Amanda Alvarez Thibeault
Amanda Alvarez Thibeault represents individuals at all stages on a wide variety of criminal matters in state and federal court, as well as advising in conduct code proceedings, Title IX Investigations, and other disciplinary actions.
Prior to joining Angeli Law Group, Amanda spent the last decade as a trial level defense attorney, first at Metropolitan Public Defender in Portland, Oregon, and then eventually running her own practice for several years. Amanda has extensive trial experience on cases ranging from misdemeanor charges all the way to murder allegations. Beyond her litigation practice, Amanda has assisted several clients at the pre-indictment stage, resulting in the district attorney’s office choosing not to bring charges against her clients on multiple occasions. In addition to her state court practice, Amanda also appears in federal court, where she has argued several motions in the District of Oregon as well as served as trial counsel in cases tried to a verdict.
In addition to her trial successes, Amanda is regularly sought out by other attorneys for motion assistance and trial strategy consultation. Her creative efforts have resulted in multiple favorable opinions from a variety of trial court judges and appellate opinions from the Oregon Court of Appeals.
Representative Work
Amanda has achieved not guilty verdicts and dismissals in a variety of cases including Driving Under the Influence of Intoxicants (both drugs and alcohol), Sexual Assault cases (including allegations of Sexual Abuse, Rape, and Unlawful Sexual Penetration), Property Crimes (including Theft, Aggravated Theft, and Forgery), Unlawful Possession of Firearm accusations, and a variety of Drug cases (including Possession and Delivery of Controlled Substances).
Amanda also has also served as the trial attorney in multiple cases that resulted in favorable appellate opinions from the Oregon Court of Appeals, like the following:
- State v. ________, 308 Or. App. 337 (2020)—Amanda was the trial attorney and initiated contempt proceedings against the State of Oregon when it refused to timely transport her client to the state hospital. The trial court judge found Oregon in Contempt and that finding was upheld on appeal.
- State v. ________, 320 Or. App. 614 (2022)—Amanda was the attorney assigned to argue at her client’s sentencing proceeding at the trial court level. The trial judge disagreed with her argument and sentenced her client to a lengthy prison sentence. That sentence was reversed on appeal, with the Court of Appeals agreeing with Amanda’s arguments that the trial court’s sentence was unconstitutional.
- State v. _______ 265 Or. App. 752 (2014) In only her second trial, Amanda argued for special jury instructions related to the defense of necessity in a Driving While Suspended case. The trial denied her request for special instructions. On appeal, the Court of Appeals agreed with Amanda and her requested instructions and reversed the client’s conviction.
Speaking Engagements
- Co-Presenter, “Show me the Brady!: How to Get the Records You Need to Impeach Critical Law Enforcement Witnesses,” OCDLA’s Discovery and Evidence Seminar (September 2023)
- Co-Presenter, “Business Records Exception: How a Ten-Minute Trick Can Make the Prosecutor’s Case More Difficult (and Maybe Impossible) to Prove,” OCDLA’s 2023 Annual Conference, A Bridge to Justice (June 2023)
- Presenter, “Judicial Ethics: How to Make a Record with a Hard Charging Judge and What You Need to Know About the Commission on Judicial Fitness and Disability,” OCDLA’s 2019 Annual Conference (June 2019)
Education
- Lewis and Clark Law School, J.D., magna cum laude, 2013
- Articles Editor, The Lewis and Clark Law Review
- Public Interest Law Project: Board Member and Auction Director
- 1L Student Bar Association Representative
- University of North Carolina at Asheville, B.A., magna cum laude, 2009
- “The Effects of Expectation on Physiological Correlates of Reward Responses to Musical Stimuli," Journal of Undergraduate Research (U.N.C. Dec. 2009)
Bar and Court Admissions
- Oregon
- U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon
Community Involvement
- California Innocence Project, Case Screener, 2016-2017