Are you truly lacking reading comprehension ? It is not under question whether Screws lynched Bobby Hall he did , no one questions it . The reason his trial was overturned by the Supreme Court is because the case against Screws wasn ' t a murder case because he would never be convicted of that in the 1940 s South but a civil rights case , charging that Screws denied Hall his civil rights . The Supreme Court threw that out because of lack of evidence for that . They didn ' t question whether Screws had lynched Hall they questioned whether the actions taken by Screws constituted a civil rights violation under the strict definition of it under the Civil Rights code . Sherrod absolutely didn ' t lie there . American Spectator just failed to read the actual judgments or else chose to outright misrepresent them . And you fell for it , hook , line , and sinker .