Affidavit

Public Court Documents
October 19, 1982

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Voter Suppression Playbook: Tactics from the 1980s Recycled to Silence Black Votes

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  • Case Files, Bozeman v. Lambert and Wilder v. Lambert Court Documents. Affidavit, 1982. e892540e-ed92-ee11-be37-6045bdeb8873. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/aecfe734-e985-4465-a2d8-32c658e88b24/affidavit. Accessed November 06, 2025.

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    AFFIDAVIT

My name is Lou Sommerville. I am 96 years o1d this March It.

Maggie Bozeman has never been in my house yet.

My granddaughter Ernestine Brooks and JuIia Wilder have
done aI1 my writing.

They never told me who to vote for. I voted for Miller, a
great big black man. I voted for a man for the town
to be wet. And those were two I voted for.

On the day of Maggie's trial, the High Sheriff told me to
go up there and say that Maggie wrote these ballots. Before
Maggie's trial , Louis Coleman told me if I dj-dn't tell it,
something would happen to my food stamps. They then cut me
down to one $IO.OO food stamp a month.

The High Sheriff told me this in the Courthouse j-n Carrolton
in the hallway. He said: We want to stop her off of this job
from voting. If you do not teII about Maggie coming to your
house and fixing your ballot up, then you won't get any more
food stamps. "

I told him Maggie ain't never been to my house just like he
ain't never been there. f asked him, "Have you ever did my
writing?" He said no. f said, "Well Maggie j_s just like you."

After they left me off the stand, I was sitting on the
Bench in the Courthouse. I overheard Sophie Spann telling
Louis Coleman, the Sheriff: "I told what you said for me to
say. Didn't I get it right? Now give me a tittle something
for a drink." He said, "f ain't got nomoney. Yeah, you fixed
it." Then he walked off.

I took this conversation to mean that Sophie lied on the
witness stand because the Sheriff told her what to say. A few
months later when I heard Sophie had died, I thought, "We1I
God took her off the map because she know she was lying.,,

Dated: October fr, /|ta
Signed by Lou

Witnessed By:

sworn to before me this ffi^u o,

Somerville

October, 1982.

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