news Warrant found for Emmett Till accuser - UPDATE: Accuser's memoir unearthed

[VOSS]

 

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The white woman who accused Black teenager Emmett Till of making improper advances before he was lynched in Mississippi in 1955 says she neither identified him to the killers nor wanted him murdered.

 

In an unpublished memoir obtained by The Associated Press, Carolyn Bryant Donham says she was unaware of what would happen to the 14-year-old Till, who lived in Chicago and was visiting relatives in Mississippi when he was abducted, killed and tossed in a river. Now 87, Donham was only 21 at the time. Her then-husband Roy Bryant and his half-brother J.W. Milam were acquitted of murder charges but later confessed in a magazine interview.

 

The contents of the 99-page manuscript, titled "I am More Than A Wolf Whistle," were first reported by the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting. Historian and author Timothy Tyson of Durham, who said he obtained a copy from Donham while interviewing her in 2008, provided a copy to the AP on Thursday.

 

Tyson had placed the manuscript in an archive at the University of North Carolina with the agreement that it not be made public for decades, though he said he gave it to the FBI during an investigation the agency concluded last year. He said he decided to make it public now following the recent discovery of an arrest warrant on kidnapping charges that was issued for Donham in 1955 but never served.

 

"The potential for an investigation was more important than the archival agreements, though those are important things," Tyson said. "But this is probably the last chance for an indictment in this case."

 

In the memoir, Donham says she attempted to help Till once he'd been located by her husband and brother-in-law and brought to her in the middle of the night for identification.

 

"I did not wish Emmett any harm and could not stop harm from coming to him, since I didn't know what was planned for him," Donham says in the manuscript compiled by her daughter-in-law. "I tried to protect him by telling Roy that 'He's not the one. That's not him. Please take him home.'" She claims in the manuscript that Till, who had been dragged from a family home at gunpoint in the middle of the night, spoke up and identified himself.

 

Donham adds that she "always felt like a victim as well as Emmett" and "paid dearly with an altered life" for what happened to him.

 

"I have always prayed that God would bless Emmett's family. I am truly sorry for the pain his family was caused," she says at the end of the manuscript, which is signed "Carolyn" but indicates that it was written by her daughter-in-law Marsha Bryant.

 

The memoir is remarkable not only because it's the most extensive account of the sensational episode ever recorded by Donham, but also because it contains contradictions that raise questions about her truthfulness through the years, said Dale Killinger, a retired FBI agent who investigated the case more than 15 years ago.

 

Keith Beauchamp, a filmmaker whose documentary preceded the Justice Department probe in which Killinger was involved and that ended without charges in 2007, said the memoir shows that Donham "is culpable in the kidnapping and murder of Emmett Louis Till and to not hold her accountable for her actions, is an injustice to us all."

 

"Our fight will continue until justice is finally served," Beauchamp said. It was Beauchamp, along with two of Till's relatives, who discovered the arrest warrant with Donham's name on it earlier this month in the basement of a Mississippi courthouse.

 

Tyson said Donham's statements in the memoir exonerating herself of wrongdoing need to be taken with "a good-sized shovel full of salt," particularly her claim that Till identified himself to the men who took him from the family home and later admitted killing him.

 

"Two big white men with guns came and dragged him out of his aunt and great-uncle's house at 2 o'clock in the morning in the Mississippi Delta in 1955. I do not believe for one minute that he identified himself," Tyson said.

 

Neither Donham nor any of her relatives have responded to messages and phone calls from the AP seeking comment. It is unclear where Donham currently lives or if she has an attorney. Her last known address was in Raleigh, North Carolina.

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A team searching a Mississippi courthouse basement for evidence about the lynching of Black teenager Emmett Till has found the unserved warrant charging a white woman in his 1955 kidnapping, and relatives of the victim want authorities to finally arrest her nearly 70 years later.

