green lantern
11-05-2006, 08:46 PM
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/11/05/bowers.ap/index.html
JACKSON, Mississippi (AP) -- Former Ku Klux Klan Imperial Wizard Samuel H. Bowers, who was serving a life sentence for the 1966 bombing death of a civil rights leader, died Sunday in a state penitentiary, officials said. He was 82.
He died of cardio pulmonary arrest, said Mississippi Department of Corrections spokeswoman Tara Booth.
Bowers was convicted in August of 1998 of ordering the assassination of Vernon Dahmer, a civil rights activist who had fought for black rights during Mississippi's turbulent struggle for racial equality. Bowers was sentenced to life in prison.
snip
During the trial, prosecutors claimed Bowers ordered the Dahmer attack after becoming enraged that Dahmer was trying to register blacks to vote.
Bowers' lawyers claimed he was "sacrificed to the media" to further the political ambitions of then Attorney General Mike Moore.
Earlier trials for Bowers, including at least two before all-white juries, ended in mistrials. A 1968 state jury split 11-1 in favor of guilty, while a 1969 jury split 10-2 in favor of conviction.
Bowers' conviction was just one in string of civil rights killings to be successfully prosecuted in the South decades after the crimes were committed.
JACKSON, Mississippi (AP) -- Former Ku Klux Klan Imperial Wizard Samuel H. Bowers, who was serving a life sentence for the 1966 bombing death of a civil rights leader, died Sunday in a state penitentiary, officials said. He was 82.
He died of cardio pulmonary arrest, said Mississippi Department of Corrections spokeswoman Tara Booth.
Bowers was convicted in August of 1998 of ordering the assassination of Vernon Dahmer, a civil rights activist who had fought for black rights during Mississippi's turbulent struggle for racial equality. Bowers was sentenced to life in prison.
snip
During the trial, prosecutors claimed Bowers ordered the Dahmer attack after becoming enraged that Dahmer was trying to register blacks to vote.
Bowers' lawyers claimed he was "sacrificed to the media" to further the political ambitions of then Attorney General Mike Moore.
Earlier trials for Bowers, including at least two before all-white juries, ended in mistrials. A 1968 state jury split 11-1 in favor of guilty, while a 1969 jury split 10-2 in favor of conviction.
Bowers' conviction was just one in string of civil rights killings to be successfully prosecuted in the South decades after the crimes were committed.