Born in 1961, Charles Swift is a native of Franklin, North Carolina. He went to local schools and gained an appointment and admission to the U.S. Naval Academy.

Following his graduation in 1984, Swift served in a variety of surface warfare billets as described in the below table.

In 1991, he left active service to attend Seattle University School of Law, as authorized by the Navy, where he graduated cum laude. Resuming active service in 1994, he joined the Navy's Judge Advocate General's Corps. A comprehensive biography can be found here ^[5] (website for the Association of Graduates of the United States Military Academy, different from LCDR Swift's commissioning source).

Summary of LCDR Swift's assignments:

The US Navy lawyer successfully represented the plaintiff Guantanamo detainee in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld (2006) and took his case to the US Supreme Court. Hamdan, a former driver for Osama bin Laden, was captured during the US invasion of Afghanistan, and held from 2002 at Guantanamo Bay detention camp. He was charged in July 2004 with conspiracy to commit terrorism.^[6]

As Hamdan's legal counsel, Swift was assisted in the defense by the Seattle law firm of Perkins Coie and Neal Katyal, a Georgetown University Law Professor. They appealed Hamdan's writ of habeas corpus petition to the US Supreme Court. In Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, 548 U.S. 557, 126 S.Ct. 2749 (2006), the Court ruled that the military commission to try Hamdan was illegal and violated the Geneva Conventions as well as the United States Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ).^[7][8] It held that Congress needed to authorize a process for detainee tribunals. The court ruled that the military commissions as established by the Dept. of Defense were flawed and illegal according to the US Uniform Code of Military Justice and Geneva Convention. As a result, the administration requested, and Congress passed, the Military Commissions Act of 2006, to authorize a form of military tribunals to try the detainee cases. The president signed the law October 17, 2006.

Beginning in 2007, Hamdan was charged under the new law and in 2008 tried by a military jury of the Military Commissions. It acquitted him of conspiracy for terrorism but convicted him of assisting efforts. It sentenced him to five and a half years, crediting him for the time he had already been detained. In November 2008, the US transferred Hamdan to Yemen, where he served the last month of his sentence. After release, he rejoined his family in Sana. In October 2012, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia overturned the conviction.

In June 2006, Swift learned that he would be forced to retire from the Navy, as he had not been promoted to commander but "passed over" a second time.^[9] The Navy has an "up or out" promotion policy.,^[9][10][11] for a second time had not been selected for promotion.^[2] He left the military that spring, the Associated Press reported. Swift said he learned about two weeks after the Hamdan decision that he would not receive a promotion to commander.^[3] Media such as The New York Times^[12] and Vanity Fair^[13] reported that the timing was not a coincidence and suggested it was politically motivated. The Deputy Judge Advocate General of the Air Force, Charles J. Dunlap Jr., later said that suggestion was without evidence.^[14]

From fall 2007 to spring 2008, Swift taught at Emory Law School as a Visiting Associate Professor and Acting Director of its newly established International Humanitarian Law Clinic.^[15]

• Swift was the subject of a biographical article in the December 2004 issue of Esquire.^[16]
• In December 2005 he was chosen as runner-up "Lawyer of the Year" by the National Law Journal for his challenge to the Guantanamo review tribunals.
• In December 2005 Swift and Lieutenant Colonel Sharon Shaffer were awarded the Joe A. Callaway Award for Civic Courage by the Center for the Study of Responsive Law, in Washington, D.C.^[17][18]
• In June 2006, the National Law Journal named Swift as one of "The 100 most influential lawyers in America."^[19]

His decorations and medals include:^[20]

• Surface Warfare Badge
• Navy Commendation Medal (2 awards)
• Navy Achievement Medal (6 awards)
• Navy Expeditionary Medal
• Humanitarian Service Medal
• Sea Service Ribbon (4 awards)

• Hamdan v. Rumsfeld
• Matthew Diaz

• "Navy Lawyer Charles Swift Battles Bush in Guantanamo Bay Case", Bloomberg.com, March 2006
• "Testimony of Lieutenant Commander Charles D. Swift", U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, June 2005
• Carol J. Williams, "Marine Corps Issues Gag Order in Detainee Abuse Case", Los Angeles Times, October 15, 2006 (article about Canadian citizen and detainee, Omar Khadr)
• Nat Hentoff, "Eroding detainees rights", The Washington Times, October 30, 2006
• FY07 Navy Line O5 Board
• Jonathan Mahler: The Challenge, Authors@Google video lecture (45 min). September 26, 2008