Dr Sabina Garahan

Biography

Dr Sabina Garahan is a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Criminal Law at Essex Law School and Co-Director of the Arbitrary Detention Redress Unit at the Essex Human Rights Centre, which works on cases of alleged arbitrary detention brought before the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. Her research primarily concerns the rights of detained persons under international law. She completed her AHRC-funded doctoral research at the Essex Human Rights Centre, focusing on protections against arbitrary detention under European human rights law. Sabina consults regularly on international human rights law and policy in an expert capacity and is a member of the Fair Trials Legal Experts Advisory Panel. Sabina previously worked as a Judicial Assistant to former President Robert Spano at the European Court of Human Rights and as a Research Assistant at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law. She is a former Editorial Board member at the Oxford Journal of Law and Religion. Sabina has provided expert advice and opinion on a range of human rights and rule of law matters to organisations including the OSCE/ODIHR, Penal Reform International and the Equal Rights Trust. Her expertise covers the death penalty, fair trial rights, and racial discrimination in justice systems, as well as prisoners’ rights and equality and non-discrimination frameworks. As an expert consultant, Sabina has delivered legal and policy reform recommendations on human rights and equality standards to key stakeholders including representatives of governments, judiciaries and civil society. She has also volunteered for organisations including Reprieve and the Free Representation Unit, and is a former member of the Death Penalty Sentencing Mitigation Unit. Sabina holds an LLB in Law with French Law from University College London, graduating with a faculty prize, and a Certificat Supérieur de Droit Français et Européen from Panthéon-Assas University, Paris. She completed her LLM in International Human Rights Law at the Essex Human Rights Centre with Distinction, funded by a County of Essex Scholarship. She is a previous recipient of the iCourts/PluriCourts High-Level PhD Summer School Scholarship.

Qualifications

• PhD Law University of Essex, (2023)

• LLM International Human Rights Law University of Essex, (2016)

• LLB Law with French Law University College London, (2014)

• Certificat Supérieur de Droit Français et Européen Panthéon-Assas University, (2013)

Appointments

University of Essex

• Co-Director, Arbitrary Detention Redress Unit (4/9/2023 - present)

• Year 1 Student Support and Progress Lead, Essex Law School (4/9/2023 - present)

Other academic

• Lecturer, University of Essex (23/1/2023 - present)

• Assistant Lecturer, University of Essex (8/10/2018 - present)

• Associate Fellow, Higher Education Academy (4/9/2019 - present)