On June 13, 2026, the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project, the Strickland family, and other community partners will gather to dedicate a historical marker honoring Denna and Estella Strickland in the Mount Calvary Baptist Church cemetery, confronting an enduring pattern of racial terror carried out by deputized white citizens in Coweta County, forcing public recognition of a long-suppressed act of racial violence.
The Netflix documentary The Perfect Neighbor opens with police bodycam footage racing through the dark streets of Ocala, Florida, toward a tragedy that has already occurred. By the time officers arrive, Ajike “AJ” Owens, a…
How the 2017 Kimbrough scholarship program shaped one student’s path to Northeastern University School of Law.
Tayo Belle ’10 reflects on her transformative experience as one of the first students to work with Professor Margaret Burnham, founder and director of the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project (CRRJ) and the origins of what would become CRRJ’s spring Clinic.
The Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project launched Version 2 of the Burnham-Nobles Digital Archive. Here are six cases, now publicly available in the Archive, the first time that some of these accounts have ever been shared.
Raymond Wilkes first participated in the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Clinic at Southern University a decade ago. Now he’s back at Northeastern University as CRRJ’s Senior Staff Attorney.
Raymond Wilkes first participated in the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Clinic at Southern University a decade ago. Now he’s back at Northeastern University as CRRJ’s Senior Staff Attorney.
Alex Stein ’19, recently joined CRRJ as Staff Attorney and Program Director. Here he shares his journey with the project, researching cases of homicidal racial violence, and the legacy of police violence in many communities.
Henry Andrews and Issac Mayo, both World War II veterans, were shot and killed by police officers, in North Carolina, in 1947. The circumstances remain unclear, as descendants search for answers and fight to have their relatives’ stories remembered.
The DOJ’s investigation found that “Memphis police officers regularly violate the rights of the people.” But the history of racial discrimination and the use of excessive force by MPD can be traced far earlier than the death of Tyre Nichols. It is the outcome of decades of impunity enjoyed by police who have ended Black lives without suffering any legal consequences.
Jordan Neely’s tragic death at the hands of a private citizen is a familiar story, one told many times in the Burnham-Nobles Digital Archive in the cases of racially-motivated homicide on public conveyances in the Jim Crow South.
A case recently released by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) under the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Collection Act, and initially investigated by CRRJ’s historian Dr. Jay Driskell, exposes the historical continuum that exists between the treatment of African Americans in public spaces in the twentieth century, and Christian Cooper’s experience in 2020.
The Madness, released on Netflix, November 28, 2024, is not based on a true story, although the death, danger and duplicity Daniels faces could have come from one of the many case files on Jim-Crow era violence contained in the Burnham-Nobles Digital Archive.
The 2020 presidential election triggered a wave of concerns and legislation regarding election integrity, voter suppression and the security of American democracy. Over the last four years, states including Florida, Texas, Georgia and…
Filmed on location in rural Louisiana, featuring a corrupt local police force and a racist sheriff (Don Johnson) viewers may wonder if the recently released thriller Rebel Ridge is based on a true…
Rosalie Nevins-Alderfer ’15 was never interested in practicing law in the usual way. “When I entered the traditional legal curriculum, I realized pretty quickly that the typical, adversarial process didn’t align with my…
From public schools in North Carolina to refugee camps in the Democratic Republic of the Congo; Sara Merlo, Northeastern Law’s Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project’s recently appointed Education Consultant, has spent the last…
Ana Souffront ’23 studied political science at the Loyola University of Chicago, was a member of the Black cultural center, and engaged in campus protests, largely concerning on-campus police interactions with students. Her…
