Promise of Justice Initiative and Community Leaders Applaud Orleans Parish DA Jason Williams’ Move to Address the Injustice of Jim Crow Jury Convictions
NEW ORLEANS – The Promise of Justice Initiative (PJI) joined with community leaders today in support of Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams’ announcement that his office has taken the first step to fulfill the promise he made to the community to overturn the unjust convictions for people serving time due to Jim Crow juries in Orleans Parish, consistent with the Supreme Court’s ruling in Ramos v. Louisiana.
“Imprisoning people convicted by Jim Crow juries erodes faith in our criminal legal system and inflicts devastating harm on families and communities, so we’re pleased that DA Williams is staying true to his commitment during his campaign and giving people imprisoned by this unconstitutional practice a long-overdue chance at justice,” said Jamila Johnson, Managing Attorney for PJI’s Jim Crow Juries Project. “Non-unanimous jury convictions are a relic of Jim Crow prohibited in 48 other states, and were ruled unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in April 2020. We welcome the district attorney’s actions as a positive first step toward restoring justice to the more than 1,500 Louisianans who remain incarcerated due to this racist and unjust practice.”
"Just like we worked to remove Confederate monuments, we must remove the legacies of the Confederacy and Jim Crow that remain in our laws and in our courts," said Mitch Landrieu, former New Orleans mayor and founder and president of E Pluribus Unum. "For more than 120 years, Louisiana's split jury system served as a shameful legacy of Jim Crow, marginalizing Black jurors and denying many innocent people a fair day in court. Generations of families have been impacted by this miscarriage of justice. The voters spoke loud and clear about ending the Jim Crow split jury verdict. I applaud District Attorney Williams’ commitment to seeking justice for those in Orleans Parish who have been convicted by these non unanimous juries, along with the many community organizations and advocates who have led this effort for many years."
“As we right the wrongs of Jim Crow juries in Louisiana, we must center healing and we must uplift the needs of survivors,” said Katie Hunter-Lowrey, Crime Survivor Organizer for PJI. “Louisiana Survivors for Reform believes the voice of every survivor should be heard and that the focus of reform should be supporting all impacted individuals and communities, investment in crime prevention strategies, and restorative justice practices that are trauma-informed. While it is absolutely necessary to dismantle this intentionally racist practice of non-unanimous juries, it will have a huge impact on those who assumed the legal process was over. We invite survivors and victims’ loved ones to contact us and we invite city and state leaders to allocate more funding and resources directly to impacted communities.”
About the Jim Crow Juries Project
For more than 120 years, Louisiana was an outlier among states in allowing people to be convicted of serious offenses – and even spend their lives in prison – without the unanimous consent of a jury. Louisiana’s split-jury rule was devised by white supremacists at an 1898 Constitutional Convention whose express purpose was “to establish the supremacy of the white race in the state.”
The non-unanimous jury rule helped make Louisiana the state with the highest incarceration rater and the most wrongful convictions per capita in the Deep South.
On April 20, 2020, the Supreme Court ruled in Ramos v. Louisiana, that the Sixth Amendment right to a unanimous jury applies in both federal and state courts. But Louisiana continues to resist application of this constitutional promise to individuals whose convictions are final, forcing people serving long sentences due to non-unanimous verdicts – including life without the possibility of parole – to remain in prison.
Working in partnership with more than 60 pro bono law firms and more than 500 lawyers across the country, PJI’s Jim Crow Juries Project is a campaign to heal the wounds inflicted by Jim Crow juries and restore the promise of justice to the more than 1,500 Louisianans who are still in prison due to non-unanimous jury convictions.
Louisiana Survivors for Reform can be reached any time at lsr@defendla.org or at https://promiseofjustice.org/louisiana-survivors-for-reform. Survivors and victims’ families can call/text (504) 459-9347 or email OrleansJCJSurvivors@gmail.com to access services. There is no cost or residency requirement for these services, only that the trial resulting in a 10-2 or 11-1 conviction occurred in Orleans Parish.
CONTACT: Laura Swinford, laura@gpsimpact.com