Pepper said the CIA could have fabricated the records. Youre going to kill somebody and then drop the gun right there? Ray claimed that he had given the gun to Raul, but only Rays fingerprints were on the gun. His family believes James Earl Ray was framed. John Karl Kershaw (October 12, 1913 September 7, 2010) was an American attorney best known for challenging the official account of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968, claiming that his client James Earl Ray was an unwitting participant in a ploy devised by a mystery man named Raul to kill the civil rights leader. [7], Ray committed a variety of crimes prior to the murder of King. Unbeknownst to Ray, however, a death sentence would have been commuted as unconstitutional under the de facto moratorium in place since 1967 and following Furman v. Georgia. I would not accept the fact that James Earl Ray pulled the trigger, and thats all that matters, said Young, who noted that Kings death came after the killings of John F. Kennedy and Malcolm X and just months before the slaying of Robert F. Kennedy. Lincoln was assassinated by a Democrat, John Wilkes Booth in 1865. [49] On June 9, 2000, the United States Department of Justice released a 150-page report rejecting allegations that there was a conspiracy to assassinate King, including the determination of the Memphis civil court jury. Astrological Sign: Pisces, Death Year: 1998, Death date: April 23, 1998, Death State: Tennessee, Death City: Nashville, Death Country: United States, Article Title: James Earl Ray Biography, Author: Biography.com Editors, Website Name: The Biography.com website, Url: https://www.biography.com/crime/james-earl-ray, Publisher: A&E; Television Networks, Last Updated: May 3, 2021, Original Published Date: April 2, 2014. In fact, he did not testify in King v. Jowers, despite the fact that he was the party being sued. At one point, he claimed a person named Raul told him to kill King, but theres no convincing proof of such an idea, according to Sides. Whatever the exact details were that led him to Memphis in April 1968, Ray rented a room at a rooming house under the name Eric Starvo Galt, near the Lorraine Motel, where King was staying. He was a democrat. The jury also affirmed overwhelming evidence that identified someone else, not James Earl Ray, as the shooter, and that Mr. Ray was set up to take the blame. Cities were burning. After returning to Alton and moving back in with his grandmother, he blazed through a number of odd jobs. At the time, it was said to be the FBI's most expensive and biggest investigation in its history. WebJames Earl Ray was the assassin of American Baptist minister and civil rights activist, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Ray was born in on March 10, 1928 in a poor Irish-American family At the age of 16, Ray left his parents and returned to Alton, where he moved in with his grandmother and landed work in the dye room of the International Shoe Tannery. Campbell said Jowers had been recorded saying that he would tailor his story for financial gain. Also at issue is the difference between Ray's guilty plea in 1969, which avoided his undergoing a criminal trial, and the case cited by the rumors, which was a civil trial heard in 1999. The original mug shot of James Earl Ray included with the memo from the FBI to the Belleville News-Democrat. Snopes and the Snopes.com logo are registered service marks of Snopes.com. Jowers also reported that he hired a hit man to shoot Dr. King from behind Jim's Grill and received the murder weapon prior to the killing from someone with a name sounding like Raoul. On April 4, 1968, Ray stood in the bathtub of the bathroom, balanced his rifle on a window ledge and shot King as the civil rights leader was standing on a balcony outside of his motel room. Who killed Martin Luther King Jr.? Now weve got to do something about this, weve got to give them something, just enough to quiet them down, not enough to make a difference. Johnson continued, Ill have those ni**ers voting Democrat for the next 200 years.. After this, Ray was on the run and was captured in the UK. After all, the FBI stalked King and his cohort in order to, as Sides puts it, ruin and smear the civil rights movement. The ugly reach of that campaign has only become clearer over the years. The man who was charged with King's murder, James Earl Ray, confessed to the crime and pled guilty; he then recanted his confession, hinted at a conspiracy, and sought to withdraw his guilty plea and secure a trial. He drove away in a white Ford Mustang before the area was barricaded, went to Atlanta and then to Canada and England before being arrested in July 1968. Later, in the early 1990s, he suggested a conspiracy involving the government had been behind the assassination. "I had nothing to do with killing your father," Ray said. The NAACP sent Rosa Parks to investigate. James Earl Ray did not have cancer. JFK conspiracy theories: The grassy knoll, Umbrella Man, LBJ and Ted Cruzs dad, Dave Garrow, a Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer of King, said that the King children are part of a larger population of American people who need to believe that the assassination of a King or a Kennedy must be the work of mightier forces rather than victims of small-fry, lifetime losers., People need to see something of a balance between effect and cause, Garrow said. [39][40][41] William Pepper, a friend of King during the last year of his life, represented Ray in a mock trial televised by HBO in an attempt to grant him the trial he never received. 