Board of Directors
Jennifer Freeman
Jennifer Freeman has been litigating cases in New York for over thirty years. She is well known as a resolver of disputes and has worked tirelessly at the forefront of groundbreaking legal developments to protect children from sex abuse, child pornography, and victimization. She has obtained countless restitution awards for child sex abuse survivors, and secured reparations for victims of abuse by teachers, family members, Big Brothers, camp personnel, clerics and others. Jennifer has spearheaded numerous confidential mediations and fashioned mass dispute resolution procedures to protect privacy and dignity. Recently, she worked on the landmark Supreme Court decision in US v. Paroline which established for the first time that all participants in the child pornography market were responsible to their victims in damages. She has worked with the National Women’s Law Center and assisted lobbying for statutory change for sex abuse victims in the Amy Vicky Act.
Jennifer graduated from Cornell University and the George Washington National Law Center where she was Editor-in-Chief of the George Washington Journal of Law & Economics. After clerking for the Honorable John R. Brown, Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, she began her legal practice at Shearman & Sterling, and later joined the Marsh Law Firm. She has served as Special Master for New York Supreme Court Judge Beatrice Shainswit, a member of the New York Judicial Screening Committee, and a scrivener for the City Bar Association Committee for the Homeless. She has spoken at conferences about sex abuse issues, most recently In Davos, Switzerland, serves on the Board of a Cuban arts organization that supports young Cuban artists, and has fundraised for children’s charities. She is a member of the New York and Texas bars.
Sarah G. Klein
Sarah Klein is an attorney, an advocate for victims of sexual abuse, and a former competitive gymnast. Sarah is also the first known victim of former Olympic Women’s Gymnastics Larry Nassar, and in July 2018, at the ESPYs, Sarah accepted the Arthur Ashe Courage Award on behalf of herself and the hundreds of other survivors of Nassar’s sexual abuse. Prior recipients of the Ashe award include Nelson Mandela, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, and Robin Roberts.
Today, Sarah is a widely respected advocate for cultural, political, and legal change. Her op-ed in the Philadelphia Inquirer, “I lobbied to change the law after I was abused by Larry Nassar,” caught the attention of Pennsylvania’s Attorney General, and she has worked in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and elsewhere for legal reform that will bring survivors healing and justice. Sarah believes that the time has come for the law to impose upon abusers and their enablers, both institutions, and individuals, the legal consequences they deserve.
Sarah is an alumna of Columbia University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Global Entrepreneurship program. She sits on the Board of Directors of CHILD USAdvocacy, an organization committed to protecting children’s civil liberties and keeping children safe from abuse. Sarah resides in the suburbs of Philadelphia and has a three-year-old daughter named Genevieve.
Konrad Kircher
Konrad Kircher is a partner at Rittgers & Rittgers in Cincinnati Ohio. Konrad is a former Marine Corps infantry officer (1984-1989), graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy (1984), four-time marathon finisher and 20-year triathlete including one Ironman finish (Louisville 2008), who seeks to satisfy his competitiveness in the courtroom. Konrad’s passion is representing the underdog against powerful institutions, and he has built a nationwide reputation as a leader in pursuing perpetrators of child sexual abuse and those organizations which enable them. Konrad has been to the Ohio Supreme Court four times since 2005 on behalf of survivors of child sexual abuse, and he handles such cases throughout Ohio. Konrad recognizes that there is much more to validation of a survivor than just receiving money, and he strives to help address all aspects of the healing process.
Konrad is admitted to practice in Ohio and Kentucky and in all federal courts in both of those states. He is active in the American Association of Justice and the Ohio Association of Justice. He was the 2019 recipient of the J. Thomas Henretta Distinguished Advocate Award from the Ohio Association of Justice for his advocacy on behalf of sexual assault survivors. Konrad was recently chosen as President-Elect of the National Crime Victim Bar Association, where he has co-chaired the Child Sex Abuse Section for many years. He will serve as President of NCVBA in 2021.
