- [Voiceover 1] Production and distribution of City Club Forums and Ideastream Public Media are made possible by PNC and the United Black Fund of Greater Cleveland Incorporated.

(dramatic music) (bell chimes) - Good afternoon, and welcome to The City Club of Cleveland, where we are devoted to conversations of consequence that help democracy thrive.

I'm Cynthia Connolly, Director of Programming here, and proud member.

Today at The City Club, we are joined by Jarrett Adams, attorney, advocate and author of the book, "Redeeming Justice: From Defendant to Defender, My Fight for Equity on Both Sides of a Broken System", which is part of our Authors in Conversation and Criminal Justice Series.

You may remember Jarrett from the last time he joined us at The City Club back in August of 2016.

Then, Jarrett shared his powerful story of, of how, at just 17 years old, he was wrongfully convicted of sexual assault and sentenced to 18 years in a maximum security prison.

Jarrett would go on to serve 10 years before being exonerated with the help of the Wisconsin Innocence Project.

Jarrett would then go on to become a lawyer himself, with the goal of helping those like himself who had faced discrimination in the legal system.

Jarrett Adams earned his Juris Doctorate from Loyola University, Chicago School of Law in May, 2015 and started a public interest law fellowship with Ann Claire Williams, judge for the Seventh Circuit US Court of Appeals, the very same court that reversed his conviction.

Jarrett also clerked in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York with the late honorable Deborah Batts.

After working for the Innocence Project in New York, he launched The Law Office of Jarrett Adams in 2017 and now practices in both federal and state courts throughout the country.

In his new book, "Redeeming Justice, Jarrett outlines the racist tactics used to convict young men of color, the unique challenges facing exonerees, once released, and how the lack of equal representation in our courts is a failure, not only of empathy, but of our collective ability to uncover the truth.

So, what are the limits and possibilities of our country's system of law?

And, what can we learn from Jarrett Adam's story to work towards a justice system that is truly just for all?

Moderating the conversation today is Michael Mudie, Partner and Appellate Group Chair at Benesch Friedlander, and Michael is also a long-standing member of the Northeast Ohio chapter of the American Constitution Society, a nationwide network of progressive lawyers, judges, students, and professors, all dedicated to the promise of the constitution and the values it embodies.

Guests, members, and friends of City Club of Cleveland, please join me in welcoming Jarrett Adams and Michael Mudie.

- [Attendee] All right.

(attendees applaud) (Jarrett chuckles) - Well, Jarrett, welcome back.

- Thank you.

(attendees chuckle) Thank you for having me and thank you, Cleveland City Club.

Had I known it was gonna be about four years since the last time I was gonna be here, I would've hugged you guys a little bit longer, right?

(all laugh) So I'm thankful to be here again.

- Excellent, and congratulations on the book.

- Yes.

- It is a tremendous accomplishment to knock out a book and, all the more, to write a really, really good one.

- Yeah, well, thank you.

(all laugh) I appreciate that, yeah.

I mean, it was difficult because I wanted to make sure I did it right.

It would be easy to, you know, as I listened to the list of accomplishments and stuff like that, you know, I sometimes daydream because it just took too much to get here, Mike, to be able to tell this story, and so, I wanted to make sure that, when I wrote the book, I wasn't just writing a book to impress you guys on my accomplishments, but to impress upon people the importance of what we're losing and what we need to start saving and just get to doing it and away from the talking about reform.

- Well, amen to that, and I'll tell you, you know, we've known each other six years now.

- Yeah.

- We met in 2015 at an American Constitution Society convention.

- Right.

- And the night we met is seared into my memory because I remember sitting out on a patio with a group of other people at the convention, hearing your story- - Right.

- and being moved, literally to tears, in front of a bunch of people who I didn't know.

- [Jarrett] Yeah (Jarrett laughs) (all laugh) - And so I knew your story.

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

- But the book, nonetheless, was a real page-turner for me, and it does a great job of conveying your story and connecting it to larger themes.

- Yeah, and one thing I thought about was this, so when I'm thinking about writing a book, my wife who's here with me as well, we started talking about our favorite books and, like, one of our favorite books together was Hidden Figures.

So the book Hidden Figures didn't just tell you about the racism and discrimination that was faced of the women when they did a lot of the work that was not, you know, credited to them and NASA.

They talked about, you know, all, you know, forms of prejudice and barriers of racism that kept them from thriving in all walks of life so I wanted to, I had this belief that getting this law degree would be like some blanketed shield where I can go off and just save every black boy like Jarrett Adams.

And then, I started to practice law, you know, Mike, and I started to realize that my next act is to inspire and ready the hand of the next generation of torch carriers and legal warriors, because that's what we have to do.

We have to equip folks with the skillset and the knowledge to be able to diversify the legal system and that's how you get to diversity throughout the system.

So I wrote it with the perspective of this isn't just me, this isn't just my family.

What's happening here is the community, especially the communities of color, are feeding the prison system its babies, and, in turn, the prison system is feeding the communities of color, late-30-year-old, early-40-year-old men, and increasingly women, who aren't skilled or ready to reintegrate back into society, and they also are in desperate need of mental health care and social work.

- That's a really important point.

There are so many different areas we can talk about that are in need of reform.

- Yeah.

- But, let's pick up on that thread and talk a little bit about re-integration, and maybe you can talk about some of the challenges you face and how that informs the reforms that we need to have.

- Yeah, so, for example, I'm exonerated.

My record is expunged, so, technically and officially, per the law, I don't have a record.

