Video: 'Scottsboro: An American Tragedy'

(Wednesday, March 25, 1931, morning CST) — The “Scottsboro Boys,” nine African-American males aged 12 to 19, were taken off a train in Paint Rock, Alabama, today, falsely accused of raping two white women.

The case was first heard in Scottsboro, Alabama, in three rushed trials, in which the defendants received poor legal representation. All but 13-year-old Roy Wright were convicted of rape and sentenced to death (the common sentence in Alabama at the time for black men convicted of raping white women), even though there was medical evidence to suggest that they had not committed the crime.

Commonly cited as an example of a miscarriage of justice in the United States legal system, the defendants suffered years of convictions, death sentences and imprisonment before they were eventually vindicated.