A relative of Emmett Till has filed a lawsuit in attempt to get the Mississippi mayor to rule on a 1955 warrant against a white woman in the kidnapping that led to the black teenager’s brutal lynching.
Till’s torture and murder in the Mississippi Delta became a catalyst for the civil rights movement after his mother insisted on an open burial in Chicago and photos of his mutilated body were published in Jet Magazine.
Last June, a team searching courtrooms in Lefleur County, Mississippi, found an outstanding 1955 warrant for Caroline Bryant, identified in the document as “Mrs. Roy Bryant”.
Till’s cousin Patricia Sterling of Jackson, Mississippi, filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday against current Lefleur County Sheriff Ricky Banks.
The lawsuit aims to force Banks to give the note to Caroline Bryant, who is now married and goes by the name Caroline Bryant Dunham.
“We are using all means at our disposal to seek justice on behalf of the Till family,” Sterling’s attorney Trent Walker told The Associated Press on Friday.
Also, read; Ethiopia Blocks Social Media Amid Orthodox Church Tensions
Till, then 14, traveled from Chicago in August 1955 to visit relatives in Mississippi, where Dunham accused him of making improper advances to her at a grocery store in the small community. Till’s cousin, who was there, said that Till whistled at women, an act that went against racist social mores in Mississippi at the time.
Evidence suggests a woman, possibly Dunham, was identified even by the men who later killed Till. The warrant for Dunham’s arrest was issued in 1955, but the Leflore County sheriff at the time told reporters that he didn’t want to “harras” the woman because she was raising two young children.
Weeks after Till’s body was found in a river, husband Roy Bryant and half-brother J.J. Milam was tried for murder and acquitted by an all-white jury. Months later, the guys confessed in a paid interview with Look magazine.
Dunham, now in her late 80s, has lived in North Carolina and Kentucky for the past several years. She has not publicly commented on the lawsuit claims.
The US Department of Justice announced in December 2021 that it had closed its latest investigation into Till’s murder without charging anyone.
After investigators found the warrant last June, Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch’s office said in July there was no new evidence to support an attempt to criminalize Dunham. In August, the district attorney said a LeFleur County grand jury declined to indict Dunham.
