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Convicting the Innocent: Errors of Criminal Justice
(1932)
by Edwin M. Borchard
Case #7
Louise Butler and George Yelder
ALABAMA
The "Black Belt" of Alabama is a well-known section of the
sunny South. Whether this belt derives its name from the dark prairie soil
or the preponderance of negroes to be found there is one of the traditional
issues for street-corner and grocery-store debates. Lowndes County is in the
very center of the black belt.
On a plantation in this county, on the southern bank of the Alabama River,
lived Louise Butler, with her coal-black fourteen-year-old niece, Topsy
Warren, her own daughter, Julia May Dickson, aged twelve, another niece,
Anne-Mary Smith, aged nine, and a small son. Louise Butler, a plump
light-brown negress, had enjoyed various amours and mothered this family,
although still free from the bonds of matrimony. In 1928, she had won the
affections of George Yelder, a lean colored gentleman about fifty-five years
old, who lived near by with his wife and two grown daughters. George was a
regular caller at Louise's house and she was exceedingly jealous of his
attentions.
One day upon her return from a visit to Montgomery, Louise discovered that
George had visited her house during the day, and found only Topsy at home.
When he left, Topsy was the proud possessor of a new half dollar. Louise's
jealousy was violently aroused when she learned of this and she administered
to this fourteen-year-old interloper a severe beating, even threatening to
kill her. Strangely, Topsy was seen no more. The rumor passed that Louise
had done away with Topsy, and it gained such credence that the state law
enforcement department at Montgomery telephoned to Deputy Sheriff "Buck"
Meadows to investigate the matter thoroughly.
Meadows visited Louise's shanty when she was away and found there her
twelve-year-old daughter Julia and nineyear-old niece Anne-Mary. In a short
while they confided in him an account of the full details of the horrible
and cold- blooded murder of poor Topsy. Julia said that Louise had beaten
Topsy unmercifully on the afternoon of her return from Montgomery when she
learned of the half dollar Topsy had. Later in the day George Yelder came by
and during a very short stay he and Louise had quite a personal "fuss" of
their own, during which George threatened to whip Louise with some
"plow-lines." They apparently made peace before he left, and shortly after
dark George again appeared at the home of Louise Butler. After a short
conversation they both went out in the yard near the woodpile, carrying a
small lamp. Julia said that her mother, Louise, then called to her and told
her to go outside the yard down into the edge of the roadway, and to stand
there and call if anyone should approach. As she proceeded to obey her
mother's command, she heard her mother or George call to Topsy to come out
to the woodpile. Topsy went out of the house at about the same time that
Julia went to stand in the roadway. She had no sooner stationed herself in
the roadway than she heard Topsy cry out, and in just a minute or two
thereafter her mother called to her to come. She obeyed, and when she
reached the woodpile, Topsy was lying on the ground – dead. They dragged
Topsy's body up close against the chop log and placed one of Topsy's arms
across the log and demanded that she chop it off with the ax or they would
kill her. Julia said that in this manner both of the dead girl's arms were
severed from her body; that she was then ordered to go into the house, look
behind a trunk, and bring a large sack and a string which were kept there.
This she did. Her mother and George then placed the corpse in the
sack—putting the trunk or body in the sack first and poking the arms in
afterward. They then tied the sack, and left the premises, lugging the
gruesome burden, in the direction of the Alabama River, which was not more
than a half mile distant. They soon returned from the direction of the river
empty handed, having been gone just long enough to have been to the river
and back. They then came into the house, and Julia said she was ordered to
build a fire in the stove, whereupon her mother cooked some supper for "Mr."
George. When George and Louise returned from the trip to the river, George
stopped by the woodpile and brought the ax into the house and washed it.
Anne-Mary told the sheriff that she had told her Auntie about Topsy having
the half dollar and saw Topsy whipped for it. She was lying in the bed next
to the wall that night when she heard Topsy scream out back of the house.
She quickly arose and peered through a crack in the wall and saw "Mr."
George holding the light and her mother strike Topsy with the ax. Then "Mr."
George passed the light to Louise and he took the ax and struck Topsy. Topsy
fell down dead right at the woodpile. Anne-Mary then related, in impressive
concordance with the testimony of Julia, how Julia was forced to cut off the
arms of Topsy, and how the body was sacked and lugged away. When asked how
she could tell which way they went off with the body, she stated promptly
that she saw which way the lantern went. She said that when Louise and
George returned to the house, George stopped by the woodpile for the ax, and
brought it into the kitchen and washed it in a pan of water.
These stories seemed incredible to the sheriff, but the children appeared to
be intelligent and did not vary their stories in the least under his
questioning. Consequently, the only thing he could do was to arrest Louise
upon her return home. Louise denied that she had done any more to Topsy than
to give her a good whipping, after which Topsy disappeared, and she didn't
know where the child had gone. This was suspicious and Louise was taken to
jail to await a preliminary hearing. A few days later, while being
questioned, she suddenly confessed that she had killed Topsy, and that she
and George had tied an old automobile casing to her body to be sure it would
sink when thrown into the river. Louise led the sheriff and the plantation
owner, her landlord, to the river's edge where she said the body had been
thrown into the water. She showed them a growth of vines in which she said
she and George had become entangled while trying to get to the river. Louise
repudiated this confession almost immediately and stoutly maintained her
innocence.
