Yahoo News: Killen convicted of the killing of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner :
Conviction coincides with 41st anniversary of civil rights killings

Former Klansman found guilty of manslaughter

Killen guilty; verdict 'a sign this town has changed'

Witness: Killen Ordered Attack on Workers | 44 Days That Changed Mississippi

Civil rights trio killings: a timeline of events | Jurors recall holdout vote that let 'Preacher' walk away free

Letters to sheriff reveal story behind battle for civil rights

'People would call and threaten to kill Wallace'

Reward: Whether FBI ever paid money remains matter of speculation among many

Suspects in 1964 civil rights slayings put past behind them  | Experts: Autopsy reveals beating

Rita's Story

Former Klansman found guilty of manslaughter
Conviction coincides with 41st anniversary of civil rights killings

Tuesday, June 21, 2005; Posted: 1:39 p.m. EDT (17:39 GMT)

PHILADELPHIA, Mississippi (CNN) -- Forty-one years to the day three civil rights workers were ambushed and killed by a Ku Klux Klan mob, a jury found former Klansman Edgar Ray Killen guilty of all three counts of manslaughter Tuesday.

The "Freedom Summer" killings of James Chaney, 21, Andrew Goodman, 20, and Michael Schwerner, 24, galvanized the civil rights movement.

The jury of nine whites and three blacks reached the decision after several hours of deliberations.

Killen showed no emotion as the verdicts were read.

But as he was being escorted from the courthouse under heavy guard, the wheelchair-bound man took swipes at reporters' microphones and cameras. One of the reporters was black, as was a cameraman.

Killen will be sentenced by Circuit Court Judge Marcus Gordon at 2 p.m. ET, a court official said. He faces a maximum sentence of 20 years per count, and a minimum of one year per count, Mississippi Attorney General James Hood said.

From her Manhattan home Goodman's mother, Carolyn Goodman, 89, told CNN she had waited a long time for a guilty verdict, but it was "nothing to be happy about."

"I'm just overcome. ... But you know I had a feeling it was going to happen," she said.

"I just hope he's off the streets," she said of Killen. "I don't want anything more terrible than that. I don't want anything violent. I'm against capital punishment."

In his closing argument Monday, Neshoba County District Attorney Mark Duncan implored the 12 jurors to "hold the defendant responsible for what he did."

"What you do today when you go into that jury room is going to echo throughout the history of Neshoba County from now on," Duncan said. "You can either change the history that Edgar Ray Killen and the Klan wrote for us, or you can confirm it."

"Find him guilty of murder," Duncan said. "That's the verdict that the state of Mississippi asks you to return."

He told the jury to think of Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner -- three young men who had volunteered to help register blacks to vote in the summer of 1964, an act "so despised it cost them their lives."

Chaney was a black man from Mississippi.

Goodman and Schwerner were white New Yorkers who came to the South with hundreds of other civil rights activists.

"Those three boys and their families were robbed of all the things that Edgar Ray Killen has been able to enjoy for the last 41 years. And the cause of it, the main instigator of it was Edgar Ray Killen and no one else," the district attorney said.

"He was the man who led these murders. He is the man who set the plan in motion. He is the man who recruited the people to carry out the plan. He is the man who directed those men into what to do."

Now 80, the balding, bespectacled Killen -- a former preacher -- appeared to be sleeping during much of the closing remarks.

Hood, who led the case, said he wished "some of my predecessors would have done their duty" by bringing charges against Killen. Noting that it was "not good politics to bring this case up," he said, politics and time should not get in the way of justice.

Hood said testimony showed Killen possessed "venom" at the time of the killings and still does.

"That venom is sitting right there. It is seething behind those glasses," he said. "That coward wants to hide behind this thing and put pressure on you."
Burden of proof

Seeking to undermine the prosecution's case, defense attorney Mitch Moran said "nothing in the record shows Edgar was there" during the ambush and killings.

"The '60s was a terrible era in a lot of ways. We do not need to relive them, and we do need to go forward," Moran said. "What I'm asking you to do is to look at this evidence and hold the state to the burden of proving this case beyond a reasonable doubt."

Another defense attorney, James McIntyre, said, "The burden of proof on this case does not reflect any guilt whatsoever."

"Mr. Edgar Ray Killen had nothing to do with it," he said.

On June 21, 1964, Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner were on their way to investigate the burning of a black church when they were briefly taken into custody for speeding.

According to testimony, the Klan had burned the church to lure the three men back to Neshoba County.

After they were released from the county jail in Philadelphia, Mississippi, a KKK mob tailed their car, forced if off the road, and shot them to death. Their bodies were buried in an earthen dam -- in a trench dug in anticipation of the killings, according to testimony.

In a 1967 federal trial an all-white jury deadlocked 11-1 in favor of convicting Killen. The lone holdout said she could not vote to convict a preacher.

Seven other men were convicted of conspiring to violate the civil rights of the victims. None served more than six years in prison. 

NOTE: Edgar Ray Killen's brother testified that Killen was not a member of the KKK. It is interesting to note that the Mississippi KKK put the following on their web site. "The Mississippi White Knights have opened a defense fund to help Edgar Ray Killen, we ask everyone to send a couple dollars to him, we must aid our brother in his time of need. Whether you think he is guilty or Innocent is not the issue, the issue is that we make sure he has proper funds to receive a fair trial. So please help if you can."

Killen guilty; verdict 'a sign this town has changed'

By Jerry Mitchell
jmitchell@clarionledger.com

PHILADELPHIA — A jury today found Edgar Ray Killen guilty of manslaughter in the 1964 slayings of civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner.

Jurors deliberated for about 2 1/2 hours Monday, then came back at 8:35 a.m. today before Circuit Clerk Patti Duncan Lee read the verdict at 11:25 a.m. of guilty on three counts of manslaughter.

The verdict comes 41 years to the day after the trio was killed. The three had come to Philadelphia to investigate the burning of a black church in Neshoba County.

The verdict "signifies this county has dealt with its past and is ready to move on to the future," said Leroy Clemens, co-chairman of the Philadelphia Coalition, a citizens' group dedicated to pushing for justice in the case.

"It's a sign that this town has changed."

Killen, an 80-year-old sawmill operator and part-time preacher, said nothing and showed no emotion, but moved his lips up and down as the verdict was read on each of the three counts.

Killen wore a nasal oxygen tube during today's court proceedings. He was comforted by his wife as he sat in his wheelchair.

Circuit Judge Marcus Gordon had earlier instructed the jury that they could render a verdict of manslaughter instead of murder.

Killen could receive from one to 20 years in prison on each of the three manslaughter convictions. Gordon did not announce when sentencing would take place, but planned to meet behind closed doors at 1 p.m. today with defense attorneys and prosecutors.

Killen was wheeled away by sheriff's deputies and taken to the Neshoba County jail after the verdict.

Heavily armed police formed a barrier outside a side door to the courthouse and jurors were loaded into two waiting vans and driven away.

The night that the three young men were killed, Neshoba County Sheriff Cecil Price had jailed the trio for speeding. By the time they were released at 10 p.m., the plan to kill them and bury their bodies was already in place.

After a high-speed chase, they were taken to a gravel road and killed. Their bodies, buried 15 feet deep in an earthen dam, were discovered on Aug. 4. They had been beaten and shot.

The notorious case inspired the 1988 film Mississippi Burning.

Prosecutors had asked the jury to send a message to the rest of the world that Mississippi has changed and is committed to bringing to justice those who killed to preserve segregation in the 1960s. They said the evidence was clear that Killen organized the attack on the three victims.

Killen's lawyers conceded he was in the Klan but said that did not make him guilty of murder. They pointed out that prosecutors offered no witnesses or evidence that put Killen at the scene of the crime. Killen did not take the stand, but has long claimed that he was at a wake at a funeral home when the victims were killed.

Killen was tried in 1967 on federal charges of violating the victims' civil rights. But the all-white jury deadlocked, with one juror saying she could not convict a preacher. Seven others were convicted, but none served more than six years.

Killen is only person ever brought up on murder charges in the case by the state of Mississippi.

Witness: Killen Ordered Attack on Workers

By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS, Associated Press Writer Fri Jun 17, 6:35 PM ET

PHILADELPHIA, Miss. - A former Ku Klux Klansman accused in the 1964 killings of three civil rights workers ordered fellow Klansmen to attack the three men and then went to a funeral home to create an alibi for himself, according to testimony read in court Friday.
ADVERTISEMENT

The 1967 testimony from James Jordan — a member of the Klan turned government witness who has since died — was read to the jury on the second day of 80-year-old Edgar Ray Killen's murder trial. Jordan testified that Killen, a Klan leader, told a group of Klansmen that the three men had been arrested and ordered them to "pick them up and tear their butts up."

Killen showed the group where the men were jailed and where to wait to hunt them down once they were released, Jordan said. He said that as carloads of Klansmen drove off to intercept the three doomed men, they stopped to let Killen off at a funeral home.

