Melina De Bona
Research Scholar & Litigation Associate
Earth Rights Advocacy

Melina is a Research Scholar and Litigation Associate at the Center’s Earth Rights Advocacy program, working on the nexus between human rights and climate change. She holds a JD from NYU School of Law and a BA in International Studies from the University of Chicago (distinguished honors).

During her time at NYU Law, she specialized in Public International Law, with a focus on socioeconomic rights in Latin America, where she is from. As part of CHRGJ’s Global Justice Clinic and UN Diplomacy Clinic, she worked on the right to water in Haiti and worked within the United Nations system as an environmental advisor to the Permanent Mission of a small island state. As a CHRGJ Fellow and Scholar, she interned for the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and worked on legal empowerment lawyering models. She also served as a research assistant for various international law professors and practitioners and represented asylum seekers in family detention facilities across the country.

After law school, Melina spent a year working for Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, specializing in international arbitration, white-collar crime investigations and sustainability.

Margaret L. Satterthwaite
Faculty Director; Director Legal Empowerment and Judicial Independence Clinic; Professor of Clinical Law; UN Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers

Courses
Publications

Margaret (Meg) Satterthwaite is a faculty director of the Center; and faculty director of the Robert and Helen Bernstein Institute for Human Rights. She is a Professor of Clinical Law and director of the Legal Empowerment and Judicial Independence Clinic. She currently serves as the UN Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers.

Meg’s recent scholarship has involved cross-disciplinary work aimed at advancing the evidence base for human rights advocacy. This collaborative work includes A Social Science of Human Rights? A Conceptual Roadmap for Social Science Methods in Human Rights Fact-Finding (co-authored with Justin Simeone); Measuring What We Treasure and Treasuring What We Measure: The Promise and Perils of Global Monitoring for the Promotion of Equality in the Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Sector (co-authored with Inga Winkler and Catarina de Albuquerque); and Persuasive Visualization: Can Visualized Data Change Users’ Opinions? (co-authored with Enrico Bertini, Oded Nov, Anshul Pandey, and Anjali Manivannan), as well as a series of articles on trauma and resilience in human rights work.

Meg’s recent scholarship has involved cross-disciplinary work aimed at advancing the evidence base for human rights advocacy. This collaborative work includes A Social Science of Human Rights? A Conceptual Roadmap for Social Science Methods in Human Rights Fact-Finding (co-authored with Justin Simeone); Measuring What We Treasure and Treasuring What We Measure: The Promise and Perils of Global Monitoring for the Promotion of Equality in the Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Sector (co-authored with Inga Winkler and Catarina de Albuquerque); and Persuasive Visualization: Can Visualized Data Change Users’ Opinions? (co-authored with Enrico Bertini, Oded Nov, Anshul Pandey, and Anjali Manivannan), as well as a series of articles on trauma and resilience in human rights work.

She has published two books, Gender, National Security, and Counter-Terrorism: Human Rights Perspectives (co-edited with Jayne Huckerby, 2013; paperback, 2014) and Human Rights Advocacy Stories (co-edited with Deena Hurwitz and Douglas Ford, 2009), a volume in the Law Stories series. Her past scholarship focused on indicators and metrics, human rights in Haiti, and the human rights impacts of counter-terrorism measures.

She has published two books, Gender, National Security, and Counter-Terrorism: Human Rights Perspectives (co-edited with Jayne Huckerby, 2013; paperback, 2014) and Human Rights Advocacy Stories (co-edited with Deena Hurwitz and Douglas Ford, 2009), a volume in the Law Stories series. Her past scholarship focused on indicators and metrics, human rights in Haiti, and the human rights impacts of counter-terrorism measures.

Meg joined the NYU faculty in 2006 after many years in the human rights field. Her human rights career began before law school: between 1990 and 1996, she co-founded and then directed Amnesty International USA’s program on the human rights of those persecuted on the basis of their sexual orientation. Meg also completed a Master’s Degree and served as International Programs Coordinator for the human rights education organization Street Law, where she helped develop curriculum in human rights and legal literacy, as well as conducting workshops and training sessions for human rights advocates and legal professionals. In 1995, she was employed as a human rights investigator by the Haitian National Truth and Justice Commission.

After receiving her law degree magna cum laude from NYU Law in 1999, Meg clerked for Judge Betty Fletcher of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The following year she was the Furman Fellow at Human Rights First (then the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights), where she focused on emergency law and collusion in Northern Ireland. In 2002, Meg clerked at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. Between 2002 and 2003, she was a human rights consultant for the United Nations, working with the human rights section of the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM). In 2003, Meg was hired as research director of NYU’s Center for Human Rights and Global Justice. She joined the full-time faculty in January 2006.

