• Position Title: Chief Executive Officer, Capital Punishment Justice Project
• Reports to: Chairperson and Vice Chairperson, Capital Punishment Justice Project
• Date prepared: July 2022
• Location: Australia-based (please note that the successful candidate would ideally be located in Melbourne but cpjp is flexible on location in Australia)

About Capital Punishment Justice Project

Capital Punishment Justice Project (CPJP) (formerly Reprieve Australia) is an NGO that stands for a world without the death penalty. We work with our partner organisations, volunteers, our Board, the Australian public and key stakeholders to develop legal and policy solutions that will help save lives.

CPJP (formerly Reprieve Australia) was founded in Melbourne, Australia, in 2001 by criminal barristers Richard Bourke and Nick Harrington to provide legal representation and humanitarian assistance to those at risk of execution.

CPJP supports partner organisations, institutions and advocates (including lawyers) in the Asia Pacific region to assist those facing the death penalty and to promote its abolition.

In recent years, CPJP and Monash University formed joint venture, Eleos Justice, which is emerging as the region’s leading evidence-based anti-death penalty research hub.

CPJP’s Board is led by Chairperson Stephen Keim SC and Vice Chairperson Sara Kowal. We have 8 Board members who voluntarily oversee CPJP’s work. We operate on a small but growing budget comprised of donations and grants, which covers our HR, case work, humanitarian support, advocacy and policy work, educational work, administrative and travel costs.

CPJP’s work is more needed than ever. Australia is one of the very few safe bases from which to do abolitionist work in the Asia Pacific region. For this reason, our partners throughout the region depend on CPJP to carry out our work, which is supportive of their caseloads and specific challenges as human rights defenders. Our approach is to be flexible in the ways we assist and to be led by local experts.

Pillars of CPJP’s work

Casework: providing substantial assistance to persons facing the death penalty in the form of legal expertise, advocacy, humanitarian assistance, support on diplomacy, and support to family members of death eligible persons (here is a recent example in which our work was highlighted in Australian Parliament).

Advocacy: advocating on behalf of individuals at risk of execution/state-sanctioned killing, their lawyers, the local anti-death penalty activists and organisations. We also advocate on the position Australia takes regarding the death penalty more broadly.

Policy: working to ensure that Australia's Strategy for Abolition of the Death Penalty is properly implemented.

Education: hosting and supporting in Australia and the Asia Pacific region training and other initiatives aimed at challenging the death penalty and deepening relationships with anti-death penalty organisations, lawyers and advocates, so as to support their work. We support a range of different training initiatives to help upskill and train the next generation of capital defence lawyers in the region.

Our key strategies promote and support positive engagement with other NGOs and members of civil society from around the region, enabling a more coordinated campaign against the death penalty.

CPJP is a member of the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, and the Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network (ADPAN).

Chief Executive Officer

CPJP is looking to appoint a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) to replace our outgoing CEO. This is an exciting opportunity to lead a well-established Australian NGO to a new level of potential impact.

The CEO will need to be: innovative, proactive, have sound judgment and be culturally sensitive; familiar with the issues with which CPJP works and the anti-death penalty landscape; and experienced in NGO management. They will need to work independently and be highly motivated; oversee the work of some large institutional projects with clear timelines, deliverables and reporting requirements; manage a skilled consultant tasked with leading on specific projects; work with a volunteer board physically dispersed; and be proactive in seeking out funding opportunities to resource CPJP’s growing workload. Most importantly, the CEO needs to be firmly aligned with and committed to the core values of CPJP.

Please review the attached job description and person specification and follow the application instructions in order to apply.