justice for all
the campaign
1.
End the Death Penalty
No justice in killing the innocent.
Call for the total abolition of the death penalty in all UN Member States - justice should never involve taking a life.
2.
Fair Appeals for All
Justice should not depend on wealth.
Ensure every prisoner - especially innocents without money - have access to competent legal support and a fair path to appeal.
3.
Support
for the innocent
Freedom is not enough.
Demand global support systems for those proven innocent - access to housing, healthcare and work after wrongful imprisonment.
the death penalty
Sunny Jacobs spent a lot of time during all of her post prison years campaigning against the death penalty along with Peter Pringle. The film brings attention to the cruelty and injustice of the death penalty. In a civilized global society where many other options of punishment and rehabilitation are available we should have learned over many centuries that this is not the way forward. It is time that we take a stronger stand to fully abolish the death penalty in all UN Member States and this will be one of the main aims of our campaign. Abolition of the death penalty should be a precondition of being a UN Member State moving forward. The old phrase still rings true for those sentenced to death for murder: “Why do we kill people who kill people, to show that killing people is wrong”. But of course in many cases those who have been executed have neither killed nor committed any offence as was the case of Sunny’s husband Jesse Tafero who was executed in the electric chair, an innocent man.
fairer appeals
One of the overlooked aspects of incarceration, especially in terms of innocents in prison is the ability to appeal cases in a fair and transparent manner. In many cases throughout the world, once someone is convicted and incarcerated, even if innocent, the justice system tends to want to wash their hands of them and make it very difficult for them to exercise a right of appeal. The greatest barrier to a successful appeal for innocents in prison is money and the vast majority of prisoners are poor and unable to pay for a competent lawyer to make their appeal, In many countries appeals processes do not exist. There are exceptions in terms of the Innocence Project in the US and MOJO in the UK who take on appeal cases pro bono but they can only take on a very small amount of cases. We wish in our campaign to highlight the need for a fair appeals system in all UN Member States and one that does not discriminate against the poor or an inability to afford a competent lawyer.
equal support
A shocking revelation to us when making this film was that if you are innocent and your case is overturned, you have no support services to help you on leaving prison. This is especially difficult for those who have served long sentences and are re-entering a very changed world with which they are then totally unfamiliar. Most UN Member States have post release support services for those who have served their prison sentences but none are readily available for innocents and they are regularly turned down when they look for support. The Sunny Center is one of the only locations in the world that provides support for innocents who have been exonerated. We therefore wish to campaign to have these services available in all UN Member Staes. We wish that countries acknowledge that there will always be mistakes and miscarriages of justice in legal systems and therefore there is a need to support those people who have been wrongfully imprisoned and provide full support post release in terms of, health, accommodation, work and education.