Lauri Chichester-Taylor is a Bakersfield native. She attended Highland High School, Bakersfield College and Cal State University, Bakersfield. She also attended Humboldt State University, where she studied for a major in Business Communications.
When she returned to Bakersfield from Humboldt State University in 1985, she worked for a local law firm and learned civil procedure doing collection work for the firm. She then moved to the coast where she worked several years for a personal injury law firm. It was under the tutelage of her supervising attorney that she learned the many facets of Personal Injury litigation and honed her skills as a valuable assistant. When she returned to Bakersfield in 1992, she began her tenure with Chain, Younger, Cohn & Stiles working for Milt Younger.
In 1993, Lauri earned her Attorney Assistant Certificate from California State University, Bakersfield, Extended Studies. After obtaining her Certificate, she obtained her national designation of Certified Legal Assistant (CLA) in 1996. In 2000, she earned her California Advanced Specialist (CAS) in the area of Civil Litigation. These designations require intense studying months prior to the examination and further require many hours of continuing legal education credit to maintain the designations. Lauri is among only 35 paralegals throughout the State of California to hold these professional designations and is one of 5 in Bakersfield.
Lauri has worked with Milt Younger on a number of catastrophic injury, wrongful death and products liability cases. Lauri was the legal assistant that worked with Mr. Younger on the largest personal injury award in the history of the firm which was resolved for a total value of over $18 Million dollars to the client.
Since 1995, Lauri has volunteered for several terms on the Board of Directors for the Kern County Paralegal Association (KCPA). She has served as the past President, Vice President and past Representative to the statewide California Alliance of Paralegal Associations. In addition, since 1998, she has been an Associate Professor at California State University, Bakersfield, Extended Studies where she team teaches the Personal Injury elective class for the Attorney Assistant program. Lauri and her co-teacher, also a paralegal, were the first paralegals to teach in the Extended Studies program, routinely taught by attorneys.
In the past years, Lauri has participated in Career Day for the local area high schools and has been a guest speaker to paralegal students going through the California State University, Bakersfield, Extended Studies program, speaking about the paralegal profession and latest legal developments in the profession.
In 2002, Lauri was bestowed with the honor of "Paralegal of the Year", an award presented annually by the membership of the Kern County Paralegal Association, to those paralegals, nominated by their peers and/or attorneys, for exceptional performance, dedication and advancement of the paralegal profession.
In her spare time, Lauri is an avid runner. In 2002, she completed 2 marathons, 2 half marathons and a variety of 10k races and has medaled in local competitions. She also plays indoor soccer. She is married and has 2 sons and 3 step-daughters.
Lauri Chichester-Taylor