Robert Sands, 15, a high school student, was killed in 1950 by R.L. Mayes in Birmingham, Alabama. Detective G.V. Evans was told by Mayes that Mayes’s wife had seen someone peeping into a neighbor’s window. Mayes went outside with a gun and shot Sands. Sands worked on the yards in this white neighborhood, which is why he was there, his father said. Sands told the detective that he was being chased by dogs and ran between houses to escape. Sands was shot on January 3, 1950, and died on July 23, 1950. His father filed a civil suit against Mayes.

Robert Sands