Ahmed Evans must be saved

Ahmed Evans was born Fred Evans in 1931 in Greenville, SC to John and Ora Evans. The family moved to Cleveland in 1948, and Evans enlisted in the army. He served in Korea as a combat engineer. Upon returning to Cleveland, he worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad. He became politically active after heading Malcolm X deliver his “ballot or bullet” speech in 1964. Evans opened the Afro Culture Shop and Bookstore, which became a gathering space for Cleveland's Black Nationalist community and was targeted by the police.

On a July night in 1968, months of tension between the Cleveland Police Department and Evans, leader of the Black Nationalists of New Libya, boiled over in Cleveland’s majority-Black Glenville neighborhood. Police and Evans’ men exchanged fire, resulting in the deaths of seven. An all-white jury convicted Evans of seven first-degree murder charges, and he was sentenced to death. Evans was taken off death row due to the 1972 Furman v. Georgia decision. He died in prison in 1978 at age 46.