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Florida

Political repression plays out state by state — shaped by local institutions, prosecutors, and movements for defense. These are the documented political prisoners and cases the census holds for Florida.

301Documented
18In custody
195Released
11Awaiting trial

Eras of repression in Florida

Where Florida’s entries fall across the census’s historical eras.

1930s 70 2000s 46 2020s 35 1950s 30 1970s 28 2010s 26

Documented cases

301 entries in the census — every one stays in the record, whether the case is open or closed.

J
John Black
John Black was among a group of white men hanged in Gadsden County, Florida, in 1846. The Espy chronology clas...
B
Blanco (Tampa deportee, 1933)
In Exile
Blanco (Tampa deportee, 1933) was a Tampa cigar worker whom the prisoners’ letter in the February 1933 Labor D...
L
Lillian Bland
Page 2’s August 24 Orlando dispatch names L. E. Bland and wife Lillian Bland as arrested and sent to the City...
P
Paul Bland
Paul Bland was a World War veteran and president of the Association of Unemployed Workers in Tampa. The Daily...
E
Enrique Bonilla
The January 16, 1932 report individually names the sixteen workers actually arrested November 7, 1931 at the T...
H
Henry Bonilla
Released
Henry Bonilla was one of the Tampa Fourteen Tobacco Workers Industrial Union defendants. A May 24, 1933 dispat...
T
Timothy Brown
Released
Timothy Brown was imprisoned in Florida after being convicted of the 1990 killing of Broward sheriff’s deputy...
B
Bunnie Brown Jr.
The political-prisoner directory lists Bunnie Brown Jr., number 025795-17, at the Starke, Florida prison addre...
S
Siobhan Browne
Released
Siobhan Browne, 37, US citizen, was charged July 26, 1999 with conspiracy to mail weapons and Arms Export Cont...
B
Barbara Broxton
Released
Barbara Broxton was a 20-year-old Florida A&M student arrested in the Tallahassee lunch-counter sit-ins on Feb...
J
John Broxton
Released
John Broxton participated in the 1960 Tallahassee campaign against segregated lunch counters and the ensuing j...
J
John Wesley Bryant
Released
John Wesley Bryant was a St. Petersburg member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee arrested and j...
J
Johnny Lee Burns
He was one of the Quincy Five, Black civil-rights and voter-registration activists prosecuted for the Septembe...
A
Alexis Butler
Released
Alexis Butler, 25 at the time and of Dania Beach, Florida, was one of the "GEO9," a group of Fort Lauderdale F...
D
David Butler
Released
David Butler was a 17-year-old Black Communist in Fort Lauderdale, Broward County, Florida, arrested on a trum...
A
Angel Cabrera
Released
Angel Cabrera was a Tampa tobacco-worker defendant imprisoned during Florida's crackdown on the 1931 strike. A...
E
Eugene Cabrera
The January 16, 1932 report individually names the sixteen workers actually arrested November 7, 1931 at the T...
J
Jose Campos
Jose Campos was one of the Tampa tobacco-strike prisoners. The Daily Worker of January 18, 1933 reports that a...
R
Robert Benjamin Canney
Robert Benjamin “Bob” Canney (July 7, 1928–August 21, 1988) was a Florida educator and civil-rights and antiwa...
J
Jose Carbonell
Released
Jose Carbonell was jailed for one year without bail in the 1954 Dade County 'subversive activities' probe for...
C
Clement Carney
Released
Clement Carney participated in the 1960 Tallahassee campaign against segregated lunch counters and the ensuing...
M
Maurice Carroll
Released
Maurice Carroll was a Jewish Cultural Center director cited for contempt in the 1954 Dade County 'subversive a...
J
John Victor Chambers
John Victor Chambers was a Vietnam Veterans Against the War member from St. Petersburg, Florida, jailed twice...
C
Conor Claxton
Released
Conor Claxton, 27, Irish foreign national, was indicted July 26, 1999 in Florida along with co-defendants Anth...

Institutions in Florida

Prisons, jails, and detention centers in Florida that appear in the census’s case files.

FCI MariannaMarianna, Florida
8 cases
U.S. District Court for the Northern District of FloridaGainesville, Florida
8 cases
Florida State PrisonRaiford, Florida
8 cases
Raiford PenitentiaryRaiford, Florida
7 cases
Palm Beach County JailWest Palm Beach, Florida
7 cases
Miami FDCMiami, Florida
4 cases
Polk County JailBartow, Florida
4 cases
Fort TaylorKey West, Florida
4 cases