LSPC currently has 13 staff members. Our staff members work on a variety of
projects all supported by our Executive Director.
Dorsey Nunn, Executive Director, has over 
twenty-five years experience working on prison related issues. He is the Co-Founder of All of Us or None, a project of LSPC started by formerly incarcerated people in 2003. He has been in the forefront of many social justice organizations from their beginnings, including Critical Resistance and the California Coalition for Women Prisoners. Dorsey has received numerous awards including the “Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition” by Nancy Pelosi and the “Senate Certificate of Recognition by Senator Jackie Speier. He is also a recipient of the Fannie Lou Hamer Award from the African-American studies department at UC Berkeley. Dorsey was sentenced to life in the California Department of Corrections when he was 19 years old. He paroled in 1981 and discharged from parole in 1984.
Karen Shain, Policy Director, has over 30 years of experience in working with and for prisoners and their families. Karen started visiting women prisoners in 1976 as a participant in a women’s prisoner project at UC Santa Cruz. She has also worked extensively in the women’s and lesbian movements in the San Francisco Bay Area. Karen is a recipient of a Social Justice Sabbatical from the Vanguard Foundation and the Eldership and Sacred Teacher Award from the Center for Young Women’s Development. For the past ten years, Karen was Co-Director of LSPC with Dorsey. In June 2010, she transitioned to Policy Director in order to provide leadership and expertise to LSPC’s policy agenda.
Anna Couey, Development Director, joined the
LSPC family in 2009. Anna is responsible for coordinating LSPC’s fundraising, as well as organizing staff and board members in fundraising projects. Anna comes to LSPC with a long history of working to strengthen community power and voice through collaborative art projects, community networking, and participatory research to advance social justice campaigns. As a former Information Activist for the DataCenter she worked on research projects for LSPC/All of Us or None in the formative years. She became actively involved in fundraising as a way to build resources and power in social justice organizations. Anna is also an artist whose work integrates community participation, communications technology and social justice.
Hamdiya Cooks, Administrative Director, has over 25 years of experience working on issues facing women in prison. Having served 20 years in the federal prison system, while incarcerated, Hamdiya led Muslim women prisoners in the struggle to honor their religious practices, including headgear and fasting. She was also a key organizer for Black
Culture Workshops at the Federal Correctional Institution in Dublin, CA for over 15 years. At LSPC, Hamdiya is responsible for day to day administrative duties. She is the former director of the California Coalition for Women Prisoners. Hamdiya holds a B.A, degree from Columbia College. She has published an article on “Islam in Prison” in the Prison Legal News and an essay profiling the lives of three women in prison in the book “Schooling the Generations in the Politics of Prison”.
Catherine McKee, Staff Attorney and Habeas Project Coordinator, 
Catherine joined LSPC in 2012 and is thrilled to be working with incarcerated women and their pro bono legal teams through the Habeas Project. She is a graduate of Duke University and UC Berkeley School of Law. Prior to coming to LSPC, Catherine advocated on behalf of former prisoners facing barriers to securing affordable housing and stable jobs. She is a 2009 recipient of a Soros Justice Fellowship. In her free time, Catherine likes to travel and spend time outdoors with her husband and her dog Igor.
Carol Strickman, Staff Attorney, joined the LSPC team in December 2008. Carol works on a range of assignments with practically everyone in the office. She serves on our Family Unity Project, which monitors mother-infant prisons, opposes shackling of pregnant prisoners, and advocates for expanded prison visits for incarcerated parents, among other issues. She represents LSPC at CURB meetings, works with the North Oakland community to oppose a gang injunction, and tracks legislation. Before coming to LSPC, Carol worked as a criminal appeals attorney for indigent clients. She graduated from UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) in 1977.
Heidi Strupp, Advocacy Coordinator, has more than a decade of experience advocating for the rights of people in prison. Her work focuses on investigating, exposing and challenging the conditions of confinement experienced by people incarcerated in the California state prison system, with an emphasis on the health concerns of older women prisoners. She has extensive experience engaging in legislative policy work, public speaking and media advocacy, grassroots organizing and building alliances across a diverse spectrum. Additionally, she is a strong advocate for alternatives to incarceration, believing that mass imprisonment fails to provide communities with meaningful public safety.
