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.  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 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 and John formed Guerra and Guerra law offices in McAllen, Texas, where Karen practiced general civil litigation and family law.  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.

A Family Law Specialist, Karen has been certified in Family Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization since 1995.*  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 extensive experience in interstate child support litigation, as well as experience with fast track child support collection techniques, such as judicial and administrative writs of withholding.  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. From 2001 to 2004, Karen worked for Hammerle Finley law offices in Denton and Lewisville.

As an experienced Family Law Specialist, Karen has handled numerous divorce cases and complex family law issues, and has extensive jury and non-jury trial experience. She has experience in family violence protective orders, temporary hearings, contempt and enforcement procedures, marital property agreements, contested property divisions, retirement matters, post divorce modifications, paternity suits, and termination of parental rights litigation.  She has handled interstate and international child visitation and child support issues, writs of attachment, writs of habeas corpus, execution of judgments, and bills of review.  Karen also has significant experience in appellate law and has successfully prosecuted and defended appeals of numerous family law issues.  Although Karen's primary emphasis has been in family law, she also has experience in handling personal injury cases, medical malpractice litigation, Tort Claims Act lawsuits, contract disputes, real estate litigation, and judgment collections.  As an experienced mediator, Karen has mediated 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 family 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 family law experience, and expertise in mediation and negotiation. This experience, coupled with her genuine concern for people, make Karen well suited to help clients deal with the significant emotional and financial stressors they experience when involved in family law disputes.  Karen is a member of the State Bar of Texas, the Denton Bar Association, and the Texas Academy of Family Law Specialists.  Karen also sits on the Board of Directors of Apodigm, Inc., a computer web design and hosting company.

*To become Board Certified in a specialty area, an attorney must have been licensed to practice law for at least five years, devoted a required percentage of practice to a specialty area for at least three years, handled a wide variety of matters in the area to demonstrate experience and involvement, attended continuing education seminars regularly to keep legal training up to date, been evaluated by fellow lawyers and judges, and passed a 6-hour written examination. To remain certified, an attorney must apply for recertification every five years and meet substantial involvement, peer review, and continuing legal education requirements for the specialty area. Certified Family Law specialists have participated in the contested trial of cases involving matters such as divorce, property division, child custody, child support, adoption, paternity or other matrimonial matters.