John —

Today marks the start of Latinx Heritage Month, and we wanted to highlight some of the unique struggles that Latinx people face when it comes to our criminal legal system. Things like language barriers, immigration status, and racial bias can uniquely impact Latinx people in our criminal legal system.

As our client Rosa Jimenez said as she remained incarcerated for more than a year after her conviction was overturned, “Nothing has happened, because I’m not rich, I’m not white — I’m an immigrant, I’m nothing, I feel like I don’t have a voice.”

Rosa was finally freed after 18 years but she was robbed of the chance to raise her own children with whom she was reunited in January. And not speaking English at the time of her arrest made her fight for justice even more challenging.

Take a moment today to read some of the stories of our remarkable Innocence Project clients and learn why Latinx people can be especially vulnerable to wrongful convictions.

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Almost 30% of Hispanic people in the U.S. do not consider themselves proficient in English, according to a Pew Research poll. At trial, interpreters are provided, but an interpreter is not constitutionally guaranteed during a law enforcement interrogation. Often, if a translator is provided during interrogation, it’s an officer who happens to speak the language, not a trained interpreter.

At the time of Rosa’s arrest, she did not speak much English. The officer conducting the interrogation, Eric de los Santos, was allegedly bilingual but Rosa said he could hardly speak Spanish and that she couldn’t understand most of what he was saying. She thought she was just being brought in to help, she had no idea that they were interrogating her as a suspect.

And for those who are not U.S. citizens, even after innocence is established and a conviction is overturned, Latinx immigrant exonerees can still face deportation or other immigration issues. For them, despite years of wrongful imprisonment, their fight with the legal system continues.

We’re fighting every day to create a more just and fair legal system and to end the systemic racism that too often pervades it, and we’re so glad that people like you are by our side.

Read more today about how our criminal legal system uniquely impacts the Latinx community, and then share this article with your friends and family on social media:

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Thank you for your support,

— The Innocence Project Team

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Started in 1992 as a legal clinic at Cardozo School of Law, the Innocence Project is now an independent nonprofit, affiliated with Cardozo, that exonerates the wrongly convicted through DNA testing and reforms the criminal justice system to prevent future injustice.

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