Late afternoon
They all assumed their usual places. Rosemary started:
“Gentlemen, Miss Jasmine asked me to tell this story. There is a long version and a short version. I’m going to tell the short version. Then give some perspective.
“In early May 1959, Barbara Jean Olsen—a FAMU student—was abducted by four armed white men who later told police in a confession that they intended to rape a black girl. They didn’t use the word black. The men, one of them only sixteen years old and a cousin of Police Chief Ortega, took Ms. Olsen to a secluded area and, according to court testimony, raped her seven times.
“Ms. Olsen was on a double date with FAMU classmates and dressed all nice for a dance. At gunpoint the armed men forced the two males to drive away in their car, leaving Ms. Olsen with the female classmate. Her classmate was able to flee, and the four men drove off with Ms. Olsen in their car.
“Meanwhile, the girl who had escaped found her two male classmates and drove to the police station to ask for help, not expecting to get any. To their surprise, the nineteen-year-old white deputy on duty got into his patrol car to search for the four men and Ms. Olsen. He found them, had already called for backup, and those officers were able to take the men into custody. The men acted as if the arrest was a joke, but soon they found themselves charged with rape, which was a capital offense at the time.
“Now I’m telling the short version, so within a month, a trial ensued, and an all-white male jury found the men guilty with a recommendation for mercy. When the judge sentenced them, they all received life in prison, but were eligible for parole.
“That’s the shortest version I can tell. After the sentencing, blacks looked at it in two main ways. One camp felt the fact that white men could be convicted of raping a black woman, no matter what the sentencing outcome, was a breakthrough in social justice for black Americans.
“Another group highlighted that many blacks had been lynched for spurious charges of raping white women, some of these lynchings contemporaneous with the Tallahassee case. Additionally, quite a few other blacks were tried and executed for allegedly raping white women. This second camp thought the absence of the death sentence in the Tallahassee case spoke to the double standard of justice, so they were dissatisfied.
“My professor at Spelman was in the first camp. She had become inured to trumped-up charges against blacks, and unpunished acts of sexual assault by whites against black women. My professor was the same age as Ms. Olsen when it happened, and it was all over the national newspapers for the entire trial. She told us her reaction when the verdict came out: shock that a white jury would find white men guilty of such a crime.
Rosemary took a sip of water. “There are some other interesting details.”
“First, the nineteen-year-old deputy was just starting as a criminology major at Florida State, which was still a segregated university. He did his duty and pursued the assailants. But what would have happened if he had not been on duty that night? Chief Ortega and the other ranking officers were off duty for the weekend. And this young boy, this young white man goes out and arrests four other white men, arresting the chief’s cousin to boot. So, this case shows a new trend towards narrowing the physical and social distance between blacks and whites.
“Like I said, Florida State was a white university. FAMU was what we now call an HBU, but then it was called ‘the black university.’ The hospitals were segregated. Theaters were segregated. But slowly segregation was losing ground, and the new attitude was showing up in the younger white generation.
“But racial injustice was far from over. Another interesting facet of the case was that Chief Ortega’s cousin was represented by John Judd, who was a county judge in 1959. A county judge doubling as a defense attorney for a racially motivated crime? Unheard of!
“In 1960 Judge Judd became an inveterate backer of many of the racist policies of the city commission. During the rape trial Judd tried to use all the racist tropes he could think of to incite the jury. She was a jezebel; he was an innocent sixteen-year-old boy. She had wanted the pleasure of having intercourse with white men. She had all the blame for being raped and abducted. You get the picture. That was ‘Judge’ Judd.
“After the bus boycotts, after the rape verdict, in the ’60s FAMU students protested the theaters; jailed by Judge Judd. Lunch counter demonstrations; jailed by Judge Judd. The police department still had the city commission’s back, and Judge Judd had the back of Chief Ortega.”
Everybody was quiet for a few minutes, including Whale.
Then Miss Jasmine said, “Miss Rosemary, when you tell us this, do you feel pain?”
