Shirin Ebadi was born on June 21, 1947, in Hamedan, Iran. In 1975, Ebadi was appointed president of Bench 24 of Tehran’s City Court, becoming the first female judge in Iran. In the 1990s, she practiced law and began taking human rights cases. Ebadi founded the Association for Support of Children’s Rights in 1995 and the Human Rights Defense Center in 2001. Two years later, she won the Nobel Peace Prize.