Joanna Naples-Mitchell is an international human rights lawyer. She currently serves as Director of the Program on Redress for Survivors of U.S. and Coalition Airstrikes at the Zomia Center. As U.S. Research Advisor at PHR, she supports PHR’s research and advocacy related to the intersection of law enforcement, racism, and medicine. In her prior role as PHR’s U.S. Researcher for more than 2.5 years, she led complex investigations on police violence and abuses in immigration detention, including “Excited Delirium” and Deaths in Police Custody, Behind Closed Doors, and “A Targeted Attack on the Bronx.”
Naples-Mitchell previously worked at Human Rights Watch, where she produced a report on lead contamination and children’s rights in Zambia and published research on U.S. condolence payments for civilian casualties. During law school, she conducted research and advocacy on the conflict in Yemen, worked with human rights organizations in Sri Lanka and Jordan, and served as a research assistant for Professor Philip Alston. Prior to law school, she spent almost five years with the Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, managing case files and conducting research on international human rights and war crimes investigations.
Naples-Mitchell’s research has been published in The Lancet, Just Security, Annals of Internal Medicine, the International Journal of Human Rights, and Bhekisisa. She is a graduate of New York University School of Law and is admitted to practice law in the state of New York. She also holds a BA in Social Studies from Harvard University.