In 2001, McKinley shot and killed Abdo Serna-Ibarra, a 23-year-old man, during a fight. McKinley, then a member of a gang, was 16. The victim was on his way to play soccer at a park in Chicago when the fight broke out.
“It was the worst mistake I’ve ever made. I took an innocent person’s life over a senseless argument,” McKinley said. “I regret it with everything in my heart.”
In 2004, he was sentenced to 100 years in prison. His sentence was revised in 2019 to 39 years, and a few months later, it was cut to 25. In the time since McKinley’s conviction, courts across the country have reconsidered how they handle juvenile offenders. The Illinois appellate court determined that McKinley’s original sentencing was too harsh, as it did not take into account his age, or his commitment to rehabilitate.
But long before McKinley knew he might experience life again outside prison, he studied day and night. He visited the prison library as often as he could, reading case law to help him better understand the legal system. He found it eye-opening.
“Witnessing the various injustices within the prison, whether it was the institutional violence that incarcerated individuals had to endure, or the unjust incarceration based off the unfair legal system, my passion started to develop,” McKinley said.
He aspired to become a civil rights attorney — which he knew was likely out of reach given his sentence. But he dedicated himself nonetheless.
He got his GED and completed a paralegal program in 2011.
“Education saved my life,” McKinley said.
When he was given the chance to apply to Northwestern University’s competitive Prison Education Program — which provides a liberal arts education to incarcerated students — McKinley jumped at the opportunity. Of 400 applicants across Illinois, he was one of 40 people accepted.
“He’s extraordinary, and we could see that,” said Jennifer Lackey, the director of the cost-free program, which was founded in 2018 — the same year McKinley applied — and is funded through grants, donations and contributions.
To apply to the program, prospective students write a personal statement and complete a textual analysis, then a select group moves on to interviews. Students who are accepted transfer to the same prison, where they take a regular course load inside the facility. They follow the same curriculum as on-campus Northwestern students, and typically graduate in about four years.
“There is so much untapped potential inside of carceral spaces where we’re not providing opportunities or programming,” Lackey said.
McKinley was overjoyed he was accepted to the program.
“It was a dream that came true,” he said.
The program gave him an opportunity to feel like he had a purpose.
“It was life-changing and helped contribute to my transformation over time,” he said.
McKinley — who completed his degree at Stateville Correctional Center in Crest Hill, Ill. — majored in social science and earned a 3.95 GPA. His professors, who taught classes inside the prison, took note of his academic aptitude and determination.
“I’m not sure I’ve ever in my life as a professor seen someone with a vision and just watched them take step after step after step to get to that place — so clearly, in such a focused, deliberate, tireless, unrelenting way,” said Lackey, a philosophy professor at Northwestern University.
“He was a remarkable student when I was his college professor,” said Sheila Bedi, a law professor at Northwestern. “Benard was deeply focused on his goal of becoming a lawyer and using his legal education to secure civil rights for himself and for other people who were incarcerated or who suffered other harms as a result of over-policing and mass incarceration.”
Before completing his bachelor’s degree, McKinley applied to law school and wrote the LSAT while incarcerated.
“Every educational opportunity I had, I took full advantage,” said McKinley, whose story has been covered by both local and global news organizations. “From the day after I committed that horrible act, I was focused on bettering myself because I wasn’t my worst mistake.”
He graduated from the program in November 2023, and was released from prison in December, after nearly 23 years. Based on his good behavior, McKinley was granted a work release to leave prison more than two years early.
“My family has been unlimitedly here to support me,” he said, noting that his transition from prison has been smooth.
On March 15, McKinley received his acceptance letter from Northwestern Pritzker School of Law — one of the top-ranking law programs in the country. He is the first person from the Prison Education Program to be accepted to law school.
“It was an amazing feeling,” McKinley said. While he tried to keep his composure on the outside, “I was jumping around like a little kid on the inside.”
Once he completes his legal degree, before he can take the Illinois bar exam, McKinley will need to get a “certification of good moral character and general fitness to practice law,” because he has been convicted of a felony, according to the Illinois Board of Admissions to the Bar.
McKinley’s plan is to become a civil rights lawyer, and he hopes to open a nonprofit legal clinic to support marginalized communities and ensure they have access to strong legal representation.
He said his goal is “to contribute and give back to the community that I hurt in the past when I was a juvenile.”
McKinley will begin law school in the fall, and in the meantime, he is working as a paralegal at Northwestern’s Bluhm Legal Clinic, run by Bedi.
“Northwestern is lucky to have a candidate like Benard who is going to contribute so much,” Bedi said. “I’m certain that he’s going to succeed as a law student, and I also am certain that the determination he has demonstrated really suggests that he is going to go on and found the clinic that he wants to run that will give back to his community.”
McKinley hopes his story inspires people to change for the better.
“Not only do I want to help at-risk youth understand their potential, but I also want to help educate those who don’t believe that people who commit horrible acts can change their lives in a positive way,” he said. “I want to help steer them in the right direction.”
