Walter McMillian, who is black, was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of a young white woman who worked as a clerk in a dry cleaning store in Monroeville, Alabama. Mr. McMillian was held on death row prior to being convicted and sentenced to death. His trial lasted only a day and a half. Three witnesses testified against Mr. McMillian and the jury ignored multiple alibi witnesses, who were black, who testified that he was at a church fish fry at the time of the crime. The trial judge overrode the jury’s sentencing verdict for life and sentenced Mr. McMillian to death.
In 1986, an 18-year-old white woman named Ronda Morrison was murdered in downtown Monroeville, Alabama. The crime sent shock waves of fear and anger through the small community. Police could not solve the crime. After six months with no leads or suspects, their attention focused on Walter McMillian. Mr. McMillian was an unlikely suspect. He had no prior criminal history and was a 45-year-old self-employed logger who had done work for many people throughout the community. What seemed to bring him attention is that he’d had an affair with a married white woman. A very public divorce between this woman and her husband pulled Mr. McMillian into the limelight and he soon went from someone having an interracial affair to someone thought to be capable of murder.
A white man accused of crimes in another county was pressured by police and ultimately made false statements accusing Mr. McMillian of murdering Ms. Morrison. This set off a chain of events that changed Mr. McMillian’s life forever. He was arrested by Monroe County Sheriff Tom Tate and eventually charged with capital murder. The sheriff arranged for Mr. McMillian to be placed on death row before his trial—when he hadn’t even been convicted of a crime. Known to his friends and family as “Johnny D,” Mr. McMillian spent 15 harrowing and tortuous months on Alabama’s death row before trial.
Mr. McMillian was with his family 11 miles away from the dry cleaning store where Ms. Morrison was murdered at the time of the crime. There were dozens of black people who could testify to his innocence but they were ignored. The nearly all-white jury convicted Mr. McMillian of capital murder and sentenced him to life imprisonment without parole.
In Alabama, elected trial judges were authorized to override a jury’s life verdict and impose the death penalty. Judge Robert E. Lee Key overrode the jury’s sentence of life imprisonment and sentenced Mr. McMillian to death by electrocution. Mr. McMillian was sent back to his cell on death row, where he ultimately spent six years.
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