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Alabama

Political repression plays out state by state — shaped by local institutions, prosecutors, and movements for defense. These are the documented political prisoners and cases the census holds for Alabama.

130Documented
2In custody
109Released

Eras of repression in Alabama

Where Alabama’s entries fall across the census’s historical eras.

1930s 45 1960s 32 1970s 27 1950s 11 2020s 3 1910s 3

Documented cases

130 entries in the census — every one stays in the record, whether the case is open or closed.

Kyle Calvert
In Custody
Kyle Benjamin Douglas Calvert, 26, of Ironside AL, placed and detonated an explosive device outside the Alabam...
Michael Kimble
In Custody
Michael Kimble is a gay anarchist freedom fighter. Kimble was incarcerated in Alabama after shooting and killi...
Ralph Abernathy
Released
Baptist minister, civil rights leader, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s closest associate. Co-founder and long...
Charles Billups
Released
Rev. Charles Billups was a Civil Rights leader who along with 11 other pastors founded the Alabama Christian M...
Bert S. Brush
Released
Bert S. Brush was a conscientious objector from Alabama imprisoned during World War I. Court-martialed for ref...
Clement C. Clay Jr.
Released
Clement C. Clay Jr., a former U.S. senator from Alabama and Confederate agent in Canada, surrendered in May 18...
Ned Cobb
Released
Ned Cobb was a Black sharecropper and Share Croppers' Union member wounded and arrested in the 19 December 193...
Alireza Doroudi
Released
Alireza Doroudi is an Iranian PhD student in mechanical engineering at the University of Alabama who was arres...
Frank Dukes
Released
The Rev. Frank Dukes was a Birmingham civil-rights organizer and Miles College student leader who helped lay t...
Joseph Gelders
Released
Joseph Gelders was a physicist-turned-organizer associated with the Southern Conference for Human Welfare, arr...
Johnny ‘Imani’ Harris
Released
Johnny ‘Imani’ Harris was a desegregation activist who in 1970 was the first black person to move into an all-...
Audrey Faye Hendricks
Released
Audrey Faye Hendricks was nine years old when she was arrested in Birmingham on May 2, 1963, the first day of...
Higinio Ochoa III
Released
Higinio Ochoa III (AKA w0rmer) is a hacker as part of the collective CabinCr3w (part of Anonymous). He was arr...
Martin Luther King Jr.
Released
Martin Luther King Jr. was a prominent civil rights leader who developed nonviolent civil disobedience techniq...
Sekou Kambui
Released
Sekou Kambui was a Civil Rights activist with the Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC), Congress for R...
Bernard Lafayette
Released
Bernard Lafayette Jr. was a co-founder of SNCC, a Nashville Student Movement organizer trained by James Lawson...
Richard Lake
Released
Founder/leader of the Atmore-Holman prison group Inmates For Action (known as 'Mafundi'), held in solitary con...
John Lewis
Released
John Lewis built his public life around nonviolent direct action, emerging from the Nashville student movement...
Olen Montgomery
Released
On March 25, 1931 nine Black teenagers (ages 12 to 19) were pulled off a Southern Railway freight train at Pai...
E. D. Nixon
Released
E. D. Nixon was a Pullman porter, longtime NAACP and union leader, and a key organizer of the Montgomery bus b...
Clarence Norris
Released
On March 25, 1931 nine Black teenagers (ages 12 to 19) were pulled off a Southern Railway freight train at Pai...
Rosa Parks
Released
Rosa Parks was the Montgomery seamstress and NAACP secretary whose arrest on December 1, 1955 for refusing to...
Haywood Patterson
Released
On March 25, 1931 nine Black teenagers (ages 12 to 19) were pulled off a Southern Railway freight train at Pai...
Ozie Powell
Released
On March 25, 1931 nine Black teenagers (ages 12 to 19) were pulled off a Southern Railway freight train at Pai...

Institutions in Alabama

Prisons, jails, and detention centers in Alabama that appear in the census’s case files.

Birmingham City JailBirmingham, Alabama
19 cases
Kilby PrisonMontgomery, Alabama
11 cases
Holman PrisonAtmore, Alabama
9 cases
Atmore State PrisonAtmore, Alabama
7 cases
Montgomery City JailMontgomery, Alabama
4 cases
Montgomery County JailMontgomery, Alabama
3 cases
FCI TalladegaTalladega, Alabama
2 cases
Etowah County JailGadsden, Alabama
1 case