Equal Justice Initiative Annual Report

2019

EQUAL JUSTICE INITIATIVE

Annual Report

5

Letter of the Director

6

Mission & History

13

The Legacy Museum

16

Re–Entry Program

19

The Sun Does Shine

01

27

Erroneous Fingerprints

02

39

Innocence Is Clear

03

51

Financial Statements

55

Staff and Board

Exonerated After 30 Years on Death Row

Faulty Evidence, Convicted for Murder

A Story of Race and Justice

LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR The Equal Justice Initiative works to end mass incarceration and excessive punishment, challenge violent and inhumane prison conditions, and confront the history of racial inequality and injustice in America.

For nearly three decades, we represented the poor, the condemned, the disfavored, children prosecuted as adults, people with mental illness, and others who are marginalized by our criminal justice system.

In the past year, we won relief for dozens of people who were condemned to death by execution and who were condemned to death by execution and who were sentenced to die in prison when they were children, and we continue to represent scored of other condemned juveniles. We won a hard-fought victory to reform abusive prison conditions and we continue to challenge extreme sentences for people who are not a threat to public safety. In the last year, we continued to win the release of many clients who were unfairly sentenced or wrongly convicted and we remain steadfast in our commitment to advance criminal justice reform.

We have become a national leader in confronting our nation’s history of racial injustice and reached millions this year with our innovative reports, exhibits, online presence, an multimedia projects.

Your support makes this happen

Bryan Stevenson

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Mission

END INJUSTICE Equal Justice Initiative is committed to end mass incarceration and excessive punishment in the United States, to challenge racial and economic injustice, and to protect basic human rights for the most vulnerable people in American society.

6

Representing the innocent History

EJI was founded in 1989 in Montgomery, Alabama, by attorney Bryan Stevenson, who has served as the organization’s executive director ever since. He had been working on Alabama defense cases since 1989 for the Southern Center for Human Rights and was director of its center for Alabama operations. It had received federal funding to provide legal representation to prisoners on death row. In 1994, after Republicans gained control of Congress in a mid-term election, they ceased funding such centers. Alabama is the only state that does not provide legal assistance to death row prisoners; EJI has committed to representing them.

Stevenson converted his operation in Montgomery by founding a non-profit, the Equal Justice Initiative.

In 1995 he was awarded a MacArthur fellowship, and he applied all of the money to support the EJI. The EJI “guarantees legal representation to every inmate on the state’s death row.” It has worked to eliminate excessive and unfair sentencing, exonerate innocent death row prisoners, confront abuse of the incarcerated and the mentally ill, and aid children prosecuted as adults.

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8

9

CURRENTLY

2,366 EXONERATIONS MORE THAN

20,735 YEARS LOST Equal Justice Initiative challenges cases in which a person was wrongly convicted of a crime and later cleared of all the charges based on new evidence of innocence. Exonerations continue to expose as junk science a number of forensic techniques—such as hair microscopy, bite mark comparisons, firearm tool mark analysis, and shoe print comparisons—that have never been scientifically evaluated or validated. Negligent or corrupt forensic laboratories have been exposed for improperly conducting tests, inaccurately conveying results in trial testimony, and fabricating results.

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From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration Located on the site of a former warehouse where black people were enslaved in Montgomery, Alabama, this narrative museum uses interactive media, sculpture, videography, and exhibits to immerse visitors in the sights and sounds of the domestic slave trade, racial terrorism, the Jim Crow South, and the world’s largest prison system. Compelling visuals and data-rich exhibits provide a one of-a-kind opportunity to investigate America’s history of racial injustice and its legacy—to draw dynamic connections across generations of Americans impacted by the tragic history of racial inequality.

Relying on previously undisclosed first-person accounts of the domestic slave trade, EJI’s critically acclaimed reports, films, on line experience, exhibit on lynching, and recently composed content on segregation, this museum explores the history of racial inequality and its relationship to a range of contemporary issues from mass incarceration to police violence.

The new, interactive museum employs unique technology to dramatize the enslavement of African Americans and the evolution of racial terror lynchings, legalized racial segregation, and racial hierarchy in America.

