Civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump, who represented George Floyd's family, to speak

RICHMOND, Ind. — "Black America's Attorney General" is coming to Richmond. Well, kind of.

According to an Earlham College release, Benjamin Crump, a renowned civil rights and personal injury lawyer, will be the keynote speaker during an online Martin Luther King, Jr. Day event at 7 p.m. Jan. 16. The event, which is free and open to the public, is co-sponsored by Earlham College, Indiana University East and the Richmond chapter of the NAACP.

Crump will reflect on the life and legacy of King in a celebration that will be the first of a series of to honor events Earlham’s 175th anniversary in 2022.

Crump's name is attached to some of the biggest Black Lives Matter Movement cases of the last decade. Most recently, he represented the family of George Floyd, who was killed by a police officer in May 2020.

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He also has represented the families of Trayvon Martin, who was killed by a neighborhood watch volunteer in Sanford, Florida, in 2012; Michael Brown, who was killed by a law enforcement officer in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014; and Stephon Clark, who was killed by police officers in Sacramento, California, in 2018. Additionally, he represented nine of the 13 black women who were victims in the Holtzclaw Oklahoma City Police sexual assault case in 2015 and worked on the precedent-setting U.S. Supreme Court case involving excessive police force against Robbie Tolan in 2008, according to a news release.

“Benjamin Crump’s unwavering commitment to social justice activism is a reminder of our responsibilities as individuals in fighting for a more just, safe and free society for all in 21st century United States,” Womai Song, Earlham College assistant professor of African and African American Studies and facilitator of the Jan. 16 virtual event, said in the release. “In the context of the challenges that we continue to face as a nation, I am exhilarated to join this extraordinary man in what promises to be a thought-provoking conversation in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.”

The president of the National Civil Rights Trial Lawyers Association, Crump previously served as president of the National Bar Association and was the first African-American chair of the Florida State University College of Law Board of Directors. He currently serves on the Innocence Project Board of Directors and is the founder and director of the Benjamin Crump Social Justice Institute.

Crump has received the NAACP Thurgood Marshall Award, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference Martin Luther King Servant Leader Award, the American Association for Justice Johnnie Cochran Award and the Alpha Kappa Alpha Eleanor Roosevelt Medallion for Service.

For more information on the Richmond event in January, contact Yemi Mahoney, IU East’s chief diversity officer and special assistant to the chancellor, at ymahoney@iu.edu or 765-973-8474.

Zach Piatt reports on sports and education for The Palladium-Item. Contact him at zpiatt@gannett.com or on Twitter @zachpiatt13.

This article originally appeared on Richmond Palladium-Item: George Floyd's family attorney to speak at virtual MLK event