A 1946 mob lynching puts court focus on grand jury secrecy

[Eugene]

Source: Associated Press

A 1946 mob lynching puts court focus on grand jury secrecy

By KATE BRUMBACK
October 22, 2019

ATLANTA (AP) — A historian’s quest for the truth about a gruesome mob lynching of two black couples is prompting a U.S. appeals court to consider whether federal judges can order grand jury records unsealed in decades-old cases with historical significance.

The young black sharecroppers were being driven along a rural road in the summer of 1946 when they were stopped by a white mob beside the Apalachee River, just over 50 miles (80 kilometers) east of Atlanta. The mob dragged them out, led them to the riverbank and shot them multiple times. For months the FBI investigated and more than 100 people reportedly testified before a grand jury, but no one was ever indicted in the deaths of Roger and Dorothy Malcom and George and Mae Murray Dorsey at Moore’s Ford Bridge in Walton County.

Historian Anthony Pitch wrote a book about the killings — “The Last Lynching: How a Gruesome Mass Murder Rocked a Small Georgia Town” — and continued his research after its 2016 publication. He learned transcripts from the grand jury proceedings, thought to have been destroyed, were stored by the National Archives.

Heeding Pitch’s request, a federal judge in 2017 ordered the records unsealed. But the U.S. Department of Justice appealed , arguing grand jury proceedings are secret and should remain sealed.

A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in February ruled 2-1 to uphold the lower court’s order. But the full court voted to rehear the case, and is set to hear oral arguments Tuesday.

-snip-

Read more: https://apnews.com/345a6a482cf5457e9dfd043bd7f1b1fd

[CottonBear]

1. There are, supposedly, (white?) witnesses to the lynching who are still alive.

These witnesses were, maybe, children or young people at the time of the crime.

Anyway, that is what the local reporting has mentioned in news reports in recent years.

No one is talking. The murderers are being protected and the witnesses are, more than likely, unwilling and/or afraid to testify. There was/is an active KKK group in the area.

This is an excellent book on the subject:

https://www.amazon.com/Fire-Canebrake-Last-Lynching-America/dp/0684868172

Laura Wexler
Fire in a Canebrake: The Last Mass Lynching in America

Description
Product description
July 25, 1946. In Walton County, Georgia, a mob of white men commit one of the most heinous racial crimes in America's history: the shotgun murder of four black sharecroppers -- two men and two women -- at Moore's Ford Bridge. Fire in a Canebrake, the term locals used to describe the sound of the fatal gunshots, is the story of our nation's last mass lynching on record. More than a half century later, the lynchers' identities still remain unknown.
Drawing from interviews, archival sources, and uncensored FBI reports, acclaimed journalist and author Laura Wexler takes readers deep into the heart of Walton County, bringing to life the characters who inhabited that infamous landscape -- from sheriffs to white supremacists to the victims themselves -- including a white man who claims to have been a secret witness to the crime. By turns a powerful historical document, a murder mystery, and a cautionary tale, Fire in a Canebrake ignites a powerful contemplation on race, humanity, history, and the epic struggle for truth.
Review
Melissa Fay Greene The Atlanta Journal-Constitution This is an outstanding work of narrative journalism, a book about murders and cover-ups that gleams with the plain beauty of truth-telling.

Los Angeles Times Thoroughly researched and superbly written.

Salon.com Wexler's telling has all the elements of a horrific Southern mystery...an admirable accomplishment.

Juan Williams author of Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965 This is Truman Capote's In Cold Blood with the added fuel of race, sex, and the quirks of Southern culture.
About the Author
Laura Wexler's work has appeared in The Oxford American, DoubleTake, and Utne Reader, among other publications. She has taught writing at the University of Georgia and Johns Hopkins University. She lives in Baltimore. Visit the author's website at www.fireinacanebrake.com.

https://www.amazon.com/Fire-Canebrake-Last-Lynching-America/dp/0684868172

[Historic NY]

2. Still hiding behind a hood...