Prosecutor closes case of 3 civil rights workers slain in 1964 with no new charges filed. Here’s why. https://t.co/3Cfv598sMD

— The Associated Press (@AP) June 21, 2016

The decision “closes a chapter” in the state’s divisive civil rights history, Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood said.

“The evidence has been degraded by memory over time, and so there are no individuals that are living now that we can make a case on at this point,” Hood said.

He said, however, that if new information comes forward because of the announcement that the case is closed, prosecutors could reconsider and pursue a case.

The 1964 killings of James Earl Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner in Neshoba County sparked national outrage and helped spur passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. They later became the subject of the movie “Mississippi Burning.”

Monday, their relatives said the focus should not be only on the three men, but on all the people killed or hurt while seeking justice.

“The civil rights period was not about just those three young men,” said the Rev. Julia Chaney Moss, Chaney’s sister and a New Jersey resident. “It was about all of the lives.”

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