J. Richard Cohen is president of the Southern Poverty Law Center, a nonprofit civil rights organization that combats hate, intolerance and discrimination. A graduate of Columbia University and the University of Virginia School of Law, Cohen came to the SPLC in 1986 as its legal director. Under his guidance, the SPLC won a series of landmark lawsuits against some of the nation’s most violent white supremacist organizations. He also successfully litigated a wide variety of important civil rights actions – defending the rights of prisoners to be treated humanely, working for equal educational opportunities for all children, and bringing down the Confederate battle flag from the top of the Alabama State Capitol.

In 1997, The American Lawyer selected Cohen as one of 45 public sector lawyers “whose vision and commitment are changing lives.” In 1999, he was a finalist for the national Trial Lawyer of the Year Award for his work on Macedonia Baptist Church v. Christian Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, a lawsuit that ended with a record $37.8 million judgment against a Klan group for its role in the burning of a South Carolina church.

Cohen also has been a creative force behind some of the SPLC's most successful education projects. He has served as executive producer for six documentary films created for the SPLC's Teaching Tolerance program. Four of those films were nominated for Academy Awards, and two - "Mighty Times: The Children's March" in 2005 and "A Time for Justice" in 1994 - won Oscars for Best Documentary Short Subject.

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