Justice Defenders

Alexander McLean is a British activist, humanitarian, and lawyer with over two decades of experience fighting to catalyze prison reform and access to justice in Africa. He has worked with government officials and legal experts in several prisons in Uganda, Kenya, South Sudan, Sierra Leone, and Saint Lucia.

At 18, Alexander volunteered at a prison hospice ward in Uganda, where he was exposed to the dehumanizing conditions suffered by prisoners. Since then, he dedicated his life’s work to serving the well-being of prisoners and instigating positive changes in criminal justice systems. In 2004, Alexander founded African Prisons Project, now called Justice Defenders, which provides legal services, education, and paralegal training within Kenyan and Ugandan prison communities. For his work, Alexander has received fellowships from the Ashoka Foundation and TED, as well as honors like the Beacon Prize and the Commonwealth Young Leader Award.

Our organization, Justice Defenders (previously African Prisons Project), is committed to closing the justice gap for marginalized prisoners in Kenya and Uganda. Coming from poverty and with limited education, the prisoners we serve lack the knowledge and resources to challenge the grounds on which they’ve been imprisoned or the proportionality of their sentences to the severity of their crime. Our program trains prisoners and prison staff to become paralegals who are able to provide other inmates with free and quality legal services so that they can access a fair hearing.

In the wake of Covid-19, we now seek to equip prison communities with technology, so that we can (1) continue providing legal education and training to our participants remotely; and (2) enable prisoners to attend court hearings and represent their case online.

We seek to bridge the justice gap for marginalized prisoners who remain unduly incarcerated because of inequitable access to legal services and information.

Globally, 10 million people are imprisoned, 3 million of whom are held without having their day in court. In Kenya and Uganda, prisons typically operate up to 3 times above capacity, putting inmates at high risk of contracting and spreading communicable diseases. In the wake of Covid-19, overcrowded prison communities comprise one of the most vulnerable populations.

The problem is rooted in systemic barriers that prevent prisoners,  especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds, from accessing justice. These barriers include shortages in legal services for the masses. Many prisoners can’t afford a lawyer, and even those who can aren’t guaranteed quality service because of shortages in legal practitioners. There is one lawyer for every 27,258 people in Uganda, and for every 5,686 people in Kenya.

Prisoners are often left to navigate the justice system alone. Without basic knowledge of their rights and legal options, they are prone to suffering unfair and prolonged incarceration without appeal. With Covid-19 lockdowns, even those who have court dates are likely to spend more time in prison as in-person hearings remain suspended.

Our core program provides inmates and prison staff with legal education and training to become paralegals. Program participants receive training in human rights, judicial processes, and legal case management. Participants also have the opportunity to become lawyers, as we provide them with scholarships to pursue a Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of London through distance learning.

Trained paralegals work out of our prison-based legal aid office and provide inmates with free, quality legal services that would otherwise remain unavailable to them. Paralegals consult with inmates on their individual cases, informing them of their legal options, providing case documentation and file tracing, and holding mock hearings that help inmates prepare for trial. Paralegals also conduct human and legal rights awareness sessions, encouraging inmates to explore their options for legal recourse and promoting a culture of fair treatment within prison communities. To date, our paralegals have empowered and assisted over 24,000 inmates to access a fair hearing, resulting in over 12,600 releases.

Adapting our program to Covid-19 safety restrictions, we are equipping prison communities with technology that will enable prisoners to attend virtual legal awareness sessions and court hearings, and allow participants to attend online classes.

The prisoners we serve include men, women, youth, and the elderly who come from poverty and are often at a disproportionate risk of conflict with the law because of their socioeconomic status. Through direct engagement with our participants via surveys and interviews during training, awareness sessions, and one-to-one meetings, we learn the challenges they face first hand. In all our program activities, we strive to empower inmates to assert themselves and participate in the defense of their rights. 

The majority of the prisoners we serve are unable to move their cases forward because they don’t have legal representation or are unable to pay their fines. A substantial number of these cases are non-violent, petty offenses that don’t warrant the inordinate period of time that detainees could spend in prison. To illustrate: one of our clients was arrested because they couldn’t pay their motorcycle insurance. Another client was wrongly accused by police of stealing produce when he accepted yams as payment for a day’s work.

We also serve convicted inmates who haven’t had the chance to fairly appeal their case. Whether innocent or guilty, our work helps to ensure that these prisoners’ basic right to be heard in court is upheld.

Prison communities are traditionally overlooked populations as they are separated from wider society. Coming from poverty, most inmates are disproportionately at risk of conflict with the law. When they’re apprehended, they don’t have enough knowledge to question their detainment nor the resources to secure counsel. Their poverty and status as prisoners mean that their rights and well-being are doubly prone to neglect.

