Anthony Ray Hinton - The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row

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For my mother, Buhlar Hinton.

May we all learn to love as unconditionally as she did.

O n April 3, 2015, Anthony Ray Hinton was released from prison after spending nearly thirty years in solitary confinement on Alabamas death row. Mr. Hinton is one of the longest-serving condemned prisoners facing execution in America to be proved innocent and released. Most of us cant possibly imagine what it feels like to be arrested, accused of something horrible, imprisoned, wrongly convicted because we dont have the money needed to defend ourselves, and then condemned to execution. For most people, its simply inconceivable. Yet, its important that we understand that it happens in America and that more of us need to do something to prevent it from happening again.

Mr. Hinton grew up poor and black in rural Alabama. He learned to be a keen and thoughtful observer of the harsh realities of Jim Crow segregation and the way racial bias constrained the lives of people of color. He was taught by his remarkable mother to never see race or judge people because of their color. He resisted mightily the notion that he was arrested, charged, and wrongly convicted because of his race, but he ultimately couldnt accept any other explanation. He was a poor man in a criminal justice system that treats you better if you are rich and guilty than if you are poor and innocent.

He is blessed with an extraordinary sense of humor, which he relies on to overcome the racial barriers that condemn so many. He lived with his mother until he was in his late twenties and worked as a contract laborer. He had never been accused of a violent act before his arrest.

One night while he was locked in a supermarket warehouse cleaning floors in Bessemer, Alabama, a restaurant manager fifteen miles away was abducted, robbed, and shot by a single gunman as he left work. The victim survived and later misidentified Mr. Hinton as the person whod robbed him. Despite the fact that Mr. Hinton was working in a secure facility with a guard who recorded everyones arrival and departure, miles from the crime scene, police went to the home of Mr. Hintons mother, where they retrieved an old .38 caliber pistol. Alabama state forensic workers asserted this recovered gun was not only used in this recent robbery and attempted murder but also two other murders in the Bessemer area where restaurant managers had been robbed and killed at closing. Based on this gun evidence, Mr. Hinton was arrested and indicted for both murders, and State prosecutors announced they would seek the death penalty. Mr. Hinton passed a polygraph examination administered by police that confirmed his innocence, but State officials ignored this information and his alibi and persisted in obtaining two convictions and death sentences.

At trial, Mr. Hintons appointed lawyer failed to obtain a competent expert to rebut the States false claims about his mothers gun. For fourteen years, he could not obtain the legal help he needed to prove his innocence. I met Mr. Hinton in 1999, and he made quite an impression. Thoughtful, sincere, genuine, compassionate, funny, it was easy to want to help Anthony Ray Hinton, although it was worrisome to think how difficult it might prove to win his freedom.

I worked with my staff at the Equal Justice Initiative to engage three of the nations top firearms examiners, who all testified that the gun obtained from Mr. Hintons mother could not be matched to the crime evidence. It took fourteen more years of contested litigation and a rare unanimous ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court before Mr. Hinton was released in 2015. During his time on Alabamas death row, Mr. Hinton watched fifty-four men walk past his door on their way to be executed. The execution chamber was thirty feet from his cell.

Mr. Hinton was sustained during his long years on Alabamas death row by a childhood friend who never failed to visit him over the course of nearly thirty years. Lester Bailey insisted that Mr. Hinton never feel alone or abandoned. Mr. Hinton learned to engage those around him and create an identity on death row unlike anything Ive ever seen. Not only did he shape the lives of dozens of other death row prisoners but also those of correctional officers who sought Mr. Hintons advice and counsel on everything from marriage and faith to the struggles of day-to-day life.

While his case created years of disappointment and frustration for Mr. Hinton and cost me many sleepless nights after each adverse legal ruling, we both could be frequently seen bowled over with laughter in the visitation room at Holman State Prison. Such is the extraordinary power of Ray Hinton and his remarkable spirit.

Ive visited countless prisons and jails to see hundreds of clients during the course of my career. Im usually ignored or merely tolerated by correctional staff during these visits. There have been times when I have been harassed or challenged by prison staff who seem to resent incarcerated people getting legal visits. Visiting Ray Hinton was unlike any other legal visit for me. Never have more guards, correctional staff, and prison workers pulled me aside to offer assistance or question me about how they could help than during the many years I have worked with Ray. I have never experienced anything like it.

I have represented scores of condemned prisoners during my thirty years of law practice. Many of my clients were innocent people wrongly convicted or condemned. However, no one I have represented has inspired me more than Anthony Ray Hinton, and I believe his compelling and unique story will similarly inspire our nation and readers all over the world.

Reading his story is difficult but necessary. We need to learn things about our criminal justice system, about the legacy of racial bias in America and the way it can blind us to just and fair treatment of people. We need to understand the dangers posed by the politics of fear and anger that create systems like our capital punishment system and the political dynamics that have made some courts and officials act so irresponsibly. We also need to learn about human dignity, about human worth and value. We need to think about the fact that we are all more than the worst thing we have done. Anthony Ray Hintons story helps us understand some of these problems and ultimately what it means to survive, to overcome, and to forgive.

Since his release, Mr. Hinton has become an extraordinary public speaker, and he has had a life-changing impact on the audiences who hear him. He is rare in his ability to mix humor, deep emotion, and compelling storytelling to move people to share his agonizing but ultimately triumphant journey. His message of forgiveness is transformative, and Ive seen him inspire groups of people as diverse as hardened police chiefs and prosecutors to young at-risk teens and students.

His story is one of forgiveness, friendship, and triumph. It is situated amid racism, poverty, and an unreliable criminal justice system. Mr. Hinton presents the narrative of a condemned man shaped by a painful and torturous journey around the gates of death, who nonetheless remains hopeful, forgiving, and faithful. This book is something of a miracle, because there were many moments when I believe both of us feared he would never survive to tell his story. We should be grateful that he did survive, because his witness, his life, his journey is an unforgettable inspiration.