PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A 16-year-old from Delaware County who was wrongfully accused and convicted of murder officially has had his name cleared, 91 years after he was executed for the crime.
In 1931, Alexander McClay Williams was convicted of murdering Vida Robare in her cottage at the Glen Mills School.
Williams was Black and was a student at the school. Robare was white. He was doing chores on the grounds of the school in October 1930 when her estranged husband found her body stabbed 47 times, according to the book "The Case That Shocked the Country."
The teen was charged with murder and wasn’t given access to a lawyer for 17 days. During that time, Williams signed three separate confessions and was interrogated numerous times without a parent or guardian present.
The trial took less than two days, and an all-white jury found him guilty in less than four hours. No appeal was ever filed. He was the youngest person ever in Pennsylvania to die in the electric chair.
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His lawyer’s great-grandson, Samuel Lemon, has worked for years to clear Williams’ name. He pointed out discrepancies in the case, including an adult-sized bloody handprint found near a door in the cottage.
It was also never mentioned she had recently divorced her husband for “extreme cruelty.”
Delaware County District Attorney Jack Stollsteimer moved to withdraw charges, saying they never should have been filed. He added that they can’t rewrite history, but they can acknowledge a wrong in the hopes the Williams family and the family of his lawyer can be at peace.
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