The Supreme Court declined to decide whether the statute of limitations has run on the conviction of James Ford Seale. A little used provision of the law allows a Circuit Court of Appeal to certify a question to the Supreme Court. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals certified a question to the Supreme Court on whether or not Seale was tried within the statute of limitations.

Seale was tried for the 1964 kidnapping by members of the Ku Klux Klan of two African American young men. Under Federal law there is no statute of limitations for capital offenses. Other felonies carry a five year statute of limitations. In 1964 kidnapping was a capital offense. While it is a capital crime now if it results in murder for most of the time between 1964 and the present it was not a capital crime. Thus the question that the Fifth Circuit asked the Supreme Court is whether the 1964 statute of limitations applies or the 2007 statute of limitations.

In 2007 Seale was tried and convicted for the Ku Klux Klan murder of Henry Dee and Charles Moore. Seale appealed to the Fifth Circuit. A three judge panel reversed the conviction on statute of limitations grounds. The panel did not decide other questions raised on the appeal since it reversed the conviction and sent the case back to the District Court. But an en banc decision deadlocked 9 to 9, which reinstated the District Court’s conviction. The en banc court instead of returning the case to the three judge panel for a decision on the other issues raised on appeal certified the question of the statute of limitations to the Supreme Court.

Dee and Moore disappeared in the heat of Mississippi’s Freedom Summer in 1964 when civil rights workers descended upon Mississippi to register African American voters. Even though Dee and Moore were not involved in the civil rights movement or in the registration of voters they were seized by a group of Ku Klux Klan, kidnapped and murdered. But the police and the district attorney were unable to prove the case against Seale or the others in the group. The only witness was a confidential informant who was afraid for his life if he testified or if his name became known publicly. The arrest was only possible after a reporter for 20/20 found the informant, Ernest Gilbert and encouraged to go public with his detailed knowledge of the murder.

Of course after the Fifth Circuit hears the other questions on appeal the case is likely to return to the Supreme Court on direct appeal.

It may be politically incorrect but I have a problem with a prosecution that occurs 43 years after the crime. We are not the same people that we were 43 years ago. Incarceration forty-three years after the crime is hardly going to prevent further crimes. After all few crimes are committed by 72 year olds. No matter how hard we try memories fade and witnesses die in a 43 year period. A trial 43 years later does not have a rehabilitative effect. The only reason to have a trial is to punish the wrong doer and that has little benefit when you are talking about a sick senior citizen.