Lewis, others, pushing to solve civil rights-era murders

ATLANTA (AP) — An stagnated investigation into the lynching of four black sharecroppers in east Georgia unsolved for 50 years could get new momentum from the federal government under a plan reintroduced in Congress on Thursday by four lawmakers, including Georgia Representative John Lewis.
The Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act could address the lynching near Monroe, Ga., where Roger and Dorothy Malcom and George and Mae Murray Dorsey were killed on the banks of the Apalachee River at the Moore’s Ford Bridge, about 40 miles east of Atlanta. They were dragged from a car, beaten and shot dozens of times as a mob of 200 looked on.
No one was ever charged in their deaths, even though the FBI’s report named 55 suspects. The case has stalled over the years, though the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and FBI have said the case remains open.
State Rep. Tyrone Brooks, D-Atlanta, told The Associated Press on Thursday he believes federal involvement will be the key to arrest, prosecution and closure in the Moore’s Ford case and others like it.
“The case involved so many local officials…they were so closely intertwined it’s been almost impossible to get the local officials to move,” Brooks said. “This can lead us toward reconciliation and healing.”
Brooks, who heads the Georgia Association of Black Elected Officials, has been urging local prosecutors to pursue the case for years, and re-enacted the bloody scene last year _ a reminder that served in part as a catalyst for Lewis’ involvement in the legislation, first proposed last year by Sens. Jim Talent, R-Mo., and Christopher Dodd, D.-Conn. Joining the effort was Rep. Kenny Hulshof, R-Mo.
“We are rejecting the reasons of yesterday that left these horrible crimes unpunished,” Lewis said at a press conference in Washington, D.C. “Our purpose here is not to open up old wounds, but to begin the process of healing.”
The bill would create an unsolved crimes section within the civil rights division of the Department of Justice and an unsolved civil rights crime investigative office within the FBI. The sponsors say it would cost $10 million to establish both offices and foster relations between federal and local authorities. The new offices would focus on the untold number of deaths that occurred before 1970 and remain unsolved by state and local officials. Brooks praised Lewis and his co-sponsors for their renewed efforts.
“I’m going to urge them to keep Moore’s Ford at the top of their agenda,” Brooks said, adding that the case represents the last public mass lynching in America.