Sherizaan Minwalla, JD MA

Sherizaan Minwalla, JD, MA is the Owner of Taboo LLC and a human rights lawyer with twenty years of experience in delivering client- and survivor-centered centered services to advocate for justice and human rights globally. Through Taboo, Sherizaan offers consulting services that promote the rule of law, human rights, and ethical documentation of trauma globally with a focus on the US and Iraq.

Her career is grounded in legal practice when she represented several hundred non-citizen survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault to legalize their immigration status under the Violence Against Women Act. Sherizaan has continued to stay engaged in refugee and asylum cases involving gender-based persecution by building the capacity of lawyers and law students and through direct client services. Having lived in the US and Iraq, Sherizaan has witnessed the full spectrum of legal and justice needs and barriers of individuals facing grave harm.

In Iraq, Sherizaan has more than a decade of experience leading justice, human rights, and development programs for several international organizations. For more than eight years, Sherizaan has responded to survivors of ISIS genocide, predominantly the Yezidi survivors of conflict related sexual violence. She is consulting with IOM on the implementation of the Yazidi Female Survivors’ Law, an Iraqi transitional justice mechanism delivering reparations to minority survivors of ISIS’ captivity.

Her ground-breaking research, Voices of Yazidi Women: perceptions of journalistic practices in the reporting on ISIS sexual violence, she and her colleague shone a light on the perceptions of survivors of genocide with regard to media practices in covering sexual violence. Since then, Sherizaan has worked with survivors, NGOs, documentary filmmakers and journalists to establish protocols for ethically engaging with survivors of trauma.

As the founder of Taboo LLC, Sherizaan has been guided in her professional journey by clients who had the determination to fight for their rights. She has passionately supported their efforts through innovative approaches to the rule of law, advocacy, international development, and research.

Sub-specialties:
Ethical documentation of conflict related sexual violence in the media and other actors (NGOs, investigators)