BOB ABERNETHY: Now, a special report. Twenty-five years ago this past week, in Greensboro, North Carolina, there was a shooting that left five people dead and the city polarized. But recently, a group of volunteers formed what they call a Truth and Community Reconciliation Project. The idea is to try to find out what happened that day and, the organizers hope, to create some forgiveness and healing. Lucky Severson has the story -- which includes dramatic film footage of the shootings.

LUCKY SEVERSON: The Reverend Nelson Johnson, reliving the violence in Greensboro of 25 years ago that he can't seem to get out of his system:

Reverend NELSON JOHNSON (Pastor, Faith Community Church): It was right in this area that Cesar was shot and Jim was shot. People were within 15 yards of each other.

SEVERSON: Where were you?

Rev. JOHNSON: Actually, I was on this side of the street when I was stabbed, when the shooting started.

SEVERSON: It was November 3, 1979. Johnson was at an anti-Klan rally and parade sponsored by the Communist Workers Union Party. Several cars carrying Klansmen and Nazis showed up uninvited. Shots were fired. Minutes later, five demonstrators were dead. Ten others, including Nelson Johnson, were wounded.

On this Sunday at his Faith Community Church in Greensboro, Reverend Johnson is still trying to reconcile himself to what happened.

Rev. JOHNSON (Speaking to Congregation): Isn't truth a good thing? Isn't reconciling people a good thing? Isn't restorative justice a good thing?

SEVERSON: Reverend Johnson was a driving force behind the recent creation of the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission, fashioned after those in South Africa, Rwanda, and other countries that have attempted to come to terms with their past. It's the first of its kind in this country.

The seven-member commission, which is privately funded, has been given 18 months to complete its mission, which includes reviewing evidence and interviewing witnesses. But unlike some commissions, this one has no legal standing to compel testimony -- or even to indict.

Rev. JOHNSON: We have no interest of placing anyone in jail. Most of the people who were trigger pullers and police officers are up in years. It would really defeat our purpose to do that.

SEVERSON: Still, there have been other commissions with no subpoena powers that have been quite successful. According to the International Center for Transitional Justice, which has worked with several commissions, including the one in Greensboro, countries like Peru, El Salvador, and Guatamala have apparently all benefited from the truth-seeking process.

Observers say even when perpetrators haven't come forward, the testimony of the victims, although painful, often proves to be cathartic. The goal of all these commissions is to prevent what happened from happening again.

But Greensboro Mayor Keith Holliday says what worked elsewhere won't necessarily work here.

KEITH HOLLIDAY (Mayor, Greensboro, NC): I don't think they are going to get more to the truth than what we already know what the truth is.

SEVERSON: Despite the mayor's skepticism, the commission appears to have fairly broad-based support from throughout the community. Still, the mayor thinks the commission will do more harm than good.

Mayor HOLLIDAY: A lot of eyes from across the nation are going to look at Greensboro and re-conjure up the image that Greensboro's a battleground. And this wrong perception of Greensboro is going to be portrayed across the country at a time when that is the last thing that we want.

SEVERSON: There was a time when Greensboro was a battleground. The sit-in at the Woolworth's soda fountain in 1960 put Greensboro on the civil rights map.

Mayor HOLLIDAY: It really sparked the revolution around the country for sit-ins. And of course, we are very proud of that.

SEVERSON: It wasn't that Greensboro had more racial problems than any other Southern city, although it had its share. But after the famous sit-in, Greensboro became a symbol of the struggle for equality. Some say the deadly rally in 1979 was mostly about race. On the other hand, Harold Greeson, an attorney for one of the Klan defendants, says the rally was nothing more than an attempt to organize workers in Greensboro's textile plants.

HAROLD GREESON (Attorney): I suppose since the incident took place in a black neighborhood in Greensboro, some would think it was race, but it was a bunch of communists who staged the rally hoping to gain some recruits for membership in unions -- taking over the country by taking over labor unions.

SEVERSON: Signe Waller was one of the rally organizers that day, a member of the Communist Workers Party. She says it is impossible to separate race from workplace equality.

SIGNE WALLER: Racism is interwoven in the whole fabric of the social system. You can't really separate it. We were organizing workers across racial lines. That was very threatening to some people, the Klan.

SEVERSON: Signe's husband, Dr. Jim Waller, a pediatrician, was one of two doctors gunned down that day.

Ms. WALLER: He really cared about people: very humble; perfectionist; thought about other people. He was thinking that he had to help people, that he had to save lives.

SEVERSON: The only woman and the only African American killed was Sandi Smith.

Rev. JOHNSON: Sandi Smith was like a young sister to me. It was a heartbreaker to have to call Sandi's mother -- to tell her that her beautiful, young daughter, an excellent student, was shot in between her eyes trying to help children get out of the way, out of a barrage of bullets.