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Council honors Caney Lee Cody Jr.; family corrects biographical detail
Summary
Jacksonville City Council read and adopted a resolution honoring the life and civil-rights work of former detective Caney Lee Cody Jr.; the family presented brief comments and noted a correction needed to the resolution’s stated age.
Jacksonville City Council adopted Resolution 2025-445 honoring the life of Caney Lee Cody Jr., a Gulfport, Mississippi native, Coast Guard veteran and former Duval County law-enforcement officer who persisted in seeking justice in the racially motivated 1964 killing of Johnny May Chappelle. Councilmember Kenneth Marr presented the resolution and family members accepted on behalf of the Cody family.
The resolution recounted Cody’s service in the Coast Guard, his law-enforcement career—rising to detective sergeant at the Duval County Sheriff’s Office—his investigative work on the Johnny May Chappelle case, his authorship of The Fourteenth Denial (2010), and later recognition by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs in 2020. The resolution concludes by honoring his commitment to justice and mourning his recent passing.
Family member Kimberly Cody Waterhouse spoke briefly after the reading; she thanked the council for recognizing her father and noted a factual correction: the resolution text listed his age at death as 90, while she said he was 95. Council members offered brief remarks and presented the resolution to the family in chambers.
Ending: The council adopted the resolution and arranged to correct the age in the official record at the family’s request.
