Supreme Court Voids Death Sentence of Ala. Negro

    PRESS RELEASE @ @ 

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND 
107 WEST 43 STREET * NEW YORK 36, N. Y. «© JUdson 6-8397 
ARTHUR B. SPINGARN oe THURGOOD MARSHALL President Director and Counsel 
ROY WILKINS ROBERT L. CARTER Secretary Assistant Counsel 
ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS ARNOLD de MILLE Treasurer Pross Relations 

SUPREME COURT VOIDS DEATH 
SENTENCE OF ALA. NEGRO January 17, 1957 

WASH., D.C., Jan. 1}.--The death sentence of an Alabama Negro 

was set aside here Monday by the U. S. Supreme Court in a 6 to 3 deci- 

sion which reversed a conviction upheld by the Alabama Supreme Court. 

The judgment and sentence were reversed on the grounds that the 

confessions used to convict the doomed man were obtained through 

methods which violated the due process clause of the Federal Constitu- 

tion. As the confessions were substantially the only evidence which 

the State had against him, it seems unlikely that he can be success- 

fully prosecuted for the same crime again. 

The condemned man, William Earl Fikes, 29, and a native of Marion, 

Ala., was convicted and sentenced to death in June, 1953 by an all- 

white jury following a reported unsuccessful attempt by an unknown 

intruder to rape the daughter of the Mayor of Selma, Ala., and bur- 

glarize her home. 

Previously, several Negroes had been arrested in connection with 

a reported series of burglary and rape in the city. The Mayor's 

daughter claimed she awoke in her apartment on the night of April 2), 

and found a Negro sitting on her with a knife at her throat. She 

struggled with him, seized the knife and he fled. 

Fikes was taken into custody May 16 when he was stopped in the 

street by white citizens and held until police arrived. He was arrested 

on "open charge" and held two days for "investigation" without being 

booked, Later, he was taken to Kilby State Prison where he was Sub- 

jected to eight days of incessant questioning until he allegedly 

confessed, He was not permitted to see relatives or consult legal 

counsel, 

At the trial the mayor's daughter could not identify him as her 

assailant. The only evidence offered by the state were two alleged 

confessions. The court also refused a motion by the defense attorneys 

to let Fikes take the stand to refute the confessions. 



® s 
aon 

In an appeal to the Alabama Supreme Court, Fikes! attorneys 

again raised the point of the alleged voluntary confessions. The 

State supreme Court upheld the lower court's conviction and death 

sentence and on June 22, 1955, denied a petition for a rehearing. The 

case was taken to the U. S. Supreme Court on Nov. 22, 1955, 

In the argument to the U. 5. Supreme Court three basic questions 

were raised by the attorneys for Fikes: the admission of the confes- 

sions; the refusal of the trial court judge to let the convicted man 

testify as to how the confessions were obtained; and that Negroes were 

systematically excluded from the jury. 

Chief Justice Earl Warren, who wrote the majority opinion which 

reversed the Albany Supreme Court judgnent, described Fikes as “an 

uneducated Negro, certainly of low mentality, if not mentally i11," 

who left school at 16 while in the third grade and was "a schizophrenic 

and highly suggestible," 

He was kept in "isolation," except for sessions of questioning, 

saw no friends or relatives and both his father and a lawyer were 

barred from attempts tu see him, the Chief Justice said. 

"The protections to be afforded to a prioner upon preliminary 

hearing were denied him, contrary to the law of Alabama. He was ques- 

tioned for several hours at a time over the course of five days preced-~ 

ing the first confession, and again interrogated at length before the 

written confession was secured. 

"The totality of the circumstances that preceded the confessions 

in this case goes beyond the allowable limits. The use of the confes-— 

sions secured in this setting was a denial of due process," 

Chief Justice Yarren concluded, "We hold that the circumstances of 

pressure applied against the power of resistance of this petitioner, who 

cannot be deemed other than weak of will or mind, deprived him of due 

process of law. So viewed, the judgment of conviction in this case 

cannot stand," 

Chief Justice Warren was joined in the opinion by Justices Hugo L. 
Black, William 0. Douglas and Tom C, Clark, Justices Felix Frankfurter 
and William J, Brennan concurred in a separate opinion. Dissenting were 
Justices John M,. Harlan, Stanley F. Reed and Harold H. Burton. 

NAACP Legal Defense attorney for Fikes was Jack Greenberg of New 

York who handled the case in conjunction with Peter A. Hall and Orzell 

Billingsley, Jr. of Birmingham, Ala. 

-30- 



r @ £ 

mae 

JACKIE ROBINSON'S EMPLOYER 
GIVES $10,000 TO LEGAL DEFENSE FUND January 17, 1957 

NEW YORK,» Jans 174--A $10,000 contribution was presented today to 

the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., by Jackie Robinson 

in behalf of William Black, President of the Chock Full o! Nuts Coffee 

Company and restaurant chain, The donation is to aid the organization 

in its legal work in the field of civil rights, 

The company recently signed the former Brooklyn Dodgers! baseball 

star to a two year $30,000 contract as vice president in charge of its 

large personnel staff. 

Jackie presented the check to officers of the legal Defense Fund 

at a press conference held this morning at the Roosevelt Hotel. Pres- 

ent to accept it was Arthur B, Spingarn, president of the NAACP Legal 

Defense and Educational Fund, Also present were Dr, Channing H, Tobias, 

chairman of the Board, and Thurgood Marshall, director-counsel of the 

Fund, 

= 30a