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Leander Shaw

Revision as of 00:31, 20 April 2007 by Dscosson (talk | contribs) (per July 28 and 1908 it is 28th not 29th)

Leander Shaw (d. July 28, 1908) was a black man accused of the robbery, rape and murder of a white woman, Lillie Shaw.

After the crime, Shaw was allegedly found rinsing his bloody shirt in Pensacola Bay, arrested and taken to the hospital where Davis, whose throat had been cut, identified him before dying. Headlines from the Pensacola Journal announced the "Brutal Assault by Burly Negro Upon White Lady."

A mob was formed shortly thereafter and breached the Pensacola Jail, where Shaw was being held. He was hanged without a trial in Plaza Ferdinand VII, and his body riddled with bullets from the angry crowd.

The crime and hanging are explored in the 2007 documentary Lillie & Leander: A Legacy of Violence by Davis's great-great-niece, filmmaker Alice Brewton Hurwitz.

References

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