1995 - 2023 by Snopes Media Group Inc. The Democrat Party and Biden are no longer slave owners to Black America as they have a right to make an independent and educated decision. Martin Luther King Jr. met Malcolm X just once. Evidence does suggest that Ray had little stomach for the integration policies that were sweeping the country. WebJames Earl Ray was an American assassin convicted for the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. After his conviction, he spent all his life in prison. In 2000, even after reviewing the results of the 1999 civil trial in Memphis, Kowalski concluded that Ray was guilty and that there was no government conspiracy. Frederick Rudolph Yokom. His claim was that the assassination was the result of a conspiracy of the otherwise unidentified man named "Raul who was a blond Cuban. Democrats, Biden still trying to enslave Black America. On the map, the locations of the church and residence of Martin Luther King Jr. were circled. Because Ray suddenly pleaded guilty in 1969, less than a year after the shooting, there was no trial. In the years following Ray's arrest, questions arose about his exact involvement in King's murder. He then grabbed some belongings in a blanket, stashed the rifle in it, left the building and dropped the bundle in the doorway of a nearby building. His body was cremated and his ashes were flown to Ireland, the home of his maternal family's ancestors. We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back. 23, 1998, at the age of 70. The verdict came as the Justice Department was reinvestigating the case because of Jowerss claims and those of a former FBI agent who said he had found evidence in Rays car in 1968 linking him to Raul but had withheld it until 1997. Pepper was sued once for defamation, by an Army soldier he accused of participating in the conspiracy, and a South Carolina judge entered an $11 million default judgment against him in 2000. All of this is therefore a very slender thread on which to hang the claim that the "U.S. government was proved responsible for King's assassination." Over the next several years, Ray embarked on a number of small crimes, serving various jail times. What Political Party was James Earl Ray part of? President Lyndon B. Johnson sold them into the Democrat plantation stating, These Negroes, theyre getting pretty uppity these days and thats a problem for us since theyve got something now they never had before, the political pull to back up their uppitiness. His son RFK Jr. doesnt believe it was Sirhan Sir How the assassinations of 1968 led the NRA to become the lobbying force it Two sprinters gave the black-power salute at the Olympics. Idaho Murders: What Led Police to Bryan Kohberger, Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads, Name: James Earl, Birth Year: 1928, Birth date: March 10, 1928, Birth State: Illinois, Birth City: Alton, Birth Country: United States. I dont know, but Im not assuming anything, and Im not going to make up a conspiracy, which seems to be a popular thing these days. The one time Jowers did testify under oath about his allegations in an earlier civil suit, Ray v. Jowers, he repudiated them. [13], He considered emigrating to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), where a predominantly white minority regime had unilaterally assumed independence from the United Kingdom in 1965. [2] James Earl Ray was the oldest of nine children,[3] including John Larry Ray,[4] Franklin Ray, Jerry William Ray,[5] Melba Ray, Carol Ray Pepper, Suzan Ray, and Marjorie Ray. Another is the shaky foundation on which the conspiracy theory rests is a matter of some nuance. The verdict presented by the parties and adopted by the jury is incompatible with the weight of all relevant information, much of which the jury never heard. [52], Ten years later, Ray's other brother, John Larry Ray, co-authored a book with Lyndon Barsten titled Truth At Last: The Untold Story Behind James Earl Ray and the Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.[39]. Biden supported Planned Parenthood, whose founder, Margaret Sanger referred to blacks as human weeds and wanted abortions to exterminate the black population. Findings by federal authorities and the House Select Committee on Assassinations are confident about some things. James Earl Ray, a career criminal who had briefly served in the U.S. Army, shot the advocate of non-violent resistance. He has claimed that while in Montreal he met a man named Raul, of varying physical descriptions over the years, who enlisted him in several small gunrunning schemes, and instructed him to buy a rifle in Birmingham, Ala. On the afternoon of April 4, Ray checked into a boardinghouse in Memphis, with a bar called Jims Grill on the first floor. No I didn't." Then figure out what the total