Just a heads up, the tale you're about to hear contains graphic, sorted, and disturbing information,

but it's one hell of a story.

In 1933 in Pompidau Beach, Florida, at a time when the state was part of the deep south

and mired in segregation, the white owner of a fish market was killed when he was shot

at point-blank range one evening during a robbery.

One gun, one bullet to the head.

Almost immediately four black men were rounded up and arrested.

Although they had nothing to do with the gruesome crime,

their confessions were coerced, and all four were convicted of the murder.

That's the way it went in the American South for hundreds of years.

In most places, people look to the sheriff or the police to uphold justice.

But in Palm Beach County, the citizens looked to a man and a black robe

who was seen as their foundation of moral strength.

He was the heart and foundation of moral strength.

He was the heart and soul of the criminal justice system.

And so when this case made its way through Florida's court system and arrived on this judge's docket, he knew only one thing to do.

He ruled that the men deserved a new trial on the grounds that the original grand jury that indicted them for the murder was made up entirely of white men, which denied the defendant's equal protection.

A decision like this was unheard of at the time, in particular in the southern states.

But this judge didn't care what the white population wanted him to do. He followed the law.

The judge was a man named Curtis Chillingworth. But the case Judge Chillingworth is most associated with

is not one that he presided over. It was the case that arose from his own

grisly murder. On the night of June 14, 1955, Curtis Chillingworth and his wife Marjorie were abducted,

...