Hon. Raquel Trabal serves as a Magistrate Judge on the Superior Court of the District of Columbia (Superior Court). She presides over the Parentage and Support Calendar.

Before joining the bench, Judge Trabal served as an Attorney Negotiator in the Domestic Violence Division of the Superior Court for seven years. In this role, she negotiated Civil Protection Orders in high conflict domestic violence matters. She was selected as a subject matter expert to assist in developing concrete systems and mechanisms to implement the new Extreme Risk Protection Order law, also known as Red Flag laws. She has presented specialized training on the role of trauma-informed practices and technology in domestic violence matters.

Judge Trabal also served as an Assistant Attorney General in the Child Support Policy and Training Sections of the Office of the Attorney General for D.C. As a staff attorney for Legal Aid of Western Michigan. She represented clients primarily through the Reentry Law Project, which assisted individuals who had a civil consequence arise out of a criminal conviction. She represented clients in child support, social security benefits, identification card issues, and sex offender registry matters. In addition, she represented Spanish-speaking domestic violence victims in divorce, custody, and visitation matters.

Judge Trabal received her B.A. in East Asian Studies and Law & Society from Oberlin College in 1999. After graduating from Oberlin, she taught English in Japan. In 2006, she graduated from Thomas M. Cooley Law School, where she served as Associate Editor for the Law Journal and President of the Hispanic Law Society.