North Carolina’s modern death penalty is the fruit of a racist past Andrew Ramseur was a young Black man accused of killing two white people, and the white citizens of Iredell County were clamoring for a lynching. In public forums, they spewed racist epithets and called Andrew a “beast” and a “monkey.” They barraged […]
The First and Only Time I Stood in an Execution Chamber
[…] set of straps that came down over their shoulders. About a foot below the pillow on either side of the bed was the place where the soon -to-be-executed lay their arms. On each of these arm-length extensions was a leather strap meant to be tightened near the person’s elbow, a faded blend of grey […]
Death Row Profile: Tilmon Golphin
[…] for “law and order” and extreme punishments. Juries began sentencing people to die at rates that outpaced almost every other state in the nation. Under this so -called “modern” system, even children were not safe from death sentences. It was at the peak of this era — in 1998 — that two brothers, Tilmon […]
For Native Americans, First Genocide Then the Death Penalty
[…] people. During the Civil War, even as the Union fought to free enslaved Americans, the United States executed nearly 40 members of the Eastern Sioux tribe. Thirty -eight men were hanged in Mankato, Minnesota in December 1862, the largest mass execution in U.S. history. The condemned were sentenced to death by a military court […]
Jim Crow & the Birth of the State–Run Death Penalty (1910–1961)
[…] courtrooms, and juries returning death sentences after only minutes of deliberation. In this Chapter Death Row Profile: Kenneth Rouse by CDPL Staff A member of the all -white jury used racial slurs and admitted that “bigotry” drove his decision to sentence a Black man to death. Yet, the courts refused to review whether racism […]
Death Row Profile: Guy LeGrande
In a crime that crossed racial lines, a prosecutor told the all-white jury that the strands of evidence would be twisted into a strong rope — a rope that could be used to kill a black defendant.
White Domination, Anti–Black Violence, and the Death Penalty in North Carolina: How the Myth of Black Criminality Has Always Justified Violence Against African Americans
[…] the murder of George Floyd, by Kimberley Pierce Cartwright. Although one terrorism scholar reported over fifty vehicular attacks against protestors, most reporters ignored widespread reports of far -right extremists either attacking or infiltrating BLM protests to promote violence. Local authorities arrested at least sixteen members of white-power militias in a dozen or more cities. […]
In Black & White: Lynching & the Death Penalty were Two Sides of the Same Coin
Newspaper articles of the time show how lynching and court-imposed death sentences were were virtually indistinguishable. Some of the accused escaped lynch mobs only to be hanged based on scant evidence a few weeks later.
Racist Roots: Origins of North Carolina’s Death Penalty
Introduction Andrew Ramseur was a young Black man accused of killing two white people, and the white citizens of Iredell County were clamoring for a lynching. In public forums, they spewed racist epithets and called Andrew a “beast” and a “monkey.” They barraged newspapers with comments like, “He should be hanging from the nearest […]
Death Qualified
Paul Brown, who has lived on North Carolina’s death row since 2000, writes about the experience of being sentenced to death by an all-white jury. He watched the prosecutor remove every Black juror, leaving the jury “locked and loaded.”