Emmett Till Blog

from the Arkansas Delta Truth and Justice Center


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Philadelphia, MS Civil Rights Murders:

Neshoba county again fails to indict others

3 years and 6 months after Killen indictment

Another month has passed and Neshoba County and the State of Mississippi have again failed to indict others in the murders of civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner.
On January 6, 2005, a state grand jury in Philadelphia, Neshoba County, Mississippi returned the first-ever state indictment in the Neshoba murders case. Edgar Ray "Preacher" Killen was indicted.
The grand jury heard testimony for less than one full day despite the fact that there were ten living suspects at that time. There was a massive amount of evidence against several of these suspects, including the 3,000 page transcript from the 1967 federal trial for conspiracy to deny civil rights.
That 1967 trial resulted in four of the suspects who were still living in 2005 being convicted. Why could not Neshoba County and the State of Mississippi at least indict them in 2005 on state charges?
And others should have been convicted in the 1967 federal trial.
Two of those suspects who were convicted on federal charges in 1967 are still alive now. Why cannot Neshoba County and the State of Mississippi indict them now? There was enough evidence to convict them on federal charges in 1967.

Why only Killen?

Why no more state indictments 3 years and 6 months after the indictment of Edgar Ray "Preacher" Killen?

Labels: Chaney, cold cases, Emmett Till, Goodman, Mississippi civil rights, Schwerner

The lone senator standing in the way of creating a Justice Department cold-cases unit to pursue unpunished killings from the civil rights era no longer plans to block the bill, his office said Thursday.

Despite support from the Bush administration, the Department of Justice and the House of Representatives, Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., had put a "hold" on the bill last year, placing it in limbo. The House had passed the bill 422-2.

The possibility that the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act could get through Congress drew praise from Till's cousin, Wheeler Parker of Chicago.

"This would show the world we're willing to try and correct some wrongs," said the retired 69-year-old barber. "It's not about animosity - it's a statement to the world that we are a democracy and we represent what we stand for."

Continued -- Jerry Mitchell, The Clarion-Ledger

I took these three photos on my recent trip to the Delta. New signs have been erected showing the significant Till sites. Susan

Labels: black history, Civil Rights Crime Act, civil rights murders, Emmett Till, KKK

Invoking an infamous Mississippi race murder, the Rev. Al Sharpton charged Wednesday that an acquittal in the Sean Bell trial would reward defense lawyers for blaming the victims of the 50-shot fusillade.

Sharpton, speaking at City Hall, ripped lawyer Paul Martin for saying it was the "attitude" of Joseph Guzman - shot 16 times - that ignited the gunfire.

"If we say Friday that people's attitude gets them shot by police, are we going to say next that it's all right for people to assault women because they look like that's what they wanted?" Sharpton asked.

Martin made the remark during his closing argument in the case against three NYPD detectives. Guzman was the person who "had the attitude to go get a gun and come back and use it," Martin said.

Guzman has denied threatening anyone with a gun, and Sharpton was outraged by the argument. "This smacks of Emmett Till - of reckless eyeballing," the civil rights activist said.

Continued --

Labels: Al Sharpton, civil rights books, Emmett Till, New York murders, Sean Bell

(Site of Clinton Melton's murder in Glendora. Melton was murdered while working at a service station that once stood here.)

JACKSON, Miss. — As an African-American teenager in Louisiana, Keith Beauchamp tried interracial dating - behaviour that prompted his parents to tell him the grisly tale of Emmett Till, who was murdered for whistling at a white woman.

The story of Till, a 14-year-old from Chicago who had come to Mississippi to visit his uncle in August 1955, was seared into Beauchamp's mind and, when he moved to New York to begin his career as a filmmaker, the slaying was his first major project.

Beauchamp's 2005 documentary on Till, in large part, led the federal government to reopen the 1955 murder case. Last year, a grand jury declined to indict Carolyn Bryant Donham, the object of the whistle, on a manslaughter charge. The two men who brutally beat the teen and dumped his body in a river died years ago.

