Social Justice & Racism

The Innocence Project, founded in 1992 by Peter Neufeld and Barry Schanck at the Cardoza School of Law, works to exonerate wrongly convicted via DNA testing and works to reform the criminal justice system to prevent future injustices. As of Jan 2020, the Innocence Project documented 365 DNA exonerations in the US. Twenty one of these had previously been sentenced to death. Of all the cases taken on by the Innocence Project, about 43% of the clients have been proven innocent and 42 were proven guilty; the rest were inconclusive and not probative.

Visit the Innocence Project

The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), founded by Bryan Stevenson, is committed to ending mass incarceration and excessive punishment in the US. It challenges racial and economic injustice and protects basic human rights. In addition, it founded the Legacy Museum and National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama, a dream of Stevenson’s based on the memorials in South Africa for the victims of apartheid and the way Berlin memorializes its Holocaust victims.

Visit the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI)

Both sites offer action opportunities and both can be found on Facebook for ongoing information.