"He said he had to go there because if anything happened, he would be the first one questioned," Jordan said in the 1967 testimony. Killen has said he was at a wake when James Chaney, a black Mississippian, and Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, white New Yorkers, were killed.

Killen is on trial in the deaths of the three men, who were in the town to investigate the burning of a black church. They were stopped for speeding, jailed briefly and then released, after which they were ambushed by a gang of Klansmen. The men were beaten and shot to death, their bodies found 44 days later buried in an earthen dam.

Killen stood trial on federal charges in 1967, but the all-white jury could not reach a verdict. He could get life in prison if convicted in the state trial.

Friday's testimony was dominated by witnesses who have long since died: Because many of those who testified in 1967 are no longer available, prosecutors got permission to put their co-workers on the stand and have them read transcripts of the earlier testimony. Defense attorneys then had the stand-in witnesses read sections of the 1967 cross-examinations.

Killen, who spent Thursday night in the hospital for elevated blood pressure, was rolled into court in a wheelchair for Friday's session. During part of the transcript reading, Killen appeared to nod off. At other times, he read along from a copy of the transcript he held in his lap.

In other transcript testimony Friday, 1967 witness Carlton Wallace Miller said a local Klan chapter met before the killings and discussed whipping Schwerner.

"Mr. Killen told us to leave him alone, that another unit was going to take care of him, that his elimination had been approved," said Miller, who was a Klansman, local police officer and
FBI informant. He said Killen told the men the Klan's Imperial Wizard had signed off on the plan to kill Schwerner.

In live testimony Friday, Mike Winstead, 48, testified that Killen admitted his involvement to Winstead's grandfather in 1967, when Winstead was 10.

"My grandfather asked him, did he have anything to do with those boys being killed," Winstead said, describing a conversation the two had on his grandfather's porch. "He told my grandfather yes, and he was proud of it."

Winstead, who is serving a 30-year sentence for rape, came to court wearing a bright yellow prison outfit. He said during defense questioning that he could remember nothing else about the 1967 conversation.

Another live witness, former FBI agent Dean Lytle, testified that he was present when agents found the victims' fire-gutted station wagon in a swamp. He said local residents were "hostile" to agents investigating the men's deaths.

"They were unhappy we were here," Lytle said. "I can't recall anyone who provided me any useful information."

44 DAYS THAT CHANGED MISSISSIPPI - Jackson, Mississippi Clarion Ledger

It's a story we think we know well.

On June 21, 1964, Klansmen killed three civil rights workers and buried them with a bulldozer. The bodies weren't found for 44 days.

Three years later, after the state failed to bring murder charges, a jury in federal court convicted seven men, acquitted eight, and couldn't decide on verdicts for three.

What happened behind the doors of the jury room has remained a secret for 36 years.

Until now.

Civil rights trio killings: a timeline of events

1964

June 16:
Klansmen beat members of Mount Zion Methodist Church in Neshoba County and burn down the church building.

June 21:
Civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James Chaney travel in their station wagon to investigate. They're arrested and jailed, then released. Returning home, they're killed by more than 20 Klansmen.

June 23:
FBI agents find the burned-out station wagon 13 miles northeast of Philadelphia in a swamp.

July 30:
FBI agent Joe Sullivan gets the tip from Mr. X on where the bodies are buried.

July 31:
FBI agents begin to offer a reward for information into the whereabouts of the civil rights workers.

Aug. 4:
FBI agents find the trio's bodies buried 15 feet beneath an earthen dam.

Dec. 4:
FBI arrests 21 suspects in connection with the trio's killings. The 19 men charged with conspiring to deprive the trio of their constitutional rights include: Olen Burrage, Otha Neal Burkes, Edgar Ray Killen, Neshoba County Sheriff Lawrence Rainey, Deputy Cecil Price, Billy Wayne Posey, Jerry McGrew Sharpe, Jimmy Lee Townsend, Herman Tucker, Bernard Akin, Jimmy Arledge, Horace Doyle Barnette, Travis Maryn Barnette, James "Pete" Harris, Frank Herndon, James Edward Jordan, Alton Wayne Roberts, Jimmy Snowden and Oliver Warner Jr. Earl Akin and Tommy Horne are arrested on charges of withholding knowledge of a felony.

Dec. 10:
U.S. Commissioner Esther Carter dismisses the charges because Horace Doyle Barnette, who confessed, isn't present to testify.

1965

Jan. 15:
FBI arrests 18 in connection with the trio's killings. Original defendants Earl Akin, Burkes, Horne and Warner aren't indicted. Philadelphia Patrolman Richard Willis is added as a suspect.

Feb. 25-26:
U.S. District Judge William Harold Cox of Jackson dismisses felony charges against all defendants except Jordan. Cox rules the law does not make murder a federal crime and only the three defendants who are law officers — Rainey, Price and Willis — can be tried on the charges.

1966

March 28:
U.S. Supreme Court reverses Cox's decision.

Oct. 7:
Cox dismisses indictments again, agreeing with defense attorneys who say the pool of potential jurors didn't include enough minorities or women.

1967

Feb. 28:
A federal grand jury indicts a new group of 19 defendants: Sheriff Rainey, Deputy Price, Philadelphia Patrolman Willis, Imperial Wizard Sam Bowers, E.G. "Hop" Barnett, Olen Burrage, Edgar Ray Killen, Billy Wayne Posey, Jerry McGrew Sharpe, Herman Tucker, Bernard Akin, Jimmy Arledge, Horace Doyle Barnette, Travis Maryn Barnette, James "Pete" Harris, Frank Herndon, James Edward Jordan, Alton Wayne Roberts and Jimmy Snowden. Jordan's case is separated from the others.

Oct. 9:
A jury begins to hear the case against 18 remaining defendants, minus Jordan.

Oct. 12:
Jordan testifies to the details of the killings and later pleads guilty to conspiracy.

Oct. 18:
Case goes to jury.

Oct. 19:
Jury informs Judge Cox of deadlock. Cox issues a "dynamite charge," ordering jury to continue deliberations.

Oct. 20:
The jury convicts Arledge, Bowers, Horace Doyle Barnette, Posey, Price, Roberts and Snowden of conspiracy. The jury acquits Akin, Travis Barnette, Burrage, Harris, Herndon, Rainey, Tucker and Willis. E.G. Barnett, Killen and Sharpe receive mistrials.

Bowers and Roberts receive 10-year sentences; Price and Posey, six years; Arledge, Snowden and Horace Doyle Barnette, three years. By 1970, their appeals exhausted, they go to prison. Mississippi never tries the men for murder.

1998

Dec. 27:
The trio's families call for reopening the case when The Clarion-Ledger reports Bowers admitted he thwarted justice in the case, saying he didn't mind going to prison because a fellow Klansman got away with murder.

1999

Feb. 25:
Attorney General Mike Moore and District Attorney Ken Turner meet. Moore assigns investigators and lawyers to the case.

December: Moore's office receives 40,000 pages in FBI reports on the case.

2000

May 7:
Jurors in the 1967 trial reveal the lone holdout in convicting Killen said she "could never convict a preacher." They also reveal intimidation they suffered after the trial.

May 14:
Bob Stringer, a key witness who helped put Bowers behind bars in the 1966 murder of Vernon Dahmer, says he heard Bowers talk with Killen about "eliminating" Schwerner. Both Bowers and Killen deny Stringer's claim.

June 4:
Experts say an autopsy report and photos show that Chaney was tortured before he died.

Sept. 10:
Ernest Gilbert, a Klansman-turned-FBI informant, says three suspects in the trio's killings took part in a similar kidnapping of a black teen three weeks earlier. 

Jurors recall holdout vote that let 'Preacher' walk away free

By Jerry Mitchell
Clarion-Ledger Staff Writer

Just after lunch in one of America's most famous trials, a dozen jurors stood, raised their right hands and swore their votes to convict or acquit would be based on the law and the evidence.

One broke that vow.

Jurors in the 1967 federal civil rights conspiracy trial or their survivors interviewed recently by The Clarion-Ledger revealed that during deliberations a lone juror told others on the panel she could never vote guilty against Edgar Ray "Preacher" Killen for one reason — she could never convict a preacher.

When the trial ended Oct. 20, 1967, seven Klansmen walked away in handcuffs, convicted of federal conspiracy charges in connection with the 1964 killings of civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James Chaney in Neshoba County. But Killen — identified in testimony as the Klan leader who coordinated those killings — never went to prison, thanks to the holdout juror.

"Damn her," said juror Nell Dedeaux, now 76, of Poplarville. "I know the preacher was guilty. He got away with it."

Contacted by telephone, Killen's wife said her husband was unavailable. However, Killen has maintained his innocence, saying he was at a funeral home that night. "It wasn't a set-up alibi," he told The Clarion-Ledger in a 1998 interview. "Country folks, if we set up, we'd set up with family."