Our project empowers prisoners, equipping them with the legal knowledge and skills needed to access a fair hearing. Our work restores the agency of prisoners⁠⁠—who are often left behind⁠—inspiring them to advocate for their and others’ rights.

Having seen how little value society places on prisoners, I founded African Prisons Project—now Justice Defenders—in 2007. From its inception, the organization’s goal was to serve marginalized and overlooked prisoners. We concentrated on improving the quality of life within prison communities by providing healthcare and library facilities.

However, after over a decade of engaging with prisoners and prison administrations, we realized there was so much more to be done in addressing the root cause of the problem. I saw prison populations growing, with many of them unduly left behind bars, recognizing that our efforts and services would inevitably fail to reach every prisoner. Gradually, we pivoted from trying to improve prison conditions to instigating change in the criminal justice  system. We learned from working with Kenyan and Ugandan inmates that most of them have no resources to make bail or acquire quality legal services. The prisons we worked in were overcrowded because people of disadvantage kept falling into the same justice gap. 

Drawing from this, we established our paralegal training and education program, building a movement of justice defenders and empowering prisoners to know and claim their and other’s rights.

I have worked with prisoners since I first went to Uganda at 18 almost 20 years ago to volunteer at a prison hospice ward. There, I witnessed the dehumanizing conditions that prisoners suffered as their fundamental needs were neglected. That was a turning point in my life, as it was made clear to me that some people’s lives were judged to have no value.

My life’s work is now towards ensuring that each person has access to a fair hearing and the right to tell their story. By equipping justice defenders to facilitate a just legal process for themselves and others– through legal education, training, and practice - we restore their value as human beings in the eyes of society and the judicial policymakers who largely influence their lives and those of their families and communities. 

I founded African Prisons Project—now Justice Defenders—in 2007 to empower defenceless Ugandan prison communities to advocate for their own right to fair trial. We expanded to Kenya in 2008. We now run our training programs and legal aid offices in 39 prisons across Uganda and Kenya.

My experience as a humanitarian and activist, and practice as a lawyer, magistrate, and junior judge have given me an intimate and multifaceted understanding of the justice gap for prison communities. My profession allows me to critically examine the systemic nature of the justice gap and how it can be addressed by increasing the efficiency of judicial processes and by creating spaces where prisoners can interface with the decision-makers in the judicial system.

The direct and continuous engagement with prisoners also enables me to see the problem from the perspective of those who are most affected by it. The death row inmates I work with have called me a “prisoner by choice,” a title I treat with deference as they tell me their stories and allow me to glimpse the manifestation of unequal justice in their lived experience. Along with my expertise in criminal law and my connections to legal practitioners in Kenya and Uganda, I believe that my in-depth understanding of the problem puts me in a sound position to address it.

Furthermore, my organization’s 13 years of work and cooperation with prisons and justice system stakeholders gives us an advantage in delivering our program. The relationships we have formed and strengthened over the years with prison authorities, government officials, and senior members of the judiciary facilitate the implementation of our initiatives.

In the face of Covid-19, the prisoners we serve are at heightened vulnerability as they are held in overcrowded prisons where social distancing is almost impossible. Left unchecked, the disease could quickly decimate an entire prison population. We are meeting this unfolding crisis with urgent and radical initiatives that will help ensure their safety while working to keep the wheels of justice turning.

One approach we have taken is to raise a bail fund that will divert petty offenders from spending prolonged periods in prison only because they cannot pay their fines or debts. We are also raising funds to supply prisoners and prison staff with sanitary items and personal protective equipment.

Our third initiative seeks to deploy technological solutions in prisons that would allow prisoners to continue attending court hearings and legal education classes remotely. If awarded, part of the prize money will fund this plan to keep justice moving in Kenya and Uganda despite disruptions to regular court operations and our program delivery due to Covid-19 lockdowns.

As Founder and Director General of Justice Defenders, I believe that I have the responsibility to influence others who are in positions of power and privilege to gain a deeper understanding of the lives of those who are at the margins of society. I am dedicated to serving prison communities—populations that are physically and socially isolated from society, and thus often neglected. My challenge is to increase awareness and build empathy and allyship among other thought leaders, social entrepreneurs, and the wider community about the inequalities suffered by inmates in accessing justice.

A crucial part of my work with Justice Defenders is to create opportunities for prisoners to interface with decision makers and private individuals with the power and resource to help. One such occasion was a visit to our prison-based legal aid clinics in Kenya, which I organized for Michael and Xochi Birch, well-known entrepreneurs in the technology/digital space in the United States. The Birches met with ex-inmates who told them about their former life in prison and journey with Justice Defenders. Inspired by these stories, the Birches committed to funding our program, and continue to be one of our staunchest supporters and champions.

