In the movie "Mississippi Burning" many aspects of our civil rights unit were key points in teh movie. Although in the movie the criminals are not convicted of all the crimes committed, in that time it was a big step for civil rights. Even though the punishment for murder was never given in the movie I think that the criminals should have somehow been convicted and charged with murder instead of just a civil rights violation. So in my opinion the punishment did not fit the crime.
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Even before the actual murder took place another crime was commited. The fact that the police pulled over the car with the kids in it for no reason was a form of discrimination and a violation of civil rights. The crime that occured after they pulled them over was murder. Today laws allow a car to drive to a well lit an inhabited area before pulling over which if the law was enacted then could possibly have saved the lives of the boys in the car. The fact that the police were there when the crime was committed and chose not to stop it is a violation for the police even though they technically didn't commit the murder.
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The guilty parties are more than just those at the crime scene. Everyone in that town knew what was going on but being that the town was obviously composed of a racialy bias population the townsfolk chose not to alert the government. In my opinion the police chief who decided to stay at the station should have been charged with some sort of conspiracy charges since he knew what was going on and it is his job to protect the citizens. After the actual crime when the FBI showed up none of the people in the town, including the black population, would not give them information. This means that technically, although it probably could not be proven, the townsfolk, including the black people, were guilty of witholding information.
It is obviously not fair to punish the townspeople because they did not directly commit a crime.