Our Founder
Co-Founder of The Remedy Project | Founder of The Criminal Justice Realm | Justice Advocate | Strategist | Crisis Manager | Author
Dr. David Z. Simpson, h.c., is a nationally respected justice advocate and strategist who turned the trauma of wrongful incarceration into a life of purpose, service, and impact. After enduring 11 years in federal prison, facing solitary confinement and targeted retaliation for refusing to cooperate with ICE, David emerged not embittered, but deeply committed to protecting others from the injustices he experienced.
Under the mentorship of renowned jailhouse lawyer Garry Okpala, David became a highly skilled legal strategist while incarcerated, assisting in numerous criminal appeals and mastering the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Administrative Remedy Process. His effectiveness and precision made him a lifeline to many behind bars seeking accountability and relief.
Following his release in 2019, David reunited with his sons and re-entered the workforce as a highly capable electrician. He was soon selected as a Justice-in-Education Scholar at Columbia University, where he met student organizer Anna Sugrue. Together, they co-founded The Remedy Project (TRP)a national nonprofit that trains students, empowers incarcerated individuals, and mobilizes communities to fight injustice through inside-outside collaboration and the remedy process.
Today, TRP has active chapters at Columbia University, Binghamton University, UCLA, NYU, Urbana High School, and Cherry Creek High School.
David also founded The Criminal Justice Realm (TCJR), a justice consultancy and crisis management initiative. Through TCJR, he provides urgent support to individuals impacted by the legal system, offering guidance from indictment through appeal, not just during incarceration. TCJR also partners with organizations, attorneys, government officials, and nonprofits to design effective programs, solve complex legal challenges, and improve advocacy strategies nationwide.
His most recent work includes stopping the permanent civil commitment of a Jamaican national falsely labeled mentally ill, exposing government abuse and forcing accountability through strategic legal and political pressure.
David’s leadership and humanitarian contributions have been recognized at the highest levels. On May 17, 2025, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Humanitarianism by the Baltimore Global International Alliance Class of 2025. Shortly after, on June 8, 2025, SHE WINS University and We Care Baltimore, Inc. honored him with the President’s Volunteer Service & Lifetime Achievement Award for his continued service to justice, community empowerment, and human dignity.
Also, in October 2025, David became a published author with the release of The Slavery Mindset. Jim Crow Culture in the United States, a groundbreaking work that examines how historical trauma, systemic oppression, and cultural conditioning continue to shape American institutions and identity. The book offers both a personal narrative and a national call to action, laying the foundation for a broader movement to transform mindsets and dismantle the systems that uphold inequality.
As both a mentor and a movement-builder, David supports aspiring professionals, legal and non-legal alike, helping them develop the skills, values, and clarity needed to create lasting change. He leads with lived experience, unwavering integrity, and a relentless drive to defend those who are targeted, silenced, or forgotten by the system.
At the core of his work is one guiding principle: to guard, guide, and empower others with the same urgency he once needed for himself.
Our Legal Architect
Legal Mastermind & Human Rights Advocate
Okey Garry Okpala is a world-renowned legal mastermind whose brilliance was forged behind prison walls. Wrongfully convicted in 1993 and sentenced to thirty years without parole, Mr. Okpala spent nearly two decades in federal custody, where he transformed tragedy into triumph. During those years, he became a certified paralegal and one of the most accomplished self-taught legal strategists to emerge from the American prison system.
Through relentless study and unmatched intellect, Mr. Okpala mastered federal criminal, civil, and immigration law. He not only fought tirelessly for his own freedom but also dedicated himself to helping others secure theirs. His legal filings, arguments, and case strategies have led to numerous victories in U.S. District Courts and Courts of Appeals, marking him as a formidable force for justice even without formal legal credentials. Where his motions or petitions were denied, the failures were not of merit, but of a justice system too often unwilling to confront its own errors.
Perhaps one of Mr. Okpala’s greatest legal triumphs came after his release, when he single-handedly overturned his own wrongful deportation. Facing a system that had already taken his freedom, his citizenship, and his country from him, Mr. Okpala refused to accept defeat. Immigration and civil attorneys, many of them seasoned experts told him that winning such a case was impossible. Yet through his own research, legal acumen, and mastery of appellate procedure, he filed and argued his case before the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which ultimately vacated his deportation order in full.
His victory stands as a rare and extraordinary example of one man defeating the machinery of two federal systems, the Bureau of Prisons and the Department of Homeland Security, through intellect, precision, and sheer will.
Within the prison system, Mr. Okpala became a teacher and mentor to countless incarcerated individuals, guiding them to become skilled jailhouse lawyers capable of advocating for themselves and others. Among his most prominent students is David Z. Simpson, now a nationally respected justice advocate and Co-Founder of The Remedy Project, who credits Mr. Okpala as one of his earliest and most profound mentors.
Mr. Okpala’s legacy is that of a man who refused to be broken by injustice. Through intellect, discipline, and unwavering faith in truth, he emerged as a symbol of what human determination can achieve, even within a system designed to silence it. His decades of legal success, his leadership among imprisoned scholars, and his continuing advocacy for human rights have earned him respect both inside and outside the walls that once confined him.
Today, Okey Garry Okpala stands not only as a survivor of America’s prison system but as a living testament to the power of law in the hands of the oppressed, a man whose name has become synonymous with courage, legal genius, and unyielding pursuit of justice.
