Efforts to win local support for a federal investigation into the 1946 murder of a black World War II veteran fell apart on Tuesday night when members of the victim's family stormed out of a county commission meeting.
Relatives of Maceo Snipes, who was gunned down the day after he voted as the first registered black voter in Taylor County, went to the commission meeting with representatives of two civil rights groups to ask for support for a US Justice Department probe into the slaying.
The request came against a backdrop of local resentment over civil rights protests of racially segregated plaques honoring local veterans that have been displayed for decades at the Taylor County courthouse.
After Edward DuBose, president of the state chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and John Cole Vodicka, leader of the Prison & Jail Project, addressed the commission, Commissioner Patty James, a black who has been vocal in her defense of the segregated plaques, asked Snipes' relatives if they were NAACP members.
That angered Vodicka, who objected loudly, and one of the commissioners ordered Sheriff Jeff Watson to escort Vodicka out of the meeting. After a brief standoff, Vodicka, DuBose and the family members all got up and left.
"It was uncalled for -- to intimidate and bully members of the Snipes family, who were here in support of the call for an investigation in their family member's murder," Vodicka said.
The 37-year-old Maceo Snipes was shot on July 18, 1946, a day after he voted in the Georgia Democratic primary.
He died two days later in the local hospital.
Fearful relatives buried him at night in an unmarked grave before some family members fled, relocating as far north as Ohio.
Relatives say Snipes, who served most of his two-year Army hitch in the Pacific, was shot in the back by anywhere from three to six white men.
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