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The Fight
March 25: In the depths of the Depression, a fight breaks out between white and black young men who are riding as hoboes on a Southern Railroad freight train. The train is stopped by an angry posse in Paint Rock, Alabama, and nine black youths are arrested for assault. Rape charges are added, following accusations from two white women who have also come off the train, Victoria Price and Ruby Bates. The accused are taken to Scottsboro, Alabama, the Jackson County seat. The women are examined by D -
The first sentence
April 6-7: Before Judge A. E. Hawkins, Clarence Norris and Charlie Weems are tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. %April 7-8: Haywood Patterson is tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. April 8-9: Olen Montgomery, Ozie Powell, Willie Roberson, Eugene Williams, and Andy Wright are tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. April 9: 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. -
Alabama supreme court
June 22: The executions of the defendants are stayed pending appeal to the Alabama Supreme Court. -
The letter
January 5: A letter from Ruby Bates to a boyfriend surfaces; in it, she denies having been raped. -
United State supreme court
May 27: The United States Supreme Court agrees to hear the case. -
Second sentence
March 24: The 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. -
14th Ammendment
November 7: 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. -
Leibowitz
January: The I.L.D. asks Samuel Leibowitz to take the case while acknowledging its inability to pay any fees. He agrees. -
Ruby suprises the jury
April 6: 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, -
Electic chair
April 9: Patterson is found guilty and sentenced to death by electric chair. -
The new jury
April 1: In Norris v. Alabama, the United States Supreme Court finds the exclusion of blacks on jury rolls deprived black defendants of their rights to equal protection under the law as guaranteed in the Fourteenth Amendment. The case is overturned and remanded to a lower court. Patterson's case is not argued before the court because of technicalities in filing dates; however, the court strongly suggests the lower courts review his case "in light of the situation which has now developed." -
Guilty again
January 23: Patterson is found guilty and sentenced to 75 years in prison. The sentence is a compromise between the foreman, who thought the defendant innocent, and the rest of the jury. -
Never the same again
January 24: While being transported back to Birmingham Jail, Ozie Powell pulls a knife and slashes Deputy Edgar Blalock's throat. Sheriff Jay Sandlin stops the car and shoots Powell in the head. Both Blalock and Powell survive. -
Sentences
July 12-16: The third trial of Clarence Norris ends in a death sentence. Pressure from his community, and his defeat in this case, causes Watts to fall ill, leaving Leibowitz to lead the defense. July 20-21: The trial of Andy Wright ends in conviction and a sentence of 99 years. July 22-23: The trial of Charley Weems ends in conviction and a sentence of 75 years. July 23-24: Ozie Powell pleads guilty to assaulting Blalock and is sentenced to 20 years. Rape charges are dropped. -
Parole
1938 November 17: Weems is released on parole. 1944 January: Andy Wright and Clarence Norris are released on parole. September: Wright and Norris leave Alabama, in violation of their parole. Chalmers persuades them to return to the South and, despite promises to be lenient, both are returned to jail, Norris in October 1944, Wright in October 1946. 1946 June: Ozie Powell is released on parole. September: Clarence Norris is paroled again.