Wednesday, November 6, 2013

New book features Freedom Riders' mug shots

A new book, Breach of Peace by Eric Etheridge, features police mug shots of the Freedom Riders:

Discovery of the mug shots taken of those young riders proved to be a photographic gold mine for Etheridge, 57, who mounted an unusual search mission as a result.

 What he did was track down the 328 arrestees after requesting their cooperation. All agreed. He then took photographs of them as they look today — most in their 70s and as committed to equal rights now as they were half a century ago.

 “Working on this project gave me a way back into my own history,” Etheridge said Saturday afternoon during an appearance at Montgomery’s old Greyhound bus station, now known as the Freedom Rides Museum.

Supreme Court will not hear "Mississippi Burning" mastermind's appeal

The U. S. Supreme Court decided this week it would not hear the appeal of convicted "Mississippi Burning" mastermind Edgar Ray Killen.

Killen, 88, is serving a 60-year sentence for his part in the 1964 murders of civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney:

In his appeal, Killen declared that he deserved a new trial because his constitutional rights were violated.On Monday, his attorney, Rob Ratliff of Mobile, Ala., vowed to keep fighting, saying the "legal options are not over. Several other options exist in the course of having proper judicial review of a conviction and sentencing that failed to meet our respected standards."Justices were not asked to rule on substantive issues, but to recognize Killen's constitutional right to due process, Ratliff wrote in an email.