Caitlin Cortez

Caitlin Cortez is a Senior Attorney at Knauf Santos Law. She has practiced since 2016, with family law at the center of her work in both Hawaii and Washington.

Before joining Knauf Santos Law in 2020, Caitlin worked at the Domestic Violence Action Center in Honolulu, where she independently managed divorce, paternity, and restraining-order cases. Her work included drafting pleadings and legal memoranda, advising clients about their rights, preparing matters for litigation, and working closely with paralegals and advocates. That experience put her in regular contact with clients dealing with difficult family circumstances and cases in which safety concerns were part of the legal dispute.

Her practice later expanded into civil litigation while she continued handling family-law matters, including divorce, paternity, restraining orders, and adoption. She also worked on community-association, construction, and commercial disputes. Those matters involved contracts, property records, financial documents, and contested factual issues, experience that remains useful in family-law cases with significant financial or property components.

Caitlin’s legal work began before her admission to the bar. At the Legal Aid Society of Hawaii, she worked first as a law clerk and later as an intake paralegal. She evaluated potential cases, identified legal issues, and helped connect clients with appropriate legal resources under attorney supervision. The work gave her early exposure to a wide range of legal problems and to clients who often had to make important decisions with limited time and resources.

During law school, Caitlin also served as a legislative aide for the State of Hawaii. She researched statutes and proposed legislation, responded to constituent concerns, and represented the office at public hearings. That work required her to move between statutory language, policy questions, and the practical concerns of the people affected by them.

At Knauf Santos Law, Caitlin represents clients in complex family law matters throughout King and Snohomish Counties, including divorce, parenting disputes, child support, spousal maintenance, relocation, protection orders, and the division of property and debt. As a Senior Attorney, she regularly handles cases where several of those issues overlap.

Her work includes matters involving business interests, real estate, retirement accounts, separate-property claims, and other assets that can complicate a divorce. She also handles contested parenting plans, relocation requests, support disputes, and cases in which the parties disagree sharply about the underlying facts.

Caitlin approaches each matter by working through the structure of the case: what facts matter, what the record supports, where the evidentiary issues are, and what needs to be developed before settlement discussions or litigation. Her background in both family law and civil litigation gives her experience with pleadings, discovery, financial records, motion practice, and contested hearings.

Her work at the Domestic Violence Action Center remains relevant to her family-law practice. She has handled cases involving restraining orders and disputes in which one party alleges intimidation, control, or threats. That experience helps her recognize when the written record tells only part of what is happening between the parties.

Caitlin earned her J.D. from the William S. Richardson School of Law at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa. While there, she served first as a staff writer and later as a Case Note Editor for the University of Hawaii Law Review. She also spent all three years of law school involved with Law for Youth Empowerment and served as the organization’s president during her final year.

She received her undergraduate degree from the University of Arizona, studying Political Science and Chinese Studies. Her undergraduate work included a semester in Nanjing, China, where she studied Mandarin Chinese, East Asian international relations, and Chinese political theory.

Caitlin has also remained involved in community legal service through Volunteer Legal Services Hawaii, providing legal information, advice, and resources through legal clinics.