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Someone has taken a young man hung him in a tree.
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Who would do something this hideous?
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Michael Donald was an innocent, good Samaritan, not a thug.
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The crime scene was in the same block
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where this group of Klan lived. What better place to start?
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The Mobile Police Department just didn't want to believe
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that Mobile would still have Klan in it, but they did.
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We felt the cops and Klan were working hand-in-hand.
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Ain't gonna tolerate this. Thomas Figures,
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he's in a position to push and nudge and make sure
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that this case does not rest from a criminal standpoint.
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I stuck to the Klansmen. The more I asked questions,
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the more they talked.
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Tiger Knowles finally cracked,
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and he names Henry Hays
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Gotcha. Got 'em, man, got 'em.
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When we think about Michael Donald,
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how long will it take for his family to get justice?
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How many years? How many decades? How much time?
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[dramatic music]
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[newsreader] The body of a Black man
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has been found hanging from a tree
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-in Mobile, Alabama. -Lynching is a tool
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to control and oppress Black people.
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Racialized violence is as old as the Constitution.
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Klans are not running around with white sheets
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over their head, but it's still happening.
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Today, people are horrified of the Police.
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[crowds chanting]
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It's the modern-day lynching.
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[dramatic music]
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What are we going to do about it?
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We move forward with people deciding,
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I'm bold enough, and I'm gonna make it change.
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Beulah Mae Donald took on one of the most violent
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criminal organizations in the United States.
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This is an incredible story of courage.
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[slide projector clicking]
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When Beulah Mae Donald discovers that her son
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has been hung, strangled and beaten,
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she seeks to hold the killers of her child accountable.
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The stakes are high, but the only way to get justice,
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is to pursue the killers in criminal court.
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[slide projector clicking]
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I don't know all the negotiations
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that were involved. I trusted a lawyer,
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who sold me out,
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and I ended up getting a plea deal.
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It was a hard decision.
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There were threats on my life. Everybody hated me.
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Everybody hated me.
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At that point, we reached an agreement
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with Jeff Sessions.
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And the agreement was,
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since Tiger had incriminated Henry Hays,
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Tiger would be allowed to plead guilty
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to a civil rights violation in the federal system,
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and was to have been sentenced to a life term.
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And then we would try Henry
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in state court for capital murder.
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Promises were made to Tiger Knowles
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for his cooperation, and he knew
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that he was a dead man in state prison.
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If he got convicted in the state court of anything,
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and he went to prison in Alabama,
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he was done for.
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[slide projector clicking]
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I'm not a psychologist, but it's my opinion,
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Henry murdered Michael Donald to please his father.
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[urgent music]
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Tiger Knowles and Hays were the product of the people,
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and the organization, they associated with.
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They wanted to please Bennie Jack Hays.
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They wanted to make him understand
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that they would do whatever it takes to further the Klan.
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It seemed to me that Bennie Jack Hays
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had control over whatever they did.
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He could have said, "Look, I don't want you
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to go out and do anything." I don't think they would have.
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They did it with his blessing.
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Bennie Hays was a tyrant,
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and Henry was deathly afraid of him.
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But Henry always tried to please his father.
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And it just never seemed to be good enough.
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Get it off me, son of a bitch. Get it off.
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Mr. Hays probably told him, "We can do this
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and nothing will be done to us."
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I just really believe, because, typically,
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in the south,
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white people think they can do things
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and nothing will be done to them.
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And I think he convinced him, if you do this,
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oh, they'll never find out that you done it.
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Most people that do crimes,
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they feel like they will never get caught.
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In the history of the State of Alabama,
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only one white man
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had ever been sentenced to death
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for the murder of a Black person.
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The most critical factor
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was to create faith in the Black community
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that local law enforcement
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had both the will and the skill
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to prosecute a white man for murdering a Black man.
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If we were successful, it would demonstrate
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that the life of a Black person
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mattered as much as the life of a white person.
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So this is Black Lives Matter in 1983.
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[slide projector clicking]
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When you look at Michael Donald and the fact that his mother,
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Beulah Mae Donald had to essentially say,
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"Michael Donald's life mattered."
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He was Black and his life mattered.
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[slide projector clicking]
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[crowd chanting]
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The moral anthem and political cry, Black Lives Matter,
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came into being in the wake of Treyvon Martin's death.
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[slide projector clicking]
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When it came to Emmett Till, back in 1955,
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oh behalf of a 14-year-old boy,
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Mamie Till had to say his Black life mattered.
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In the case of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombings,
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for decades, on behalf of four little girls,
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and a fifth girl, who was maimed,
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we were literally saying, "Black girls' lives matter."
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Early '80s, there was not a sense of security
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that history would not repeat itself.
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We'd seen the Klan, numerous times,
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get away with lynchings,
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get away with brazen acts of violence against Blacks,
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to which there were no consequences.
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No-one was held accountable.
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[handcuffs clicking shut]
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[newsreader] Henry Hays is the Klansman
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who is charged with killing Michael Donald,
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then hanging the Black youth's body from a tree,
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near downtown Mobile, two-and-a-half years ago.
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He was arrested, and per the agreement,
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he was turned over to Chris Galanos.
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He wanted a capital murder conviction.
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He wanted Henry Hays to get the electric chair.
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In order to get a capital murder conviction,
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we're gonna need Tiger Knowles to show
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just how vicious this was.
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[slide projector clicking]
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Tiger was put in a prison out on the west coast,
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under a concealed name, and so forth.
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So Chris and I flew out there.
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In October of 1983,
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we interviewed Tiger together
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and I was forceful, but not abusive.
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I was very direct,
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and I was painfully candid.
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I was the one that told him, "In that cell,
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you've got an agreement with the federal government.
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But if you fail to tell the whole truth,
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it does not preclude prosecution by the state.
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If successful, we'll put you in the electric chair.
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And, sport, you ain't told me the whole truth."
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[dramatic music]
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[slide projector clicking]
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I was the one that told him, "In that cell.
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Today is the day, and it is your call.
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You can either tell it all,
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or I'm going to present your case
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to a grand jury when I get back to Alabama."
