Roy K. Moore, FBI agent who led probes into infamous killings of civil rights era
Died Oct. 12, 2008
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Roy K. Moore, an FBI agent who oversaw investigations into some of the most notorious killings of the civil rights era, including those depicted in the movie “Mississippi Burning,” has died. He was 94.
Mr. Moore’s daughter, Sandra Giglio, said he died Sunday in a Madison, Miss., nursing home of complications from pneumonia and other ailments.
Mr. Moore, a former Marine and native of Oregon, had established a solid reputation in the FBI when Director J. Edgar Hoover sent him to Mississippi in 1964 after the disappearance of civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman.
Nearly two months later, their bodies were dug out of an earthen dam in Neshoba County. “Mississippi Burning,” released in 1988 and starring Gene Hackman and Willem Dafoe, was based on the case.
Nineteen men were indicted in 1967 on federal charges of violating the civil rights of Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman. Seven were tried and convicted and served six years or less in prison.
The federal trial ended in a hung jury for Edgar Ray Killen, a part-time preacher and saw mill operator. However, the case was reopened decades later, and Killen was convicted of manslaughter in state court in 2005 and sentenced to 60 years in prison.
Mr. Moore retired from the FBI in 1974 and worked as a security consultant in the banking industry. He also stayed active in civic organizations, his daughter said.
Services will be held Friday in Ridgeland, Miss.