Gregory Zarzaur
Gregory Zarzaur, Esq. is the founding member and lead trial attorney at The Zarzaur Law Firm. Greg is one of a handful of Alabama attorneys that is a recognized member of the National Crime Victim Bar Association and he is dedicated to increasing awareness for crime victim rights and assisting such victims in maximizing any recovery they may be entitled to under the law. He has been active in educating his colleagues and victim advocates about ways to help human trafficking and child sex abuse victims obtain the justice they deserve while putting the shame of these heinous crimes on those persons responsible for them. Greg believes the survivors he represents and knows that perpetrators and their enablers strongly resist the truth from coming out but the truth is invincible and its rise is inevitable.
Stephen Jimenez
Steve Jimenez, award-winning journalist, co-founder of New Yorkers Against Hidden Predators, board member of CHILD USAdvocacy, and a survivor of several years of child sex abuse at a Catholic elementary school, has also been a longtime leader in the fight for access to justice for survivors in New York and nationally.
Michael T. Pfau
Seattle attorney Michael T. Pfau has practiced law for 25 years. He has tried over 50 cases to juries, the bench, and arbitration panels. Michael has obtained multiple verdicts in excess of $1 million, and he has recovered tens of millions of dollars in settlements for his clients. In 2012, he obtained an $8 million jury verdict against a Catholic religious order, which is believed to be the largest verdict of its kind in Washington State.
Michael was born in 1964, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He attended Boston College, graduated magna cum laude, and earned a number of other academic honors. After Boston College, Michael attended Michigan law school and graduated in 1991. He has been named a perpetual “Super Lawyer” by Washington Law and Politics, receiving that honorable distinction every year since 2003.
While Michael has represented a wide range of clients, including businesses and injured persons, he has dedicated a large part of his practice to representing victims of sexual abuse against sexual predators and the institutions that employ and protect them. Michael has had tremendous success prosecuting claims of sexual abuse in the Pacific Northwest and in other states. In this endeavor, Michael has been lead counsel for hundreds of victims of sexual abuse, and has recovered nearly $100 million dollars for his clients over the past 10 years in lawsuits against the Catholic Church, the Mormon Church, the State of Washington, the Boy Scouts of America, and other institutions responsible for sex abuse.
Michael is involved with a number of community activities, and he takes special pride in working with the disadvantaged and with children who have special needs. He and his wife, Heather, have four children, Elena, Michael, Luca, and Alexandra, with whom they spend the majority of their non-working hours.
Paul Slager
Paul Slager is a partner at Silver Golub & Teitell in Stamford CT. Paul was listed by Connecticut Super Lawyers as one of the Top 10 Attorneys in Connecticut in 2019. He represents plaintiffs in complex, high-value cases, where people have suffered life-changing personal or financial injuries. Many of his cases stem from catastrophic events involving medical malpractice, sexual abuse, violent crimes, interstate trucking and other serious accidents, defective consumer products, and financial or consumer fraud. He accepts these cases only after carefully and independently investigating the merits of each case in advance and only when he believes cases will help balance important injustices, improve public safety or otherwise make a positive impact in the community. Paul is currently the President of the Connecticut Trial Lawyers Association, a bar association serving over 1,300-member trial attorneys. Paul is admitted to the bar in Connecticut, New York and Illinois. He received his JD from the University of Michigan law School. Paul is deeply committed to the rights of survivors of child sexual abuse.
Stephen Mills
Stephen Mills is the author of Chosen: A Memoir of Stolen Boyhood, which recounts his childhood sexual abuse, the painful process of recovery, and a decades-long quest to stop a serial predator and find justice. The New York Times called Chosen “a searing, haunting, urgent cri de coeur." The Pulitzer-prize-winning novelist, Junot Díaz, hailed it as "a work of shattering, almost unbearable radiance ... destined to be a classic because this is a book that will save lives.” Stephen is also the co-author of Next of Kin, a Los Angeles Times Best Book of the Year. Since 1983, he has advised and written for an array of public interest organizations in the fields of human rights and environmental protection. Stephen is honoured to serve as an Ambassador for CHILD USA, the leading U.S. non-profit fighting for the civil rights of children. He lives in California with his wife, Susan.