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I just could not fathom
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why somebody would kill
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and hang someone from a tree.
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The motive for the murder of Michael Donald
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was not known until Tiger made the connection
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between the Anderson Trial
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and the killing of Michael Donald.
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[newsreader] Josephus Andersen will go on trial, in Mobile,
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during the week of March 15 through 20, 1981.
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On Monday the 16th, the trial of Josephus Andersen
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started in the Mobile County courthouse.
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[newsreader] Anderson was accused of killing
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a white police officer in Birmingham.
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His trial was moved to Mobile because of the publicity
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the case received in Birmingham.
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The composition of the jury
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is 11 Black people and one white person.
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So it was a topic of educated speculation, shall we say,
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that Mr. Andersen would either be acquitted,
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or the case would result in a mistrial.
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The Joseph Andersen trial
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Started the week before Michael was killed,
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and I watched the trial the whole week.
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The fifth day of the trial, the case went to the jury.
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That evening, all of these people
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congregated on Herndon Ave
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and waited to see what the 10 o'clock news
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was going to report.
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[newsreader] The jurors couldn't reach agreement.
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Judge Hocklander said he was forced to declare a mistrial
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in the five-day-old case.
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The news came on and I saw him coming out the courtroom.
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I got up from the TV,
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and got dressed, and went to my sister's house.
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We talked about it for a little while and then it was over.
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Never thought we'd be affected by that.
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On Wednesday night,
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the local Klavern met
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on the property of Bennie Hays, who at that time,
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was the second ranking Klansman in the State of Alabama.
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At that Klan meeting,
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they discussed what they thought
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would be the outcome of the trial.
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and Bennie Hays made a statement to the effect
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that if a Black person, and he used another word,
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could get away with killing a white cop
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then we ought to be able
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to get away with killing a Black person,
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again, using another term.
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So Henry and Tiger left the apartment on Herndon Avenue,
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looking for a Black person to kill and to lynch,
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solely because the Klan wanted to "send the message".
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There was fear the Black community
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would start increasing its vote,
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legislatures would change in the south,
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and, possibly, throughout the country.
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And the hierarchy of the Klan viewed it
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as, maybe, a spark that started a fire
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that couldn't be put out.
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What we see in American history, again and again,
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is this ugly convergence and correlation
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between Black ascendency,
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[applause]
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and retribution and revenge
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at the hands of white supremacy.
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We saw in the wake of the civil war and reconstruction,
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we saw it in the 1920s with the resurrection of the Klan,
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and fears over immigration.
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We saw it again on the eve of the civil rights movement
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in the 1960s.
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What we have seen
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is what Cornell Belcher called Blacklash .
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This racialized violence always seems to occur
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at a moment where, perhaps,
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Black America has made an advancement of some kind.
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And the racialized violence reminds Black America
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of its place in this nation.
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[slide projector clicking]
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Bennie Hays' motive was, basically,
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to cover his backside
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and to attempt to protect his son.
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[newsreader] Henry's father, Klan leader Bennie Hays,
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has denied it all and asserts that his son has been framed
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by the communists.
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Because a communist don't pick, only if you're in their way.
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Right now, I'm in their way.
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I'm the one they're picking on. To get to me they got my son.
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How could a Klansman
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living on a rundown farm
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in a rural part of Mobile country
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come up with the money to hire
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one of the best defense attorneys around?
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When these two Klansmen were identified as killers,
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the old man, Bennie Jack Hays,
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he hired a Klansman to burn his house down
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so he could hire a prominent attorney
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to defend his son in the state trial.
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He did burn the house.
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He got an insurance settlement.
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He used that to pay the lawyer for his son, Henry Hays.
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Bennie Jack Hays raised enough money to hire
268
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one of the best criminal lawyers, M.A. 'Bubba' Marsal.
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The defense was to attempt to discredit Tiger
270
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because Mr. Marsal argued
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that Tiger had cut his deal to save his life
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and, therefore, would say anything
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that he was told to say.
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[ominous music]
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It was sometime before lunch
276
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one of the trial coordinators
277
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came to me and said, "Chris is gonna have to leave the case."
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[newsreader] Mobile County District Attorney,
279
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Chris Galanos, has been suspended.
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That came from Montgomery Circuit Judge, W. Gordon,
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who will preside over the DA's DUI trial.
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Assistant DA, Tom Harrison, is taking over for a while.
283
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Chris is going to leave immediately.
284
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He will have no contact with the office, nothing,
285
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and you're gonna have to try the Michael Donald case.
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Whoa!
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[dramatic music]
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[ominous music]
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I have been told
290
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that the next grand jury to convene in Mobile country
291
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will consider the issue
292
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of whether or not to impeach me.
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[newsreader] Galanos believes that grand jury
294
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will be empaneled December 5th. December 5th also is the date
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when the capital murder trial of Henry Hays
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is scheduled to begin,
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two work days after Galanos' DUI trial
298
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is scheduled to begin.
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I went to rehab.
300
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I mean, it's not something that I'm proud of,
301
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but that's what happened.
302
00:16:55,176 --> 00:16:58,143
Chris had been charged with driving under the influence
303
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Chris is gonna leave immediately
304
00:17:02,576 --> 00:17:05,709
and he is gonna go into some kind of rehab
305
00:17:07,243 --> 00:17:10,276
and you're gonna have to try the Michael Donald case.
306
00:17:11,676 --> 00:17:13,143
I knew his case was going on, but I didn't have any idea
307
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what was going on in his case.
308
00:17:16,243 --> 00:17:17,243
Then they told me-- [chuckles]
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--that in this case we really need to be careful.
310
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I said, "Why? I'm gonna try the case like whatever.
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What do you mean, be careful?"
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They said "We've heard some rumors."
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I said, "What are the rumors?"
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"Well, if you convict, the Klan is gonna riot."
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00:17:37,176 --> 00:17:40,076
I said, "Oh, okay." "And if you don't convict,
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the Black community, they're gonna riot."
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I said, "Oh, no."
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So they were concerned about me.
