Jasper County Democrat, Volume 12, Number 62, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 November 1909 — TERM IN PRISON FOR EX-SHERIFF [ARTICLE]

TERM IN PRISON FOR EX-SHERIFF

Joseph F. Shipp and Others Put In a Federal Prison. SEQUEL TO NE6RO LYNCHING Victim Had Been Granted a Stay of Execution by the Supreme Court and ■ Mob Took the Law in Its Own Hands and Hanged Him—Sheriff and Jailer and Others Found Guilty of Contempt of Court In Falling to Protect Prisoner.

Washington, Noc. 16. —Ninety days* imprisonment was imposed on ex-Sher-iff Joseph F. Shipp of Chattanooga, Tenn., by the supreme court of the United States. The sentence was for contempt of court in failing to prevent the lynching of a negro, Ed Johnson, whose execution had been stayed by the court. Luther Williams and Nick Nolan were sentenced to imprisonment for ninety days and Jeremiah Gibson, the jailer, who is seventy-six years old; Henry Padgett, and William Mayers, all of Chattanooga, for sixty days. All except the sheriff and jailer were accused of participation in the lynching. The court, in finding Shipp guilty, commented on a published interview alleged to have been had with Shipp. “The people of Hamilton county were willing to let the law take its course until It became known that the case would not probably be disposed of for four or five years by the supreme court of the United States.” it quoted Shipp as saying. “But the people would not submit to this, and I do not wonder at It.” The prisoners w ere locked in the District of Columbia jail.