Feds reopen Emmett Till case

The federal government has reopened its investigation into the 1955 slaying of Emmett Till, the black teenager whose brutal murder in Mississippi became a catalyst for the civil rights movement. The Justice Department told Congress in a report it is reinvestigating Till’s killing after receiving new information. A 2017 book, The Blood of Emmett Till, revealed that a key witness admitted to lying about what happened before the slaying. Carolyn Donham, then Carolyn Bryant, testified that Till, a 14-year-old Chicagoan visiting family in Mississippi, grabbed her, whistled, and made sexual advances toward her at a store. But in the book she said that wasn’t true.

Donham’s then-husband, Roy Bryant, and his half-brother J.W. Milam abducted Till from the home where he was staying and beat him, shot him, and threw him in a river. His mother, Mamie Till, left his casket open, and photographs of his mutilated body bore witness to the racial hatred in the South. Milam and Bryant were charged with murder and acquitted. They later admitted to the killing in a magazine interview but weren’t retried. The Justice Department did not say in its report to Congress what the new information is that led to the investigation’s reopening. The case was closed in 2007 after authorities said all the suspects were dead.