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They made me go home in a different car every day,
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and a different route, and all that.
321
00:17:55,809 --> 00:17:59,543
If prosecutors and law enforcement were afraid,
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if they wanted to take a different route home every day
323
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in order to ensure their safety,
324
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what about Beulah Mae Donald?
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As a resident of public housing, could she change her address?
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00:18:12,343 --> 00:18:13,343
Could she take a different car home?
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Could she assign security staff to herself?
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00:18:19,243 --> 00:18:19,709
She demonstrated more courage
329
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than most people I've seen in my life.
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Do you believe in your struggle to the point
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where you would literally lose your life?
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00:18:31,709 --> 00:18:33,143
Because, guess what, it's just that dangerous.
333
00:18:34,509 --> 00:18:37,776
It's just that dangerous when I open up my mail,
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and someone sends to my home
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mail that tells me they're gonna kill me,
336
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or tweets at me, you deserve to be dead, you stupid bitch.
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And tweets my address.
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You're putting your life in danger
339
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just by speaking up for truth and justice.
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When a Black woman has the temerity
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00:19:02,043 --> 00:19:03,743
to take on any white assailant
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any white person who deigns to take the life of a Black person,
343
00:19:09,176 --> 00:19:10,609
particularly in the deep south.
344
00:19:12,076 --> 00:19:13,476
Beulah Mae Donald's life, the life of her family,
345
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the life of her community is at risk.
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She had every reason to be afraid.
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There was an empirical, historical basis
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for absolute terror
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Gosh, when the community would just come
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and sit in front of my mom's door.
351
00:19:31,509 --> 00:19:33,143
So I think they call this protecting the house
352
00:19:33,776 --> 00:19:35,043
and protecting her.
353
00:19:36,176 --> 00:19:38,043
Because the Klan was still around in Mobile.
354
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[ominous music]
355
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I thought one of the best ways to really catch up
356
00:19:49,309 --> 00:19:51,509
on exactly what had happened that night.
357
00:19:52,709 --> 00:19:53,109
I had the chief investigator, Bob Eddy
358
00:19:55,476 --> 00:19:58,543
and we got with the FBI, and we got Tiger Knowles.
359
00:19:59,576 --> 00:20:01,476
We started out at Herndon Avenue,
360
00:20:03,043 --> 00:20:05,709
and I said, "Okay, we're gonna ride the route that you did,
361
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the best you remember,
362
00:20:08,676 --> 00:20:10,209
because I wanna know what happened.
363
00:20:11,043 --> 00:20:12,376
Tommy had to do that.
364
00:20:13,543 --> 00:20:16,376
He needed to know what Tiger was gonna say
365
00:20:17,309 --> 00:20:18,409
and how he was gonna say it.
366
00:20:20,476 --> 00:20:22,809
They had US marshals with them.
367
00:20:24,076 --> 00:20:26,109
They had an obligation to make sure
368
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that there was no likelihood of any kind of escape.
369
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[slide projector clicking]
370
00:20:32,109 --> 00:20:33,043
[ominous music]
371
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Bennie Hays told me
372
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that I was getting too heavy involved in the Klan,
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and I was getting to where I know too much.
374
00:20:44,343 --> 00:20:45,343
If anything ever happened
375
00:20:46,443 --> 00:20:49,476
and I wind up being the fall guy,
376
00:20:50,643 --> 00:20:51,309
he took his hand and done like that.
377
00:20:52,609 --> 00:20:54,176
He said, "Your pockets will be padded with money.
378
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You'll never have to work ever again.
379
00:20:58,176 --> 00:20:59,476
But if you ever open your mouth about the Klan,
380
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you're gonna die.
381
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[urgent music]
382
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We get up to the trial, Tuesday morning,
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you went into the courtroom the Klan in this part,
384
00:21:13,376 --> 00:21:14,076
and then you had
385
00:21:15,176 --> 00:21:18,109
all of the NAACP, all over there.
386
00:21:19,476 --> 00:21:21,243
To imagine a criminal court
387
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in the '80s, in Mobile, Alabama,
388
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where you have a jury box
389
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with 11 jurors who were white, and one juror who's Black.
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Of white defendants being held accountable
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for the death of Michael Donald,
392
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the stakes could not be higher,
393
00:21:42,476 --> 00:21:44,676
the racial tensions could not be higher
394
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The nation is literally watching.
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Everyone had to have a sense
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of this being a historical aberration.
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Black people do not get to hold white people accountable
398
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for the death of Black lives.
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A criminal trial for folks
400
00:22:05,543 --> 00:22:07,409
who are card carrying members of the Klan.
401
00:22:08,443 --> 00:22:08,743
You'd have a reason to be afraid,
402
00:22:10,109 --> 00:22:11,476
a reason to be concerned and, particularly,
403
00:22:12,643 --> 00:22:14,143
when the text and the sub-text of the trial
404
00:22:15,309 --> 00:22:17,143
is white supremacy, and American racism.
405
00:22:20,109 --> 00:22:20,676
[newsreader] Today was tense at the courthouse,
406
00:22:22,143 --> 00:22:22,809
a bomb threat was phoned in.
407
00:22:24,309 --> 00:22:24,409
and a prosecution witness said Hays' father
408
00:22:25,243 --> 00:22:26,376
threatened to kill him.
409
00:22:27,476 --> 00:22:28,209
He said if I ever open my mouth
410
00:22:28,709 --> 00:22:29,776
about anything,
411
00:22:31,176 --> 00:22:31,576
that I would be dead within 8 hours,
412
00:22:32,409 --> 00:22:33,476
24 hours at the most.
413
00:22:34,309 --> 00:22:35,709
I was really scared.
414
00:22:37,176 --> 00:22:38,209
I moved out of my mother and father's house
415
00:22:39,309 --> 00:22:40,609
'cause when I was started testifying
416
00:22:42,543 --> 00:22:43,643
Bennie Hays came to my mom and daddy's house,
417
00:22:44,743 --> 00:22:47,209
looking for me, to shut my mouth,
418
00:22:48,076 --> 00:22:49,443
to keep me from talking.
