Cleveland Louis Sellers, Jr. v. South Carolina

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Student Activists Lead in the Fight for Civil Rights

    PressRelease B Sime 

January 24, 1972 

CLEVELAND LOUIS SELLERS, JR. v. SOUTH CAROLINA 

BACKGROUNDER 

On Friday, January 7, 1972, NAACP Legal Defense and Educa- 

tional Fund, Inc. (LDF) attorneys asked the U.S. Supreme Court to 

hear the case of Cleveland Louis Sellers, Jr., a young black man 

who has been implicated in events which led local law enforcement 

officials in South Carolina to carry out the infamous Orangeburg 

Massacre against students at South Carolina State College in 

February of 1968 

Sellers now stands convicted of riot law violations and will 

have to serve a one-year prison term and pay a $250 fine -- the 

maximum South Carolina sentence for riot -- if the Supreme Court 

refuses to overturn his conviction. LDF attorneys allege that mis- 

carriages of justice occurred throughout Sellers' state trial and 

led directly to his conviction by a local Orangeburg jury. 

The case holds a very special importance for black Americans, 

LDF attorneys claim. If Sellers' conviction is allowed to stand, 

he would be the only person to receive a major conviction as a 

result of the massacre. Police officials, charged by the Federal 

government of participation in the shoot-out, which left three 

students dead and 40 others wounded, were acquitted by local juries 

and all charges against them have been dropped. 

According to the LDF petition to the Supreme Court, Sellers 

took part in a student demonstration on February 6, 1968, two days 

(More) 

NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc, | 10 Columbus Circle | New York, N.Y. 10019 | (212) 586-8397 

William T. Coleman, Jr. - President Jack Greenberg - Director-Counsel 



Backgrounder Page 2 
Cleveland Louis Sellers, Jr. 
Vv. South Carolina 

before the massacre. Students at the predominantly black South 

Carolina State College gathered before a segregated bowling alley 

in downtown Orangeburg and attempted to enter it. When several 

students were arrested by police, additional students gathered until 

the crowd grew to 200 or 300 students. Sellers was not among those 

arrested. However, he was allegedly observed by police officials 

who testified at his trial that they had seen Sellers passing 

through the crowd after the arrests were made. While they could 

not hear what transpired, the officers testified, the various groups 

of students became more boisterous after talking with Sellers. 

Students began flicking matches and cigarette lighters. It was 

alleged that at one point, Sellers, standing some distance from the 

bowling alley and, pointing in the direction of a supermarket, 

shouted, "Burn, baby, burn." No fires were set that night, but at 

some point the glass door to the bowling alley was broken. As 

students were returning to the college campus, other stores were 

alleged to have received some damage, although no one saw Sellers 

commit any act of violence. 

After the Massacre, on February 8, an indictment was handed 

down against Sellers, charging him with riot, on February 8, 1968 -- 

the day of the massacre, and incitement and conspiracy to riot on 

the 8th -- and "at divers times before that date." 

When the case went to trial in state court, LDF attorneys 

contend, the judge refused to ask questions of prospective jurors -- 

as requested by Sellers -- that would have disclosed their attitudes 

towards segregation and their feelings about the student demonstrators. 

He also refused to allow challenges for cause of several prospective 

jurors who stated that they would tend to believe the testimony of 



Backgrounder Page 3 

Cleveland Louis Sellers, Jr. 

v. South Carolina 

police officers more than other witnesses. Only police officers 

were used by the prosecution to testify against Sellers. 

At trial, the LDF petition claims, there were no witnesses 

who had seen Sellers after the bowling alley demonstration on the 

6th or who could testify as to his activities and whereabouts 

during the massacre. When this became clear in mid-trial, the 

indictment against Sellers was changed so that charges against him 

were solely based on his activities at the bowling alley demonstra- 

tion of the 6th. 

Finally, Sellers was acquitted of incitement to riot, LDF 

charges, because of lack of evidence, but was found guilty of riot, 

eventhough no one had seen Sellers commit any act of violence. 

When the case was appealed to the South Carolina Supreme 

Court, the petition continues, that court denied Sellers' claims 

that the South Carolina riot law had only been successfully prose- 

cuted in cases where defendants had actually participated in acts of 

violence. They upheld the lower court conviction, based on evidence 

which only showed incitement to riot, a crime for which Sellers had 

been acquitted. 

LDF attorneys now claim that the conviction of Sellers should 

be reversed; that the South Carolina Supreme Court changed the 

definition of riot on his appeal; that once Sellers had been acquitted 

of incitement to riot, his conviction of riot on evidence that showed 

only incitement violated the constitution's double jeopardy clause; 

and that the definition of riot is so vague as to violate his 

rights to freedom of speech and of assembly. Further, the refusal 

to ask questions of jurors about their possible racial prejudices 

and to excuse jurors who said they would tend to believe policemen 

over other witnesses denied Sellers his right to be tried by a fair 

and impartial jury. 

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