Publié : mar. févr. 24, 2004 5:11 am
40 Years After Civil Rights Workers' Deaths, Victim's Brother Hopes Case Will Be Reopened
By Siobhan McDonough Associated Press Writer
Published: Feb 24, 2004
WASHINGTON (AP) - Ben Chaney says he has felt sadness, anger and frustration since his brother, a young civil rights worker, was killed in Mississippi during the "Freedom Summer" of 1964.
"As I've gotten older, I've learned to galvanize energy from the emotions toward trying to resolve the case and see some justice done," says Chaney, 52, of New York City.
That's why he will help lead a series of events to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the murders of civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, victims of one of the most notorious crimes of the civil rights era.
A 20-bus caravan will embark a 20-stop tour beginning in New York City on June 9, said Chaney, who heads the James Earl Chaney Foundation, a civil rights group. The trip will include a stop in Philadelphia, Miss., where a memorial service will be held.
Civil rights veterans, students, business and labor leaders, clergy and others will be part of the caravan, Chaney said. At each stop, participants will do door-to-door voter registration, the same mission that motivated the three young men in 1964. Workshops on voter registration also will be conducted.
"We want to bring attention to the fact that there are still several murders that occurred in Mississippi that have not been resolved," Chaney said in an interview Monday. "There are open wounds there."
James Chaney, a 21-year-old black man from Mississippi, and Goodman, 20, and Schwerner, 24, both white men from New York City, were part of the "Freedom Summer" program in Mississippi in which young civil rights workers organized voter education and registration campaigns.
The trio disappeared when they went to investigate a fire at a church in Neshoba County. Several weeks later, their bodies were found buried in an earthen dam a few miles from the church. They had been beaten and shot.
Seven members of the Ku Klux Klan were convicted of federal civil rights violations in the June 21, 1964, deaths and sentenced to prison terms ranging from three years to 10 years. The state never brought murder charges, and none of those convicted served more than six years.
In 1999 then-Mississippi Attorney General Mike Moore and then-Neshoba County District Attorney Ken Turner began trying to build a case against an undisclosed number of suspects, some with ties to the KKK.
Work has been hampered as memories fade and the few remaining witnesses die.
Still, Chaney said authorities have the power and the opportunity to right a wrong of the past. He wants the case - the subject of the 1988 movie, "Mississippi Burning" - reopened.
"This is not a dead-end issue," he said. "There is no statute of limitation on murder."
Urging black people to register to vote and then to cast their ballots is the best way to get his brother's case reopened, he said, explaining, "It puts pressure on the prosecutor to prosecute."
Chaney said officials now seem more aggressive about prosecuting past civil rights crimes. Bobby Frank Cherry was convicted in 2002 in the 1963 Birmingham, Ala., church bombing that killed four black girls, and Byron De La Beckwith was convicted in 1994 in the 1963 murder of Mississippi NAACP leader Medgar Evers.
"Forty years is a lot of time," he lamented. "Time has not stood still and there have been changes, and I've gotten old. But I'm very optimistic this can happen. I want this to happen in my mother's lifetime."
By Siobhan McDonough Associated Press Writer
Published: Feb 24, 2004
WASHINGTON (AP) - Ben Chaney says he has felt sadness, anger and frustration since his brother, a young civil rights worker, was killed in Mississippi during the "Freedom Summer" of 1964.
"As I've gotten older, I've learned to galvanize energy from the emotions toward trying to resolve the case and see some justice done," says Chaney, 52, of New York City.
That's why he will help lead a series of events to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the murders of civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, victims of one of the most notorious crimes of the civil rights era.
A 20-bus caravan will embark a 20-stop tour beginning in New York City on June 9, said Chaney, who heads the James Earl Chaney Foundation, a civil rights group. The trip will include a stop in Philadelphia, Miss., where a memorial service will be held.
Civil rights veterans, students, business and labor leaders, clergy and others will be part of the caravan, Chaney said. At each stop, participants will do door-to-door voter registration, the same mission that motivated the three young men in 1964. Workshops on voter registration also will be conducted.
"We want to bring attention to the fact that there are still several murders that occurred in Mississippi that have not been resolved," Chaney said in an interview Monday. "There are open wounds there."
James Chaney, a 21-year-old black man from Mississippi, and Goodman, 20, and Schwerner, 24, both white men from New York City, were part of the "Freedom Summer" program in Mississippi in which young civil rights workers organized voter education and registration campaigns.
The trio disappeared when they went to investigate a fire at a church in Neshoba County. Several weeks later, their bodies were found buried in an earthen dam a few miles from the church. They had been beaten and shot.
Seven members of the Ku Klux Klan were convicted of federal civil rights violations in the June 21, 1964, deaths and sentenced to prison terms ranging from three years to 10 years. The state never brought murder charges, and none of those convicted served more than six years.
In 1999 then-Mississippi Attorney General Mike Moore and then-Neshoba County District Attorney Ken Turner began trying to build a case against an undisclosed number of suspects, some with ties to the KKK.
Work has been hampered as memories fade and the few remaining witnesses die.
Still, Chaney said authorities have the power and the opportunity to right a wrong of the past. He wants the case - the subject of the 1988 movie, "Mississippi Burning" - reopened.
"This is not a dead-end issue," he said. "There is no statute of limitation on murder."
Urging black people to register to vote and then to cast their ballots is the best way to get his brother's case reopened, he said, explaining, "It puts pressure on the prosecutor to prosecute."
Chaney said officials now seem more aggressive about prosecuting past civil rights crimes. Bobby Frank Cherry was convicted in 2002 in the 1963 Birmingham, Ala., church bombing that killed four black girls, and Byron De La Beckwith was convicted in 1994 in the 1963 murder of Mississippi NAACP leader Medgar Evers.
"Forty years is a lot of time," he lamented. "Time has not stood still and there have been changes, and I've gotten old. But I'm very optimistic this can happen. I want this to happen in my mother's lifetime."