Justice Defenders’ work reimagines the way inequities in the criminal justice system are addressed by directly working with prisoners to transform the system. Other criminal justice organizations such as the Penal Reform International, the Foundation for Human Rights Initiative, and the Law Reform Foundation follow a top-down approach, placing focus on influencing policies and national governments to impact the people on the ground. Our approach complements the great work of these organizations by capacitating the people who are most affected by justice system policies to advocate for their rights to a fair hearing and be heard by the decision-makers.

Through our program, we act on the truth that inmates are more than a statistic, more than people to be punished. We seek to realize our vision of inmates, who have otherwise been cast off by society, to fulfill their potential to serve others. Justice Defenders’ work demonstrates that prisoners themselves are capable of being catalysts for justice reform.

Furthermore, through our legal education and training program, we show that prisoners and prison officers can study side by side and support each other. This approach not only humanizes a sector in society that is often viewed negatively, but also fosters a greater sense of community and respect within prison environments.

Our mission is to increase access to justice for marginalized prison communities, empowering the defenseless with the knowledge and skills they need in order to represent themselves and advocate for their own rights. This overarching goal is supported by the following activities, outputs and outcomes:

With the support of foundations, individual donors, our volunteers and partner organizations such as the Uganda and Kenya Prisons Service, we provide prisoners and prison staff with legal education and paralegal training. The training includes modules on human rights, basic legal concepts and due process, case management, and legal research. Program participants also have the opportunity to enroll in distance courses from the University of London and pursue a Bachelor of Laws degree.
 
As part of the program, our trained paralegals provide other prisoners with legal services, including advising inmates on legal options, helping them prepare for hearings, gathering and managing relevant records and court files. Our paralegals also regularly conduct human rights awareness sessions, promoting a culture of respect, cooperation, and mutual support among members of prison communities.
 
The main outputs from our program activities include the number of prisoners and prison staff who have received legal education and training, the number of inmates who are able to access free legal services and information.
 
As an immediate program outcome, we observe greater awareness among prisoners about their basic rights and legal options. They are also empowered to represent themselves in court and pursue the resolution of their cases. Long term, we find that our program graduates become more motivated to engage with judiciary stakeholders. By doing so, these individuals shed light on the challenges and hardships that prisoners face in securing fair trial, and are able to instigate discussions on potential systemic changes that would increase access to justice for the incarcerated.

Through our education and training program, we currently have 285 active legal paralegals who are able to serve an average of 10,000 inmates annually across the 39 prisons we serve in Kenya and Uganda. To date, the work of our paralegals and staff have facilitated the release of over 12,600 inmates. 

By the next year, we anticipate to continuously support our active paralegals, with the goal of providing legal services to a total of at least 15,000 inmates in 2021. We also aim to replicate our legal education and training program in Gambia. Furthermore, we are planning to pilot human rights awareness sessions in UK prisons next year, where we have recently completed a scoping project. 

While we aim to achieve these targets in 2021, we also acknowledge that our performance in the next year may be affected by Covid-19. To mitigate the impacts of the pandemic on our work, we are investing in digital solutions that would allow us to continue delivering our program remotely while our prison-based operations remain limited.

By 2025, Justice Defenders’ key target is to help 500,000 defenceless people get a fair hearing. By then, we expect to operate in more than 100 prisons across 5 countries. We will have about 500 trained paralegals and more than 50 law graduates educating others and offering free legal services. The digitalization of our education and training program is foundational for realizing this vision and represents the keystone of our strategy for growth.

Our five-year target is to provide at least 500,000 inmates with legal services through our Justice Defenders staff and trained paralegals. To enable us to reach this target, we are working to deliver our programs, primarily delivered on-site, online through technological solutions. Through this investment, we anticipate being able to train more paralegals and law students in a time-efficient and cost-effective manner – thus increasing the number of trained paralegals able to provide legal services within the prisons at a faster rate.

We will equip the prison communities we serve with teleconferencing technology and internet access, which will allow inmates to continue attending court hearings and legal education classes remotely in the short term, as we adapt to Covid-19 restrictions. As we demonstrate the viability of this technological solution for delivering legal services and education to inmates, we plan to adopt this solution more widely in the next five years. In doing so, we expect to minimize operating expenses, promote transparency and accountability, and maximize resources in the long term. This will increase our program’s scalability and allow us to create more impact.

