To celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month 2022, the CBA’s YLS D&I committee is shining a spotlight on local Hispanic/Latinx attorneys and law students in the Greater Cincinnati legal community. CBA members nominated Hispanic/Latinx attorneys and law students for recognition, and members of the YLS D&I committee conducted interviews to learn more about them.
Meet Pedro Diaz Gutierrez, an attorney with Valencia & Diaz, Ltd.
1. What is the best way in your opinion to enhance diversity and inclusion in the Cincinnati legal community?
By encouraging younger students to get involved. We have a lot of our clients tell us they want to study criminal justice, be a police officer or be a lawyer and do immigration law but are faced with a lot of limitations. Helping remove those limitations will help enhance diversity and inclusion in the Cincinnati legal community. And that starts with educating people about the process to get involved. I think it also turns on the responsibility of employers in hiring and trying to hire diverse employees. Which is something we do at our firm because of the cultural background of our clientele.
Our cultural background has helped us have empathy for our clients.
I think a lot of whatever issues that may be between different cultures come from ignorance from not knowing and understanding the other side. So I think highlighting and celebrating different months is something that can bring people together and have an open mind about things to help people realize we are not all that different.
I think highlighting and celebrating attorneys in the legal community helps show that there is a presence and opportunities for POC, Latinx, for anyone. It shows younger people that they can be attorneys and that it is not impossible.
I come from a different aspect of the legal side because it was never my intention to go to law school. When I went to law school, I was never the one gunning to be the first in my class. I just wanted to graduate. And when I graduated, I was intimidated by going to courts, hearings, and stepping in front of judges. Then you slowly realize it’s not as big of a deal as people make it out to be. A lot of the intimidation of the legal profession stops a lot of people from entering the profession.