Bina Ahmad joined Hadsell Stormer Renick & Dai in March 2025. She specializes in civil rights and movement defense.
Prior to joining the firm, Ms. Ahmad worked in criminal defense, civil rights, international law, and animal law. She practiced for nearly a decade as a public defender with the Legal Aid Society of New York City and The Office of the Federal Public Defender in Los Angeles. As a state public defender, Ms. Ahmad challenged New York State’s heinous automatic remand detention of fugitive warrant cases, changing the state’s practice to allow for both bail and release in those cases. She also practiced civil rights impact litigation against the criminal system, building creative and intersectional cases seeking to shrink these systems.
As part of her work supporting radical movements and state-targeted communities, Ms. Ahmad has provided legal advice and support to numerous organizations. She has conducted hundreds of Know Your Rights trainings from a curriculum she created. Ms. Ahmad has spoken on panels across the country on animal liberation, police and prison abolition, prosecutorial misconduct, and international human rights along with fellow activists and thinkers such as Angela Davis, Amy Goodman, Laura Whitehorn and Bill Quigley. As both a lawyer and activist, she has worked with numerous animal rights and human rights organizations. Ms. Ahmad lived and worked in Palestine with Al-Haq, served on the legal team for the Russell Tribunal on Palestine with Noura Erakat and tribunal jurors such as Angela Davis, Alice Walker and Russell Banks, and was a legal consultant to Badil Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights as well as to the Norwegian Refugee Council’s Palestine Division. She served on the Steering Committee of the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, and was as Global Strategic Litigation Fellow with the International Legal Foundation. In addition, Ms. Ahmad worked as a volunteer attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights, provided legal support and advice to the international human rights nonprofit WITNESS, and supported and represented hundreds of activists. Ms. Ahmad is regularly sought to provide legal commentary by media outlets, and has given dozens of public talks across the country on animal liberation, international human rights, abolition, the criminal legal system, Palestinian human rights, and movement and radical lawyering.
Education
- J.D., Northeaster University School of Law
- B.A., University of Wisconsin Madison
Admissions
- California
- New York
- District of Columbia
- U.S. District Court Central District of California
- U.S. District Court Eastern District of Michigan
- U.S. Court of Appeals 5th Circuit
Memberships
- American Muslim Bar Association, Advocacy Chair
- Muslims for Just Futures (MJF), Co-Chair of the legal network
- Parceo, Advisor
- Food Empowerment Project, Advisory Board Member
Publications
- 2024 CUNY law review article, “The Professionalized Violence of Prosecutorial Power and Misconduct”
- The Appeal, “U.S. Police Dogs Originated from Slavery—and Must Be Abolished” co-authored with Kiah Duggins
- The Transnational Institute, “Shrinking Space and the Movement for BDS,” co-authored with Ben White and Phyllis Bennis
- ABA GPS Solo Magazine, “Criminal Defense for Political Activists: A Lawyer’s Solidarity with the Movement”
- Vanity Fair, “Eric Garner’s Public Defender Says Cop and Prosecutors ‘Are a Team in Every Case,’” co-authored with Joe Doyle and Michael Rooney
Awards & Accolades
- Davis-Putter Scholarship for Academic Social Justice Activists
- Alumni Coop Funding Award
- Fund for Public Interest Coop Award for Legal Internship with Al-Haq
- National Lawyers Guild New York City Chapter Spring Fling Honoree