cost of the trip would be.? By allowing ads to appear on this site, you support the local businesses who, in turn, support great journalism. For over 25 years following the assassination, James Earl Ray, his defenders, and others consistently referred to the man who allegedly framed Ray as Raoul. WebJames Earl Ray Escapes. Best Known For: James Earl Ray is infamous for assassinating civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968. He had Irish, Scottish and Welsh ancestry and had a Catholic upbringing. Ray struggled to adapt to military life and was eventually discharged for ineptitude and lack of adaptability in 1948. Kershaw convinced Ray to submit to a polygraph test as part of an interview with Playboy. In a statement about the 1999 civil suit, Coretta Scott King cited several unrelated and unspecified agents in her description of the parties she believed were responsible for her husband's murder: There is abundant evidence of a major high level conspiracy in the assassination of my husband, Martin Luther King, Jr. And the civil court's unanimous verdict has validated our belief. What are the disadvantages of shielding a thermometer? I want to make it clear that my family has no interest in retribution. The full transcript of the trial remains posted on the King Centers website. Its still a mystery to me, Bernice King said. During a rainstorm on February 1, 1968, two black sanitation workers in Memphis lost their lives when the trucks compactor Convicted assassin of Martin Luther King Jr. (19281998), Speeches, writings, movements, and protests, Initial convictions and first escape from prison, Martin Luther King Jr. assassination conspiracy theories, Interview with James Earl Ray by John Auble, United States House Select Committee on Assassinations, "James Earl Ray, 70, Killer of Dr. King, Dies in Nashville", "The assassin's brother: John Larry Ray marks time in Quincy, still trying to set the record straight", "James Earl Ray: The Man Who Killed Dr. Martin Luther King, chapter 3", "Report of laboratory, FBI headquarters to Memphis, Apr. He escaped from the prison in April 1967, and some believe he had help from prison authorities, as part of the opening stanza of the conspiracy. James Earl Ray was white. U.S. House Select Committee on Assassinations, Martin Luther King Jr. Records Collection Act, King: A Filmed Record Montgomery to Memphis, The Witness: From the Balcony of Room 306, Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story, Joseph Schwantner: New Morning for the World; Nicolas Flagello: The Passion of Martin Luther King. I Am a Man: The ugly Memphis sanitation workers strike that led to MLKs assassination, The King family has lauded Pepper repeatedly, and he was honored by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference for his unceasing commitment in the pursuit of justice., I think the people of this country are entitled to know the truth, Pepper said. James Earl Ray, the man who confessed to killing Martin Luther King Jr. later recanted and insisted he was set up by a man named "Raul." Moreover, Jowers' repudiations, even under oath, his failure to testify during King v. Jowers, his refusal to cooperate with our investigation, his reported motive to make money from his claims, and his efforts along with his friends to promote his story all suggest a lack of credibility. Rays lawyer J.B. Stoner was a known white supremacist, and Ray who also made clear his admiration for Hitler had done volunteer work for the 1968 presidential campaign of Alabamas former segregationist Governor George Wallace, who had gone head-to-head with King in Birmingham, Selma and Montgomery. I never saw those questions answered.. In court, Ray answered the standard series of questions about whether he was knowingly and voluntarily admitting he committed murder. According to the criminal justice system of the state of Tennessee, James Earl Ray fired the shot from the second-floor bathroom of the boardinghouse. Consequently, Jowers has only confessed in circumstances where candor has not been required by law or where he has not been required to reconcile his prior inconsistencies. WebJack Kershaw. But he found it difficult to adapt to the military's strict codes of conduct. James Earl Ray was white. Why do you assume he was a Democrat? By that time, the Dixiecrats were rapidly becoming Republicans - so if he WAS a registered democrat, it was ju The New York Times. After Byrd, the racist recruiter for the KKK died in 2010, Biden did his eulogy and praised the former Grand Kleagle as his mentor and dear friend.. He was convinced that he would escape capture because of his intelligence and cunning, and he also believed that Governor of Alabama George Wallace would soon be elected to the presidency, so that Ray would only be confined in prison for a short time, pending a presidential pardon by Wallace. