Join us for a discussion of Phoebe Zerwick's new book, Beyond Innocence: The Life Sentence of Darryl Hunt
Saturday, May 28, 2022 @ 1:00 pm - 2:30 pm | Hanes House
Presented in conjunction with our current exhibition, Sherrill Roland: The Odds, this discussion will explore the wrongful conviction and exoneration of Darryl Hunt, and offer insight into the lifelong impacts of incarceration.
This program will begin with a brief guided tour of Sherrill Roland: The Odds, followed by a discussion with Phoebe Zerwick. Copies of Beyond Innocence: The Life Sentence of Darryl Hunt will be available or purchase.
Free and open to the public.
About Beyond Innocence: The Life Sentence of Darryl Hunt
Darryl Hunt is a seminal figure in the annals of wrongful convictions, both for what he endured and for his remarkable legacy. A young Black man falsely accused of murdering a white woman in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and sentenced to life in prison, he spent 19 years behind bars before his tireless attorneys were able to prove his innocence. After his exoneration in 2004, as depicted in the acclaimed documentary, The Trials of Darryl Hunt, Hunt became a national advocate for social justice, devoted himself to alleviating the "civil death" almost every ex-prisoner faces upon re-entry into society, and in time inspired lasting reforms, among them a law that allows those on death row to appeal their sentence with evidence of racial bias and a state agency unique to North Carolina that investigates and adjudicates claims of innocence. He was a beacon of hope for so many—until he could no longer bear the burden of the injustice he had experienced and in 2016 took his own life.
Phoebe Zerwick had investigated Hunt's case as a newspaper reporter for the Winston-Salem Journal in a series of articles that led to his DNA exoneration. Deeply troubled at his death by the idea that she and others who fought for Hunt's freedom had missed something, she set out to understand the full story of Hunt's life