419
00:22:50,343 --> 00:22:51,443
[slide projector clicking]
420
00:22:52,809 --> 00:22:54,409
When my mother and father went to the store to guy groceries
421
00:22:55,576 --> 00:22:58,076
I wrote them a note saying I moved out.
422
00:22:59,376 --> 00:23:01,209
I couldn't live here no more, and I started staying
423
00:23:02,276 --> 00:23:03,576
at the Salvation Army in Pritchard.
424
00:23:05,343 --> 00:23:06,809
I honestly believed that they would have killed
425
00:23:07,643 --> 00:23:08,443
my mom and daddy.
426
00:23:09,476 --> 00:23:10,476
29-year-old Henry Hays looked chipper
427
00:23:11,643 --> 00:23:12,576
as his capital murder trial got under way.
428
00:23:14,409 --> 00:23:15,809
Security is tight at the trial where in his opening argument,
429
00:23:17,209 --> 00:23:17,676
acting District Attorney, Tom Harrison,
430
00:23:18,776 --> 00:23:19,576
charged that Hays and 20-year-old
431
00:23:20,743 --> 00:23:21,676
James 'Tiger' Knowles, went out looking
432
00:23:23,076 --> 00:23:25,176
for a Black man and found Michael Donald.
433
00:23:26,243 --> 00:23:27,509
I put Tiger Knowles on the stand
434
00:23:28,676 --> 00:23:30,776
and we went through, you know, who he is,
435
00:23:32,243 --> 00:23:33,776
did he know Henry Hays and how did he know him,
436
00:23:35,209 --> 00:23:36,776
just asking what happened that night.
437
00:23:37,709 --> 00:23:38,409
[slide projector clicking]
438
00:23:40,743 --> 00:23:41,376
Soon as he leaned over to the car
439
00:23:42,643 --> 00:23:44,209
to give us directions, I put a pistol in his face
440
00:23:45,109 --> 00:23:45,576
and made him get in the car.
441
00:23:46,643 --> 00:23:48,643
Then he started begging for his life.
442
00:23:50,409 --> 00:23:51,343
[ominous music]
443
00:23:56,276 --> 00:23:57,709
[haunting music]
444
00:24:03,809 --> 00:24:04,376
[newsreader] The body of a Black man
445
00:24:05,643 --> 00:24:07,043
was found hanging, lynch style, from a tree
446
00:24:08,243 --> 00:24:09,076
in a residential street in Mobile, Alabama.
447
00:24:10,109 --> 00:24:11,043
That was more than two years ago.
448
00:24:12,309 --> 00:24:13,043
Today, a courtroom heard that the killing
449
00:24:14,143 --> 00:24:14,709
was the work of the Ku Klux Klan.
450
00:24:15,643 --> 00:24:17,343
[slide projector clicking]
451
00:24:18,509 --> 00:24:20,609
Mrs. Donald did not attend the trial
452
00:24:22,109 --> 00:24:25,709
because, I think, that it would have been too painful.
453
00:24:27,176 --> 00:24:32,276
She'd lost a child, and to have to relive that
454
00:24:33,276 --> 00:24:35,376
would be devastating to any parent.
455
00:24:36,076 --> 00:24:37,309
[somber music]
456
00:24:38,409 --> 00:24:42,276
Consider what Beulah Mae Donald was going through
457
00:24:43,509 --> 00:24:46,043
while trying to secure justice for Michael Donald,
458
00:24:46,776 --> 00:24:49,243
while grieving his death.
459
00:24:49,743 --> 00:24:50,676
[somber music]
460
00:24:51,809 --> 00:24:55,609
Consider what Gwen Carr is going through now,
461
00:24:56,643 --> 00:24:59,343
in the wake of Eric Garner's death
462
00:25:00,576 --> 00:25:04,676
Consider all the mothers, behind the hashtags,
463
00:25:06,143 --> 00:25:08,776
who had children we understand to be human beings.
464
00:25:09,476 --> 00:25:10,143
[somber music]
465
00:25:11,076 --> 00:25:13,309
Our child, they die one time.
466
00:25:14,376 --> 00:25:15,376
The mother, the father, the family,
467
00:25:16,309 --> 00:25:16,809
we die a little every day.
468
00:25:18,209 --> 00:25:19,509
[slide projector clicking]
469
00:25:20,443 --> 00:25:21,376
What happened to George Floyd
470
00:25:22,709 --> 00:25:25,343
brought back so vividly of how my son was killed.
471
00:25:26,476 --> 00:25:27,809
There are so many m others and fathers
472
00:25:28,709 --> 00:25:29,576
who's child has been murdered,
473
00:25:30,676 --> 00:25:32,176
and no-one ever heard about them.
474
00:25:33,443 --> 00:25:35,276
They are the nameless, and they are the faceless,
475
00:25:36,176 --> 00:25:37,709
but their pain is the same
476
00:25:40,476 --> 00:25:41,309
[somber music]
477
00:25:42,176 --> 00:25:42,676
[slide projector clicking]
478
00:25:45,809 --> 00:25:46,609
When the trials started, I didn't go to the trials.
479
00:25:47,743 --> 00:25:48,709
I never went to any of the trials,
480
00:25:49,509 --> 00:25:51,276
because at that point,
481
00:25:52,476 --> 00:25:53,776
I don't know what was going on with my body
482
00:25:54,743 --> 00:25:56,176
but I had gotten so little.
483
00:25:57,443 --> 00:26:00,676
And the doctor said what I was doing was no eating.
484
00:26:02,243 --> 00:26:03,776
And I think that what it was, I didn't want anything to eat.
485
00:26:05,309 --> 00:26:07,509
But I had got so small, my ma was worried about me.
486
00:26:09,043 --> 00:26:09,776
She said, "Are you all right? because I dropped
487
00:26:11,043 --> 00:26:13,143
so much weight in so little time.
488
00:26:14,209 --> 00:26:15,276
Our top story, the Henry Hays trial.
489
00:26:16,543 --> 00:26:17,543
Hays admits that he's a member of the Ku Klux Klan.