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“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere�

Martin Luther King, Jr.

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RE-ENTRY

Post–Release Education and Preparation (PREP) Program More than half a million people are released from prison every year in the United States, with virtually no support for the inherent challenges of re-entering society, including stringent parole conditions, exploitative fees charged by private supervision companies, obstacles to employment and business opportunities, and the denial of voting rights.

Ten years ago, EJI started a re-entry program that provides support and services for clients when they are released from prison, including help getting driver’s licenses, finding places to live, and applying for jobs. We assist clients in obtaining transportation that allows them to maintain employment, dealing with changes in technology during their incarceration, and managing finances. We also provide therapy and counseling for clients to help them cope with the trauma of incarceration and to ease the transition from prison.

EJI’s Post-Release Education and Preparation (PREP) program is a long-term supervised release program concentrating on the unique needs of people who entered prison before they were 16 years old. PREP provides employment, daily supervision, counseling from licensed mental health professionals, and educational programming for clients who entered prison as children.

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Former clients Ian Manuel, Anthony Ray Hinton, Kuntrell Jackson, and Jacob Warner all now work with EJI.

EJI re-entry program provides support and services for clients when they are released from prison, including help getting driver’s licenses, finding places to live, and applying for jobs.

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CASE 01

“THE REFUSAL OF STAT E 01 PROSECUTORS TO RE-EXAMINE THIS CASE DESPITE PERSUASIVE

AND RELIABLE EVIDENCE OF INNOCENCE IS DISAPPOINTING AND TROUBLING.”

Bryan Stevenson

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VICTIM 01

SHINE Exonerated After 30 Years on Death Row

Anthony Ray Hinton Convicted 1986 Exonerated April 3, 2015 Sentence Death Row Race Black Sex Male

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Anthony Ray Hinton walked out of the Jefferson County Jail a free man for the first time in 30 years at 9:30 a.m. on Friday, April 3, 2015. “The sun does shine,” he said as he was embraced by family and friends. Mr. Hinton spent 30 years on death row for a crime he did not commit.

One of the longest serving death row prisoners in Alabama history and among the longest serving condemned prisoners to be freed after presenting evidence of innocence, Mr. Hinton is the 152nd person exonerated from death row since 1983. Thirty years ago, Mr. Hinton was arrested and charged with two capital murders based solely on the assertion that a revolver taken from his mother’s home was the gun used in both murders and in a third uncharged crime.

“To take thirty years of my life, that’s not right. That’s not justice.

I would like to ask the world, where is my justice?”

After thirty years in custody for crimes he did not commit, Mr. Hinton’s release is bittersweet.

“We are thrilled that Mr. Hinton will finally be released because he has unnecessarily spent years on Alabama’s death row when evidence of his innocence was clearly presented,” said his lead attorney, Bryan Stevenson.

“The refusal of state prosecutors to re-examine this case despite persuasive and reliable evidence of innocence is disappointing and troubling.”

After 12 more years of litigation, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the lower courts, and a new trial was granted. The judge finally dismissed the charges after prosecutors said that scientists at the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences tested the evidence and confirmed that the crime bullets cannot be matched to the Hinton weapon.

EJI attorneys engaged three of the nation’s top firearms examiners who testified in 2002 that the revolver could not be matched to crime evidence. State prosecutors never questioned the new findings but nonetheless refused to re–examine the case or concede error.

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“I would have been executed despite my innocence�

Contribution Factors Mistaken Witness ID, False or Misleading Forensic Evidence, Inadequate Legal Defense

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REPORT In 1985, two Birmingham area fast-food restaurants were robbed and the managers, John Davidson and Thomas Wayne Vason, were fatally shot. There were no eyewitnesses or fingerprint evidence; police had no suspects and pressure to solve the murders grew as similar crimes continued.

On July 25, 1985, a restaurant in Bessemer was robbed and the manager was shot but not seriously wounded.

Anthony Hinton was arrested after the manager identified him from a photo lineup, even though he was working in a locked warehouse fifteen miles away at the time of the crime.

