The film Just Mercy—based on the best-selling book of the same name by Bryan Stevenson—tells the story of a young lawyer, played by Michael B. Jordan, fighting for death row inmates in Alabama.
Stevenson, who went to work defending those with little or no access to legal counsel after graduating from Harvard Law School, founded the nonprofit Equal Justice Initiative in 1989 to support low-income and wrongfully convicted people.
The film highlights the challenges he faced during this time, navigating the justice system and fighting for his clients. One of those cases, Walter McMillian (Jamie Foxx), is a man wrongfully accused of murder who has already spent six years on death row.
As Stevenson fights to get McMillian’s conviction overturned, he is faced with corrupt law enforcement, bureaucratic obstacles and harassment from those who want McMillian to stay behind bars. It took five rounds of appeals before McMillian was granted a new trial, which led to all charges against him being dropped.
Just Mercy is in select theaters December 25 and theaters everywhere January 10.
