Former Klan leader found guilty of manslaughter in 1964 slayings of three civil rights workers

PHILADELPHIA, Miss. — An 80-year-old former Ku Klux Klansman was convicted of manslaughter Tuesday in the slayings of three civil rights workers exactly 41 years ago in a notorious case that inspired the movie "Mississippi Burning."

The jury of nine whites and three blacks reached the verdict on their second day of deliberations, rejecting murder charges against Edgar Ray Killen but also turning aside defense claims that he wasn't involved at all.

Killen showed no emotion as the verdicts were read. He was comforted by his wife as he sat in his wheelchair, wearing an oxygen tube. He was immediately taken into custody by the sheriff, and Circuit Judge Marcus Gordon said he would set a sentencing date later in the day.

Civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner were ambushed on June 21, 1964. Their bodies were found 44 days later buried in an earthen dam. They had been beaten and shot.

Cheers could be heard outside the two-story, red brick courthouse after the verdicts were announced. Passers-by patted Chaney's brother, Ben, on the back and one woman slowed her vehicle and yelled, "Hey, Mr. Chaney, all right!"

Later, Ben Chaney thanked the prosecutors but said that for the community, "I really feel that there is more to be done." He said there were still no black businesses downtown.

Schwerner's widow, Rita Schwerner Bender, praised the verdict, calling it "a day of great importance to all of us." But she said others also should be held responsible for the slayings.

"Preacher Killen didn't act in a vacuum," Bender said. "The state of Mississippi was complicit in these crimes and all the crimes that occurred, and that has to be opened up."

Killen's relatives left the courtroom without speaking to reporters.

Outside the courthouse, defense lawyer James McIntyre, said he will file an appeal, noting that the defense had objected to giving the jurors the manslaughter option.

"At least he wasn't found guilty of a willful and wanton act," McIntyre said.

Prosecutors had asked the jury to send a message to the rest of the world that Mississippi has changed and is committed to bringing to justice those who killed to preserve segregation in the 1960s. They said the evidence was clear that Killen organized the attack on the three victims.