I was never convicted, so I was figuring out how to get off the south side of Chicago to closer to downtown because my commute at night was just so dangerous coming from work and having to go to school, so I'm literally coming home at, like, midnight, and so, I started to apply for these different apartments, you know, that are considered in affluent areas downtown towards where my school was, and I was getting mysterious nos, Mike, and I couldn't really, you know, put it together, at all, and there was this one lady who came out of her office, caught me in a parking lot, and she told me, she says, "Listen, I don't know if you notice, but when they do a credit check, one of your last known addresses is a prison."

- [Attendee] Oh.

- And so, literally, exonerated, graduating from law school the following, you know, year, because I was moving, like, incrementally, as I started to, like, I was moving incrementally, and this apartment was like in a really safe, you had a doorman type of thing, and so I knew I was doing a clerkship and I just, you know, it was befuddled, but it also made me write this down, right?

Because I want it to be able to share this process, to be able to show people, if we have a system that you go and you serve your sentence, and when you get out, there's another hidden sentence, it's never over with.

- [Attendee] Right.

- And, who is bearing the brunt of that?

The communities of color that I just talked about, right?

'Cause that's, I'd never reintegrated back into, you know, downtown.

I went right back into the neighborhood in which, you know, I grew up in, and so, when you think about that, you think about the totality and really, if the community of color is a chair, the legs are missing, based off what the criminal justice system is doing to it.

- Yeah, and I really enjoyed the way the book relayed some of the indignities.

- Yeah.

- I mean, even the simplest thing, like getting an ID, you know, you get caught into this scenario where, "Mom, can I go outside?"

"Ask your dad."

"Dad, can I go outside?"

"Ask your mom."

- Mm-hmm.

- You know, each form you need, you need the other form in order to get it, and so, you face those kinds of hurdles in order to find a job, find a place to live.

- [Jarrett] Mm-hmm.

- Can you talk a little bit as well about the need for counseling and to help people overcome the trauma associated with being incarcerated?

- I can't overstate this.

Like, my mom and my aunt were instrumental in me getting therapy, but I'm gonna share this 'cause it's important, especially to the black men and young men to understand, it's okay to not be okay and need to talk to someone, and I think that, you know, a lot of bravado and a lot of, you know, male ego allows us to feel like we can fix it ourself, and I couldn't fix it myself.

My issue was this.

When I came home, my friends weren't turning up.

They were turning down.

They had kids, they had careers, and I felt like, if I just worked hard enough, I would be able to catch up with this 10 years, and it wasn't healthy, mentally, and it was impossible, and there were things and moments in life that would break me down to make me realize that, and that's when I became receptive to getting to therapy.

I'll give you an example.

So, who doesn't go, when it's around the holidays, and you're with your family, and you usually open up photo books and photo albums, and you go through pictures and you, whether it's hot chocolate, apple cider, or a spiked cider, like, you guys are going through, you know the years?

And I'm going through, you know, going through the photo album, Michael and I'm looking at myself as a kid and I'm seeing the evolution of me, you know, pre-K, eighth grade.

My last picture is of a high school picture of me graduating.

My family's pictures continued.

Mine's don't pick back up until 10 years later in the photo album, so it was stuff like that, that made it real, and, again, I continued to document this because I knew I wanted to write a book.

I just didn't know how I wanted to write it, but I knew I wanted to tell these real stories because we're not gonna strong-arm our way to reform.

It's just gonna, you know, ignite more debate.

We have to politely indict people on their heartstrings of sympathy and empathy to get them to look at people as people, and that was, that was what I prayed came across in the book.

Close your eyes.

What mother couldn't, you know, identify with my mom who was beating herself up simply because she couldn't afford me an attorney?

I mean, getting into it with my stepfather along the way, because she was trying to get money out of the 401k.

Those are real-life problems that you don't see in the courtroom, but they play out and they cripple our community.

- That's right.

That's right.

I wanna pick up on something you just mentioned about the difficulty you had in finding a lawyer.

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

- You know, our economy is becoming increasingly two tiered, and I don't think I'm telling any secrets if I say, most of the people who are charged with crimes are not coming from the upper echelon of that two-tiered system.

Can you talk a little bit about how the difficulty you had in finding a lawyer allowed things to get off the rails?

- Well, I mean, that's what it was all about.

I mean, to that point, we're doing early research right now.

80% of people charged are not able to afford attorneys, you know, in America in our criminal justice system.

So, you just think about that.

That means what?

They're going to the public defense system, right?

I don't even need to tell you guys how broken the public defense system is across the country.

You look at public defenders and shout out to public defenders who are watching this.

I support you and scream loudly in that voice.

You're talking about public defenders who are managing 50 to 75 cases at a time.

Michael, if me and you handled that amount, we'd be in front of the board of bar examiners, right?

(Michael laughs) So, that tells the tale of just how lopsided it is, and so, with me, in particular, we were, I was assigned a panel list attorney because the public defender's office conflicted out of my case, and I go into the details in the book and I take people slowly through just how much and how important representation is.

You know, other stark realities is this, when someone is on trial facing the rest of their life, you'd be lucky if you get all of the discovery before the trial starts.

If I'm suing you, I could find out your grandmother's favorite color, if I can make it relevant to the lawsuit.

So those are the stark differences.

So when you, you can get access to everything if you're suing about money, but if you're on trial for your life, good luck.

And that's the reality of our system and how broken it is.

And, I found myself saying to myself, "I don't know how anyone could ever plead guilty if they're not guilty."

I never did it, and didn't have an understanding.

When I started to teach men in the law library, you know, it was a requirement that you get your GED or something like that, I started to help men with their cases, I came across man after man after man, Michael, who pled guilty to get out of the county jail 'cause they was sick of being there, and they thought that they would lose their jobs and lose their families, only to get sentences, and their life was essentially placed on layaway and they came back to prison.

- Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

And, I'm wondering, you know, your story is, in one sense, not uncommon.

- [Jarrett] Not at all.

- You know, there are plenty of people who are facing unjust incarceration, unjust sentences.

Now, what makes your story unique is that there was light at the end of the tunnel, that you were able to get out and then get your education, not just a BA, but also a JD.

I know we talked a little bit before about some of the hurdles that other exonerees have faced.

- [Jarrett] Mm-hmm.

- And you mentioned a former client of yours, Glenn Ford, I believe.

- Yeah.

- Can you tell a little bit about his story?

- So Glenn wasn't my client, but he was a case that we studied.

So, I have a nonprofit called Life After Justice, and basically what we're doing is we are, it's three tiers.

We have strategic litigation, a focus on mental health care and policy change, but also the problem that is, when people are exonerated of crimes, there aren't easy access to compensation like you would think, and I know people are confused because you'll see a media coverage of so-and-so just won $25 million or something like that.

That is less than 10%, 2% of what people who are exonerated, what they come home and what they face.

And then, there are barriers in terms of even getting state compensation and stuff like that.

So in particular, Glenn Ford is an important case because Glenn Ford was exonerated and he was exonerated in the state of Louisiana and he had cancer, and he came home and, instead of him being compensated and given the healthcare that he needed, he literally died on his deathbed while the prosecutor who prosecuted the case, also advocated for him to be compensated.

His compensation was denied, and it was basically denied on a technicality.

They acknowledged that he was innocent, but then they took no liability because of that thing that we're dealing with now, qualified immunity.

And so it was, it was a story that not many people, you know, know about who didn't catch the nightly news, but it's one in which that I've mentioned all the time, even though I've never met this man, I can't tell you that I slept good after that night of looking at this, you know, this interview, and it was an interview conducted on 20/20.

You guys can just check it out, and Glenn is laying there in his deathbed, simply just asking to be compensated, and it's a struggle for me to believe that our society is okay with it, so that's why we need to talk about it, talk about it and fix it.

- Mm-hmm.

And, you know, there are so many different angles we can look at these problems from.

- [Jarrett] Mm-hmm.

- You know, that Glenn story is a story about a failure to right a wrong.

The short staffing and lack of resources of the public defender is a way to prevent it from happening in the first place.

Another thing you and I had talked about before is prosecutorial reform as a way to keep these accidents or these injustices from happening in the first place- - [Jarrett] Yeah, 'cause they're definitely not accidents.

- What are some of the ways you think we could reform the way prosecutors offices operate to make the system more fair?

- Well, again, we have... Well, let me say this, this has to be a holistic approach.

You know, it can't just be on one end, and I mention this a lot, as well, with police reform, you know, community relations, the innocent black men dying and stuff like that.

It has to be a holistic approach.

We need both the judiciary, the lawyers, prosecutors, defense attorneys, everybody to come together and treat this just like we treated the pandemic, because it is a pandemic.

That's exactly what we're dealing with.

And so, in terms of prosecutors and in terms of police, and in terms of everyone in the criminal justice system, I mean, as quickly as possible, Mike, we need to figure out how to bridge the gap between social workers, mental health care providers, and stuff like that because those are the people who help us realize that each name or each person that comes before us as a new case, deserves new attention, and not the biases that we all have, you know?

So, I think about, I think about that when I think about the prosecutors and prosecutor reform, but I also think about this.

We, again, struggle with the diversity of it.

If you look at the prosecutor's offices across the nation, you literally have very few people of color who are at the helm, and then, on those that you do, because it's oftentimes a political position, they find themselves campaigning all the time, as opposed to rooting out the bad apples in the office and really doing change because there's no stability there, so I think that here's the best analogy that I can use, Michael.

So, our criminal justice system is the sink, right?

It's leaking, leaking bad, and we keep trying to change the faucet.

We've even got shiny faucets, but it keeps leaking (Michael chuckles) - 'cause we just don't wanna do what we need to do, and that's tear up the floor and fix the pipes.

- That's right.

That's right.

(attendees chuckle) - You like that?

- [Michael] Yeah.

(Michael laughs) - [Jarrett] Yeah.

(attendees applaud) - So it sounds like one of the things we really need is kind of a cultural shift within prosecutor's offices to get out of the mold of, "You know, my job is to lock up the bad guys."

- Yeah.

- And instead, to review cases holistically.

I'm wondering if there are some institutional reforms that you support as well, like conviction integrity units, exemptions, or exceptions to immunity rules, other ways that we might spur that kind of cultural change within prosecutors' offices?

- Yeah, I think people should pay attention to what Larry Krasner is doing in Philadelphia.

He's not the only one.

You have Melinda Katz in New York and Queens, Ken Thompson, the late, great Ken Thompson started one in Brooklyn, and this was a conviction integrity unit.

My thing with conviction integrity units is this, there shouldn't have to be a unit, if we were handling these fairly all the time.

Now, the fact that there is a unit, I'm encouraged by it.

But, however, there are a few units that are operating like Krasner and Philadelphia and some of the others, you know.

We, again, we talk about Marilyn Mosby and what she's doing, and it's one of these things where, just like you just said, culturally, it has to shift.

I'll give you an example.

So when you have people running for positions of attorney general or of prosecutors, have you ever heard people stand up and say, "Look, vote for me because I'll make sure that I get it right.

I'll prosecute bad apples.

I'll go against this entire system to make sure that it's treating people fairly.

