Be intentional with who you surround yourself with. We become similar to the people we spend most of our time with. I’ve found it important to be intentional about who my friends and co-workers are because they rub off on us and shape who we are.
As a part of my series about “Big Ideas That Might Change The World In The Next Few Years” I had the pleasure of interviewing Alexander McLean.
Alexander McLean is the Founder and CEO of Justice Defenders. He is passionate about justice, having trained as a barrister and magistrate. During gap year travels to East Africa, Alexander fundraised to provide better health facilities and educate Ugandan inmates about the law. After graduating from the University of Nottingham in 2007, he moved to Kampala, where he created a team of local and international staff and volunteers to develop the work of the African Prisons Project — now known as Justice Defenders.
He is a Senior TED Fellow, Ashoka Fellow and UK Young Philanthropist of the Year. He appears in TIME’s 30 Under 30 Changing the World and ‘The Power List’, featuring Britain’s most influential people of African and African-Caribbean heritage.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you please tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
Until I was eight years old, I hadn’t traveled outside Europe. My life changed when my mom got a job with United Airlines. It opened up a world of possibilities — for next to nothing, we could fly all over the globe. I loved the excitement of being at the airport and waiting to see if there would be spare seats on the plane for us.
Our first trip, in the early 1990s, was to New York just before Christmas. We woke up in the middle of the night, jet-lagged, and ended up at Denny’s, where we ate pancakes by the stack. We visited FAO Schwarz, the city’s oldest toyshop, where I marveled at the great quantity and variety of toys. On our final evening, we went for a last walk through the city. It was New York as you imagine it should be at Christmas. The air was filled with snow, and people were moving around busily, preparing for the approaching holiday. The image was jarred when we came upon an old Black man, shaking a tin of pencils, which he was selling. He wore a sign that said, “God is good, but I am blind.”
I couldn’t get him out of my mind as we flew home. To my 8-year-old self, his life looked hard beyond measure. The possibilities that existed to me — to travel between continents, eat what I liked and be home with my family — didn’t seem to exist for him. And yet, his sign suggested he had something more than pity; he had hope. I think seeing this man first triggered a sense within me that there might be strength, resilience or hope in unexpected people. It’s something I experience each day now as I lead Justice Defenders.
American justice has shaped my thinking and outlook. At the age of eight or nine, I was at my local library and was struck by a photograph on the cover of a book. It featured a Black man in a black and white striped prison uniform, seated in the electric chair with besuited white men tying wide leather straps all over his body. The expression on his face is one of total defeat as if life had left his body before he was dead.
Later I read about George Stinney. At 14, he was convicted of murdering two white girls based on a confession given to a sheriff who’d offered him ice cream and the chance to go home if he did so. He was too small to fit in the electric chair and had to sit on a Bible for his head to reach the electrode.
One thing that the man in the chair and George in his police mugshot had in common was a look of defeat. There was no sparkle in their eyes, rather a dull blankness.
This is the effect the law can have. To drive the lifeblood, the joy, the hope of a future from us, and leave us broken. As an adult, I have come to recognize this look in the faces of prisoners around Africa and have had my own heart broken by the realization that it doesn’t need to be that way. Another way is possible.
When we see injustice and inequality, we can and should become angry. What will we do with that anger? It can consume us, burn us out or cause us to become apathetic. What does it look like for us to move from anger — from having our hearts stirred — to action?
Can you please share with us the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?
Having had my heart stirred by injustice and finding joy in words from a young age, I wanted to become a barrister — the term used in the UK for an advocate who presents cases in court. No one in my family was a lawyer. My dad came to the UK from Jamaica in 1960, responding to the Mother Country’s post-war call for labor. We had little money growing up, but the British government used to pay for poor but bright children to go to expensive private schools. I got one of these assisted places. My dream had been to go to Oxford to study Geography before law. Still, despite being one of the ten highest achieving Geography students in England, Oxford rejected me as they said I couldn’t think laterally.
I then took a gap year at the age of 18 to volunteer at a hospice in Uganda. I ended up at a massive national hospital where patients were dying of aids and tuberculosis in the hallways, abandoned by their families. The first man I cared for was lying on the floor by the toilet. The nurse told me that he’d been found unconscious by the police in a market. They didn’t know his name or whether he had any family and suspected that he was in a diabetic coma. Because he had no money, he got no care — I saw that he was lying in a pool of urine with the flesh on his bottom and back rotten down to the bone. He was decomposing while he was still alive. I returned the next day and, with the help of a nurse trained by the hospice, washed him, got him bedding and tried to advocate for him with the doctors. For five days, I washed and advocated for him. I came on the sixth day to learn that he had died the night before. After a while, a porter arrived with a trolley with a dead woman on it and put the man on top of the woman. I understood they would go to the mass grave together with everyone else who had no one to bury them. I called my mom that evening and cried for that man. It was a turning point in my life, as I realized that there are people whose lives are judged to have no value.
