Mississippi Cold Case
Mississippi Cold Case | |
---|---|
Written by | David Ridgen |
Directed by | David Ridgen |
Theme music composer | Johnny Cash The Reverend Peyton's Big Damn Band Elmo Williams and Hezekiah Early |
Country of origin | Canada |
Original language | English |
Production | |
Producer | David Ridgen |
Running time | 42 minutes |
Original release | |
Network | CBC |
Release | February 11, 2007 |
Mississippi Cold Case is a 2007 feature documentary produced by
As a result of the documentary and related investigations, state and federal officials re-opened the case, prosecuting James Ford Seale of Franklin County for the kidnappings and deaths. He was convicted in 2007 in federal court and sentenced to three life terms. Families of Dee and Moore filed a civil suit in 2008 for damages against Franklin County, Mississippi, charging that its law enforcement officials had been complicit in these events. The county settled the suit with the plaintiffs in 2010 for an undisclosed amount.
Moore and Dee murders
There were rumors circulating amongst members of the KKK that black Muslims were preparing for "insurrection" by bringing guns into Franklin County.
On May 2, 1964, Charles Eddie Moore, a college student, and Henry Hezekiah Dee, a millworker, both 19 and from Franklin County, Mississippi, were picked up by KKK members while they were hitchhiking in Meadville.[1] Klan members, including Seale, beat them with beanpoles until they were unconscious, repeatedly asking the pair to identify who was behind the county's "Negro trouble". Moore and Dee were unconscious but still breathing when the Klansmen dumped their bodies in the Mississippi River.
They were locked in a trunk of a car, driven across state lines, chained to a Jeep motor block and train rails, and dropped alive into the Mississippi River to die.[2][3][4] Edwards later confessed to the FBI that he and Seale had kidnapped and beaten two young black men.[5]
Moore and Dee's mangled torsos were discovered on July 12 and 13, 1964 during the frantic FBI search for
Documentary
In June and July 2004, while preparing to shoot another documentary in Mississippi, Ridgen stumbled across a sequence that troubled him in a 1964, 16 mm film produced in Mississippi by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.[9][10] As the sequence in the film Summer in Mississippi showed a body being taken from a river, he was struck by the narrative:
It was the wrong body. The finding of a negro male was noted and forgotten. The search was not for him. The search was for two white youths and their negro friend.
The documentary film Ridgen was viewing in the CBC archive was called Summer in Mississippi (1964),[11] it was about the murders of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Mickey Schwerner, the three civil rights workers killed by Klansmen in a case that would become known by its FBI codename, "Mississippi Burning". Ridgen immediately wondered why the other body was "forgotten," and how it was determined that this person was "the wrong body".[12]
Looking into the story more deeply, Ridgen discovered the identity of the body: 19-year-old Charles Eddie Moore, an African-American youth. According to articles Ridgen read in
Forty-one years after the murders, weeks before Klan leader Edgar Ray Killen was found guilty of manslaughter in the murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner, David Ridgen convinced Thomas Moore, older brother of Charles, to return to Mississippi to seek justice for his brother and Henry Dee. Moore had already been investigating the case.[14]
Filmmaker Ridgen and the CBC organized and funded the entire production.[15] Ridgen has documented Moore on trips spanning over 26 months. A short version of the documentary (34 min.) premiered on February 11, 2007, on CBC.[citation needed] A one-hour version aired on MSNBC on June 9, 2007.[citation needed] A full-length feature version of the film has been completed.[citation needed]
Results of the documentary
Moore's quest and the documentary about it caused state officials to re-open their investigation into the case. The case had been re-opened in 2000 by then-US Attorney Brad Pigott, but closed again in June 2003 after Pigott and the USDOJ Civil Rights Division decided not to proceed based on the evidence. It was re-opened in early July 2005 after Moore and Ridgen visited US Attorney Dunn Lampton at his office. Previously, Moore and Ridgen had been told by a prominent Mississippi journalist that James Ford Seale was dead, as had been reported elsewhere in the media.[16][17]
Shortly after Ridgen and Moore arrived in Mississippi in July 2005, District Attorney Ronnie Harper told them that Seale was alive. They did not believe him.[9][10] Later that day, Moore's cousin Kenny Byrd told Ridgen and Moore that Seale was still alive. He confirmed it by pointing out Seale's motor home a short distance away.[9][10]
Through the course of the production of Mississippi Cold Case, Thomas Moore continued to press the murder conspirators and officials over more than 24 months. Additional evidence was discovered, including new documents and important witnesses willing to testify.
