Labor organizer. He was sent to Folsom Prison along with Tom Mooney for the July 22, 1916 Preparedness Day bombing in San Francisco, in which ten people were killed and forty more were injured. First held without counsel, he and others were charged with murder and retained Attorney Maxwell McNutt in their defense. Billings was convicted and sentenced to hang, but his sentence was changed to life imprisonment in 1918. By 1939, when the case unraveled, his sentence was commuted. He married Josephine Rudolph on March 26, 1940 in California. On December 22, 1961, California Governor Edmund G. Brown granted him an official pardon. He had served more than twenty-three years for a crime it is believed he did not commit. After his release, he remained active in the labor movement. He also ran a watch repair shop.
Labor organizer. He was sent to Folsom Prison along with Tom Mooney for the July 22, 1916 Preparedness Day bombing in San Francisco, in which ten people were killed and forty more were injured. First held without counsel, he and others were charged with murder and retained Attorney Maxwell McNutt in their defense. Billings was convicted and sentenced to hang, but his sentence was changed to life imprisonment in 1918. By 1939, when the case unraveled, his sentence was commuted. He married Josephine Rudolph on March 26, 1940 in California. On December 22, 1961, California Governor Edmund G. Brown granted him an official pardon. He had served more than twenty-three years for a crime it is believed he did not commit. After his release, he remained active in the labor movement. He also ran a watch repair shop.
Bio by: Jan Franco
Advertisement
