Johnny Robinson (1947–1963) was a young

African-American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa. ...

teenager who, at age 16, was shot and killed by a police officer in the unrest following the

16th Street Baptist Church bombing The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing was a terrorist bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama on September 15, 1963. The bombing was committed by a white supremacist terrorist group. Four members of a local Ku Klux ...

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Jefferson County, Alabama, Jefferson County. The population was 200,733 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List ...

. A Birmingham police officer, Jack Parker, who was riding in the back seat of a police car, shot and killed Robinson. Parker was never indicted for the killing.

Background

Johnny Robinson was born in 1947. He had a difficult upbringing in Birmingham, as the city had seen 50 racially driven bombings between 1945 and 1963. He was the oldest of three children and attended the Alberta Shields School. A few years prior to his death, Robinson's father was murdered by a neighbor, leaving his mother alone to raise her children in a city fraught with racial violence. The officer who shot Robinson was a head of a lodge of a fraternal order of police. He had put his signature to an ad in the newspaper arguing against integration in the police.

Events

Early on Sunday morning, September 15, 1963, a

Ku Klux Klan The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to KKK or Klan, is an American Protestant-led Christian terrorism, Christian extremist, white supremacist, Right-wing terrorism, far-right hate group. It was founded in 1865 during Reconstruction era, ...

member placed a bomb with a timing device under the side steps of the

16th Street Baptist Church The 16th Street Baptist Church is a Baptist church in Birmingham, Alabama, United States. In 1963, the church was bombed by Ku Klux Klan members. The bombing killed four young girls in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement. The church is stil ...

, which had served as the headquarters for the

Birmingham Children's Crusade The Children's Crusade, or Children's March, was a march by over 1,000 school students in Birmingham, Alabama, on May 2–10, 1963. Initiated and organized by Rev. James Bevel, the purpose of the march was to walk downtown to talk to the mayor ab ...

during April and early May. Two hundred worshipers were expected in the church that day and after the bomb detonated in the late morning, three 14-year-old girls and an 11-year-old girl were found killed, with twenty-two wounded. The incident prompted civil unrest that was further provoked by the shooting deaths of two black children that day: 16-year-old Johnny Robinson, and 13-year-old Virgil Ware. Aside from civil unrest, there is no confirmed connection between these two teenagers and the victims of the bombing. Ware had been riding on the handlebars of his brother's bicycle when he was shot twice with a revolver by Larry Joe Sims, a white 16-year-old who supported the segregationist movement. Earlier that day, Sims had joined a fellow teenager, Michael Lee Farley, at the headquarters for the

National States' Rights Party The National States' Rights Party was a white supremacist political party that briefly played a minor role in the politics of the United States. Foundation Founded in 1958 in Knoxville, Tennessee, by Edward Reed Fields, a 26-year-old chiropra ...

and set out to cruise the neighborhood together. Sims was later charged with

first-degree murder Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or valid excuse committed with the necessary intention as defined by the law in a specific jurisdiction. ("The killing of another person without justification or excuse ...

but was convicted of

second-degree manslaughter Manslaughter is a crime in the United States. Definitions can vary among jurisdictions, but manslaughter is invariably the act of causing the death of another person in a manner less culpable than murder. Three types of unlawful killings consti ...

, while Farley pleaded guilty to second-degree manslaughter. Both teens were sentenced to seven months in jail, which was changed to two years probation. Robinson was about to join his sister for Sunday dinner, but had accompanied his friends to a gas station that was not far from the 16th Street Baptist Church. Several white men drove by, yelling racial slurs, waving Confederate flags, and throwing bottles. Some witnesses later said Robinson was with a group of boys who threw rocks at a car draped with a Confederate flag. A police car then arrived on the scene. Birmingham police officer Jack Parker was in the back seat, pointing a shotgun out the window. Parker later gave two differing accounts of the event, as he both claimed to have fired a

warning shot In military and police contexts, a warning shot is an intentionally harmless artillery shot or gunshot with intent to enact direct compliance and order to a hostile perpetrator or enemy forces. It is recognized as signalling intended confronta ...

and that the gun went off accidentally. Parker was white, as were all Birmingham Police officers at that time. He had joined the police force in 1951 and was 48 years old when he shot Robinson. At the time he was also the head of a

Fraternal Order of Police The National Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) is a fraternal organization consisting of sworn law enforcement officers in the United States. It reports a membership of over 355,000 members organized in 2,100 local chapters (lodges), state lodge ...

Aftermath

After a week of funerals related to the bombing, co-founder of the

Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights The Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights (ACMHR) was an American civil rights organization in Birmingham, Alabama, which coordinated boycotts and sponsored federal lawsuits aimed at dismantling segregation in Birmingham and Alabama during th ...

Nelson Smith remarked that their people would be hard to restrain when they were still under active threat of bombings. Two grand juries refused to indict Parker, claiming that there were no reliable witness accounts. Not long after the shooting, he signed a newspaper advertisement advocating against integrating the police department of Birmingham. He resigned 10 years after the shooting. Parker died of

lung cancer Lung cancer, also known as lung carcinoma, is a malignant tumor that begins in the lung. Lung cancer is caused by genetic damage to the DNA of cells in the airways, often caused by cigarette smoking or inhaling damaging chemicals. Damaged ...

on April 9, 1977, decades before the FBI re-opened Robinson's case in 2007 in light of the Department of Justice's Cold Case Initiative.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, Johnny 1947 births 1963 deaths 1963 in Alabama African-American history in Birmingham, Alabama African Americans shot dead by law enforcement officers in Alabama Events of the civil rights movement Child murder in Alabama Deaths by person in Alabama People murdered by law enforcement officers in the United States Racially motivated violence against African Americans in Alabama September 1963 in the United States People murdered in Alabama People murdered in 1963