Miss. Upholds Verdict in 1964 Slayings
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
JACKSON, Miss. — The Mississippi Supreme Court yesterday upheld the manslaughter convictions of former Ku Klux Klan leader Edgar Ray Killen in the slayings of three civil rights workers in 1964.
Killen, 82, was convicted on June 21, 2005 — exactly 41 years after Michael Schwerner, James Chaney, and Andrew Goodman were killed. He was sentenced to three consecutive 60-year prison terms. The three victims, all young men, had been helping blacks to register to vote. Their bodies were found two months later buried in an earthen dam.
Witnesses testified that Killen helped plan the slayings. The case was portrayed in the 1988 movie “Mississippi Burning.”
