Clive Stafford Smith is a British civil rights attorney who currently works diligently to dismantle the death penalty in the United States of America; helping to overturn death sentences for nearly 300 convicts.  He also helped to found both the non-profit Louisiana Capital Assistance Center in New Orleans and the Gulf Region Advocacy Center in Houston.  In addition, Smith has represented more than 100 of the detainees held as enemy combatants at the U.S. Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba.

 

In August of 2004, Smith returned from the U.S. to live and work in the United Kingdom, where he is the Legal Director of the UK branch of Reprieve, a global non-profit human rights  organization that is also opposed to the death penalty (it also fights against the transgressions that regularly take place in secret prisons).  In 2005 he received the Gandhi International Peace Award for his efforts, and for his ethics.

 

“If we become an accomplice to criminal activities by the American government, then we are liable along with it … I don’t understand the idea of compassion fatigue. I mean, would you rather spend your life focused on pointless vengeance or would you rather focus it on compassion? I don’t think you can get compassion fatigue, I think compassion is what life’s all about … I think we should use whatever power we have to try to help people who need our help.” ~ via Clive Stafford Smith

Filed under: In LOVE with Humanity by Scaughdt