Melanie Tara Partow

Biography

Melanie Tara Partow is a Certified Specialist in Appellate Law by the State Bar of California and serves as Adjunct Professor and Co-Supervisor of the Civil Rights Litigation Clinic at UC Irvine School of Law. She holds a Master of Studies in International Human Rights Law from the University of Oxford, where she earned a distinction in International Criminal Law, and a J.D. from Southwestern University School of Law. Since August 2019, Partow has served as a Trial Attorney with the U.S. Department of Defense's Military Commissions Defense Organization, where she represents a high-value detainee facing capital charges in the 9/11 case before the U.S. Military Commissions at Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Partow's legal practice spans civil rights litigation, international human rights law, and federal and state appellate work. From 2009 to 2019, she litigated, tried, and appealed over 100 civil rights cases involving wrongful conviction, arbitrary detention, unconstitutional conditions of confinement, and extrajudicial killing by law enforcement. Her appellate work has resulted in published opinions in both federal and state courts, including decisions by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and California Courts of Appeal. She has also worked on cases under the Alien Tort Statute against multinational corporations for human rights abuses in violation of international law.

In addition to her litigation practice, Partow has taught international human rights law at the University of Southern California Gould School of Law and has clerked for Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. She has published scholarship on domestic prosecutions of crimes against humanity under customary international law and contributed to a casebook on international criminal law and tribunals. Partow maintains an active high-level security clearance and operates a solo practice in Long Beach, California, representing parties on appeal in state and federal courts.

Education

• MSt in International Human Rights Law, University of Oxford, 2010
• J.D., Southwestern University School of Law, 2004