Pencil and felt-tip pen artwork by Jesse Graham while incarcerated
A recent article in The Assembly by Sylvia A. Harvey, “A Narrow Window of Hope for People Sentenced to Die in Prison,” highlights how Emancipate NC is helping revive a long-forgotten North Carolina law that offers one of the only remaining opportunities for people sentenced to life without parole to seek relief.
The law, Review of Sentences of Life Imprisonment Without Parole, once allowed people serving life-without-parole sentences to request a sentence review after 25 years in prison. It was quietly repealed just four years later, limiting eligibility to roughly 225 people sentenced between 1994 and 1998. All have now served the required time, yet for years the opportunity went largely unnoticed.
“It was flying under everyone’s radar,” said Ian Mance, senior counsel at Emancipate NC. “No one had really thought about it too deeply.”
In 2022, Emancipate NC partnered with the North Carolina Black Alliance to launch a pilot project aimed at putting the law back into action. Emancipate NC represents eligible individuals in court, while the alliance supports the effort as part of a broader racial justice campaign focused on extreme sentencing disparities.
With no legal precedent to follow, Emancipate NC built the process from scratch, developing standards for strong petitions and guiding courts through how the statute can be applied. Petitions often include extensive documentation, evaluations, and evidence of rehabilitation, sometimes running up to 30 pages.
Despite a slow and opaque process with no guaranteed right to counsel or hearing, Emancipate NC’s work is already making an impact. One of the organization’s clients received a commutation in November, alongside others at various stages of review.
As The Assembly reports, this narrow legal window is more than a technicality. Through its leadership, Emancipate NC is turning an overlooked statute into a real opportunity for justice, accountability, and second chances.