92-year-old White Woman Who Wrongly Accused the Groveland Four of Rape in the South During the Jim Crow Era Has Died
A White woman who faked accusations against four Black men of rape in the Jim Crow South in 1949 has died. She was 92 years old.
According to Norma Padgett Upshaw, Ernest Thomas, Samuel Shepherd, Charles Greenlee, and Walter Irvin raped and sexually attacked her in Groveland, Florida, when she was 17. Groveland is about 30 miles west of Orlando. The group, which became known as the “Groveland Four,” was at the center of a case that was seen as one of the worst examples of unfair justice in Florida during the Jim Crow era.
Padgett Upshaw died of natural causes on July 12 in Taylor County, Georgia. This is what the probate court papers say. This newspaper was the first to report her death.
From the start, there were doubts about Padgett Upshaw’s statement, but during the Jim Crow era, the men were found guilty even though there was no proof of a crime. In November 2021, Circuit Court Judge Heidi Davis in Lake County, Florida, agreed with the state’s request to throw out the charges against Thomas and Shepherd after their deaths. She also overturned the sentences of Greenlee and Irvin.
The Groveland Four were given full posthumous pardons by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2019.
“For seventy years, these four men’s records have been messed up because they were thought to have done crimes they didn’t.” “As I’ve said before, that is a long time to wait, but it’s never too late to do the right thing,” DeSantis said at the time.
On the night of July 16, 1949, Padgett Upshaw said her car broke down in Groveland. She said four men stopped and raped her.
The cops tortured Shepherd, Greenlee, and Irvin after they were arrested until they got two of them to confess. Thomas got away from the police and was later killed after a search.
Greenlee was given a life sentence.
Irvin and Shepherd were given the death sentence. The sheriff shot both of them while they were being taken from county jail to a new trial. He said it was in self-defense. Shepherd died at the scene, but Irvin got away by pretending to be dead. Later, his term was changed to life in prison.
The judge officially cleared the four men in court in 2021. Following the hearing, Greenlee’s daughter Carol Greenlee held an emotional news conference in front of cameras.
I won’t hate anyone; I will love and welcome everyone who didn’t know at the time that my father was a kind, caring person who never raped anyone. “Today I’m here to say thank you,” she said.