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Guilty verdict to free Rideau
Manslaughter term less than 44 years already served
By ADAM NOSSITER
Associated Press writer
LAKE CHARLES, La. - In the nation's bloodiest prison, Wilbert Rideau became a thinking man, an award-winning journalist who has been called "the most rehabilitated inmate in America." Now, after more than 40 years behind bars, he is a free man.
Rideau, a confessed killer and a black man whom three all-white juries had convicted of murdering a white bank teller in 1961, walked free late Saturday after a racially mixed jury found him guilty of the lesser crime of manslaughter.
"It offers hope to the black community. It's a new day," said the Rev. J.L. Franklin of Lake Charles, who has led a minister's group that has been pushing for years for Rideau's release.
Rideau has never denied that he killed Julia Ferguson and shot two other bank employees on Feb. 16, 1961 after holding up the branch where they worked. Testifying for the first time in this trial, he said it was an act of panic.
He was freed late Saturday. Since he has spent nearly 44 years in prison - more than double the 21-year maximum for manslaughter when the crime occurred - he was immediately released.
Rideau was a janitor and eighth-grade dropout when he held up the bank three days after his 19th birthday. In the Louisiana State Penitentiary, he became a self-educated writer and helped transform The Angolite into a nationally acclaimed magazine dealing with the criminal justice system.
He also co-directed "The Farm," a prison documentary that was nominated for an Oscar in 1999, and wrote and narrated an award-winning National Public Radio documentary.
Two governors turned Rideau down for pardons, under strong pressure from citizens in Lake Charles, despite repeated board recommendations for his release. In 2000, a federal appeals court said his original 1961 indictment was flawed because blacks were excluded from the grand jury.
Prosecutors wanted another murder conviction because it would have meant life in prison for Rideau, whose death penalty was among hundreds set aside after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1972 that all state death penalties then in effect were unconstitutional.
Franklin said Rideau spent the night with his mother and sisters, who seemed numb, after a jubilant celebration with his attorneys.
"Wilbert was just so elated. We were all just extremely excited. And amazed that he is free. We were all very excited and Wilbert's talking about his projects."
Everyone was taken aback because Rideau already had plans and was ready to move on them, Franklin added.
Rideau left Lake Charles on Sunday morning, said Linda LaBranche, a legal researcher who worked with the Rideau Project at Loyola University in New Orleans and who runs Rideau's Web site.
"We wanted to get him out of Lake Charles as soon as possible. We're all concerned for his safety in Lake Charles," she said.
Don Hickman, whose father, branch manager Jay Hickman, was one of two people whom Rideau shot and left for dead, responded, "I think that's BS. These people here are not going to try to kill him.
"I don't even know of any rednecks around here who would be dumb enough to do that."
Hickman said he thought jurors didn't know a manslaughter verdict would bring immediate freedom for Rideau, and might have convicted him of murder if they had.
"I was telling a friend of mine this morning we'll just have to learn to live with it," said Hickman, who said people he had talked to were disappointed by the verdict.
Will blacks and whites in Lake Charles now be able to discuss the case together? "I don't think they'll talk in the same vein," he said.
Hickman said testimony about police incompetence was something of a revelation to him. "They really screwed it up," he said.
Shortly before the jury was handed the case, Rideau's attorney Julian Murray suggested that racism had distorted the crime, keeping local passions inflamed.
"You have to understand that time, and then it comes together," Murray said. "You think they would hesitate to exaggerate the facts of the case, to get the result they wanted?"
Ferguson's stabbing on a lonely rural road was "a terrible act, a criminal act, one for which he deserves great punishment, but not one for which he deserves to be locked up for the rest of his life," Murray said. "He did a terrible thing, but it wasn't murder."
Prosecutors derided that contention, saying the crime was deliberate and coldly executed.
Franklin, who attended every day of the trial, said prosecutors "were just out-lawyered."
He and LaBranche said key facts kept from widespread knowledge in Rideau's home town - for instance, refutation of the longstanding statement that Rideau had slashed Ferguson's throat - apparently played into the jury's decision.
Prosecutors' refusal to reveal such details built up a "myth" about the killing, he said. "I don't think it will cave down easily," Franklin said. He said it also "almost even short-circuited" healing for the victims' families.
