The reputed Ku Klux Kansman, Edgar Ray Killen, is about to go on trial for the murder in 1964 of three voter-registration volunteers. The murders inspired the Alan Parker film Mississippi Burning and the trial is an attempt to deal with some unfinished business from Mississippi's bloodstained racist past. The murders served to galvanise the civil rights movement and led to the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Opinions appear divided in Philadelphia where the trial is taking place - mainly along predictable racial lines. Some think there is no value in going after an 80 year old man for murders that took place over 40 years ago. I believe that justice must be seen to be done in this case. Killen's name has been involved with the case for most of those 40 years and if he is innocent then let him go free, but the relatives of the victims deserve the opportunity for closure, as the Americans are fond of saying. Apparently when the swamps around the area were dredged the bodies of many young blacks were discovered. It seems there will always be unsolved racist murders and if one of them reaches a conclusion, all the better.
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