Pa. Mayor Surrenders on Murder Charges
CNSNews.com
Friday, May 18
The mayor of a Pennsylvania town surrendered to authorities Thursday on charges of murder in the 1969 shooting death of a black woman during race riots.
York Mayor Charlie Robertson was a York police officer on July 21, 1969 when Lillie Bell Allen was fatally shot by a white mob during the riots. The 27-year-old mother of two and the daughter of a black minister had been visiting from Aiken, S.C.
In an affidavit filed in conjunction with the mayor's arraignment, Rick Lynn Knouse, one of five men charged in the case, told a grand jury that Robertson gave him ammunition for his hunting rifle and told him to "kill as many [expletive] as you can." The affidavit charged Robertson "acted as an accessory before the fact of the crime of first-degree murder" in Allen's death.
The mayor denied involvement in the attack, but admitted to yelling "white power" at a rally the night before Allen was murdered. He announced he would turn himself in at a press conference Wednesday, one day after winning the Democratic nomination for a third term in office, beating Ray Crenshaw, the first black to run for mayor in the city's history. "I am not a racist," Robertson said. "My job is to comfort and heal the city of York."
Copyright CNSNews.com
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