“I think that mitigates against the fact that he is an elderly man now. “It took (38) years for him to be brought to justice to begin with,” Jones said. While board members could consider Blanton’s advanced age in deciding whether to grant parole, Jones said that shouldn’t be a factor. Evidence against Blanton included secret recordings that were made using FBI bugs at his home and in the car of a fellow Klansman turned informant. Robert Chambliss, convicted in 1977, and Bobby Frank Cherry, who was convicted in the bombing in 2002, both died in prison.īlanton and Cherry were indicted in 2000 after the FBI reopened an investigation of the bombing. Long a suspect in the case, Blanton was the second of three people convicted in the bombing. I’m not saying what I will say until then,” said Rudolph. Thomas Blanton Jr., being led away by Jefferson County Sheriffs deputies after the former Ku Klux Klansman was convicted on for the murder of the four black girls in the 1963 bombing. The church was the scene of a Ku Klux Klan bombing that killed four black girls in 1963. Visitors look at 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala., on Friday, July 29, 2016. NAACP chapters statewide are sending letters in opposition to Blanton’s release, and the Birmingham chapter is sending a busload of people to oppose parole, he said. The president of the Alabama NAACP, Bernard Simelton, said releasing Blanton at a time when protests are occurring nationwide over police killings of black people would send a horrible message. Birmingham, AL was nicknamed 'Bombingham. This undated file photo shows Alabama inmate Thomas Edwin Blanton Jr., a one-time Ku Klux Klansman convicted in the 1963 church bombing that killed four. Robert Chambliss was convicted in 1977, and Bobby Frank. Blanton is the only church bomber still living behind bars. FILE-This undated file photo shows Alabama inmate Thomas Edwin Blanton Jr., a one-time Ku Klux Klansman convicted in the 1963 church bombing that killed four black girls in Birmingham, Ala. Inmates are not allowed to attend parole hearings in Alabama, but opponents of Blanton’s release are expected to address the three-person board when it meets in Montgomery. Today marks 57 years that 11-year-old Denise McNair, and 14-year-olds Addie Mae Collins, Carole Robertson, and Cynthia Wesley were killed by Klansmen, Robert Chambliss, known as Dynamite Bob, Bobby Frank Cherry, and Thomas Edwin Blanton, Jr. Thomas Edwin Blanton Jr was the second of three people convicted in the bombing. (20 June 1938-26 June 2020) was a Ku Klux Klan member who was one of the perpetrators of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in. The board has scheduled a hearing for Wednesday to consider parole for the 78-year-old Blanton. Soon, Alabama’s parole board will decide whether Blanton deserves to be free after serving 15 years of a life term for murder. Today, Blanton is old and imprisoned, the last survivor among three one-time KKK members convicted of murder in the bombing. was a young Ku Klux Klansman with a reputation for hating blacks in 1963, when a bomb ripped a hole in the side of 16th Street Baptist Church, killing four black girls during the civil rights movement.
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