The New England Innocence Project ("NEIP") provides pro bono legal assistance to inmates who are challenging their wrongful convictions. The organization's mission is to identify, investigate and exonerate wrongfully convicted individuals who are currently incarcerated in New England. NEIP currently focuses on the use of DNA evidence to achieve these goals. Over the past ten years, more than 150 individuals in the United States have had their convictions vacated after DNA testing established that they were innocent of the crimes for which they had been convicted and imprisoned. NEIP considers cases from Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont, Connecticut and Rhode Island in which actual innocence is claimed.

In addition to its work on behalf of individual inmates, the NEIP also supports legal reform that will hasten the identification and release of innocent prisoners and ensure that wrongful convictions are, to the extent possible, prevented in the future. For instance, with corrective legislation and improved training for law enforcement, some of the most frequent causes of wrongful convictions, such as eyewitness misidentification, can be decreased.