Hung Jury

TRIALS Hung Jury For the eleven days of his trial, Byron De La Beckwith, 43, accused killer of Mississippi N.A.A.C.P. Leader Medgar Evers, performed more like a circus clown than a defendant in a first-degree murder case. Constantly shooting his French cuffs, he propped his feet up on a nearby chair, swigged soda pop, glowered at Negro news men, hallooed to white spectators, was once restrained by a bailiff from saun tering over to the jury box to chat with his peers, and with the exaggerated Southern courtliness upon which he so much prides himself, even offered cigars to Prosecutor William L. Waller.

But after the jury had been out for a while, Beckwith quit hamming around, sat in tense silence until--22 hours after they had been handed the case for a verdict--the jurors returned to say that they could not agree. Circuit Judge Leon Hendrick declared a mistrial, and Beckwith, with nary a smirk nor a smile, got up and went back to his cell.

No sooner had this celebrated civil rights murder trial ended in a hung jury, split seven to five for acquittal, than there were murmurs of surprise. Many had expected "Mississippi justice." But that was not the case. Judge Hendrick had presided wisely and fairly. Prosecutor Waller, 37, had won the admiration of Northern newsmen for his aggressive presentation. And Defendant Beckwith had been tried be fore a jury of his peers--even if it was all male, all white, and all Mississippian.

"To No One Else." The case against Beckwith, a Greenwood fertilizer salesman, hinged on a .30/06 Enfield rifle, found near a clump of sweetgum trees across the street from Evers' home in Jackson on the morning after the murder. A fingerprint of Beckwith's was found on the weapon's telescopic sight.

Prosecution witnesses identified the rifle as Beckwith's. One told of trading Beckwith a Japanese-made sight--identical to the one on the Enfield--in return for a revolver. An FBI expert swore the fingerprint belonged to Beckwith and to "no one else in the world."

Two Jackson cab drivers told how, four days before Evers was ambushed on June 12, Beckwith had asked directions to Evers' home, saying, "I've got to find where he lives in a couple of days." A young woman said that she had seen a car similar to Beckwith's parked near Evers' house 50 minutes before the shooting. But because the bullet that killed Medgar Evers was too badly shattered to produce positive results in ballistics tests, the state never did prove that it had been fired by the rifle in the sweetgum grove.

"No, Suh." When the defense's turn came, Chief Counsel Hardy Lott, a former president of Greenwood's white Citizens Council, which had solicited funds for Beckwith's defense, called 20 witnesses, compared with the prosecution's 36. Two were Greenwood cops who claimed they had seen Beckwith in Greenwood, a fast 90-minute drive from Jackson, shortly before and after the killing.

The star witness for the defense was "Delay" Beckwith himself, who punctuated his testimony with soft "suhs." "Did you kill Medgar Evers?" asked Lott. "No, suh." Was Beckwith in Jackson the night of the murder? "No, suh." At one point, Lott handed Beckwith the Enfield to examine. Beckwith leaned forward in the witness chair, aimed the gun over the jury's heads and pulled the trigger. Said he: "I couldn't say this is my scope or my gun." Anyway, Beckwith added pleasantly, his Enfield with a telescopic sight had been stolen from his car two days before Evers was murdered.

A Word of Caution. On crossexamination, Waller brought out Beckwith's militant segregationist sentiments. Beckwith admitted writing a letter to a Jackson newspaper in which he said: "I shall bend every effort to rid the U.S. of integrationists, whoever and wherever they may be." As Waller read the excerpt, Beckwith leaned forward to caution him solicitously: "I want you to understand; and where there is humor intended, I want you to laugh and smile; and where it is serious, I want you to be serious."

After the jury went out, Beckwith's wait was relieved by visits from former Mississippi Governor Ross Barnett and onetime Army Major General Edwin A. Walker. Beckwith seemed deeply moved by their presence. At week's end, Beckwith's lawyers prepared to file a motion to get him out of jail on bond while he awaits a new trial, which will probably come in the late spring.

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