(NewsNation) — Nearly 70 years after Emmett Till’s murder, Deborah Watts, the victim’s cousin and the co-founder of the Emmett Till Legacy Foundation, says justice has yet to be served in the case.
Till was brutally murdered in August 1955 after whistling at a white woman named Carolyn Bryant in a Mississippi grocery store.
Bryant’s husband and brother-in-law dragged Till, 14, from his bed in the middle of the night, brutally beat him, shot him in the head and threw him in a river. The two men were acquitted in his murder.
“Let’s figure out how we can turn things around in this country, so that we don’t have more Emmetts repeated, as we currently have in this country,” Watts said Wednesday night on “CUOMO.” She referenced Ahmaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin and Breonna Taylor.
“I think that’s the lesson … We need to make sure that systemic racism is not part of the fabric, and the DNA of America, which it is … but what are the things we can do to effect change?”
Wattz also told “CUOMO” that she wants justice served against Bryant, the white woman who accused Till of flirting with her.
“His mother wanted justice … Her wishes were that all of those that were involved in Emmett Till’s kidnapping and murder would be prosecuted,” Watz said.