Author probes forgotten story of race, faith, death penalty

The story of Willie Francis has long been forgotten; in the late 1940s, however, it was front-page news when he survived the electric chair and was forced to face death a second time.

His story has been resurrected by Gilbert King in "The Execution of Willie Francis: Race, Murder, and the Search for Justice in the American South."

The author, raised in St. Helen's parish in Niskayuna, is a writer and photographer in New York City.

Down South

Mr. King stumbled upon Mr. Francis's case while doing research on a crime encyclopedia for another author. Intrigued, he decided to learn more.

"I finally got the courage to go down to Louisiana, and I became obsessed," he said.

Willie Francis was a semi-literate, African-American teenager from a devout Catholic family who lived in St. Martinsville, Louisiana. He was convicted by a white jury of killing his boss.

Into the past

Mr. King interviewed people who knew Mr. Francis and others involved in the case.

"They were the friendliest people," he said. "There was an openness about them."

The townsfolk weren't proud of what had happened to Mr. Francis and seemed to want the truth to be told, Mr. King said.

Catholic links

Catholics played important roles in Mr. Francis's story, the author noted.

For example, the first time Mr. Francis faced the electric chair, Rev. Maurice Rousseve, the pastor of Notre Dame parish, a black Catholic church near the jail, counseled him.

When newspapers reported Mr. Francis's story of surviving "the chair," Catholics around the country began writing letters.

As Mr. Francis's case went before the U.S. Supreme Court and people worked to get the Board of Pardons to look at his case, Catholic leaders tried to save him from a second trip to the electric chair.

Death penalty

Prior to writing his book Mr. King did not have any strong feelings about the death penalty.

"I [was] trying not to let my feelings into this," he said. "I [wanted to] stay out of it and let the story tell itself."

Now, he said, "I think it is morally wrong for the government to kill a person."

(Mr. King will sign his book at The Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza, Albany, April 12, 2-3 p.m. Visit www.williefrancis.com.)

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