The influential Harvard Law professor and civil rights scholar Charles Ogletree has died at the age of 70. At one of the country’s most prominent law schools, he taught the future president and first lady, Barack and Michelle Obama. He also represented Anita Hill when she accused U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment, defended rapper Tupac Shakur in criminal and civil cases, and fought for reparations for survivors of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre.

In 2010, Ogletree joined us on Democracy Now! to discuss his book, “The Presumption of Guilt: The Arrest of Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Race, Class and Crime in America.”

Charles Ogletree: “The title, 'The Presumption of Guilt,' is to remind us we presume guilty of some people without knowing the facts. We do it based on race, on class, on clothing, on where you drive, where you walk, where you shop, where you eat. And that’s why 'The Presumption of Guilt' is the title, to remind people, let’s not make judgments about people. Let’s judge them by, as I said before, the content of their character, not skin color. That’s the problem.”