MONTGOMERY, AL– Black Americans are serving death row sentences on a greater scale than white or other raced Americans, according to a research study by Jennifer Rae Taylor in the Equal Justice Initiative.
EJI describes that historically, victimization of Black citizens was “ignored,” and southern justice departments “brutally punished…Black criminality,” often relying on lynching as a form of punishment.
EJI demonstrates how the double standard is evident when comparing the Scottsboro Boys vs Recy Taylor.
The Scottsboro Boys were “nine innocent Black men and boys accused of raping two white women in Alabama in 1931…the prosecution’s case was full of holes and their trials were repeatedly reversed due to racial bias.”
By comparison, EJI writes, a “Black woman named Recy Taylor was kidnapped and gang-raped by a group of white men. Afterward, an all-white grand jury refused to indict anyone for Mrs. Taylor’s attack, even after one of the suspects confessed to police.”
When the 15th Amendment was created, EJI explains, “80 percent of Black male voters living in 10 of the 11 former Confederate states were registered to vote.”
But then, “Jim Crow” laws were created to prevent Black citizens from voting, which caused “the number of Black registered voters to plummet to 5,000 by 1900, and just 1,000 by 1904,” said EJI.
Jury selection uses registered voters, so decreasing the diversity in voters decreases the diversity in juries, added EJI, noting “studies examining trials throughout the country consistently find that…prosecutors still use…peremptory strikes to exclude Black people…from jury service.”
A 2016 prosecutor manual included “77 justifications for striking people of color,” reported EJI, noting a Dallas prosecutor handbook stated, “Do not take Jews, Negros, Dagos, Mexicans, or a member of any minority…no matter how rich or educated.”
Attorney Elizabeth Semel describes how there is a “universal finding” of racial discrimination across the country at all levels. However, the state of Alabama catches the eye, said EJI, noting that Alabama has reversed at least 170 death sentences, with nine exonerated.
“Alabama ranks in the ‘top 10’ nationally on several death penalty metrics,” added EJI, stating, in 2024, there were “162 individuals held on Alabama’s death row” and, in 52.2 percent of the cases, there was Black misrepresentation on the jury.
Multiples of these executions, regardless of whether the convicted was not guilty or guilty, have been “torturous,” reports EJI, noting journalist Brian Lyman recalls his experience: “I have seen executions. They are horrible. A botched execution is even worse.”
EJI cites a statistic, noting, “Black people make up about one in every five Alabama residents but one of every two people on the state’s death row,” creating, as EJI adds, a “norm of Black execution.”
EJI reminds readers, “A recitation of numbers cannot fully capture the human impact that racial discrimination in the selection of death penalty juries has had in Alabama.”