Still, Beauchamp's documentary expertise and his ability to persuade people to talk about buried secrets of the civil rights era have earned him a rare collaboration with the FBI.

Now, Beauchamp is filming a series of documentaries based on civil rights killings for the cable channel History as well as TV One. Any new evidence Beauchamp uncovers is shared with the FBI for its Cold Case Unit that focuses on crimes that have gone unpunished from that era.

In turn, the FBI is arranging interviews for Beauchamp with veteran agents who covered the cases and other contacts, said agency spokesman Ernie Porter.

Labels: Adlena Hamlett, CIA, Cleve McDowell, Clinton Melton, cold cases, Emmett Till, Emmett Till Birdia Keglar, FBI, George Lee, Henry S. Mims, KKK

* * * * *
--Performed Cleve McDowell's Autopsy: Where were the bullets? McDowell, a Mississippi civil rights leader, was murdered in 1997. The well-liked lawyer,left, was a friend of Rev. Jesse Jackson and once worked with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Questions still surround McDowell's untimely murder and the state's autopsey.
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Innocence Project Asks State Board to Revoke Steven Hayne’s Medical License Based on Repeated Autopsy Misconduct

1,000-page formal allegation with Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure seeks to stop Hayne from conducting autopsies and practicing medicine
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(JACKSON, MS; April 8, 2008) – Based on evidence that Steven Hayne, who conducts 80% of autopsies in Mississippi, has committed fraud and misconduct that sent an unknown number of innocent people to prison, the Innocence Project and the Mississippi Innocence Project today filed a formal allegation to revoke his license to practice medicine in Mississippi.

The allegation filed today with the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure outlines several violations – spanning two decades – of the Mississippi state law that regulates medical practice. Hayne’s practices have been questioned for several years and have come under increasing scrutiny after two men – Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks, both of Noxubee County, Mississippi – were exonerated this year, 15 years after Hayne’s testimony helped convict them of capital crimes they did not commit.

If the State Board of Medical Licensure revokes Hayne’s medical license, he will not be able to conduct any autopsies for law enforcement in Mississippi or practice medicine in any other context in the state. Under the law, a doctor’s medical license is revoked if he or she engages in “incompetent professional practice, unprofessional conduct, [and] other dishonorable or unethical conduct that is likely to deceive, defraud, or harm the public.” The law also requires doctors to be “honest in all professional interactions including his or her medical expert activities” and directs medical experts “not [to] make or use any false, fraudulent, or forged statement or document.”

“Steven Hayne’s long history of misconduct, incompetence and fraud has sent truly innocent people to death row or to prison for life. This is precisely why regulations are in place to revoke medical licenses. Steven Hayne should never practice medicine in Mississippi again, and the complaint we filed today is an important step toward restoring integrity in forensic science statewide – and restoring confidence in the state’s criminal justice system,” said Peter Neufeld, Co-Director of the Innocence Project. The Innocence Project is a national organization affiliated with Cardozo School of Law; the Mississippi Innocence Project is based at the University of Mississippi School of Law.

The allegation filed today with the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure includes a 14-page summary letter and 1,000 pages of supporting documents, including trial transcripts and autopsy reports from several cases. The allegations that merit revoking Hayne’s medical license include:

Hayne misrepresents his credentials, claiming under oath to be the “chief state pathologist for the Department of Public Safety” (a position that does not exist) and claiming under oath to be “board-certified” in “forensic pathology” (when in fact he is not properly board-certified in forensic pathology). Papers filed with the Board today include several transcripts of testimony where Hayne has made these false claims.

Hayne testified falsely in Levon Brooks’ trial, leading to his wrongful conviction and sentence of life in prison without parole. The victim in the case had marks on her body, and the prosecution’s central theory of the crime was that they were human bite marks inflicted before the victim died. Hayne testified that marks on the victim’s hand in the case occurred prior to her death – a conclusion that is “simply wrong,” according to the allegation, and has no scientific basis.

