No Federal Prosecution in Emmett Till Case (Another MSM Scandal?)

After an investigation of more than a year, the federal government has decided not to prosecute anyone for the murder or kidnapping of Emmett Till and has handed the case to the local Mississippi District Attorney Joyce Chiles.

According to the a story published in USA Today: "She's in a very tough spot, either way it goes," said David Beito, a historian at the University of Alabama who has studied the Till case extensively and doubts there is enough evidence to file any criminal charges."Let's say she doesn't prosecute. There's been a lot of hype, and that has raised expectations. But if she does prosecute, there will be people saying this is a weak case. I would not want to be in her shoes."

While prosectors will probably not release the results of the FBI investigation until completion of a local inquiry, by all indications, it did not find evidence to justify the sensational claims over the past two years. This should be no surprise to anyone who has looked closely into the case. As Linda Royster Beito and I pointed out in a HNN article, the worst major offender was"60 Minutes." In a sloppy and poor researched report by Ed Bradley in 2004, it alleged that "more than a dozen people may have been involved in the murder of Emmett Till and that at least five of them are still alive."

Assuming no final surprises, the rest of the media will deserve to be roundly condemned when the final report appears for its spectacular failure to scrutinize, or even question, the wild allegations made by"60 Minutes" and others. These (apparently) false claims have unduly raised expectations and created much false hope.