Meg has served as a consultant to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the human right to safe drinking water and sanitation, the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights while countering terrorism, the World Health Organization, and the World Bank. In 2009, she received the Pioneer of Justice and Equality for Women and the Law; in 2011 she was awarded the Podell Distinguished Teaching Award; and in 2014, she received the NYU School of Law Alumni Association’s Legal Teaching Award.

She has served as an adviser or member of the board of directors of a range of human rights organizations, including Amnesty International USA, Digital Democracy, the Global Initiative for Economic and Social Rights, Haiti Corps, and the International Justice Resource Center. She is a member of the Human Rights Reference Group of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

Lucia Monda
Legal & Program Manager
Prevention Project

Lucia Monda is Legal & Program Manager for the Prevention Project at the Center, where she manages multiple workstreams: Health and Human Rights; Mental health and Psycho-Social Support; Development, Inequality and Corruption; and Culture.

She holds a Master’s Degree in Law with honors from the University of Naples Federico II and an LL.M. from New York University. At NYU, she was selected for the Transitional Justice Scholar Leadership Program and awarded the prestigious International Law and Human Rights Fellowship.

Her research interests include legal empowerment, gender, and human rights; international humanitarian law and cross-border movement; judicial and non-judicial transitional justice mechanisms, focusing on the Middle East and North Africa.

Lucia has worked in human rights, international criminal law, and transitional justice. She has trained at the UN Special Tribunal for Lebanon, the International Center for Transitional Justice, and the Clooney Foundation for Justice, among other organizations. A common thread in her work experience is a desire to help others access opportunities they may not otherwise have to claim their own power. As she believes nothing affects people’s choices more than armed conflict, she is currently exploring interactions between legal empowerment strategies and transitional justice to contribute to human development.

Katelyn Cioffi
Senior Research Scholar, Digital Welfare State and Human Rights Project
Technology and Human Rights

Katelyn Cioffi is a Senior Research Scholar at the Center, where she works on the Digital Welfare State and Human Rights Project and leads the project’s work on digital identity systems. Katelyn’s research focuses on how digital government initiatives—such as biometric national digital ID systems, federated identity ecosystems, and legal and regulatory frameworks for emerging technologies and artificial intelligence—affect human rights, social exclusion, and inequality.

Katelyn has experience working across a wide range of human rights issues, including social and economic rights, freedom of expression, gender-based discrimination, and international justice. Prior to coming to CHRGJ, she worked in the Strategic Litigation Unit at Amnesty International, where she supported human rights litigation in the United States, the European Court of Human Rights, and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. She has worked extensively with civil society organizations around the world on issues of transitional justice, human rights, monitoring & evaluation, and capacity building.

From 2018–19, Katelyn was a Fulbright Fellow at the Amsterdam Center for International Law, University of Amsterdam, where her research focused on the doctrine of emerging consensus and its effect on contestation in regional human rights systems. She holds a JD from Harvard Law School (cum laude), an MA in International Studies and Diplomacy from the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, and a BA in History from Brown University. Katelyn is admitted to practice law in the State of New York.

Katarina Sydow
Senior Advisor to UN Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers

Katarina Sydow is the Senior Advisor to the UN Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, Professor Margaret Satterthwaite.

Katarina was previously Director of the Human Rights and Privatization Project at the Center, where her research focused on poverty and inequality, and the human rights impacts of commodifying essential services such as healthcare, water and education.

Katarina has a broad interest in international law and human rights issues. She has worked as a consultant for UN Women and the United Nations Development Programme, contributing to policy briefs concerning the Women, Peace and Security agenda and the Global Focal Point for the Rule of Law. Katarina was also an NYU International Law and Human Rights Fellow at the United Nations Department of Peace Operations, Justice and Corrections Service.

Before moving to the United States, Katarina worked as a barrister in the UK for eight years, where she was ranked in Legal 500 and Chambers and Partners. She specialized in public law, human rights and medical law.

Katarina holds an LLM in International Legal Studies from NYU, a Graduate Diploma in Law from City, University of London, and a BA in Modern History from the University of Oxford. At NYU, she was an Arthur T. Vanderbilt Scholar and the recipient of the Jerome Lipper Award for International Legal Studies and the Howard Greenberger Award for comparative law.

Jacqueline Gallant
Research Scholar & Litigation Associate
Earth Rights Advocacy

Jackie Gallant is a Litigation Associate at the Center’s Earth Rights Advocacy program, where she works on projects addressing the climate emergency and its implications for rights protection.

