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This FBI prosecutive report concerns the 1955 kidnapping and murder of 14-year-old Emmett Louis Till in Mississippi and the later review of whether additional people could be charged. The Bureau opened the later investigation in May 2004 at the request of the Mississippi Fourth Judicial District attorney after determining that original local investigative and court records were apparently lost. The released material includes a 2006 narrative report, a detailed historical background on segregation and racial violence in the Mississippi Delta, maps and location material, a chronology, and references to trial testimony. It records that Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam were acquitted of murder in 1955, that a Leflore County grand jury later returned no bill on kidnapping charges, and that both men later confessed to a reporter for Look magazine.

FBI file number: 44A-JN-30112 | Documents span: 1955-2006 | Released in 2 parts
Names in this file: Emmett Louis Till, Roy Bryant, John William Milam, Carolyn Bryant, Mose Wright, James O. Eastland
Subjects: civil rights, murder investigation, Mississippi, racial segregation, kidnapping, FBI review