None of the jurors interviewed recalled the holdout's name, but from a photograph Dedeaux identified Willie Arnesen, a Meridian secretary who died earlier this year. Arnesen's son, Donald Vance of Meridian, confirmed his mother held out for a not-guilty verdict.

The deaths of the three civil rights workers are among 18 deaths that have been reexamined by authorities in the South for possible prosecution, with more momentum than ever to pursue murder charges.

The Klan killings of the trio, perhaps the most infamous slayings of the civil rights era, shocked the nation. Federal charges were brought after the state passed on bringing murder charges. The three men were targeted for their Freedom Summer work challenging segregation.

The 11-day trial brought swarms of media from around the globe, with televised coverage of the event. "Tension was in the air constantly," recalled veteran journalist Bill Minor, who covered the trial for the Times-Picayune .

The holdout juror

During the past year,The Clarion-Ledger has tracked down seven jurors who served in the 1967 trial or, in case of their deaths, their families. All jurors said these were the first interviews they had given since their verdicts.

They talked about their deliberations that stretched over three days, their frustrations with the holdout juror, and outside efforts to influence them.

Juror J.P. Hollingsworth, now 82, of Pascagoula recalled that the holdout juror told the rest of the panel she "didn't want to convict a preacher."

Killen's occupation didn't matter to juror Harmon Raspberry, now 86, of Stonewall, who voted to convict: "I felt like because he was a preacher, he ought to know better than the rest of 'em."

Dedeaux recalled the holdout juror saying, "I'm not going to find Brother Killen guilty. I don't believe it. He wouldn't do such a thing. I'll stay here till Christmas."

That attitude still angers Dedeaux, who believes Killen orchestrated the trio's killings.

"He helped them do it," she said. "It was just dirty the way they did those boys."

Dedeaux wasn't the only one upset. So was Langdon Anderson, the jury foreman.

"He was disgusted" that Killen was not convicted, said his daughter, Martha Willoughby of Poplarville. "My dad's attitude was 'murder is murder,' and if someone did it, they're guilty."

Juror Lessie Lowery of Waynesboro was also angered by the jury's inability to convict the Baptist minister. "Preacher Killen, he was the one who did a lot of dirt," she said. "Everybody just thought I would vote different than what I did. When you put your hand on that Bible and weigh the evidence, that's something else."

But what jurors recall differs from what Arnesen's son, Donald Vance, says his mother told him.

Vance denied his mother refused to convict Killen because he was a preacher. He said his mother told him she couldn't convict Killen because "he could look you in the eye. None of the rest of 'em could look at you."

Arnesen, however, changed her mind after the verdict, Vance said. "Later on, Mama found out he was a scoundrel and said she was sorry she let him go."

Legal experts say the holdout juror's refusal to convict a defendant because of his occupation violates the oath given jurors.

During the 1967 trial, U.S. District Judge Harold Cox told jurors, "You are to perform this duty of deciding these disputed issues of fact without sympathy, bias or prejudice as to any party or person in this case. The law does not permit jurors to be governed by sympathy, prejudice or public opinion. ... Keep constantly in mind that it would be a violation of your sworn duty to base a verdict upon anything but the law and the evidence in this case."

Pat Bennett, professor at Mississippi College School of Law, said the holdout juror's pronouncement she could never convict a preacher is not based on the law or the evidence. "It would violate her oath," Bennett said.

Threats to jurors

FBI documents, interviews and other evidence obtained by The Clarion-Ledger show that during trials in the 1960s involving Klansmen, attempts were repeatedly made to influence, tamper with or threaten jury members.

The 1967 federal conspiracy trial was no exception.

One night after hearing testimony, juror Edsell Parks of Brandon, now 68, recalled receiving a telephone call at home telling him he "oughta turn those boys a-loose."

"It was somebody I knew," he said.

He would not reveal the man's name or what kind of relationship the two had. "I wouldn't want that in the newspaper," he said.

Anderson was also contacted while the trial was going on, Willoughby said.

Anderson was home less than an hour when a man "said he was calling about the trial and said it was important that certain things be done," she said. "My dad told him he wasn't going to talk about it."

Anderson knew the caller and shared the man's name "in case anything happened," said Willoughby, who wouldn't say who it was. "For a long time after that, my dad always checked under the hood to make sure nothing was planted there."

There were other attempts to influence jurors.

In South Mississippi near two juror's homes, "the week before and during the trial, there were four cross burnings around Lumberton and Poplarville," Willoughby said. "The general consensus was that they were trial-related and were warnings."

Fear of retribution emerged during jury deliberations when one woman said she felt the Klan would firebomb her if she voted guilty.

"I told her, 'You ought not to have got on here then,' " Dedeaux said she told the juror, whose name she couldn't recall.

The jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of Killen's guilt.

"We just couldn't agree," Dedeaux said. "I just can't understand people who won't vote guilty when the evidence is there, and the facts are there."

Judge Cox called in jurors and read what is commonly known as the "dynamite charge," urging them to reach a unanimous verdict, if possible.

His words prompted the fearful juror to change her vote to guilty on Killen and seven others identified in testimony as Klansmen, including Imperial Wizard Sam Bowers.

The lone holdout, however, continued to vote not guilty on Killen, for whom a mistrial was declared.

Influencing juries

In an interview before his 1996 death, Klansman-turned-FBI-informant Delmar Dennis told The Clarion-Ledger that Killen once told him the Klan had influenced the all-white juries in the 1964 murder trials of Klansman Byron De La Beckwith, which both ended in mistrials.

The remarks of Dennis, who also testified in the 1967 federal conspiracy trial, prompted authorities to subpoena Killen to appear before a 1990 grand jury in Jackson investigating the 1963 killing of NAACP leader Medgar Evers.

Killen told The Clarion-Ledger Dennis' statement was "a lie," saying he had never even belonged to the Klan. He accused FBI agents of using paid informants such as Dennis to concoct lies. "You name it, they did it," Killen said. "They would threaten you if you didn't tell them what they wanted to know. They did things you'd shoot your neighbor for."

The state of Mississippi never prosecuted any of the Neshoba County suspects for murder.

Arnesen's son opposes their prosecution now — just as he did the 1998 reprosecution of Bowers, now serving a life sentence for the 1966 murder of Vernon Dahmer.

"The opposition knew where to put their witnesses and what to say," Vance said. Bowers "didn't have a chance."

Vance said he also opposed the 1994 reprosecution of Beckwith, now serving a life sentence for gunning down Evers in front of his family. "That poor ol' guy Beckwith, I'm sure he was guilty."

He paused.

"I couldn't have convicted him."

Letters to sheriff reveal story behind battle for civil rights

By Jerry Mitchell
Clarion-Ledger Staff Writer

The never-published letters arrived amid the maelstrom of the civil rights movement, documenting a nation torn apart by hate.

In the summer of 1964, there was no greater maelstrom than the Neshoba County sheriff's office, where swarms of media descended because of the disappearances of three civil rights workers.

By the time the search ended 44 days later, the FBI found the bodies of those workers: James Chaney, a black Mississippian, and Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, two white Jewish New Yorkers. Before the year ended, Sheriff Lawrence Rainey and Deputy Cecil Price were among 21 men indicted by a federal grand jury.

In 1967, a jury convicted Price and six others — and acquitted Rainey and seven others — of federal conspiracy charges. Three had mistrials. Mississippi never tried anyone for murder.

And now the office of Attorney General Mike Moore is investigating whether such murder charges can be brought more than three decades later.

The Clarion-Ledger has obtained correspondence Rainey and Price received at the sheriff's office in 1964.

Rainey, now 77 and living in Meridian, recalled letters and telephone calls his office received in 1964 as being both supportive and threatening.

"We got some of both, best I remember," said Rainey, who insists he had nothing to do with the trio's killings and never even belonged to the Klan.

Through his wife, Price, now 62 and living in Philadelphia, turned down a request for an interview.

John Dittmer, author of the 1994 book Local People on the civil rights movement in Mississippi, said the forgotten correspondence gives a glimpse into the hate of that era, not only from the South, but from places such as Seattle and San Francisco.

"It just shows the depth of racism," said Dittmer.

Six days after the three civil rights workers turned up missing, Rainey's office received a postcard from Detroit — what would later prove to be a hoax.

"Call off your hunt. The boys are here with me — James, Andy & Mickey," the postcard said. "The boys only wonted (sic) a little fun."

A writer from Yazoo City suggested in a July 11 letter that Rainey needed to search where Chaney's mother lived: "You might be able to catch James there."

On Aug. 4, 1964, the truth came. Schwerner, Goodman and Chaney had been executed by the Klan and their bodies buried beneath tons of dirt.

In the months that passed, Rainey received mail from several Klan organizations, including a member of the United Klans of America who said he met Rainey and Price before.

