A suspected Ku Klux Klansman who faces trial on murder charges next month for the notorious 1964 slayings of three civil rights workers is in serious condition in a Mississippi hospital after a falling tree crushed both his legs, officials said Friday.
Edgar Killen, 80, was rushed to Rush Hospital in Meridian, Mississippi, Thursday after the accident, Newton County Sheriff Jackie Knight said. He was transferred to University Medical Center in Jackson, the state capital, where he was scheduled for surgery Friday.
An avid woodsman and ordained Baptist minister, Killen was arrested two months ago in connection with the murders of Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James Chaney, who were shot on a remote road outside this town 41 years ago.
The arrest occurred shortly after the state reopened a long-dormant investigation into the murders, which helped galvanize support for the civil rights movement and were dramatized in the 1988 movie “Mississippi Burning.”
The trio, all in their 20s, were killed while helping blacks register to vote during the “Freedom Summer” campaign.
Killen has pleaded not guilty to the murders and is free on bond. Jury selection in his trial was scheduled to begin April 18.
“We will just have to wait and see what the extent of his injuries are,” said Neshoba County District Attorney Mark Duncan, the lead prosecutor in the case. “We can be ready for trial at any time, but obviously if it’s some kind of serious injury it may affect the scheduling of the trial.”
Prosecutors say Killen was the mastermind of a Klan plot to abduct and kill the civil rights workers June 21, 1964, shortly after they were released from the local jail where they had been held on charges of speeding and arson.
Killen was among 18 men, including several known Klansmen, who were tried for federal civil rights violations in 1967. Seven were convicted and sentenced to prison terms of between three and 10 years. Killen’s trial ended in a hung jury.
Despite evidence collected by the FBI, state prosecutors did not charge the suspects with murder. No jury in Mississippi had ever convicted whites for killing blacks or civil rights workers.
