Claudia Salinas (second from left) with some of her colleagues.
Since childhood, Claudia Salinas took the side of justice to turn it into her life’s mission.
“I must have been five years old when I started defending my sister or others who needed help. I felt it was my duty to help them, to defend them,” says Claudia, laughing, a lawyer at The Innocence Center, a non-profit organization that seeks to provide legal assistance to those who have been wrongly accused of various crimes and are imprisoned.
“Growing up, I saw how one of my uncles went in and out of prison, and we didn’t have the necessary help, we didn’t have resources to hire a lawyer. So one day, I must have been around seven, I stood up to my father and said, ‘when I grow up, I’ll be a lawyer.’ I think it made him laugh, but I was very determined,” says Salinas, born in Fresno and now based in San Diego.
With her passion for justice, one of the things she likes most about her job is that they can really help innocent people.
“Many times, after a meeting in jail with them, I feel bad. Seeing them stay there, while we can leave, with all those stories, thinking about the legal options, remembering their eyes, their desperation.”
“Many people don’t believe in what we do, they have given up, others simply don’t trust the system. We have proven to them that it is worth making this effort, showing that injustice has been done to certain people in prison and they can be set free,” she says.
Claudia has breathed the world of law throughout her life. Working as a volunteer in various organizations, as an assistant to politicians, in the District Attorney’s office – “just to see what it feels like on the other side,” she says – and many more. She spent almost five years at the California Innocence Project and now, she is part of The Innocence Center.
“It’s something that I am passionate about. It can be very difficult, very rewarding, but also very intense. A case can take years to reach its conclusion, sometimes positively and, other times, without achieving a release,” she adds.
What we experience, there (in prison visits) we have to be careful, we have to activate our self-care, take care of ourselves,” she says.
This lawyer says it is very difficult to solve these types of cases and even romanticize about them.
“When I tell people that I work in this field, they look at me strangely or with curiosity. This area of the law that seeks to free innocent people is seen in movies, documentaries, in the press. They are perfect stories to tell and provide hope, but in reality, they are very difficult. I try to be very honest. I tell the petitioners what their possibilities are, if they are minimal I also tell them. That’s tough,” she says.
For her, there are two fundamental factors in these cases: time and evidence.
Sometimes so much time has passed that it is difficult to verify the history of a case and when people or documents are sought, they have been lost, do not exist, and there is no way to gather evidence, which practically can dismiss a case.
“I leave and get into the car, turn off the computer and the phone. This can be secondary trauma, what we experience, there we have to be careful, we have to activate our self-care, take care of ourselves.”
She could have dedicated her legal career to other perhaps more lucrative and less intense areas, but that feeling that arose in her at the age of five has led her to practice and feel positive about these types of cases.
“My parents support me in everything, they have never questioned me. I know they were very emotional when I graduated. For them, helping people is a positive thing,” she says. “This work is valuable because of the stories, we are not looking for economic satisfaction precisely.”
There are two pieces of advice she communicates to her clients: to maintain hope and to be realistic. For her, being aware of the cases can cause less harm if false expectations of a possible exoneration are not built.
“We are doing good work, we have improved, but considering that California is one of the states with the most people in prisons, the tools and organizations available are not enough. The problems with California are that it has a huge police force and its population is very large, hence these numbers,” she says.
One of the advances in innocence investigations has been provided by scientific advances to analyze cases and DNA, previously, without that, an accusation was based on crime witnesses who often may have created a supposed scenario or mistaken the supposed culprits.
One of the things she enjoys most about her job is the interaction with her clients.
“Lately, there is nothing more satisfying than seeing a person free, sharing their first meal with them, with their family. For me, going to jails, questioning them, talking with them, fills me with satisfaction. There they are, with hope, seeing us, you see that hope in their faces, as if saying, ‘finally there is someone who believes me’,” says Claudia.
But there is also the other side, when the necessary information cannot be obtained, when it is known that they are innocent but there are no legal tools to exonerating them.
“Many times, after a meeting in jail with them, I feel bad. Seeing them stay there, while we can leave, with all those stories, thinking about the legal options, remembering their eyes, their desperation. It can be too much. Many times, I leave and get into the car, turn off the computer and the phone. This can be secondary trauma, what we experience, there we have to be careful, we have to activate our self-care, take care of ourselves,” she finally says.
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