Acting as a generalist in the field, she has worked on a broad set of issues, including rights-based climate litigation, the rights of nature, youth climate activism, the right to a healthy environment, and rights-based biodiversity litigation. Jackie holds a JD (cum laude) from NYU School of Law and a BA (magna cum laude) in International Relations from Brown University.

Jacob Metz-Lerman
Research Scholar
Earth Rights Advocacy

Jacob Metz-Lerman is a Research Scholar at the Center part of the Earth Rights Advocacy team. Jacob works on issues related to climate litigation, climate justice, and climate displacement.

Jacob holds a J.D. from NYU School of Law (cum laude), where he was awarded the Ann Petluck Poses Memorial Prize for his clinical work during law school. Jacob was a student advocate in the Earth Rights Advocacy Clinic and Immigrant Rights Clinic. Jacob also holds a B.A. in Political Science from Grinnell College. Prior to law school, Jacob spent three years representing asylum seekers in Cairo, Egypt.

Jackson Gandour
Research Scholar
Inequalities

Jackson is a research scholar in the Human Rights and Privatization Project at the Center. His research focuses on the commodification of public services, economic inequality, and workers’ rights.

Previously, Jackson was a fellow at Human Rights Watch, where he worked on housing policy, social protection, and labor rights. He received a JD (magna cum laude) from NYU Law, where he was an Online Editor for the Journal of International Law and Politics and received the Jerome Lipper Prize for work in the field of international law. He completed his undergraduate education at Indiana University Bloomington, graduating with highest distinction with degrees in philosophy and film production.

Gabrielle Apollon
Director, Haitian Immigrant Rights Project
Global Justice Clinic

Gabrielle Apollon directs Rights without Borders: Haitian Immigrant Rights part of the Global Justice Clinic, through which she is building a hemisphere-wide coalition of Haitian activists, lawyers and allies, collaborating to combat the anti-Black racism, exclusion and cyclical displacement Haitians have faced as they’ve migrated throughout the Western Hemisphere.

She is also co-leading the Clinic’s work on climate migration, documenting and challenging anti-Blackness as it relates to Haitians’ experiences of climate harms, in Haiti as well as in transit and destination countries. Gabrielle previously served as Managing Attorney at The Door: A Center for Alternatives, where she represented young people in immigration and family law matters. While at The Door, Gabrielle expanded services for Francophone immigrants and became a New York Community Trust Leadership Fellow. A 2015 graduate of NYU School of Law, Gabrielle was an AnBryce Scholar and served as a student advocate in the Global Justice and Children’s Rights Clinics. As a student, Gabrielle earned a Ford Foundation Public Interest Law Fellowship to work with Conectas in Brazil in 2013, documenting human rights violations of Haitian migrants en route to Brazil.

Prior to law school, Gabrielle worked at the United Nations Office of the Special Envoy to Haiti as a research specialist. She holds a Bachelor of Arts and a Master of International Affairs from Columbia University, where she was awarded the J.W. Saxe Memorial Award for Public Service and Harry J. Carman Fellowship. While studying political science and international development, Gabrielle interned with the Council on Foreign Relations and Haiti’s presidential commission, Groupe de Travail sur l’Education et la Formation (GTEF). Gabrielle speaks French and Haitian Creole. She serves as the Vice President of the Board of Directors of St. Hope Leadership Academy.

Ellie Happel
Interim Director, Global Justice Clinic
Co-Director, Haiti Justice and International Accountability
Co-Director, Caribbean Climate Justice Initiative

Ellie co-directs the Global Justice Clinic projects Haiti Justice and International Accountability and the Caribbean Climate Justice Initiative.

Both projects partner with social movements and communities in Haiti and the Caribbean to defend their environmental, economic, social and cultural rights; to prevent rights violations, particularly by international actors; and to support efforts to build community power in the face of extractive development models and the global climate crisis. Ellie also co-teaches the Global Justice Clinic Seminar.

Ellie lived and worked in Haiti between 2011 and 2017, first on cases of forced eviction in the internally displaced people (IDP) camps in Port-au-Prince, and then to develop the Global Justice Clinic’s partnership with Kolektif Jistis Min (Justice Mining Collective), a coalition of Haitian social movement organizations that came together to monitor Haiti’s nascent gold mining industry.

Ellie is a 2011 graduate of NYU School of Law where she was a Root Tilden Kern scholar. She holds a B.A. magna cum laude in Metropolitan Studies from New York University. Ellie is fluent in Spanish and Haitian Creole.