"To men like you, Mr. Price, Mr. (Robert) Shelton (imperial wizard of the United Klans of America) and Mr. Beckwith, I take my hat off to you all," the man wrote. "I know that within my heart you all are doing what is right ... Stop these commies and civil rights leaders. ...

"Mr. Rainey, I would be proud to be a member of your group. I know you all to be men, and I love each of you as a brother."

Enclosed was a card, "You have been patronized by a member of United Klans of America" with a drawing of torch-carrying Klansmen.

In addition to this personal letter from a Klansman, other Klan organizations sent in Klan pamphlets, bylaws and even a poem decrying interracial marriage.

The sheriff's office received The Southern Review, partly owned by Klansman Byron De La Beckwith, convicted in 1994 of killing NAACP leader Medgar Evers in 1963.

The paper, addressed to Price, has headlines such as, "Communist Attack on South Has Begun" and "A Scientist's Report on Race Differences."

The sheriff's office also received a copy of a publication of the National States' Rights Party (identified by the FBI as a Klan-front group), which included pictures of kissing interracial couples captioned, "This is mongrelization."

Also included: an article titled, "Christians Are God's Chosen People — Not the Jews." One article refers to civil rights workers as "human flotsam ... They are promised $10 per day, free room and board and all of the sex they want from the opposite members of either race. ...

"Hundreds of the Secret Police (FBI) have flooded into Mississippi. They are here for ONE reason: to harass, intimidate and FRAME the wonderful White Christian people who are desperately fighting against mongrelization of their people."

The Klan wasn't the only group that sent the sheriff mail. So did civil rights activists.

Not many days after the trio turned up missing, Rainey received a letter from the Council of Federated Organizations that began "Dear Friend" and told him its Freedom Summer project had been mischaracterized as an invasion of Mississippi.

"We believe that this hostility is based upon a misunderstanding of the program, and that an explanation of the project's intent and scope is needed to allay the fears of white people in Mississippi," said the letter, signed simply, "Summer Project Staff, COFO."

After Price and Rainey were arrested in December 1964, they received a telegram of support from 24 people, including four preachers, calling themselves "Others Within Mississippi."

Letter writers, including one from Greenville, S.C., also offered support: "Dear Sheriff, I want you to know that people here in South Carolina are rooting for you and the 20 other men involved in the civil rights charge. I'm not saying that you or the other men had anything to do with the civil rights workers, but they got exactly what they deserved. I wish that you could tell the other men about what I said in my note. I want to wish you all the luck in the world and also the 20 other men in being cleared of the charge. I know if I was on the jury that I would free you of all charges. ... If I ever get out to Mississippi, I want to look you up. GIVE 'EM HELL SHERIFF."

Some writers assumed law enforcement officers were involved in the killings and reacted angrily.

Rainey received this note: "MURDERER! God will punish you."

And this letter: "We intend to see you squirm as did Michael Schwerner and his friends at your hands and WE will show NO MERCY. Personally I'm after YOU. ... You fat belly rebel ... I'm trading my life for YOURS."

Despite such threatening messages, Philip Dray, co-author of the 1988 book on the trio's killings, We Are Not Afraid, said what's remarkable is how nonviolent the civil rights activists were during the 1960s.

Dray said that's demonstrated by how the trio reacted to the Klan the night they were killed — as shown in confessions given the FBI.

"Even as Mickey Schwerner was being pulled from the COFO station wagon to his death, he was still attempting to peacefully reach out to the men in the lynch mob, assuring gunman Alton Wayne Roberts, 'Sir, I know just how you feel,' " Dray said. "Roberts was a violent man, a man of action who was afraid of no one, but he'd never encountered Schwerner's brand of courage."

Some of the other letters received by the sheriff's office in 1964 praised the 21 charged for waging an important fight.

"This letter is to wish all of you people in Mississippi, and the most of all the 21 in your town the best. I am myself with you all the way," a Seattle woman wrote Dec. 8, 1964. "Tell those men for me to stick by their guns and keep up the good work. All wars are won by people with what he believes in, and plenty of guts."

Price got this note from San Francisco: "Hooray! Glad to see white men have 'equal rights,' too. No one can be convicted until they squeal on themselves. So keep quiet and no one gets convicted. Too bad it wasn't King who got it" — a reference to civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

The letter is signed, "I.M. White" apparently meaning "I am white."

Dittmer said the letters confirm opposition to the civil rights movement outside the South.

That's not surprising, he said. "This was the year George Wallace went north in his presidential race and did extraordinarily well."

The letters also give lie to those who might try to rewrite history, he said. "There's a myth today that everybody supported Martin Luther King Jr. except a few rednecks. If you look at things like Gallup polls, the majority of the white people in the South were opposed to what King was doing in Birmingham, opposed to what he was doing in Selma. Only in recent years has the movement become as American as apple pie."

He suggested the letters also foreshadowed the rise of the anti-government movement that led to the Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168.

"When this letter from Seattle says, 'tell those men for me to stick by their guns and keep up the good work,' that could be something someone would write today about these things today."

He sighed.

"It's too close to the present."

Jan. 8, 2001

'People would call and threaten to kill Wallace'

Widow describes fear surrounding civil rights murders case

By Jerry Mitchell
Clarion-Ledger Staff Writer

MERIDIAN — The FBI worked hard to protect the identity of Mr. X, who revealed where three civil rights workers were buried in 1964.

And no wonder. Look what happened to the family of the late Meridian Police Sgt. Wallace Miller, who was suspected of being Mr. X.

Nell Miller and her son, Wallace Miller Jr., hold a picture of Wallace Miller Sr. (Vickie D. King/The Clarion-Ledger)
In her first-ever interview, Miller's 62-year-old widow, Nell Miller, told The Clarion-Ledger about the harassment, intimidation and violence her family suffered because the Klan believed he was Mr. X and had received a $30,000 reward.

"My kids and I suffered," she said. "People would call and threaten to kill Wallace."

She shared her story of terror at the same time as Mississippi authorities are moving toward the first-ever charges in the June 21, 1964, deaths of three civil rights workers, Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman.

Attorney General Mike Moore has made clear his top target in the case is Edgar Ray Killen, also known as "Preacher" Killen.

Wallace Miller testified in a 1967 federal conspiracy trial against Killen, implicating him in the killings.

Killen came within one vote of being convicted. Jurors said the holdout told them she "could never convict a preacher."

Like Killen, two others received mistrials. Eight were acquitted, and seven were convicted. The state never tried any of the men for murder after passing on prosecuting the case.

Killen told The Clarion-Ledger that he is innocent, that he had nothing to do with the killings and that he was at a funeral home that night.

Wallace Miller was close friends with Killen, and the two were from the same part of Neshoba County, said Miller's widow.

When two of Miller's children died, Killen performed the funerals.

And when Wallace Miller decided to marry again in 1962, Killen handled the wedding ceremony, Nell Miller said. "We got married at Edgar Ray Killen's house."

By this time, Wallace Miller had already served 14 years on the Meridian police force, many of those as a sergeant.

He had also suffered a string of bad luck. He had been shot several times as an officer, including an accidental shooting by a fellow policeman who was cleaning his handgun.

Fellow officer John Williams recalled Miller as "an easy-going, quiet nice kind of a guy you couldn't help but like."

Miller was especially popular at police cookouts, barbecuing chicken or frying a batch of catfish.

In the summer of 1964, tensions in Mississippi rose to a boiling point with many young civil rights workers headed to Mississippi to encourage voter registration. In response, the Klan recruited 5,000 members to combat this "invasion."

Miller became one of those recruits. He testified that Killen visited him at the Meridian Police Department and told him the organization opposed communism and integration.

Miller testified that Killen swore him into the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, the nation's most violent Klan organization in the 1960s.

Nell Miller recalled Killen visiting them several times.

Not long after three civil rights workers turned up missing in Neshoba County on June 21, 1964, Killen visited again, she said.

But this time was different, she said. Instead of sitting with her husband at the kitchen table, the two conversed privately, she said. "Wallace said, 'We're going to have to go in the back room and talk.' "

Miller testified about that night: "We sat on the bed, and we were discussing the civil rights workers. Mr. Killen told me that they had been shot, that they were dead, and that they were buried in a dam about 15 feet deep."

It was the last time that Nell Miller recalled Killen visiting their home.

The killings of the trio caused her husband to part ways with the Klan, she said. "He didn't believe in nobody getting killed."

In the weeks that followed, Miller began to meet secretly with FBI agents and tell them what he knew about the slayings, including the names of those involved.

His revelations to the FBI led agents to the door of James Jordan, who confessed to his role in the killings.

Nell Miller said she doesn't know if her husband was Mr. X or not, but said she's certain he didn't receive the $30,000 reward Mr. X was rumored to have received.

All he received was $2,400 to cover expenses as an FBI informant for a couple of years, she said. "A lot of people thought we got the reward, but we didn't get nothing."

When FBI agents in December 1964 arrested Killen and 20 other men identified as Klansmen on federal conspiracy charges in connection with the trio's deaths, Klan leaders realized someone inside was talking. Miller became their prime suspect.

