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Mafia beat-up could free Klansman
Mafia beat-up could free Klansman
Tom Leonard in New York
July 30, 2008
A FORMER Ku Klux Klan member who was jailed for his part in the killing of three civil rights workers in the 1960s must be freed because the FBI used a mafia enforcer to torture a key witness for information, his lawyers say.
Edgar Ray Killen, 84, was convicted in 2005 for ordering the killing of three men 41 years ago, a crime that was dramatised in the 1989 film Mississippi Burning, which starred Gene Hackman.
His lawyers have appealed against his life sentence for triple manslaughter, citing new evidence that the FBI used Gregory Scarpa - known as the Grim Reaper - to put pressure on Klan
members to reveal where the bodies had been hidden.
The lawyers also said Killen's conviction was tainted by the fact that a defence lawyer in a previous trial over the killings, in 1967, was an FBI informant who had been providing prosecutors with information about the defence case.
The court transcript from 1967 - in which Killen was acquitted of civil rights charges - was allowed to be used in the later trial because many of the witnesses had since died.
Killen's lawyer, Rob Ratliff, said the evidence included crucial information from a Klan member who revealed where the bodies had been buried.
It was now clear that the informant had been kidnapped by Scarpa and an FBI helper, and subjected to "typical Mafia-type behaviour", Mr Ratliff said.
The "behaviour" may have included a severe beating but certainly included death threats to his family and having a gun barrel inserted into his mouth.
Killen's lawyers argue that his right to a full and fair trial, and the right t
o confront witnesses against him, had been violated.
If the 1967 trial had known that the location of the bodies had been discovered unlawfully, it would not have been allowed as evidence, Mr Ratliff said.
The FBI has always declined to comment on whether Scarpa was involved in the case.
Scarpa was a senior member of the Colombo crime family and an FBI informant for three decades.
His involvement in the investigation, which had long been rumoured, was confirmed last year by a New York judge who had seen Scarpa's FBI file while trying an unrelated murder case.
The judge said: "That a thug like Scarpa would be employed by the federal government to beat witnesses and threaten them at gunpoint to obtain information regarding the deaths of civil rights workers in the South in the early 1960s is a shocking demonstration of the government's unacceptable willingness to employ criminality to fight crime."
Found this on Emac's site, then found the link. A litt
le good news maybe for the family.
Mafia beat-up could free Klansman
Tom Leonard in New York
July 30, 2008
A FORMER Ku Klux Klan member who was jailed for his part in the killing of three civil rights workers in the 1960s must be freed because the FBI used a mafia enforcer to torture a key witness for information, his lawyers say.
Edgar Ray Killen, 84, was convicted in 2005 for ordering the killing of three men 41 years ago, a crime that was dramatised in the 1989 film Mississippi Burning, which starred Gene Hackman.
His lawyers have appealed against his life sentence for triple manslaughter, citing new evidence that the FBI used Gregory Scarpa - known as the Grim Reaper - to put pressure on Klan
members to reveal where the bodies had been hidden.
The lawyers also said Killen's conviction was tainted by the fact that a defence lawyer in a previous trial over the killings, in 1967, was an FBI informant who had been providing prosecutors with information about the defence case.
The court transcript from 1967 - in which Killen was acquitted of civil rights charges - was allowed to be used in the later trial because many of the witnesses had since died.
Killen's lawyer, Rob Ratliff, said the evidence included crucial information from a Klan member who revealed where the bodies had been buried.
It was now clear that the informant had been kidnapped by Scarpa and an FBI helper, and subjected to "typical Mafia-type behaviour", Mr Ratliff said.
The "behaviour" may have included a severe beating but certainly included death threats to his family and having a gun barrel inserted into his mouth.
Killen's lawyers argue that his right to a full and fair trial, and the right t
o confront witnesses against him, had been violated.
If the 1967 trial had known that the location of the bodies had been discovered unlawfully, it would not have been allowed as evidence, Mr Ratliff said.
The FBI has always declined to comment on whether Scarpa was involved in the case.
Scarpa was a senior member of the Colombo crime family and an FBI informant for three decades.
His involvement in the investigation, which had long been rumoured, was confirmed last year by a New York judge who had seen Scarpa's FBI file while trying an unrelated murder case.
The judge said: "That a thug like Scarpa would be employed by the federal government to beat witnesses and threaten them at gunpoint to obtain information regarding the deaths of civil rights workers in the South in the early 1960s is a shocking demonstration of the government's unacceptable willingness to employ criminality to fight crime."
Found this on Emac's site, then found the link. A litt
le good news maybe for the family.