Clifton Walker

Clifton Walker, 37, a World War II veteran and father of five, was shot to death in his car on Poor House Road outside Woodville late on the night of February 28, 1964, while driving home from his late shift at the International Paper Company plant in Natchez. His car was ambushed and riddled with close-range shotgun blasts; he was found dead in the vehicle the next afternoon. The killing is believed to be among the first carried out by the newly formed White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, which was responsible for several other Mississippi civil-rights-era murders. Mississippi Highway Patrol investigators recommended two suspects for arrest in 1964, but the local district attorney declined to prosecute, citing insufficient evidence. The DOJ's Civil Rights Division formally closed its file in 2013, naming three men — Prentiss Mathis, Carl Cavin, and Red Metcalf, all reported deceased — as subjects.

Woodville, MS · Wilkinson County

• 1964: Case opens — victim reported missing or found.
• Documented milestones (renewed investigation, media coverage, family advocacy) to be added as sourced.
• Present: case remains unresolved. No named suspect has been convicted.

• Victim identity, background, and the February 28–29, 1964 date and circumstances, per the DOJ's public case file.
• The DOJ's 2013 Notice to Close File names three subjects, all reported deceased.

• No one was ever charged in Walker's killing.
• The relationship, if any, between the two suspects Mississippi Highway Patrol recommended in 1964 and the three subjects later named in the DOJ's 2013 closure has not been publicly reconciled.

• U.S. Department of Justice — Civil Rights Division case page
• U.S. Department of Justice — Notice to Close File
• Project Cold Case
• Murder Accountability Project
• NamUs