Michael Donald
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Michael Donald (July 24, 1961 – March 20, 1981) was picked at random as the victim of a lynching by two Ku Klux Klan members in Mobile, Alabama in 1981.
According to a contemporary source, "In 1981 the trial of Josephus Andersonan, an African American charged with the murder of a white policeman, took place in Mobile. At the end of the case the jury was unable to reach a verdict. This upset members of the Ku Klux Klan who believed that the reason for this was that some members of the jury were African Americans. At a meeting held after the trial, Bennie Hays, the second-highest ranking official in the Klan in Alabama said: "If a black man can get away with killing a white man, we ought to be able to get away with killing a black man."[1]
The same night other Klan members burnt a three foot cross on the Mobile County courthouse lawn, Bennie Hays' son, Henry Hays (age 26), and James "Tiger" Knowles (age 17) drove around Mobile looking for a victim. They spotted Michael Donald walking home from getting his sister a pack of cigarettes, beat him with a tree limb before cutting his throat and hanging him from a tree.
The FBI became involved, partly at the urging of Michael and Thomas Figures, local activists. Two and a half years later, Hays and Knowles were arrested. Bennie Hays was himself indicted in Donald's murder but died before his trial began.
Henry Hays was convicted and was executed in the electric chair June 6, 1997. The Associated Press reported that Hays was Alabama's first execution for a white-on-black crime since 1913. James Knowles is serving a life sentence. He avoided the death penalty by testifying against Hays at trial.
Hays maintained his innocence right up until a few days before he died. However, he confessed to Rev. Bob Smith, who was the president of Mobile's NAACP.
The Associated Press reported that the slaying was ordered by Klan leaders, including Hays' father, "to show Klan strength in Alabama."
Morris Dees, founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, brought a wrongful death suit on behalf of Beulah Mae Donald. The Klan was hit with a $7 million wrongful-death verdict in the case. The settlement bankrupted the United Klans of America, and the Donald family was given the deed to the UKA meeting hall in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Beulah Mae Donald used the settlement to buy her first home. She died in 1987.
The incident served as a springboard for other legal cases against racist groups across America.
In 2006, Herndon Avenue was renamed Michael Donald Avenue. Mobile's first black mayor, Sam Jones, presided over the small gathering of Michael Donald's family and local leaders.
