What Is The Tom Robinson Case In To Kill A Mockingbird

In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Jean Louise “Scout” Finch, her brother Jem and their friend Dill overlook a rape case where an African American man in Maycomb County, Alabama was wrongfully arrested and tried for committing sexual assault on a Cauca-sian woman named Mayella Ewell. The story takes place in the mid 1930’s and at this time in American history, African Americans in the South got very little, if any, respect they deserve. As a result, almost all of Maycomb County immediately sided with Mayella against Tom Robinson. This case can be compared to a real life case during the 1930’s where nine innocent African American men were accused of raping two Caucasian women while on a train riding through Al-abama. During the T. Robinson case, Tom clearly said that …show more content…
They each said that they were just looking for work down south and it was reported that the two women had prostituted themselves for a couple of bucks. Despite their in-nocence, all nine of the convicted men were found guilty in favor of the women. One of them had a top notch lawyer from New York, but his Jewish heritage in a predominantly Christian town was a losing fight. However, the difference between the Scottsboro case and the case of Tom Robinson is that America and the world had heard of the case and supported the decision to acquit them of all charges. The Scottsboro boys all got support from the American Communist Party. Tom Robin-son only had a small handful of supporters: Atticus and the kids. Because the Scottsboro boys received so much support from the world over, their sentences were short-lived and they were each acquitted of all charges. In the book, however, despite Atticus’ efforts to defend him, Tom was found guilty of rape and sentenced to