Within weeks, a Klan leader told him he had to appear before members, a fate he realized might mean his death.

"He told me he was going to be put on trial," Nell Miller recalled. "He said, 'I might not be back.' "

She remembers him strapping on his service revolver and heading out the door. "He told me that if they shot him, one or two would go down with him," she said.

For Nell Miller, it was a horrifying wait that lasted for several hours into the night.

"Lord, I just can't describe it," she said. "Here I was with children, not knowing how I'm going to survive. But I always had faith and trust in Wallace."

Her husband managed to escape the meeting safely after a sheriff unexpectedly entered the Klan gathering and confusion ensued.

At the police department, he endured harassment, fellow officers recalled.

And when the family went to a restaurant, there was no reprieve, Nell Miller recalled. "He was called an SOB, a n----- lover and a traitor."

One night, she recalled hearing a muffled voice on the telephone say, "We're going to kill your children if you don't pay us the money we want."

She recoiled. The voice sounded like the woman she had hired that night to baby-sit her four children while she worked at a grocery store, she said.

Because her husband was out of town that night, she called police, who quickly went to the woman's house, got her children and returned them safely.

After three years of harassment, Miller testified in the 1967 trial against those he said were involved in the killings, and he shared the story of what Killen had told him that night in June 1964.

That evening after her husband had testified, his police walkie-talkie barked to send an ambulance to the couple's home because "Wallace Miller has been shot," Nell Miller recalled.

"Sirens were going," she said. "At that time, a car jumped up in the driveway."

Before she realized what was happening, her husband dashed outside, she said. "I thought they were going to shoot him."

Instead, she learned it was the FBI, who had overheard the talk on the radio.

Even when the trial ended, the harassment continued. She awoke one morning to see a black stripe spray-painted across her car.

The most devastating blow came several months later.

For about a year, the Millers had worked to build business for their small grocery on 45th Avenue.

"We were trying to make some extra money," she said. "Policemen weren't that well paid."

On a cold winter day in early 1968, the grocery store went up in flames. "The Klan burned it down," Nell Miller said.

Despite the terror, the family never considered moving, she said. "Wallace had a job to do, and we didn't have the money to move. We were just poor folks."

Two years later, Wallace Miller suffered a heart attack. She believes it was possibly induced by the never-ending stress, she said. "All of it kept boiling and boiling."

He never fully recovered from the heart attack and died in 1972 from cancer that spread from a broken hip to his lungs.

Miller's son, Wallace "Wally" Miller Jr., was born just a few months before the 1967 trial began and has few memories about what the family endured.

But to this day, people stop him on the street and tell him how brave his father was in opposing the Klan, he said. "They say, 'Hey, you're Wallace Miller's son. He was a great man. We loved him.' "

Killen, who had presided at his wedding and family funerals, was noticeably absent from Miller's service, Nell Miller said.

For the widow, the nightmare didn't end with her husband's death.

The Klan continued to harass, believing the FBI had paid them $30,000, she said. "People called, saying Wallace owed them money. For a long time after he died, the FBI had our home under surveillance."

She supports state authorities reinvestigating the case, she said. "If you're guilty of something, you need to pay for it."

She said she never knew who to blame for the hardships her family suffered and, therefore, didn't blame Killen or anyone else.

"I don't have any hard feelings toward him. If God can forgive, so can I."

Reward: Whether FBI ever paid money remains matter of speculation among many

By Jerry Mitchell
Clarion-Ledger Staff Writer

PHILADELPHIA — The FBI's grim discovery of corpses of three civil rights workers following a grueling 44-day search prompted many Americans to assume one of the killers or their accomplices had ratted out the others for big money.

But documents and interviews show talk of a $30,000 reward, which was all over town and later in the papers, was a bluff to keep Klansmen from knowing who was helping the FBI.

In fact, the reward wasn't even offered until after authorities had the information they said the reward was designed to elicit.

The first reference to a possible reward appears in FBI files on July 31, 1964 — a day after agents already learned where the bodies were located.

That day, according to records of the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, a state segregationist spy agency, agents began to offer a reward — even as they were preparing to dig up the dam where the bodies were buried.

So why would FBI agents offer suspects in the case a reward when agents already knew where to dig?

Simple, explained former FBI agent Jim Ingram of Jackson, it was for disinformation purposes. "We made everybody think money was going to be paid," he said. "That way it would create suspicion among Klan members that one of them was talking for money."

FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover echoed that strategy when he discussed the role of Mr. X — the informant who told the FBI where the trio's bodies were buried — in a March 26, 1965, conversation: "The whole point is make them think you've got somebody inside and see who panics."

Former FBI agent Joe Sullivan of New York City, who headed the investigation into the deaths, confirmed Mr. X was a Neshoba County intermediary who passed on the critical information to him. Sullivan did not dispute a former agent's statement that Mr. X was a law enforcement official in Neshoba County.

It was suppertime on July 30, 1964, Sullivan said, when Mr. X first revealed where the bodies of the civil rights trio were buried.

Sullivan said he spent the rest of the night devising his plans. "Then I talked to Washington because I was going to spend a bunch of their money on a search," he said, referring to excavation costs. "I wanted them to know I was thinking of spending their money."

In keeping with his background as a one-time spy for the federal government in South America, Sullivan decided to conceal the FBI's efforts to locate the slain workers by continuing their ongoing search. "We had the major activity move forward like it was just another day," he said.

As if the FBI had no idea where the bodies were?

"Precisely," Sullivan said.

That same day, FBI documents show agents interviewed then-Neshoba County Sheriff Lawrence Rainey, then-Deputy Cecil Price and then-Philadelphia policeman Richard Willis — all suspects in the case.

FBI documents make no reference to such a reward in those interviews, but Sovereignty Commission papers say Price, Rainey, Constable Clayton Livingston and Justice of the Peace Leonard Warren were offered rewards by FBI agents in exchange for "information leading to the discovery of the bodies of the civil rights workers and the apprehension of those responsible for the murders."

Legally, none of them could have accepted such a reward since state law prohibits sworn officers from accepting such rewards.

Four months after those interviews, Price, Rainey and 19 others were indicted on federal conspiracy charges in connection with the trio's killings. Livingston and Warren were never charged or listed as suspects in the case.

Commission records say Rainey was told the FBI would "take care of him and it would be worth $25,000 or $30,000 to him."

Price said FBI agents offered him $1 million, commission agent Andy Hopkins wrote. "This is when they informed him that he could buy a cattle ranch in Wyoming with that kind of money and never have to work again. They did not promise him leniency or exoneration if he was involved."

Sullivan denied FBI agents promised such rewards but said they could have mentioned a different $25,000 reward that was being offered by William Bradford Huie, author of the 1965 book Three Lives for Mississippi.

"We wouldn't talk to police that way," Sullivan said. "Until we were satisfied we had the place where the bodies were, we didn't talk money at all.

"When we were talking to someone we were trying to turn as an informant, we would tell him there was money for cooperation — like a day's wage. We weren't bouncing thousands of dollars."

Whether the FBI actually paid a reward is uncertain.

In his 1965 conversation with President Johnson, Hoover said $30,000 was paid.

In recent interviews, several FBI agents said $30,000 was paid, but none knew who the recipient was.

A July 31, 1964, document from Sullivan's then-boss, Al Rosen, to Washington suggested that $5,000-$30,000 would be disbursed after the bodies were found, but no later documents confirm any money was paid.

If a reward was indeed given, Sullivan isn't saying. "You haven't seen anything that says Sullivan says that," he said.

Nor is Rosen, who now lives in Akron, Ohio. "All that I know is in the files of the bureau," Rosen said.

Whether money was actually paid or not, there is little doubt the FBI agents' talk of such a reward had its intended effect.

Word quickly circulated through Neshoba County about the offer of $30,000 — the modern-day equivalent of nearly $166,000.

Resident Florence Mars said finding the bodies fueled rumors about who may have gotten the $30,000 reward.

Neighbors eyed each other distrustfully, she said. "Anybody who bought a new car or anything else was looked at suspiciously."

Nearly 37 years later, curiosity among citizens has yet to wane, she said. "They're still trying to decide who did it."

Suspects in 1964 civil rights slayings put past behind them

By Jerry Mitchell
Clarion-Ledger Staff Writer

PHILADELPHIA — For many suspects in the 1964 killings of three civil rights workers in Neshoba County, life has hardly changed.

They live in the same homes in the same towns, some with the same telephone numbers they had 36 years ago.

Former Neshoba County Deputy Cecil Price, now 62, still lives a block off the town square here, in a brown clapboard house where he's lived for more than three decades.

Price was among the 18 men tried in 1967 for the Ku Klux Klan's June 21, 1964, killings of Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James Chaney near here. Testimony identified Price as jailing the trio in the afternoon, releasing them into the night, helping Klansmen capture them and transporting the trio to a remote road where they were shot to death.