I'll start to find creative ways to hold people accountable for why guns are entering these neighborhoods, and stop just hammering the people in the neighborhoods."

You've never heard that.

You hear people get up and say, "Vote for me.

I got a 99.99.99 conviction rate.

(Michael laughs) And I'm also gonna get this new prison built over here and also this new jail facility over here."

For whatever reason, that rhetoric from far and beyond has been successful in getting people in office, and so, that's why people are afraid to shift away from that culture.

- Mm-hmm.

So we've talked a bit about reform in public defenders' offices and directing more resources that way.

We've talked a bit about ways we can fix prosecutors' offices.

Police reform has been a big topic here in Cleveland, since even before Tamir Rice was killed- - [Jarrett] Tragic.

- seven years ago now- - Right.

- and it's been a major, major focus of the national conversation, rightly so, over the past year and a half.

- Yeah.

- Based on your experiences, what would you like to see inside police departments in order to turn down that pipeline a little bit?

- Well, listen, I'm gonna have a theme throughout, and it's in my book, as well.

Social workers, therapists, psychologists.

You know, I have a friend, you know, a childhood friend where, you know, when I was wrongfully arrested and convicted, it was just me and him a lot, right?

So when I left, he ended up joining the service.

He left the service, became a police officer.

He's now an officer at the VA Hospital and we have these conversations a lot, and so, he just tells me from the inside the perspective that he has of what's going on, and basically, it's a culture thing inside of there too.

I mean, if you, whatever competition it is, if you pit sides, people are trying to win, Michael, and that's what we have, and so, if...

I'll say this again.

If you lined up all the police officers and law enforcements in society, up against the wall, you need to plug in a therapist in between each one, right?

Because that's the only way that we get out of this.

Look, there's a reason why there's a field of people who study people, right?

And so, why are we stupid enough not to listen to them?

Right?

- [Michael] Right.

- And, this is why we have to do this, and what I'm saying is this, when people said defund the police, I think what was missed was that really meant allocating, reallocating the funds, so we're not asking that police, you know, now to be walking around with batons and no guns, even though they should, like England, and then, we wouldn't have shootings like this, but what we're asking for is we're asking for... What's wrong with us asking for more educated, thoughtful, well-rested, you know, people to police our neighborhoods?

There's nothing wrong with asking for that.

And now, we have to go from not asking to demanding, and we demand by lawyers litigating in a judiciary, and ordering things that happen.

- It sounds to me like a recurring theme, like, what I picked up from your book, and what I'm picking up a lot from you here today is just recognition of humanity.

- [Jarrett] Yes.

- You were not recognized as a human being when you were incarcerated.

You were hardly recognized as a human being by your appointed counsel.

- [Jarrett] Mm-hmm.

- And one of the problems you seem to be relating, right now, is that police are not relating to people as human beings, and the trained professionals can help to facilitate that mindset shift so that we can all begin to relate better that way.

- I mean, absolutely.

You know, I was on a panel with Wes Moore and I'm sure you guys are familiar with him.

One of the things that stuck out that Wes said was he says, during his tour, he's walking around in Iraq and literally, you know, he's trying to introduce himself and stuff like that, and he used the analogy that that's what's happening in our society.

Look, we have police in the areas, walking around.

They're not from these areas.

If you're not from the areas, you don't know, you know, what things are and what they aren't, you know?

And it's like, you can tell the stark difference when you go into these communities of color, it seems like a occupation going on by the police, but, when you go in affluent communities, they're policing.

Like, they don't do anything unless they see anything, right?

- Right.

- In Chicago, in other cities, in Cleveland and stuff like that, they're going in to find something.

That's different, you know?

And that's how you create these injustices, and that's how you alienate the community from ever trusting you.

I went to...

I got a case right now in Chicago.

So, I was looking for a witness, (chuckles) and I go up on a porch, knock on the door, and there's a little boy, and he like, "Mama, it's the police!"

(laughing) 'Cause I had a suit on, right?

(all laugh) And he like shut the blinds on me, right?

I'm like... You know?

(all laugh) But, in that lighthearted moment, it also told me this, even the kids of these communities are victims of what they believe police in their communities are like.

Like, that's a real point right there.

Like I, you know, I don't wanna appear as being smarter than I actually am.

I just read a lot of different stuff, right?

I just challenged myself to read a lot of different stuff and also support my arguments in court with a lot of science and data and stuff like that and, when you do that, you start to learn, right?

- Mm-hmm.

- And what I'm saying is, I think we need to learn our way out of this situation.

We got 2.3 million people incarcerated.

We have 900,000 almost, if not, still incarcerated black men.

And, I'll use that pandemic analogy again.

So, we were able to get out of the pandemic by developing a vaccine.

So what is a vaccine?

It's actually the virus created into an antibody injected into our body.

We aren't saving these communities of color from violence unless we start to get the men and women who are in prison, who've been there for 25, 30 years, in better shape to reintegrate back into society and fix their communities.

And I'll use another analogy, right?

So, in these communities that predominantly make up people who are locked up, they know what the problem is, Michael.

Like, they're not, you know, these people aren't dumb people.

They're victims, as well.

They know what the problem is.

They know how to fix it, but they're usually the furthest away from the solution and the fixable items, right?

Which is why we need to empower, and put people who are in these communities in a leadership position, and the one thing that I hate hearing that I can't let go is this, so when you talk about diversity and you talk about diversity in the legal field, on the bench and prosecutor's offices and stuff like that, even in law firms, more importantly, in big law firms, right?

The head of law firms are not diverse as they should be, and so, they're responsible as well.

All hands on deck.