Police seized an old revolver belonging to Mr. Hinton’s mother, and state firearm examiners said that was the gun used in all three crimes. The prosecutor—who had a documented history of racial bias and said he could tell Mr. Hinton was guilty and “evil” solely from his appearance— told the court that the State’s experts’ asserted match between Mrs. Hinton’s gun and the bullets from all three crimes was the only evidence linking Mr. Hinton to the Davidson and Vason murders.

Anthony Hinton, 29 years old with no history of violent crime, steadfastly maintained his innocence. A polygraph test given by police exonerated him, but the judge (nowretired Circuit Judge James Garrett) refused to admit it at trial.

Mr. Hinton was appointed a lawyer who mistakenly thought he could not get enough money to hire a qualified firearms examiner. Instead, he retained a visually-impaired civil engineer with no expertise in firearms identification who admitted he could not operate the machinery necessary to examine the evidence.

With no credible expert to challenge the State’s assertion of a match, Mr. Hinton was convicted and sentenced to death.

30 YEARS LOST 23

“RACE, POVERTY, INADEQUATE LEGAL ASSISTANCE, AND PROSECUTORIAL INDIFFERENCE TO INNOCENCE CONSPIRE TO CREATE A TEXTBOOK EXAMPLE OF INJUSTICE ”

01 In 2014, the United States Supreme Court unanimously overturned his conviction based on his attorney’s deficient representation, and Jefferson County Circuit Court Judge Laura Petro ordered a new trial.

The State’s evidence of a match was wholly discredited by three highly qualified firearms examiners, including the former chief of the FBI’s firearm and toolmarks unit, who testified in 2002 that the bullets from all three crimes could not be matched to a single gun at all, much less to Mrs. Hinton’s gun, and found that her gun could not have fired the bullets from the third uncharged robbery.

For more than fifteen years, attorneys with the Equal Justice Initiative repeatedly have asked state officials to re-examine the evidence in this case, but former Jefferson County District Attorney David Barber, and Attorneys General from Troy King to Luther Strange, all failed to do so.

“Race, poverty, inadequate legal assistance, and prosecutorial indifference to innocence conspired to create a textbook example of injustice,” Mr. Stevenson said.

“I can’t think of a case that more urgently dramatizes the need for reform than what has happened to Anthony Ray Hinton.”

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CASE 02

“WHEN AVAILABLE FORENSIC TESTING CAN PROVIDE IMMEDIATE RELIEF TO A WRONGLY CONVICTED INNOCENT PERSON IN PRISON, IT IS IRRESPONSIBLE TO FAIL TO ACT. WE CAN AND WE MUST DO BETTER.”

02

Bryan Stevenson

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Beniah Dandridge Convicted 1996 Exonerated September 30, 2015 Sentence Life Race White Sex Male

Contribution Factors

False or Misleading Forensic Accusation, Official Misconduct, Inadequate Legal Defense

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VICTIM 02

Faulty evidence, convicted for murder On May 5, 1995, Beniah Dandridge was charged with capital murder in the killing of Riley Manning Sr. in Montgomery, Alabama, based exclusively on the Alabama Bureau of Investigation's assertion that bloody fingerprints found at the crime scene matched Mr. Dandridge. No other physical evidence connected Mr. Dandridge to the crime.

Mr. Dandridge testified that he had nothing to do with the murder and presented evidence, corroborated by other witnesses, that he was elsewhere at the time of the crime.

The jury convicted him of the lesser offense of intentional murder, and he was sentenced to life in prison.

At trial, prosecutors relied on the ABI examiner’s testimony that the fingerprints definitely matched Mr. Dandridge. The only other evidence presented was the testimony of a jailhouse informant who, in exchange for a reduced sentence in a pending case, said Mr. Dandridge told him he was involved in the crime.

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REPORT On December 18, 1994, 71-year-old Riley Manning, Sr., was found beaten and strangled in his apartment in Montgomery, Alabama. The apartment had been ransacked and his truck, checkbook and several hundred dollars in cash were missing.

The victim was found by his son, Riley Manning, Jr., who checked for a pulse and then called police. Riley Jr., later told Montgomery police that he got blood on three of the fingers on his left hand when he checked his father’s pulse. Police found bloody fingerprints at the scene, but never compared them to Riley, Jr.’s fingerprints.

