Chronology of the Case of Delbert Lee Tibbs
Compiled by Rob Warden
Copyright © 2006, Center on Wrongful Convictions
Bluhm Legal Clinic, Northwestern University School of Law
February 3, 1974 — Terry Robert Milroy, a twenty-seven-year-old white man, is murdered and Cynthia Nadeau, his seventeen-year-old white girlfriend, is raped near Fort Myers, in Lee County, Florida. Nadeau describes the killer-rapist as a black man with a dark complexion and pock-marked skin.
February 6, 1974 — Tibbs, a thirty-four-year-old African American hitchhiker from Chicago with light skin and a clear complexion, is stopped near Ocala, Florida, some 220 miles north of Fort Myers, questioned about the crime, photographed, and released.
February 12, 1974 — Despite the discrepancy between Tibbs’s appearance and her initial description of the killer-rapist, Nadeau identifies Tibbs from the photographs taken six days earlier. A warrant is issued for his arrest.
March 15, 1974 — Tibbs is arrested near Clarksdale, Mississippi, and waives extradition to Florida.
March 16, 1974 — Tibbs arrives in Fort Meyers and is identified by Nadeau from a live lineup that includes three other African American men.
March 27, 1974 — A Lee County grand jury indicts Tibbs for the murder of Milroy and the rape of Nadeau.
December 11, 1974 — Tibbs’s trial opens before Judge Thomas Sands and an all-white jury. State Attorney James R. Long is the prosecutor. Tibbs is defended by Chicago lawyer George Howard.
December 14, 1974 — The jury returns a verdict of guilty, recommending a death sentence for the murder.
March 24, 1975 — Judge Sands sentences Tibbs to death in the Florida electric chair for the murder and life in prison for the rape.
July 28, 1976 — Florida Supreme Court reverses the conviction and remands the case for a new trial based on the weight of the evidence. Tibbs v. State, 337 So. 2d 788 (1976).
Late 1976 — Judge Jack Shoonover holds that a retrial is barred by the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment.
January 8, 1977 — Tibbs is released on $90,000 bond.
April 9, 1981 — Florida Supreme Court holds that because the verdict was overturned on the weight of the evidence — as opposed to the sufficiency of the evidence — that Tibbs may be retired. Tibbs v. Florida, 397 So. 2d 1120 (1981).
June 7, 1982 — U.S. Supreme Court affirms Florida Supreme Court’s double-jeopardy holding. Tibbs v. Florida, 457 U.S. 31 (1982).
July 7, 1982 — State Attorney Long’s successor, Joseph D’Allesandro, drops all charges against Tibbs.
