Karen Jacobsen started Jacobsen & McElroy on March 16, 1998 after spending 11 years with Thompson, Meade & Nielsen and a one-year tenure with another local litigation firm. She was the partner in charge of construction defect cases and also handled complex commercial matters, product liability and premises liability matters. She continues to focus on these areas of litigation in her practice, working with insurance companies, self-insured clients and business clients.

Karen is a 1983 graduate of the University of Pacific School of Business. She attended UOP on a volleyball and basketball scholarship, where she played on the nationally ranked UOP volleyball team. She subsequently returned to her hometown of Sacramento, where she obtained her law degree from McGeorge School of Law at the University of Pacific in 1986. She graduated with distinction, and was Order of the Coif, and a lifetime member of the Traynor Honor Society, as well as a staff writer and editor of the Pacific Law Journal.

Karen is a native of Sacramento and is very active in the local community. She serves as a Settlement Conference Judge and Arbitrator for the Sacramento County Superior Court and as a Settlement Conference Judge for El Dorado Superior Court and Placer County Superior Courts. She is also a mediator/neutral for the Eastern District Federal Court’s Voluntary Dispute Resolution Program. She has participated for many years in the Anthony Kennedy Inn of Court and in 2001 was elevated to the status of a Master of the Bench, which is a lifetime position. The organization is made up of Federal, State and Appellate Judges/Justices and civil and criminal attorneys and is dedicated to increasing professionalism, civility and ethics among members of the bench and bar. Karen is also on the Executive Committee for the Inn of Court.

Karen also is in her third term as a member of the Board of Directors of the Association of Defense Counsel. She also served on the Board of the Women Lawyers of Sacramento for many years and is a member of the Sacramento County Bar Association and the American Bar Association.

Karen is a charter member of the Eastern District Historical Society and she previously served as a member of the University of the Pacific’s National Commission as well as the YWCA Board of Directors. Karen was selected by the Sacramento Bee as one of the top 50 all time prep girl basketball players in the Greater Sacramento Area.