TAYLOR COUNTY, USA — Norma Lee Padgett, whose accusation of rape against four Black men in 1949 catalyzed a notorious miscarriage of justice in the Jim Crow South, passed away on July 12, 2024 at the age of 92.
On that fateful night in 1949, Ms. Padgett and her husband, Willie, were driving along a secluded road in central Florida after a night of drinking and dancing.
Their car stalled near Okahumpka, and after a period without assistance, two Black men in a sedan offered help.
A confrontation ensued, leaving Willie Padgett injured in a ditch. The specifics of this altercation remain unclear to this day.
As dawn broke, Ms. Padgett, then 17, walked several miles to a local club where she sought help from the night watchman.
She later informed the authorities that the Black men, whom she claimed numbered four, had assaulted her husband, abducted her at gunpoint, and raped her before releasing her.
The accusations led to the wrongful conviction of the men, now known as the Groveland Four.
This group included Ernest Thomas, Samuel Shepherd, Charles Greenlee, and Walter Irvin.
Their ordeal involved brutal arrests, coerced confessions, and violent mob actions that underscored the racial injustices of the era.
Despite the eventual exoneration of the Groveland Four, Ms. Padgett never recanted her account.
In 2019, at the age of 86, she defended her story before a clemency board, stating, “I’m not no liar… They done it.”
The tragic consequences of her accusation saw Thomas killed by a mob in 1949, Shepherd shot by Sheriff Willis V. McCall in 1951, Greenlee imprisoned for 12 years, and Irvin spending 18½ years in prison.
Irvin narrowly escaped execution in 1954, only to die under suspicious circumstances in 1969.
The case, brought back to the public eye through Gilbert King’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book “Devil in the Grove,” highlights systemic racial injustices. King noted, “There are a lot of Black families that have been gaslighted… They know these stories are out there, and they never get anywhere. There’s no judicial relief.”
King’s research revealed the FBI had conducted a parallel investigation, which he described as “undeniable” in its findings.
The case’s prominence has since grown, symbolizing the broader issues of fabricated evidence and racially motivated legal abuses.
Norma Lee Tyson was born on March 10, 1932, in Bay Lake, Florida. She spent much of her life in Groveland, where she worked in fruit processing and lived in relative obscurity after the events of 1949.
Her turbulent marriage to Willie Padgett ended in 1958, and she later remarried, taking the surname Upshaw.
In her final public appearance in 2019, Ms. Padgett vehemently maintained her original claims, despite mounting evidence to the contrary.
Her statements stood in stark contrast to new findings from unredacted FBI files and testimonies that suggested no rape had occurred and highlighted the ulterior motives of law enforcement officials at the time.
The death of Ms. Padgett closes a chapter in a case that continues to evoke strong emotions and serve as a grim reminder of past racial injustices.
The state of Florida officially exonerated the Groveland Four in 2021, acknowledging the profound failures of the justice system that led to their wrongful persecution.
