Warren Kimbro

Background

Warren Aloysious Kimbro was a Black Panther Party member in New Haven, Connecticut. He lived at the New Haven Panther headquarters at 365 Orchard Street, where Alex Rackley was held and tortured for two days under suspicion of being an informant for the FBI's COINTELPRO program.

The offence

Kimbro was found guilty of the May 21, 1969, murder of New York Panther Alex Rackley. After Rackley was held and tortured at the New Haven Panther headquarters, Kimbro, Bridgeport, Connecticut Panther Lonnie McLucas, and national Panther field marshal George W. Sams, Jr. drove Rackley to the marshes of Middlefield, Connecticut. Kimbro and McLucas each shot Rackley, on Sams' orders.

Investigation

At trial, it was established that Rackley was held and tortured for two days at 365 Orchard Street under suspicion of being an informant for the FBI's COINTELPRO program.

Trial

Kimbro was tried in the first of the New Haven Black Panther trials, held in 1970, in connection with the murder of Alex Rackley.

During the trial, Sams testified that national Panther leader Bobby Seale, who had been speaking at Yale University the day before the murder, had personally ordered the killing. There was no corroborating evidence presented to support Sams' testimony. In Seale's subsequent trial, the jury was unable to reach a verdict, and the prosecution chose not to re-try the case.

Kimbro turned state's evidence in exchange for the reduced charge of second degree murder. He received the mandatory life sentence for second degree murder and served four years. Kimbro and Sams both turned state's evidence in exchange for the reduced charge of second degree murder, and they each received the mandatory life sentence and served four years. Many of the people in the New Haven chapter of the Panthers were described as middle class, defined more by propaganda than by their own personalities, and they were young and impressionable.

Michael Koskoff, one of the lawyers for McLucas, said: "Many of the people in the New Haven chapter of the Panthers were middle class. They were defined more by their propaganda than by their own personalities. And they were young and impressionable. At the trial, Sams and Kimbro both turned state's evidence in exchange for the reduced charge of second degree murder, for which each received the mandatory life sentence and served four years. Kimbro afterwards attended Harvard University."

Sentencing

Kimbro received the mandatory life sentence for second degree murder after turning state's evidence. He served four years.

Appeals

The jury in Seale's subsequent trial was unable to reach a verdict, and the prosecution chose not to re-try the case.

Outcome

Kimbro had been found guilty of the May 21, 1969, murder of Alex Rackley in 1970, in the first of the New Haven Black Panther trials. After trial developments, Kimbro was convicted under the reduced charge of second degree murder and served four years of the mandatory life sentence.

Aftermath

For more than 20 years, Kimbro was president and CEO of Project MORE, a non-profit agency in New Haven that offered both day programs and residence to ex-convicts, helping them to re-enter society.

Kimbro later attended Harvard University. He died on February 3, 2009.

The Rackley case and Kimbro's journey from murderer to one who rehabilitates convicts were the subjects of a 2006 book, Murder in the Model City: The Black Panthers, Yale and the Redemption of a Killer by Paul Bass, editor of The New Haven Independent, and Douglas Rae, professor of management and political science at the Yale School of Management (Basic Books, 304 pages).

Other details

Commentators believed that Sams orchestrated the murder to cover up the fact that he was the informant and agent provocateur, though they had no corroborating evidence to prove the claim. The narrative also included an urban legend that Hillary Clinton defended Bobby Seale and helped him get acquitted; this was said not to be the case because Clinton was a student at the time and not a lawyer. The legend also claimed that Kimbro and Al Gore became friends at Harvard; it was noted that Gore attended Harvard from 1965 through 1969, several years before Kimbro.