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Killen Verdict

By TChris, Section Crime in the News
Posted on Tue Jun 21, 2005 at 09:34:25 AM EST
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by TChris

The 6-6 jury split that TalkLeft described yesterday didn't last long, as the jury returned a guilty verdict today against former KKK member Edgar Ray Killen. The jury convicted Killen of manslaughter for his role in the 1964 deaths of three civil rights workers. It settled on the lesser charge after acquitting him of murder.

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    • Killen Verdict | 10 comments (10 topical)
    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#1)
    by Dadler on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:18 PM EST
    How'd they come to the manslaughter conclusion? Has the willfulness of this act faded over time?

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:20 PM EST
    If my reading comprehension shot, or is there nothing in that last link about a murder acquittal except for a reference to a 1967 Federal case?

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#3)
    by Andreas on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:20 PM EST
    Rita Schwerner Bender and others who lost their loved ones in the struggle for racial equality have stressed, in light of the current trial, that the issues raised by the struggles of forty years ago have not disappeared. Ms. Bender told a memorial service for her husband, Chaney and Goodman on June 19 at Mt. Zion Church, the same church burned down by the Klan 41 years ago: “It’s important that we seek to understand how a government became complicit in terror and how good people looked aside and let it happen.” She said it was important to understand the Mississippi events of the 1960s because “governments can run amok again.”
    Case of 1964 civil rights killings goes to the jury By Peter Daniels and Helen Halyard, 21 June 2005

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#4)
    by DawesFred60 on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:20 PM EST
    So do any-of-you recall/recollect/remember that he was an informant also for the FBI? This guy is an ass but he is also one more scapegoat and worked as a informer for many years. but dadler who really was behind it and many other killings? also remember janet reno and her order to murder little kids at waco? she is now in a hot place and this guy will be joining her soon.

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#5)
    by MikeDitto on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:20 PM EST
    Dadler, I imagine it has more to do with 40 year old evidence and the probability that many of the witnesses are elderly or already dead. Like it or not, I think that the average Joes and Janes on a jury consider the burden of proof on a lesser crime to be lower than that on the greater crime. In other words, they may not have questioned the intent, but some other facts of the case. I think it's tough for most folks to make the distinction between reasonable doubt and all possible doubt. I also think it's often tough for them to see reasonable doubt in the absence of incontrovertible proof of innocence.

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#6)
    by Mreddieb on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:20 PM EST
    Fred
    remember janet reno and her order to murder little kids at waco?
    I find if offensive wingnuts like you spin lies and conspiracy theories as fact. Waco was a cult run by a child molester. HE like Jones decided to commit Suicide by Cop. You wackos always leave out one little detail. All Korish had to do was give up and turn himself in end of story. Beside this subject was totally out of line and unrelated to this topic.

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#7)
    by jimcee on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:20 PM EST
    Too bad he can't be bludgened to death and buried in the same berm that his victims were but at least they found him guilty of something.

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#8)
    by Peter G on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:21 PM EST
    Three counts of voluntary manslaughter, each carrying a 20-year maximum, which can run consecutively. Defendant is 80 years old. Seems to me the judge has sufficient leeway at sentencing to see that justice is done. By the way, I don't know Mississippi law, but here in Pennsylvania one of the bases on which murder is mitigated to voluntary manslaughter is {if the jury believes} that the defendant acted under a genuine but unreasonable belief that his/her use of deadly force was justified. Could possibly fit this case.

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#9)
    by Aaron on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:21 PM EST
    The truth is that this is no victory. This guy was part of a criminal conspiracy who abducted and murdered three kids with premeditation. Apparently if the jury hadn't had the option of a manslaughter conviction, he would've gotten off completely. So here's a murder who's had 40 years of freedom since his crime, and now gets what amounts to little more than a slap on the wrist. I wouldn't be surprised if the judge gives him the minimum one-year sentence, that would be a total of three years for three murders. Boy we've come a long way since the 50s and 60s, instead of walking scot-free for killing Black people, you get three years. Yeah, that's justice, got those Ku Klux Klan members shaking in their boots now. Not that there's anything that would make up for the deaths of those young people or bring them back, real justice would've included the old racist F**k being lynched in the town square, charred black and force-fed to Ku Klux Klan members in the crowd. If they had fried the old fart in the electric chair, then maybe we have some semblance of justice, but sometimes I forget this is America.

    Re: Killen Verdict (none / 0) (#10)
    by Richard Aubrey on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:22 PM EST
    It is hard to keep up with you guys. As a general rule, if a guy's convicted, it means he's almost certainly innocent. And punishment is a crime itself. Why waste two lives? Or is it five? Something like that. IMO, an old guy in a wheel chair is a better bet for jury sympathy than, say, Bill Clinton or John DeLorean carrying large-print Bibles.

    Killen Verdict | 10 comments (10 topical)