In the summer of 1901, a male, Deputy Sheriff Richard Read of the Hardin County Sheriff's Department, met a violent end while trying to keep the peace at a public picnic in Elizabethtown, Kentucky. On July 22nd, Deputy Read confronted a man who was causing a disturbance. When the deputy instructed the man to be quiet, the individual drew a revolver and shot him twice.
A bystander who witnessed the shooting immediately returned fire, seriously wounding the suspect.
The man who shot Deputy Read was subsequently apprehended. Following the shooting, the wheels of justice turned, and on November 16, 1902, the suspect was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison for the death of Deputy Read.
However, the legal conclusion to the case was not the final chapter. Later on the same day he was sentenced, an enraged mob forcibly removed the convicted man from the Hardin County Jail. The mob then took matters into their own hands and lynched him, hanging him from a nearby tree.