But, when you look at that, what I hate to hear is, "I mean, well, we're looking."

Well, look.

Stop looking and start creating.

We gotta invest into these communities and start to get people the skills and stuff like that is to contribute to society.

Why just sit back and wait and say, "Well, there's no good candidates"?

It's our job, and our duty to create these candidates.

And speaking about books, if someone picked up the book of your life, right?

Your family, your loved one, picked up the book of your life, would they be satisfied with what you did with the criminal justice system and what we're doing right now?

And I ask that specifically, because there were people back when slavery was going on, who wasn't for slavery, but they just was like, "That's not my business," right?

- [Attendee] Yeah.

- So, now, what I'm saying to you all, is this, "Are we gonna let that happen again?"

It's everyone's business.

- No, you're exactly right about that, and a thing we'd hit on before in our private conversations is the idea that by not doing that, we're losing twice.

- You know, we failed to develop this giant wellspring of human talent.

- [Jarrett] Absolutely.

- And then, we pay again for that failure to develop that talent, when we have instances like three generations of people locked up in the same institution, like you relayed in the book.

- Yeah, it was... And, I'm like, literally, everyone has a nickname in prison.

So I'm hearing 'em call each other nicknames, G Pops, Old Man, Grass On, I'm like, "Man, they got some cool nicknames around here."

(Michael laughs) I get on a visit, there's, it's three generations of men being visited by two black ladies with a toddler in tow, and I just will never forget this young girl coming through the visiting door, extending her arm, knowing to be wand by a security guy.

And, you gotta understand that that is impactful, right?

Children are like sponges.

They pick up on things, and so, when something like that, when you see stuff like that, it's a red flag and it's a telltale sign that we are doing something wrong.

And, in a situation like that, again, I know that there are safety, there are concerns, but we gotta do it a different way, Michael.

We have to, and this is what I'm trying to tell you, we have to implement the social worker and a therapy angle, for they can let us know exactly what we need to do to be impactful.

And also this, why not?

'Cause what we've been doing ain't working.

You know, we- - That's the truth.

- We've spent how much money on a war on drugs?

And we have the result of mass incarceration and a crippled black and brown community.

So now, let's do this.

Let's spend a fraction of that on revitalizing these communities.

I wanna see the best of the best teachers in the worst areas in Cleveland.

Go get me the best of the best teachers, Stanford, Yale, whatever it is, do a project for 15 years, call me back.

You tell me if a better product isn't coming from those impoverished areas.

- Indeed, indeed.

So we're getting close to the wrap-up time, but before- - Already?

- Seriously.

- Uh.

(attendees laugh) - One of the things, I always walk away from events like this with, is a question.

- Yeah.

- And that question is, "What do I do now?"

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

- And so, we've talked about some policies that everybody in the room and everybody listening on the radio and livestreaming and so on ought to be advocating for.

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

- There are great organizations out there.

There's Families Against Mandatory Minimums.

- [Jarrett] Mm-hmm.

- There's the American Constitution Society, which does some work on the policy side.

- [Jarrett] Right.

- There's your organization, Life After Justice.

- [Jarrett] Yes.

- What would you encourage the people in this room and the people listening out there, to do tomorrow, the day after?

How do we get to work?

- So, I'll say this, because me and you are lawyers, and I believe we're in the presence of some Supreme Court justices as well and other legal professionals.

Here's what I'll say.

This country was founded on litigation.

We need to litigate these issues that we have right now.

We need to take, and fund, as much research to support brief filings that we pray will get to the Supreme Court and change what we have right now.

If it's not the legislator and the statutes that are being implemented to ease the mass incarceration, then we need to litigate our way there, and we can't do that without everyone, and what I'm talking about as everyone is this.

I am talking about the biggest of the biggest law firms.

I am talking about these firms getting involved, helping with litigation.

I am talking about these people in this room, convening like this to follow and watch.

It's not gonna happen overnight, and that's the thing that everyone has to understand.

There's no right answer to make you walk out of here and go press a button, so what we need to do is this.

We have to continue to convene and we have to inch this thing along because our job is to hand this world to the people behind us in the shape that we would want to continue to live in it in.

- I love it.

I absolutely love it.

So we've all got our work cut out for us, we've heard.

- [Jarrett] Absolutely.

- Lawyers, we're gonna litigate, students, you're gonna continue learning and get ready to build a better future, and I see Cynthia back up, so- - That was a quick 35.

If my court hearings went like that, I would be great, okay?

(attendees laugh) - Everyone, Jarrett and Michael Mudie.

(attendees applaud) Today at The City Club, we're listening to a forum in our Authors in Conversation Series, as well as our Criminal Justice Series, featuring Jarrett Adams, author of "Redeeming Justice: From Defendant to Defender, My Fight for Equity on Both Sides of a Broken System".

We're about to begin the audience Q&A.

We welcome questions from everyone, City Club members, guests, students, and those of you joining us, via our livestream online, or the radio broadcast, 90.3 Ideastream Public Media.

If you'd like to tweet a question, please tweet it @thecityclub.

You can also text them to 330-541-5794.

That's 330-541-5794, and our staff will try to work it into the program.

Today, we have our amazing City Club volunteers attending the microphones, and may we have the first question please?

- Good afternoon.

- [Jarrett] Hey, good afternoon.

I'm so glad you're here today.

Tomorrow, there's a program in East Cleveland at East Cleveland Public Library from 1:00 to 4:00 PM, and a part of that program is gonna be a panel talking about our Cuyahoga County Juvenile Detention Center.

- [Jarrett] Mm-hmm.

- And, the conditions there are horrendous.

Children are being left in their cells for long periods of time.

