Episode 48 features an interview with Gilbert King, author of Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America. King's book analyzes the Groveland Four: Ernest Thomas, Charles Greenlee, Samuel Shepherd, and Walter Lee Irvin. Also known as the Groveland Boys, these four African-American men were falsely accused of raping Norma Padgett in Lake County, Florida, in 1949. Thomas was shot and killed by a mob, but the other three suspects were put on trial. Both Shepherd and Irvin were sentenced to death and Greenlee was sentenced to life in prison. National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) special counsel Thurgood Marshall had the verdict overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court in November 1951.

While transporting Shepherd and Irvin, Lake County Sheriff Willis Virgil McCall claimed that the prisoners attacked him and that he subsequently shot and killed Shepherd and shot Irvin. Irvin claimed that McCall falsified the escape attempt, but McCall was cleared of any wrongdoing. Irvin was again sentenced to death for the rape of Padgett. In 1955, the then newly-elected Governor of Florida LeRoy Collins commuted Irvin's sentence to life in prison. Irvin was paroled in 1968 and died in 1970.]]>
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