Justice Department closes investigation into Emmett Till killing after failing to prove key witness lied

The Justice Department has officially closed its investigation into the infamous killing of Emmett Till without federal charges for a second time, leaving only more questions after a potentially significant claim from one of the last living witnesses led investigators on a fresh hunt for evidence.

(Original Caption) Friends restrain grief-stricken Mrs. Mamie Bradley (left) as her son’s body is lowered into the grave after a four day, open casket funeral. The 15-year old Negro youngster, Emmett Till, was shot and clubbed to death last week in Greenwood, Mississippi. He is believed to have been murdered for allegedly whistling at a white woman. Two men have confessed kidnapping the youth by deny killing him.

In 2017, professor Timothy Tyson unearthed what appeared to be a key piece of evidence in one of the most haunting and grisly murders documented in the Jim Crow Era: a recantation from the woman at the center of the case who had accused Till of making sexual advances at her over 60 years ago.

Yet after an exhaustive investigation, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division has now concluded it cannot prove the woman lied to federal investigators about her story.

After CNN reported the development in the case earlier Monday, the department subsequently made public a memo explaining the evidence investigators reviewed and its reasons for closing the matter without federal charges.
Read more here:https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/06/politics/emmett-till-case-closed/index.html