About Karen Guerra
Karen Guerra was born in Grand Island, Nebraska, and grew up in Council Bluffs, Iowa. She has lived in Texas since 1973, when she moved to San Antonio to attend college. There, she met and married John Guerra. When John finished law school, the family relocated to the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, and Karen worked as a paralegal and completed her college education. She worked as a paralegal for ten years, first with the Hidalgo County District Attorney’s Office where she prepared felony indictments, assisted with gathering and preparing evidence for trial, and handled the criminal case management for the 139th District Court. Later Karen was employed as a trial assistant with Henrichson-Smith, P.C. where she worked on personal injury litigation, including products liability, premises liability, and medical malpractice cases.In 1986, Karen graduated magna cum laude from the University of Texas Pan American in Edinburg, Texas, with a bachelor of business administration degree in Finance. Karen then attended Baylor Law School, where she was a member of the Baylor Law Review and won awards in appellate law, appellate procedure, and constitutional law. She was involved in practice court, moot court, and negotiation competitions, and won the State Bar consumer law writing competition award. Karen graduated from Baylor Law School in 1989 with honors in the top five percent of her class.
After her graduation from law school, Karen worked as an associate attorney for the Law Offices of Hector Villarreal in Edinburg, Texas, where she gained experience in general civil litigation, family law, and criminal law. In 1990, Karen and her husband, John, formed Guerra and Guerra law offices in McAllen, Texas. Early pioneers in the mediation movement, Karen and John also formed Lawtalk, Inc., a legal information and education services corporation that emphasized the development, training, and use of alternative dispute resolution systems. They provided mediation services in South Texas and provided a wide range of training programs for attorneys and other professionals throughout the State. While living in the Valley, Karen and John were actively involved in the marriage preparation program of their church, and were a presenting team for Worldwide Marriage Encounter and Engaged Couples Encounter. Karen also served on the Bishop’s Task Force on Marriage Preparation for the Diocese of Brownsville, Texas.
A Family Law Specialist, Karen has been certified in Family Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization since 1995. To achieve this certification, she was required to demonstrate substantial experience and involvement as a trial attorney in all aspects of family law litigation before being entitled to sit for the six hour specialty examination. In fact, the requirements of the Texas Board of Legal Specialization are so stringent that less than one percent of Texas attorneys are currently certified as family law specialists. As an Family Law Specialist, Karen has handled numerous and complex family law issues, and has extensive jury and non-jury trial experience.
In 1996, Karen’s husband was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. Karen and her husband closed their McAllen law office, and in 1997, Karen accepted a position as the managing attorney for a newly formed child support enforcement office with the Attorney General's Office in Corpus Christi, Texas. Working with the Attorney General's Office, Karen gained valuable management experience as well as experience in administrative law and in interstate child support litigation. In 1999, Karen and John moved to Carrollton, Texas, when Karen accepted a position with the Fifth District Court of Appeals in Dallas, in a program specially funded to reduce the backlog of appeals in the Dallas area.
Karen has lived and worked in Denton County since 2001. From 2001 to 2004, Karen worked for Hammerle Finley law offices in Denton and Lewisville, and in July 2004, she opened The Guerra Law Firm in Carrollton, Texas, where she currently works. Karen has over seventeen years experience as an attorney. Although her primary emphasis in recent years has been in family law, she also has extensive experience in handling personal injury cases, medical malpractice litigation, Tort Claims Act lawsuits, contract disputes, property disputes, real estate litigation, criminal law matters, and judgment collections. As an experienced mediator, Karen has mediated numerous family and non family law disputes.
Continuing legal education is very important to Karen, and she stays on the cutting edge of the development of the law as it impacts her clients' cases. She has authored numerous scholarly papers and has been a speaker for the State Bar of Texas Advanced Family Law Course, the Corpus Christi Family Bar Association, and the Hidalgo County Bar Association. She has also lectured at various Alternative Dispute Resolution training programs throughout Texas, including a 40 hour basic mediation training, 24 hour advanced mediation training in divorce and family law, and numerous continuing legal education courses in negotiation strategies.
Karen has a strong background in financial issues, extensive trial experience, and expertise in mediation and negotiation. This experience, coupled with her genuine concern for people, make Karen well suited to help litigants deal with the significant emotional and financial stressors they experience when involved in legal disputes. She adheres to high ethical standards as set forth in The Texas Lawyer’s Creed. Karen is a member of the State Bar of Texas, the Denton Bar Association, The College of the State Bar, and the Texas Academy of Family Law Specialists. Karen is a member of the Metrocrest Chamber of Commerce and also sits on the Board of Directors of Apodigm, Inc., a computer web design and hosting company.
Karen and her husband, John, have been married for 33 years. They are members of Holy Cross Church in The Colony, Texas. They have a son, Johnny, a daughter-in-law, Michelle, a granddaughter, Madeline, and will soon be blessed with a grandson. Karen's son, Johnny is employed as a network engineer for Sprint and is currently a night student at Southern Methodist University Law School. Johnny and Michelle are expecting their second child in a few weeks, and Michelle is currently on sabbatical from her teaching career.
