Introducing Barbara Dougan, CAIR-MA Civil Rights Director

Barbara Dougan

After a prolonged and rigorous national search, we’re thrilled to announce the newest addition to the CAIR-Massachusetts team: Barbara Dougan, Esq.! Ms. Dougan will serve as the first Civil Rights Director for a Muslim organization in New England’s history.

Barbara Dougan brings over 20 years of experience as a civil rights attorney in Boston. She was formerly Director of the Project to Combat Racial Violence at the Boston Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights, representing the victims of hate crimes, police misconduct and discrimination in housing and public accommodations. Most recently, she ran the Massachusetts office of Families Against Mandatory Minimums, where as the Massachusetts Project Director her legislative advocacy helped to reform harsh drug sentencing laws that overwhelmingly impacted minority communities. She was one of the organizers of a 9/11 legal response network in conjunction with the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the ACLU, and National Lawyers Guild, where she presented Know Your Rights talks at mosques and developed attorney referral lists and a help hotline. Along with a team of attorneys, she litigated one of the first post-9/11 airline cases (Alshrafi v. American Airlines) on behalf of a US citizen from Jordan. In 2010, Ms. Dougan was named one of the “Top Women in Law” by Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly and has been honored by the NAACP, National Lawyers Guild, Community Change, and Fair Housing Center of Greater Boston.