Riley, Jr. told police that his father recently had allowed a transient named David Suddeth to live with him. Police identified Suddeth’s girlfriend and the FBI surreptitiously placed a wiretap on her telephone. Suddeth soon called his girlfriend and admitted that he had beaten and robbed Manning, acting alone.

Before police located Suddeth, they also zeroed in on 29-year-old Beniah Alton Dandridge, who had worked for Manning and who allegedly was seen in a bar with a large amount of cash after the murder. Police requested that the Alabama Bureau of Investigation (“ABI”) compare Dandridge’s fingerprints to the prints found at the scene.

allowed to store his boat on Manning’s property. Based solely on the fingerprint comparison, Dandridge was charged with capital murder, murder during a robbery and burglary.

By that time, police had arrested Suddeth in Florida where he admitted to the crime and said he acted alone.

When both men were brought to court for their initial appearance, Montgomery County District Court Judge Lynn Bright asked Suddeth if he understood why he was there. Suddeth said he did understand, but pointed to Dandridge and said, “I do not understand what he’s doing here. He did not have anything to do with it.”

By happenstance, not long after that, Dandridge’s defense attorney ran into Suddeth in the jail and told Suddeth that Dandridge was going to be released because police believed that Suddeth acted alone.

Apparently out of pique, Suddeth then reached out to police and said, for the first time, that he and Dandridge committed the crime together.

On December 20, 1994, after the ABI said the prints at the scene belonged to Dandridge, he was brought in for questioning. Dandridge was upset by Manning’s death but denied any knowledge of the crime. Dandridge said that he worked as painter for Manning and visited Manning’s home often. Dandridge said that he was

31

TRIAL Dandridge went to trial in Montgomery County District Court in March 1996. Carol Curlee, a latent print examiner with the Alabama Bureau of Investigation, testified that she compared two fingerprints from the crime scene to Dandridge’s fingerprints and found 14 points of similarity in one print and nine points of similarity in the other—nine being the minimum standard required by ABI to make an identification.

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The prosecutor asked Curlee, “In your research that you’ve done, of all people on earth, does (sic) any two people have the same fingerprint?”

Dandridge’s attorney objected on the ground that Curlee could not have researched everyone on earth, but the trial judge overruled the objection.

Curlee replied, “I’ve been in the field of fingerprints for 25 years and I’ve looked at millions and millions of prints. We also have training, which a lot of it does come from the FBI and there’s probably two hundred million fingerprints on file with them. I think we’re housing possibly about a million and a half and to date, no one has ever found two fingerprints of any individual to be the same”.

20 YEARS LOST Dandridge testif ied in his own defense and denied involvement in the crime.

He said he was on a date with Debbie Williams at the time and that afterward he went home where he lived with his sister, Catherine. Both women testified and corroborated Dandridge.

During closing arguments, the prosecutor referred to the defense fingerprint expert as a “prostitute” and made more than 100 references to fingerprints, ending his argument saying, “If you believe those are his fingerprints, then this case is over, and your verdict should be guilty.”

The prosecution also called a jail inmate, Jimmy Hill, who testified that Dandridge confessed to being involved in the crime. Hill told the jury he had not been promised any leniency by the prosecution or police.

On March 13, 1996, the jury convicted Dandridge of all counts and he was sentenced to life in prison. Suddeth pled guilty to capital murder and was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

On cross-examination, Hill admitted that he had prior convictions for 23 different felony crimes and that he was facing a life sentence on a pending charge of first-degree theft, but denied he had any deal. In fact, his case file—which Dandridge’s attorney failed to examine—showed that Hill’s attorney had spoken to the prosecution and Hill already pled guilty to the theft charge and was placed on probation.

In 1998, Suddeth and Hill recanted their prior statements. Suddeth told Dandridge’s attorney that he acted alone and that Dandridge was not involved. Hill admitted that he had lied about Dandridge confessing and had also lied when he said there was no deal with the prosecution.

