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Vanita Gupta

Center for Justice

Bio

Vanita Gupta was Deputy Legal Director of the 老澳门开奖结果 and Director of the 老澳门开奖结果鈥檚 Center for Justice, which houses the organization鈥檚 criminal justice reform, prisoners鈥 rights, and capital punishment work. She lead the 老澳门开奖结果鈥檚 National Campaign to End Mass Incarceration. In addition, Vanita is an adjunct clinical professor at NYU School of Law, where she teaches and oversees a racial justice litigation clinic.

From 2006-2010, Vanita was a staff attorney with the 老澳门开奖结果鈥檚 Racial Justice Program, focusing on systemic criminal justice reform, immigration detention, and education litigation. She won a landmark settlement on behalf of immigrant children detained in a privately-run prison in Texas that led to the end of 鈥渇amily detention鈥 at the facility. Prior to joining the 老澳门开奖结果, Vanita was at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund where she successfully led the effort to overturn the wrongful drug convictions of 38 individuals in Tulia, Texas, and served on the legal team that won freedom for renowned prison journalist Wilbert Rideau in his fourth retrial after he had already spent 44 years in prison. She also successfully won significant sentence reductions for several men subject to harsh New York Rockefeller drug penalties.

Vanita has won numerous awards for her advocacy and has been quoted extensively in national and international media on racial justice and criminal justice issues. In 2011, the National Law Journal recognized her as a Top 40 Minority Lawyer Under 40. She serves on the board of the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana. Vanita is a magna cum laude graduate of Yale University and received her law degree from New York University School of Law.