The black boy executed at 14 was George Stinney Jr., a young African American boy who was wrongly convicted and executed for the murder of two white girls in 1944.
George Stinney Jr. was arrested and charged with the murder of two young white girls, Betty June Binnicker and Mary Emma Thames, in South Carolina. The trial lasted only a few hours, and the jury, all white men, found Stinney guilty. He was sentenced to death in the electric chair.
Stinney's case became a symbol of the racial injustice and inequality that existed in the American South during the Jim Crow era. He was only 14 years old at the time of his execution, making him the youngest person executed in the United States in the 20th century.
Despite the lack of evidence and the questionable circumstances surrounding his trial, Stinney was executed on June 16, 1944. His case remained a source of controversy for decades, and in 2014, after a lengthy legal battle, Stinney was posthumously pardoned by the South Carolina Supreme Court.
The pardon recognized that Stinney had been denied a fair trial and that the evidence against him was insufficient. However, it did not exonerate him completely, as the court did not find him innocent.
Despite the pardon, Stinney's story remains a reminder of the enduring legacy of racial injustice in the United States.
