Ruby Bates, in a letter to a Earl Streetman, denies that she was raped. Alabama Supreme Court, by a vote of , affirms the convictions of seven of the boys. The conviction of Eugene Williams is reversed on the grounds that he was a juvenile under state law in The U. Supreme Court announces that it will review the Scottsboro cases. The Supreme Court, by a vote of , reverses the convictions of the Scottsboro boys in Powell vs.
Grounds for reversal are that Alabama failed to provide adequate assistance of counsel as required by the due process clause of the 14th Amendment. Samuel S. Haywood Patterson's second trial begins in Decatur before judge James Horton. Haywood Patterson found guilty by jury and sentenced to death in the electric chair. Judge Horton postpones the trials of the other Scottsboro boys because of dangerously high local tensions.
In one of many protests around the nation, thousands march in Washington protesting the Alabama trials. Judge Horton sets aside Haywood Patterson's conviction and grants a new trial. Haywood Patterson and Clarence Norris are tried for rape, convicted, and sentenced to death.
Judge Horton, who had faced no opposition in his previous race, is defeated in his bid for re-election. Alabama Supreme Court affirms the convictions of Haywood and Norris. Two lawyers are charged with attempting to bribe Victoria Price in order to change her testimony.
In July of Powell pleaded guilty to assault and was sentenced to 20 years. Leibowitz requested that the six years already served be taken into account, but Judge Callahan, noting that the rape charge had been dropped against Powell, gave him the maximum sentence.
He was sent to Atmore, the prison for dangerous criminals known as "the murderers' home. Graves decided against granting clemency. These people make wise cracks talking about somebody in Alabama to defend us, say I would get out better. They won't let the New York people come around. His father walked out a month after his birth and his mother died when he was two. Willie was raised by his grandmother until her death in Although he made it through to seventh grade in Atlanta, a doctor later measured Roberson's IQ to be about 64, and his mental age at nine.
He could not read or write and had difficulty speaking, and was the butt of many courtroom spectators' jokes. Roberson had boarded the Southern Railroad headed to Memphis in search of free medical care for his syphilis and gonorrhea. He was in pain and lying in a car near the back of the train when he was arrested along with the 8 other African American teenagers accused of rape. The cane he used to walk with was thrown away on orders of the deputy that took him into custody. This painful, syphilitic condition was evidence to defense attorney Samuel Leibowitz that Roberson could not have committed this crime.
Judge James Horton agreed that it was unlikely that Roberson could have jumped from car to car as Victoria Price claimed. However, when it was revealed that Ruby Bates had been treated for syphilis herself, Roberson's venereal disease was cited as evidence of his guilt.
Horribly, he was not treated for his condition until Roberson was one of the defendants released in July of , after six years without a retrial.
Upon his release, Roberson said he wanted to become an airplane mechanic. After a brief foray into show business, Roberson settled into steady work in New York City.
He was continually plagued by ill health, and suffered asthma attacks and bad luck. One night in Harlem, Roberson was in a bar when a fight broke out. Although not involved in the fight, he was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct.
Of that incident he wrote, "I am again a victim of almost inconcievable maglinity and though I hartily dislike the role of myrter I have been cast in that role and it seems impossible to escape it. Roberson's asthma had been greatly aggravated by his time in jail and he eventually died of an asthma attack.
Charles Weems "Please tell all the young mens to try hard and not to go to prison for my sakes. Charles Weems was a native of Chattanooga, Tennessee. His mother died in , when he was only four, and six of his seven siblings died soon afterwards.
His father then fell ill and sent him to live with an aunt in Riverdale, Georgia. He was on his way home to Tennessee when he was pulled from the Southern Railroad train. He was twenty years old and did not know any of the other 8 African American defendants. After the initial Scottsboro trial, Weems was not tried again until July of Fellow defendants Clarence Norris and Andy Wright had just lost their cases and defense attorney Samuel Leibowitz, in a frustrated summation of Weems' case, told the jury that he no longer believed he could convince a white jury of a black defendant's innocence in a rape case.