During those months, I met and cared for prisoners, usually teenage boys like me, often imprisoned for having underage sex, which has a maximum penalty of death in Uganda. Often, they had been in prison for years without a trial. Some had been horribly tortured by the police. In the hospital, the doctors and nurses would often refuse to treat them due to them being prisoners.
As I cared for them, alongside a group of nursing students, security guards and gardeners I mobilized, I saw that there could be great joy in serving those that others had rejected and that I could learn a vast amount from the people I was trying to help.
Moved by my experience of caring for young prisoners, I bulldozed my way into Uganda’s maximum-security prison. It was built in the 1920s when Uganda was a British colony. Designed to hold 600, it now has almost 4,000 inmates. I came to learn that in Uganda, two-thirds of prisoners hadn’t been tried. I visited death row, designed for 50 and holding 500, and learned of Edward Mpagi, who had been sentenced to death for murder. After 12 years on death row, it was discovered that the person he had killed was still alive. It would take another six years before he could be released. I was told of another who’d stolen a mango from a neighbor’s tree using a Stanley knife. He’d been sentenced to death for armed robbery.
Which principles or philosophies have guided your life? Your career?
My childhood experiences and interactions with people in prisons worldwide have significantly informed the principles that guide my life.
I want to be part of a society where we’re equally accountable to the law and protected by it. I yearn for a society that recognizes opportunities to create bridges between people from very different backgrounds and knows that through listening to each other and through proximity, there’s a chance for shared learning and growth.
I believe that society only flourishes fully when every individual has a chance to bring their gifts, talents and potential to the table. We embody that belief at Justice Defenders. We are a community that believes that we can all play a role in making, shaping and implementing the law because the law affects us all, from before we are born until after we die.
Ok thank you for that. Let’s now move to the main focus of our interview. Can you tell us about your “Big Idea That Might Change The World”?
We dream of a day where no one is punished or imprisoned without telling their side of the story. Our hope is for a world where each of us is equally accountable to and protected by the law.
Globally, millions are in prison for years awaiting trial. The majority lack the means to defend themselves in court, resulting in unjust sentences that could be overturned.
Multiple barriers prevent detainees from obtaining justice. About 90 percent of detainees cannot afford quality legal representation. Beyond affordability, finding a lawyer in Kenya and Uganda, where we operate, is also a challenge. According to a University of Pennsylvania report, one lawyer serves 5,686 people in Kenya and 27,258 people in Uganda. Many of those we serve say that when they can access legal service, they only see their lawyers once, usually only on the day of the trial. Without access to quality legal services, defendants cannot present an adequate defense to court, and judges are left without sufficient information needed to deliver a balanced verdict.
Ultimately, the lack of sufficient legal representation has created justice systems that deny a fair defense and imprison people for years due to unresolved cases.
Justice Defenders works to make justice and fair trials accessible to prisoners in Africa through legal education, training and practice. In prisons across Kenya and Uganda, we train prisoners and prison staff to become paralegals and lawyers, equipping them with legal skills and knowledge to assert their rights and provide legal services for themselves and others.
Prisoners study the law, learn how judicial systems work and understand the nature of their cases. They then provide critical legal services within their community. Those services include overseeing legal practices, file tracing, advocating on individual cases, collaborating with pro bono partners for court appearances, conducting alternate dispute resolution and seeking diversion from the formal court system. By ensuring that each defendant can effectively engage at their hearing, judges get to hear both sides of the story and make more informed decisions.
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How do you think this will change the world?
Globally, 10 million people are imprisoned, and three million are held without having their day in court. Justice Defenders is working toward facilitating one million fair hearings in Africa and beyond as part of our long-term goals and strategy.
Who better to work to make, shape and implement the law than those who have experienced conflict with it for themselves? Indeed, there are many things that can only be seen through eyes that have cried.
Prisoners, ex-prisoners and prison staff have unique perspectives on legal systems, yet their experiences are rarely listened to. Bringing them together with prosecutors, the police, judges, experienced lawyers and academics create remarkable possibilities for good.
