teeeighteen tell us about your background and how you came to represent your clients. >> guest: i am so pleased that abbe smith included me in the book but i was inspired by my grandfather's legacy as a civil rights advocate came of age in the '60s in mississippi with the naacp and voters league and they were -- he was targeted before i was born and then i went to law school i started to look into lew the law and wanted to practice working on a class-action peace that was my first real exposure to the criminal-justice system and i saw a lot of parallels pacific cisco is less than 5% of the population by yet of majority of clients were black and ran the gamut with those with serious offenses working on behalf of clients at every stage of felony i was inspired to do this kind of work and spent time at a clinic in moscow as a defender clinic and almost every single one of the clients was is african american with the most petty offenses you could kick a soccer ball at a police officer and snowballs being thrown kids being charged with assault with a dangerous weapon there are things that