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the start
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 Drs. R. R. -
event 2
A grand jury indicts all nine "Scottsboro Boys." -
event 3
Before Judge A. E. Hawkins, Clarence Norris and Charlie Weems are tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. -
event 4
Haywood Patterson is tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. -
event 5
Olen Montgomery, Ozie Powell, Willie Roberson, Eugene Williams, and Andy Wright are tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. -
event 6
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 -
event 7
The executions of the defendants are stayed pending appeal to the Alabama Supreme Court. -
event 8
A letter from Ruby Bates to a boyfriend surfaces; in it, she denies having been raped. -
event 9
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. -
event 10
The United States Supreme Court agrees to hear the case. -
event 11
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. -
event 12
Haywood Patterson's second trial begins, this time in Decatur, Alabama, before Judge James Horton. -
event 13
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 r -
event 14
Patterson is found guilty and sentenced to death by electric chair. -
event 15
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." -
event 16
Judge Horton sets aside Patterson's conviction and grants a new trial. -
event 17
The cases are removed from Judge Horton's court into Judge William Callahan's court. -
final event
Seven of the defendants appear in Callahan's court. The youngest two, Roy Wright and Eugene Williams, have been transferred to a Juvenile Court. -