81 Days - That's all South Carolina needed to erase three children's lives.

SYNOPSIS:

Two white girls leave their home one afternoon to go picking flowers in 1944 in the small South Carolina town of Alcolu. They never returned home.

After finding the bodies in a muddy ditch, all fingers point to 14 year old George Stinney as the murderer, a local black kid who saw the girls before they were murdered. Instantly, Alcolu descends into racist madness as Stinney's family is forced to run for their lives, all but abandoning George to the mercy of the criminal justice system, and Stinney's own life is put in danger by a lynch mob mentality.

1944 is an election year and no one wants to upset the voters. The DA, the judge and the defense attorney are all running for elected office, so there is a huge desire for conviction, while the defense has little desire to represent.

While in jail, Stinney faces the horrors of being an inmate alone. Being only 5'2" and 90 lbs, he is an easy target for inmates and racist white guards. Stinney puts his faith in the bible that was given to him, knowing God will insure he will get the one thing he truly wants: To be allowed to go home.

The sham trial begins at 2:30 PM. It lasts three hours. The State produces no evidence of Stinney's guilt, save a "confession" that wasn't recorded or even written. The defense barely puts up a challenge and calls no witnesses on Stinney's behalf. At 4:55, the all white male jury retires to the jury room to deliberate. At 5:05, they return with a verdict of guilty with no recommendation for mercy. By 5:30, Stinney is condemned to die by the electric chair.

While waiting on death row, all efforts are made to save Stinney's life. The courts reject motions for stays of execution, the public wants Stinney executed and even the state governor (running for US Senate in 1944) refuses to get involved. After all avenues fail, Stinney begins to accept that he will never see his family again.

Stinney is finally led to his execution. The Chair is made for a full grown adult, not a child, so nothing fits and has to be fabricated. As the electricity is turned on every goes wrong. The straps give way, the helmet loosens and the face mask falls off Stinney's face, showing the terrified, tear soaked eyes of a 14 year old kid railroaded to the death chamber.

The next day, life goes on in Alcolu, as residents read in their papers about the horrors committed by Hitler against people, while no one considers the horror of sending the youngest person in the 20th century to the death chamber.

All it took was 81 days to erase two white girls and a black boy. And 70 years later, the miscarriage of justice still stands. The movie ends with a epilogue showing what evidence has been produced to clear Stinney鈥檚 name and the fact that the powers of South Carolina, to this day, still stand behind the trial and conviction as acceptable because the trial 鈥渇ollowed the laws of the time.鈥?

81 DAYS