-
Use Cases
-
Resources
-
Pricing
1931
% complete
gang rape of two white girls by nine black teenagers on a Southern Railroad freight run on
1931 - 1989
% complete
1930's nine young African-American men were tried for raping two white women in a train freight car in a groundbreaking case that tested the limits of race relations in the United States.
April 6, 1931 - April 7, 1931
% complete
Clarence Norris and Charlie Weems are tried, convicted, and sentenced to death
April 7, 1931 - April 8, 1931
% complete
Haywood Patterson is tried, canvicted and sentenced to death
April 8,1931 - April 9, 1931
% complete
Olen Montgomery, Ozie Powell, Willie Roberson, Eugene Williams, and Andy Wright are tried, convicted, and sentenced to death.
April 9, 1931
% complete
The case against Roy Wright, aged 13, ends in a hung jury when 11 jurors seek a death sentence, and one votes for life imprisonment.
June 22, 1931
% complete
The executions of the defendants are stayed pending appeal to the Alabama Supreme Court.
January 5 1932
% complete
A letter from Ruby Bates to a boyfriend surfaces, in it, she denies having been raped
march 24 1932
% complete
Alabama Supreme Court, voting 6-1, upholds the convictions of seven of the defendants, granting Eugene Williams a new trial because he was a juvenile at the time of his conviction.
may 27 1932
% complete
United States Supreme Court agrees to hear the case.
november 7 1932
% complete
In Powell v. Alabama, the U.S. Supreme Court rules that the defendants were denied the right to counsel, which violated their right to due process under the Fourteenth Amendment. The cases are remanded to the lower court.
march 27 1933
% complete
Haywood Patterson's second trial begins, this time in Decatur, Alabama, before Judge James Horton
April 6 1933
% complete
Ruby Bates appears as a surprise witness for the defense, denying that any rape occurred and testifying that she was with Victoria Price for the whole train ride. Her assertion that she and Price were with boyfriends the night before explains the presence of semen in their vaginas. On the stand, Dr. Bridges admits that the sperm found in his examination were non-motile, and indicates that Victoria Price showed few physical signs of having been forcibly raped by six men, as she claimed, but he refuses to say how old the semen could have been.
April 9 1933
% complete
Patterson is found guilty and sentenced to death by electric chair.
April 18 1933
% complete
Judge Horton sets the sentence of death for Patterson, and then suspends it on a motion for a new trial. Then, the judge postpones the trials of the other defendants because tensions in town are running too high to expect a just and impartial verdict
June 22 1933
% complete
Judge Horton sets aside Patterson's conviction and grants a new trial.
October 20 1933
% complete
The cases are removed from Judge Horton's court into Judge William Callahan's court
November 20 1933
% complete
Seven of the defendants appear in Callahan's court. The youngest two, Roy Wright and Eugene Williams, have been transferred to a Juvenile Court.
may 1937
% complete
Thomas Knight dies
August 1952
% complete
Patterson dies of cancer.
august 1959
% complete
Roy Wright dies.
october 1976
% complete
Clarence Norris is pardoned by Alabama Governor George Wallace.
July 12 1977
% complete
Victoria Price files a lawsuit against NBC for defamation and invasion of privacy after the broadcast of Judge Horton and the Scottsboro Boys; her claim is dismissed.
January 23 1989
% complete
Clarence Norris dies, the last of the Scottsboro boys