Hayne testified falsely in Kennedy Brewer’s trial, leading to his wrongful conviction and death sentence. Just as it was in Brooks’ case, Hayne’s motive was to falsely claim that marks on the child’s body were inflicted by the assailant before she died. Even though the marks clearly were caused after the victim died, Hayne’s false assertion would support the prosecution’s central theory of the case. Hayne claimed in the autopsy report that he took biopsies from the so-called bite marks (to determine whether they occurred prior to her death), but testified at Brewer’s trial that he didn’t take biopsies of the marks. The most logical conclusion is that Hayne realized the biopsies would not support the false theory that the marks occurred before the victim’s death, so Hayne improperly stopped analyzing them. Hayne also testified in Brewer’s trial that the marks were caused by human teeth, rather than the expected decomposition or insect activity that regularly occurs after death. There was no scientific basis for Hayne’s testimony.

Hayne testified falsely in Tyler Edmonds’ trial, leading to his conviction and death sentence. Hayne claimed that he could tell from a bullet wound in the victim’s head that it was more likely that two people (rather than one person) had fired the fatal shot together. The Mississippi Supreme Court found Hayne’s testimony in the case “scientifically unfounded” and noted that his conclusion was not based on scientific methods or procedures.

Hayne issued an autopsy report – with no medical or scientific basis – supporting the prosecution case against Tina Funderburk, who is being charged with her daughter’s murder. An expert who Hayne himself brought into the case said the cause and manner of death could not be determined, but Hayne nevertheless examined the meager skeletal remains and said the child died from compression of the head and suffocation.

In four other cases, Hayne may have made false findings and potentially testified falsely under oath. In two of those cases, Hayne examined skeletons and said he could tell that the victims were strangled (even though the skeletons had no muscles). In another one of the cases, Hayne claimed in an autopsy report that he examined organs – when in fact it appeared the organs had not been touched.

“We have only presented the tip of the iceberg to the State Board of Medical Licensure, but this evidence shows Steven Hayne’s unprofessional, dishonorable and unethical conduct that has deceived, defrauded and harmed the public,” said W. Tucker Carrington, Director of the Mississippi Innocence Project.

The complaint filed today says, “We believe the conduct in this complaint alone is sufficient to justify immediate revocation of Dr. Hayne’s license … His work compromises the accuracy and integrity of medicine and criminal justice throughout the state. We urge you to put an end to his misconduct through an expeditious, thorough investigation of his work and revocation of his license.”

The Innocence Project and the Mississippi Innocence Project continue asking the state’s Commissioner of Public Safety to appoint and help secure funding for a State Medical Examiner. The State Legislature created the position in the 1980s to provide assistance and oversight for medical examiners across the state. The position has been vacant for over a decade, leaving no oversight of Hayne’s autopsies and no system for training and recruiting qualified pathologists to conduct autopsies in Mississippi.

For the summary letter of today’s allegation, go to: http://www.innocenceproject.org/docs/Letter_to_Medical_Board.pdf

For more on the Brewer and Brooks cases, go to: http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/1175.php

For the letter from the Innocence Project and the Mississippi Innocence Project to the Commissioner of Public Safety, urging him to fill and help fund the State Medical Examiner position, go to: http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/1173.php

For an op-ed earlier this month from a former Commissioner of Public Safety, calling on officials to fill and fund the State Medical Examiner position, go to: http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080330/OPINION/803300302/1046

For more background on Steven Hayne, see “CSI Mississippi,” a Reason Magazine investigative report by Senior Editor Radley Balko, at http://www.reason.com/news/show/122458.html.

