Frank Hairston Jr.
Frank Hairston Jr., a Black man, was one of seven men from Martinsville executed in the electric chair in Richmond in February 1951, a group known as the Martinsville Seven. His family and advocates say he was questioned without a lawyer and that his confession was coerced under threat of mob violence, and the NAACP argued the trials were unfair and the death sentences racially unequal. An independent investigation, as reported by the Zinn Education Project, found that confessions had been extorted after violent mistreatment by local officials, while the Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the appeals. In December 2020 relatives and a former Richmond mayor asked Governor Ralph Northam for a posthumous pardon and an apology, and in 2021 Northam granted pardons citing due process failures and a racially biased death sentence, without addressing guilt.
Cause of death, as reported: Executed by the state. Family members and advocates say the men were interrogated without a lawyer, their confessions were coerced under threat of mob violence, and their trials were unfair; the NAACP argued the trials were unfair and the death sentences racially unequal.
Reported by: family members and advocates; the NAACP (advocates); the Commonwealth of Virginia (the agency that held him).