RICHMOND, Va. – Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam on Tuesday granted pardons to seven black men who were executed in 1951 for raping a white woman, in a case that drew requests for mercy from around the world and that in recent years years has been denounced as an example of racial disparity in the use of the death penalty.
Northam announced the pardons after meeting with a dozen descendants of the men and their defenders. Some of the descendants were heard crying and sobbing after Northam’s announcement.
The Martinsville Seven, as the men were known, were convicted of raping Ruby Stroud Floyd, 32, a white woman who had gone to a predominantly black neighborhood in Martinsville, Virginia, on January 8, 1949 to pick up money for the clothes he had sold.
Four of the men were executed in the Virginia electric chair on February 2, 1951. Three days later, the remaining three were also electrocuted. All of them were tried by completely white jurors. It was the largest group of people executed for a single-victim crime in Virginia history.
At the time, rape was a capital offense. But Northam said Tuesday that the death penalty for rape applied almost exclusively to blacks. From 1908 – when Virginia began using the electric chair – to 1951, state records show the 45 people executed for rape were black, he said. The pardons do not address the guilt or innocence of the men, but Northam said the pardons are an acknowledgment that they did not receive due process and that they received a “partially racial death sentence that did not apply similarly to the defendants.” whites “.
“These men were executed because they were black, and that’s not right,” Northam said.
“His punishment did not match the crime. They should not have been executed, “he added.
The seven men were sentenced and sentenced to death within eight days. Northam said some of the defendants were deteriorating at the time of their arrests or unable to read the confessions they signed. He said none of the men had lawyers present while they were being questioned.
Prior to their executions, protesters picketed the White House and the governor’s office received letters from around the world asking for mercy.
James Walter Grayson is the son of Francis DeSales Grayson, who was one of the seven. He cried loudly when Northam told family members he would grant the pardons after meeting with them on Tuesday. “Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Lord, ”he said as he wept as two other descendants of the men hugged him.
Grayson said he was four years old when his father was executed.
“It means a lot to me,” he said of the pardon.
“I remember the same day the police arrived at the door. He kissed us and they took him away, “he told the Associated Press in an interview after the announcement.
In December, defenders and descendants of the men asked Northam to issue posthumous pardons. Their petition does not argue that the men were innocent, but they claim that their trials were unfair and that the punishment was extreme and unjust.
The Martinsville Seven did not receive a proper trial due “simply for being black,” were sentenced to death for a crime that a white person would not have been executed for “simply being black,” and were murdered by the Commonwealth, “simply for being black,” the defenders wrote in their letter to Northam.
The seven men, mostly teenagers or early twenties, were: Grayson, Frank Hairston Jr .; Howard Lee Hairston; James Luther Hairston; Joe Henry Hampton; Booker Millner; and John Clabon Taylor.
Northam has granted a total of 604 pardons since he took office in 2018, more than the previous nine governors put together, his administration announced on Tuesday.
“It’s about correcting mistakes,” Northam said. “We all deserve a criminal justice system that is fair, equal and correct, no matter who you are or how you look,” he said.
In March, Northam, a Democrat, signed legislation passed by the Democratic-controlled legislature that abolished the state’s death penalty. It was a dramatic change for Virginia, a state that had the second-highest number of executions in the U.S. The case of the Martinsville Seven was cited during the legislative debate as an example of the disproportionate use of the death penalty against people of color.