If anyone out there has any information, knowledge or opinions concerning the "Tommy Lee Walker" murder case in 1952-53, please email me or simply post your thoughts on this forum. I have been researching data on that case for many years however I would love to receive some thoughts from people who actually knew Tommy in a personal sense. Me, as others, were there at his trial every day and he never stood a chance.
Cecil R brown
The last time anyone commented on the Tommy Lee Walker discussion was July 10, 2010. Today, I am asking specifically if there is anyone out there who may know members of his family or someone who does. If so, PLEASE contact me directly by phone: 469.236.9909/972.230.8593 or email: brown.cecil@rocketmail.com.
I too remember this incident, and it left a lasting impression with me!! I remember because I visited him at the funeral home, how terrible this was for all black people, especially our black men. JUSTICE WAS NOT DONE in this or the EMMIT Teel case, how sad!!
I relocated back to Dallas in'07. Since that time about ten 'death row' convictions have been overturn due to wrongful conviction. These were due in large part to tampering with evidence, hiding evidence favorable to the defendant, and simply put conviction by color. Some of these men have been on death row in excess of ten years. Most if not all were tried and convicted under DA Wade or one his trainees. These have been done for the most part quietly. Why??
There is a system in place that almost forces a defendant to plead guilty to a crime of which he/she is innocent. Police pressure and tactics, defense costs, judges seeking higher office are but a few that bars someone from a fair day in court.
There was a case in Inglewood CA a few years back. A policeman assaulted a teen male. He said the teen grabbed at his genitals! The teen was cuffed at the time. Another officer was called as a witness. He refused to testify until he was given immunity!!
Truth does have a price and it is usually paid by a defendant.
I remember that Dallas was frozen with fear of the so called "Nude Rapist". We were in high school and the Dallas cops would roust young black boys for nothing, but standing together rapping. Tommy Lee worked in the Walnut Hill area and had to catch a bus to work. Lake Bachman is in the area and Love Field is to the east. A pilot was on the way home when he says a white woman ran from the lake and fell across his car's hood, with her throat cut, blood everwhere and screamed her last words ... "a nigger raped me!" Needless to say every black man was at risk. Tommy Lee was running across the lake park to the bus stop when they grabbed him. Leading up to his trial no other women were attacked. After his sentencing and conviction he was executed in Huntsville, and that night the "Nude Rapist" struck again. He was never caught and no additional rapes ever occured.
Hi Kenneth, as you were commenting I was also posting my comment asking all of the above incidents that you just mentioned. Was I right or wrong about her husband?
While visiting his mother's family in Greenwood, Mississippi during the steamy August of 1955, black Chicagoan 14-year-old Emmett Till ran headlong into segregated southern society with devastating repercussions. Mumbling "Bye, Baby" while wolf whistling at the white wife of the general store's owner upon leaving a store, the teenager became marked for death. The following Saturday night, rousted from sleep, Till was taken by a posse of white men seeking to avenge the "honor" of the woman Till spoke to in the store. They castrated him and beat him to death before tying him to the propeller of a cotton gin, submerging him in the swampy waters of the Tallahatchie River. When his body surfaced and was transported back home to Chicago for the funeral, Emmett's mother, Mamie Till, insisted on an open casket so that the whole world could see what they had done to her baby. The black press covered the story, which was eventually picked up by the national press, and across the country white and black Americans saw the boy's bloated corpse. A trial commenced back in Mississippi, significant not in its verdict (all of the men were found not guilty by an all-white jury,) but in the witnesses who testified. Black witnesses came forward and in open court pointed out the guilty men, despite the risk to themselves that such action would entail. http://www.americanlynching.com/main.html
I seem to recall the funeral. It was at the Church across the street from St. Peter's Academy. I don't know all of the particulars. Some of the talk that I have heard was that the female involved was some low-class white girl. I have always heard that some money might have changed hands and then she cried rape. I was quite young at the time, about seven or eight. It was a way of saying stay away from white females.
I had no idea that he was so young! Was this before or after Emmit Till?
Tommy Lee Walker was put on trial and found gulity of rape and murder in 1953 by an all-white jury. He was electrocuted the following year in Huntsville, TX.
Thanks, Fred. I hope we can keep this going with more input. Tommy was in one of my classes; he was very quite, kind of an introvert. I never knew him other than that but I have always been intrigued by this case I guess because he was a classmate, student and the incident happened near Elm Thicket (Love Field) where I lived at the time.
I DIDN'T KNOW TOMMY LEE WALKER,BUT THE ENTIRE COMMUNITY WERE SAYING HE DIDN'TCOMMIT THE CRIME OF RAPE 'WHICH HE WAS CONVICTED OF AND SENTENCE TO DEATH BY THE ELECTRIC CHAIR.I REMEMBER GOING ON HALL ST. TO PINKSTON MORTARY TO VEIW THE BODY.I WAS ONLY TEN YEARS OLD.TOMMY LEE WALKER WAS MY FIRST VEIWING OF A DECEASED MALE.THERE WAS A LONG LINE AND I CAN REMEMBER BEING SCARE. EVERYONE IN THAT LINE WAS SAYING HE DIDN'T DO IT.HE DIDN'T DO IT HE WAS FRAME.
Replies
There is a system in place that almost forces a defendant to plead guilty to a crime of which he/she is innocent. Police pressure and tactics, defense costs, judges seeking higher office are but a few that bars someone from a fair day in court.
There was a case in Inglewood CA a few years back. A policeman assaulted a teen male. He said the teen grabbed at his genitals! The teen was cuffed at the time. Another officer was called as a witness. He refused to testify until he was given immunity!!
Truth does have a price and it is usually paid by a defendant.
Emmett Till, 1955
While visiting his mother's family in Greenwood, Mississippi during the steamy August of 1955, black Chicagoan 14-year-old Emmett Till ran headlong into segregated southern society with devastating repercussions. Mumbling "Bye, Baby" while wolf whistling at the white wife of the general store's owner upon leaving a store, the teenager became marked for death. The following Saturday night, rousted from sleep, Till was taken by a posse of white men seeking to avenge the "honor" of the woman Till spoke to in the store. They castrated him and beat him to death before tying him to the propeller of a cotton gin, submerging him in the swampy waters of the Tallahatchie River. When his body surfaced and was transported back home to Chicago for the funeral, Emmett's mother, Mamie Till, insisted on an open casket so that the whole world could see what they had done to her baby. The black press covered the story, which was eventually picked up by the national press, and across the country white and black Americans saw the boy's bloated corpse. A trial commenced back in Mississippi, significant not in its verdict (all of the men were found not guilty by an all-white jury,) but in the witnesses who testified. Black witnesses came forward and in open court pointed out the guilty men, despite the risk to themselves that such action would entail.
http://www.americanlynching.com/main.html
I had no idea that he was so young! Was this before or after Emmit Till?