490
00:26:19,076 --> 00:26:20,509
Now, he's being tried on charges of capital murder,
491
00:26:21,809 --> 00:26:23,209
charges that could send him to the electric chair,
492
00:26:24,409 --> 00:26:25,409
if convicted of killing a young, Black man,
493
00:26:26,109 --> 00:26:27,309
Michael Donald.
494
00:26:28,376 --> 00:26:29,743
The two or three times that I paid
495
00:26:30,576 --> 00:26:32,043
any attention to Henry,
496
00:26:33,443 --> 00:26:36,409
he appeared to be scared to death, justifiably so,
497
00:26:37,276 --> 00:26:38,543
'cause the ship was sinking.
498
00:26:40,176 --> 00:26:43,343
Every witness that I put on was another nail in his coffin.
499
00:26:44,376 --> 00:26:46,109
When Tiger Knowles told the story
500
00:26:47,409 --> 00:26:49,243
I think everybody was just so amazed,
501
00:26:50,309 --> 00:26:51,143
'cause if it hadn't been for him
502
00:26:52,076 --> 00:26:53,243
we never would have known.
503
00:26:54,509 --> 00:26:55,443
[newsreader] Testifying for the prosecution,
504
00:26:56,609 --> 00:26:57,776
James "Tiger' Knowles, pointed at his fellow
505
00:26:59,076 --> 00:26:59,743
Ku Klux Klansman, Henry Hays,
506
00:27:01,109 --> 00:27:02,743
and said that together they killed 19-year-old
507
00:27:04,209 --> 00:27:06,643
Michael Donald in March, 1981, because he was black.
508
00:27:07,376 --> 00:27:08,276
[ominous music]
509
00:27:11,609 --> 00:27:12,743
The Klan wanted the message
510
00:27:13,809 --> 00:27:15,076
to get back to the Black people,
511
00:27:16,376 --> 00:27:17,776
not just of Alabama, of the whole United States,
512
00:27:19,143 --> 00:27:21,443
that we would not stand for a Black person
513
00:27:22,809 --> 00:27:24,509
killing a white police officer and getting away with it,
514
00:27:25,309 --> 00:27:27,443
especially in Alabama.
515
00:27:28,576 --> 00:27:31,176
We had gotten the rope, ad we got the gun.
516
00:27:32,509 --> 00:27:35,276
And then I tied the hangman's noose in Henry's car.
517
00:27:36,076 --> 00:27:37,609
We were out on a hunt.
518
00:27:39,209 --> 00:27:41,543
That's what we were doing, we were hunting Black people.
519
00:27:43,109 --> 00:27:45,309
Klansmen said that they were out hunting Black people.
520
00:27:46,576 --> 00:27:50,409
and they came upon Michael Donald and killed him.
521
00:27:52,043 --> 00:27:52,776
They literally mean they were out hunting Black people.
522
00:27:54,343 --> 00:27:57,509
Just go watch the tape of what happened to Ahmaud Arbery
523
00:27:59,443 --> 00:28:01,043
when they killed him on the streets in Georgia.
524
00:28:02,576 --> 00:28:05,543
Watch men, who are not police officers,
525
00:28:06,576 --> 00:28:09,776
who have no authority, drive around,
526
00:28:11,243 --> 00:28:16,043
and literally corner off this young man.
527
00:28:17,276 --> 00:28:18,176
And then shoot him, with a shotgun,
528
00:28:19,109 --> 00:28:20,543
in his hand, in his body.
529
00:28:21,443 --> 00:28:22,143
[slide projector clicking]
530
00:28:25,343 --> 00:28:28,076
He was an easy target because he was by himself,
531
00:28:29,243 --> 00:28:32,576
and so that's the reason we chose him.
532
00:28:34,043 --> 00:28:34,809
I called him over to the car for directions.
533
00:28:36,276 --> 00:28:37,443
I think it was for directions, I don't remember.
534
00:28:38,609 --> 00:28:39,743
Henry pulled the car right against the curb,
535
00:28:41,076 --> 00:28:44,776
and I asked Mike where Butt Nightclub was,
536
00:28:46,409 --> 00:28:47,443
and he went to give me directions to it,
537
00:28:48,743 --> 00:28:49,609
and I put the gun in his face and told him,
538
00:28:50,443 --> 00:28:51,476
"Don't say anything."
539
00:28:52,743 --> 00:28:53,576
I pulled the gun and told him to get in the car.
540
00:28:55,176 --> 00:28:56,409
He got in the back seat, and I got in it with him.
541
00:28:57,643 --> 00:28:58,776
The guy had no idea we was gonna kill him.
542
00:29:00,276 --> 00:29:01,809
We brought him-- took him to Baldwin County.
543
00:29:03,109 --> 00:29:03,809
I asked him if he had a girlfriend.
544
00:29:05,043 --> 00:29:05,609
He said, "Yeah."
545
00:29:07,743 --> 00:29:09,209
The last thing he said, as far as I can remember,
546
00:29:10,476 --> 00:29:11,376
was in the car when he said, "Please don't kill me.
547
00:29:12,676 --> 00:29:13,776
I'll do anything you want, just don't kill me."
548
00:29:15,776 --> 00:29:18,509
When we got out of the car is when he attacked me
549
00:29:19,276 --> 00:29:20,276
and tried to get away.
550
00:29:21,443 --> 00:29:22,476
It's like he just completely changed
551
00:29:23,676 --> 00:29:26,276
and went from a calm person to a mad dog,
552
00:29:27,109 --> 00:29:27,543
a raging animal.
553
00:29:30,643 --> 00:29:32,443
When I think about Tiger Knowles
554
00:29:33,776 --> 00:29:38,509
describing Michael Donald fighting like a mad dog,
555
00:29:40,776 --> 00:29:43,743
I think about the fact that the killer
556
00:29:45,409 --> 00:29:48,243
is describing the victim as non-human.
557
00:29:50,343 --> 00:29:54,309
That says everything we need to know about hate crime.
