Edwin Roscoe Stephenson (March 8, 1870 – August 4, 1956) was a minister of the now defunct Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and a member of the Ku Klux Klan.
[1] He shot and killed Catholic priest James Coyle on August 11, 1921, in Birmingham, Jefferson County, Alabama, but was acquitted of murder.
[3] A side-line clergyman, Stephenson worked as a barber and married people, for a fee, in the Jefferson County Court House.
[4] A well-known member of the Ku Klux Klan, he killed Coyle one hour after 18-year-old Ruth married a Catholic, 44-year-old Pedro Gussman, whose Spanish parents lived in Puerto Rico.
Coyle's sister and housekeeper both testified by stating that there had been no raised voices or scuffling prior to the shooting, contradicting Stephenson's claim that he had fired in self-defense after the priest threatened and assaulted him.