Mississippi journalist wins Lovejoy Award

WATERVILLE – An investigative reporter from Mississippi told an audience at Colby College that he had his life threatened by Ku Klux Klan members when writing newspaper stories that sent some Klan members to prison for decades-old crimes.

Jerry Mitchell was recognized Sunday night for his efforts when he received Colby’s 2006 Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award, which is given annually to a journalist who defends the freedom of the press.

Mitchell, a writer for The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, also received an honorary degree from Colby.

Mitchell said he first became interested in the Ku Klux Klan after seeing “Mississippi Burning,” the 1988 movie about the murders of three civil rights workers in 1964.

It infuriated him that killers walked free, “even though everyone knew they were guilty,” Mitchell said.

In the years to come, Mitchell’s reporting led to the imprisonment of the Klan’s Imperial Wizard, Sam Bowers, for ordering the fatal fire bombing of NAACP leader Vernon Dahmer in 1966; Bobby Cherry, for the 1963 bombing of a Birmingham church that killed four girls; and Ray Killen, who helped orchestrate the 1964 killings that inspired “Mississippi Burning.”

Mitchell said he believes the truth should always be told.

“There is such a thing as the truth: Somebody killed somebody and got away with it,” he said.

The Lovejoy Award was established in 1952. It’s named for a Colby graduate who was murdered in 1837 while defending his press against a pro-slavery mob in Illinois.

Previous winners of the Lovejoy Award include Bill Kovach, David Halberstam, Ellen Goodman, Studs Terkel, and Daniel Pearl, who received the 2002 award posthumously.