2007 prosecution
The prosecuting US Attorney brought the case before a federal Grand Jury, which voted to indict the alleged kidnapper and killer, James Ford Seale. He was arrested in January 2007.[18] On January 24, 2007, Seale appeared in federal court in Jackson, Mississippi and was charged with two counts of kidnapping, and one count of conspiracy to kidnap two persons. Seale pleaded not guilty and was denied bond on January 29, 2007, by U.S. Magistrate Judge Linda Anderson.
After Edwards admitted to the murders, he was granted immunity to testify against Seale.[19]
Amid many motion hearings from the defense and prosecution, Seale's trial was set for May 30, 2007, in Jackson, Mississippi.[10][20][21][22][23] Seale was convicted by a majority-white jury on June 14, 2007.[24] On August 24, 2007, James Seale was sentenced to three life sentences for one count of conspiracy to kidnap two persons and two counts of kidnapping, where the victims were not released alive.
On August 5, 2008, Thomas Moore and Thelma Collins, Henry Dee's sister, filed a federal complaint in a Natchez, Mississippi court claiming state complicity in the deaths of Henry Dee and Charles Moore. They were aided by Professor Margaret Burnham and the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project (CRRJ) at the Northeastern University School of Law.[25] The suit claims that in Franklin County in 1964, Sheriff Wayne Hutto and his chief deputy, Kirby Shell, conspired with the Klansmen who abducted and killed Dee and Moore. The plaintiffs sought a federal jury trial for civil damages.[3][26][27] On June 21, 2010, Franklin County, Mississippi agreed to an undisclosed settlement in the civil suit with the families of Charles Moore and Henry Dee.[28]
People involved
Charles Marcus Edwards
Charles Marcus Edwards is a deacon at a church in
In the documentary, Thomas Moore, the brother of the murdered Charles Moore, seeks justice for the unpunished killing of Charles and Henry. Thomas confronted Edwards in Meadville, Mississippi, but at first Edwards didn't want to discuss the murder case. All Edwards said was "I ain't guilty of that." Edwards confessed during FBI questioning, but he was given immunity in exchange for this testimony against James Ford Seale. Edwards would testify in the 2007 trial which saw Seale convicted.[29] In his testimony, Edwards stated that he saw the victims stuffed alive into the trunk of Seale's car and then driven away to a farm.[29] He also stated that Seale attached heavy weights to the two boys and then dumped them alive into the river.[29] Edwards himself would be indicted for aiming a shotgun at the victims while Klan members beat them, but was later given immunity in exchange for his testimony.[29]
Awards
Mississippi Cold Case has won several awards, including
See also
References
- ^ Rochester, Abigail (September 12, 2022). "Dee, Henry and Charles Moore, Murders of". Mississippi Encyclopedia. Retrieved September 29, 2022.
- ^ "Dee, Moore families file suit against Franklin County, Miss., in 1964 murders". Concordia Sentinel. 2008-08-11. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ a b "Families sue Franklin over Klan slayings". Clarion Ledger. 2008-08-07. Retrieved 2008-08-26. [dead link]
- ^ a b "Moore and Collins vs. Franklin County" (PDF). 2008-08-05. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2018-02-22.
- ^ "U. S. vs Cecil Price et al. ("Mississippi Burning" Trial)". Douglas O. Linder. 2008. Archived from the original on 1999-05-08. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ a b c d Ingwerson, Charlyn (2007). "Cracked cold case: the Justice Department's 2007 conviction of the 1964 murders of Charles Eddie Moore and Henry Hezekiah Dee". The Forensic Examiner. 16 (3): 74+ – via Gale Academic OneFile.
- ^ Rogelio V. Solis, Associated Press (23 September 2008). "Feds: Rethink acquittal of reputed Klan member". USA Today. Retrieved 10 May 2014.
- ^ a b c "Cracking a Mississippi Cold Case". Queens Alumni Review. 2007-05-22. Archived from the original on 2007-11-02. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ a b c d Ridgen, David. "Cracking a Mississippi cold case". Civil Rights and Restorative Justice. Archived from the original on 2011-01-17. Retrieved 2023-11-14.
