Mission:

In the two states with the highest incarceration rates in the world, Innocence Project New Orleans frees innocent prisoners, exposes injustice and prevents wrongful convictions.

Purpose:

Innocence Project New Orleans (IPNO) is a nonprofit law office that represents innocent prisoners serving life sentences in Louisiana and Mississippi, and assists them with their transition into the free world upon their release. IPNO uses its cases to explain how wrongful convictions happen and what we can all do to prevent them. IPNO works with legislators, judges, lawyers, law enforcement and policymakers to protect the innocent within the criminal justice system.

Since its inception in 2001, IPNO has freed 20 wrongfully convicted prisoners and cleared the name of one other man who died in prison, eight years before DNA exonerated him. IPNO takes the hardest cases—cases that others are not equipped to. We devote the majority of our time and resources to freeing poor people who will otherwise die in prison for crimes they did not commit.