Before Bryan Stevenson ever uttered a word at Saturday’s spring commencement, his work as an attorney dedicated to saving the innocent resonated with people in Maryland.

Just like Stevenson, Rachel Bennett, the director of the Innocence Project Clinic at the University of Baltimore School of Law, did not start her judicial career in innocence work.

Bennett, a New York City native, worked as a paralegal in Brooklyn, advocating for people applying for unemployment benefits.

“Initially, I didn’t think that sounded like a glamorous job,” said Bennett. “But once I got into it, I realized there were lots of situations where people lost their jobs due to unfair circumstances.”

Representing her clients, Bennett learned to “speak on their behalf,” while trying to win their financial compensation.

Advocating for her clients made a big difference in Bennett’s career. She would later join a student clinic in California, working on death penalty cases.

“My experience made me realize it’s value (innocence work) and how important it was to do criminal law,” said Bennett.

During Saturday’s keynote address, Stevenson opened discussing his experiences as an undergraduate. He realized that he did not have the resources to pursue a higher career in philosophy.

So, he decided on law school, partaking in an innocence clinic in Georgia. Like Bennett, it was there Stevenson met people sentenced to the death penalty.

“…If you get proximate to people who suffer and struggle, if you get proximate to people who fall down, many of you will find your calling,” said Stevenson, who spoke extemporaneously Saturday.

He reflected on America’s social climate and on related topics, like how many have “given into the politics of fear and anger,” and how the country is still “burdened by a long history of racial inequality and racial injustice.”

Since 1985, Stevenson has fought against these issues through his legal work, and non-profit organization, the Equal Justice Initiative.

Bennett appreciates Stevenson speaking against the flaws within the U.S. criminal justice system, especially the lack of mental health resources for the incarcerated, and convicting minors as adults.

One of Stevenson’s current clients is a child charged as an adult, placed in solitary confinement for three years.

“I assign work from Bryan Stevenson to my law students every year because his work is so inspiring and realistic,” said Bennett. “He is also rooted in a lot of the core problems that affect not just wrongful convicted and innocence work, but the criminal justice system more (abruptly).”

In a 2012 Ted Talk, Stevenson emphasized creating an identity where a person speaks out against injustice within the prison system.

“I’ve come to understand that each of us are better than the worst thing we’ve ever done…Even if you kill someone, you are not just a killer,” said Stevenson.

He said that the characters of a society are judged based on how they treat their poor, instead of condemnation via mass incarceration, or death penalty.

Over a decade later, Stevenson used the same statement in his keynote speech Saturday, saying that America “needs more grace” when interacting with one another.

Under the Maryland Office of the Public Defender, there are two innocence project clinics: one at the University of Baltimore, and the other at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law.

There, law school students spend a year within their specific clinic. They are separated into groups of two-to-three people. Like Stevenson, students in the innocence clinic meet with clients, researching information to file a legal claim.

While some claims can take up to seven years to complete, the students work on them as much as they can, ensuring that they leave enough information for the next group of clinical students.

For 18 years, the University of Baltimore was the only innocence project clinic in Maryland.  Erica J. Suter, director of the Innocence Project Clinic at Maryland Carey Law, was sent from the University of Baltimore to lead the new location, which opened last fall.

“It’s great to give students at both law schools the opportunity to do this kind of work,” said Suter.

Criminal injustice is still relevant. Prison Policy Imitative reported this year that “mass incarceration costs the government and families of system-involved people at least $445 billion every year.”

Suter says for the clients that it’s “very meaningful to have people working hard on their case and try to bring them home.”

Some students even become friends with their clients.

Stevenson, whose relationship with his client, Walter McMillian, became the subject of his  2014 memoir, ‘Just Mercy,” described how McMillian, a Black man, was accused of killing a white 18-year-old, Ronda Morrison.

McMillian was never charged with any previous crimes. However, the Alabama police pressured another felon to accuse McMillian of murder. Ultimately, he was given life imprisonment without parole, later changed to the death penalty.

From 1988-1993, Stevenson worked hard to bring McMillian back to his family, eventually overturning the conviction.

“Just Mercy” became the basis of a 2019 film which starred Michael B. Jordan as Stevenson and Jamie Foxx as McMillian.

It was this example that inspires Maryland’s own public defender.

Natasha Dartigue, the first Maryland public defender of color, says that “Just Mercy” and Stevenson brought innocence work to the international field.

“He brought attention to the wrongfully convicted, a population where if somebody’s convicted, they’re forgotten,” said Dartigue.

As the daughter of Haitian immigrants and the mother of two Black children, Dartigue sees her work through a profound lens. When she advocates for these communities, she carries a closer perspective.

In 2025, the Maryland Equitable Justice Collaborative reported said that “Black Marylanders make up about 30% of the State’s population, but 71% of those in our State’s correctional facilities.”

“When I am speaking on issues within the Black community, I have a true understanding of what that means,” said Dartigue.

Besides the opening of a new innocence clinic, Dartigue was able to increase grant funding for the Maryland public defense system. Yet, there are not enough resources for every wrongfully convicted person.

“I’m glad that we were able to double the number of people we could help…but that’s just a drop in bucket regarding the volume of letters seeking help.”

Another issue within the innocence system is the difficulty in building legal claims. Bennett mentions that may cases involve police misconduct, like McMillian, hindering the fairness of the trail.

Stevenson left Morgan students with several pieces of advice: ranging from uplifting other people, to having the bravery to do uncomfortable things, to staying hopeful in the fight for justice.

He said that graduates may be occupationally impacted based on their skin color. However, the descendants of the enslaved and immigrants inherit resilience and power, as their predecessors learned “to love in the midst of agony.”

“…That strength is also flowing through your veins…. I want you to hold onto that and never doubt that you can do the difficult things that must be done to achieve justice in this country,” said Stevenson.