| The one time Decatur, Alabama ever gained sustained national attention, it was called "The Scottsboro Boys." Most people aren't aware it was only the first trial that took place in Scottsboro--the other high-profile trials took place at Morgan County Courthouse. With the New York Times looking on, Morgan County Circuit Court Judges and the people of Alabama made history. |
| Decatur, Alabama is represented by at least four inmates on death row at Holman prison: Willie Burgess, Jr. killed Louise Thompson Crowe at the Decatur Bait and Tackle Shop during a robbery on January 26, 1993. John Milton Hardy killed Clarence Nugene Terry at Bud's Convenience Store on the Beltline, during a robbery September 7, 1993. Corey Maples killed Stacy Alan Terry and Barry Dewayne Robertson II in southwest Decatur in 1995. Robin Myers stabbed a woman to death--an elderly neighbor--and stole her VCR for crack cocaine. He was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death by then-Circuit Judge C. Bennett McRae. |
| Decatur, Alabama's other data point in the national psyche occured in 1979 when the Ku Klux Klan shot four SCLC marchers (two of them juveniles), and tried to kill Reverend Dr. Joseph Lowery's wife in downtown Decatur. |
| Ulysses Charles Sneed was Hardy's accomplice in the convenience store murder/robbery in 1993. After his conviction and sentence were upheld by the Court of Criminal Appeals, it was reversed and remanded by a 5-4 margin in the Alabama Supreme Court in 2000. The reversal was based on the most obscure technicality imaginable. Three years later, he's still in Morgan County Jail, awaiting his second trial. |
| It's my understanding that Burgess, Hardy, Sneed, and Myers all killed their victims for money to buy drugs. And Maples was a severe polydrug addict, including crack cocaine, and was involved in big-time interstate drug trafficking when he did his double "execution." When crack cocaine hit this country in 1985, homicide rates more than doubled in juveniles, in non-white perpetrators, and in murder by firearm. It's not surprising why, when you consider paranoia and explosive aggression are hallmarks of chronic cocaine use. End-stage crack addicts are sometimes called "bush people"--because they tend to be heavily armed, and think there's somebody behind every bush out to get them. Their crimes tend to be brutal, impulsive, and absolutely senseless. burgess didn't have to kill Louise Thompson Crowe just to rob her. But he did. He shot her. myers didn't have to kill an elderly neighbor just to steal her VCR. But he did. He stabbed her to death. hardy and sneed didn't have to kill Clarence Terry just to rob the convenience store. But they did. sneed held the door open for hardy, who walked in the store firing his rifle. Even when Clarence Terry was injured and helpless, hardy shot him five times in the head, and it was all captured by video surveillance. |