John ,

Today, our friends at the National Registry of Exonerations released a report about race and wrongful convictions in the United States.

The report confirms the inherent racism within our criminal legal system and shows some alarming and persistent racial disparities when it comes to wrongful convictions. For example, the report found that while Black people represent 13.6% of the American population, they account for a staggering 53% of 3,200 exonerations in the Registry as of August 2022.

Please take a moment to read through some of the report’s biggest takeaways, and share its findings with your network on social media: [[link removed]]

The report also found that innocent Black people in the U.S. are seven times more likely than white people to be falsely convicted of serious crimes, and 19 times more likely to be wrongly convicted of drug crimes — even though data shows that white and Black Americans use illegal drugs at similar rates.

Unlike murder and rape, hardly any drug crime investigations originate with reported crimes. The truth is, racial profiling plays a major role in these arrests. Police officers exercise virtually unlimited discretion to choose who to investigate, search, and arrest for drugs, and they are more likely to stop and search Black and Latinx people, leading to many wrongful convictions.

Here at the Innocence Project, our work is all about freeing innocent people and transforming the criminal legal system that put them there in the first place — that means confronting and fighting against the racism that permeates every part of the system.

The data in this report only reaffirms just how critical this work is and the urgent need to create fair, compassionate, and equitable systems of justice for everyone.

Check out the National Registry of Exonerations’ report right now and share what you learn from it with your friends and family on social media: [[link removed]]

Thank you so much for your support,

— The Innocence Project Team


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The Innocence Project works to free the innocent, prevent wrongful convictions, and create fair, compassionate, and equitable systems of justice for everyone. Founded in 1992 by Barry C. Scheck and Peter J. Neufeld at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University, the organization is now an independent nonprofit. Our work is guided by science and grounded in antiracism.

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