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The Mississippi Burning Trial (united States vs. Price et al.): A Trial Account
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reportedly had announced at a Klan meeting when the impending arrival in Mississippi of an army of civil rights workers was discussed, "Hell, I've got a dam that'll hold a hundred of them." The bodies were placed together in a a hollow at the dam site and then covered with tons of dirt by a Caterpillar D-4.
While the bodies were being buried, Price had returned to his duties in Philadelphia. Around 12:30 A. M., Price met with Sheriff Rainey. Given their Klan membership and the close relationship between the two, it is almost unimaginable that at that time Price did not relate, in full detail, the events following the release from jail of Schwerner, Goodman, and Chaney.
At the CORE office in Meridian, meanwhile, staffers were growing increasingly concerned about the long overdue civil rights workers. Calls inquiring about their whereabouts turned up no helpful information. At 12:30 A.M., a call was placed to John Doar. the Justice Department's point man in Mississippi. Less than a week earlier Doar had been in Oxford, Ohio warning Summer Project volunteers that there was "no federal police force" that could protect them from expected trouble in Mississippi. Doar feared the worst. By 6:00 A.M., Doar had invested the FBI with the power to investigate a possible violation of federal law.
The morning after the civil rights worker's disappearance, the phone rang in the office of Meridian-based FBI agent John Proctor. (In the movie "Mississippi Burning," the character played by Gene Hackman is loosely based on Proctor.) Within hours, Proctor was in Neshoba County interviewing blacks, community leaders, Sheriff Rainey, and Deputy Price. Proctor was a Alabama native who had successfully cultivated relationships with all sorts of people, including local law enforcement officers, who might aid in his investigations. After his interview with Cecil Price, the Deputy slapped Proctor on the back and said, "Hell, John, let's have a drink." Price went to his car and pulled contraband liquor out of his trunk.
By the next day, June 23, Proctor had been joined by ten newly arrived special agents and Harry Maynor, his New Orleans-based supervisor. The first big break in the FBI investigation, called MIBURN (for "Mississippi Burning"), came when Proctor received a tip that a smoldering car had been seen in northeast Neshoba County. While Proctor was at the scene, searching the area around what turned out to be the burned blue CORE station wagon, he looked up to see Joseph Sullivan, the FBI's Major Case Inspector. It was by then abundantly clear that the Johnson Administration was placing top priority on the case. By June 25, the federal military had joined the search, with busloads of sailors arriving in Neshoba County to beat their way through snake-infested swamps and woods. Days later, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover would fly to Jackson to announce the opening of the FBI's first office in Mississippi.
It soon became apparent to Inspector Sullivan the case "would ultimately be solved by conducting an investigation rather than a search." It turned out to be an extraordinarily difficult investigation. Neshoba County residents, many * of whom either participated in the conspiracy or knew of it, were tight-lipped. Proctor found that some of his most useful information came from kids, so he would stuff candy in his pockets before setting out for a day's schedule of interviews. A promise of $30,000 in reward money finally brought forward information, passed through an intermediary, concerning the location of the bodies. (Jerry Mitchell, an investigative reporter with
http://law2.umkc. edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/price&bowers/Account.html
6/18/2013