After a year in the making, on March 22, 2022, Students for a Just Society as well as their co-sponsors were able to bring Anthony Ray Hinton virtually to our campus. Mr. Hinton moved us with his extremely motivational and inspirational words.
Mr. Hinton survived for 30 years on Alabama's death row for a crime he did not commit. In 1985, Mr. Hinton was convicted of the unsolved murders of two fast-food restaurant managers based on the testimony of ballistics experts for the State who claimed that the bullets at the crime scene came from a dusty revolver found in Mr. Hinton's mother’s closet. Meanwhile, the ballistics expert hired for Mr. Hinton’s defense team was blind in one eye and could not effectively challenge the State’s theory. An all-white jury, white judge, and white prosecutor convicted Mr. Hinton and sentenced him to death. Years later, three independent experts concluded that the bullets could not have been fired from his mother’s revolver.
With the assistance of the Equal Justice Initiative, led by attorney Bryan Stevenson, Mr. Hinton was freed in 2015. Since his release, Mr. Hinton has traveled the world sharing his story and discussing the changes that need to be made to prevent similar injustices from happening to other people.
Mr. Hinton came and spoke to the AU community last Tuesday and moved himself to tears as he shared his incredibly unjust story. Mr. Hinton was given a death sentence simply, “because I was born Black and poor in the state of Alabama.” And yet in the seven years since he was fully exonerated, no one in the state of Alabama has apologized to Mr. Hinton for this gross miscarriage of justice. Mr. Hinton spoke out against our unjust criminal justice, yet made a point in stating that we are not dealing with mass incarceration, but we are in fact dealing with a new form of slavery. He said the system isn’t broken, it is working exactly how it is supposed to be working. Mr. Hinton, with great sorrow, said that every man of color should be and needs to be afraid of the system. He finished the talk with an inspiring call to action. He told the AU community that in order to fight the death penalty people need to educate themselves, vote, and help elect new people into office. He said that nothing is more powerful than reading and learning about “this cocked system.” Mr. Hinton left us in awe with his journey and motivated us to take action.
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