3 Life Terms Handed Down in '64 Killings

A Madison County Sheriff's Department deputy, right, escorts reputed Ku Klux Klansman James Ford Seale to the federal courthouse, Friday, Aug. 24, 2007, in Jackson, Miss., for sentencing in the deadly abductions of two black teenagers in 1964. Seale, 72, faces up to life for the June 14 convictions on kidnapping and conspiracy charges. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis) (Rogelio V. Solis - AP)

Wingate agreed to assign Seale to a prison where his health needs can be met. He has cancer, bone spurs and other health problems.

The jury of eight whites and four blacks took two hours in June to reach the unanimous verdicts to convict Seale.

The prosecution's star witness was Charles Marcus Edwards, a confessed Klansman who received immunity from prosecution for his admitted role in the abductions and his testimony.

He testified that Seale and other Klansmen abducted the two teenagers near Meadville, in southwest Mississippi, took them to the nearby Homochitto National Forest and beat them while asking questions about rumors that black people in the area were stockpiling guns. Edwards said that during the beating, the young men said _ falsely _ that weapons were being stored in a black church, Roxie First Baptist.

Edwards testified that he was absent later, but that Seale told him about how he and other Klansmen bound the teenagers with tape, put them into a car trunk and drove them through part of eastern Louisiana to get to the area where they were dumped, alive, into the river.

Their remains were identified by a few personal trinkets _ Charles Eddie Moore's Alcorn A&M College dormitory key, his golden stretch-band wristwatch and a belt buckle with the initial "M," and Dee's waterlogged draft card, which remained in his wallet.

Seale was arrested on a state murder charge in 1964, but the charge was later dropped. Federal prosecutors say the state charges were dropped because local law enforcement officers in 1964 were in collusion with the Klan. Seale denies ever belonging to the Klan.

Federal prosecutors revived the case in 2005, largely at the urging of Thomas Moore, who researched the crime. Except for Edwards, the other people implicated in the crime had died, leaving Seale alone to face prosecution.

"If it hadn't been for Thomas, this case never would've seen the light of day," said U.S. Attorney Dunn Lampton.

The case was among more than a dozen unsolved, civil rights-era crimes that state and federal prosecutors across the South have revived since the early 1990s.

Wan J. Kim, head of the Justice Department's civil rights division, said during a news conference after the sentencing that the FBI has compiled a list of more than 100 unsolved cases.

Kim _ who announced his resignation Thursday _ said the Justice Department will pursue those cases, regardless of whether the Senate approves a cold-cases bill that would give the department more resources. A bill has passed the House and awaits Senate consideration.

Kim cautioned, however, that reviving decades-old cases can be difficult.

"While our commitment, our desire and our energy are manifest and there, we need to lower expectations because these are tough, tough cases to put together," Kim said. "And in many, many instances, because of the laws that existed at the time, there will not be federal jurisdiction for many of these offenses. We know that. But that doesn't mean we're not trying."