penalty litigation.

As a practicing attorney, Salomon experienced the injustices of the legal system and was inspired to infuse indigenous justice principles into the adversarial and punitive structure of American law, co-founding Ollin law in 2013.

At Ollin Law, Mr. Zavala focuses on prison reform/abolition and represents clients with a range of matters, including wrongful convictions and resentencing hearings. He has conducted legal clinics and trainings throughout the U.S. and Mexico, including providing direct services to deportees after serving prison sentences, and has conducted various trainings on alternatives to incarceration and indigenous peoples rights advocacy. Currently, he serves on the boards of various community-based nonprofits, including incarceration-based education and indigenous peoples rights organizations.

Mr. Zavala, a first-generation Chicano, was raised by his single Mexican immigrant mother in the Florence District of South Central, Los Angeles during the 1980s and 90s. He witnessed first-hand the consequences of mass incarceration and tough-on-crime policies, and those early memories are at the root of his legal work and commitment to justice.

Attorney – Pascual Torres, Esq.

EMAIL: ptorres@ollinlaw.org

Attorney Pascual Torres was raised in East LA’s Aliso Village Housing Projects. His early experiences there led him to a life-long commitment to social justice and community service, having lost loves ones to the war on drugs, gang violence and mass incarceration.

A co-founder of Ollin Law, Pascual has been instrumental in expanding the concept of “healing law,” where communities can have a transformative relationship with the law. Pascual was also key in developing the organization’s “Bring Them Home” Prison Project, which advocates for inmates serving long sentences while keeping them connected to their families.

Mr. Torres represents incarcerated clients serving long sentences in gaining their parole and other post-conviction relief, including wrongful convictions and resentencing petitions. Mr. Torres has also conducted various “clean-slate” post-conviction clinics throughout LA County.

Mr. Torres has a long trajectory of social justice and healing work, including as a member of the Dolores Mission Community, where Homeboy Industries was founded. Pascual worked at Homeboy Industries for many years gaining extensive knowledge on the root causes of gang violence. He has also traveled to Mexico and Central America where he presented and trained government agencies, including law enforcement and NGO’s on trauma-informed approaches to violence and visited prisons where he facilitated healing circles.

He is a proud graduate of Los Angeles’ People’s College of Law and received his bachelor’s degree from the California State University at Northridge. Mr. Torres is trained in different healing modalities and practices various indigenous ceremonies.

Paralegal / Community Advocate – Mirna Solorzano

EMAIL: msolorzano@ollinlaw.org

Mirna was born in El Salvador and migrated to Los Angeles in the 1980s with her parents to escape the country’s civil war. Mirna’s parents involvement in the FMLN (Farabundo Marti para la Liberacion Nacional) exposed her at an early age to social and political organizing, which cultivated within her a strong sense of compassion, activism and community organizing. As such, as an adolescent Mirna joined the MIR (Movimiento Infantil Revolucionario), the youth counterpart of the FMLN.

As a refugee teenager in the streets of Los Angeles, she experienced trauma and turned to gangs until the birth of her first son, when she decided to transform her life. As part of this process, Mirna returned to her ancestral roots for guidance and strength and went to school while working various jobs.

A profound transformation shift occurred when Mirna returned to El Salvador and witnessed the country’s policy of “Mano Dura” and the impact that massive deportations had on the social fabric of the country. Mirna was inspired to focus on social justice issues, especially those affecting immigrants and youth involved with the justice system.

As a result, in 1996 she co-founded “Homies Unidos,” a youth empowerment and violence prevention organization, serving as its legal advocate for many years. As a legal advocate, Mirna became a voice for those who felt estranged from the legal system, including organizing “Youth and the Law Clinics,” advocating for tenant’s rights facing eviction and assisting those facing deportation after serving time in prison.

Mirna is the eldest of three siblings and is a proud mother of four adult men and grandmother to eight beautiful grandchildren.