Our program is non-revenue generating, and we intend to continue providing inmates with free legal services and paralegal training. As such, we rely on the generous support of our funding partners and donors. With global funding for access to justice among underserved populations decreasing by 40% over the past four years, we face challenges in securing the financial sustainability of our program.

The pandemic has also created logistical difficulty and uncertainty in the delivery of our paralegal training program and legal services, which are primarily done online. As Kenya and Uganda are still working to contain Covid-19, our operations will continue to be affected by changes in safety restrictions and lockdown periods.

Lastly, another roadblock is the unfamiliarity of some paralegals, clients, and judges in using digital tools and in holding hearings online. It may take time for clients to become accustomed to virtual hearings, as it can initially feel more distant compared with an on-site court proceeding.

We are increasing our fundraising efforts to help ensure the financial sustainability of our program in the short and medium term. To increase our fundraising capacity, we are building internal fundraising tools that will help our team maintain a pipeline of grant projects and awards we can pursue. 

In the long-term, we are seeking full government adoption to sustain our program. We continue to deepen our engagement with justice system stakeholders to promote the effectiveness of our program. In Uganda, we finalized the paralegal toolkit, which will be rolled out to prison officers to help them understand their role in enabling prisoners’ access to justice, specifically in supporting prison staff and prisoners working as paralegals.

To counter Covid-19 disruptions in the delivery of our paralegal training program and legal services to inmates, we are deploying teleconferencing technology and internet access in the prison communities we serve. This will both allow inmates to continue benefiting from our services and Justice Defenders to deliver our legal education and training programs online, even with the logistical difficulties brought on by lockdown restrictions.

Lastly, we are investing in digital literacy to address the unfamiliarity of paralegals, clients, and judges in using digital tools. We will train them in using the software so they become more confident in navigating virtual courts. Our patron and advisor, Lord Michael Briggs, who has taken leadership around digitalization of courts in the UK as a Supreme Court judge, will be advising on the integration of technology into our programs.

1. The University of London (UoL) – UoL provides a world-class law program, which our participants can access via distance learning. Through this partnership, a total of 23 prisoners, ex-offenders, and prison staff have earned their Bachelor of Law degrees.

2 .The Commonwealth Scholarship Commission - With the partnership of the Scholarship Commission, we are able to provide unique opportunities for prison officers and judicial officials in East Africa to spend time in the UK on Secondment, offering significant professional development, and impacting the justice system in their country.

3. Kenya and Uganda Prison Services – Our partnership with state prison services in Kenya and Uganda is instrumental in the implementation of our prison-based legal services and education programs. Without their support, we would be unable to conduct operations within the prison communities we seek to serve.

4. Legal Aid Service Providers Network (LASPNET) – LASPNET is a coalition of private legal practitioners and nonprofits that works with the Justice, Law and Order sector in Uganda in order to address issues directly affecting disadvantaged communities in accessing justice. Our involvement with LASPNET facilitates our engagement with senior officials in the justice system, bringing their attention to the challenges faced by prisoners.

Our prison-based legal services and paralegal education and training program have and always will be free for prisoners. As such, Justice Defenders’ work is non-revenue generating, and is sustained by donations, grant funding, and in-kind contributions from volunteer legal practitioners.

Justice Defenders’ capacity to provide free legal services to inmates is supported by a Training-of-Trainers approach, where we capacitate prisoners and prison staff to educate other inmates on their basic rights and legal options, empowering them to represent themselves in court. 

Our work helps increase the number of court hearings and case resolutions that can be carried out, thereby supporting the decongestion of prison communities. With the threat of Covid-19 spreading in large prison populations in Kenya and Uganda, this work is more urgent than ever.

Beyond helping reduce overpopulation in prisons, our program restores agency to incarcerated people who have lost hope in the system. We build the capacity of prison communities to engage with actors and decision makers in the justice, law and order sector to shed light on the conditions in which they live and changes that could be made for a fairer criminal justice system for all. 

In this regard, our program has the transformative potential to change the way prisoners see themselves and the way society views prison communities. Our work reinstates a truth that is often distorted by the stigma of incarceration—that prisoners are human beings with human needs, and that they can still contribute to instigating positive changes in society. 

To ensure financial sustainability, we diversify our sources of funds with major donors who are willing to commit on a multi-year basis. Institutional funders and grant-making trusts tend to have a 2- or 3-year term on their grants, while individual donors can be stewarded to give for many years, with some who can potentially offer large lump sums in just one year. Our strategy to bolster our fundraising pipeline includes:

1. Developing and stewarding longstanding partnerships with our major donors and trust relationships.

2. Expanding our sources of funds for long-term work by pursuing and building relationships with more local funders in Kenya and Uganda.

