An Oklahoma judge dismissed the reparations lawsuit filed by the last three known survivors of the Tulsa race massacre on Friday, court records show.
The three had been locked in a yearslong court battle against the City of Tulsa and other groups and officials over the opportunities taken from them when the city’s Greenwood neighborhood was burned to the ground in 1921.
Contemporary reports of deaths began at 36, but historians now believe as many as 300 people may have died, according to the Tulsa Historical Society and Museum. Thousands were left homeless.
Lessie Benningfield Randle, 108, Viola Fletcher, 109, and her brother, Hughes Van Ellis, 102, were among the plaintiffs, CNN previously reported.
The City of Tulsa requested the lawsuit be dismissed with prejudice against refiling, arguing in part that “simply being connected to a historical event does not provide a person with unlimited rights to seek compensation from any project in any way related to that historical event.”
Family attorneys are expected to address the possibility of an appeal. Family members for Randle could not immediately be contacted.
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