Events

Karyn Sinunu-Towery is a 30-year veteran prosecutor in Santa Clara County who has volunteered with the Innocence Center. She will tell the story of how she helped gained the freedom for Jeremy Puckett through the Center. Karyn Sinunu-Towery is the past president of the San Jose Rotary Club. 

The Innocence Center is an independent non-profit law firm dedicated to freeing the innocent from prison, educating the public on the causes of wrongful conviction, and assisting freed clients as they reenter society. 

The Innocence Center launched in 2023.  The Board and Staff have decades of innocence work under their belt, all having worked at the California Innocence Project as a staff or faculty member.  Collectively, the group has freed more than 40 people who have served 560+ years in prison for crimes they did not commit.  The team has been responsible for getting a dozen laws changed to prevent future injustices and make it easier to free the innocent.  The Innocence Center is a member of the Innocence Network.

They will be talking about the latest iniatives and partnerships with Rotary District 5170 Ambassadors of Compassion. 

Our very own Dave Eschelman will enchant, inform, and enterain us with the latest scientific fun facts. 

Matt Morley has served in a local government role for over 25 years. His time served includes both large and small organizations, including the West Valley cities of Los Gatos and Cupertino. He enjoys and values the customer service aspect of the work he performs in local government, making Saratoga a great fit for him.  And he has just passed his one year mark here with us.

 Matt grew up in and currently resides in Gilroy, where he and his wife Sonya have raised their three children, Emma, Grant and Devon.  He received a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of California at Davis and during his career returned to school to earn an MBA. Matt enjoys hiking and backpacking in his spare time with a little wine tasting when time allows.

Today Matt will talk with us a little about his time in Saratoga and fill us in on what you want to know about the City of Saratoga!

DeAnna Pursai holds a Master’s in Education Policy Analysis in the School of Education from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an undergraduate degree in Elementary and Special Education from Purdue University. DeAnna has named as a CNN Hero in April, 2022. She was the recipient of the 2023 Boy Scouts of America Silicon Valley Character Award, and she was named a 2023 Women Making Herstory recipient this past March for State Senator Dave Cortese’s District 15. She has been named an Architect of Change on the Maria Shriver blog DeAnna is active in the downtown Rotary Club of San Jose, as the Chair of the Rotary Neurodivergent Youth Empowerment Fund, and serves as the Rotary District 5170 Rotary Climate Action Council Chair, and as the Rotary mentor to the Rotaract Club at San Jose State University. She proudly served 6 years as a board member of Christmas in the Park. She is big sister to Angel Ellenberger, who happens to have Down syndrome and is an exquisite actress, entertainer and comedian. One of DeAnna’s bucket list items is to give a TED Talk on the subject of how to innovatively cast a wider higher education net to include adults with differing abilities who historically have not had access to higher education.

Gita is the founder of AFEC (A Future for Every Child: https://afec.giving/our-work/#top) and has done an outstanding job of providing opportunities and changing lives for a number of youth in India.