At the preliminary hearing, Julia and Anne-Mary told their stories under
oath, and the sheriff related the repudiated confession. Louise was bound
over without bail for action by the Grand Jury, and George was then
arrested. The following week, there was a preliminary hearing for him. Julia
and Anne-Mary, placed on the witness stand, adhered strictly to their former
testimony. George was ordered back to jail without bail. Louise had been
brought into court that afternoon, with the idea that she might again make
the confession which she had made to the sheriff. This, however, she did not
do. When the time came for her to be led back to jail, the child Julia began
to cry and asked her mother, "Mama, ain't you going back home with us this
evening?" She seemed to be very much distressed that her mother was to be
denied that privilege. On that occasion, the solicitor told the child that
the mother was being confined in jail because of the facts which Julia had
told in court, and that if those facts were not true, now was the time to
say so. The child, sobbing and holding to her mother, replied : "Dey shore
done it." The mother was soon parted from the child and carried back to the
jail.
The cases were submitted to a Lowndes County Grand Jury, which returned
indictments against both Louise and George on April 17, 1928. The defendants
were arraigned the same day. Since they were unable to employ counsel, the
court assigned Mr. R. L. Goldsmith, an able attorney of Whitehall, Alabama,
to defend them.
Separate trials were held before separate juries in Judge A. E. Gamble's
court. Louise was tried on April 24 and George on April 25, 1928. The
prosecuting officers were Calvin Poole and Joseph R. Bell, capable public
officials. Mr. Bell describes the court scene in this way:
When the time for the trial of these cases came to
hand, the Court House and adjacent grounds were packed and crowded to their
fullest limits with colored citizenry. It was as though a pall of darkness
had settled over and around the Temple of Justice. It is a fact, strange to
relate, that although the defendants were of their own race, the greater
portion of the spectators wished for their conviction and punishment. The
throng was tense, hushed and expectant, and the day being mildly warm, the
odor of the courtroom was most oppressive.
At Louise's trial, the full testimony already related was
presented to the jury. In support of her "not guilty" plea, Louise
maintained her innocence and denied having any knowledge of what had
happened to Topsy. The jury returned a verdict of guilty. The following day
George was tried and the testimony of the state's witnesses repeated. George
endeavored to establish an alibi by the testimony of his wife and daughters,
who stated that he was at home with a "lame back" on the night of the
murder. The prosecuting officers attacked the credibility of this story, and
the jury found George guilty also. On April 26, 1928, both defendants were
sentenced by Judge Gamble to serve life imprisonment in the Alabama State
Penitentiary.
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Within a week after George and Louise had been sent to the
penitentiary, a rumor reached the sheriff's office that Topsy was alive, and
living with some relatives in Dallas County, some twenty miles away. The
sheriff investigated and found the rumor to be true; he found Topsy "hale,
hearty, and as black as ever." Mr. Bell relates that
when Topsy was brought into Hayneville for
identification, she was stared at, and regarded by the colored population,
even as one who had returned from the dead. It would have been laughable had
it not been so pathetic. Her body was examined, and was found to still bear
the scars from the beating she received, but there was no evidence showing
that she had ever been deprived of her arms nor that her skull had been
crushed. Her identification was complete, and steps were immediately taken
to have George and Louise restored to liberty.
Judge Gamble and Solicitor Poole were summoned from
Greenville and they investigated the reappearance personally. Pardons were
granted by the Governor in the latter part of June, 1928.
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George told Mr. Bell that he will never be the same again,
for a man cannot know what it means to be tried for one's life when
innocent, unless one has been through the ordeal.
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This is a case of perjury, fitting into circumstantial evidence. The
disappearance of Topsy lent credence to the horribly fantastic explanation
of the two children. It is remarkable that two illiterate children could
adhere so closely to a manufactured tale, embellished by vivid imaginations,
throughout several exacting cross-examinations. It was the impregnability
and consistency of the two children which finally persuaded the authorities
to believe their stories and to put Louise and George on trial for their
lives. Sheriff Meadows later stated that he was reliably informed that the
two children had been coached every day for a week by a young man who had
unlimited influence over them and worked with them at a dairy and who had a
grievance against George Yelder. He had concocted the story soon after the
rumor of Topsy's death began to spread. Possibly the trial authorities
derived some support from Louise's repudiated confession, which, however,
played no part in the trial. What persuaded Louise even momentarily to admit
the crime and what induced the children to swear away the life of Louise,
who apparently had their affection, it is impossible to say. Sheriff Meadows
suggests that in her ignorant way Louise felt she would curry favor by doing
what was desired and that the "white-folks" would help her out for telling
such a hair-raising story. Had Topsy not been found, Louise and George would
have been incarcerated for life. Fortunately for them, their martyrdom was
limited to a few months.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Records of the Second Judicial Circuit Court of Alabama,
Hayneville, Lowndes County, in case No. 850, State v. Louise Butler,
and in case No. 852, State v. George Elder, alias George Yelder, alias
George Yeldell.
2. Bell, Joseph R. An Honest Miscarriage of Justice. (Unpublished manuscript
document.)
3. Acknowledgments: Miss Jozy Dell Hall, Washington, D.C.; Mr. Douglas
Arant, Birmingham, Ala.; Mr. D. C. Leatherwood, Hayneville, Ala.
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