Mervin Smith, a retired FBI fingerprint examiner testified for the defense that he examined the fingerprints found at the scene and said that the prints were not made by Dandridge.

A motion for new trial based on the recantations was denied. For more than a decade, Dandridge’s attempts to overturn his conviction—both in state and federal courts— were denied. Eventually, he sought the help from the Equal Justice Initiative.

33

02 EJI took on Mr. Dandridge’s case and filed a new challenge to his conviction in November 2014. In those proceedings, EJI presented evidence from independent forensic experts who testified that their examination of the fingerprint evidence conclusively excluded Mr. Dandridge. The ABI’s examiner had used unreliable procedures to compare the fingerprints and had ignored obvious differences that clearly showed the prints did not belong to Mr. Dandridge. Excluding Mr. Dandridge, the experts found that the fingerprints instead matched the victim’s son, eliminating the State’s most significant evidence against Mr. Dandridge.

Earlier in the week of Mr. Dandridge’s release, the ABI acknowledged its examiner’s error. The Montgomery County District Attorney asked Circuit Court Judge Truman Hobbs to order Mr. Dandridge’s release, and the judge ordered Kilby Prison to release him immediately.

Mr. Dandridge walked out of prison, greeted by loved ones and EJI attorneys.

35

“We have a system of justice in this country that treats you much better if you’re rich and guilty than if you’re poor and innocent. Wealth, not culpability, shapes outcome .”

Bryan Stevenson Executive Director

CASE 03

“OUR CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM 03 TREATS YOU BETTER IF YOU ARE RICH AND GUILTY THAN IF YOU ARE POOR AND INNOCENT .”

Bryan Stevenson

39

VICTIM 03

IS CLEAR A story of race and justice Walter McMillian Convicted 1988 Exonerated March 2,1993 Sentence Death Row Race Black Sex Male

Walter McMillian walked out of a courtroom a free man after prosecutors conceded that he had spent six years on Alabama's Death Row because of perjured testimony and evidence withheld from his lawyers. Whether he was also put there for being a black man who violated the racial and sexual taboos of the smalltown South is only one of the issues swirling around a case that has evoked not only distinctly Southern but also far broader questions of race and justice.

Contribution Factors

Perjury or False Accusation, Official Misconduct

40

Mr. McMillian might have been another forgotten black inmate in an Alabama Prison.

Almost everything about Mr.McMillan’s conviction But Judge Key overruled the jury and condemned Mr. in 1988 for the shooting death of an 18-year-old white McMillian to die in the electric chair. Because of the female store cleck now seems extraordinary. From the death sentence, Mr. McMillian’s case was vigorously start, the case was enveloped in a volatile mixture of race appealed, and eventually overturned. and sex stemming from McMillian’s involvement with a “I think everybody needs to understand what happened white woman. Mr. McMillian, who is 46 years old, was because what happened today could happen tomorrow locked up on Death Row even before he was tried. if we don’t learn some lessons from this,” said his lawyer, The state built a case on suspect testimony and withheld Bryan Stevenson. “It was too easy for one person to crucial evidence that called that testimony into question. come into court and frame a man for a murder he didn’t In the end, it was a decision by the trial judge, Robert E. commit. It was too easy for the state to convict someone Lee Key Jr., to treat Mr. McMillian as harshly as possible, for that crime and then have him sentenced to death. And that allowed Mr. McMillian to win his freedom. If the it was too hard in light of the evidence of his innocence jury’s sentence of life in prison without parole had been to show this court that he should never have been here left in place, Mr. McMillian might have been another in the first place”. forgotten black inmate in an Alabama prison.

41

McMillian was convicted after a one-and-ahalf-day trial on the testimony of three witnesses.

42

REPORT McMillian’s case, which was given national attention, played out in Monroeville, Alabama, best known as the home of the Harper Lee, whose “To Kill a Mockingbird,” told a painful story of race and justice in the small-town Jim Crow South.

To many of his defenders, Mr. McMillian’s conviction for the killing seemed like an updated version of the book, in which a black man was accused of raping a white woman.

