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Bryan Stevenson
Founder of the Equal Justice Initiative and Creator of the National Memorial for Peace and Justice
Civil rights attorney who founded the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) in 1989, has won reversals, relief, or release for over 140 wrongly condemned death row prisoners, argued and won multiple cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, and created the National Memorial for Peace and Justice documenting over 4,400 racial terror lynchings in America
Overview
Bryan Stevenson (born November 14, 1959) is an American civil rights attorney, author, and law professor who founded the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1989. Over the course of more than three decades, Stevenson and EJI have provided legal representation to hundreds of people on death row and have won reversals, relief, or release for over 140 wrongly condemned prisoners. His most famous case was the defense of Walter McMillian, an African American man who was wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death in 1988 for the murder of a white woman in Monroeville, Alabama, despite overwhelming evidence of his innocence, including testimony from witnesses placing him at a church fish fry miles from the crime at the time of the murder. After six years of appeals, Stevenson secured McMillian's release in 1993 after proving that prosecutors had suppressed exculpatory evidence and relied on coerced testimony. The case became the basis of Stevenson's bestselling memoir "Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption" (2014), later adapted into a 2019 film. Stevenson has argued and won multiple cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, including Sullivan v. Florida (2010) and Miller v. Alabama (2012), which established that mandatory life-without-parole sentences for children 17 and younger violate the Eighth Amendment prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. He also successfully argued that sentencing children to die in prison is unconstitutional. In 2018, Stevenson and EJI opened the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, the first memorial dedicated to the victims of lynching in the United States. The memorial documents over 4,400 racial terror lynchings that occurred in the United States between 1877 and 1950, with 800 six-foot steel columns suspended from the ceiling, each representing a county where a lynching took place and inscribed with the names of the victims. The accompanying Legacy Museum traces the history from enslavement through racial terror lynching to mass incarceration. Stevenson has received numerous honors including the MacArthur Foundation "Genius" Grant (1995), the National Humanitarian Medal from the National Conference for Community and Justice, and the Smithsonian Magazine American Ingenuity Award for Social Progress.
Key Affiliations
Equal Justice Initiative (EJI)
Founder and Executive Director (1989-present); has won reversals, relief, or release for over 140 wrongly condemned death row prisoners
organization
New York University School of Law
Professor of Clinical Law; teaches capital punishment and criminal justice reform
organization
Controversies & Concerns
Founded the Equal Justice Initiative in 1989, which has since provided legal representation to hundreds of death row inmates and won freedom for over 140 wrongly condemned prisoners
Won the freedom of Walter McMillian in 1993 after proving that Alabama prosecutors had suppressed exculpatory evidence and relied on coerced testimony to secure a death sentence against an innocent man
Argued and won Sullivan v. Florida (2010) and Miller v. Alabama (2012) before the U.S. Supreme Court, establishing that mandatory life-without-parole sentences for children violate the Eighth Amendment
Created the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in 2018, the first memorial in the United States dedicated to victims of lynching, documenting over 4,400 racial terror lynchings between 1877 and 1950
His EJI research documented that thousands of African Americans were lynched in the American South with the participation or acquiescence of local law enforcement, and that many of these killings had never been officially acknowledged
Publicly challenged the direct line from racial terror lynching to mass incarceration, arguing that the United States incarcerates more people per capita than any nation in history and that the system disproportionately targets Black and brown communities
His work documenting racial bias in capital sentencing has shown that the race of the victim is the strongest predictor of who receives the death penalty in America
Related Investigations (2)
Known Associates & Connections
Anthony Ray Hinton
Represented Hinton for 16 years and won his freedom in 2015 after 30 years on Alabama death row based on faulty ballistics evidence
Walter McMillian
Represented and freed McMillian in 1993 after proving his wrongful conviction for murder; the case became the basis for "Just Mercy"
Barry Scheck
Fellow wrongful conviction attorney and Innocence Project co-founder; allied in criminal justice reform work
Sources & Documentation
3 documented sources from official records, investigations, and reports
Stevenson, B. - Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (Spiegel & Grau)(2014)
Equal Justice Initiative - Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror (Third Edition)(2017)
Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012)(2012-06-25)
Personal Information
- Born
- 1959-11-14
- Birthplace
- Milton, Delaware
Education
- •Eastern University (BA, 1981)
- •Harvard Kennedy School (Master of Public Policy, 1985)
- •Harvard Law School (JD, 1985)
Key Timeline
1959-11-14
Born in Milton, Delaware
1985
Graduates from Harvard Law School and Harvard Kennedy School; begins representing death row inmates in the Deep South
1989
Founds the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) in Montgomery, Alabama, dedicated to defending the most marginalized people in the criminal justice system
1993
Wins the freedom of Walter McMillian after six years of appeals, proving Alabama prosecutors suppressed exculpatory evidence to secure a death sentence against an innocent man
1995
Receives the MacArthur Foundation "Genius" Grant for his work in criminal justice reform and death penalty defense
2010
Argues and wins Sullivan v. Florida before the U.S. Supreme Court, contributing to the ruling that life-without-parole for non-homicide juvenile offenders violates the Eighth Amendment
2012-06-25
Supreme Court decides Miller v. Alabama, ruling that mandatory life-without-parole sentences for juvenile offenders violate the Eighth Amendment; Stevenson argued significantly for this outcome
2014
Publishes "Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption," which becomes a bestseller and is later adapted into a 2019 film starring Michael B. Jordan
2015
EJI publishes "Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror," documenting over 4,400 racial terror lynchings between 1877 and 1950
2018-04-26
Opens the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama, the first memorial in the United States dedicated to victims of lynching