Mass Incarceration, Mass Incarceration of Women, School To Prison Pipeline, Criminal Justice Reform, Criminal Justice, KOLUMN Magazine, KOLUMN, KINDR'D Magazine, KINDR'D, Willoughby Avenue, WRIIT, Wriit,

When African Americans are killed by police, these lawyers get a phone call | CNN

Criminal Justice, Criminal Justice Reform ... Posted by: KOLUMN Magazine Staff

Read Time 1 min.

When African Americans are killed by police, these lawyers get a phone call | CNN

Darran Simon, CNN, Edited by Braden Goyette, CNN, CNN
Photographs by John Nowak, CNN. Featured Image

[dropcap]CNN[/dropcap] Civil rights attorney L. Chris Stewart was sitting in church in Atlanta on an April Sunday in 2015 when he received a Facebook message with a news article and a plea from a friend. A police officer had killed her cousin, Walter Scott, and she needed help. [mc4wp_form id=”6042″]

Later that day, his phone rang in the middle of an engagement photo shoot with his fiancée. This time it was Walter Scott’s brother.

“They’re lying about my brother,” Stewart recalled him saying. “If you can get here by tomorrow, you’re hired.”

Stewart, 40, is among a growing group of prominent civil rights attorneys in the country who have become the go-to for families of black men who have been killed by police. They are confidants and counselors, helping their clients navigate not just their cases, but the media and the public during one of the worst times of their lives.

Generations ago, civil rights attorneys fought against segregation, and to secure rights denied to African Americans, Stewart said.

CLICK TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE, CNN