by CATHARINE SKIPP
Costa Mesa, California native Starnes Arnold, 1L, spent the last nine years living in Asia. He became a professional Muay Thai fighter in Thailand, and later moved to Taiwan to study Chinese. He continued competing in juijitsu, kickboxing, and MMA, once becoming the #1 ranked amateur MMA middleweight in Southeast Asia. He used his language skills to become a Muay Thai instructor and taught Taiwanese students at various gyms across the island. Additionally, he worked as an English teacher for middle school students and says he learned more from them than he did from most adults. As a first-year student, he plans to study international law and hopes to work in a global setting as an international litigator.
From professional ballet to medicine and now law, Adriana Báez’s journey has been fueled by passion and advocacy. Between medical school courses, she advocates for clients facing health disparities with the Florida Health Justice Project. Earlier, she coordinated care and services for patients, serving in leadership positions with the Mitchell Wolfson Sr. Department of Community Service and as a legal intern with Miami Law’s Children and Youth Law Clinic. UM’s first female M.D./J.D. candidate, she promotes diversity and inclusion within professional communities through mentorship. She is a two-time recipient of the CALI award for excellence and was awarded University of Miami’s 30 Under 30.
Taimaisú Ferrer Sin, 2L, and a Dean’s Merit Scholar, is a Peter Palermo Fellow for the Center for Ethics and Public Service. She is a Jack Kent Cooke Foundation Graduate Scholar and an NAACP LDF Earl Warren Scholar. She is involved in the Black Law Students Association, Miami Law Women, and the Hispanic Law Students Association on campus. Off-campus, she is a Wilkie D. Ferguson, Jr. Bar Association member, and an American Institute of Architects associate member. This past summer, she served as a HOPE Summer Public Interest Fellow with Legal Services of Greater Miami. Currently, she is a zoning analyst intern at the National Zoning Atlas.
Photini Kamvisseli Suarez, 3L, is a fellow in the Human Rights Clinic’s Right to Food team. She is also working on environmental justice as a research assistant to Professor Abigail Fleming. During her 2L year, she received the CALI Excellence for the Future Award and the HOPE Exemplary Service Award as a student intern for her work with the HRC. In this role, she supported a growing national human right to food movement, with a focus on Maine, which recently enshrined the first-ever right to food amendment in its constitution. She was also the Summer 2022 Kozyak Minority Mentoring Foundation Harley and Sheryl Tropin Fellow.
Third-year Miami Scholar Paula Manrique is completing an environmental law concentration as a joint J.D./M.P.S. student focusing on coastal zone management at the Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science. She has interned with the Everglades Law Center, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and Earthjustice Washington D.C. Regional Office. As a 3L, she worked as a certified legal intern at Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office Felonies Unit and attended the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Dubai as an observer with the environmental law program. She is on the executive boards of the Environmental Law Society and the National Lawyers Guild.
Timothy Mondloch, 3L, is the current Race and Social Justice Law Review editor-in-chief. He hopes to use the skills and connections he has gained at Miami Law to advocate for positive change in reparations, criminal defense, and human rights and further explore his passion for litigation. As a law clerk and summer associate with McDermott Will & Emery and an intern with Bread for the City (a D.C.-based nonprofit), Mondloch has worked on a variety of commercial litigation matters and pro bono cases. These include helping people from various South American countries gain a path toward citizenship and providing support for individuals in gaining access to government benefits and family law services.
University of Miami Law Review and Charles C. Papy, Jr. Moot Court Board member Gabriella Pinzon, 3L, was awarded two CALI Excellence for the Future Awards in Civil Procedure and Torts in her first year. She then served as an intern for Judge Jose E. Martinez in the Southern District of Florida and at the United States Attorney’s Office, gaining valuable insights into the complexities of the legal system. During her second year, Pinzon triumphed in moot court, winning both the John T. Gaubatz and John J. Gibbons Moot Court Competitions and a Best Oralist award. Most recently, Pinzon served as a summer associate at Jones Day and accepted a first-year associate position upon passing the bar.
Gabriela Rivero, a 3L Miami Scholar, is earning her J.D./LL.M. in International Law. As a 1L, she received the Innovative Service in Public Interest Award for her work with the ACLU of Florida’s Immigrant Detention Database. She completed a HOPE Summer Fellowship at the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies. As a 2L, she joined the Immigration Clinic, served on multiple executive boards, and clerked at Kurzban, Kurzban, Tetzeli & Pratt, P.A. As a 3L, Rivero is the Public Interest Leadership Board fundraising co-chair and externed with the Southern Poverty Law Center.
First-year Ellie Wheeler is a Dean’s Merit Scholar pursuing a J.D. and an LL.M. in Real Property Development. She graduated cum laude from the University of Florida as a marine sciences major with a minor in agricultural and natural resource Law. She spent most of her undergraduate career interning in the Behringer Laboratory, studying crustacean disease ecology. She was drawn to UM’s J.D./LL.M. program to help bridge the gap between water law and property development in South Florida and help advise developers and policymakers to ensure that future growth is attainable. She is passionate about helping the greater community by leading breathwork and yoga classes.
Olivia Zukowski, 2L, and a Miami Public Interest Scholar, credits the HOPE Public Interest Resource Center for her 1L year pro bono involvement, including her time as a Health Disparities Project Intern with the Center for Ethics and Public Service. She spent her 1L summer learning more about employment discrimination litigation with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission as a Squire Patton Boggs Public Policy Fellow. As a 2L, she participates in Exchange for Change, a legal writing program with the Everglades Correctional Center, and is a junior staff editor for the University of Miami Law Review. She will join Carlton Fields as a summer associate in 2024.
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