There were no immediate suspects after Ronda Morrison was murdered on the morning of Nov. 1, 1986, in a drycleaning store. Eight months later the police, arrested Ralph Myers, a 30-year-old with a long criminal record, in connection with another killing in nearby Escambia County. After a week of interrogation by the police, Mr. Myers accused Mr. McMillian, a pulpwood worker, as Ms. Morriso’s killer. Mr. McMillian was arrested, and in an extraordinary move, was immediately sent to Alabama's Death Row, in Holman State Prison, Atmore, which is usually reserved for convicted murderers awaiting execution. Judge Key, for two decades the local circuit court judge, moved the trial from Monroe County, which is 40 percent black, to Baldwin County, which is only 13 percent black.

McMillian was convicted after a one-and-a-half-day trial on the testimony of three witnesses. Mr. Myers testified that McMillian asked him for a ride to the cleaning store.

There, Mr. Myers said, he witnessed the murder. Another criminal suspect testified that he saw McMillian’s “low rider” truck near the cleaner’s, and a third man implicated McMillian.

McMillian’s lawyer called a dozen witnesses, who all testified he was at home the day of the murder taking part in a fish fry. But despite that testimony and the lack of physical evidence, he was found guilty. Judge Key, citing the “vicious and brutal killing of a young lady in the first full flower of adulthood” changed the life sentence to death, as allowed under Alabama law.

McMillian, who had two jobs and no criminal record other than a misdemeanor charge stemming a barroom fight, did not have a history of violence, but he was well known in town for something else. Mr. McMillian, who is married with three children from his current marriage and has nine children altogether, was dating a white woman named Karen Kelly. And one of his sons had married a white woman.

6 YEARS LOST 43

ROOTS OF SUSPICION Both Mr. McMillian and his lawyer at the original trial, J. L. Chestnut, contended that Mr. McMillian’s relationships along had made him a suspect. “The only reason I’m here is because I had been messing around with a white lady and my son married a white lady,” he said in a prison interview.

After turning down four appeals, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals threw out Mr. McMillian’s conviction from 5 to 0.

Monroe County District Attorney, Tommy Chapman, who did not prosecute the original case, joined the defense in seeking to have the charges dismissed. But he contended there was no deliberate effort to frame Mr. McMillian.

Whatever the reason, inquiries by Mr. Stevenson and by Alabama Bureau of Investigation agents have since discredited every element of the prosecutions “It just mushroomed into a horrible mistake,” he said case. All three prosecution witnesses have recanted in an interview. “I don’t want to call it that. A horrible their testimony. incident.” He contended that Mr. McMillian’s release Mr. Myers has said that law officers prodded him into proved the system worked. Neither he nor Circuit accusing Mr. McMillian. What’s more, Mr. Stevenson’s Court Judge Pamela W. Baschab offered any apology or investigation turned up Mr. Myers’s first response to the comment on the case at the 10-minute hearing. inquiries by the police about Mr. McMillian, in which he said he had no knowledge of Mr. McMillian’s involvement in the crime. Mr. Stevenson also turned up statements But Mr. Stevenson said the case was a reminder from the time of the trial in which four doctors at a how flawed the justice system could be. forensic hospital said Mr. Myers told them he was being Since the case was resolved in the state courts, Mr. pressured by law officers to lie about Mr. McMillian.

McMillian’s case was not affected by recent decisions None of that material was turned over to the defense limiting appellants’ access to the Federal courts. at the time, as required. Finally, the lawyer found that Mr. McMillian’s truck was not turned into the low rider identified by his accusers until well after the murder.

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“The only reason I’m here is because I had been messing around with a white lady and my son married a white lady.”

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“I feel like a bird, I feel like a bird”

Mr. Stevenson, who handles death row cases for the Alabama Capital Representation Resource Center in Montgomery, said only the death sentence had allowed Mr. McMillian to receive adequate representation. And this case was unusual because the state’s case proved not flimsy, but nonexistent, he said. Innocence Is Clear.

“The fortunate thing about Mr. McMillian’s case is his innocence was demonstrable,” he said. “It’s clear he had nothing to do with this crime. There are other folks in prison who don’t have the money or the resources or the good fortune to have folks come in and help them.” He said he would examine possible legal action on Mr. McMillian’s behalf.

