Lorenzo Johnson

45, Voice of the Innocent

I spent 22 years in prisons for wrongful conviction. From 1995 to 2017. 

My case included prosecution misconduct, police misconduct, a grave case of legal deficiency

During your time in prison who were the Black revolutionaries or Black revolutionary moments that you would reference to get you through those years knowing you were innocent?

As I got my GED, I started taking college courses during that time. I was reading books by Mumia Abu-Jamal, George Jackson and Eldridge Cleaver. All the revolutionaries that we look up to who changed the course of history and made us love each other more. 

As I'm reading these books a fire comes in you. I saw the struggle that they went through.

I had a natural life sentence.  

People hear “Black Panther” and they get spooked out. They immediately think, oh, it's racist, you know? Nah, it’s just educating your people, uplifting your peoples but people get the wrong [idea] because  they're bearing arms. Well if somebody else said bears arms it wouldn't be no problem. Like presidents get elected [based on the right] to bear arms and right to protect your family. But when some Black people say it, why you don't want them to protect themselves?

Mass incarceration [has] been in existence. It changed from plantations to prisons. We’re not just talking about wrongful conviction, we’re talking about people that's getting unnecessary hits on parole boards. We're talking about the racial disparity and sentences where Black and Hispanic get a bigger sentence than somebody that's from a rich neighborhood where they'll go to a program for the day. They won't even have a record after that, where me or you, will have to go get bail. We got a charge, we're going to get parole or probation if we don't beat this. This is designed to stop you from progressing, voting, job[s]. 

You don't have to be a big name to be a revolutionary. I met some revolutionaries that people never heard about and they circled, they keeping it going. When I see Black Panthers, when I see George Jackson, I just see people that refuse to let society put Blacks in a pigeonhole. 

Going back to that fire in your stomach can you tell us some of the names of the books that really fed that fire in your stomach? That revolutionized your mind. 

The books that revolutionized my mind. There's so many. I don't want to leave nothing out. So I'll throw a couple out there. You got Live from Death Row from Mumia. That was a book. You know another book that spoke on a lot of things I was already spoken about was Michelle Alexander: The New Jim Crow.

But it was a book before The New Jim Crow that was written by  Connie Rice’s Power Concedes Nothing. 

 Blood In My Eyes, George Jackson, Soul on Ice,  Eldridge Cleaver.  We've been oppressed for a long time. In my situation, I was innocent so I had to fight against my oppressor at the time. My oppressor was a crooked judicial system that got me jammed up.  I ended up spending more than two decades in prison. My way of life changed, things that used to make me smile didn't make me smile anymore because I knew what was behind that free lunch. 

“Revolution is…”

Revolution is never giving up. Revolution is keeping up the good fight. Revolution is not turning your back on your people that need you. Revolution is not folding under pressure when you're being oppressed in any way. The revolution is not just in prison. The revolution we fight for every day is here on the streets,  when we go to try to get a job. When we try to raise our kids or when our kids go to school. They're not being taught our history. They're being taught their history. So, revolution to me is, you know, love your people and by wanting the best for your people, you're going to do different for your people from the people before you.