We partner with world-class academic institutions, such as the University of London, to tutor and facilitate law degrees for committed prisoners. Our students are following in Nelson Mandela’s footsteps, who studied law from prison in South Africa. Thirty-nine prisoners and prison staff have graduated with a law degree, and 28 students are currently studying.
We’ve provided legal services to more than 33,100 people. More than 15,600 people have been released from prison after receiving advice from our paralegals.
Ultimately, we hope that those we train will move into positions where they are making and implementing the law. Our first graduate, Moses, has gone from prisoner to a lawyer in the Ugandan army.
We receive invitations from around the world each week to replicate our simple model of quality legal education for prisoners and prison staff together, enabling them to correct injustice, change laws and equip them for futures spent using the law to serve the poorest in society. In addition to prisons, we are being asked to go into refugee camps and immigration detention centers.
We know that some of the most vulnerable people in some of the world’s poorest countries have brains that can move mountains. Each of us, even the death row inmate, wishes to go to bed at night knowing that the day counted for something.
COVID-19 has highlighted that people at the margins of society have been left behind in the world’s rapid digital transformation. We’ve worked with urgency to bring court sessions and legal training online, ensuring the wheels of justice can keep turning even from behind bars.
The pandemic has highlighted that inequality anywhere in the world affects everyone. Injustice anywhere affects all of us. As much of the global workforce and many schools have shifted online, COVID-19 has highlighted a digital divide and the urgent need for digital connectivity. For people in prison, the digital divide has severe consequences: People are suddenly unable to participate in our group legal awareness sessions, which enable them to argue or appeal their case, and they are unable to travel to court hearings to secure justice.
The long-term lack of consideration of the people at the margins of society highlights the need to build a better world to ensure access to justice is a right and not a luxury. We’ve worked tirelessly to respond quickly to the need for fair trials and legal training by implementing new forms of digital justice. We’ve facilitated more than 13,300 virtual court sessions since the start of the pandemic.
Our approach of equipping those prisoners with the knowledge and digital tools to operate legal offices within prisons has meant the services our trained paralegal-prisoners provide to their fellow inmates have continued.
Keeping “Black Mirror” and the “Law of Unintended Consequences” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this idea that people should think more deeply about?
Look in our prisons, and you’ll think it’s illegal to be poor.
For those who come into conflict with the law, a disproportionate number does so due to poverty reasons. People may be unable to pay rent and face eviction, unable to defend themselves in court. They may find themselves falsely accused of a crime because they couldn’t pay a bribe or protection money. Or, they face criminal behavior charges due to an addiction or mental health issue that they have been unable to resolve.
Once in the system, they lack the financial resources for proper legal representation or bail. As a result, they’re more likely to get prison sentences than non-custodial options. They simply cannot afford a just defense.
But Justice Defenders proves the loftiest of ideals don’t require execution by the elite. Instead, we put the power of the law into the bound hands of the disenfranchised, ensuring that radical integration is the only means of ensuring liberty and justice for all.
This work isn’t easy. There is no quick fix. We work to improve criminal justice systems, but further investment is needed to tackle the root causes of offending. With government resources perpetually stretched, injustice cannot be an afterthought. Poverty and injustice must be treated as interrelated issues and tackled simultaneously. As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “There can be no justice without peace, and there can be no peace without justice.”
Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this idea? Can you tell us that story?
After around 10 years of work establishing prison libraries and health clinics and improving healthcare and education, I thought, “Why is it that the prisons we work in are filled with poor people without access to lawyers?”
Whatever we did to improve their conditions, if people in prison didn’t have justice, they didn’t have peace.
In one prison, I saw a prisoner on death row who’d completed a geography course. Sitting on the stairs up to the gallows, he was teaching geography to fellow prisoners. It was a surreal, heartening moment. I recognized the untapped potential of people in prison and how they could be agents of change.
As a result, we shifted our focus to take legal skills to the prison community. We train people in prison to become paralegals and lawyers, to provide legal services for themselves and others because everyone deserves a fair hearing.
What do you need to lead this idea to widespread adoption?
To achieve widespread adoption and rollout of our programs and reach even more people, Justice Defenders requires additional funds. We already have more requests for our work from around the world than we can respond to. We need more than people in prison as a reference to be able to join our community. We need people from across the justice system to be prepared to come together to find a common cause in adversarial justice systems and work together.
With a committed community of supporters, we would achieve widespread adoption.
