An African American, Lemuel Penn joined the Army Reserve from Howard University and served as an officer in World War II in New Guinea and the Philippines, earning a Bronze Star.
[2] In the 1940s, Penn had worked for Gunnar Myrdal on the landmark study of race relations, An American Dilemma, and is cited in that book's acknowledgments.
Penn was driving home, together with two other black Reserve officers,[2] to Washington, D.C. from Fort Benning, Georgia returning from their annual summer training camp.
Their Chevrolet Biscayne was spotted by three white members of the United Klans of America[3] – James Lackey, Cecil Myers and Joseph Howard Sims – who noted its D.C. license plates.
On June 27, 1966, criminal proceedings began against Sims, Myers, Lackey, and three other local Klansmen, Herbert Guest, Denver Phillips, and George Hampton Turner.