New York University School of Law this week wrote about its connection to EJI, where some three dozen NYU Law alumni have worked since EJI’s founding in 1989.
EJI director Bryan Stevenson is a Professor of Clinical Law at NYU, and many EJI attorneys took his courses, including Racial Justice and the Law and Eighth Amendment Law and Litigation, before enrolling in his clinic course. Through the clinic, dozens of NYU Law students have come to Montgomery, Alabama, to work on death penalty cases and racial justice issues. Mr. Stevenson told NYU Law, “I’m particularly proud that many of our senior attorneys, who are the heart and soul of a lot of our work, started at NYU and made their way up.” Senior attorneys Charlotte Morrison, Alicia D’Addario, and Aaryn Urell (pictured here with deputy director and NYU Law clinical professor Randy Susskind) are NYU alums.
Many of these clinic students apply and are accepted into EJI’s two-year postgraduate fellowship program, and many fellows become staff attorneys at EJI after the fellowship ends. Charlotte Morrison, NYU Law Class of 2000, and Aaryn Urell, Class of 2001, both were clinic students who started as fellows at EJI in 2001 and are now the two longest-serving alumni at EJI. One of their first cases was that of Anthony Ray Hinton, who was exonerated and released earlier this month after serving 30 years on death row for crimes he did not commit.
Ms. Morrison told NYU Law that Mr. Hinton’s release brought feelings of joy and anger for justice delivered “way too late.” But, she added, “in this ocean of desperate need and suffering that people have, I feel really lucky to be working for an organization that actually is maximizing its ability to help people.”
The Law School lists 45 alumni who are former or current EJI employees.