Who we are

Amicus is a small legal charity which helps provide representation for those facing the death penalty in the United States.  We were founded in 1992 in memory of Andrew Lee Jones, who was executed by the state of Louisiana in 1991.

We believe the death penalty is disproportionately imposed on the most vulnerable in society, violating their right to due process and the concept of equal justice before the law.  We are not a campaigning organisation.  We believe we can make the greatest difference through active involvement in frontline work.  Our mission is to provide better access to justice for those who could not otherwise afford it.

The quality of representation in a capital trial is literally a matter of life and death.  Capital defence lawyers in the US are generally overworked and underpaid.  Some are also woefully inexperienced and a significant number of US citizens have gone to their deaths because of poor legal representation.  Our internship programme sends 20-30 trained interns out to the US every year to carry out vital work that would not get done without them.  Our casework programme provides additional remote support from here in the UK.  In addition, we run a twice yearly training programme on US capital law, we organise a range of awareness raising and fund raisising events and we publish the Amicus journal. 

Our founder, Jane Officer, was a retired school teacher who joined the penfriend organisation Lifelines after seeing the BBC death row documentary 14 Days in May.  In 1990 she received Andrew Lee Jones' name as a penfriend and started writing to him.  They gradually formed a strong friendship and Jane travelled to Louisiana to speak at Andrew's pardon board hearing and to be with him on the day of his execution.

After Andrew's death, Jane set up the Andrew Lee Jones Fund, which awarded scholarships to British and American law students who were interested in capital defence.  Over the years, Jane's small group of committed volunteers evolved into Amicus.  We now have an office in London with three Directors managing our activities.  Our Board of Trustees includes members of the original Andrew Lee Jones Fund founding committee and Jane Officer is now one of our patrons.

Our founder, Jane Officer, speaking about the history of Amicus.

Read the story of
 Andrew Lee Jones

Meet the Amicus Team
 Our Team 

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