Mississippi Civil Rights Workers' Murders - Aftermath

Aftermath

For much of the next four decades, no legal action was taken on the murders.

The journalist Jerry Mitchell, an award-winning investigative reporter for the Jackson Clarion-Ledger, wrote extensively about the case for six years. Mitchell had earned fame for helping secure convictions in several other high-profile Civil Rights Era murder cases, including the murders of Medgar Evers and Vernon Dahmer, and the Birmingham Church Bombing.

In the case of the civil rights workers, Mitchell developed new evidence, found new witnesses, and pressured the state to take action. Barry Bradford, a high school teacher at Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, Illinois, and three of his students, Allison Nichols, Sarah Siegel, and Brittany Saltiel, joined Mitchell's efforts. Bradford later achieved recognition for helping clear the name of the civil rights martyr Clyde Kennard.

Together the student-teacher team produced a documentary for the National History Day contest. It presented important new evidence and compelling reasons to reopen the case. The team also obtained an interview with Edgar Ray Killen, which helped convince the state to investigate. Partially by using evidence developed by Bradford and the students, Mitchell was able to determine the identity of "Mr. X", the mystery informer who had helped the FBI discover the bodies and end the conspiracy of the Klan in 1964.

Mitchell's investigation and the high school students' work in creating Congressional pressure, national media attention and a taped conversation with Killen prompted action. In 2004, on the 40th anniversary of the murders, a multi-ethnic group of citizens in Philadelphia, Mississippi, issued a call for justice. More than 1,500 people, including civil rights leaders and Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, joined them to voice their desire to revisit the case.