While in prison, Weems was tear gassed in his cell for reading International Labor Defense literature, and he asked his correspondents not to mention any labor actions in Birmingham, Alabama. In October , after some of his fellow defendants were released, Weems was in the prison hospital for tuberculosis. In March of the next year, in a case of mistaken identity, he was stabbed with a knife by the prison mill foreman.
He was paroled in November , and was offered a job in a laundry in Atlanta. He married and settled down into obscurity, keeping his job and his health, although his eyes would persist in bothering him from the tear gas a decade earlier. Eugene Williams "Sorry about my last letter -- hope it didn't make you angry.
Didn't mean any harm whatever. At 13, he was one of the youngest of the nine African Americans taken from the train. Williams was convicted in a speedy trial at Scottsboro with the other boys, but the Supreme Court of Alabama struck down his conviction based on his young age.
He was still in jail without another trial in when the defendants received two visitors, a Life magazine reporter and Dr. Williams told Branche that he thought often of girls. Life magazine described him rather suspiciously as "a sullen, shifty mulatto" who "usually tries to impress visitors with his piety. After his release and a brief entertainment career, Williams moved to St.
Louis where he had relatives who helped him adjust to a relatively stable life. Andrew Wright "Mr. White, if you can't trust your mother, who can you trust? All four of the African American teenagers were pulled off the train and arrested at Paint Rock, Alabama, after allegedly participating in a rape of two young women who were white. Andy was 19 at the time, and had had enough schooling that he could read and write a bit. With the other teenagers arrested on the train, he was convicted in It was the support of their parents that led most of the defendants to put their trust in the I.
In Andy Wright was sentenced to 99 years in jail for rape. He wrote a letter to the Scottsboro Defense Committee expressing concern that he and four of the other defendants had had their freedom traded for the four released that year. In Kilby Prison in Montgomery, Alabama, he was assaulted by both guards and prisoners, and spent time in the prison hospital. His continually poor health made it difficult for him to work in the prison industries and further antagonized his tormentors.
Wright narrowly escaped an attack when Charley Weems took his shift at the prison mill and received knife wounds intended for Andy.
As bad as the physical punishment was, the psychic punishment may have been worse. By independent accounts, Wright was a good-natured prisoner, but he wrote: "A colored convict's very best behavior is not good enough for these officials here. Every time they open their mouths it is [']you black bastard.
In he wrote: "I am trying all that in my power to be brave but you understand a person can be brave for a certain length of time and then he is a coward down. That the way it is. In November , Wright received parole and was sent to work near Montgomery. The work the parole board had found seemed no better than prison to Andy, and he fled north. Allan Knight Chalmers, the chairman of the S.
When Wright returned, he was imprisoned despite promises of leniency. In May , Wright was paroled again, and Chalmers found a job for him in an Albany hospital. When asked about Victoria Price upon his release, Andy said: "I'm not mad because the girl lied about me. If she's still living, I feel sorry for her because I don't guess she sleeps much at night.
In Albany the next year, Wright was accused of rape for a second time. A former girlfriend accused him of raping her thirteen-year-old foster daughter. Wright claimed he had merely bought a present for the girl and detectives hired by the NAACP confirmed his story. An all-white jury acquitted him after he spent another eight months in jail. His involvement in the Scottsboro case undoubtedly loaned credence to the woman's accusations.
I don't believe I'll ever live it down," he lamented. Andy Wright's run of bad luck continued: in subsequent years, he found little work in Albany, Cleveland or New York City. In a fight with his wife, he stabbed her; she didn't press charges, but he was forced to leave Albany for good and he settled in Connecticut.
A series of retrials and reconvictions followed and the Scottsboro Boys collectively served more than years in prison. Subsequently, the national conversation and protests of unfair and unequal court proceedings led to two additional groundbreaking Supreme Court decisions in on jury diversification: Patterson v. State of Alabama and Norris v. Privacy Terms of Use. Skip to main content. Related Posts Read Post. Read Post. Privacy Terms of Use Back to Top.
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