The jury convicted Price, Imperial Wizard Sam Bowers and five others of conspiring to deprive the trio of their civil rights. Price served four years in prison, but his boss, Neshoba County Sheriff Lawrence Rainey, was among eight men who were acquitted. Reputed Klan leader Edgar Ray Killen and two others received mistrials when the jury couldn't agree on their verdicts.

After his time in federal prison, Price returned here and sought to replace his felony record with respectability. He worked in a local jewelry store and joined the Philadelphia Country Club. He rose to leadership among Mississippi Shriners.

His present life seemed the antithesis of his past.

His world came crashing down earlier this year when he pleaded guilty to another felony — selling certifications for commercial driver's license tests without testing.

Price is now serving three years' probation for that crime.

The former deputy is no more talkative than most of the suspects in the 1964 killings now being investigated by state authorities. He shuns any interviews.

Price wasn't the only one to wind up in trouble in the years that followed the 1967 federal trial.

So did Killen, who came within a single vote of being convicted in that trial. Testimony identified Killen as coordinating the slayings. Killen denies any role in the deaths.

Nine years after that trial, Killen wound up in prison on an entirely different charge — threatening a woman over the telephone in 1974.

According to court documents, a tape-recorded conversation shows Killen threatened the wife of a man he believed was saying he was having an affair.

"That son of a b---- will be dead at 8 o'clock, you hear," court documents quote Killen as telling the woman. "Folks die for things he did. You understand that? I don't make any mistakes and get the wrong man. ...

"Would you be satisfied with him if somebody would bring him home where you wouldn't recognize him for a week? I want that revenge. I like revenge."

In a recent interview, Killen denied the voice on the telephone was his.

"They all lied there," said Killen, who served five months in state prison. "She testified that she had called me on my home phone and knew my voice because she called me."

His life has changed little since his release from prison. The 75-year-old Union man continues to cut timber weekdays, preach Sundays and teach always that God supports racial separation.

"I have some very good black friends," he said. "I regret to say that there are not too many of 'em that I trust."

Testimony in the 1967 trial showed Bowers ordered the killing of Schwerner. Bowers maintains he is innocent, saying in a sealed interview he was "happy to be convicted and have the main instigator of the entire affair walk out of the courtroom a free man" — an apparent reference to Killen.

After serving six years in prison on federal conspiracy charges, Bowers returned to run his amusement machine business in Laurel and remained reclusive.

In the end, Bowers' Klan past caught up with him.

In 1998, a jury convicted him of giving the orders to kill NAACP leader Vernon Dahmer in 1966. Bowers, now 75, is now serving a life sentence in the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility in Rankin County.

Others avoided prison but didn't dodge ostracism.

Philadelphia's support for the defendants has faded with time, said Stanley Dearman, editor of the Neshoba Democrat. "On the surface, people still spoke and exchanged greetings if they saw each other on the street."

Under the surface, a shift began to take place as residents retreated from suspects, who found refuge in friends, he said. "There was a subtle polarization that came about."

One who did experience rejection was Horace Doyle Barnette, who did what Klansmen swore they would never do.

He talked.

His confession became the basis for the arrests of suspects in the case.

Shortly after the killings, Barnette returned to his native Louisiana and worked in the auto parts business. For the rest of his life, he kept an unlisted telephone number.

"He was very unpopular with the other" defendants, said one family member, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution. "As much as eight or nine years ago, he would get threatening telephone calls. That's something that's never gone away. He was very much an outcast."

The 1967 trial resulted in the convictions of Barnette and his brother-in-law, Jimmy Arledge, for conspiracy. They both ended up in federal prison in Texarkana, Texas, and at one point were beaten by fellow inmates.

Barnette has since died. Arledge, now 63 and living in Meridian, would not discuss the case.

Besides Barnette, the only suspect who left eastern Mississippi was James Jordan, who took part in the killings and later testified against his fellow Klansmen.

Relocated by the federal government, Jordan wound up in McClanney, Fla., working at a funeral home. He has since died.

Alton Wayne Roberts — convicted in the case and identified in FBI confessions as the man who killed Schwerner and Goodman — worked as a bouncer and later had his own Meridian nightclub, where he brought in country bands and patrons brought in their drinks.

Last year, he died of heart failure after battling heart problems.

Another former Neshoba County Sheriff, Ethel Glen "Hop" Barnett, received a mistrial in the case. In 1989, he drowned in the Pearl River in a fishing accident.

Others who have died include Frank Herndon and Bernard L. Akin, who were both acquitted in the federal trial. Testimony identified Herndon's Longhorn Drive-In in Meridian as a popular Klan gathering.

Among the best-known suspects still living is former Neshoba County Sheriff Lawrence Rainey, who was acquitted in the federal trial.

In 1989, Rainey's boss, a black security operator, drew criticism from the black community for hiring Rainey but refused to fire him.

Also that year, Rainey sued makers of the 1988 film Mississippi Burning for damages, insisting he was falsely portrayed. That lawsuit was later dismissed.

Despite such events, Rainey said Saturday he has suffered no ostracism over the years.

While people have continued to treat him kindly, he said, his health is failing.

"I have cancer of the throat," said Rainey, now 77, retired and living in Meridian. "I've had open heart surgery. I have a stainless steel valve in my heart. I'm doing a little piddling around. I ain't able to do very much."

Rainey insists he is innocent and was with his wife at the hospital the night the three civil rights workers were killed.

In fact, Rainey said, he sought to have the killings prosecuted by the state of Mississippi.

"The FBI wouldn't cooperate," Rainey said. "Circuit Judge O.H. Barnett sent J. Edgar Hoover a telegram to turn over their conspiracy evidence. He never did answer."

Now, 36 years later, the state of Mississippi may finally pursue prosecution of those killings — something it's never done before.

Last year, investigators of Attorney General Mike Moore's office began the tough task of piecing together the case to see if murder charges can be brought.

The 12 living suspects include:

# Price, Bowers, Arledge, Jimmie Snowden and Billy Wayne Posey, who were each convicted of federal conspiracy charges.

# Rainey, then-Philadelphia policeman Richard Andrew Willis, James T. "Pete" Harris, Olen L. Burrage and Herman Tucker, who were each acquitted in the federal case.

# Killen and Jerry McGrew Sharpe, who each received mistrials.

Both Moore's office and Neshoba County District Attorney Ken Turner are seeking to see if murder charges can be brought in the case for the first time.

Earlier this year, their efforts made national headlines when the FBI revealed it had turned over 40,000 documents in that case to Moore's office.

Apparently some of the suspects missed the story.

"I don't keep up with that stuff," explained Harris, 66, of Meridian, who denied any role in the killings. He added without explaining, "there was a lot of 'em that was falsely charged."

Talk of the reopening angers some of the suspects.

"You know what?" Snowden, 66, of Hickory, told a reporter. "You're about to kill the cat. You better call somebody else."

Several suspects complained of bad health, and all of those who spoke denied any part in the killings.

"I ain't doing too good," said Sharpe, a one-time used car salesman now 57 and living in Philadelphia. "I've had numerous strokes. Went blind on top of that."

Asked about the killings, he replied, "Man, it's been 35 years since that happened."

Testimony identified the place where the trio were buried as part of Burrage's property.

Burrage, now 71 of Philadelphia, who in recent years sold his trucking firm, hung up when asked about the reinvestigation of the killings.

Called back again, he said, "Look, buddy, find somebody else to talk to. You're wasting my time."

Testimony accused Tucker of running the bulldozer that buried the trio's bodies.

Tucker, a 71-year-old Philadelphia farmer, talked of a stroke that has since devastated his health. "I'm lucky to be alive," he said.

As for the case, he said, "The civil rights workers don't cross my mind."

He denies any role in the killings and denied ever belonging to the Klan. "I'm not a joiner," he said. "I don't belong to anything."

Willis, now 75, who has retired from law enforcement and lives in Noxapater, said of the killings: "I don't know anything about it. I haven't got anything to say."

Asked if he had anything to do with those killings, he hung up.

Testimony identified Posey as directing Klansmen to the dam where the bodies were buried. Now 64 and living in Meridian, he would not comment on the case.

As for Killen, he doesn't have a lawyer, but said he plans on hiring one soon.

"I have no rights. I have to be a newspaper reporter or a n----- if I want to have rights."

June 4, 2000

Experts: Autopsy reveals beating

Chaney wasn't just shot to death, pathologists insist

By Jerry Mitchell
Clarion-Ledger Staff Writer

Like the photograph of Emmett Till two generations ago, the picture of James Chaney horrifies and outrages.

It is that autopsy picture, along with a signed autopsy report obtained by The Clarion-Ledger, that experts say proves Klansmen on June 21, 1964, didn't just kill the black civil rights activist, they tortured him before he died.