They're being sent to bed without eating.

I have a friend who teaches there.

She says that they're not being let out their cells to get their iPads for their education, which is against state law.

I serve on the State Board of Education and I'm very concerned about it, and so, I guess what I'm asking you is what are your thoughts on it?

Have you, are you familiar with what's going on there?

And what do you think can be done about it?

- Yeah, that's for me, or for Michael?

I'm sorry.

(attendees laugh) - It's for, it's for you.

- [Jarrett] Yeah, okay so- - But both of you can respond if you want to.

- Yeah, and I'll definitely want you to respond to these, too, because I wanna make sure, whenever I make statements, they're educated, and so, since I'm not a resident of Cleveland, you know, I can't speak to exactly what's going on, but what I can tell you is this, there are similarities across the country with the issues that you're talking about, and this goes to the last point that I made.

I'll ask you a question.

Are you guys being represented by a big law firm?

- When you say "you guys", I... - You, and the issue that you're bringing on the behalf of the kids at the juvenile justice center.

- Not that I know of.

It doesn't get, it doesn't get talked about.

- Right, and so- - It really doesn't get talked about.

- So, what I mean by that is this, it's time for everyone who has a law degree, and even everyone, to step up and do something.

- [Attendee] Mm-hmm.

- So the issues that you raised are very concerning, because what that means is this, if that's going on right now in the juvenile system, those kids will be alleyoops for the adult system- - [Attendee] Yep, yep.

- is what's gonna happen.

And so, it's not just their problem, their community's problem.

It's everyone's problem because, if not, if we don't step in right now, we are incubating, you know, adult offenders is what we are doing.

- [Attendee] Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

- And so, just by you asking that question is important, and now the next step is, "Who do we identify?"

And, hopefully, someone watching this program can reach out to you to start the litigation.

There's only so much that ACLU can do and handle with the resources that they have.

We need people to step up to the plate and take a pass on some of those, you know, those Christmas parties and start to do some of these cases that are meaningful and impactful, not just for them, but for everyone.

- [Attendee] Okay, thank you.

- Did you have- You like, "I'm good, I don't need no follow up."

(Jarrett laughs) - I can't follow that other than to say, we should talk afterward.

- Yeah.

(attendees laugh) - Hello, my name is John Colcaro and I'm a student at Wickliffe High School.

Before I ask, I just wanna say, this is for Jarrett.

Your story is so inspirational, but at the same time, it's also one of the stories where it's hard for anybody who hasn't been in the same position to put yourself in and try and be like, well, and try and relate to it just by feeling.

- [Jarrett] Right.

- So my question for you is, when you were falsely incarcerated, during your time, did you ever think that there was hope?

- Yeah, I mean, look, I go through it in the book, and it was a morphing.

Upon the guilty verdict and a sentence of 28 years, 17-year-old Jarrett was lost forever.

You know, I instantly grew up and had to grow up inside of a prison with grown men who were, you know, 25 years to life, based on the sentence that I had, that's what, you know, I was in there, in prison, doing time with.

I'll say this, (sighs) I've never been hit by a car, but for people who have, I know enough to say, "Man, I don't wanna be hit by that car," right?

And so what I'm telling you is that I know enough through going through it to experience it, to tell you that not only do you not wanna be hit by the car that is the criminal justice system, but I'm telling you that it disproportionately hits people that aren't like you, and that's why you should care even more.

You think about, you know, how we got to where we are in this nation, we didn't get there because it was one sector of people.

We got there because multicolored hands touched the foundation, which built us to where we are right now, and so, I think that just being, you know, as, look, as a student, you know, your age, I wasn't offered events like this in the city of Chicago.

So, the fact that you are here encourages me, and it should encourage everybody else that we got a dynamic group of people who are coming up.

So, now, we need to make sure that we ready their hand for the torch that they will carry, and, hopefully, that torch is founded in equality and supported by the science and data that we know is telling us we're doing this thing wrong.

Thank you for your question.

- [Attendee] Thank you so much for sharing your story and for touching on so many parts of our justice system that are broken.

One thing you haven't talked about, I wonder if you could speak to, is the parole system and probably elsewhere, but in Ohio, it's broken.

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

- You've got, especially for old law inmates, who have been there since before '96, with, when the laws changed, they have indefinite sentences.

- Right.

- And there's like 4,000 guys in prison who go up, though, one guy I've been talking to over the past year he's gone before the parole board 10 times, and, because of the nature of his crime, which was violent, he's got no chance, but he's changed.

Now, he's 67 years old.

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

- He poses no threat.

There's guys in walkers and wheelchairs.

Like, what can we do to change that system?

It's really, Ohio in particular is the one I know, but I'm sure it's elsewhere.

- Right.

- It's really, it gives no chance for people to change.

- Yeah.

Because I practice, you know, across the country, I get the opportunity to see the hallmarks and the similarities and stuff, and I'll just tell you, you know, Cleveland, Ohio, Ohio isn't alone in its public defense problem, and also, its parole problem.

And so I, again, go back and draw on the same thing that I've been drawing on before.

Who is the person evaluating the person that they are considering to let out?

If that person isn't a therapist, if that person isn't, you know, a forensic psychologist, if that person isn't a psychosexual psychologist or whatever it is, then that's the wrong person.

All right?

We're literally asking the business that it is now, the criminal justice system, to decide whether or not it lets out its commodity.

That's never gonna work, and I wanna be clear in what I'm saying is that the criminal justice system is a business for some, but a debt to most, right?

We don't, do not disbelieve that everyone has a stake in the criminal justice system because they do.

Your tax dollars, that's where they go, but there's a business behind this.

