In 1958, James Thompson (9) and David Simpson (7) - both African-American - were accused and convicted of raping/ molesting a 5 year old white girl in Monroe, North Carolina. The case drew international attention...but since then, the story has been largely forgotten/ not told.
James shares...
"We were playing with some friends over in the white neighborhood, chasing spiders and wrestling and stuff like that and one of the kids suggested that one of the little white girls give us a kiss on the jaw...the girls gave me a peck on the cheek, and then kissed David on the cheek. So, we didn't think nothing of it. We were just little kids."
"They took us down in the bottom of the police station to a cell...they had us handcuffed...they beat us to our body...they punched us all in the stomach, and back and legs...we was hollering and screaming...they threatened to castrate us...we thought they was gonna kill us."
Things weren't much better back at home (Jame's sister Brenda shares):
"You could see them burning crosses right there in the front yard...and mom would go out in the morning and sweep bullets off of the front porch."
Is Jim Crow dead?
Over 50 years later, the effects of this harmless kiss (the boys were never the same) can be seen in the destruction of childhood hopes and dreams.
James laments...
"I still feel the hurt and pain...and nobody never said 'hey, look, I'm sorry what happened to y'all. It was wrong.'"
"I wonder if this hadn't happened to me, you know, what could I have turned out to be? Could I have been a doctor? Could I have went off to some college, or some great school?"
"It just destroyed our life."
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