3. Identifying other potential sources of income, such as exploring a business model where we charge the state for services provided by current and ex-offenders as a way to subsidize the provision of free legal services.

In the long term, our goal is to seek full government adoption of our legal services, education, and training program. We believe that buy-in from the government would be the best way forward for us to scale our social impact, with public institutions (such as prison services) delivering our program model. Once our program has been adopted by the government, Justice Defenders would then become an innovation, consulting and advocacy organization funded by private philanthropy.

Our top five funding sources for FY 2019-2020 are as follows:

1. Anonymous, an individual donor, granted an amount of $600,000
2. Anonymous, individual donors, granted an amount of $480,000
3. Democratic Governance Facility, a charitable institution, granted an amount of $151,830
4. Oldfield Trust, a charitable institution, granted an amount of $108,000
5. Google Impact Challenge, a charitable institution, granted award funding of $100,000

We are seeking to raise $174,517 in total in grants by the end of the year, which will fund the anticipated full costs of implementing smart technology solutions that will enable us to keep legal processes moving and improve our organizational capacity to create sustainable, scalable, long-term impact. Overall, we will equip prison communities with technology that will enable prisoners to continue their law education and paralegal training via online classes and to attend virtual court hearings.

Specifically, funding will go towards the following:

• Equipment and internet access (e.g. laptops, data bundles, dongles);
• Training in ICT literacy, computer literacy, and media literacy;
• The development of a case management tool, which will use mobile device management software, to track and monitor case progress and resolution;
• And salaries of program staff and support cost.

We are currently forecasting our year-end expenses as we continuously adjust and refine our program given the Covid-19 pandemic. As of our May management accounts, we estimate a total of $1,833,294 in expenses for 2020.

69% is allocated for our program-specific costs, such as funding our paralegal training and law education program for inmates. This will include salaries for program staff, monitoring and evaluation costs, and pastoral costs. As COVID restrictions have made it difficult/impossible to implement our in-prison programs at the previous capacity, we will be purchasing new computers and internet subscriptions that will allow our program participants to attend online classes and virtual hearings.

Our program expenses include our immediate and short-term Covid-19 response initiatives, specifically our bail and fines fund to facilitate the release of nonviolent offenders and the cost of purchasing sanitary items for the prisons we work with.

27% accounts for our UK operations, comprising costs of UK staff, external consultants, and staff travel and meetings. We anticipate hiring key staff positions, namely the Chief of Staff and Director of Fundraising and Communications, to strengthen organizational capacity and donor communications.

4% of our expenses will support professional fees, fundraising costs, and marketing, communication and advocacy costs.

I am applying for The Elevate Prize to bolster Justice Defenders’ fundraising capacity. If awarded, the prize money will help us reach our budget target for the activities mentioned in the previous section. More importantly, being selected as an Elevate Prize awardee will support our efforts to reach more funders.

Access to The Elevate Prize Foundation’s network of partners, executives, and decision makers will enable me to engage in knowledge exchange with other thought leaders. We can all learn from each other as we share our experiences, best practices, and strategies in implementing social impact initiatives.

Winning The Elevate Prize will also allow Justice Defenders to amplify our work to a much wider audience. Building recognition for the effectiveness of our programs will help attract more funders and in-kind contributors to support our organization. More importantly, we aim to inspire ordinary people around the world to create positive changes within their local communities, and to revisit and challenge assumptions and biases towards incarcerated individuals.

Justice Defenders needs support in raising funds that will allow us to implement technological solutions that will allow us to scale our program delivery. We seek partners who can connect us to networks of potential donors and help us discover new grant opportunities. 

We also aim to build partnerships with legal practitioners, social justice organizations, and social science researchers and academics whom we can learn from as we continue improving our program delivery and scale of social impact. Lastly, being that we are early in the process of integrating technology into our solutions and model, we are looking for partners who can help us scope this project and advise on the technical methodology of digitalization. 

We are currently working on forming partnerships with the institutions listed below to solicit in-kind contributions supporting the delivery of our legal education and training program. Working with expert volunteers from these institutions will help keep our educational content relevant and up to date with developments in legislation and legal procedure. 

• Uganda Law Society (ULS)
• Makerere University Public Interest Law Clinic (PILAC)
• Justice Centres Uganda
• Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC)
• Judicial Institute for Africa (JIFA)

We are also identifying potential partnerships to support us in the process of digitizing our legal education and training programs, both as an immediate response to Covid-19 and as a possible long-term model. For now, we are considering the below organizations to support us in developing online content and hosting it on an accessible platform.

• EDX
• MakeTimeCount (MTC)
• Content-Creatives
• EDOVO