14yr old boy executed in South Carolina in 1944 finally exonerated

70 years after 14 year old George Stinney Jnr. was executed for allegedly beating two young white girls to death in Alcolu, South Carolina, a judge yesterday Wednesday Dec 17th threw out his murder conviction.

When George was executed in 1944, he was so small he had to seat on a phone book in the electric chair. He's officially the youngest person to be executed in the U.S. in the 20th century.

George was found guilty of beating the girls, 11 and 8 years old with a railroad spike. His trial lasted only three hours and it took the a jury of all white people just 10 minutes to find him guilty - this was just 3 months after the girls were found murdered. This was back when there was a lot of segregation in America.



George was arrested after he confessed to the crime, but his older sister always maintained that George was coerced into confessing and couldn't have committed the murder because he was with her the day of the murder.

Civil rights advocates have been trying for years to clear George Stinney Jr's name. They managed to get the case reopened and yesterday morning, Judge Carmen Mullins tossed the murder conviction.

Culled