WebBIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) Jurors in the murder trial of a former Ku Klux Klansman were shown grisly morgue photos yesterday of the four black girls killed in a 1963 church
She was 93. Cross had attended the same Sunday School class as the four victims on the day of the bombing and was slightly wounded in the attack. 9:01 AM EDT, Wed September 7, 2022, A grieving relative is led away from the site of the. ", "Beauty from the Ashes of 16th Street Baptist Church", "Church Bomb Kills 4 Girls in Ala.; 2 Die in Fighting", "The Speech That Shocked Birmingham the Day After the Church Bombing", "Ceremony recalls victim of civil rights violence", "First of 4 Birmingham Bomb Victims is Buried", "We Shall Overcome Historic Places of the Civil Rights Movement", "Funeral Speakers Say Deaths Of Three Children Not In Vain", "Martin Luther King's 'Eulogy for the Martyred Children', "The ghosts of Alabama: After 37 years, two men are indicted for a bombing that transfigured the civil rights movement", "Birmingham Klansman Guilty in Dynamite Case; Two Other Defendants Face Trial Today--Dr. King Gives City an Ultimatum on Jobs", "FBI: A Byte Out of History: The '63 Baptist Church Bombing", "Murderer Of 4 Birmingham Girls Found Guilty (38 yrs later)", "Former Klansman convicted in deadly 1963 bombing of Birmingham, Alabama church", "Cherry convicted: Jury verdict in bombing hailed as 'justice finally', "Birmingham Church Bombing Conviction Ended an Obsession of the Prosecutor", "Bill Baxley Reflects on 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing", "Former Prosecutor Says FBI Delayed Alabama Conviction", "Former Klansman Convicted In Bombing Death", "Another Redemption: Baxley in Birmingham", "Puzzle Pieces Put Together in Bombing Case", "Alabamian Guilty in '63 Blast that Killed Four Girls", "Robert E. 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Her sister was one of the girls who died. WebAn unidentified man digs grave for one of the four victims of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing, Birmingham, Alabama, late September 1963. On the afternoon of May 22, after the jury had deliberated for almost seven hours, the forewoman announced they had reached their verdicts: Bobby Frank Cherry was convicted of four counts of first-degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. Many of the civil rights protest marches that took place in Birmingham during the 1960s began at the steps of the 16th Street Baptist Church, which had long been a significant religious center for the citys Black population and a routine meeting place for civil rights organizers like King. [121] (A fishing float attached to a section of wire, which may have been part of a timing device, was found 20 feet (6.1m) from the explosion crater[87] following the bombing. At 10:22 a.m. on the morning of September 15, 1963, some 200 church members were in the buildingmany attending Sunday school classes before the start of the 11 am servicewhen the bomb detonated on the churchs east side, spraying mortar and bricks from the front of the church and caving in its interior walls. WebThe Birmingham church bombing occurred on September 15, 1963, when a bomb exploded before Sunday morning services at the 16th Street Baptist Church in [98] The following day, both men surrendered to police. [127], When asked by the judge whether he had anything to say before sentence was imposed, Cherry motioned to the prosecutors and stated: "This whole bunch lied through this thing [the trial]. "[45], Two more Black youths, Johnny Robinson and Virgil Ware, were shot to death in Birmingham within seven hours of the Sunday morning bombing. Following the bombing, the 16th Street Baptist Church remained closed for over eight months, as assessments and, later, repairs were conducted upon the property. [11], Black and white residents of Birmingham had access to different public amenities such as water fountains and places of public gathering such as movie theaters. Investigators also gathered numerous witness statements attesting to a group of white men in a turquoise 1957 Chevrolet who had been seen near the church in the early hours of the morning of September 15. The police were reportedly responding to Black youths throwing rocks at cars driven by white people. "[109], Defense attorney John Robbins reminded the jury in his closing argument that his client was an admitted segregationist and a "loudmouth", but that was all that could be proven. 
In the weeks following the September 4 integration of public schools, three additional bombs were detonated in Birmingham. We strive for accuracy and fairness. The police were plenty busy around that time. As part of a revival effort by states and the federal government to prosecute cold cases from the civil rights era, the state placed both Blanton Jr. and Cherry on trial, who were each convicted of four counts of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2001 and 2002, respectively. Mourners embrace at the funeral. He wont be eligible for parole again until 2021. In his eulogy, Dr. King said, "These children -- unoffending, innocent and beautiful -- were the victims of one of the most vicious and tragic crimes ever perpetrated against humanity. The current state death penalty law applied only to crimes committed after its passage.
September 12, 2013 - Fifty years after the bombing, all four girls who died are awarded Congressional Gold Medals. Brogdon testified on May 16 that Cherry had boasted to her that he had been the individual who planted the bomb beneath the steps to the church, then returned hours later to light the fuse to the dynamite. Officially, the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing remained unsolved until after William Baxley was elected Attorney General of Alabama in January 1971. May 1, 2001 - Blanton is found guilty of first-degree murder and is sentenced to four life terms. Search instead in Creative? September 15, 1963 - A bomb blast at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, kills four African-American girls during church services. (The plastic remnants were later lost by investigators. 
[66] This information was relayed to the Director of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover;[67] however, no prosecutions of the four suspects ensued.
