I remember when this happened and everyone knew they were dead, but the "authorities" said the
men had run off with the car.  Everyone knew they were dead and any trial would be a sham, which it
was.  It was long time coming.  I am sure most of us are not naive enough to believe this can't happen
again.


Updated: 04:56 PM EDT
Ex-Klansman Convicted of Manslaughter
Verdict Comes on 41st Anniversary of Infamous Slayings
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS, AP

Jurors declined to convict Edgar Ray Killen of murder, opting for lesser charges of manslaughter.


PHILADELPHIA, Miss. (June 21) - Forty-one years to the day after three civil rights workers were beaten and shot to death, an 80-year-old former Ku Klux Klansman was found guilty of manslaughter Tuesday in a trial that marked Mississippi's latest attempt to atone for its bloodstained, racist past.

The jury of nine whites and three blacks took nearly six hours to clear Edgar Ray Killen of murder but convict him of the lesser charges in the 1964 killings that galvanized the struggle for equality and helped bring about passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Killen, a bald figure with owlish bifocals, sat impassively in his wheelchair, an oxygen tube up his nose, as he listened to the verdict.

''Forty-one years after the tragic murders ... justice finally arrives in Philadelphia, Miss,'' said Rep. Bennie Thompson, Mississippi's only black congressman. ''Yet, the state of Mississippi must see to it that the wrongs of yesterday do not become the albatrosses of today.''

The murder charge carried up to life in prison. But Killen could still spend the rest of his life behind bars; each of the three manslaughter charges is punishable by up to 20 years. Judge Marcus Gordon scheduled sentencing for Thursday.

Civil rights volunteers Andrew Goodman and Michael - two white New Yorkers - and James Chaney, a black Mississippian, were intercepted by Klansmen in their station wagon on June 21, 1964. Their bodies were found 44 days later buried in an earthen dam, in a case that was dramatized in the 1988 movie ''Mississippi Burning.''

I am glad that justice is finally served. It is a bummer that he wasn't convicted on murder but at least he will be behind bars.






Cat

What is kept in the dark, will soon be brought to light! Justice is served somewhat. The others are either burning in hell or about to burn! Burn, baby, Burn!

Tanya

Oh please.  This poor, abused, fundamentaist preacher was only following the instincts of his fundamentalist beliefs.  These three punks were defying that morality which said that some people (those of color) shouldn't have the right to vote.  So now this poor old cracker will die in jail.  And so he should, like Pinochet, Henry Kissinger, Rummy, Little Georgie and crew, and so many others.  (You know, of course that the first 2 sentances are ment in sarcasm).

 (You know, of course that the first 2 sentances are ment in sarcasm).


D.C., only a fool would assume that you actually meant that!  ;)

Tanya

Two sayings come to mind:
"Better late than never," and "justince delayed is justice denied."

For more than a century it was as likely as a month of Sundays that a Klansman who attacked African-Americas would be convicted in Mississippi.  And yet we see an 80-year-old on the brink of death convicted only of manslaughter for one of the single most vile hate crimes in American history.

I think I can safely say that he will suffer tremendously in the prison showers...if he lives long enough in there to actually take one. Personally, I think he'll be shanked before his first day of his sentence is served!

Forty years after the fact, one klansman who already has nine toes in the grave.  Wow.  What an accomplishment.

I hope he lives long in prison.  Let the SOB suffer as his victims did.  Hope the guards let "the boys" have their fun.  I hate thinking those thoughts.

It's just too bad that Emmitt Till may never rest in Peace after the all-idiot jury acquitted his killers twice (the two heathens died of natural causes after they bragged about the killing in a Southern Pride magazine.) It's a shame that Southerners tolerated, condoned and applauded such violent hatred during the 60s. They may never live it down. (I am also ashamed of my own state's past Klan activity, and that they are still factions of neo-Nazis and other hate groups still roaming our city. :()

Glad he was convicted, but it took damned long for it to happen.  ::)

It's just too bad that Emmitt Till may never rest in Peace after the all-idiot jury acquitted his killers twice (the two heathens died of natural causes after they bragged about the killing in a Southern Pride magazine.) It's a shame that Southerners tolerated, condoned and applauded such violent hatred during the 60s. They may never live it down. (I am also ashamed of my own state's past Klan activity, and that they are still factions of neo-Nazis and other hate groups still roaming our city. :()


Don't worry! Justice will be served eternally on the other side. Whatever you do on Earth will decide your fate in the afterlife. I'd hate to be them.

Tanya

I think I can safely say that he will suffer tremendously in the prison showers...if he lives long enough in there to actually take one. Personally, I think he'll be shanked before his first day of his sentence is served!



I hope he lives long in prison. Let the SOB suffer as his victims did. Hope the guards let "the boys" have their fun. I hate thinking those thoughts.


I can relate to that. However, as I understand it he will be kept in solitary confinement.

I can relate to that. However, as I understand it he will be kept in solitary confinement.


Bummer.  Let "the boys" have at him.