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03 Mr. McMillian, who appeared in court in a dark three-piece suit instead of the prison whites he has worn for six years, listened impassively as the charges were thrown out, then smiled and hugged his lawyers, Mr. Stevenson and Bernard Harcourt, before being greeted by throngs of family members and well-wishers who overflowed the courtroom and waited in the halls. Outside they unfurled a makeshift banner, using his nickname, that read, “Welcome Home Johnnie D. God Never Fails.”

Mr. McMillian said he had always expected this day to come, but when asked if the decision restored his faith in the judicial system he said: “No. Not at all.” The overwhelming support was very emotional and joyous for both of them, to the point where McMillian flaps his arms and chants “I feel like a bird, I feel like a bird.”

Mr. Stevenson added: “We told the court when we were here a year ago that truth crushed to earth shall rise again. It doesn’t necessarily mean we believe in the judicial system.”

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UNTIL PROVEN INNOCENT EXONERATIONS BY CONTRIBUTING FACTOR Wrongful convictions have been found to result from erroneous eyewitness identifications, false and coerced confessions, misconduct by police and prosecutors, false or misleading forensic evidence, and perjury by witnesses who are promised lenient treatment or other incentives in exchange for their testimony.

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A shocking rate error has emerged:

for every 09 people

executed in this country,

01 innocent person has been exonerated.

FINANCIAL STATEMENTS

51

STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL POSITION

UNRESTRICTED

TEMPORARILY RESTRICTED

TOTAL

ASSETS Cash and cash equivalents

$

Grant receivable Accounts receivable Due from (to) other funds Inventory

10,871,399

$

11,624,176

$

22,495,575

2,443,397

-

2,443,397

159,142

-

159,142

11,624,176

(11,624,176)

-

390,917

-

390,917

Investments

21,609

-

21,609

Prepaid expenses

71,634

-

71,634

TOTAL CURRENT ASSETS

$

Restricted cash and cash equivalents

25,582,274

-

-

15,137,833

$

25,582,274 15,137,833

Certificates of deposits

607,368

-

607,368

Grants receivable, net

951,342

-

951,342

Construction in process – Museum

5,238,077

-

5,238,077

Construction in process – Memorial

8,686,476

-

8,686,476

465,519

-

465,519

1,446,522

-

1,446,522

Construction in process – Memorial Center Property and equipment, net TOTAL ASSETS

$

42,977,578

$

15,137,833

$

58,115,411

LIABILITIES AND NET ASSETS Current liabilities Accounts payable

1,047,780

-

1,047,780

Accrued liabilities

16,973

-

16,973

1,064,753

-

1,064,753

41,912,825

15,137,833

57,050,658

TOTAL CURRENT LIABILITIES Net assets TOTAL LIABILITIES AND NET ASSETS

52

$

42,977,578

$

15,137,833

$

58,115,411

STATEMENT OF ACTIVITIES

UNRESTRICTED

TEMPORARILY RESTRICTED

TOTAL

REVENUE AND OTHER SUPPORT Contribution

$

Grants Service income Investment return Settlement Other income TOTAL REVENUES AND OTHER SUPPORT

$

11,922,117

$

16,536,077

$

28,458,194

4,808,723

5,028,106

9,836,829

683,433

140,000

823,433

99,318

211,359

310,677

342,253

-

342,253

85,819

-

85,819

9,622,156

(9,622,156)