What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why. (Please share a story or example for each.)
- Be intentional with who you surround yourself with. We become similar to the people we spend most of our time with. I’ve found it important to be intentional about who my friends and co-workers are because they rub off on us and shape who we are.
- Have courage with your convictions. When people doubt or disagree with you, have the confidence to stand up for what is right.
- Recognize that change takes time. We know significant change doesn’t come overnight, so we have regular meetings to hear the stories of people we’ve elevated each week. By focusing on the considerable impact on individuals’ lives, our team recognizes every win. This leads me to the next thing I wish someone had told me…
- Celebrate! Small wins should be celebrated as much as large ones. Celebrate with the people who have worked alongside you to make it possible. You don’t reach significant goals without all of the smaller steps along the way.
- Contemplation is a good thing. I’ve found great power in balancing contemplation with action. Fighting injustice is a marathon, not a sprint. By actively dedicating time for reflection and innovation, new doors and possibilities always present themselves.
Can you share with our readers what you think are the most important “success habits” or “success mindsets”?
I believe the most important “success habit” or “success” mindset is to learn from your mistakes. Second, make time to regularly review and reflect on your life: the successful areas and the areas that need improvement. Third, have a mentor who can guide and challenge and encourage you — someone who isn’t afraid to speak the truth in love. And, last but by no means least, have friends with shared values with whom you have accountable relationships.
Some very well known VCs read this column. If you had 60 seconds to make a pitch to a VC, what would you say? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂
My hope for 2021 is that the world will channel the emotion of the past year into action for social good. There are three areas where I think there are particular opportunities for us to make an impact:
The death penalty:
I was moved to read of the executions carried out during the recent Christmas and new year period. I’ve spent time with people on death row in many countries and become friends with condemned men and women and executioners. I won’t comment now on the morality of killing to show that killing is wrong and that the presence of the death penalty can contribute to higher murder rates, nor the number of innocent people sentenced to death in the US or overseas, nor the cost of administering capital punishment — these arguments against it are well documented.
I believe there are opportunities for us to engage in renewed public discourse about whether the death penalty has a role in our societies and to turn the spotlight on those who play a role in the administration of the death penalty and the injustices around it.
That leads me to my second hope for 2021 that we might live with greater proximity to each other, especially those whose lives look to be different from our own:
Perhaps in 2021, if it’s not your experience already, you’ll consider new ways you might be in proximity to those from different backgrounds? Look for ways in which they might shape you and be your teachers and ways in which they may educate you as you look to share the benefits of the education you’ve received with the world.
Finally, my hope is that, as lawyers, we might listen more. We are used to talking; we are often articulate; we feel we have something of value to say. Especially for those of us interested in human rights/immigration/crime, we might feel that we make unheard voices heard. The reason those voices may not typically be heard is that we can fail to listen.
If, like me, you come from a family that relied on welfare and a privileged legal education was beyond your parents’ dreams for themselves, I want to offer you special encouragement. Perhaps more than any other profession, the law judges our success by the wealth of the clients we serve and the hourly rate we can charge. For me, the legacy we will leave goes far beyond the wealth we accumulate. There is remarkable transformative potential for our lives when we encounter the defenseless as we work to help them access justice and get transformed by their boldness, courage, resilience and compassion in return.
I don’t know if you’ve taken the time to research who you come from. I am the descendent of slaves and slave owners. I come from those who have perpetrated great crimes and those who have suffered. As we work in adversarial justice systems, I believe that we have the opportunity to make bridges of our lives — between the rich and the poor. Those with power and those without it. Between black and white. And that there’s a joy that comes with being proximate to others working for justice.
While we have the extraordinary privilege of saying the power of the law is in our hands, it doesn’t belong to us. It belongs to everyone. Everyone should have access to the power of the law. You have an amazing opportunity to make that happen.
If you have an inkling that you might have a role to play with your life in using the law as a tool for liberation and transformation, I urge you to take steps now. Have adventures, volunteer with organizations that share your values. Even though you may be young or inexperienced, I know firsthand that youthful conviction and naivety can be a source of change and hope in unlikely places, even if others write us off for our youth, lack of resources or the color of our skin.
How can our readers follow you on social media?
To learn more about our work, follow us:
Facebook www.facebook.com/JusticeDefenders
Twitter www.twitter.com/justicedefends
Instagram www.instagram.com/justice.defenders/
LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/company/justice-defenders
Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.
Justice Defenders: Alexander McLean’s Big Idea That Might Change The World was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.