Judge Edward Aaron
Judge Edward Aaron (born 1923) was an African American handyman in Birmingham, Alabama who was abducted by six members of Asa Earl Carter's independent Ku Klux Klan group on Labor Day, September 2, 1957.[1] Aaron, who was mildly developmentally disabled, was abducted by Klan members who beat him with an iron bar, castrated him with a razor and poured turpentine on his wounds before putting him in the trunk of a car and driving him away from the scene, finally dumping him in a creek.[2] Police found Aaron, near death from blood loss, and took him to Hillman Hospital.[3] Two of the six Klansmen turned state's evidence and received 5 year sentences in exchange for testifying against the other four men. Those four were convicted and received 20 year sentences at Kilby Prison. However when George Wallace became governor of Alabama he pardoned the four convicted men, but not the two who had turned states evidence, with no explanation.[1][4]
The 1988 film Mississippi Burning references the story of Judge Aaron, but gave his name as Homer Wilkes.[5]
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Eskew, Glenn T. But for Birmingham: The Local and National Movements in the Civil Rights Struggle, Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 1997. (p.115)
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