 

A warrant for the arrest of Carolyn Bryant Donham — identified as “Mrs. Roy Bryant” on the document — was discovered last week by searchers inside a file folder that had been placed in a box, Leflore County Circuit Clerk Elmus Stockstill told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

 

“They narrowed it down between the ’50s and ’60s and got lucky,” said Stockstill, who certified the warrant as genuine.

The search group included members of the Emmett Till Legacy Foundation and two Till relatives, cousin Deborah Watts and her daughter,Teri Watts. Relatives want authorities to use the warrant to arrest Donham, who at the time of the slaying was married to one of two white men tried and acquitted just weeks after Till was abducted from a relative’s home, killed and dumped into a river.

 

“Serve it and charge her,” Teri Watts told the AP in an interview.

 

Donham set off the case in August 1955 by accusing the 14-year-old Till of making improper advances at a family store in Money, Mississippi. A cousin of Till who was there has said Till whistled at the woman, an act that flew in the face of Mississippi’s racist social codes of the era.

 

Evidence indicates a woman, possibly Donham, identified Till to the men who later killed him. The arrest warrant against Donham was publicized at the time, but the Leflore County sheriff told reporters he did not want to “bother” the woman since she had two young children to care for.

 

Now in her 80s and most recently living in North Carolina, Donham has not commented publicly on calls for her prosecution.

 

District Attorney Dewayne Richardson, whose office would prosecute a case, declined comment on the warrant but cited a December report about the Till case from the Justice Department, which said no prosecution was possible.

 

Contacted by the AP on Wednesday, Leflore County Sheriff Ricky Banks said: “This is the first time I’ve known about a warrant.”

 

“I will see if I can get a copy of the warrant and get with the DA and get their opinion on it,” Banks said. If the warrant can still be served, Banks said, he would have to talk to law enforcement officers in the state where Donham resides.

 

Arrest warrants can “go stale” due to the passage of time and changing circumstances, and one from 1955 almost certainly wouldn’t pass muster before a court, even if a sheriff agreed to serve it, said Ronald J. Rychlak, a law professor at the University of Mississippi.

 

But combined with any new evidence, the original arrest warrant “absolutely” could be an important stepping stone toward establishing probable cause for a new prosecution, he said.

Source

Edited July 16, 2022 by VOSS

[Jotham]

Get her.

[yonsé]

GET HER!!!!!!

[infrared]

They’re still so many racists out there from that period and the holocaust  and new ones coming up 

[Power love]

Is that women still alive?? She must be 80 something now

[Josh]

That little kid deserves justice. 

[James_Dean]

Get her ass 

[Stepfon]

Lock her lying ass up.

[Kylizzle]

I'm surprised there wouldn't be a statute of limitations on a crime like this? She should go to jail either way

[Thinking Of You]

I want that disgusting ugly old stank hoe under the jail. I want her dragged by her hair follicles to the jail cell.

[GraceRandolph]

The Deppford wives should focus on getting her as opposed to focusing on Amber Heard. 

[Seiko Oomori]

lock ha up

[Sesame]

 Lock the old ***** up 

[CaptainMusic]

 

The fact that this evil old hag has just been living her life comfortably for the past 50 years is so infuriating.

 

If those old guards from WW2 can be arrested so should she.

[TROPICUM]

this old hag ***** mother***** stupid ***** woman titanic survivor looking **** *** ******* pug face.

 

Lock her up!

[Virgos Groove]

Lock her up

[bitchfit]

Get her! 

[ToMmY]

Lock that pig up!

[RainDreamer]

Well lock her and her walking kane up then! 

[Hector]

Lock that disgusting racist up 

[Katamari]

9 hours ago, Power love said:

Is that women still alive?? She must be 80 something now

She is. Says so in the article

 

still deserves to rot in prison  

[X~MoviePoP]

JAIL NOW

[John Slayne]

Lock her up! 

[loveisdead9582]

It wold be amazing if they did. Imagine all the racists squirming, thinking about all the things they THOUGHT they got away with…

[Jagger]

They should. What she did is disgusting and she deserves to face consequences