# Reopening the Emmett Till case **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 24, 2004, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954 "2004-10-24T23:14:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2004, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/1 "2004-10-24T23:14:19Z")
On _60 Minutes_, this evening, they’re doing a segment on the 1955 murder of Emmett Till. For those who don’t know: Emmett Till was a black teenager who travelled from Chicago to Mississippi to visit relatives. While there, he whistled at a white woman-whose husband and brother-in-law then kidnapped, tortured and shot Till. Despite overwhelming evidence, a jury found them Not Guilty. Shortly after the trial, the accused granted an interview and freely confessed to the crime. [CBS Reports on Emmett Till Probe](http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20041021/ap_on_re_us/civil_rights_slaying_1). Now, they’re looking into whether or not the wife of one of the murderers, Carolyn Donham (then Bryant), was also involved in the killing. What are your thoughts on this? Will justice finally be done? ---
**Author:** ![rfgdxm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c0e974/32.png) [@rfgdxm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rfgdxm)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2004, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/2 "2004-10-24T23:19:28Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > What are your thoughts on this? Will justice finally be done? Barring dramatic new evidence, I worry more that someone innocent will end up taking the blame at this late date. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2004, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/3 "2004-10-24T23:29:05Z")
I want them to go after the jury. Dirty, rotten bigots. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/4 "2004-10-25T01:22:55Z")
One of the greatest injustices in US history. Emmett was from the backwoods and was visiting his cousins. He was painfully shy and had a severe stutter. He had been warned to be very careful around the white folk and was probably extremely nervous inside the store. There is a technique that people who stutter use, or used to use anyway, to help them reduce the stuttering. They whistle for a little while before speaking. That’s probably where the whistling came in. It infuriates me to even think about Mr. Till and what he went through. I hope they get the bastards that did it so they can spend the rest of their miserable life in jail and their families and neighbors will always know how shamefully sub-human they acted. They should out the people on that jury too. Haj ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/5 "2004-10-25T01:27:19Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > One of the greatest injustices in US history. > > Emmett was from the backwoods and was visiting his cousins. Actually, he was from Chicago. Hardly the backwoods. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/6 "2004-10-25T02:08:24Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > One of the greatest injustices in US history. > > Emmett was from the backwoods and was visiting his cousins. He was painfully shy and had a severe stutter. He had been warned to be very careful around the white folk and was probably extremely nervous inside the store. > > There is a technique that people who stutter use, or used to use anyway, to help them reduce the stuttering. They whistle for a little while before speaking. That’s probably where the whistling came in. > > It infuriates me to even think about Mr. Till and what he went through. I hope they get the bastards that did it so they can spend the rest of their miserable life in jail and their families and neighbors will always know how shamefully sub-human they acted. > > They should out the people on that jury too. > > Haj According to the report on 60 minutes, Mrs Bryant reached for a gun when the whistling incident happened. There was also a women present in the car when Till was picked up. If the story is correct she is an accessory to murder and there is no statute of limitations for it. I won’t print my feelings on the matter but suffice it to say I didn’t have Jesus in my heart when I saw the report. I hope every person they ever met saw that program. I second the idea of outing the jury. The fact this guy got paid $4000 to confess to murder… I just can’t… damn I’m mad. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/7 "2004-10-25T02:14:16Z")
Are any of the jury members still living? If that had been a white teenager, most likely, she’d have shoved him off and told him to come back when he grew some pubes. Or something. I found it interesting that Donham wouldn’t come out and talk to Bradley. You know, you gotta wonder-how she still feels about it. Not even an expression of remorse, or acknowledgment of the part she played in the whole thing? Even though it’s been almost fifty years, and it was long before I was born, every time I read about it, it just makes my blood boil, that things like this can happen. ---
**Author:** ![rfgdxm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c0e974/32.png) [@rfgdxm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rfgdxm)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/8 "2004-10-25T02:52:56Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > I found it interesting that Donham wouldn’t come out and talk to Bradley. You know, you gotta wonder-how she still feels about it. Not even an expression of remorse, or acknowledgment of the part she played in the whole thing? Regardless if she is guilty or innocent, her lawyer surely would have told her never to make any comments on this case. What does she have to gain by doing so? ---
**Author:** ![pokey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ebca7d/32.png) [@pokey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pokey)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/9 "2004-10-25T03:41:07Z")
I watched 60 Minutes tonight too (Jon Stewart) and I was trying to eat dinner but I couldn’t finish it. I knew the Emmett Till story before, but boy, it makes you cry. It gives you a stomach ache to cope with so much sadness and anger when you think about that kind of evil. It really struck me when the man said that even though all the participants would be elderly now, they would still go to jail. There is something comforting about the idea that people maybe think they get away with something, that they are special and privileged and that deep down it was okay that they didn’t save a kid, but that 50 years later they might find out that they were very mistaken and that someone will stand up for that kid even though they didn’t. I don’t have much to say about it. I would really hope that if anyone involved is still alive that they will have to face up to what they did. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/10 "2004-10-25T04:03:54Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Actually, he was from Chicago. Hardly the backwoods. I garbled that. He was visting the backwoods and didn’t know the “customs” there. Haj ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/11 "2004-10-25T04:05:09Z")