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. Ray began to claim that the man he knew only as Raul was present in Memphis on April 4, and that Ray himself was at a nearby gas station when the shot was fired. Intermittently, rumors have circulated on social media holding that the United States government was found guilty in 1999 of conspiring to assassinate Martin Luther King, Jr. And he asserted that he did not "personally shoot Dr. King," but may have been "partially responsible without knowing it," hinting at a conspiracy. Republicans introduced the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to end slavery, give citizenship, and give Black America the right to vote. With rates currently down to half that in 2018 (18%), these theories seem unlikely to go away any time soon. BND archives Ray blinked in the original photo. You can unsubscribe at any time. They were recaptured on June 13. Ray hired Jack Kershaw as his new attorney, and Kershaw publicly argued and promoted Ray's claim that he was not responsible for the assassination of King. Check here if you would like to receive subscription offers and other promotions via email from TIME group companies. James Earl Ray died in 1998. Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library, Washington, D.C. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library, San Jose, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=James_Earl_Ray&oldid=1142126272, American people who died in prison custody, People extradited from the United Kingdom to the United States, Prisoners who died in Tennessee detention, United States Army personnel of World War II, Short description is different from Wikidata, Wikipedia indefinitely move-protected pages, All Wikipedia articles written in American English, Pages using infobox person with multiple parents, Articles with unsourced statements from May 2022, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, 99 years in prison (1 year was added after his re-capture for a total of 100 years), This page was last edited on 28 February 2023, at 17:21. And their view of the case is shared by other respected black leaders. Yes, the President is part of the political party. Indeed, compelling evidence including Rays fingerprints on the rifle that was later determined to be the murder weapon seemed to point to him. Ray told this version of the assassination and his flight during the following two months to journalist William Bradford Huie. The Rhodesian government expressed its disapproval. Karen Whitsett, a black state senator from Michigan, simply said, Thank you to President Trump for saving her life through the treatment of hydroxychoroquine. The mock trial jury finally acquitted Ray. At that point, Hardin On June 10, 1977, Ray and six other convicts escaped from Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary in Petros, Tennessee. I say that in the hope of creating an awareness of how this happened, and that the involvement of government in these events may cease with respect to other leaders who will emerge.. Ballistics tests could not prove that the rifle dropped outside the boardinghouse, a Remington .30-06 Gamemaster, either did or didnt fire the fatal shot, because the gun did not create distinctive grooves on the bullet, as most guns do. It didnt help that Rays story kept changing. Georgia Democrat State Representative Vernon Jones also received backlash from Georgia Democrats for endorsing President Trump. Ray pleaded guilty to the murder of King on March 10, 1969. Hoover was so angry, he had hate in his heart. [21], After purchasing the rifle and accessories, Ray drove back to Atlanta. The Justice Department also found the evidence presented in the civil trial to be lacking in credibility: The evidence introduced in King v. Jowers to support various conspiracy allegations consisted of either inaccurate and incomplete information or unsubstantiated conjecture, supplied most often by sources, many unnamed, who did not testify. Nor have any of the conspiracy theories advanced in the last 30 years, including the Jowers and the Wilson allegations, survived critical examination. He paid $8.50 for a weeks stay. But Rays sudden guilty plea stopped all official investigations. This material may not be reproduced without permission. In addition to his segregationist beliefs, he also saw a big payday, some historians have said, in killing Black leaders like H. Rap Brown, Stokely Carmichael and, of course, King. Ray was given a 20-year sentence at MSP. He was constantly in and out of prison so he never voted. He was a segregationist but neither a Republican or a Democrat. Ray began claiming that a man he had met in Montreal back in 1967, who used the alias "Raul," had been involved in the assassination. The year women refused to stay silent, tossed their bras and redefined poli To fight the status quo, the activists of 1968 harnessed the power of fashi MLK was dead. Even the reference of aint is racist as to say those in Black America are not educated. However, any claim made by Ray about his guilt or innocence should be weighed against his strong incentive to be freed from prison (where he died in 1998). The rifle Ray had purchased in Birmingham was found near the front of the boardinghouse with Rays fingerprints on it. On July 19, he returned to U.S. and the following March he pleaded guilty to murdering King. Democrats fought a bloody civil war against Lincoln and the Republicans plan to free Black America. [10], While in Mexico, Ray, using