PANIDA RZONCA
Los Angeles
Panida Rzonca is Directing Attorney – Human Rights Advocacy, Legal and Housing Counsel at the Thai Community Development Center. She has been working with Thai victims of human trafficking since 2007. At Thai CDC she oversees all direct social and legal services and provides those services herself as well.
Her experience includes clerking at the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles where she worked with both clients of labor and sex trafficking.
Currently, Ms. Rzonca’s work is concentrated on assisting victims of sex trafficking by what may well be the largest Thai sex trafficking enterprise exposed to date. She counsels victims called upon to be witnesses in federal court as well as all those in need of immigration services. She also manages the delivery of comprehensive social services to victims, which includes assistance in reporting trafficking to law enforcement and assisting victims to obtain legal immigration status, restitution, and ultimately, justice.
In addition to her work to combat human trafficking, Ms. Rzonca has been involved with both labor and housing rights advocacy. She is dedicated to workers’ rights advocacy within the Thai community working on public awareness campaigns and on assisting workers who seek to file wage and fair labor claims.
She is a HUD certified housing counselor, providing counseling to members of the Thai community with limited English proficiency, who are in danger of losing their homes.
She is devoted to assisting the underserved through the Slavery Eradication and Rights Initiative Project’s campaign to raise awareness of the Anti-Human Trafficking Program at Thai CDC.
Ms. Rzonca was the 2018 President of the Thai American Bar Association.
Ms. Rzonca graduated from Southwestern School of Law and received a B.A. in Political Science with a focus on International Relations at the University of California, San Diego.
