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    • Content Page

    Race and Sentencing

    The combined impacts of biased policing, discretionary charging decisions, sentencing enhancements, and the continuing impacts of the tough-on-crime movement have created and bolstered a criminal legal system in which people of color, particularly Black people, are more likely to be sentenced to prison and are subject to lengthier periods of incarceration.  
    • Content Page

    Race and Collateral Consequences

    It is legal today to discriminate against individuals with criminal records “in nearly all the ways that it was once legal to discrimination against African Americans,” says Michelle Alexander in The New Jim Crow. “Once you’re labeled a felon, the old forms of discrimination, housing discrimination, denial of the right to vote, denial of education opportunity, denial of food stamps and other public benefits, and exclusion from jury service—are suddenly legal.”

    • Content Page

    Race and Juvenile Justice

    “Today, 50 years after Gault, youth of color continue to be disproportionately suspended and expelled, arrested, processed in courts rather than diverted, detained in secure facilities and transferred to adult court for prosecution.” — Professor Kristin Henning, reflecting on racial disparities in the juvenile justice system 50 years after the Supreme Court’s affirmation of the right to due process, including to defense counsel, for juveniles in delinquency proceedings.

    • Content Page

    Racial Disparity Resources

    Additional resources on racial disparities in the criminal legal system.
    • Content Page

    State Criminal Justice Network Newsletter

    NACDL's State Criminal Justice Network Newsletter features a snapshot of NACDL's state criminal justice priorities, as well as recent internal and external reports, information on upcoming events, webinars, current state legislative reform efforts, legislative tracking, action alerts and more! The newsletter is disseminated monthly via email. 
    • Document

    Letter to House Judiciary on Commercial Law on DPAs and NPAs for Corporations (November 2009)

    Letter to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law regarding deferred and non-prosecution agreements for corporations, as proposed in the Accountability in Deferred Prosecution Act of 2009 (H.R. 1947).
    • Content Page

    NACDL State Advocacy Resources

    NACDL is committed to serving as a  partner with our state affiliates, state advocacy groups and partner organizations to promote criminal justice reform at the state level. See the resources below to learn how NACDL can assist with preparing your membership for legislative relationship building, planning & executing legislative outreach events, advocacy day prep, online advocacy issue support and more! 
    • Document

    NACDL v. Executive Office for United States Attorneys and U.S. Department of Justice (appellate)

    15-5051 (D.C. Cir.)

    NACDL sued the Justice Department seeking disclosure of its Federal Criminal Discovery Blue Book.  This publication reportedly covers the law, policy, and practice of prosecutors’ disclosure obligations.  The U.S. Court of Appeals upheld the lower court’s decision that the publication is protected work product. Included here are key pleadings filed in the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers' (NACDL) Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit seeking the Department of Justice's Federal Criminal Discovery Blue Book.
    • Landing Page

    NACDL Litigation

    Information on lawsuits NACDL has filed in pursuit of preserving constitutional rights and transparency.
    • Document

    Antrell Thomas et al vs. Anthony S. Evers et al

    2022CV001027 (Brown County Cir.)

    The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL), the Wisconsin Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (WACDL), Winston & Strawn LLP, and New York University School of Law's Center on Race, Inequality, and the Law filed a civil rights class action lawsuit on behalf of indigent defendants in Wisconsin who lack access to timely appointed counsel in criminal proceedings.
    • Document

    Anderson v. State of Louisiana

    04-05405 (La. 14th J.D)

    An NACDL-supported class action filed by pro bono counsel at Baker Botts LLP and Sutherland Asbill & Brennan LLP, the suit alleged that deficiencies in the Calcasieu Parish public defense system were so extreme that defendants were being denied their right to counsel as guaranteed by the U.S. and Louisiana Constitutions. The lawsuit alleged that due to substantial under-funding, public defender clients did not have their cases properly investigated, had infrequent communication with their attorneys, and experienced extraordinary delays in the processing of their cases.
    • Document

    Colorado Criminal Defense Bar v. Hickenlooper

    10-cv-02930-JLK (D. Colo.)

    Filed by pro bono counsel at Morrison & Foerster LLP, this lawsuit sought to invalidate Colorado Revised Statute § 16-7-301(4), which required a defendant to meet with a prosecutor before being assigned counsel. In Rothgery v. Gillespie County, 554 U.S. 191, 213 (2008), the U.S. Supreme Court held that a defendant’s right to counsel under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution attaches at “a criminal defendant’s initial appearance before a judicial officer, where he learns the charge against him and his liberty is subject to restriction.”
    • Document

    Wilkerson, Robinson, Wolverton, NACDL, CACJ, and ACLU-NC v. Alameda County Sheriff Gregory J. Ahern

    RG20062694 (Ca. Sup.)

    NACDL, et al. filed a class action lawsuit seeking release of medically vulnerable individuals from Santa Rita Jail in Alameda County, Calif.  The lawsuit seeks to compel Alameda County Sheriff Gregory Ahern to release all medically vulnerable people in custody at Santa Rita or in rare circumstances transfer them to home confinement.
    • Document

    National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers v. Evanston, Illinois Police Department

    1-08-2073 (Ill. App.)

    Citing wrongful convictions due to mistaken eyewitness identification and the urgent need to reform traditional police eyewitness identification procedures, NACDL, in conjunction with the MacArthur Justice Center of the Bluhm Legal Clinic at Northwestern University School of Law, filed a civil lawsuit against the Illinois police departments who participated in a controversial study of eyewitnesses and police lineups.
    • Document

    NACDL, CACJ & Youth Justice Coalition v. CA Gov. Gavin Newsom & CA Atty General Xavier Becerra

    S261827 (Cal. Sup. Ct.)

    NACDL, et al., filed a Petition for Writ of Mandate Seeking the Immediate and Significant Reduction of County Jail and Juvenile Facility Populations Across the State of California. As explained in the petition, the conditions in these facilities constitute violations of the U.S. Constitution’s Eighth Amendment prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment as well as violations of individuals’ Due Process rights under the Fourteenth Amendment, in addition to violations of the California Constitution and other state and federal laws.