An Alabama jury last year awarded $7 million to the mother of a black man slain by members of the Klan.

In December 2000, a separate jury in the case awarded $3.5 billion to the state, then the largest ever by an Alabama jury.

An Alabama jury awarded huge libel damages to a local official for trivial mistakes in an advertisement that did not mention him.

The idea seems to have its roots in the experience of Walter McMillian, who was convicted of capital murder by an Alabama jury in 1988.

And last year, an Alabama jury awarded $4.1 million to four people who suffered strokes or heart attacks after taking an ephedra-based appetite suppressant made by the company.

An Alabama jury clearly thought so, for it awarded $2 million to the poor, suffering victim.

But in the three years that ended in September, Alabama juries awarded $221.5 million in punitive damages, according to state court records.

The notes were so persuasive, in fact, that on May 28, 1960, an Alabama jury defied the prejudices of those times and acquited King.

An African American, Creed Conyer, was selected as the first black person since Reconstruction to sit on an Alabama grand jury.

In 1988 an Alabama jury convicted 15-year-old Clayton Flowers of capital murder and recommended a sentence of life in prison without parole.