Atticus says to his children:
Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.
As Atticus has never said before that it is a sin to do something, Scout is curious, so she asks Miss Maudie why it is a sin to kill a mockingbird. Miss Maudie explains:
Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don’t eat up people’s gardens, don’t nest in corncribs, they don’t do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.
In other words, mockingbirds are a symbol in this novel of innocent people who do no harm in the world and try to do good and who therefore shouldn't be persecuted.
The two obvious mockingbirds in the book are Tom Robinson and Boo Radley. Both are the objects...
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of fear and prejudice. Neither do any harm in the world, and both try to do good. Tom Robinson does helpful tasks for Mayella Ewell and Boo saves Scout andJem from Bob Ewell's attempt to kill them. When Atticus says to Scout that Bob Ewell fell on his knife—something she knows is a lie—Scout understands that exposing Boo's involvement in Bob Ewell's death would be wrong. She says that it would:
be sort of like shootin‘ a mockingbird, wouldn’t it?
The third mockingbird in the book is more elusive, but it would be Scout. She is an innocent would-be victim of Bob Ewell's hate who sings the "song" that is this novel. It is because she portrays events with such a clear-eyed innocence that we starkly see how Tom Robinson is wronged and come to see how the children's treatment of Boo is a parallel story of misplaced prejudice.
There are, as you stated, three metaphorical "mockingbirds" in this story: Tom Robinson, Boo Radley, and, although to a lesser degree, Dolphus Raymond.
Tom Robinson is a "mockingbird" because he is a harmless and gentle soul, wrongfully accused by the society around him of a crime he did not commit. In all reality, he is a kind and simple character, and the accusations hurled at him are much like stones or projectiles launched at the "mockingbird" Atticus spoke of.
Boo Radley, whose real name is Arthur, has community rumors spread about him, despite a severe lack of any real grounds for such gossip. Because he keeps to himself, stays mainly inside the Radley house, and has a certain air of mystery to those around him, he is alienated from the rest of Maycomb society, and is a reclusive enigma to others.
Lastly, Dolphus Raymond, who everyone thinks is the town drunk, actually only drinks sodapop from his brown-bagged bottle, and because he loiters about town and acts unusually (according to Maycomb standards, that is), he also is castigated and considered an outcast. The words that people use in reference to him are hurtful, which makes him another sacrificial mockingbird in this story.
The lesson here is that people should not prematurely judge others based solely on outward appearances, a theme that runs through the entirety of Harper Lee's classic about racial prejudice, fitting in, and southern life during the depression era.