How does Tom Robinson die after his trial in To Kill a Mockingbird?

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Book cover for To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, featuring a silhouette of a child under a tree and a large moon, with the title in script and — To Kill a Mockingbird This book cover is one of many given to Harper Lee's classic work *To Kill a Mockingbird* (1960). The novel won a Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and the next year was made into an Academy Award-winning film.

In Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, Tom Robinson is killed while attempting to escape from custody following his unjust conviction.12

The editor of the local newspaper later describes his death as the "senseless slaughter of songbirds," a poignant reference to the novel's central metaphor regarding the destruction of innocent beings.1