558
00:29:55,576 --> 00:29:59,243
Tiger Knowles is so detached from his own humanity,
559
00:30:00,543 --> 00:30:01,376
he's lost sight of the fact
560
00:30:02,543 --> 00:30:04,376
that he's behaving in a beastly manner,
561
00:30:05,743 --> 00:30:09,076
in an animal-like manner, in an animalistic-like manner.
562
00:30:10,209 --> 00:30:13,076
That he's providing moral commentary
563
00:30:13,809 --> 00:30:15,643
on Michael Donald's behavior
564
00:30:17,176 --> 00:30:19,776
as someone desperately trying to fight for their life.
565
00:30:20,776 --> 00:30:22,209
[somber music]
566
00:30:23,409 --> 00:30:24,743
Michael was a strong person.
567
00:30:25,576 --> 00:30:26,509
He was a strong person.
568
00:30:28,209 --> 00:30:29,309
So he was just overpowered, he probably got tired.
569
00:30:30,709 --> 00:30:32,709
But he was a strong person and I know that for a fact.
570
00:30:34,343 --> 00:30:35,243
He fought 'em. I knew he fought 'em.
571
00:30:35,743 --> 00:30:37,309
I knew he did.
572
00:30:39,376 --> 00:30:42,043
He was hit way over a hundred-- at least two hundred times,
573
00:30:42,776 --> 00:30:44,309
with a limb that was found.
574
00:30:45,143 --> 00:30:48,409
And then we killed him.
575
00:30:50,309 --> 00:30:52,076
Henry went and got the rope. We put the rope round his neck.
576
00:30:53,243 --> 00:30:54,476
Henry put his foot on Mike's head,
577
00:30:55,709 --> 00:30:56,476
and was pulling on it to hold it secure
578
00:30:57,409 --> 00:30:58,543
while we tied the noose.
579
00:31:00,176 --> 00:31:01,443
Henry and I put him in the trunk of the car.
580
00:31:01,443 --> 00:31:02,576
Henry cut his throat.
581
00:31:05,043 --> 00:31:06,609
And we took him back to Mobile,
582
00:31:08,509 --> 00:31:09,743
and lynched him.
583
00:31:16,176 --> 00:31:17,276
Just image that.
584
00:31:18,609 --> 00:31:23,609
A person was brutally beaten, their throat was cut,
585
00:31:24,476 --> 00:31:25,809
and then hung from a tree.
586
00:31:27,276 --> 00:31:30,776
My God, I mean, your heart just-- just drops.
587
00:31:31,609 --> 00:31:32,776
My heart just dropped.
588
00:31:34,143 --> 00:31:34,576
Then you're thinking about the family
589
00:31:35,743 --> 00:31:38,276
of that child, 'cause he was 19-years-old.
590
00:31:39,543 --> 00:31:41,509
When Tiger Knowles described what he had done
591
00:31:43,043 --> 00:31:45,609
He told us how he fought them and they had got tired.
592
00:31:46,776 --> 00:31:48,276
Henry said, "We not gonna let this nigger
593
00:31:49,443 --> 00:31:50,776
fight us like this and not kill him,"
594
00:31:51,743 --> 00:31:52,709
and that's what happened.
595
00:31:53,609 --> 00:31:55,143
[slide projector clicking]
596
00:31:56,543 --> 00:32:01,243
They really play on this young man's courtesy to them.
597
00:32:04,243 --> 00:32:06,076
They ask this young man for directions
598
00:32:07,343 --> 00:32:09,276
to get somewhere. He stopped what he was doing
599
00:32:10,443 --> 00:32:12,509
to try to show them where they needed to go
600
00:32:13,309 --> 00:32:14,243
in that community.
601
00:32:15,443 --> 00:32:16,543
He was brought up to respect people
602
00:32:17,709 --> 00:32:18,576
and try to help people where he could.
603
00:32:20,143 --> 00:32:22,276
That's what he was doing, and they took advantage of it.
604
00:32:25,109 --> 00:32:26,243
And to me, that's as low as you can get.
605
00:32:27,809 --> 00:32:29,043
Some people would have just kept walking,
606
00:32:30,543 --> 00:32:31,409
but he wasn't brought up that way.
607
00:32:32,343 --> 00:32:33,476
[slide projector clicking]
608
00:32:38,476 --> 00:32:39,743
[somber music]
609
00:32:41,809 --> 00:32:43,543
[slide projector clicking]
610
00:32:45,143 --> 00:32:47,709
He was an easy target because he was walking by himself.
611
00:32:49,143 --> 00:32:49,643
I called him over to the car for directions.
612
00:32:51,109 --> 00:32:52,709
I think it was for directions, I don't remember.
613
00:32:54,143 --> 00:32:55,409
I pulled a gun and told him to get into the car.
614
00:32:56,109 --> 00:32:57,509
[ominous music]
615
00:32:58,709 --> 00:33:00,476
When they first got Michael into the car,
616
00:33:01,643 --> 00:33:02,343
Tiger had held a gun on him, and said,
617
00:33:03,443 --> 00:33:04,609
"Take everything out of your pocket."
618
00:33:06,209 --> 00:33:09,609
In his pocket was his wallet that had a dollar bill in it.
619
00:33:10,776 --> 00:33:11,443
The sister testified he had a dollar
620
00:33:12,643 --> 00:33:14,476
when he left the house. And when we found him,
621
00:33:15,309 --> 00:33:16,409
that dollar was gone.
622
00:33:17,609 --> 00:33:19,176
That constituted, obviously, robbery,
623
00:33:20,109 --> 00:33:21,343
we could prove kidnapping.
624
00:33:22,543 --> 00:33:25,176
So those two, combined with his murder,
625
00:33:25,809 --> 00:33:28,076
made it capital murder.
626
00:33:29,409 --> 00:33:32,676
Michael Donald is abducted, he's brutally beaten,
627
00:33:33,609 --> 00:33:36,076
and then, post mortem, lynched.
