Travis Silva focuses his practice on high-stakes commercial litigation, including intellectual property, contract, and class action matters. He works with technology, media, pharmaceutical, and public entity clients, and he has represented law firms both big and small in professional liability matters.
A former middle school teacher and college instructor, Mr. Silva is skilled in communicating complex concepts to judges, juries, arbitrators, and mediators. When necessary, he is ready to step in as trial counsel, with experience that includes obtaining a complete verdict for an angel investor facing tort and contract claims after a three-week trial. Mr. Silva is also practiced in resolving cases short of trial, whether through dispositive motion or mediation, often at an early stage of the litigation.
Outside of the Firm, Mr. Silva is an active member of the bar. He has presented to the Association of Corporate Counsel and taught with the Practising Law Institute. Mr. Silva’s active pro bono practice focuses on advancing the rights of immigrant youth. For obtaining a teenaged client’s release from immigration detention, Legal Services for Children awarded Mr. Silva its 2019 Pro Bono Leadership Award. Mr. Silva’s civil rights advocacy also includes authoring two briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court. He is a member of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and a member of OneJustice’s Advisory Board.
Prior to joining Keker, Van Nest & Peters, Mr. Silva worked at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, where he prosecuted civil rights cases, including a federal class action. Mr. Silva clerked for the Honorable Michael Daly Hawkins of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Consultant v. Family Office
After a three-week trial in San Francisco Superior Court, we obtained a complete verdict in our client’s favor, disposing of contract and tort claims brought against our clients, a family office and related businesses.
Former Client v. Law Firm
We defended an Am Law 100 law firm against a malpractice claim arising out of its defense of its former client in class action litigation. Just weeks before the arbitration hearing, we settled the case on terms favorable to our client.
Detainee v. Federal Government
We obtained our client’s release in a habeas action challenging the Trump Administration’s eleven-month detention of an immigrant youth.
11/09/2022
Representing Shanghai Moonton Technology Co., Ltd., Keker, Van Nest & Peters lawyers secured the dismissal of a copyright lawsuit filed by Riot Games, Inc. in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. Read more
August 03, 2022
The Daily Journal has named Keker, Van Nest & Peters partner Travis Silva among the Top 40 California Lawyers Under 40 for his recent litigation victories. Read more
01/1/2022
Keker, Van Nest & Peters is pleased to announce that the firm has elevated David Rosen, Travis Silva, and Anjali Srinivasan to its partnership effective January 1, 2022. Read more
August 18, 2021
San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin announces that the District Attorney’s Office has submitted for filing a civil prosecution action against three corporations that manufacture and distribute ghost guns throughout California. Keker, Van Nest & Peters, LLP and the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence are co-counsel in this groundbreaking case. Read more
December 27, 2018
A teenager who came to the U.S. illegally from Guatemala along with his older sisters and their families to try to find his mother ended up being held in a juvenile detention center that he wrote was a “real prison."
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December 19, 2018
Decades after the U.S. stopped institutionalizing kids because large and crowded orphanages were causing lasting trauma, it is happening again. The federal government has placed most of the 14,300 migrant toddlers, children and teens in its care in detention centers and residential facilities packed with hundreds, or thousands, of children. Read more
November 24, 2018
An undocumented mentally disturbed teenager from Guatemala, taken to California by federal officers and locked up for nearly a year, has been returned to his mother in Ohio after a judge in San Francisco ordered officials to justify his confinement. Read more
November 13, 2018
A San Francisco law firm is seeking the release of a 17-year-old Guatemalan refugee being held at the Yolo County Juvenile Detention Facility. Read more
- "When School is Your Home: Why Educating a Million Homeless Students Is a Civil Rights Battle?," American Bar Association Annual Conference, 2016
- "Identifying Children At-Risk of School Push-Out," San Mateo County Bar Association, 2016
- "Representing the Pro Bono Client: Advocacy Skills for Administrative Hearings," Practising Law Institute, 2015