Bryan Stevenson

Laureate Profile

Bryan Stevenson is founder and executive director of Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), which represents indigent defendants, death row inmates, and juveniles who have been denied fair and just treatment in the legal system. A graduate of Harvard Law School and the Kennedy School of Government, Stevenson is a tireless advocate on behalf of minority defendants and prisoners whose trials are marked by racial bias or prosecutorial misconduct. As staff attorney for the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta and executive director of the Alabama Capital Representation Resource Center, he represented capital defendants. He has helped secure reversals or reductions in more than 75 death penalty cases and provided training and consulting to counsel representing death row inmates. Stevenson has received numerous awards and consistently been recognized as one of America’s 100 most influential lawyers.