Anjana Malhotra

Practitioner-in-Residence, Seton Hall Law, Director of the Human Rights/Rule of Law Project within the Center for Social Justice

Practitioner-in-Residence

Anjana Malhotra, Practitioner-in-Residence, directs the International Human Rights/Rule of Law Project within the Center for Social Justice. Her focus is on immigrants’ rights at the intersection of local and federal immigration enforcement, immigration relief for women, national security issues, and the emerging practice of private deportations. She also assists in teaching the Immigration, Human Rights and Labor Clinic.

Following law school, Ms. Malhotra clerked for the Honorable Harry Pregerson, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. She then worked as the first Aryeh Neier Fellow for the American Civil Liberties Union Immigrants’ Rights Project and Human Rights Watch. As the Neier Fellow, she investigated human rights abuses in Muslim communities and provided legal and advocacy assistance in both the U.S. Courts and international forums to unlawfully arrested Muslim individuals. Ms. Malhotra also researched and authored the seminal HRW/ACLU advocacy report, “Witness to Abuse,” which details the U.S. government’s abuse of the material witness law to unlawfully detain Muslim, Middle Eastern and South Asian men without probable cause. The report documented, for the first time, the number of material witnesses who were secretly detained under the government’s material witness program and exposed the egregious constitutional and international human rights abuses which these “material witnesses” suffered. The Report received national and international attention and prompted reform to the material witness program, with Ms. Malhotra advising the Senate Judiciary Committee on reform.

Ms. Malhotra also litigated cases challenging the detention of material witnesses, working with the Yale Law School National Security Clinic. Her work recently resulted in the first decisive major federal court victory for material witnesses, al-Kidd v. Ashcroft, CV-06-36059 (September 5, 2009), where the Ninth Circuit held that under the Fourth Amendment the federal material witness law could not be used to preventively detain or investigate suspects; and further held that former Attorney General John Ashcroft could be held personally responsible for the unconstitutional detention of Abdullah al-Kidd for his role in developing the unconstitutional material witness policy.

Following her fellowship with the ACLU and Human Rights Watch, Ms. Malhotra worked as an associate for Wilmer, Cutler, Pickering, Hale and Dorr, where she managed and litigated securities cases and worked on pro bono cases involving immigrants’ rights, Title IX claims, and the rights of Guantanamo detainees under international human rights law.

Immediately prior to joining Seton Hall Law, Ms. Malhotra served as a labor attorney at Gladstein, Reif & Meginniss, a worker-side labor firm in New York City. There she represented unions and workers to vindicate their rights under federal and state laws. While at Gladstein, Ms. Malhotra successfully litigated complex wage and hour class action suits against large corporations, and individual cases on behalf of low-wage immigrant workers. Other notable victories include the following.

Li v. Sun Kwong Seafood Restaurant, 1:05-cv-11951 (E.D.N.Y.), attachment of defendant’s property; restaurant workers case where the plaintiffs alleged wage and hour violations under federal and state law and employer retaliation for whistle blowing.

Mayor of City of New York v. Council of City of New York, 9 N.Y.3d 23, 842 N.Y.S.2d 742, 874 N.E.2d 706 (2007), defeating the Mayor of New York City’s challenge to City Council legislation amending (and improving) the collective bargaining rights of New York City’s EMT workers and Firefighters.

N.L.R.B. v. Regency Grande Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, No. 06-5013, 2008 WL 449782 (Feb. 20, 2008 3d. Cir.), holding employer violation of the National Labor Relations Act in a union campaign.

Ms. Malhotra received her A.B., magna cum laude, from Duke University in Comparative International Studies and Cultural Anthropology. She received her J.D., cum laude, from New York University, where she was a Root-Tilden-Kern Public Interest Scholar, a William and Mary Sterling Scholar, a Senior Articles Editor for the Journal of Law and Social Change and was awarded the Ann Petluck Poses Memorial Prize, which is given to students for outstanding clinical work.

PUBLICATIONS

Witness to Abuse: Human Rights Abuses under the Material Witness Law Since September 11, Vol. 17 No. 2 (G), June 2005 (American Civil Liberties Union/Human Rights Watch).

Overlooking Innocence, Refashioning the Material Witness Law to Indefinitely Detain Muslims Without Charges, 2004 International Civil Liberties Report (2004).

Indefinite Detention Without Probable Cause: A Comment on INS Interim Rule 8 C.F.R. 287.3, 26 N.Y.U. Rev. L. & Soc. Change 397 (2000-2001).

Material Witness Law is Being Abused, Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, July/August 2004, p 69.

LAW REVIEW ARTICLES

Indefinite Detention Without Probable Cause: A Comment on INS Interim Rule 8 C.F.R. 287.3, 26 N.Y.U. REV. L. & SOC. CHANGE 397 (2000-2001)

OTHER PUBLICATIONS

Witness to Abuse: Human Rights Abuses under the Material Witness Law Since September 11, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH VOL. 17 NO. 2 (June 2005)

Overlooking Innocence, Refashioning the Material Witness Law to Indefinitely Detain Muslims Without Charges, 2004 INTERNATIONAL CIVIL LIBERTIES REPORT (2004)

Material Witness Law is Being Abused, Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, (July/August 2004)