There's the phone business, the $15 for the first minute, whatever it is for the rest, right?

There is the business of canteen.

You know, there's no Amazon Prime in jail so you're literally selecting the vendor that is the vendor.

There's a business that is within this criminal justice system that is keeping us from repairing people and putting them back in their neighborhoods, and I spoke about that a little earlier in that we aren't getting to... You could lock up all the young black kids you want to.

It's not gonna get us any safer, okay?

It's not.

It's only gonna create the cycle of what I just told you.

They're gonna come out 40, 50 with nothing, and it doesn't help, so, when you're, in your question, I would, I would, again, back to litigation.

Someone needs to sue on behalf of the communities who are getting the people who are reentering society ill prepared.

I cannot state this enough.

Y'all watched Hamilton?

Y'all seen Hamilton?

- [Attendees] Mm-hmm.

- That play was about what?

Litigation, all right?

That's what this country was built on, and now we have to not just get away from that.

We need to continue to do it.

It's like you about to rap.

Go ahead, then.

(all laugh) - Hey, my name is Montero Barron.

I am a student at Wickliffe High School.

I am freshly 18, and my question to you is, as a young black man who has been in certain scenarios of the sort of which your case was, my question was, how did it go?

How were you accused?

What happened?

Did just the police randomly show up to your house?

Were you in the wrong place at the wrong time?

What happened is what I want to know.

- The short answer to that is I was a black kid, along with two other black kids, falsely accused by a white kid, and that took all common sense out the accusation.

- [Montero] Yeah.

- Like, literally no one cared.

The accusation was so outlandish.

We were supposed to have snuck up a flight of stairs, raped someone, fled the building, but meanwhile, the police withheld a statement from a college student who said, "No, that's not what happened," and I saw all of them hanging out with the lady who accused us.

I would encourage you to read the book because it does a better job of explaining what took place.

But, I also tell you this, it was nothing more than a historical depiction of young black boys, which supplemented the lack of evidence and supported the false conviction.

That's really what it was about.

And I would, I wouldn't... You're 18, so you'll be going off to college, right?

- [Montero] Yes, sir.

- You'll definitely be getting out of the house.

The one thing that I wish I would have listened to my mother when she was telling me, was this.

Don't think that the justice system is gonna treat you the same, 'cause it's not, right?

I mentioned in the book that there was a Stanford swimmer case where a young man was accused of a sexual assault that he did.

He was caught in the act.

He did it, and the judge gave him about nine months in jail, and you know why he said that?

He says, "Just looking at him, he doesn't look like he's the type of person who could survive in prison."

But meanwhile, young man, they'll look at me and you, and we fit the perfect model.

- Yeah.

And second question real quick, where do I get the book from?

(attendees laugh) - You can get it right on the table.

- How much, where's it at?

Where?

- It's on the table and I'm gonna put my number in it and I want you to call me and let me know what you're doing through school, okay?

- [Montero] Appreciate you.

Yeah.

- [Jarrett] (whispers) All right.

- [Ronnie] Good afternoon.

Before I get started, actually I'ma buy that book for the young man.

- [Jarrett] Oh, man.

- [Ronnie] I got you for that.

(attendees applaud) Too late, I got you.

With that being said, my name is Ronnie Cannon and I work for a nonprofit organization here in Cleveland, Ohio, that helps individuals that's coming out of the prison system get connected to employment, shameless plug.

With that being said, from a personal standpoint, you kind of spoke about counseling for those that are coming home from prison, right?

- [Jarrett] Mm-hmm.

- Me, as a returning citizen myself, after doing close to 20 years in prison, for me, it has never been a situation of going to talk to anybody about it.

- [Jarrett] Right.

- As you kind of spoke about, the relief that I get or the solace that I got was actually speaking to those individuals that was in a similar situation as myself, and I felt that those are the people that I can actually compare or share stories with that understood, moreso than going to, say, a therapist, as you're indicating, which kind of brings me to the second point that you raised, where you was talking about like the virus cure, and the virus, so to speak.

Those individuals that has some vested stake in the prison system, coming home, to be able to give back to the system, I mean give back to the society.

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

- So if you can speak a little bit more about counseling from peer to peer, versus gonna say a professional that may not know anything about what, say, a person like yourself or myself actually went through.

Thank you.

- Well, I appreciate you stepping to the mic and sharing that story and no shameless plug at all.

I hope that people are watching and they support your organization as well 'cause it's important, and it affects all Ohioans when people come home, so what I'll say is this, it most certainly is power and healing in amongst us convening, right?

I did that for years when I would go to the Innocence Network Conference and I would see so many people like myself and it was therapeutic, but I wouldn't take dating advice.

You know what I mean?

From... (laughing) You know what I'm saying?

'Cause we all were locked up, and I'll tell you this.

(attendees laugh) Here is what I tell you, right?

In all seriousness, and I pray that more young black men start to take, you know, this therapy thing seriously, and the reason I say that is because, you know, we don't deal with post anything.

We deal with persistent traumatic stress, 'cause it's never stopped in our neighborhoods, and so, what I realized was therapy is working when you don't realize it, right?

And I started to talk to people about what I went through and what they were trying to do was encourage the conversation about what I went through, and I was just trying to talk about what I'm trying to get ready to do.

I was compartmentalizing it without allowing myself to heal.

And, what it did was it would trigger my anger, right?

I'm not gonna make it seem like when I came home, I wasn't ready to wring people' neck for what happened to me because I was.

I was never compensated before.

I came home, and I'm staying with my mother, and I'm 27 years old, and, you know, I'm going to church with my mom, and all the young ladies in the church trying to date me and they're like, "What's wrong with dude?"

