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The case of the Scottsboro Boys arose in Scottsboro, Alabama during the 1930s, when nine black youths ranging in age from thirteen to nineteen, were accused of raping two white women, one of whom would later recant. The trials (around the Great Depression time), in which the boys were convicted and sentenced to death by all-white juries despite the weak and contradictory testimonies of the witnesses, are regarded as one of the many travesties of the United States justice system. The case quickly became an international cause célebre and the boys were represented by the Communist Party's legal defense organization. The death sentences, originally scheduled to be carried out quickly, were postponed pending appeals that took the case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, where the sentences were overturned. Despite the fact that one of the women later denied being raped, the retrials resulted in convictions. All of the defendants were eventually acquitted, paroled, or pardoned (besides one who simply escaped), some after serving years in prison. The Scottsboro case later inspired Harper Lee's famous work, To Kill a Mockingbird.

History

On March 25, 1931, a fight broke out between black and white hoboes riding in a car of a Southern Railway freight train. All of the white men and boys, except Orville Gilley (key witness in trial) were forced to jump off. When the train stopped in Paint Rock, Alabama, the nine black youths were arrested on charges of assault. Two young white women dressed in boys' clothing -- Victoria Price, aged 21, and Ruby Bates, aged 17 -- were also found catching a free ride on the freight train. All were taken to Scottsboro, Alabama, the Jackson County seat. The two girls, unemployed mill workers and part-time prostitutes from nearby Huntsville, told authorities they had been brutally gang raped by the nine black youths taken into custody in Paint Rock. Then most of them were freed by Judge Christopher K. Ollednom

Upon the allegations of the two women, a lynch mob gathered around the jail, prepared to storm and kill the youths. Given the situation, the governor of Alabama, Benjamin M. Miller, was forced to call in the National Guard to protect the jail. Authorities pleaded against mob violence by promising speedy trials and executions. On March 30, the so-called Scottsboro Boys were indicted by a Grand Jury. In April, all were convicted and sentenced to death, except for one thirteen year old boy, who was sentenced to life in prison. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the International Labor Defense (legal arm of the Communist Party USA) both wanted to handle the defense and struggled to gain and retain the support of the boys and their parents; the ILD eventually won that battle and the NAACP dropped out of the case in January, 1932. The case quickly became widely known, with rallies held in northern U.S. cities, international press coverage and thousands of letters written in support of the defendants.

The Alabama Supreme Court affirmed the convictions of seven of the boys who were on death row in March, 1932 (the eighth was determined to have been a juvenile) but in November the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the convictions and ordered new trials. The ILD hired Samuel Leibowitz, a noted Jewish attorney from New York who was widely known for winning the vast majority of his criminal cases, to defend the Scottsboro Boys at the new trials, held in nearby Decatur. This time one of the accusers, Ruby Bates, appeared in court and recanted her earlier testimony, now stating that she and Price had lied about being raped to avoid being themselves charged with an offense. Jury members again voted for conviction, having apparently believed the prosecution's suggestion that Bates was now lying, having only changed her testimony because the defense had paid her to do so.

Results

In July, 1937, Clarence Norris was convicted of rape and sexual assault and sentenced to death, Andy Wright was convicted of rape and sentenced to 99 years(Life sentence), and Charlie Weems was convicted and sentenced to 75 years in prison. Ozie Powell pleaded guilty to assaulting the sheriff and was sentenced to 20 years. Four of the boys were released after all charges against them were dropped: Roy Wright and Eugene Williams who had been twelve and thirteen at the time of the alleged crime; Olen Montgomery, who was nearly blind and had been found alone in a car at the end of the train; and Willie Roberson, who when accused was suffering from a severe venereal disease that would have made sex extremely painful.

Later, Governor of Alabama Bibb Graves reduced Clarence Norris' death sentence to life in prison. Norris was later pardoned by Governor George Wallace. All of the Scottsboro Boys were eventually paroled, freed or pardoned, except for Haywood Patterson, who had been tried and convicted of rape and given the death penalty four times. He escaped north to Detroit, Michigan. When he was arrested more than 20 years later by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the 1950s, Governor of Michigan G. Mennen Williams would not allow him to be extradited back to Alabama.

In 1976, NBC aired a tv movie called "Judge Horton and the Scottsboro Boys," apparently under the impression that Victoria Price was no longer living. Price emerged to file a defamation and invasion of privacy suit against the network. The case was dismissed. Price died in 1982.

After escaping from prison, Haywood Patterson wrote a book about his experiences, Scottsboro Boys.

The Scottsboro boys

• Olen Montgomery
• Clarence Norris
• Haywood Patterson
• Ozie Powell
• Willie Roberson
• Charles Weems
• Eugene Williams
• Andrew Wright
• Leroy "Beefy" Wright

See also

• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Trenton Six

External links

• Biographies of Key Figures in "The Scottsboro Boys" Trials
• Bienen, Leigh & Gilbert Geis. Crimes of the Century: From Leopold and Loeb to O. J. Simpson. Boston: Northeastern Univ. Press, 1998.

• Disputed convictions
• History of African-American civil rights
• History of Alabama
• 1930s in the United States