Documentary: The Untold Story of Emmitt Till (Proceeds to Hurricane Katrina Victims)

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[NPHC] Emmett Till To be Exhumed


BC-Civil Rights Killing,0289
Body of Emmett Till, black youth killed in Mississippi in 1955, to
be exhumed
Eds: Will be led.
By DON BABWIN
Associated Press Writer
CHICAGO (AP) -- Nearly 50 years after 14-year-old Emmett Till's
murder shocked a nation and galvanized the civil rights movement,
his body will be exhumed as federal authorities attempt to
determine who killed him, the FBI said Wednesday.
Till's body, buried in a cemetery in the Chicago suburb of
Alsip, will be exhumed within the next few weeks so the Cook County
Medical Examiner's office can conduct an autopsy, said Deborah
Madden, spokeswoman for the FBI's office in Jackson, Miss.
The black youth, who was raised in Chicago, was abducted from
his uncle's home in the tiny Mississippi Delta community of Money
on Aug. 28, 1955, reportedly for whistling at a white woman at a
grocery store. His mutilated body was found in a river three days
later.
The U.S. Justice Department announced plans last year to reopen
the Till investigation, saying it was triggered by several pieces
of information including a documentary by New York filmmaker Keith
Beauchamp.
"The exhumation is a logical continuation of that," Madden
said. "An autopsy was never performed on the body and the cause of
death was never determined."
The plan to exhume the body was first reported in Wednesday's
Chicago Sun-Times.
Two white men charged with the murder -- store owner Roy Bryant,
the husband of the woman Till purportedly whistled at, and J.W.
Milam, Bryant's half brother -- were acquitted by an all-white jury.
The two, now deceased, confessed to the killing months later in
Look magazine.
(Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
APTV-05-04-05 1130EDT