It’s 2020. New Orleans. The most incarcerated city, in the most incarcerated US state. The city has elected a progressive Black district attorney, Jason Williams, who promises to change the system from within. One of the first things Jason does after he wins is set up a new department in the district attorney’s office – the civil rights division – led by Emily Maw.
A small team of lawyers and investigators is tasked with looking back through more than 1,000 old cases, examining whether each convicted person should still be in prison.
Twenty-five years earlier, Kuantay Reeder says he was playing basketball when Mark, his childhood friend, was killed outside a food store. Kuantay was arrested and eventually found guilty of Mark’s murder, a crime Kuantay says he didn’t commit. He was prosecuted by the office of one of the city’s old DAs, Harry Connick, infamous for his hardline tactics.
We hear from Prof Andrea Armstrong, a leading US expert on prison and jail conditions, and former city judge Calvin Johnson, who describes how Connick’s office was associated with frequent rights violations at the time Reeder was prosecuted.
Photograph: Annie Flanagan/The Guardian
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