Honorary Board
Ann Chen is in-house counsel at Zip, a leading fintech company in the Buy Now, Pay Later sector, where she supports the company’s mission to expand financial inclusion for underestimated consumers. She partners closely with business leaders across a broad range of legal areas, including sales and marketing, AI and product development, human resources, intellectual property, and litigation. Ann brings extensive senior in-house experience advising global organizations across the financial services, healthcare, and consumer goods industries. Her practice spans complex litigation, intellectual property, commercial contracting, marketing, diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), and labor and employment. She is a recognized inclusive leader, having previously led the DEI program for the legal department of a Fortune 100 company and having been selected as a Fellow of the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity (LCLD). Ann earned her BA from Yale University and her JD from the University of Michigan Law School. She clerked for U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan of the Southern District of Florida, now a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. She has been recognized by The National Law Journal as one of Chicago’s “Top 40 Under 40 Rising Stars” and is a recipient of the Asian American Bar Association’s In-House Counsel Leadership Award and the Chicago Bar Association Vanguard Award. |
Vikas Didwania is a federal prosecutor at the United States Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois. He recently was on leave from the US Attorney’s Office until January 2025 to serve as the Senior Policy Advisor for Criminal Justice at the White House. As a prosecutor, Vikas has investigated and prosecuted a wide range of federal criminal cases concerning national security and terrorism, complex fraud, violent crime, and narcotics trafficking. Before joining the US Attorney’s Office in Chicago, Vikas worked as a litigation associate and partner at Kirkland & Ellis LLP in Chicago, and as a law clerk for Judge Pamela A. Rymer of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.Vikas graduated from the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Chicago Law School.
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Daniel Kim is an associate at Littler, where he advises clients on labor-management relations and litigates labor and employment matters before federal, state, and administrative agencies. Daniel received his J.D. from Notre Dame Law School and his B.A. from George Washington University. Before law school, Daniel served in the United States Marine Corps. Daniel became involved in AABA because he benefited from the mentorship and networking opportunities that AABA provided when he started practicing law in 2019 and sees the value of an organization like AABA particularly for younger attorneys and law students. Daniel also serves on the Board of Directors for the Korean American Bar Association of Chicago. |
Hon. Young B. Kim | Judge Young B. Kim is a U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Northern District of Illinois and has served on the bench for the Eastern Division (Chicago) since 2010. He was born in South Korea and his family emigrated to the United States when he was 11 years old. He is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the Loyola University School of Law in Chicago. Before taking the bench, he served as an Assistant Cook County Public Defender, lawclerk to District Judge Charles R. Norgle, Sr. of the Northern District of Illinois, an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, and an Administrative Judge for the EEOC. As a federal judge he particularly enjoys presiding over citizenship naturalization ceremonies in the ceremonial courtroom where he himself was naturalized as a U.S. citizen in 1986. |
Samera Syeda Ludwig is a partner at Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP where she focuses her practice on labor and employment. For more than 20 years, she has represented employers in both state and federal courts and in administrative proceedings throughout the country. As an experienced litigator, Samera counsels and represents businesses on matters involving employee discipline, employee claims of discrimination, and harassment and retaliation and conducts internal investigations. Samera has an active pro bono practice partnering with the National Immigrant Justice Center assisting individuals in obtaining asylum, U visas and other relief. Samera also sits on the Board of the Chicago High School For The Arts. Samera received her B.A. with Honors from Wesleyan University and her J.D. from Columbia Law School.
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Romeo Quinto is a retired biglaw litigation partner who represented some of the largest financial services, life sciences, and transportation companies in antitrust and complex business disputes for over 20 years. He now dedicates his time teaching trial advocacy across the country for NITA and appellate advocacy for Chicagoland law schools, mentoring law students and junior attorneys with a special interest in helping those who are diverse and/or first-generation lawyers, and most importantly enjoying time with his family especially while traveling internationally. Romeo earned a JD from Loyola University Chicago School of Law in 2000 and then clerked for the Hon. David D. Dowd, Jr., in the U.S. District Court for the N.D. Ohio before starting private practice. |
Vic Ramos | Vic Ramos is assistant general counsel at Sikich. He has also worked at Sargent & Lundy and was a Chicago Leadership Circle Fellow. |
Lei Shen | Lei Shen is a partner at Mayer Brown and is a recognized leader in privacy and technology, with a deep track record advising clients across industries and company sizes. From guiding cutting-edge work on artificial intelligence and biometric technologies to building and scaling global privacy compliance programs, she brings unmatched depth and fluency to data protection. Companies—from startups launching their first products to Fortune 100s executing billion-dollar deals—rely on her practical and strategic, solutions-driven approach to manage regulatory risk, enable growth, and unlock business value. She is the recipient of AABA’s 2025 Law Firm Partner Leadership Award, which is given to a law firm partner with an exceptional track record of collaborative leadership in promoting inclusion, belonging, cultural empathy, and mentorship in the legal profession. |
Asian American Bar Association of Greater Chicago 321 S Plymouth Court |
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