> [@rfgdxm](#): > > Regardless if she is guilty or innocent, her lawyer surely would have told her never to make any comments on this case. What does she have to gain by doing so? She might have done so years ago, or whatever. Expressed some form of remorse. Gain-hell, who cares? What ever happened to doing the right thing, simply because it’s the right thing? A boy was brutally murdered and she was partly to blame. You can’t tell me that doesn’t eat at her conscience. At least, I hope it does. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/12 "2004-10-25T17:09:17Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > There is a technique that people who stutter use, or used to use anyway, to help them reduce the stuttering. They whistle for a little while before speaking. That’s probably where the whistling came in. As Till’s cousin told the story, Till turned around and whistled at her as they were leaving the restaurant. (The woman was 21 at the time, and he was not the shy type.) Then they ran to their car and drove like hell. The rest of them knew the trouble they could get in for what he’d done and I expect they impressed that upon him quickly. > [@Guinastasia](#): > > A boy was brutally murdered and she was partly to blame. You can’t tell me that doesn’t eat at her conscience. At least, I hope it does. If it doesn’t, it can eat at her conscience while she sits in jail. I’ll wait. I saw this story tonight too, and like a lot of people learned a lot of new things about the case. I don’t know if I’d seen the photo of Till’s corpse before. I remember thinking it must’ve been horrible for her to see her son after the damage she and they described, so I sure as hell wasn’t expecting to hear she’d had an open-casket funeral! ---
**Author:** ![Kythereia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e8c25b/32.png) [@Kythereia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kythereia)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/13 "2004-10-25T17:10:41Z")
I’m sitting here reading the backstory and I can’t finish my lunch. My God… ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/14 "2004-10-25T17:11:35Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Gain-hell, who cares? What ever happened to doing the right thing, simply because it’s the right thing? I meant to add- you’re expecting a woman who helped her husband and a friend murder a black kid to do the right thing? ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/15 "2004-10-25T17:33:33Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > I meant to add- you’re expecting a woman who helped her husband and a friend murder a black kid to do the right thing? Color me insanely optimistic, color me hopelessly naive. I just hope that the passage of time has allowed her to reflect on what happened. She did end up divorcing Bryant-their lives after the event were never the same-their store had to close (no one would do business with them), they couldn’t get work in most places, etc. If George Fucking Wallace could have a change of heart, why couldn’t she? I knew about the open casket-in 11th grade, our teacher showed us _Eyes on the Prize_, and I believe they had footage of his funeral. (Although I don’t recall his body looking that horrid) ---
**Author:** ![Shrinking\_Violet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@Shrinking\_Violet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shrinking_Violet)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/16 "2004-10-25T18:33:22Z")
I saw a documentary about this quite recently, and it left me sick to my soul. ☹ Emmett’s mother was (is?) an amazing woman - she held the open-cask funeral to bring home to people the sheer horror of what happened, and I believe it was a turning point in race relations in the US. I shall go to my grave full of admiration for that woman … so brave, strong and dignified. Anyone know what happened to her? ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/17 "2004-10-25T18:43:08Z")
> [@Shrinking Violet](#): > > Emmett’s mother was (is?) an amazing woman - she held the open-cask funeral to bring home to people the sheer horror of what happened, and I believe it was a turning point in race relations in the US. I shall go to my grave full of admiration for that woman … so brave, strong and dignified. Anyone know what happened to her? Mamie Till-Mobley died in January 2003. [Here’s a Washington Post story about her.](http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A25041-2003Jan7?language=printer) ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/18 "2004-10-25T18:59:05Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > I want them to go after the jury. I don’t think we want to go there. The independence of the jury is a cornerstone of our system. It’s bad enough when a jury has to fear riots if they don’t return the “right” verdict. If a jurror has to worry about a civil rights lawsuit if he or she returns the “wrong” verdict, our right to a jury trial would become meaningless. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/19 "2004-10-25T19:03:32Z")
It was a landmark case for another reason: it was the first time a black man testified against whites. Till’s grandpa(?) was asked to identify the men who’d come to his house to kidnap Till. “Are any of these men in the courtroom?” “Thar he.” ---
**Author:** ![Random](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/57b2e6/32.png) [@Random](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Random)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2004, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954/20 "2004-10-25T20:21:25Z")
Ever? In the whole U.S.? Cite, please. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reopening-the-emmett-till-case/270954.md?page=2)