Equal Justice Initiative

EJI urges our supporters to contact our sister organization Partners in Health (PIH) which is coordinating emergency services for the victims of the hugely destructive earthquake that hit Haiti on January 12, 2010. PIH is on the ground in Haiti and is one of the most effective health care providers in impoverished settings in the world. PIH is already in Haiti leveraging the skills of more than 120 doctors and nearly 500 nurses and nursing assistants who work at its health clinic sites in Haiti. To help PIH respond to the crisis in Haiti, click here.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held on January 5, 2010, that Washington State's felon disenfranchisement law violates the Voting Rights Act because it results in minorities being denied access to the polls on account of their race.

The American Law Institute, comprised of 4000 judges, lawyers, and law professors who shape and help promote consistency in the law throughout the United States, recently disavowed the intellectual framework for the modern death penalty system.

On December 18, 2009, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals reversed David Riley's capital murder conviction and remanded his case for a new trial because the trial court allowed his jury to consider highly prejudicial evidence in an illegal manner.

The United States Supreme Court reaffirmed this week in a case from Florida, Porter v. McCollum, that a defense lawyer must conduct a reasonable investigation to uncover mitigating evidence in preparation for a capital trial.

EJI is working to assist people who have been forced into homelessness, denied critical medical care, and subjected to permanent imprisonment as a result of Alabama's Community Notification Act.

Nearly half of all children in the United States and 90% of African American children will rely on food stamps at some point during childhood, and fallout from the recession could push those numbers higher.

Dozens of community members participated in a discussion and book-signing by acclaimed actor, producer, and human rights activist Mike Farrell on October 9, 2009, at EJI.

The State of Alabama executed Max Payne by lethal injection yesterday at Holman Prison in Atmore, Alabama. Mr. Payne was the sixth person to be put to death in Alabama this year. Alabama has executed 44 people in the modern death penalty era.

Human rights work on behalf of Romani victims of discrimination and advocacy for poor people in the criminal justice system in the Deep South was the focus at today's Gruber Justice Prize award ceremony.