Manslaughter term less than 44 years already served
By ADAM NOSSITER
Associated Press writer
LAKE CHARLES, La. - In the nation's bloodiest prison, Wilbert Rideau became a thinking man, an award-winning journalist who has been called "the most rehabilitated inmate in America." Now, after more than 40 years behind bars, he is a free man.
Rideau, a confessed killer and a black man whom three all-white juries had convicted of murdering a white bank teller in 1961, walked free late Saturday after a racially mixed jury found him guilty of the lesser crime of manslaughter.
"It offers hope to the black community. It's a new day," said the Rev. J.L. Franklin of Lake Charles, who has led a minister's group that has been pushing for years for Rideau's release.
Rideau has never denied that he killed Julia Ferguson and shot two other bank employees on Feb. 16, 1961 after holding up the branch where they worked. Testifying for the first time in this trial, he said it was an act of panic.
He was freed late Saturday. Since he has spent nearly 44 years in prison - more than double the 21-year maximum for manslaughter when the crime occurred - he was immediately released.
Rideau was a janitor and eighth-grade dropout when he held up the bank three days after his 19th birthday. In the Louisiana State Penitentiary, he became a self-educated writer and helped transform The Angolite into a nationally acclaimed magazine dealing with the criminal justice system.
He also co-directed "The Farm," a prison documentary that was nominated for an Oscar in 1999, and wrote and narrated an award-winning National Public Radio documentary.
Two governors turned Rideau down for pardons, under strong pressure from citizens in Lake Charles, despite repeated board recommendations for his release. In 2000, a federal appeals court said his original 1961 indictment was flawed because blacks were excluded from the grand jury.
Prosecutors wanted another murder conviction because it would have meant life in prison for Rideau, whose death penalty was among hundreds set aside after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1972 that all state death penalties then in effect were unconstitutional.
Franklin said Rideau spent the night with his mother and sisters, who seemed numb, after a jubilant celebration with his attorneys.
"Wilbert was just so elated. We were all just extremely excited. And amazed that he is free. We were all very excited and Wilbert's talking about his projects."
Everyone was taken aback because Rideau already had plans and was ready to move on them, Franklin added.
Rideau left Lake Charles on Sunday morning, said Linda LaBranche, a legal researcher who worked with the Rideau Project at Loyola University in New Orleans and who runs Rideau's Web site.
"We wanted to get him out of Lake Charles as soon as possible. We're all concerned for his safety in Lake Charles," she said.
Don Hickman, whose father, branch manager Jay Hickman, was one of two people whom Rideau shot and left for dead, responded, "I think that's BS. These people here are not going to try to kill him.
"I don't even know of any rednecks around here who would be dumb enough to do that."
Hickman said he thought jurors didn't know a manslaughter verdict would bring immediate freedom for Rideau, and might have convicted him of murder if they had.
"I was telling a friend of mine this morning we'll just have to learn to live with it," said Hickman, who said people he had talked to were disappointed by the verdict.
Will blacks and whites in Lake Charles now be able to discuss the case together? "I don't think they'll talk in the same vein," he said.
Hickman said testimony about police incompetence was something of a revelation to him. "They really screwed it up," he said.
Shortly before the jury was handed the case, Rideau's attorney Julian Murray suggested that racism had distorted the crime, keeping local passions inflamed.
"You have to understand that time, and then it comes together," Murray said. "You think they would hesitate to exaggerate the facts of the case, to get the result they wanted?"
Ferguson's stabbing on a lonely rural road was "a terrible act, a criminal act, one for which he deserves great punishment, but not one for which he deserves to be locked up for the rest of his life," Murray said. "He did a terrible thing, but it wasn't murder."
Prosecutors derided that contention, saying the crime was deliberate and coldly executed.
Franklin, who attended every day of the trial, said prosecutors "were just out-lawyered."
He and LaBranche said key facts kept from widespread knowledge in Rideau's home town - for instance, refutation of the longstanding statement that Rideau had slashed Ferguson's throat - apparently played into the jury's decision.
Prosecutors' refusal to reveal such details built up a "myth" about the killing, he said. "I don't think it will cave down easily," Franklin said. He said it also "almost even short-circuited" healing for the victims' families.