628
00:33:37,343 --> 00:33:39,076
After all of that, lawyers have to, ultimately,
629
00:33:40,276 --> 00:33:43,076
hold one of the killers accountable for murder
630
00:33:43,709 --> 00:33:45,543
by legal acrobatics,
631
00:33:47,176 --> 00:33:49,409
where you have to, essentially, establish the theft of a dollar
632
00:33:50,676 --> 00:33:53,443
in order to establish the theft of a life.
633
00:33:54,143 --> 00:33:55,309
[ominous music]
634
00:33:56,343 --> 00:33:58,376
There have been over 200 attempts,
635
00:33:59,076 --> 00:34:00,443
over 100 years,
636
00:34:01,576 --> 00:34:05,409
to pass federal anti-lynching legislation.
637
00:34:06,576 --> 00:34:08,609
Until this very day, we have not done so.
638
00:34:09,743 --> 00:34:12,176
Lynching is not a relic of a bygone era,
639
00:34:13,343 --> 00:34:15,509
but, literally, manifests and metastasizes
640
00:34:16,576 --> 00:34:18,409
in new forms of racial terrorism,
641
00:34:19,543 --> 00:34:22,109
literally as we speak and as we Tweet.
642
00:34:23,276 --> 00:34:24,709
Look what they did to George Floyd on TV,
643
00:34:26,076 --> 00:34:27,609
Everybody can see it. Where's the remorse?
644
00:34:28,743 --> 00:34:29,576
They lynched him, that's what I call it,
645
00:34:31,076 --> 00:34:32,243
a lynching, still, maybe a different tactic.
646
00:34:33,309 --> 00:34:34,409
Some 30 years later, and you go,
647
00:34:35,343 --> 00:34:36,109
this is still happening.
648
00:34:37,176 --> 00:34:38,743
A Black life still has no value.
649
00:34:42,176 --> 00:34:43,276
[somber music]
650
00:34:47,743 --> 00:34:49,676
In this trial, the final jury
651
00:34:50,776 --> 00:34:52,043
was 11 whites and one Black lady.
652
00:34:54,443 --> 00:34:57,376
I still had some concerns about the makeup of the jury.
653
00:34:58,543 --> 00:34:59,476
White and Black people see things differently.
654
00:35:00,409 --> 00:35:01,776
I mean, we show Black folks
655
00:35:03,309 --> 00:35:05,509
the film where the police was beating Rodney King in LA,
656
00:35:06,443 --> 00:35:09,043
and we say, "Police brutality."
657
00:35:10,109 --> 00:35:11,109
And white folks see that same film
658
00:35:12,276 --> 00:35:14,676
say to the jury, "He resisted arrest".
659
00:35:16,143 --> 00:35:17,476
They figure they can kill a Black person,
660
00:35:19,176 --> 00:35:21,043
the all white jury, they'll find him not guilty.
661
00:35:23,276 --> 00:35:25,076
And that's been the practice over the years.
662
00:35:26,443 --> 00:35:27,543
[newsreader] The admitted Klansman stood stone-faced
663
00:35:29,176 --> 00:35:30,609
as the verdict was read, but moments later turned ashen,
664
00:35:32,176 --> 00:35:33,176
as the words, guilty of capital murder, sank in.
665
00:35:34,776 --> 00:35:36,476
There were gasps and muffled cries in the packed courtroom,
666
00:35:37,676 --> 00:35:38,476
not only from Hays' family, but the family
667
00:35:40,076 --> 00:35:42,076
of Michael Donald as well. It took the jury 26 minutes
668
00:35:43,143 --> 00:35:43,776
to recommend life without parole.
669
00:35:45,143 --> 00:35:46,076
Judge Braxton Kittrell will sentence Hays
670
00:35:46,676 --> 00:35:47,076
on January 19th.
671
00:35:49,309 --> 00:35:50,309
In the State of Alabama, the way the law works
672
00:35:51,576 --> 00:35:52,576
is the jury gets to make the recommendation
673
00:35:53,676 --> 00:35:54,776
for sentencing in a capital crime.
674
00:35:56,276 --> 00:35:56,309
They can either recommend life without parole
675
00:35:57,776 --> 00:35:58,643
or they can recommend death.
676
00:35:59,676 --> 00:36:01,076
This particular jury for Henry Hays
677
00:36:02,143 --> 00:36:03,209
recommended life without parole.
678
00:36:04,409 --> 00:36:06,143
However, a white judge, in the mid '80s,
679
00:36:07,409 --> 00:36:09,509
in Mobile Alabama, rejected that recommendation
680
00:36:11,043 --> 00:36:13,109
from the jury and, instead, sentenced him to death.
681
00:36:14,409 --> 00:36:17,043
It was the first time, since at least the early 1900s,
682
00:36:18,043 --> 00:36:19,109
and possibly longer, that a white
683
00:36:20,043 --> 00:36:21,076
had been sentenced to death
684
00:36:22,176 --> 00:36:22,776
for a crime committed against a Black person
685
00:36:24,243 --> 00:36:25,109
in the state of Alabama. As a young man,
686
00:36:26,209 --> 00:36:27,276
who was born and raised in the south,
687
00:36:28,576 --> 00:36:30,409
I am just proud to be in this chair, on this day,
688
00:36:31,709 --> 00:36:32,509
when a white man has been sentenced to die
689
00:36:33,309 --> 00:36:34,476
for murdering a Black.
690
00:36:35,809 --> 00:36:38,143
Nobody,
691
00:36:39,309 --> 00:36:44,543
not then, not today, 39 years later,
692
00:36:45,709 --> 00:36:49,776
ought to be, you know, running a victory lap.
693
00:36:51,109 --> 00:36:54,243
The only conclusion you can reach
694
00:36:55,076 --> 00:36:57,509
is that everybody lost.
695
00:36:59,109 --> 00:37:02,243
Two families was destroyed from the hatred that went on.
696
00:37:03,409 --> 00:37:05,076
It was just a sad situation, it was.
697
00:37:05,743 --> 00:37:07,209
Two families were destroyed.
698
00:37:10,743 --> 00:37:15,509
Bennie Hays, obviously, felt that he was so powerful
699
00:37:16,443 --> 00:37:18,676
that he was above the law.