Manuel La Fontaine II, Northern California Regional Organizer, All of Us or None As a former street organizer (also known as a gang member), a formerly-incarcerated person, and a college graduate, Manuel brings street savvy, along with scholastic aptitude, and incorporates them into his work life to better assist those without voices. Manuel’s passion is to help transform the social, economic, criminal justice, and political system in our society to more equitable, sustainable and inclusive systems. As a grassroots organizer, he works to help build All of Us Or None into a civil rights movement striving towards the full restoration of all civil and human rights for formerly incarcerated people
Linda Evans, All of Us or None Organizer, has been at LSPC since 2003. Linda is a founding member of Pleasanton AIDS Counseling and Education, an inmate-to-inmate AIDS peer counseling organization and the Council Against Racism, a prisoner organization that worked against institutional racism and to lessen racial tensions inside the prison. Linda served 16 years in federal prison for actions against the government. On January 20, 2001, then President Clinton commuted her sentence and she was released. In 2002 she received an Open Society Institute Justice Fellowship to organize formerly incarcerated people. Along with her partner Eve Goldberg, Linda is co-author of the booklet, “The Prison Industrial Complex and the Global Economy. Linda received her B.A. and M.A. in Humanities while she was in prison.
Aaliyah Muhammad, Organizer, has been at LSPC since 2005. She worked as the Intern Coordinator/ Community Liaison position until 2007 when she helped organize the Sacramento Chapter of All of Us or None. Aaliyah and many family members have been affected by the Prison Industrial Complex. She feels taking on the PIC is a “David and Goliath” battle, but the small victories are well worth the fight. Aaliyah travels around the Sacramento area to educate the public about the discrimination former prisoners face coming home from prison. She is currently enrolled in Paralegal Studies at University of Northern California Law School, Sacramento.
Jerry Elster, Organizer, is a formerly incarcerated man from South Central Los Angeles and a proud member of All of Us or None. He holds Associate of Arts degrees in Ministry and General Education. He is a substance abuse counselor and a co-founder of No More Tears, an anti-violence organization. He likes to say that some people go to Penn State; he went to the state pen. There, Jerry transformed himself from being a societal problem to becoming part of the solution. His trials have taught him how essential it is for incarcerated (as well as formerly incarcerated) people to speak in their own voices. A people without a voice are a people without hope. All of Us or None provides both the vehicle and the opportunity for us to be heard. His goal is for the full restoration of his human rights.
Zoe Wigfall, Administrative Assistant, joined LSPC in November 2010. Before that, she worked for the California Coalition for Women Prisoners as a Program Assistant. Zoe reports that CCWP gave her insight into the PIC (prison industrial complex) and the opportunity to visit women prisoners in Chowchilla. Zoe is a single parent with one adult child and one 15 year old, who she would give her heart to, if they needed it. She has worked many, many jobs, from office jobs to driving jobs, but couldn’t find the right job. She thought she found her dream job when she became a commercial truck/bus driver, which turned out to be not true. She joined AOUON in 2008/2009, a movement that caught her interest because of what we fight for – the rights of formerly incarcerated people and having our rights restored. AOUON opened the door for her for CCWP and eventually LSPC. Zoe remembers very clearly saying she “would never go back into an office job”. Again, this turned out to be not true. She states that she can actually say, “I Love My Job!” and thanks LSPC for the opportunity to be part of its family.
Martha Wallner, Communications/ Media Coordinator, joined LSPC in October 2011. After a decade of media policy activism and consulting she’s excited to return to hands-on communications work for social justice organizing. She comes to LSPC with years of progressive media experience as the co-founder of Deep Dish TV, a member of the Paper Tiger TV Collective, the director of Berkeley Community Media and the Grassroots Liaison to the Media & Democracy Coalition. She’s served as a board member with Scribe Video Center (PA) and Media Alliance (CA) and was on the advisory board of the Center for Media Justice and the successful Campaign to Pass the Local Community Radio Act of 2010. She’s an avid student of Afro-Brazilian dance and an active member of the East Bay Meditation Center’s Alphabet Sangha.