In Conversation with Juanita E. Mantz, Writer, Performer, Podcaster, Lawyer & Deputy Public Defender
Join us for a conversation with Juanita E. Mantz.
Thank you to the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences for sponsoring this event along with Pfau Library.
Juanita E. Mantz (“JEM”) is a USC Law educated lawyer, writer, performer, and podcaster who believes writing has the power to change the world. She graduated from UCR in 1999 with a degree in English Literature and from USC Law in 2002.
After working at big firms, she has been a criminal defense attorney with the Law Offices of the Public Defender, Riverside County for over 15 years and specializes in representing mentally ill clients. Juanita has taken numerous serious felony cases to trial on the mental health issues and is on the forefront of mental health law representing incompetent clients advocating for diversion.
Juanita is also a creative nonfiction writer who has 2 books. Her memoir "Tales of an Inland Empire Girl" (Los Nietos Press, 2022) about her chaotic IE childhood and high school dropout year is a finalist for the 2023 Latino Books to Movie Awards. Her chapbook "Portrait of a Deputy Public Defender, or how I became a punk rock lawyer" (Bamboo Dart Press, 2021) about the horrors of mass incarceration won a gold medal at the 2022 International Latino Book Awards for best first book, nonfiction English.
Her stories have been published in literary journals, newspapers & anthologies including in The Acentos Review, Aljazeera, As/Us, Entropy, Hispanicdotes, Mutha, Muse, San Bernardino-Singing (anthology), The Dirty Spoon Radio Hour, The James Franco Review, & The Press Enterprise, amongst others.
Juanita is a Macondista, a VONA alum and has presented at UCR Writers' Week, the UCR Punk Conference, the Tomás Rivera Conference, Pasadena LitFest, AWP & Beyond Baroque. She produced the ASA 2020 Freedom Course on Combatting Mass Incarceration and was the 2022 writer in residence at Pasadena City College where she taught incarceration impacted students. She is in the low residency MFA creative writing program at the University of New Orleans.
On her video podcast, "Life of JEM" she does live interviews with writers. Her next project is creating venues for those impacted by incarceration to tell their stories.
Find everything on her author website: https://juanitaemantz.com
Series organizers: Dr. Mary Texeira (Sociology), Robie Madrigal (Pfau Library), Stan Futch (President, Westside Action Group), Dr. Jeremy Murray (History), Cecelia Smith (CSUSB, BA/MA Graduate), Matt Patino (CSUSB MA Candidate). Click here to view previous panels in the Conversations on Race and Policing series (link).