On March 25, 1931, nine black teenagers were arrested in Paint Rock, Alabama for allegedly raping two white women. Twelve days later, the young men were put on trial in the nearby town of Scottsboro. After numerous the proceedings culminated in two landmark decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court, Powell v. Alabama and Norris v. Alabama. Ultimately, the death sentences issued by the jury were overturned, but the defendants were nonetheless sent to prison.



The trials of the Scottsboro Boys have come to symbolize the role of race in the criminal justice system of the Jim Crow South. Read a history of the trials of the Scottsboro Boys and biographies of the major figures involved, as composed by Law Professor Douglas O. Linder of the University of Missouri - Kansas City School of Law.