Not long ago I noted that, contrary to the post-trial statements of Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood and Neshoba County District Attorney Mark Duncan, there is proof James Chaney was tortured, and there is evidence he was shot by more than one person. At the time of the original state autopsies, the families of James Chaney and Michael Schwerner requested additional, independent autopsies, which were conducted by Dr. David Spain of Scarsdale, NY:
"We made the request because the state had been so hostile to us and was engaged in a campaign of denying the murders," said Schwerner's widow, Rita Bender of Seattle. "That we were right is exemplified by the fact that the state of Mississippi issued a death certificate for Michael Schwerner, which was sent to me some weeks after the Featherstone autopsies, which stated that Mickey's cause of death was 'unknown.' "
After Spain concluded that James Chaney's body was "totally decimated" by those who tortured him, William Featherstone, the medical examiner who conducted the original state autopsies, teamed up with the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission to bring ethics charges against Spain to the College of American Pathologists.
When Spain was quoted in the media about his conclusions, Featherstone angrily contacted the commission, saying Spain never contacted him and that a second autopsy can't be performed without permission from the pathologist who made the original examination.
Another reason for that anger was that Spain's statements "conflict sharply with the official autopsy," commission documents show.
Featherstone obtained the commission's help in filing an ethics complaint against Spain with the College of American Pathologists. "The complaint has also been filed with the executive director of the college," commission documents show. "The matter is scheduled for hearing at the annual meeting of the College of American Pathologists at Miami, Florida, October 16, 1964."
During their post-conviction question and answer period Duncan and Hood "said that they knew much more about the case, including who actually killed the three, than they were allowed to tell jurors in court."
Duncan said Wayne Roberts and James Jordan, both of Meridian, were actually responsible for shooting the young men, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner. Roberts shot Goodman and Schwerner, he said, and Jordan shot Chaney, they said.
The autopsy photograph and signed autopsy reports, obtained by the Clarion Ledger in 2000, prove that James Chaney was tortured. Sovereignty Commission files say that James Chaney
was shot at several times by several different people but was struck by only three bullets, each of which was alleged to have been fired from a different firearm."
James Hood and Mark Duncan do not state that James Chaney was beaten. The Attorney General and the District Attorney claim there were only two gunmen, one who shot Schwerner and Goodman and one who shot Chaney.
In his closing arguments for the prosecution of Edgar Ray Killen, Jim Hood bragged:
I wanted to be here myself, I didn't want to have any regrets. That I did my duty to the victims and their families.
Which side are you on, boys, which side are you on?
Which side are you on, boys, which side are you on?
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Read Dr. David Spain's account of his Mississippi Autopsy.
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