-

27,563,819

$

12,293,386

$

39,857,205

EXPENSES Contract labor

117,999

-

117,999

Depreciation expense

173,339

-

173,339

Dues and subscriptions

94,892

-

94,892

Employee benefits

528,600

-

528,600

Experts

293,047

-

293,047

1,908

-

1,908

Payroll taxes

214,839

-

214,839

Printing, postage, publishing and media

Miscellaneous

577,197

-

577,197

Re-entry and client support

90,072

-

90,072

Reimbursed expenses

78,830

-

78,830

Rental expense

34,292

-

34,269

Repairs, maintenance and renovation

56,572

-

56,572 2,795,728

Salaries and payroll expenses

2,795,728

-

Supplies

46,181

-

46,181

Training

318,863

-

318,863

Travel

308,269

-

308,269

Utilities, telephones and communication

185,563

-

185,563

5,916,168

-

Increase in net assets

21,647,651

12,293,386

33,941,037

Net assets, beginning of year

20,265,174

2,844,447

23,109,621

TOTAL EXPENSES

NET ASSETS, END OF YEAR

$

$

41,912,825

$

15,137,833

$

$

5,916,168

57,050,658

53

STAFF & BOARD

55

MR. STEVENSON AND HIS STAFF HAVE WON REVERSAL, RELIEF OR RELEASE FOR OVER 125 WRONGLY CONDEMNED PRISONERS ON DEATH ROW.

OUR STAFF BRYAN STEVENSON Executive Director

ESTELLE HEBRON-JONES Staff Attorney

ANDREA MARTIN Development Manager

EVA ANSLEY Operations Director

MICKEY HUBBARD Staff Attorney

LORI TAYLOR Executive Assistant

RANDY SUSSKIND Deputy Director

RACHEL JUDGE Staff Attorney

RAMONA THORNTON Staff Assistant

ALICIA D’ADDARIO Senior Attorney JACQUELINE JONES-PEACE Senior Attorney CHARLOTTE MORRISON Senior Attorney SIA SANNEH Senior Attorney ANGIE SETZER Senior Attorney AARYN URELL Senior Attorney MARIA MORRISON Senior Social Worker CATHLEEN PRICE Cooperating Senior Attorney DEBORAH LEFF Senior Social Worker ANTHONY RAY HINTON Community Educator RYAN BECKER Staff Attorney STEPHEN CHU Staff Attorney JOHN DALTON Staff Attorney CLAUDIA FLORES Staff Attorney

ALISON MOLLMAN Staff Attorney BENJAMIN SCHAEFER Staff Attorney JEANNE SEGIL Staff Attorney JENNIFER TAYLOR Staff Attorney KIARA BOONE Deputy Program Manager JOSH CANNON Deputy Program Manager CATHERINE COLEMAN-FLOWERS Rural Development Manager MAKI SOMOSOT Communications Manager LYNDA BLACK Staff Assistant RENEE CLEVELAND Staff Assistant SHERRY HILL Staff Assistant IVAN HUGLEY Facilities PAIGE LINDSEY Staff Assistant

JAMES WARREN Executive Assistant MARY WOODS Staff Assistant MADELINE BAILEY Law Fellow BROOKS EMANUEL Law Fellow MARK FELDMAN Law Fellow TERRON FERGUSON Law Fellow LUKE FREDERICKS Law Fellow JONATHAN NOMAMIUKOR Law Fellow EVAN MILLIGAN Law Fellow ERIC BROWN Justice Fellow KORBIN FELDER Justice Fellow JONATHAN KUBAKUNDIMANIA Program Assistant AIWANG RADING Justice Fellow

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EJI’S BOARD OF DIRECTORS JEROME GRAY Chairman of the Board Evergreen, Alabama

MARTHA MORGAN University of Alabama School of Law Tuscaloosa, Alabama

EVA ANSLEY Secretary/Treasurer

BRYAN STEVENSON Senior Attorney Montgomery, Alabama

OPHELIA DAHL Boston, Massachusetts SCOTT DOUGLAS Executive Director Greater Birmingham Ministries Birmingham, Alabama DR. PAUL FARMER Partners in Health Boston, Massachusetts RANDY HERTZ NYU Clinical Law Center New York, New York

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KIM-TAYLOR-THOM NYU Taylor of Law New York, New York KATY VINCENT Montgomery, Alabama CARLOS WILLIAMS Executive Director Federal Defenders, Southern District Mobile, Alabama

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EQUAL JUSTICE INITIATIVE WILL CONTINUE TO REFORM THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM AND REDUCE, IF NOT ELIMINATE THESE TRAGIC ERRORS IN THE FUTURE.

EQUAL JUSTICE INITIATIVE 122 Commerce Street Montgomery, Alabama 36104 334-269-1803 www.eji.org EJI is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization