Bryan Stevenson facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Bryan Stevenson
Stevenson in 2012
Born	(1959-11-14) November 14, 1959 (age 65) Milton, Delaware, U.S.
Education	Eastern University (BA) Harvard University (JD, MPP)
Occupation	Director of Equal Justice Initiative Professor at New York University School of Law
Known for	Founding Equal Justice Initiative
Awards	National Humanities Medal (2021)

Bryan Stevenson (born November 14, 1959) is an American lawyer and activist. He teaches law at New York University School of Law. He also started and leads the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI).

From Montgomery, Alabama, he works to make the justice system fair. He especially helps poor people and minority groups, focusing on children. He helped the highest court in the U.S. decide important cases. These decisions stopped children under 18 from being sentenced to death. They also stopped children from getting life in prison without a chance to be released.

His book, Just Mercy, tells about his work. It was made into a movie in 2019. The book shares his story, including helping Walter McMillian. Walter was wrongly found guilty and faced the death penalty.

Stevenson also started the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery. This memorial honors over 4,000 African Americans who faced terrible mob violence in the South. He believes this history of violence affects how the justice system works today. A related place, The Legacy Museum, shows how slavery and past violence connect to today's high rates of people of color in prison.

Growing Up

Bryan Stevenson was born on November 14, 1959. He grew up in Milton, Delaware, a small town. His father, Howard Carlton Stevenson Sr., was from Milton. His mother, Alice Gertrude (Golden) Stevenson, grew up in Philadelphia. Her family had moved there from Virginia during the Great Migration. Bryan has an older brother, Howard Jr., and a sister, Christy.

Both parents traveled to work in the northern part of Delaware. His father worked at a food processing plant. His mother was an equal opportunity officer at Dover Air Force Base. She always told her children that education was very important.

Stevenson's family went to the Prospect African Methodist Episcopal Church. As a child, Bryan played piano and sang in the choir. The strong faith of his church influenced his later beliefs. He learned that people can always "stand up after having fallen down." This taught him that "each person in our society is more than the worst thing they've ever done."

As a child, Stevenson saw how segregation worked. He went to a "colored" elementary school at first. When he was in second grade, his school officially ended segregation. But the old rules still affected daily life. Black children played separately from white children. At the doctor's office, black families used the back door. White families used the front door. Pools and other places were still separated, even if not by law.

His father accepted the racism he had grown up with. But his mother openly disagreed with the unfair separation. Stevenson remembered how his mother protested one day. Black children had to wait for hours at the back door of the polio vaccination station. White children went in first.

Education and Learning

Stevenson went to Cape Henlopen High School and finished in 1978. He played soccer and baseball. He was also the president of the student body. He won public speaking contests. His brother, Howard, says he helped Bryan practice his speaking skills. They had serious arguments, which helped Bryan get better at talking.

Bryan earned top grades and won a scholarship. He went to Eastern University in St. Davids, Pennsylvania. There, he led the campus gospel choir. He graduated in 1981 with a degree in philosophy.

In 1985, Stevenson earned two more degrees from Harvard University. He got a law degree from Harvard Law School. He also earned a master's degree in Public Policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government. While in law school, he worked for the Southern Center for Human Rights. This group helped people on death row in the South. This work showed Stevenson what he wanted to do with his life.

His Important Work

Southern Center for Human Rights

After finishing Harvard in 1985, Stevenson moved to Atlanta. He joined the Southern Center for Human Rights full-time. He was given the job of helping people in Alabama. In 1989, he was put in charge of the Alabama office. This office helped people facing the death penalty. It was funded by the government.

Equal Justice Initiative

Later, the U.S. government stopped funding groups that helped people facing the death penalty. So, Stevenson started his own non-profit group. He called it the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) in Montgomery. In 1995, he received a special grant called a MacArthur Fellowship. He used all the money to support EJI.

He promised to defend anyone in Alabama sentenced to the death penalty. Alabama was the only state that did not provide lawyers for people on death row. It also had the highest rate of death penalty sentences.

One of EJI's first big cases was helping Walter McMillian. Walter had been sent to death row before even being found guilty of murder. Stevenson proved that the prosecution's case was wrong. Walter was then freed from jail in 1993.

Stevenson has been very concerned about harsh sentences for children. He helps young people who committed crimes when they were under 18. In 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unfair for people under 18. Stevenson worked to expand this idea to other cases involving children.

EJI started a legal effort to review cases where children were sentenced to life in prison without parole. This included cases where no one was killed. In 2012, the Supreme Court made a big decision. They ruled that it was unconstitutional to automatically sentence children under 18 to life without parole. This decision changed laws in 29 states. In 2016, the court said this rule must apply to older cases too. This could affect sentences for 2,300 people who were children when they were sentenced.

By 2022, EJI had helped over 130 people avoid the death penalty. They also help poor people and work to fix unfairness in the justice system.

Remembering History

The EJI offices are near a place where enslaved people were brought off boats. Nearby is Court Square, a major site for selling enslaved people. Stevenson noticed that downtown Montgomery had many signs about Confederate history. But there was nothing about the history of slavery. Slavery was the basis of wealth in the South.

He suggested putting up historical markers at three slavery sites. The state history department said they didn't want to because it might cause arguments. Stevenson worked with an African-American history group. This group got state approval for the markers in 2013. They are now in Montgomery.

National Memorial for Peace and Justice

Stevenson bought land in Montgomery for a new project. It is called the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. It remembers almost 4,000 people who faced mob violence in the South. This violence happened from 1877 to 1950. Stevenson believes this history of violence is linked to today's high rates of death sentences. He also thinks it connects to the high number of minority people in prison across the country. The memorial opened in April 2018.

Next to the Memorial is The Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration. It also opened in April 2018. This museum is in a building that was once a slave warehouse. It has exhibits about mob violence, racial separation, and mass imprisonment today. Stevenson shows how the treatment of people of color in the justice system is connected to the history of slavery.

Author and Speaker

Stevenson wrote a well-known book called Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption. It was published in 2014. Time magazine called it one of the "10 Best Books of Nonfiction" for 2014. The New York Times also listed it as a "100 Notable Book." It won several awards. A movie based on the book, Just Mercy, came out in 2019. Michael B. Jordan played Stevenson in the film.

Stevenson often gives public speeches. Many of these talks help raise money for EJI's work. His speech at TED2012 became very popular online. After his talk, people at the conference gave over $1 million. This money helped fund a campaign to stop putting children in adult jails and prisons. By April 2020, his talk had been watched over 6.5 million times.

He has also given many graduation speeches and received special honorary degrees from universities.

Awards and Honors

Bryan Stevenson has received many awards for his work:

• 1991 ACLU National Medal of Liberty
• 1995 MacArthur Fellow
• 2000 Olof Palme Prize
• 2009 Gruber Prize for Justice
• 2011 Four Freedoms Award in Freedom From Fear
• 2015 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction
• 2015 Dayton Literary Peace Prize for Nonfiction
• 2015 Time 100: The 100 Most Influential People
• 2017 The Stowe Prize for Writing to Advance Social Justice
• 2018 People's Champion Award from the 44th People's Choice Awards
• 2018 Benjamin Franklin Award
• 2019 Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement
• 2020 Right Livelihood Award
• 2020 Global Citizen Prize for Global Citizen of the Year
• 2021 National Humanities Medal
• 2025 Stockholm Prize in Criminology

Personal Life

Bryan Stevenson has never married. He has said that his work is too demanding for married life. He has lived in Montgomery, Alabama since 1985.

Adaptations

• Just Mercy (2019), a film based on his book Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption.