CONVICTION

USA 2022 - DCP - 31 minutes, in English

Director: Jeremy Raff

Producer: Jeremy Young

Print Courtesy: 2nd Place Media

“I don’t want to be accepted, I want to be embraced,” says Brandon Jackson, who has just been released from 25 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. In 1997, Jackson was convicted for an armed robbery of $6,500 from an Applebee’s restaurant outside of Shreveport, Louisiana. Nobody was injured. There was no physical evidence connecting him to the crime. At trial, two jurors voted not guilty. In 48 states, it would have been a mistrial, and he may have walked free, but Louisiana’s Jim Crow-era laws designed to lock up Black defendants allowed for non-unanimous jury convictions. Jackson was sentenced to life in prison. Over time, he finds a sense of purpose advocating to reverse Louisiana’s last such law, as we see in this powerful documentary. —KE

Wednesday, July 12 6PM | MFC 1