About Catherine
Catherine Trevino studied history and English at Indiana University Bloomington before earning her law degree at Valparaiso University School of Law. Those early academic choices shaped a lawyer comfortable with both careful research and clear writing. She carried that combination into a career that has spanned prosecution, defense and private practice.
Her legal career began in Lake County, where she served as a deputy prosecutor starting in 1990. She rose through the prosecutor’s office and became managing lawyer of the felony division in 1995. In those years she oversaw felony dockets, worked with investigators and guided junior attorneys through complex case work.
Trevino moved into private practice and public defense around the turn of the century. She worked as an associate at the Law Office of Steven Polick in 2000. By 2002 she was back in the public defender’s office as an assistant public defender for Lake County, representing clients facing criminal charges. The following year she opened her own practice, the Law Office of Catherine Lake, and began handling matters as lead counsel.
Her career shows frequent shifts between roles that prosecute and roles that defend. Those shifts continued after she relocated her practice area and professional affiliations in the 2010s. In 2014 she took another post as an assistant public defender and joined bar groups in Minnesota, serving local legal communities while maintaining ties to Indiana.
In 2019 she established Trevino Law Office, where she operates today. Her bar memberships include the Indiana Bar Association, where she has held membership since 1990, and Minnesota-based groups such as the Anoka Bar Association and Minnesota Woman Lawyer, both listed from 2014 onward. She has also been involved in the Northwest Indiana Women Lawyers Association, where she has served as president since 2004.
Colleagues describe Trevino as a lawyer who has handled a wide range of criminal matters over several decades. Her résumé includes courtroom work, oversight of felony units and years of public defense work that required direct client representation and case preparation under time pressure. She is licensed to practice in both Indiana and Minnesota and has moved between public office and private practice several times during her career.
She maintains the Trevino Law Office and continues to represent clients in criminal matters across her admitted jurisdictions. She currently practices criminal defense and related matters in Indiana and Minnesota.
