April 22
TEXASimpending execution
Jasper awaits execution of James Byrd slayer
James Byrd Jr. told his family that he would “put Jasper, Texas, on the map”
one day, and he did.
“He thought it would be because of his music,” said Louvon Harris, one of his
sisters, recalling the confident young man who played trumpet in the school
band and sang exuberantly in the church choir or for anyone he thought it would
bring joy to.
“Never did we think it would be because of his death.”
But it was Byrd’s murder — a horrific, white-on-black hate crime along a lonely
country road — that brought notoriety to this East Texas town and created an
impression that locals say was never quite true and has taken years to correct.
They hope Wednesday’s scheduled execution of killer John William King will be
the final act in a searing legal and moral drama that has lasted nearly 21
years.
“Now when you mention Jasper, you associate Jasper with James,” Harris said.
“It’s sad to know it was for a different reason than he anticipated.”
Byrd, a 49-year-old African-American known and liked around town, took a ride
from King, a buddy of his from prison and another friend who worked at the
local movie house. In an unconscionable rage in the early hours of June 7,
1998, the white men wound up chaining Byrd by his ankles to the bumper of a
1982 Ford pickup and dragging him for 3 miles before dumping his body on the
side of the road.
The crime and the quick arrest of the killers — King a shocking figure with
white supremacist tattoos — devastated the townspeople here as deeply as it did
the rest of the nation. Yet from the beginning, their grief was overshadowed by
the growing stereotype of their community as a place where the whites were
mostly racists and the blacks lived in constant fear.
The people of Jasper did their best to prove the outsiders wrong. They stayed
indoors when the Ku Klux Klan marched through town. They did the same when the
New Black Panthers Party marched through. Clergy members preached forgiveness
and worked hard to keep lines of communication open.
They came together to address areas of legitimate concern, such as racial
disparities in local hiring.
The Rev. Kenneth Lyons, the Byrd family’s minister at Greater New Bethel
Baptist Church, drew up a list of names that he hoped would save Jasper. For 20
years, he has kept it tucked inside the Bible under the lid of his pulpit.
Recalling scripture where God offered to save a city for the sake of 10
honorable men, Lyons drew up his own list.
Among the names is a fellow minister, a woman who “played a big role during
that time” and one of James Byrd Sr.’s good friends.
“I began to think of 10 people in Jasper who I knew were sincere and earnest,”
he recalled. “And this is what I said: I said, ‘Lord, here are the 10 that I
have found here in Jasper, Texas. You said if you could find 10 in Sodom and
Gomorrah, you would save it. And here’s 10 from Jasper, Texas. Save it.’”
Faith, he and others say, may have done just that.
“There was kind of a rally in the faith,” said Eddie Hopkins, executive
director of the Jasper Economic Development Corp., likening it to the coming
together that followed the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. “I think that same kind
of sentiment happened after James Byrd. I think there was a rally in the
faith.”
The Ministerial Alliance, with leaders from about 30 churches in and around
Jasper, stepped in immediately.
“We all spoke with one voice,” Lyons said. “When the Black Panthers came to
town, the black preachers spoke out against it. When the Ku Klux Klan came, the
white ministers spoke out against it. To show harmony, to show them that Jasper
was of one accord.”
The work inside the community didn’t stop the stain from spreading.
“We were stereotyped,” said Billy Rowles, Jasper County sheriff at the time. “I
was stereotyped as a pot-bellied, beer-drinking, East Texas redneck, racist
sheriff. They portrayed me that way and our community as a bunch of racists and
bigots and zeroes.
“It broke your heart, how they portrayed us.”
The economy suffered, too.
“Doctors wouldn’t come; businesses wouldn’t come,” said the Rev. Ron Foshage of
St. Michael’s Catholic Church. “People moved out. It’s been very difficult
because we live with this stigma.”
Foshage, Rowles and Lyons insist that the stereotypes were overhyped. In 2019,
there are signs that attitudes have softened.
A large tech support business headquartered in Brewton, Ala., is remodeling a
building across from the courthouse for a new Texas location that promises to
add as many as 250 jobs. Provalus chose Jasper out of 50 prospective cities
across the country.
Landing the company wasn’t easy, said Hopkins of the economic development
group.
“One of the things that came up in a conversation with the corporation’s
president was James Byrd,” he said. “Not that we were going to have to convince
him that