That report says Chaney had a left arm broken in one place, a right arm broken in two places and "a marked disruption" of the left elbow joint. That picture suggests he may have suffered other trauma to the groin area that white activists, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, did not.

In 1967, jurors in the federal trial in connection with the deaths never saw this evidence, nor have the full details of their autopsies ever been published.

Informed of Chaney's injuries, juror Nell Dedeaux gasped. "It's the first I've heard of that," said Dedeaux, now 75 and living near Poplarville. "I sure didn't know that about that boy's arms being broken. Didn't any of us know it."

It is evidence that could be used for the first time in court if authorities are successful in bringing the first-ever murder charges against those involved in the Klan killings.

"We've had a few breaks," Attorney General Mike Moore said last week. He would not give details.

The trio's slayings are among 18 civil rights deaths authorities in the South have re-examined for possible prosecution since 1989.

Yet few stunned the nation more than the trio's slayings near Philadelphia, in part because of the massive manhunt before the bodies were found, in part because two of the victims were white.

Forty-four days later, the truth came. The trio's bodies had been buried beneath tons of earth.

An FBI investigation eventually led to a federal conspiracy trial, where there were seven convictions, eight acquittals and three mistrials. No one was ever charged with murder.

For 36 years, countless books and movies have portrayed the killings of all three as quick executions, but experts now agree with what a second opinion then suggested — the damage Chaney suffered suggests he was treated differently than the other two.

"If he had broken one arm, you might could rationalize it," said Dr. Joe Burton, chief medical examiner for metropolitan Atlanta, who examined the trio's autopsy photos under intense magnification. "To break both of them would be more like torture. He was not only shot, he was tortured for some reason."

It is a conclusion with which Chaney relatives agree.

"My family has always believed my brother was beaten," said Ben Chaney of New York, who recently viewed the autopsy photograph of his slain brother for the first time. "That was part of the Klan psychology."

For 36 years, the injuries to Chaney have been blamed on the bulldozer the FBI used to exhume the bodies of the trio, buried 15 feet beneath an earthen dam.

In an interview with The Clarion-Ledger before his death several years ago, Dr. William Featherston, the Jackson pathologist who conducted the autopsies, reiterated that belief.

"Apparently a lot of damage done to Chaney's body occurred when the scoop caught his body," Featherston said. "He was the last one to be buried. He was the one who suffered most of the injury due to disinterment."

That's not true, said former FBI agent Joe Sullivan of New York City, who oversaw the bodies' retrieval Aug. 4, 1964.

First of all, he said, Chaney's body was buried first and uncovered last.

Second, Sullivan said, "there was never any damage to the bodies at all from the mechanical equipment on site."

Use of the bulldozer halted once blue flies swarmed over the site, long before agents spotted any bodies, he said. "Some of the digging was actually done by hand, and I'm not talking about shovels. I'm talking about hands. Then a boot showed up."

That boot belonged to Schwerner and let agents know they had found the bodies of the missing civil rights workers.

Burton said the injuries noted on Chaney are not consistent with damage a bulldozer would do in burying or digging up the body.

"It's kind of hard to break two arms and not crush the rest of the body," Burton said. "If you run over someone with a bulldozer, you would virtually tear the arms off the body. It used to be common that some law enforcement would break people's arms. I would think it's like a 99 percent probability the injuries weren't caused by a bulldozer."

Renowned pathologist Dr. Michael Baden of New York, who in 1991 conducted a second autopsy on slain Mississippi NAACP leader Medgar Evers, agreed with Burton. "The injuries are not those made by a bulldozer," said Baden after reviewing the autopsy report and Chaney's photograph.

With Featherston insisting a bulldozer caused the damage, the issue was never raised in court.

Featherston testimony

In that 1967 trial, Featherston's testimony was brief and to the point. Schwerner had apparently been killed by a shot through the heart. So had Goodman.

Featherston explained he had to say apparently because the bodies had been buried 44 days, making his examination more difficult.

"You do not know for sure whether or not any of these bullets actually penetrated the hearts, do you?" defense lawyer Travis Buckley asked.

"No, sir," Featherston replied.

"And having made no detailed examination you do not know as a matter of fact whether or not sodium cyanide or some other similar alien which would induce death by poisoning was present in those tracts would you?" Buckley asked.

"No, sir," Featherston replied. "I also don't know if they were hit by lightning, bit by a rattlesnake or maybe by some other cause of death."

Severe decomposition

Featherston was never asked about the trio's autopsy pictures. The photograph of Chaney shows severe decomposition in the groin area — something pictures of Goodman and Schwerner do not.

Upon studying these photos under magnification, Burton ruled out the possibility Chaney had been castrated but noted that trauma to the body can accelerate decomposition.

It was 1964 when the idea that Chaney was beaten first arose. Dr. David Spain, a New York City pathologist, examined the bodies of Schwerner and Chaney at the request of the two men's families after the trio's autopsies.

He detailed other injuries to Chaney not included in the autopsy report — a broken jaw and a crushed right shoulder. Burton and Baden were unable to confirm such injuries from the autopsy photograph. X-rays of the three were taken at the time but have since been destroyed.

"It was obvious to any first-year medical student that this boy had been beaten to a pulp," Spain wrote in Mississippi Eyewitness.

But Mississippi authorities largely discredited his words, and his conclusions became little more than a historical footnote.

In an interview before his death several years ago, Spain said he still believed Chaney was beaten.

Asked about the assertion a bulldozer caused the injuries, Spain replied, "That's a lot of baloney. There is a certain pattern to the injuries."

What happened

What happened the night Chaney and the others were killed is detailed in confessions from two participants — James Jordan and Horace Doyle Barnette.

Those confessions identify Edgar Ray Killen of Union, otherwise known as "Preacher" Killen, as directing Klansmen where to go and what to do that night. (Killen insists he is innocent.)

After Neshoba County Deputy Cecil Price released Schwerner, Goodman and Chaney from jail at about 10 p.m., Klansmen chased down the trio in their station wagon. Price struck Chaney with a blackjack before Klansmen loaded the trio into Price's car to take them where they would be killed.

When Price stopped his deputy's car on a nearby gravel road, Klansman Alton Wayne Roberts pulled Schwerner out, put his hand on Schwerner's shoulder and shot him dead.

Roberts then removed Goodman from the car and shot him.

According to Barnette's confession, Jordan jerked Chaney out of the car. As he and others shot Chaney, Jordan said, "You didn't leave me anything but a n-----, but at least I killed me a n-----."

Killen received a mistrial. Barnette, Jordan, Roberts and Price were each convicted of federal charges of conspiring to deprive the trio of their civil rights. Of the five, Killen and Price are still alive.

Philip Dray, co-author of the 1988 book about the killings, We Are Not Afraid, said what dumbfounds him about the suggestion Chaney was beaten is Klansmen were angrier with Schwerner: "He was the one they really, really hated."

The secret of why Chaney may have been treated differently can be found in the long-sealed records of the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, a segregationist spy agency headed by the governor from 1956 to 1973.

"James Chaney, the colored member of this group, is alleged to have broke (sic) away from the group of men that were holding them captive," commission investigator Andy Hopkins wrote in his Jan. 26, 1965, report for the Sovereignty Commission's files. "Shortly after he made the break, he was shot at several times by several different people but was struck by only three bullets, each of which was alleged to have been fired from a different firearm."

That coincides with Jordan's statement Chaney died perhaps 40 feet away from where Schwerner and Goodman were killed.

The autopsy report offers other possible evidence Chaney broke free. He was shot in the back, an indication he may have been hit while trying to evade his killers.

John Dittmer, author of the 1994 book on the Mississippi civil rights movement, Local People, said Klansmen may have beaten Chaney before finishing him off.

"There are books on lynching and mob psychology," Dittmer said. "To kill a person isn't enough. People go berserk. If this happened, it was because Chaney decided to run away."

Jordan's statement appears to support a gap of time between the first round of shots fired and the last ones fired: "A volley of shots, approximately six or seven in number, were heard, followed by two separate shots."

The two last shots that Jordan described could have been the shots that killed Chaney, one that struck him in the abdomen and the final bullet that fractured his skull.

Former FBI agent Jim Ingram, who headed the civil rights desk for the FBI in Mississippi in the 1960s, said he believes the Klansmen's motive was clear: "It seems to me they would have gotten their licks on Chaney since he was a Mississippi black associating with these whites from up North."

Viewing the autopsy photo of his brother rekindled memories of another picture Ben Chaney saw as a child, the badly beaten body of Emmett Till, a black Chicago youth killed by two white men in Money, Miss., in 1955 after he supposedly whistled at a white woman.

His words choked with emotion. "My brother just turned 21 years old. He didn't even get a chance to do anything. What does a person know at 21? They just snuffed his life out."

