Book leads to new investigation of 1955 Till killing
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — A new investigation into the brutal slaying of Emmett Till was prompted by a 2017 book that revealed lies by a key figure in the 1955 case that helped build momentum for the civil rights movement, a federal official said Thursday.
A federal official told The Associated Press that information published in the book led federal investigators to re-examine the case. The official wasn’t authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
The reopening of the Till case was revealed in a federal report sent to lawmakers in March that said the Justice Department had received unspecified “new information.”
The book “The
Blood of Emmett Till” by Timothy B. Tyson quotes a white woman, Carolyn Donham, as saying in 2008 she wasn’t truthful when she testified that the black teen grabbed her, whistled and made sexual advances at a Mississippi store in 1955.
A potential witness with Till, then 14, in the store that day, cousin Wheeler Parker, said he has talked with law enforcement about the case in recent months.
A Mississippi prosecutor declined comment on whether federal authorities had given him new information since they reopened the investigation.
Two white men — Donham’s then-husband, Roy Bryant, and his half brother, J.W. Milam — were charged with murder but acquitted in the slaying of Till, who had been staying with relatives in northern Mississippi at the time. The men later confessed to the crime in a magazine interview but weren’t retried. Both are now dead.