Redemption Earned, an organization providing legal representation and reentry support for elderly and infirmed people in Alabama’s overcrowded prison system, announced Wednesday it has been awarded the 2025 J.M.K. Innovation Prize. Following a nationwide search for early-stage projects with transformative potential, the J.M. Kaplan Fund awards the biennial Prize to ten innovators tackling urgent issues in the fields of social justice, the environment, and heritage conservation. Awardees receive $175,000 each and join a collaborative designed to help navigate critical phases of growth and impact.
“By serving those who have earned parole but remain unfairly incarcerated despite age and infirmity, Redemption Earned offers a path toward justice and fiscal responsibility in one of the nation’s most troubled prison systems,” said Julia Bator, executive director of the J.M. Kaplan Fund. “Their work reflects the courage and purpose at the heart of the J.M.K. Innovation Prize, and we are thrilled to support them over the coming years.”
Founded in 2021 by former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb and the late Judge Teresa Pulliam, Redemption Earned works to address a crisis within Alabama’s prison system. In 2020, the U.S. Department of Justice sued the Alabama Department of Corrections, arguing that the state’s facilities were so overcrowded, understaffed and unsafe that they violated constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment. Designed for 12,000 people, Alabama’s state prisons hold more than 20,000 individuals, with mortality rates four times the national average. Nonetheless, despite court-ordered reforms, the state’s parole board grants parole to fewer than 20 percent of eligible applicants.
This systemic bottleneck has created a particularly dire situation for older incarcerated people. Alabama held just five medical parole hearings last year, even as the number of incarcerated people over age 60 approaches 3,000—a population that has grown more than 500 percent since 2000. Entire dorms and infirmaries now function as de facto nursing homes, straining already unsafe facilities.
Redemption Earned focuses on this growing and largely invisible population: elderly and infirm people eligible for parole who have served decades, present minimal risk to public safety, and have complex medical needs. Working in a politically challenging environment, the organization has built trust and forged partnerships across Alabama’s Department of Corrections, parole board, nursing homes and law schools. To date, Redemption Earned has secured the release of 42 people, reviewed over 350 cases, and provided legal representation, reentry planning, and placement in nursing homes or safe housing.
“It is pure injustice to continue incarcerating elderly, infirm, and dying people who are no longer a danger to the public and were granted the option of parole at sentencing,” said former Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb. “The J.M.K. Innovation Prize will allow us to expand our staff capacity to meet rising demand and help to replicate our model in other states grappling with similar crises.”
The organization is now in conversation with partners in Arkansas, Florida and Georgia exploring opportunities to adapt the Redemption Earned model across the South.
Now in its tenth year, the J.M.K. Innovation Prize honors organizations pioneering transformative approaches to complex challenges in the fields of heritage conservation, the environment and social justice. This year’s milestone cycle drew a record 3,790 applications, underscoring the growing need for philanthropic support of untested but promising ideas, the organization shared.
The 2025 winners join a national network of 60 past recipients who continue to collaborate and learn from one another through convenings, mentorship and strategic guidance provided by the J.M. Kaplan Fund.
For more information on Redemption Earned, visit redemptionearned.org. To learn more about the 2025 J.M.K. Innovation Prize and to watch a video interview with Chief Justice Cobb, visit jmkfund.org/awardee/sue-bell-cobb.
