Attorneys

Avantika Shastri joined Van Der Hout, Brigagliano & Nightingale, LLP, in October of 2004. Her practice focuses primarily on deportation defense. She has represented clients in immigration matters before the federal courts, the administrative agencies, and the Department of Homeland Security. She has also acted as co-counsel on amicus briefs before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

During law school, she represented individual clients and engaged in broader class-action litigation in support of immigrant rights through her work at Asian Pacific Islander Legal Outreach, a community-based social justice organization in San Francisco; the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic at Harvard Law School; and the California Asylum Representation Clinic at the University of California, Berkeley (Boalt Hall). She also externed for the Honorable Magistrate Judge Edward M. Chen at the United States District Court, Northern District of California.

Prior to law school, Ms. Shastri volunteered and worked with Narika, an organization that aids survivors of domestic violence in the South Asian community as well as other local and national organizations serving immigrant communities.

Ms. Shastri received her Juris Doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley (Boalt Hall) and received her Bachelor of Arts from the University of California, Berkeley.