“I feel sadness. When we were talking about the bus boycott, you can see some humor. Like Miss Jasmine riding herd on the sheriff’s a—” She stopped short of saying it.
“You mean, riding herd on the sheriff’s ass, from the back of the bus, is that what you were going to say?”
“Something like that, ma’am. I started to get carried away.”
“That’s all right, dear. I find humor in that too. And in Roberta A. talking about the damn fools in church, Jesus Christ! There’s definitely a humorous side to those events.”
Rosemary thought, then said, “But there’s no humor in rape. To tell this story is sad; to live this story is sad.” Rosemary stopped. “But it’s important to tell it correctly.”
“Well, dear, you’ve said quite a lot, and you don’t have to say more if you don’t want to.”
“Miss Jasmine, there is one more part. Everything I said just now was all background. Here’s the part that moves me most. When the rape happened, Ms. Olsen was just nineteen. A young woman, yes, but still a girl. And there she was scared to death out in the woods, maybe praying those men would kill her, just to get it over with.
“According to Florida law at the time, a rape victim’s name was supposed to be confidential, but by the time the case went to trial, everybody knew who she was. Imagine, a nineteen-year-old girl, on a date, and then forced to have sex multiple times at gunpoint and knifepoint, by strangers.
“This was a national story. New York Times, Washington Post, you name it. And Podunk papers all over the country had wire services. Her story was all over the news everywhere. Basically, she had to spread her legs for the nation to judge, when in fact all those men had already confessed upon being arrested. Not coerced. Just confessed because they didn’t think they were in trouble or had done anything wrong.
“What makes the biggest impression on me is that this woman—this nineteen-year-old girl—had the courage to face her accusers, while also facing the nation’s scrutiny. In a white court with a white judge and an all-male white jury. It was bad enough that the prosecution had to take her through the trauma as lightly as one could to outline the case, including details of intercourse.
“But then the defense piled on. ‘You did it for the pleasure. You weren’t a virgin, were you? You are just a little whore who wanted to try out some white men.’
“The defense didn’t literally say whore or jezebel; they didn’t have to. But she faced the defense attorneys with courage. The jury saw the truth in Ms. Olsen. So, when the jury issued the guilty verdict, albeit guilty with mercy, Ms. Olsen had done womankind a service, showed how to be brave, how to face the truth, how to stand up.
“Even though none of those men served more than six years due to parole, they did go to jail. They were arrested by Chief Ortega’s men and sentenced in Chief Ortega’s city. The trial shows the tide was slowly turning.
“But for me on a personal level, every day the courage of Ms. Olsen shows me the courage to live my day and live it with optimism and contentment.”
Rosemary was finished. Whale looked around. Everybody was quiet for a good minute, then Miss Jasmine said, “Miss Rosemary. I admire your courage. I admire you coming here to apologize to Larry. And most of all I admire you telling this painful story with grace and wisdom, not just to me, but in front of three grown men whom you don’t really know.
“Thank you, Miss Jasmine, it was my honor.”
“Miss Rosemary, I admire one more thing.”
“What’s that, Miss Jasmine?”
“I admire that plate of bacon you served us at the restaurant. Maybe later this week Sam can drive me and my two welfare projects to the pancake house and have some more.”
“That sounds fantastic. But don’t you remember agreeing with Manager Jackson that you would celebrate your birthday at JHOP?”
Miss Jasmine thought a moment, and then it came to her. “Well look at me. Never forgot anything my whole life besides thirteen years, and now here I am forgetting my 101st birthday party. Tee hee hee!”
“Will you be telling stories here tomorrow morning?” asked Rosemary.
“Tomorrow morning and afternoon. Please come on by.”
With that, Rosemary walked out the door looking at her phone. McArdle and Kenneth walked out, and Larry came out with Whale. Rosemary said, “My ride will be here in a minute,” and in less than that a car pulled up. As Rosemary got in, Larry said, “Well I’ll be goddamned, if it ain’t that goddamn dirty dog Jackson Jackson the fifth himself. Goddamn whippersnapper!”