In the last half-century, America has become the nation with the highest rate of incarceration in the world, authorized the execution of hundreds of condemned prisoners and continued to struggle to recover from a long history of racial injustice.
For more than three decades, Alabama public interest attorney Bryan Stevenson, founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative, has advocated on behalf of the poor, the incarcerated and the condemned, seeking to eradicate racial discrimination in the criminal justice system. An intimate portrait of this remarkable man, TRUE JUSTICE: BRYAN STEVENSON’S FIGHT FOR EQUALITY follows his struggle to create greater fairness in the system and shows how racial injustice emerged, evolved and continues to threaten the country, challenging viewers to confront it. The film debuts WEDNESDAY, JUNE 26 (8:00-9:45 p.m. ET/PT), exclusively on HBO.
The documentary also will be available on HBO NOW, HBO GO, HBO On Demand and partners’ streaming platforms.
Six-time Emmy(R) winner Peter Kunhardt (HBO’s Emmy(R)-winning “Jim: The James Foley Story”) executive produces and directs; Emmy(R) winners Teddy Kunhardt and George Kunhardt produce and direct.
Told primarily in his own words, TRUE JUSTICE shares Bryan Stevenson’s experience with a criminal justice system that, he asserts, “treats you better if you’re rich and guilty than if you’re poor and innocent.” The burden of facing this system is explored in candid interviews with associates, close family members and clients.
This feature documentary focuses on Stevenson’s life and career – particularly his indictment of the U.S. criminal justice system for its role in codifying modern systemic racism – and tracks the intertwined histories of slavery, lynching, segregation, and mass incarceration. Highlighting watershed moments involving cases and clients, TRUE JUSTICE offers a rare glimpse into the human struggle that is required when the poor and people of color are wrongly condemned or unfairly sentenced and explores the personal toll it has taken on Stevenson and his colleagues.
The film chronicles Stevenson’s work in Alabama, the birthplace of the civil rights movement and home to the Equal Justice Initiative, as well as the early influences that drove him to become an advocate for the poor and the incarcerated. As a young lawyer in the 1980s, he witnessed firsthand how courts unfairly applied the death penalty based on race and how the Supreme Court ultimately declared that racial bias in the administration of the death penalty was “inevitable.”
Tracing the trajectory of the Court since the 1857 Dred Scott decision, which ruled that African Americans are not citizens of the U.S., TRUE JUSTICE shows how the Court has long sanctioned inequality, oppression and violence. Illuminating the power of memory in cultural change, the film instills hope of a brighter American future through the insights of this pioneer.
The film also documents the monumental opening one year ago, on April 26, 2018, of the Equal Justice Initiative’s Legacy Museum and its National Memorial for Peace and Justice, the country’s only lynching memorial, which is dedicated to the more than 4,400 African American victims of lynching. These sites are part of the EJI’s nationwide effort to engage in a truth and reconciliation process around this country’s legacy of Native American genocide, slavery, lynching, and racial segregation. As part of the campaign, Stevenson and the EJI are also working with communities to recognize lynching victims by collecting soil from lynching sites and erecting historical markers.
TRUE JUSTICE: BRYAN STEVENSON’S FIGHT FOR EQUALITY reveals a history that can’t be forgotten in the pursuit of genuine justice.
“I’m grateful to HBO and Kunhardt Films for their interest in our work,” says Bryan Stevenson. “We have ignored our nation’s history of racial inequality and the unfairness of our criminal justice for far too long. I am persuaded that if we commit to challenging racial injustice, poverty, and abuse of power, we can achieve a more just society. I hope films like this can contribute to that goal.”
In 2014, Stevenson published his critically acclaimed memoir, “Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption,” which, like TRUE JUSTICE, focuses on his life’s work and most memorable cases. “Just Mercy” has spent more than three years on the New York Times bestseller list and has received several literary nonfiction awards, including a Carnegie Medal and an NAACP Image Award. Stevenson is also a recipient of the MacArthur Genius Grant, among other honors.
Kunhardt Films’ HBO credits include the Emmy(R)-winning “Jim: The James Foley Story,” the Emmy(R)-winning “Teddy: In His Own Words,” the Emmy(R)-nominated “Nixon by Nixon: In His Own Words,” the Emmy(R)-nominated “Gloria: In Her Own Words,” “The Newspaperman: The Life and Times of Ben Bradlee,” “Becoming Warren Buffett,” “King in the Wilderness” and “John McCain: For Whom the Bell Tolls.”
TRUE JUSTICE: BRYAN STEVENSON’S FIGHT FOR EQUALITY is a co-production of HBO and Kunhardt Films; produced and directed by Peter Kunhardt, George Kunhardt, and Teddy Kunhardt; executive produced by Trey Ellis and Peter Kunhardt; edited and produced by Maya Mumma, ACE. For HBO: executive produced by Jacqueline Glover, Nancy Abraham, and Lisa Heller.
