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CNN Live Today

Third Suspect in 1963 Alabama Church Bombing to Be Tried

Aired May 13, 2002 - 11:14   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Now we turn to the south, where one of the tragedies in the civil rights history books will be recalled today in a courtroom in Birmingham, Alabama. This case involves the last man accused in the murder of four girls and the bombing of a Birmingham church. It was nearly 40 years ago.

Opening statements could come today. Our Brian Cabell has more.

BRIAN CABELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Thirty-nine years have passed since that awful Sunday in 1963; that day when a bomb rocked the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham. Four girls getting dressed in their white satin choir robes were killed instantly when bricks and mortar came raining down on them. The city mourned, the nation mourned. And Martin Luther King Jr., officiating at the funeral, warned against hating those who had planted the bomb.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.: Love your enemies. Bless them that curse you.

CABELL: The bombing came at a time when segregation was still the law throughout much of the south. And the Ku Klux Klan was frequently the enforcer, especially in Alabama. Birmingham acquired the nickname "Bombingham."

The FBI investigation pointed to four Klansmen as suspects in the case. But FBI Chief J. Edgar Hoover determined there wasn't enough evidence to charge them.

Eight years passed, and then a crusading Alabama Attorney General, Bill Baxley, reopened the case and charged Bob Chambliss, one of the original suspects, with murder, got him convicted and sent him to prison for life. Chambliss died behind bars in 1985.

More than a decade later, the files in the case were opened yet again.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The state grand jury has returned the indictment.

CABELL: Two more of the original suspects, Tom Blanton and Bobby Frank Cherry were charged. The fourth suspect had already died. Blanton was convicted of murder last year and sent to prison for life. That's where he resides today. But Cherry was ruled mentally incompetent to stand trial. A subsequent ruling did find him competent. And, now, 39 years after the crime, Bobby Frank Cherry, professing his complete innocence, will get his day in court.

This will likely be the final chapter of a story that horrified a nation, frustrated investigators, and left the victims' families wondering why it has taken so long.

(on camera): Brian Cabell, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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