A Black man in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, took a drastic approach to instill a history lesson in an unwilling student and is now facing charges of first-degree harassment and false imprisonment.

Robert Lee Noye, 52, was arrested on Monday after he forced a woman to sit at his home and watch the nine-hour miniseries, Roots. Noye claimed to have done the deed "so she could better understand her racism," reports The Gazette.

When the woman attempted to move, Noye told her to "remain seated and watch the movie with him or he would kill her and spread her body parts across Interstate 380 on the way to Chicago," as cited in a criminal complaint.

The woman's identity and race have not been made public. Why Noye felt compelled to ensure the woman watch the film is also unclear. 

No further details about Noye's charges have been released.

The movie was adapted from Alex Haley’s 1976 novel of the same name, and Roots traces the lineage of a fictional version of Haley’s maternal side of his family back to his great-great-great-grandfather Kunta Kinte’s capture in The Gambia, through his time enslaved in America, and the lives of his descendants who were enslaved and those freed at the end of the Civil War. Airing over eight separate nights on ABC in January 1977, Roots was a groundbreaking miniseries.

Not only did Roots illustrate the brutalities of slavery, but it also told the story of one family’s lineage in the United States. The airing of the miniseries also encouraged many across racial lines to have open dialogues about slavery.

Additional films such as 12 Years A Slave, Harriet and Roots: The Saga of An American Family have also offered graphic and unapologetic accounts of slavery and forced the public to acknowledge the fact that the effects of racism still permeate society today, whether they'd like to admit it or not.

Born Alexander Murray Palmer Haley, the writer was born on August 11, 1921, in Ithaca, New York. Haley served in World War II as a member of the United States Coast Guard. He became the first Black man to gain the rank of chief petty officer, paving the way for other Black men and women service members to gain senior ranking in the naval branches of the military.  

Haley was also the first Black coast guardsman to be designated to the specialty rate of journalist due to his service to the Coast Guard and Navy's public affairs and history programs. 

Haley's distinction as a journalist enabled other Black military members to break the mold and serve in roles other than that of cooks and stewards.

The historian and author died on February 10, 1992, from cardiac arrest.