June 18, 2000

Rita's Story

By Jerry Mitchell

CLARION-LEDGER STAFF WRITER

'I'm not giving up until I find out'

Rita: Stating 'cause of death unknown' on death certificate a final blow for young widow

For the first time, Rita Schwerner Bender shares in depth her story of the summer of '64, a summer that changed her life, a summer that began with the disappearances of her then-husband, Mickey Schwerner, and his friends, James "J.E." Chaney and Andy Goodman, a summer of tragedy.

Her life changed with a knock. Then another. Until she heard the words, "Something's happened."

Rita rubbed her eyes and caught the rest. "You have to come down to the office."

She trudged from her dorm room on the campus in Oxford, Ohio, where she, along with her husband of two years, Mickey, his buddy, J.E., their new friend, Andy, and other civil rights activists had been training for the summer project she hoped would bring freedom to black Mississppians.

She and Mickey knew Mississippi. They had moved there from New York City in January 1964, helping black Mississippians register to vote.

It was the tragedy of the 1963 Birmingham church bombing that killed four girls that inspired Rita at age 22 and Mickey at age 24 to travel south and become part of the civil rights movement.

Many Mississippians weren't happy to see outsiders telling them how to change, and Rita often felt their hateful stares.

She remembered the times police detained Mickey and told him he'd better watch it because they were eyeing his every step.

At their apartment in Meridian, the telephone rang all hours with threats — so many she hated to answer because this caller might be like the last one who scared her, saying, "That Jew-boy is dead."

Mickey, J.E. and Andy were supposed to stay in Ohio with Rita, but when they heard the Mount Zion Methodist Church had been torched, they returned to Mississippi early.

Rita had planned to travel with them, but Mickey urged her to stay. After all, she needed another week of training to get ready for the "freedom school" she would run in Meridian.

When Mickey left at about 4 a.m. that Saturday, they briefly said goodbye, and she sank back to sleep.

After being awakened and rushing toward the telephone, Rita's mind raced through the past week of training, the nonviolence drills in which summer volunteers learned to block blows from mock attackers.

Nothing prepared her for the knot in her gut as she grabbed the phone.

The caller let her know her husband and the others were missing. They failed to check in at 6 p.m. as planned, and they never returned.

They're six hours late, Rita thought.

She knew the drill. If anyone failed to check in, a flurry of phone calls followed.

First, activists would call the hospitals. Then the jails. Then law enforcement officials. Then the Justice Department.

So far, those calls had turned nothing up.

And so she sat by the phone and waited. And wondered.

She finally stretched out on a couch, closing her eyes but never finding sleep in the darkness.

After dawn broke, fellow activist Ivanhoe Donaldson came by and invited her to go for a walk.

She accepted.

Mickey had developed a bit of a friendship with Ivanhoe, but Rita hardly knew him. At the most, he might nod when he saw her.

As they strolled on a sidewalk that ducked beneath an arch before snaking across the green campus, Ivanhoe showed a side she'd never seen.

Away from the other activists, he told her tenderly, "Rita, you know he's dead."

By the next day, Rita had bitten her fingernails down to the quick. It was a lousy habit that worsened with stress. So did her smoking.

Today, she would begin her return trip to Mississippi. Maybe she could find out herself what happened to Mickey. Maybe Mickey would be there to greet her. Maybe, just maybe.

No one in the movement wanted her to go back to Mississippi alone. The question was who would join her on the trip.

It was too dangerous for any black activist to go with her. The choice became Alabama native Bob Zellner, a tough movement veteran with the right accent.

When they arrived at the airport in Cincinnati, they saw civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer of Ruleville, who had spoken at some of the training sessions.

Rita admired her for her compassion and her strength, beaten by police for fighting bigotry.

As the two women spoke, reporters recognized Rita, ran up to her and told her the trio's station wagon had been found, almost destroyed by flames.

Rita stood stunned, speechless. Fannie Lou led her through the crowd to a nearby bench where the two women sat together.

Fannie Lou rested her huge arms around Rita's small frame. Tears trickled down the two women's cheeks.

For all the times Rita had been told Mickey was dead, now she knew he really was.

Two days later, Rita and Bob Zellner traveled to Philadelphia to talk with Neshoba County Sheriff Lawrence Rainey. Rita wanted to hear for herself what had happened and to see the burned-out station wagon.

It wasn't that Rita felt so brave. It was that she felt so numb. It was a numbness that reached all the way to the bone, a numbness that obliterated all of her fears.

After evading a group of armed men in their pickups, Rita and Bob finally met Rainey, whom she joined in his sheriff's car. Rainey sat in the driver's seat, Rita behind him in the passenger's seat, Bob next to her and a top highway patrol official next to Rainey, who did most of the talking.

Rita explained that she believed Rainey knew where Mickey and the others were.

The patrol official replied that Rainey and his deputy, Cecil Price, knew nothing about what had happened, that Rainey had been at his wife's bedside in the hospital that night of the disappearances, that Price had released the trio from jail at 10 p.m. that night and who knew where they chose to go after that?

Rita could hardly believe what she heard. She felt strongly the sheriff's office played a role in what she believed were the trio's deaths. Wasn't it obvious their arrests were part of a setup?

Rainey turned around and rested his beefy right arm on the back of the front seat, saying he knew nothing about the missing men.

"You're lying," she shot back. "I'm not going to go away. I'm not going to give up until I find out what happened. And if you don't want me to find out, you'll have to kill me, too."

Rainey became red-faced, clenching his fingers into a fist, telling her he didn't know why she'd assume he knew anything about what happened.

She started to speak again. The sheriff told her to be quiet.

"I'm not going to shut up," Rita replied. "I'm not going to leave until you tell me what happened to my husband."

Rita's insistence to see the station wagon paid off in a trip to the garage where it was being held, with Rainey escorting her.

Inside the garage, she glimpsed the familiar station wagon that looked anything but familiar. Set on blocks, the soot-covered vehicle had no tires, no windows and no seats — the victim of a vicious fire set to destroy any evidence of what she was certain was foul play.

She stood there, silently, glancing at the charred remnant of what she and Mickey once traveled on the small roads across Mississippi, and the feelings of his certain death swept over her.

Later that day, Rita tried to meet with Mississippi Gov. Paul Johnson, who told the media the missing trio might be in Cuba.

She appeared at the governor's office at the state Capitol with Bob Zellner and the Rev. Ed King. Turned away, they walked several blocks to the governor's mansion, where Rita saw Johnson getting out of the car with Alabama Gov. George Wallace and Jackson Mayor Allan Thompson.

Reporters met the politicians and happened to ask about the missing trio. Johnson joked, "Governor Wallace and I are the only two people who know where they are — and we're not telling."

He never saw Rita until a reporter yelled, "That's the missing civil rights worker's wife."

When Rita introduced herself, Johnson whirled away and dashed inside the mansion. As state troopers led her away, she could see Johnson staring at her through the glass door.

Away from the mansion, she talked to Allen Dulles, the president's envoy sent to Mississippi.

Dulles extended his hand and offered his sympathy.

Fighting back her tears, she said, "I don't want sympathy. I want my husband back."

By the time the bodies were finally found, Rita had plunged back into politics. She was in Washington, D.C., working on challenging Mississippi's all-white Democratic delegation — a challenge that would forever change the Democratic Party.

She was in the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party office when the news came Aug. 4, 1964, that FBI agents had found the bodies of Mickey, J.E. and Andy.

Television repeated the same images: the earthen dam where they'd been buried and the bodies being taken to a Jackson hospital.

Oh, God, they're really dead.

The numbness she had felt for 44 days gave way to a deluge of sorrow, yet the tears never came. I can't let them see me cry.

Not long after Mickey's death, his death certificate arrived with the words Rita could never forget: "Cause of Death: Unknown."

For her, it was the final blow, proof the entire segregationist system that promoted hate was fatally flawed and doomed to fail. It couldn't even acknowledge how Mickey had been killed at the hands of others.

It would take four months before there were arrests and another three years before there was a trial — a federal one on conspiracy charges in which Deputy Cecil Price was convicted with six others. Sheriff Lawrence Rainey and seven others were acquitted.

Rita didn't bother to go. She had wanted Mississippi to prosecute Mickey's killers, and that didn't happen.

In the years following his death, she continued to carry the label of his widow. She knew in one sense that's who she was but also felt she'd lived a whole life since then.

She went to law school and put together a successful career. She remarried in 1967, had two children and joined a law firm with her husband in Seattle.

The years passed, but the feelings that justice had been evaded never went away. Last year, she asked state authorities to do what Mississippi had never done — prosecute the killings.

And now, a year later, her request may become a reality.

For her, bringing the case into the courtroom isn't about retribution. It's not even about closure for her family. It's about acknowledging what happened then.

"These murders, other murders and church burnings didn't happen in a vacuum. There was an atmosphere of frenzy created. I believe strongly that history has to be understood because if it isn't understood, it gets repeated."

history | recent events | journey to peace | tribute | links | lesson plans
forums | multimedia  | articles | bookstore  | store
 UseekUfind.com

site map

WebNet International, Inc.