Case Study On Scottsboro Boys

Their story was: The girls stayed over night at a Ms. Brochie's residence, and took the train to look for work the next morning. On the train a group of blacks kicked a group of whites off the train. One of them, Charlie Weems waved a pistol in the air while the others attacked the girls and raped

In both cases the jury and spectators could not always decide if the girls were telling the truth about events that happened. For Victoria one of the times she didn’t know all the information that could be vital to deciding the cases outcome was when she was explaining where Mrs. Brochie lived; Victoria stayed there prior to the alleged rape. Victoria said she did not know where Mrs. Brochie’s house was located saying that she had to ask a boy on the street where she lived and later saying that all she could remember is that it was the fourth house in the block. When further investigation occurred they said they never found Mrs. Brochie or the house she supposedly lived in. This same type of uncertainty and inability to remember happened in To Kill A

Charles Weems was arrested in March 1931 at the age of nineteen, making him the oldest of the Scottsboro Boys. He was convicted of rape first in 1931, then again in a second trial in 1937. In prison, Weems suffered from tuberculosis and was stabbed by a prison guard who had mistaken him for Andy Wright. He was finally released in 1943.

Ann Putnam and Abby Williams were summoned to nearby Andover, where they accused 50 more people and they were mostly strangers. Fortify by their power, Putnam and several other precocious girls started accusing even more people. When they accused Lady Phipps they had gone to far, she is the governor wife, the minister of Boston was forced to step in. Thomas Brattle then wrote something saying that it is a mere fantasy of people and deprived and deluded by the devil, and not a reality to be regarded or minded by any wise man. His letter made a profound ripple in the colony.

Although, what really happened was one of the white girls stepped on one of the boys hands and they started fighting and throwing rocks. ”8 out of the 9 boys were trialed with death” (Linder). The court during the time had a strong racial dislike for the black race. On January 1932, the court ruled 6-1 on all but one of the convictions.

The judge rushed into trial and days later sentenced him to death. Andy Wright was tried next and got sentenced to ninety-nine years ("The Trials of “the Scottsboro Boys."). Charlie Ween was sentenced seventy-five years. Ozie Powell was brought into court, but he had a new prosecutor. This new prosecutor was Thomas Lawson, and he dropped the rape charges from Ozie Powell and the four defendants who had not been tried yet:

They prostituted around the South, trying to earn money, and then hopped on the moving trains to change location. As well as Victoria Price and Ruby Bates, nine African-American boys were riding on the same train as these two girls. Some white men tried to kick the boys off the train, and started a fight. The nine boys beat the men and threw them off the train. The train was stopped and a lynch mob was waiting the arrival of the boys.

The Scottsboro trials was heard of everywhere. Everyone knew about it, so the people of the south couldn't do their version of justice without everyone everywhere getting extremely upset. If it had been up to just the south the nine boys would have been found guilty in the first trial and sentenced to death, but because it was so public they couldn't just sentence them to death. For example one of the trials had to be re done because the nine boys didn't have proper defense. So they brought in a guy from the north named Samuel Leibowitz.

Overall these innocent men deserved more than what they recieved, an unfair treatment in and out of the courtroom. Both cases had African American men that were judged by a jury of all white people and because they raped a woman. If they lost this case it meant they would receive the death penalty. This was always going to be an unfair trial. In To kill a Mockingbird it is said that “A jury never looks at a defendant it has convicted,

Scottsboro Boys PB’s American Experience has impacted the view of racism towards blacks immensely. This event was a very prominent turning point in American history. The Scottsboro boys case has been one of the largest cases involving a black man (men) and a white women in the case of rape. This event has affected how people are judged now including taking age into consideration, not getting the facts correct, and the fact that black’s used to be very unfairly treated just because of the color of their skin. Laws, punishments, and law enforcement have changed very much since the 1930’s.

Scottsboro Racism Paragraph The Scottsboro trials were a long horrific eighteen-year-long trial about eight black boys in Scottsboro, Alabama. According to Anderson in the video lecture “Scottsboro Boys” a large group of people had gotten on a train to find work when a large fight broke out on the train. The fight was between eight black men and a few white men, the train stopped in Scottsboro when two white women got off the train and accused the eight black men of rape. The eight boys were brought into court and trialed. There were multiple cases of racism in the Scottsboro trials, one included that all the boys were trialed together and in only one day.

Topic: Scottsboro Trials Sources: Remembering Scottsboro: The legacy of an infamous trial, The Trials of the Scottsboro boys, and Scottsboro and its legacy: The cases that challenged american legal and social justice. Thesis: The Scottsboro Trials were an important piece of history because it was a huge stepping stone of the civil rights movement and it showed the racial inequality in America which was then taken to the supreme court. (support statement) No crime in American history, produced as many trials, convictions, reversals and retrials as did the alleged gang rape of two white girls by nine black teenagers. (Supported Statement 2)

In this document about the Scottsboro tragedy, the information that was given stated that there were nine boys named Haywood Patterson, Clarence Norris, Willie Roberson, Ozie Powell, Andy Wright, Charlie Weemes, Olen Montgomery, Eugene Williams and Roy Wright. Haywood Patterson got his hand stepped on by a White man, causing Haywood to almost fall off the train. When he was told that the train was only a White train, Haywood and the other 8 boys got into a fight with the White men and threw them off the train. The White men went back looking for this “gang” of boys and found two women, Ruby Bates and Victoria. Both women said they were raped by the group of boys.

Through April 9th, the rest of the boys were tried, and all were given the death sentence. Roy Wright’s trial ended on a hung jury as he was too young to be put to death in one juror’s eyes, but the rest voted for his execution. Patterson’s second trial was from March 27th to April 9th, 1933, and he was again found guilty and sentenced to death by electrocution. Through November and December of 1933, Patterson and Norris’ cases result in death penalties. In the beginning of 1936, Patterson is tried for the 3rd time with a different result; 75 years in prison.

The case got so popular that there were marches being held across the world to petition a release of the Scottsboro boys. A re-trial was finally held and there were defense attorneys set up for the Scottsboro boys, but nothing ended up happening. In 1935 the ILD cooperated with the NAACP and created a Scottsboro defense committee (SBC).the case slowly was forgotten of and more legal failures happened. Finally, in July 1937 a plea bargain by the SBC, released four of the defendants.one escaped in 1948 and the “last defendant was released in 1950,nineteen years after his initial arrest. “ The release of last defendant, sparked a big movement which was called the Civil Rights movement.