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James Joseph Richardson (born December 26, 1935) was an African-American man who was wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death in 1968 for the October 1967 mass murder of his seven children. They died after eating a poisoned breakfast containing the organic phosphate pesticide parathion. At the time of the murders, Richardson was a migrant farm worker in Arcadia, Florida living with his wife Annie Mae Richardson and their children. At a trial in Fort Myers, Florida, the jury found him guilty of murdering the children and sentenced him to death. As a result of the United States Supreme Court's 1972 Furman v. Georgia decision finding the death penalty unconstitutional, his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. He was then exonerated in 1989 after 21 years, when his case was revisited by appointed Miami-Dade County prosecutor Janet Reno. Following Richardson's exoneration, the babysitter of the Richardson children, Bessie Reece, has been named as the key suspect. Reece died in 1993. In 2016 he began receiving compensation under a state law narrowly tailored to his case. Deaths On October 25, 1967, the seven Richardson children, ranging in age from two to eight, consumed food poisoned with parathion. Six of the children died that day: Betty, age 8; Alice, age 7; Susie, age 6; Dorreen, age 5; Vanessa, age 4; and James Jr., age 2. The seventh child, Dianne, age 3, died the next day. Betty and Alice were from Annie Richardson's previous marriage while James was the father of the five youngest.The night before, Annie Mae Richardson, James' wife, had prepared a lunch of beans, rice, and grits for the children. The meal was placed in a locked refrigerator overnight. In the morning the Richardsons left to work at the orange groves 16 miles away. A neighbor, Bessie Reece, was delegated to take care of the children while their parents were at work. The oldest four were enrolled in school; they went home to eat lunch. After they returned to school that afternoon, their teachers noticed they were showing strange symptoms, and the principal immediately took them to hospital. One of the teachers went to check on the three children at home, found them to be sick as well, and they were also taken to the hospital. Word was sent to the parents that just one of their children was ill and that a parent needed to come to the hospital. Both left the groves to go to the hospital, unaware that six of their children were already dead by that time. Investigation and accusation Joseph H. Minoughan of the Arcadia Police Department was the first officer to arrive at the hospital. Determining that all of the sick children were from the same family, he promptly went to their apartment building to search for and quarantine any potential poison. He found nothing in the apartment indicative of a poison except an insect spray, and did not believe that it could have been the cause of the children's poisoning, so he rushed back to the hospital. Arcadia Police Chief Richard Barnard and DeSoto County Sheriff Frank Cline were among the next law enforcement officers to examine the apartment. Minoughan came back from the hospital for a second examination of the apartment and found them there. Barnard and Cline went into the unlocked apartment and noticed a very strong smell, but no sign of any poison.Cline believed that the poison might be a pesticide and went to the shed behind the apartment building to search it; he found no poison there, either. Reporters started flocking to Arcadia to cover the breaking news. Richardson and the law enforcement officers were repeatedly questioned, but did not make any preliminary statements. Frank Shaub, a prosecuting attorney in the area, did respond to reporters and gave them accounts of his investigation of the house.The next morning, after the death of the last child, Dianne, a two-pound sack of parathion was discovered in the shed. Cline, Barnard, their staffs, and Shaub all agreed that the bag of parathion had not been there the day before, when the premises had been searched five times. They thought that whoever had placed the parathion sack was also probably the person who had poisoned the children. Conflicting reports on how the parathion sack was found were given to law enforcement officers. Minoughan was the first officer to arrive and was told by Bessie Reece, the babysitter, that Charlie Smith, a black resident of Arcadia's Quarters, had discovered the parathion. When Minoughan asked Barnard who called in the discovery to the police station, he was informed that it was an anonymous male caller. The next day Cline and Shaub's local assistant, John Treadwell, III, told reporters that Richardson had "discussed insurance policies for the children the night before their deaths". It was determined that the insurance salesman, George Purvis, talked to Richardson just hours before the children were poisoned. According to authorities, Richardson and Purvis gave conflicting stories on the insurance policies. No additional evidence was found for two days. The children's funeral was held on Sunday. Both Richardson and his wife collapsed in sorrow at the service. National news magazines, television, and radio networks covered the funeral. This put Sheriff Cline at the center of nationwide attention. Barnard later told attorney Mark Lane: "Cline saw the chance to make a big name for himself. He needed to make an arrest real bad."Two days after the funeral Cline charged Richardson with murder in the first degree. However, Police Chief Barnard said, "There just is no case against that man." Treadwell, charged with prosecuting the case if it came to trial, agreed with Barnard. The murder warrants were dropped, but both Richardsons were formally charged with child neglect. Hayes agreed with Cline and summoned a coroner's inquest "to substantiate evidence already on hand". At the press conference the next day Cline announced that Richardson had five other children who had died under mysterious circumstances in another Florida city and that his motive for this crime was to collect the insurance money on the children, which would total almost $14,000. Judge Hayes said that both Richardson and his wife had taken lie-detector tests and that the results showed that Richardson had knowledge of the poisoning, which indicated he was guilty.The coroner's jury held a hearing on November 2, 1967, at which Judge Hayes said: "We will meet today to instruct Frank Cline to file murder charges against Richardson." This statement carried considerable weight in Arcadia, including with the hand-picked jury, because of Hayes' prominent standing in the county and the fact he had been a judge in Arcadia for more than 31 years. Defense John S. Robinson, a 30-year-old white lawyer, became concerned over the media coverage of the Arcadia murders. He believed the case was being handled unfairly as the judge constantly claimed that Richardson was guilty. He contacted people who knew Richardson a.... Discover the Willa Reece popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Willa Reece books.