###

Eric Ferrero
Director of Communications
The Innocence Project
Office: 212-364-5346
Cell: 646-342-9310
100 Fifth Ave., 3rd Floor
New York, NY 10011
www.innocenceproject.org

MORE on Hayne ... Reason Magazine, November 2007

In a remarkable capital murder case earlier this year, the Mississippi Supreme Court, by an 8-to-1 vote, tossed out the expert testimony of Steven Hayne. The defendant was Tyler Edmonds, a 13-year-old boy accused of killing his sister’s husband. Hayne, Mississippi’s quasi-official state medical examiner, had testified that the victim’s bullet wounds supported the prosecution’s theory that Edmonds and his sister had shot the man together, each putting a hand on the weapon and pulling the trigger at the same time.

“I would favor that a second party be involved in that positioning of the weapon,” Hayne told the jury. “It would be consistent with two people involved. I can’t exclude one, but I think that would be less likely.”

Testifying that you can tell from an autopsy how many hands were on the gun that fired a bullet is like saying you can tell the color of a killer’s eyes from a series of stab wounds. It’s absurd. The Mississippi Supreme Court said Hayne’s testimony was “scientifically unfounded” and should not have been admitted. Based on this and other errors, it ordered a new trial for Edmonds.

MORE on Hayne ... Reason Magazine, November 2007

Labels: Chaney, Charles Moores, Civil Rights Crime Act, civil rights movement, Cleve McDowell, cold cases, Emmett Till, Goodman, Mississippi murders, Schwerner, Sonny Boy Keglar

Stuart Wexler and Larry Hancock, authors of an upcoming book, "Seeking Armageddon: The Effort to Kill Martin Luther King Jr.," are exploring evidence that members of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan in Mississippi were involved.

"It's becoming more and more evident they had the motive, the means and the opportunity to assassinate Dr. King, and in fact, that had been a major goal of theirs for years," Wexler said.

Some proof can be found in FBI and Miami police documents that suggest White Knights members may have helped jam Memphis police radios when King was shot on April 4, 1968.

Vivian is among civil rights leaders gathering today in Memphis to remember

King and to sign their support for legislation that would create a Justice Department unit aimed at solving the unpunished killings from the civil rights era.

The House passed the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act by an overwhelming margin of 422-2, but the bill has stalled in the Senate, where U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., has put a "hold" on the legislation, putting it in limbo. He has cited the cost - $10 million a year to examine civil rights killings before 1970 and $3.5 million to help local law enforcement conduct investigations.

In the '50s and '60s, King was friends with Mississippi NAACP field secretary Medgar Evers.

In 1963, a member of the White Knights shot Evers in the back outside his Jackson home, and King attended the funeral.

Continued, from the Hattiesburg American

Labels: andrew young, civil rights movement, Cleve McDowell, martin luther king, Medgar Evers, Mississippi

Official blocks measure that passed by overwhelming margin in U.S. House

Alvin Sykes, president of the Emmett Till Justice Campaign, speaks Tuesday in Washington at a joint hearing with two congressional subcommittees about the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act. (Photo by Heather Wines/Gannett News Service)

Reporter Jerry Mitchell of Jackson, Miss. Clarion Ledger writes that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid wants the Senate to take up legislation that would create a unit within the Justice Department to track down unpunished killings committed before 1970:

The House passed the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act by an overwhelming margin of 422-2, but the bill has stalled in the Senate, where U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., has put a "hold" on the legislation, putting it in limbo.

"Senator Coburn is blocking passage of this bill," said Jim Manley, a spokesman for Reid, a Nevada Democrat. "Senator Reid supports the bill and will work with (Sen. Christopher) Dodd to move it, perhaps as part of a package of relatively noncontroversial judiciary bills being held up by Republicans."

Coburn continues to oppose the bill despite its support from the Bush administration, the Justice Department, the FBI, the House and most senators.

Continued --

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Labels: Barack Obama, civil rights murders, cold cases, Emmett Till, Luther Jackson, lynch, Medgar Evers, Mississippi, Schwerner