In recognition of the severe immigration consequences faced by noncitizens who come into contact with the criminal justice system, the Washington Defender Association established the Immigration Project in 1999. WDA’s Immigration Project focuses its work on three areas:

• Providing technical assistance to criminal defense counsel representing noncitizens in criminal proceedings;
• Offering training and education on these immigration consequences to criminal defenders, prosecutors, judges, and other relevant entities; and
• Participating in collaborative efforts with stakeholders to make the criminal legal system more responsive to the unique circumstances of noncitizens.

FOR INDIVIDUAL CASE ASSISTANCE, click here.

FOR GENERAL INQUIRIES, contact us at WDAIP@defensenet.org (please note, we do not answer case-specific questions via email).

The Immigration Project Team

Sara Dunsky (she/her)
Resource Attorney
SaraD@defensenet.org

Sara earned her J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center in 2009, and began her legal career with a yearlong public interest fellowship at Howrey, LLP. She then worked as an associate public defender in Montgomery County, MD, where she represented indigent criminal defendants in their misdemeanor cases, and fought to help her non-U.S. citizen clients avoid incurring severe immigration consequences as a result of their criminal charges. She went on to practice humanitarian and family-based immigration law, running her own solo practice and then working as a staff attorney and clinical supervisor–representing clients and teaching law students–at the East Bay Community Law Center in Berkeley, CA. Before joining WDA, Sara was a senior attorney at Kids in Need of Defense (KIND), providing training and legal technical assistance to KIND’s immigration attorneys across the U.S.

Amy Kratz 
Resource Attorney
amy@defensenet.org

Amy Kratz has been in private immigration practice since 2007, representing immigrant clients in administrative and removal proceedings, at the Board of Immigration Appeals, U.S. District Court and the U.S. Court of Appeals. Her practice focuses on asylum and humanitarian relief. Prior to that she was a staff attorney and co-legal director at Northwest Immigrant Rights Project. She directed the UW Immigration Clinic from 2001-2005, and instructed the Seattle University Immigration Clinic in 2016 and 2022. She joined the WDA Immigration Project as a resource attorney in 2025.

Jonathan Moore
Resource Specialist
jonathan@defensenet.org

Jonathan Moore has worked with people in immigration proceedings since 1983. He worked as a paralegal at Proyecto Libertad, in Harlingen, Texas, with mostly detained Central-American asylum-seekers, from 1983 until 1990. From 1985-1987, he also worked for the Rio Grande Defense Committee, on legal defense of South Texas sanctuary workers. He worked in Seattle, at the Joint Legal Task Force – Hispanic Immigration Program and its successor, the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, mainly on deportation defense, from 1990- 2005. Jonathan Moore was accredited by the Board of Immigration Appeals through NWIRP from 1993 until 2005. He currently works at the Washington Defender Association Immigration Project, supporting public defenders and defense lawyers on issues related to the immigration consequences of criminal convictions.

Lori Walls
Resource Attorney
lori@defensenet.org
(206) 623-4321 x 106

Lori completed her B.A. and J.D. from the University of Washington in Seattle. As a law student, she was an editor of the Pacific Rim Law & Policy Journal and received the Charles Z. Smith Public Service Student of the Year Award. In 2011, she and three other women started the Washington Immigration Defense Group, a law firm that specializes in deportation defense. Her appellate practice before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals includes two published cases. Lori is a member of the Washington State Bar Association and the American Immigration Lawyers Association. She has been a volunteer at the King County Bar Association’s Neighborhood Legal Clinic Program for 16 years. Before attending law school, she worked as an editor and writer for 15 years and as a furniture builder for five years.

, Immigration Project Resource Attorney