Last Friday, an Oklahoma judge has thrown out a lawsuit that sought reparations for victims and their families of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. The lawsuit is the latest blow in the push for reparations, but unlike all other cases, the plaintiffs seeking reparations are still alive.

Viola Fletcher, 108, Lessie Benningfield Randle, 107, and Hughes “Uncle Red” Van Ellis, 102, are the plaintiffs named in the lawsuit which had originally been filed in 2020. The lawsuit cited a violation of Oklahoma’s public nuisance law and argued that Black residents who lived in Tulsa are still feeling the effects of a massacre that targeted them over a hundred years ago.

The lawsuit names the Regional Chamber of Commerce and other local agencies as defendants arguing that they should be responsible for the compensation to Black victims and their descendants over the Tulsa Race Riot. Additionally, the lawsuit demanded that city officials provide a detailed account of all the property and wealth that was destroyed or stolen during the attack. The lawsuit also sought to have the construction of a hospital in North Tulsa and the establishment of a Tulsa Massacre Victims Compensation Fund.

The complaint expounded, “From the period immediately after the Massacre until the present day, Defendants actively and unreasonably, unwarrantedly, and/or unlawfully thwarted the community’s efforts to rebuild, neglecting Greenwood and predominately Black, North Tulsa communities.” The amended complaint goes on, “Instead, Defendants redirected public resources, which should have been used to abate the nuisance surrounding Greenwood, to benefit the overwhelmingly white parts of Tulsa.”

In June 1921, the Tulsa Race Massacre unfolded in the Greenwood district, an area dubbed “Black Wall Street.” The chaos unfolded over the course of one day after White residents accused a 19-year-old Black shoe shiner, Dick Rowland, of assaulting a 17-year-old white elevator operator, Sarah Page.

Historical Records show that witness accounts vary on what actually happened. However, one widely accepted theory is that Rowland tripped as he was walking and instinctively grabbed Page’s hand to catch his fall. According to the commission report which studied the Tulsa Race Riot, Page screamed and ran away after he grabbed her.

The interaction between the teenagers would set off a mob of angry whites that descended onto the Greenwood district, a 35-block area with prospering businesses, banks, restaurants, and shops owned by Black residents. Throughout one night, the white mob attacked the roughly 10,000 black residents living in Greenwood, burning their homes, looting their businesses, and killing anywhere from 75 to 300 residents. In addition to the destruction of property and human life, the riots would go on to cause trauma and economic instability for the Black community, even after a century.

In her dismissal of the lawsuit, Tulsa County District Court Judge Caroline Wall explained that such demands would prove to be a significant burden on the government's financial stability.

An attorney representing one of the survivors, Sara Solfanelli, shared a statement following the judge's ruling. Solfanelli explained, “Black Americans, especially Black Tulsans, carry the weight of intergenerational racial trauma day in and day out—a weight they cannot relinquish or cavalierly dismiss. The dismissal of this case is just one more example of how America’s, including Tulsa’s, legacy is disproportionately and unjustly borne by the Black community.”

Attorneys for the plaintiffs detail that the dismissal is a setback in their efforts, but they are committed to ensuring it's not the end.

The lead attorney for the lawsuit, Damario Solomon-Simmons, shares that his legal team will now file an appeal with the Oklahoma Supreme Court and that despite the setback in their efforts to repair the harm done to Tulsa's Black community, this dismissal will not be the end.

"We know we have a conservative Supreme Court, but we believe the law and the facts are so clear, that any lawyer any judge that's actually looking at the documents will say, 'Hey, you can let these people into court,'" he said during a Monday press conference.

While the mayor's office shares they have not yet received Judge Wall's opinion, Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum issued an official statement that explained, "The City remains committed to finding the graves of 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre victims, fostering economic investment in the Greenwood District, educating future generations about the worst event in our community’s history and building a city where every person has an equal opportunity for a great life.”