A Colorado man’s quest for justice for his dead brother gained a measure of hope Tuesday as prosecutors asked a federal appeals court to reconsider a decision to overturn the conviction of a reputed Ku Klux Klansman convicted last year for the abductions of two black teenagers slain in 1964.
James Ford Seale, 73, was serving a life sentence for kidnapping and conspiracy related to the abduction of Charles Eddie Moore and Henry Hezekiah Dee.
Moore’s brother, 65-year-old Thomas Moore of Colorado Springs, pressed for the investigation, located Seale and convinced the star witness against Seale to step forward.
The 19-year-olds had been hitchhiking in southwest Mississippi when they were abducted, beaten, weighted down and thrown into a Mississippi River backwater.
Seale’s conviction was overturned Sept. 9 when a panel of three 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judges ruled the statute of limitations for kidnapping had expired before Seale’s arrest.
The U.S. Justice Department claims the panel overlooked an important court precedent and erroneously applied a statute of limitation.
Seale’s attorneys disagreed.
“We remain confident that the panel decision was correctly decided,” said Kathy Nester, Seale’s federal public defender.
Authorities in Mississippi are trying to determine if there is enough evidence to charge Seale with murder, if his acquittal is upheld. There’s no statute of limitations on murder.
Seale and another man, Charles Marcus Edwards, faced state murder charges in 1964, but federal prosecutors said the charges were thrown out because local law enforcement officers colluded with the Klan.
Many people thought Seale was dead until 2005, when Moore tracked him down in the tiny town of Roxie, not far from where the teens were abducted. After the case was reopened, Edwards, at Moore’s request, agreed to testify against Seale and was ultimately promised immunity.
Edwards testified he was with Seale when the teens were kidnapped but not when they were thrown, still alive, into the river.
