Southern Center for Human Rights

The Southern Center for Human Rights is working for equality, dignity, and justice for people impacted by the criminal legal system in the Deep South. SCHR fights for a world free from mass incarceration, the death penalty, the criminalization of poverty, and racial injustice.

We envision a world in which the legal system is used not as a tool to concentrate power and control but instead as an instrument of true justice by which individuals and communities remain accountable to each other.

Goal One: End extreme sentencing in criminal legal cases

Goal Two: Expose, challenge, and eliminate inhumane prison and jail conditions, including ending solitary confinement.

Goal Three: Eliminate wealth-based detention and financial incentives for correctional control, including cash bail and private probation.

The Southern Center for Human Rights has invested in leadership development in the following ways: Executive coaching from The Management Center for SCHR's Executive Director and Deputy Director; Management training for SCHR's managers and supervisors through The Management Center; Conflict Management training for staff; and Training, coaching, and resources for staff and board through Resilia.

The Southern Center for Human Rights (SCHR) has experienced significant leadership transition. In 2021, SCHR lost our Public Policy Director due to her sudden death. That same year, Sara J. Totonchi, who had served as SCHR's Executive Director for eleven years, transitioned to a new position outside the organization. In 2022, SCHR’s new Executive Director, Terrica Redfield Ganzy, who had previously served as Deputy Director, took the helm of the organization and promoted SCHR’s Impact Litigation Director, Atteeyah Hollie, to Deputy Director and SCHR’s Movement Policy Counsel, Tiffany Williams Roberts, to Public Policy Director. For the first time in the organization’s history, SCHR became a Black-led organization. To ensure these leaders had the tools they need to successfully lead the organization through this transition, SCHR has invested significantly in organizational leadership and development. Through grant funding, we have been able to engage coaching for our executive leadership, management training for managers and supervisors, and capacity coaching and a myriad of resources for our entire staff and board through a LeadersTrust Flexible Leadership Award. We have also partnered with pro bono volunteers to help develop branding and marketing tools and practices. We have adapted to the external challenge of a trend toward failed "tough on crime" policies, criminalization of protest, and fear-based crime narratives by strenghening our coalition partnerships to increase our collective power to advocate for change, establishing the First Amendment Lawyer Bridge, a project designed to ensure that people arrested for expressing dissent are paired with attorneys, educating media through our Movement Law School for Journalists program, and educating the public through publishing opinion pieces and hosting townhalls, symposia, and webinars.