Since graduating from Yale Law School in 1996, Joe has dedicated his career to addressing civil rights violations by the government and others. After graduating law school, Joe served as a law clerk for the Honorable Vaughn Walker of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California because of his commitment to advancing civil rights.
To this end, Joe practiced criminal defense for a small criminal defense law firm where he specialized in defending against criminal prosecutions and convictions for drug offenses. After this, Joe because a solo practitioner where he drafted motions at both the trial and appellate levels and argued before the Ninth Circuit in the successful appeal of the convictions of a prominent marijuana activist, Edward Rosenthal, for cultivating medical marijuana. See United States v. Rosenthal, 454 F.3d 943 (9th Cir. 2006).
In 2003, Joe joined the medical marijuana advocacy organization Americans for Safe Access and served as its Chief Counsel for nearly ten years. In this capacity, Joe briefed and argued the medical marijuana employment discrimination case Ross v. RagingWire, 42 Cal.4th 920 (2008) before the California Supreme Court, and secured a published decision requiring courts to return medical marijuana to qualified patients, City of Garden Grove v. Superior Court, 157 Cal.App.4th (2007).
Later, Joe successfully briefed and argued cases regarding federal preemption of California’s medical marijuana laws, County of San Diego v. San Diego NORML, 165 Cal.App.4th 798 (2008); for the availability of civil actions for the destruction of medical marijuana plants, County of Butte v. Superior Court, 175 Cal.App.4th 729 (2009), and for the legality of dispensaries under California law, People v. Jackson, 210 Cal.App.4th 525 (2012). Joe also briefed and argued a case to reschedule marijuana before the District of Columbia Circuit. Americans for Safe Access v. Drug Enforcement Administration, (D.C. Cir. 2013).
Since leaving Americans for Safe Access in 2013, Joe has maintained a solo practice where he has continued his medical marijuana practice and litigated cases challenging racial and religious discrimination, police misconduct, marijuana regulation in the administrative, civil, and criminal spheres; and under the Public Records Act.
Joe’s practice evidences his commitment to protecting the rights of criminal defendants and the protection of civil rights generally.