Esau Copeland

Case summary

Incident

According to C. Dallas Mobley’s Nov. 17, 1952 Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) report, relatives of Esau Copeland contacted Special Agent John Paul Slayden on Oct. 31, 1952 to report that Copeland “had been murdered and robbed by Sheriff S.H. Gill and his deputies of Meriwether County.”

Mobley reported that Daniel Duke, attorney for the Copeland family, said that on the evening of Oct. 29, 1952, Copeland had driven his 1941 Chevrolet to the home of Buck Latham in Shiloh. According to both Copeland’s family and Duke, Copeland worked as a tenant farmer for Latham. That night, Copeland was due to receive his $300 crop settlement.

Later that evening, James Copeland, Esau’s stepson, discovered the Chevrolet in a field about four miles from Latham’s home. When James Copeland arrived at the scene, he encountered Meriwether County Sheriff Sutton H. Gill, who told Duke that Gill urged him to “get going.” Duke told the FBI that James Copeland later returned to the scene with other family members. When they arrived, James Copeland recounted to Duke, they noticed that the car’s tires had been shot, there was “evidence of a scuffle” and Esau Copeland’s wallet was empty.

On Nov. 5, 1952, Gill told FBI agents that around midnight on Oct. 29, he received word from a state revenue agent, Bill H. Moore, that Copeland was intending to transport bootlegged alcohol in Warm Springs that night. Moore allegedly told Gill that he and Bill Hall, Warm Springs town marshal, had Copeland’s license plate number.

According to Gill, Moore trailed Copeland on the “Columbus to Warm Springs highway” that evening. Moore told Gill that Copeland was driving around 90 mph when he crashed his car in an unsuccessful attempt to turn. Moore told Deputy Sheriff Cecil Perkins that, during the pursuit, he fired two shots at Copeland’s car in an attempt to stop him. Moore got out of his car to investigate and, according to Gill, collected a spare tire that had been “thrown from the trunk” of Copeland’s car. Moore claimed that when he went to return the tire to the car, he discovered an “old blanket.” Gill told Moore to solicit Hall’s help as they searched for Copeland.

The FBI also spoke with D.B. Phillips, chief of the Harris County Police Department, who stated that he also reported to the scene that evening to help find Copeland. It was around 1 a.m., Phillips stated, when Moore, Hall, and Phillips discovered Copeland’s body “in the weeds some thirty or forty feet where his automobile was lying,” covered in a blanket.

Phillips stated the three officers transported Copeland to Johnson’s Hospital in Meriwether.

According to Dr. Lawson Johnson, Copeland arrived at the hospital around 2 or 3 a.m. Johnson told the FBI that Copeland was “accompanied” by Moore, Hall, and 10 to 15 “unidentified Negroes.” At the time of his admission, Johnson said, Copeland was unconscious and in a “state of shock.” Covered in dirt and grass, Copeland had a broken left arm, several rib fractures, and a six-inch scalp wound.

Copeland died at the hospital at 10 p.m. on Oct. 30. Johnson listed Copeland’s cause of death as “Cerebral Concussion.” In his interview with the FBI, Johnson said that he did not take any x-rays as part of Copeland’s examination, nor did he perform an autopsy. Copeland’s body, Johnson said, bore no signs of “physical mistreatment.” The family told Duke that Copeland’s head was bruised and appeared to have been hit “by some blunt instrument.”

Johnson also told agents that Copeland’s wallet was intact but empty.

Aftermath

The FBI, the Georgia State Crime Laboratory, and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) began an investigation into Esau Copeland’s death after his family contacted the FBI and Duke on Oct. 31.

GBI Special Agent Rubin Smith told the FBI in a November 1952 interview that he accompanied Dr. Herman Jones of the Crime Laboratory to the scene on Nov. 2. Smith stated that the car, “lying in a ditch on the right side of the highway,” was missing its wheels and tires. By measuring the skid marks that the car left before it crashed, Smith determined that the car had been traveling at about 72 mph. Smith believed that the car rolled over two or three times before coming to a stop.

About 14 steps from the car, Smith told the FBI, he discovered “pressed down,” bloody grass. The area, which Smith believed was where Copeland’s body had been lying, was separated from the car by a barbed wire fence.

Smith stated that he did not find any bullet holes in the car, but he spoke with a relative named Joe Copeland, either misnamed or mistakenly identified as Esau’s brother, who said that the right front tire had been shot out. Copeland gave Smith a bullet that Copeland said he found in the car and pointed out several bullet holes, but Smith stated in his FBI interview he believed they were “obviously not bullet holes.”

Jones told the FBI that the bullet Copeland gave them “could not have been fired from [Moore’s] revolver,” as a ballistics test revealed that, though the ammunition was of the same caliber, it was “different.” He also believed that the bullet had been “carried in someone’s pocket for a long period of time” because it was “slick on the flat side.” Jones stated that if someone had shot a bullet into the car’s tire, it would have been “torn to pieces.”

Jones performed an autopsy on Nov. 2, which Smith was present for. Smith and Jones both told the FBI that they did not find any bullet holes in Copeland’s body, nor did they see, as Jones put it, any “signs of physical violence or mistreatment.” Copeland was buried later that day at Bethlehem Cemetery in Hamilton, Harris County.

According to Mobley’s November 1952 FBI Report, Duke told FBI agents “that it was his understanding” that it was Sheriff Gill who had been chasing Copeland on suspicion of bootlegging, but did not find any alcohol in the car following the crash.

In his FBI interview, Gill stated that he believed the investigation demonstrated that “the victim had died as a result of his own illegal acts in attempting to escape from and outrun a state officer.” While officials did not find any alcohol in Copeland’s car, they did discover an onion sack, which Gill explained was “generally used by bootleggers for hauling cans of non-tax paid illegal whiskey.”

The FBI concluded in November 1952 that Duke’s allegations about what happened to Copeland were “unfounded.” Mobley wrote, “Sheriff Gill and his deputies were not present and did not participate in the incident."

In January 1953, the Department of Justice (DOJ) determined that “the reported facts” of Copeland’s case did not “indicate a violation” of his civil rights, and closed the case.

A 1958 Macon city telephone directory indicates that Moore was still employed as an agent for Georgia’s Revenue Department. Gill died in Woodbury, Georgia in 1963.

Media Gallery

Case summaries are compiled using government records and archival primary source material. These include, but are not limited to, investigative records, arrest reports, newspaper articles, court filings, census records, birth and death certificates, transcripts, and press releases. In many cases, the records contain contradictory assertions.

In addition to the incident files associated with this case, this summary relied on the following:

Sources

Genealogical Records

• Certificate of Death for Meriwether County, Georgia, United States, 1952, Georgia Department of Public Health
• City Directory for Macon, Georgia, United States, 1958
• Indexes of Vital Records for Georgia: Deaths, 1919-1998, Georgia, United States, 1963, Georgia Health Department
• Population Schedule for Harris County, Georgia, United States, 1920, 1930, 1940, 1950
• Population Schedule for Meriwether County, Georgia, United States, 1950
• World War II Draft Registration Cards, Georgia, 1940, 1942

Newspaper Articles

• “51 Arrested in Meriwether Liquor Raids,” Atlanta Constitution, December 17, 1952
• “Meriwether Agents Jail 60 on Illegal Liquor Counts,” The Columbus Ledger (Columbus, GA), December 17, 1952