- ^ Fox, Beryl; Leiterman, Douglas (1964). Summer in Mississippi. Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
- ^ a b Ridgen, David (Independent Filmmaker). "The Dee and Moore Case: Cracking a Mississippi cold case". Northwestern University School of Law. Archived from the original on 2014-07-14. Retrieved 2014-07-12.
- ^ Attack On Terror: The FBI Against the Ku Klux Klan In Mississippi. Funk & Wagnalls. 1970.
- ^ Breed, Allen G. (2007-01-26). "Brother Wins Arrest in '64 Case". Washington Post. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ "Martyr's Brother Seeks Justice". Southern Poverty Law Center. 2005-07-22. Archived from the original on 2007-09-30. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ Serrano, Richard A. (June 18, 2002). "A Brother Who Won't Forget, a Prosecutor Who Won't Give Up". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved July 25, 2011.
- ^ , Louisiana Weekly Archived October 17, 2006, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Brother Wins Arrest in '64 Case". Fox News. 2007-01-25. Archived from the original on January 27, 2007. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ProQuest 905093292. Retrieved October 4, 2022 – via ProQuest.
- ^ "Miss. Murder Cold Case Under Way". San Francisco Chronicle. 2007-05-30. Retrieved 2008-08-26. [dead link]
- ^ "Seale trial opening arguments made". Natchez Democrat. 2007-06-04. Archived from the original on 2016-02-22. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ "The Klansmen Bound: 43 Years Later, James Ford Seale Faces Justice". Jackson Free Press. 2007-05-23. Retrieved 2008-08-26.[permanent dead link]
- ^ "Mississippi Public Broadcasting - news". Mpbonline.org. June 25, 2011. Archived from the original on July 27, 2011. Retrieved July 25, 2011.
- ^ "Ex-KKK man guilty in 1964 killing". BBC.com. 2007-06-15. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ "The Dee and Moore Case" Archived 2015-11-20 at the Wayback Machine, Civil Rights and Restorative Justice, Northeastern University School of Law, 2015
- ^ "Dee, Moore families files suit against Franklin County, Miss., in 1964 murders". Concordia Sentinel. 2008-08-11. Archived from the original on 2008-08-16. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ Walker, Adrian (2008-08-08). "A righteous quest". The Boston Globe.com. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ "Miss. Officials Agree To Settlement In '64 Slayings". NPR. 2010-06-21.
- ^ a b c d "Ex-KKK man guilty in 1964 killing". BBC News. 15 June 2007. Retrieved 10 May 2014.
- ^ "CANADA'S GOLDEN SHEAF AWARD WINNERS". 2007. Archived from the original on 2012-09-18. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ "2007 IRE Award Winners". IRE.org. 2007. Archived from the original on 2008-05-09. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ "CBC cold case documentary wins Gemini". Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. 2007-10-15. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ "CINE Golden Eagle Award Winners". CINE. 2007. Archived from the original on May 10, 2008. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
- ^ "NOMINEES FOR THE 29th ANNUAL NEWS & DOCUMENTARY EMMY AWARDS ANNOUNCED BY THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF TELEVISION ARTS & SCIENCES". 2008-07-15. Archived from the original on 2008-08-21. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
External links
- Mississippi Cold Case at IMDb
- https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/u-s-governor-censored-news-release-photos-in-civil-rights-cold-case-1.672700 CBC Story
- https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/accused-in-1964-mississippi-race-slayings-wrote-hate-letter-1.668898 CBC March 2007
- https://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/25/national/25civil.html New York Times
- https://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/us/03civil.html?ei=5088&en=8617809676350bcc&ex=1328158800&partner=&pagewanted=all New York Times
- http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/2007/200701/20070125.html CBC Radio One - The Current
- https://archive.today/20110524123354/http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/MediaNews/2007/02/10/3578634-sun.html Toronto Sun film review
Canadian Press
- https://www.thestar.com/article/175121 The Toronto Star
- http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_6017304 Denver Post/Associated Press
- http://www.eenvandaag.nl/index.php?module=PX_Story&func=view&cid=2&sid=32151 Dutch Television
- http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article1884442.ece The Times
- http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,2090730,00.html Guardian UK
- https://www.npr.org/2007/05/29/10425378/trial-set-to-begin-in-civil-rights-era-murder-case NPR June 2007
- https://www.npr.org/2007/06/05/10741271/seale-civil-rights-murder-trial-begins-43-years-on NPR June 2007