Darrell Evers; Slain Civil Rights Leader’s Son

BURBANK, Calif. — Darrell Kenyatta Evers, the eldest son of slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers, died Sunday of colon cancer. He was 47.

As the oldest child of the NAACP leader, Evers was expected to become politically active, but he took a different path.

He expressed his views through art, and his avant-garde paintings were collected by the likes of Henry Luce II and hair designer Vidal Sasson. His work reflected on prejudice and on his father’s life and death; one painting was titled, “Oh My God, They’ve Moved in Next Door.”

In the 1990s, Evers founded Intellikey Labs in Burbank with his wife, Lauren, creating one of the nation’s largest quality-control DVD companies.

Evers’ death comes a month after that of his father’s killer, white supremacist Byron De La Beckwith. Although the elder Evers, leader of the NAACP in Mississippi, was murdered on June 12, 1963, De La Beckwith wasn’t convicted of the crime until 1994.

In addition to his wife, Evers is survived by his son, Keanan; his sister, Reena Evers-Everette of Los Angeles; his brother, James Van Evers of Los Angeles, and his mother, Myrlie Evers-Williams of Bend, Ore.