Pal·a·din (noun) /ˈpalədn/

Any of the Twelve Peers of Charlemagne’s court, of whom the Count Palatine was chief
A leading champion for good

Why We're Here Our vision is to increase access to justice globally by empowering legal teams to do more pro bono, more efficiently.

According to the Legal Services Corporation, currently, 92% of low income individuals’ civil legal needs go either unmet or inadequately met, and about 50% of qualified individuals are turned away from legal services organizations due to a lack of capacity. We see technology as a powerful way to connect those in need with attorneys who can help them, ultimately connecting more low income individuals with free legal services.

Our technology is a pro bono ecosystem-wide infrastructure that helps legal services organizations (LSOs) maximize volunteer reach and law firm and in-house legal teams streamline and grow their pro bono programs. Our tools empower pro bono professionals to centralize their work, recruit volunteers more efficiently, and report out on business and community impact.

To date, we’ve connected volunteers with tens of thousands of individuals and organizations in need across civil and criminal areas.

Read about some of their incredible work

Who We Are Our Team

Hannah Christensen Business Development Representative

Hannah brings more than 8 years of diverse sales experience to her position as a Business Development Representative at Paladin. With her educational background in psychology and a master's degree in counseling, Hannah has pursued her career with genuine passion, navigating through various industries, including real estate and insurance. She's deeply committed to understanding and meeting her clients' needs, prioritizing the cultivation of authentic relationships and crafting personalized solutions. Hannah excels in developing strategies and solutions tailored to each client's unique needs and goals, consistently aiming for the highest level of client satisfaction.

Emily Drevets Senior Software Engineer

Emily is a fullstack software engineer passionate about working on products that matter. Having got her start as a software engineer by way of Chi Hack Night, a civic tech group in Chicago, Emily is excited to use her skills to increase access to justice. Prior to Paladin, she was working as a cofounder at a seed stage labor tech startup.

Stephanie Dworkin Director of Client Success

Stephanie joins us from the corporate team at Goodwin Procter in Boston. Prior to Goodwin, Stephanie worked as a legal intern at the Innocence Project and on the Customer Experience team at ZocDoc. Having worked in both tech and law, she is thrilled to be joining the Paladin team!

Ben Feldman Chief Growth Officer

Ben brings more than a decade of business development and revenue leadership to his role as Chief Growth Officer at Paladin. Prior to joining Paladin, Ben spent the majority of his career in legal managed services with Axiom and Factor (spun out of Axiom in 2019). As part of these teams, Ben partnered with clients to solve discrete problems, as well as work through transformational and innovative change initiatives. He worked with in-house legal teams across Financial Services, Life Sciences and Technology, as well as ran commercial strategy and sales for Factor’s law firm business. Ben lives in Connecticut with his wife and son. He has a BS from Indiana University.

Eric Krawczyk VP of Engineering

Eric believes that technology is essential for equitable progress. Having worked with seed- and growth-stage startups for several years, he brings extensive experience in taking ideas and turning them into products. Prior to joining the Paladin team, he worked on automated wind turbine inspections at SkySpecs, peta-scale network analytics at Deepfield (acq. Nokia), and an electronic health record platform for schools at DocNetwork. Eric is thrilled to align his professional work with his personal values and build tools that make justice more accessible.

Danielle LoMastro Community Growth Manager

Danielle is driven to provide high-quality service and is committed to strengthening client relationships. After graduating college in 2021, Danielle began working at Compass Real Estate and assisted top agents from the Chicago North Shore area with building their business/brand and understanding various technology platforms. Danielle is a problem-solver and is passionate about the ways technology can advance our world and Paladin’s mission.

Carlos Mercado Senior Software Engineer

Carlos joined Paladin because he wanted to help make a difference. With extensive experience building scalable software and managing teams at AKT Peerless and Convr, he’s excited about Paladin’s mission and thrilled to be part of the team.

Kenzo Narita Senior Software Engineer

Kenzo is a full stack software engineer with a background in energy and health tech. He enjoys working for startups, where he can have the biggest contribution to the products being built. Kenzo gets satisfaction from using technology to make people's lives easier, and loves working for companies with strong missions, interesting tech and good people.

Melinda Sather Senior Client Experience Manager

Melinda is passionate about enabling clients to get the most out of technology to support their day-to-day responsibilities. She has worked in client success and experience since 2016 and enjoys supporting the legal industry. Having an extensive background in SaaS technology positions her to be thoughtful and creative when working with each and every client. Melinda is thrilled to be combining her client experience to progress access to justice, as well as Paladin’s values and mission.

Renee Sim Product Designer

Renee is a designer and lifelong learner, dedicated to utilizing her passion for design to create impact. Her previous experiences include education and tech-enabled healthcare. She strives to find solutions and build for equity and accessibility through human-centered design practices.

Kristen Sonday Co-Founder & CEO

Kristen is the Co-Founder and CEO at Paladin. As a first generation-college Princeton graduate, Kristen first witnessed how complicated our judicial system is to navigate while at the U.S. Department of Justice conducting international criminal work in Mexico and Central America. As one of the few Latinos on the team, she saw the immense value of having an advocate with you throughout the legal process, which inspired her to want to build something to increase access for those in diverse communities. After DOJ, she joined the Founding Team of YC-backed Grouper, where she learned how to build a startup from the ground up. In addition to Paladin, Kristen Co-Chairs the Legal Services Corporation’s Emerging Leaders Council and is a partner at LongJump, investing in overlooked founders in the Chicago area.

Twitter
LinkedIn

Stacy Zinken Chief Experience Officer

Stacy brings 20 years of cross-functional marketing, business development and client success experience to her role as Chief Experience Officer at Paladin PBC. With her in-house law firm experience, as well as her subsequent experience working within legal technology companies, Stacy is uniquely positioned to connect the dots between strategic value of technology and law firm growth. She builds strategies and programs that are centered on the voice of the client.

Sound like fun?

Join Us