WJA 2023: Kylee Gomez

University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law

Kylee Gomez knew for sure that law school was the right path to public service three years into her bachelor’s degree, when she volunteered with an early version of her law school’s expungement clinic.

Once in law school, she continued with the expungement clinic as a research assistant. She also served as a teaching assistant for an LSAT prep course and a lawyering skills course. She would like to thank the professors at the University of Missouri-Kansas City for their support, including Ellen Suni, Sydney Ragsdale, Mikah Thompson, Meg Reuter, and Dean Barbara Glesner Fines.

Gomez also interned with the General Crimes Unit of the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office, where she drafted responses to motions and listened to jail calls. She also has served as a legal intern for the Missouri Court of Appeals Western District under Judge Gary D. Witt. On her first day, she said Witt handed her a flash drive and told her to draft an opinion for him in a couple weeks.

Although it underwent edits and additions from Witt, she said the core of her draft made it through to the final opinion.

“I ended up writing the opinion the same way he would have decided it,” Gomez said.

She also interned for the U.S. District Court Western District of Missouri under Judge W. Brian Gaddy last summer, drafting social security orders, researching memos for suppression hearings and doing a lot of writing.

“I loved it,” Gomez said.

She’s returning to the court to clerk for Gaddy this August.