Katie expertly navigates family law cases and their inherent power dynamics. She gained this expertise over twenty-three years practicing family law in San Francisco, through her master’s and bachelor’s level psychology education, and in many community-based workplaces and volunteer spaces where Katie has devoted her time and expertise.
Katie pursues domestic violence restraining orders and civil harassment restraining orders for people needing protection, and she has received trauma-informed training that equips her to assess threats within families and communities. Katie litigates and mediates divorce and child custody matters. She also advises Bay Area schools on executing their protocols in compliance with family law when disputes arise between school parents.
Katie takes pride in her premarital and post-marital agreements, which she has continually tailored over two decades to factor in legal, economic, and cultural shifts, and which she writes in plain, comprehensible language.
Katie is a child advocate, who serves as minor’s counsel (i.e., an attorney representing children in their parents’ child custody matters) and takes a child-centered approach to representing and mediating for parents in child custody cases. She has signed Pierce’s Pledge, a promise that signing family law attorneys will require our divorce/custody clients with minor children to sign that they do not own firearms or that, if they do, they will store them in a secure, off-site location with a third party. From 2009 through 2023, Katie sat on the board for Amsha Africa Foundation (“AAF”), a nonprofit through which Katie facilitated pen pal relationships between U.S. and Kenyan children for fourteen years.
From her master’s degree in counseling psychology and her work with families and schools, Katie understands psychologically complex individuals and groups. People in the family law system deserve an attentive advocate or mediator, clearly explained insights, and well-written accounts of their presenting conflicts. Katie delivers on these essential elements.
Katie has reported on California cases for the Daily Journal, The Bar Association of San Francisco Bulletin, Legal by the Bay, and Trial Insider. She has contributed attorney and judicial profiles for San Francisco Attorney Magazine. Katie’s newspaper publications include the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, and The Noe Valley Voice. In April 2020, she published Urban Playground, her book of interviews with San Francisco children.
Katie earned her B.A. in Psychology from Fairfield University in Connecticut, her Master of Counseling degree from Arizona State University, and her law degree from the University of San Francisco School of Law.
Katie is a member of the Family Law and Solo & Small Firm sections of the Bar Association of San Francisco; Joy in the Law; CouncilONE; ProVisors San Francisco 9; and the ProVisors Bay Area Lawyers Group. She is a board member for CouncilONE, a Bay Area community for small business owners.
Abby de Vries is a Junior Associate with Burke Law. A Bay Area native, Abby grew up in Livermore, California. She is excited to begin her legal career close to home.
Abby earned her undergraduate degrees at Arizona State University, graduating with a B.A. in Philosophy with an emphasis in morality, politics, and the law, as well as a B.S. in Psychology. She earned her Master of Science degree in Industrial and Organizational Psychology at Grand Canyon University, where her research explored normative social influence and the effects of overwhelming workplace stress.
She earned her Juris Doctor from the University of San Francisco School of Law, where she deepened her commitment to advocacy and justice. Outside of work, Abby enjoys reading, sampling San Francisco’s phenomenal restaurant scene, and unwinding with a good true crime documentary.
