Evers was assassinated by Byron De La Beckwith, a member of the “White Citizens' Council, a group formed in 1954 to resist integration of schools and civil rights activity in America. His murder and the resulting trials led to many civil rights protests. An all-white jury failed to convict De La Beckwith in his first two trials. He was finally convicted, however, 30 years later in a new state trial in 1994 that was based on new evidence. Evers’ wife Myrlie Evers, later became a noted activist in her own right, serving as national chair of the NAACP. His brother Charles Evers became the first African-American mayor elected in the state of Mississippi in 1969 in Fayette, Mississippi. 