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Rubin "Hurricane" Carter (May 6, 1937 – April 20, 2014) was an American middleweight boxer.[1] He is best known for being wrongfully convicted for a triple murder for which he was in jail for 19 years.
Carter was an African American who was born in Clifton, New Jersey.[1] He was sent to a juvenile reformatory after stabbing a man and being convicted of assault in the late 1940s.[1] He escaped in 1954 and joined the Army. He was discharged for unfitness. He was sent to prison for escaping from the reformatory. He mugged several people, for which he was convicted and imprisoned.
Carter began a boxing career in 1961, shortly after being released from prison. He married Mae Thelma Basket in 1963.
In 1966, in a bar in Paterson, New Jersey, a bartender and two customers were shot dead. In 1967, Carter and John Artis were convicted of the murders and given three life sentences. In 1976, their convictions were quashed and they were reconvicted at a second trial. In 1981, Artis was paroled. In 1985, Carter's murder convictions were again quashed and he was released.
Carter's wife divorced him. he moved to Toronto, Ontario and married Lisa Peters. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2011. He died of the disease on April 20, 2014 in Toronto, aged 76.[2] He is survived by his daughter and son from his first marriage.
Carter is the subject of Hurricane, a song by Bob Dylan, and The Hurricane, a movie.
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