Our Movement Strategist
Immigration Justice Leader | Speaker | Co-Founder of the New Sanctuary Coalition
Ravi Ragbir is one of the most respected and courageous leaders in the fight for immigrant rights in the United States. A longtime permanent resident from Trinidad, Ravi’s life was upended when he was detained and targeted for deportation by ICE in retaliation for his outspoken advocacy. What followed was a years-long battle against an unjust system, one he fought not only for himself, but for millions of undocumented people living in fear.
In the face of intense persecution, Ravi became a national symbol of resistance. As Co-Founder and Executive Director of the New Sanctuary Coalition (NSC), he built a sanctuary movement rooted in radical solidarity, interfaith collaboration, and immigrant self-determination. Under his leadership, NSC mobilized thousands of volunteers, provided direct support to countless families facing detention and deportation, and transformed the landscape of immigrant defense with dignity-driven, community-led strategies.
Ravi’s voice sharp, moral, and unflinching, has echoed from the pews of churches to the halls of Congress. Driven by his commitment to the cause, he gave countless keynote speeches, media interviews, and panel presentations for free. His story and leadership inspired coverage in The New York Times, Democracy Now!, The Intercept, and other major platforms, helping to expose the cruelty and hypocrisy of the U.S. immigration system.
Our Justice Advocate
Justice Advocate | Legal Researcher | Survivor of America’s Prison System
Robert Clarke known in prior court proceedings as Lewis Brown is a formerly incarcerated justice advocate whose life embodies endurance, discipline, and the relentless pursuit of truth. Having spent nearly three decades within the American prison system, Mr. Clarke emerged not as a product of it, but as proof that the human spirit can survive even its harshest conditions.
While incarcerated, he devoted his years to studying law, particularly in the areas of criminal defense, immigration, and administrative remedies. Without formal credentials but with lived expertise, he learned from seasoned jailhouse litigators and became a voice for himself and others. He drafted motions, advised peers, and challenged unjust disciplinary actions and sentencing disparities. His work was marked by courage and precision, driven by a deep belief that no one should be silenced or discarded by a system built on human imperfection.
Mr. Clarke became especially skilled in navigating the administrative remedy process, filing and managing complex grievance and appellate procedures both for himself and others. After his release in early 2025, he joined The Remedy Project (TRP) an organization founded to help incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people fight administrative abuse and later became involved with The Criminal Justice Realm (TCJR), where he supports criminal and immigration advocacy cases.
Today, Robert Clarke channels his lived experience into constructive reform. His focus is to expose systemic failures that lead to wrongful imprisonment, unlawful deportation, and bureaucratic neglect. A survivor of the draconian drug laws that fueled mass incarceration, his story is not one of defeat, but of transformation, a testament to resilience, integrity, and the enduring passion for justice.
His journey is a reminder that redemption and reform are not born from privilege, but from courage and that even within oppression, truth can still prevail.
Criminal Justice Realm Productions is the media and education arm of The Criminal Justice Realm, a YouTube channel created to expose injustice, expand understanding, and teach the public how America’s justice system truly works.
Through this platform, Dr. David Z. Simpson and his team use storytelling, analysis, and on-camera instruction to make knowledge accessible to everyone. The channel is both a classroom and a watchtower, a place where truth and strategy meet.
One of its core initiatives is training students, families, and advocates in the Administrative Remedy Program, the formal process used to challenge abuse, neglect, and rights violations inside the Federal Bureau of Prisons. These videos offer step-by-step education on how to file, follow, and complete remedies effectively, empowering viewers to advocate on behalf of themselves or others.
Beyond procedural training, Criminal Justice Realm Productions also explores the deeper layers of the American condition, its programming, its culture, and the invisible mindset that shapes how justice is defined and delivered. Through interviews, commentary, and visual storytelling, the channel brings light to the dark spaces of policy, power, and human experience.
Every episode carries the same purpose that defines The Criminal Justice Realm itself: to transform knowledge into power, awareness into action, and observation into reform.
Criminal Justice Realm Productions, educating, exposing, and empowering through truth and light.
Every symbol tells a story, ours tells the truth behind justice.
“From darkness, we bring light.”
The Criminal Justice Realm logo is more than an image, it is a message. It tells the story of what we stand for and what we exist to do.
In the background of the logo stand three buildings: the FBI Headquarters to the left, the Supreme Court of the United States in the center, and a federal prison to the right. Each represents a pillar of America’s justice system ,investigation, judgment, and punishment. They stand side by side, symbolizing how deeply connected these institutions are.
Together, they sit beneath a dark sky, a deliberate choice showing how the system too often operates: cold, shadowed, and without light. The courtyard before them is dark, representing the uncertain ground faced by those within it.
But at the front of this darkness stands a bronze-skinned hand, raised high above the gate that separates the people from the halls of power. In that hand burns a torch of light, the light of truth, justice, and human dignity.
Surrounding the flame are two halos inscribed with The Criminal Justice Realm. They represent enlightenment and guidance, orbiting the torch to show that this light is living in motion, reaching outward.
The torch itself symbolizes hope and clarity, the guiding light that helps people find their way through the darkest corners of the justice system. It stands for every person, every family, and every advocate who refuses to let injustice have the final word.
The Criminal Justice Realm is that light, born from darkness, built to guide others through it. It represents the belief that even in a system built on fear, there can still be understanding, truth, and change.
From darkness, we bring light. From confusion, we bring clarity. From injustice, we bring remedy.
Discover resources and join the movement for justice
Discover the groundbreaking book by Dr. David Z. Simpson that exposes how America's system of control still operates through modern institutions.
Available in:
• eBook(Amazon)
• Paperback
Curious about the Criminal Justice Realm movement? Learn how we're transforming justice, empowering communities, and building freedom through collective action.
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Remedying the human rights crisis that IS the United States prison system.
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