Robinson died before reaching the hospital. In attendance were 1,600 people. BIRMINGHAM, Alabama (Reuters) - When a church bombing killed four young black girls on a quiet Sunday morning in 1963, life for a young Condoleezza Rice changed forever. In a 1987 interview focusing upon his recollections of the bombing, Petts recollected: "Naturally, as a father, I was horrified by the deaths of those children." Family and friends of Carole Robertson attend graveside services for her in Birmingham on September 17, 1963. WebBIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- Shortly before four dead bodies are rushed into Hillman Emergency Clinic at University Hospital Betty Ruth Speir, a medical resident, notices [29] The explosion was so intense that one of the girls' bodies was decapitated and so badly mutilated that her body could be identified only through her clothing and a ring. Kay Ivey. [61] Although he met with initial resistance from the FBI,[50]:278 in 1976 Baxley was formally presented with some of the evidence which had been compiled by the FBI, after he publicly threatened to expose the Department of Justice for withholding evidence which could result in the prosecution of the perpetrators of the bombing.[76]. [39], Violence escalated in Birmingham in the hours following the bombing, with reports of groups of Black and white youth throwing bricks and shouting insults at each other. He said this past was not the evidence upon which they should return their verdicts.
[1][2][3] Four members of a local Ku Klux Klan (KKK) chapter planted 19 sticks of dynamite attached to a timing device beneath the steps located on the east side of the church.[4]. On May 15,[123] Cross testified that prior to the explosion, she and the four girls killed had each attended a Youth Day Sunday School lesson in which the theme taught was how to react to a physical injustice.
Within 24 hours of the bombing, a minimum of five businesses and properties had been firebombed and numerous carsmost of which were driven by whiteshad been stoned by rioting youths. [99]:162, The state prosecution had originally intended to try both defendants together; however, the trial of Bobby Cherry was delayed due to the findings of a court-ordered psychiatric evaluation. June 26, 2020 - Blanton dies in prison of natural causes, according to a statement released by Alabama Gov. September 15, 1963 - Four girls are killed and 14 injured in a bomb blast at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama.- Riots break out, and two African-American boys, Virgil Ware, 13, and Johnny Robinson, 16, are also killed.
Immediately after the blast, More than 20 other members of the congregation were injured in the blast. [61] These witness statements specifically indicated that a white man had exited the car and walked toward the steps of the church. Martin said: "The cold-blooded callousness of this hate crime has not diminished by the passage of time." September 15, 2013, marked the 50th anniversary of the bombing. "[53] Carole Robertson was buried in a blue casket at Shadow Lawn Cemetery.[54]. Mauldin testified on April 30 that he had observed two men in a Rambler station wagon adorned with a Confederate flag repeatedly drive past the church immediately before the blast, and that, seconds after the bomb had exploded, the car had "burned rubber" as it drove away. [26], The explosion blew a hole measuring seven feet (2.1m) in diameter in the church's rear wall, and a crater five feet (1.5m) wide and two feet (0.61m) deep in the ladies' basement lounge, destroying the rear steps to the church and blowing a passing motorist out of his car. [60] By the time of the announcement, Herman Cash had also died; however, Thomas Blanton and Bobby Cherry were still alive. Most crucially, Blanton can also be heard saying that he was not with Miss Vaughn but, two nights before the bombing, was at a meeting with other Klansmen on a bridge above the Cahaba River.
In his opening statement for the prosecution, Don Cochran presented his case: that the evidence would show that Cherry had participated in a conspiracy to commit the bombing and conceal evidence linking him to the crime and that he had later gloated over the deaths of the victims. The intention was to fill the jail with protesters. In his rebuttal closing argument, defense attorney Art Hanes Jr. attacked the evidence presented by the prosecution as being purely circumstantial,[87] adding that, despite the existence of similar circumstantial evidence, Chambliss had not been prosecuted in 1963 of the church bombing. [73] Baxley formally reopened the case in 1971. Baxley acknowledged that typical juries in 1960s Alabama would have likely leaned in favor of both defendants, even if these recordings had been presented as evidence,[128] but said that he could have prosecuted Thomas Blanton and Bobby Cherry in 1977 if he had been granted access to these tapes. WebFour black girls were killed and at least 14 others were injured, sparking riots and a national outcry. That bomb took the lives of four young girls, including my friend and playmate [Carol] Denise McNair. )[22]:63. The 16th Street Baptist Church served as a rallying point during the civil rights movement. According to Cobbs, Chambliss had said: "It [the bomb] wasn't meant to hurt anybody it didn't go off when it was supposed to. Following Cook's testimony, Baxley introduced police sergeant Ernie Cantrell. The church's pastor, the Reverend John Cross Jr., attempted to placate the crowd by loudly reciting the 23rd Psalm through a bullhorn. While in jail, King wrote a letter to local white ministers justifying his decision not to call off the demonstrations in the face of continued bloodshed at the hands of local law enforcement officials.
Although a subsequent FBI investigation identified three other menBobby Frank Cherry, Herman Cash and Thomas E. Blanton, Jr.as having helped Chambliss commit the crime, it was later revealed that FBI chairman J. Edgar Hoover blocked their prosecution and shut down the investigation without filing charges in 1968. It was meant to suck the hope out of young lives, bury their aspirations, and ensure that old fears would be propelled forward into the next generation.[146]. Web1963 Birmingham church bombing From left, 11-year-old Denise McNair and 14-year-olds Carole Robertson, Addie Mae Collins and Cynthia Wesley were killed while She was buried at Greenwood Cemetery in Birmingham, but On July 2, 1964, President Lyndon Johnson signed into effect the Civil Rights Act of 1964. He also noted that Cherry had initially been linked to the bombing by the FBI via an informant who had claimed, fifteen months after the bombing, that she had seen Cherry place the bomb at the church shortly before the bombing. A section of wire and remnants of red plastic were discovered there, which could have been part of a timing device. July 1997 - The case is reopened by the FBI, citing new evidence. 0 On Sept. 15, 1963, four young girls were killed in a bombing at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. According to Vann's later testimony, Chambliss was standing "looking down toward the church, like a firebug watching his fire".
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