Dee Um

Biography

Dee Um is the Find Justice Fellow at Mehri & Skalet. Before M&S, Dee was a Workers’ Rights Fellow at the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights. There, she represented low-wage workers in cases involving wage theft, discriminatory background check policies, and sexual harassment.

Dee grew up in the Silicon Valley and studied Public Policy at the University of Southern California. After college, she joined 1951 Coffee Company, a social enterprise providing job training and placement to refugees and asylum seekers. Over her four years managing the training program, Dee taught more than 200 students from 37 countries. This experience motivated her to pursue a career in public interest law.

At Harvard Law School, Dee focused on immigration and public defense pro bono work. She worked on asylum applications and appellate briefs at the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic, and was a student attorney at Harvard Defenders, representing indigent clients in criminal show-cause hearings. She spent her summers at the Capital Habeas Unit of the Federal Defenders office in Montgomery, Alabama, and at the Public Defender Service in Washington, D.C.