You know what I mean?

Like, 'cause it was me thinking I was gonna catch up with these years, and I needed to sit down, and I needed to decompress, and I needed to be able to talk to someone, and the thing is, I would encourage you to do both, like, 'cause it ain't nothing wrong with that, man.

You can definitely learn and heal from people who went through similar journeys, but there are professionals that are professionals for a reason, and that's what I encourage everyone to do, especially, people like you and I who've who've walked those tiers.

- Jarrett, hi.

Thank you for being here.

I was here the last time you were here, and I gotta say, I echo the comments about your story is just inspirational, heartbreaking, and inspirational.

So my name is Becky Ruppert McMahon.

I'm the Chief Executive of the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association here in town.

We have nearly 5,000 members, lawyers, judges, et cetera, and I wanna go specifically to your call-out to big law.

So we work...

I'm biased, I admit it.

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

We work in a community that is one of the most giving in terms of what the legal profession gives back to whether it's investing in the next generation.

We have pipeline programs.

We're in every high school in Cleveland and East Cleveland Shaw High School.

We have all kinds of efforts associated with trying to diversify the profession.

Law continues to be one of the least diverse professions out there and, as relates to the criminal justice reform, this concept of pursuing litigation and calling on the big firms, let's be blunt, big firms, typically, don't practice criminal law.

They're typically not in the criminal justice system, right?

Big firms go where their clients tell them to go.

- [Jarrett] Mm-hmm.

- So, have you seen models across the country that are working, that, where pitches are being made to big law, big law firms to say, "Get invested in the criminal justice system," 'cause I'd sure love to hear what's working.

- Yeah, yeah.

And I, and look, and I wanna make sure that I say this.

My point about big law getting involved was not to call out anyone, 'cause that's the last thing I wanna do is make people defensive because then people don't wanna get involved.

But, what I'm saying is this, we wouldn't have stopped fighting to come up with the vaccine until we came up with one, and that's all I'm saying in terms of what's happening right now.

We've gotta save our babies from becoming adult offenders, and if that takes us doing more, then we gotta do more.

But, what I would also say is this.

One of the folks that I've seen and I'm aware of who really do it on a big level is the Skadden Fellow, and I'm sure you've probably heard of the Skadden Fellows, but we need more of that, right?

Because the name that we think of, we think of Skadden, right?

Can you think of any other who have these fellows?

And that's what I'm saying, and I'm not saying it's not out there.

I don't want people to send me emails, something like, "You said..." (all laugh) but what I'm saying is we- - They could send their emails to me 'cause we're always looking for new and different ways to get engaged 'cause I think the commitment is there if we can make the right case.

- [Jarrett] Yeah.

- For why, not just big firms, but in-house counsel, small firms, all of us need to be in it.

- Right, and you know, look, I'll tell you an easy way.

Well, not an easy way.

Nothing is easy in this criminal justice system, but here's a way to incentivize lawyers.

The public defense system in Ohio, when the public defenders are conflicted out, there's a panel list of attorneys, right?

And then, courts can appoint attorneys.

That fee should be reflective of how serious you're taking this issue.

I guarantee you, if you upped that fee to about $250 an hour, there'll be a long line wrapped around the court building, asking for cases to handle.

So that's a unique way of doing it, but also there's this.

And, I also am aware of what the bar is doing because I did a little digging and research and stuff like that.

The program of pairing law students with lawyers to give them the best of the best training is important to every bar.

I do post-conviction work.

I'm not gonna call out any lawyers, but I'ma just tell you, there is a deficient area of competent attorneys handling some of the most high-stakes cases, and it shouldn't be that way, right?

And so I would, you know, if you wanna have me down to do some type of event to fundraise for you guys for a position, you know, that annually or every year creates a fellow, we need to create fellows and we need to start bringing in law students and encouraging them through the pipeline, all the way, with support, where they don't have to worry about Sallie Mae in their inbox three months after they graduate school.

So, I thank you for that question, but it's most certainly a call that I won't stop calling because I'm telling you, who would have ever thought that The White House would be lit up like a rainbow?

Litigation got that done.

- [Becky] Thank you.

- [Jarrett] Thank you.

- All right, thank you everyone for being here and thank you again to Jarrett Adams and Michael Mudie.

(attendees applaud) Today at The City Club, we have been listening to a forum featuring Jarrett Adams, author of "Redeeming Justice: From Defendant to Defender, My Fight for Equity on Both Sides of the Broken System", part of our Authors in Conversation and Criminal Justice Series.

Our conversation was moderated today by Michael Mudie, Partner and Appellate Group Chair at Benesch Friedlander, and we welcome guests at tables hosted by The Char and Chuck Fowler Family Foundation, Friends of Dave Nash, Towards Employment, and Wickcliffe High School.

We're so happy to have you all here.

Be sure to join us next Friday, August 12th, for our final forum in our Local Hero Series this year, We'll be welcoming Erika Anthony, Co-Founder of Cleveland Votes and Executive Director of the Ohio Transformation Fund.

She'll be joining us right on the heels of our mayoral election to discuss how we can collectively work towards increasing voter engagement in future elections and beyond.

Tickets are still available for this forum and you can purchase them and learn more about our other forums at cityclub.org.

And, that brings us to the end of today's forum.

Thank you, Jarrett Adams and Michael Mudie, and thank you members and friends of The City Club.

This forum is now adjourned.

(attendees applaud) (bell chimes) (dramatic music) - [Voiceover 2] For information on upcoming speakers or for podcasts of The City Club, go to cityclub.org.

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