700
00:37:20,143 --> 00:37:24,576
But in the end, he was brought to his knees,
701
00:37:26,243 --> 00:37:28,343
and caused the death of his son.
702
00:37:33,109 --> 00:37:35,443
You can't give life, so why take it?
703
00:37:36,376 --> 00:37:37,176
You kill an innocent person,
704
00:37:38,343 --> 00:37:39,476
that person stays with you day and night.
705
00:37:41,743 --> 00:37:42,509
[slide projector clicking]
706
00:37:52,509 --> 00:37:54,143
It seemed like a long time coming,
707
00:37:55,376 --> 00:37:57,343
but just the fact that it ended up coming,
708
00:37:58,543 --> 00:38:01,076
it was like everybody was praising God,
709
00:38:02,343 --> 00:38:05,276
and just thanking God, and just really, really happy.
710
00:38:06,443 --> 00:38:08,076
I think the jubilation was not so much
711
00:38:09,243 --> 00:38:11,309
that he received the death penalty,
712
00:38:11,309 --> 00:38:14,276
it was that the life of a Black man in 1984
713
00:38:15,343 --> 00:38:16,643
was determined to have mattered,
714
00:38:18,143 --> 00:38:20,709
to the extent that what was said to apply to all
715
00:38:21,643 --> 00:38:22,276
on the dignity, and respect,
716
00:38:23,443 --> 00:38:24,176
and the right to life and liberty,
717
00:38:25,409 --> 00:38:28,176
the right not to be targeted for race and killed.
718
00:38:28,776 --> 00:38:29,643
that it was realized,
719
00:38:30,743 --> 00:38:32,676
in that moment, in that courtroom
720
00:38:33,809 --> 00:38:34,343
We were pleased with the arrest.
721
00:38:35,509 --> 00:38:36,743
We were more pleased with the outcome.
722
00:38:38,276 --> 00:38:42,176
Mike was a young kid, 19, going to the store,
723
00:38:43,543 --> 00:38:45,443
minding his own business, just going to the store.
724
00:38:46,709 --> 00:38:50,109
It's extraordinarily unusual for any white person
725
00:38:50,709 --> 00:38:51,409
to be held accountable
726
00:38:52,543 --> 00:38:54,109
for taking the life of a Black person.
727
00:38:55,376 --> 00:38:59,109
So to the extent that you have a member of the Klan
728
00:39:00,043 --> 00:39:01,576
being given the death penalty
729
00:39:02,609 --> 00:39:04,176
for taking the life of a Black person,
730
00:39:05,409 --> 00:39:07,543
t may not be moral progress, but it is progress
731
00:39:08,676 --> 00:39:11,043
in terms of the recognition of Black life.
732
00:39:13,309 --> 00:39:15,043
Beulah Mae Donald, in many ways,
733
00:39:16,176 --> 00:39:18,343
embodies, personifies, the moral nuance,
734
00:39:19,409 --> 00:39:21,276
the complexity in the Black community
735
00:39:22,076 --> 00:39:23,309
about the death penalty.
736
00:39:24,209 --> 00:39:26,643
She grieves over her son,
737
00:39:28,109 --> 00:39:30,143
but as a woman of faith is opposed to the death penalty,
738
00:39:31,043 --> 00:39:31,243
and has a forgiving heart.
739
00:39:33,476 --> 00:39:36,609
This is a moral calculus that can only be performed
740
00:39:37,776 --> 00:39:40,076
by someone who should be eligible for sainthood.
741
00:39:43,343 --> 00:39:45,076
We were getting letters from all over the world.
742
00:39:46,176 --> 00:39:46,743
The postman would just get mad,
743
00:39:47,809 --> 00:39:49,109
beause we were getting, like crates,
744
00:39:50,309 --> 00:39:53,309
10 and 12 crates a day, per day, of mail
745
00:39:54,576 --> 00:39:58,376
from all around the world. All around the world.
746
00:39:59,309 --> 00:40:00,243
[slide projector clicking]
747
00:40:02,476 --> 00:40:03,709
Beulah Mae Donald, having endured
748
00:40:05,076 --> 00:40:07,809
the emotional rigors of a criminal trial,
749
00:40:08,743 --> 00:40:10,409
knew that she wasn't done.
750
00:40:11,676 --> 00:40:14,743
It wasn't enough to hold a few individuals accountable,
751
00:40:16,209 --> 00:40:19,676
she had to hold the whole United Klans of America
752
00:40:21,076 --> 00:40:24,509
accountable for the death of Michael.
753
00:40:25,509 --> 00:40:28,276
She wanted a victory to a civil trial,
754
00:40:29,509 --> 00:40:33,409
on behalf of her child, her son, but also other children,
755
00:40:34,576 --> 00:40:37,376
on behalf of them and their mothers.
756
00:40:38,076 --> 00:40:39,776
[somber music]
757
00:40:43,643 --> 00:40:45,609
It was not enough to have a guilty verdict.
758
00:40:46,809 --> 00:40:49,109
She understood that there was something
759
00:40:49,809 --> 00:40:52,676
much more nefarious at play.
760
00:40:54,276 --> 00:41:00,609
And so she brought a civil suit against the Klan in Alabama.
761
00:41:01,709 --> 00:41:04,209
This was an opportunity to take down
762
00:41:05,509 --> 00:41:08,643
one of the longest-standing white supremacist,
763
00:41:09,676 --> 00:41:11,476
domestic terrorist organizations
764
00:41:12,409 --> 00:41:12,443
that existed in the nation.
765
00:41:14,543 --> 00:41:15,676
Think about this, this is a Black woman
766
00:41:17,043 --> 00:41:18,609
who has just lost her son to lynching,
767
00:41:20,109 --> 00:41:23,276
finds the strength to move forward in a civil suit
768
00:41:24,143 --> 00:41:28,076
against the Klan in Alabama.
769
00:41:28,809 --> 00:41:30,676
It's almost unimaginable.
770
00:41:33,509 --> 00:41:34,476
[dramatic music]
59598
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