the alias Eric Starvo Galt, attempted to establish himself as a pornographic film director. Inspired by the failed jail break by James Earl Ray, the man convicted for the assassination of civil rights activist Martin Luther King and serving a 99-year sentence, This verdict is not only a great victory for my family, but also a great victory for America. By 1964, Democrats knew they were losing the battle against Black America. Pepper wrote three books outlining the conspiracy, most recently The Plot to Kill King in 2016, which were largely ignored by the media. I think there was a major conspiracy to remove Doctor King from the American scene, said Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), a 78-year-old civil rights icon. And so after 50 years, the King assassination seems destined to remain mired in controversy, the subject of infinite debate over whether Ray was a lone gunman inspired by racism, a hired assassin aided by secret government forces, or simply a patsy manipulated to kill a civil rights hero. [6] Ray left school at the age of 12. Write to Olivia B. Waxman at olivia.waxman@time.com. Ray was a known criminal, on the lam after escaping a Missouri state prison when he committed the assassination, and had more than two dozen known aliases for himself before he was put behind bars again. No vast sums of money were awarded (the Kings sought only $100), and Ray was not exonerated. A package was abandoned close to the site that included a rifle and binoculars, both found with Ray's fingerprints. He also bought a Redfield 2x-7x scope, which he had mounted to the rifle. Please try again later. He was trying to depart the United Kingdom for Angola, Rhodesia, or apartheid South Africa[30] using the falsified Canadian passport. Ray was white and was quickly drawn to Wallace's segregationist platform. However, President Trump has pumped fear into the Democrats as his policies are benefiting Black America. [32][33], Airport officials noticed that Ray carried another passport under a second name. In exchange for his plea, prosecutors did not seek the death penalty and Ray was sentenced to 99 years in prison. In 2000, the report authored by assistant attorney general Barry Kowalski found that Jowers had changed his story repeatedly and that neither he nor the ex-FBI agent were credible. Is this who we now are? WebJames Earl Ray deceased in prison; was a U.S. prisoner, and a British prisoner, apprehended June 8, White was arrested after a citizen recognized him from an article in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat newspaper. Ray was born on March 10, 1928, in Alton, Illinois, the son of Lucille Ray (ne Maher) and George Ellis Ray. Do you also find that others, including governmental agencies, were parties to this conspiracy as alleged by the defendant? We strive for accuracy and fairness.If you see something that doesn't look right,contact us! James Earl Ray was a supporter of George Wallace - who was a democrat in the 1960s but was on the side of segregation, which when you hear about t Further, he has also renounced his confessions in certain private conversations without his attorney. A confirmed racist and small-time criminal, James Earl Ray began plotting the assassination of revered civil rights leader .css-47aoac{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-decoration-thickness:0.0625rem;text-decoration-color:inherit;text-underline-offset:0.25rem;color:#A00000;-webkit-transition:all 0.3s ease-in-out;transition:all 0.3s ease-in-out;}.css-47aoac:hover{color:#595959;text-decoration-color:border-link-body-hover;}Martin Luther King Jr. in early 1968. The photo still haunts us with what was lost. He had entered a guilty plea on the advice of his attorney, Percy Foreman, to avoid the sentence of death by electrocution, which would have been a possible outcome of a jury trial. But that biography doesnt explain why or how Ray moved from committing property crime and supporting racists, to killing a national icon. No other parties (including any branches or agents of the United States Government) were named as defendants in King v. Jowers, and no identification was provided by Jowers of the purported other parties with whom he colluded to assassinate King. "Memphis Jury Sees Conspiracy in Martin Luther King's Killing" He was charged with drunkenness and breaking arrest, before getting discharged for ineptness and lack of adaptability in 1948. Asked about the King familys suspicions, an FBI spokesman responded in a statement that the government has revisited the assassination four times: Findings from these reviews support the FBIs conclusion that James Earl Ray, acting alone, fired a rifle once, fatally wounding Dr. King on April 4, 1968, at the Lorraine Motel.. The Republican Party was formed in 1854 as an anti-slavery party with Abraham Lincoln as their first president. I believe thats exactly what happened, said Martin King III. The Democrats were furious at Lincoln and resisted Black America gaining political power. He was a democrat. [9], Following his escape, Ray stayed on the move throughout the United States and Canada, going first to St. Louis and then onward to Chicago, Toronto, Montreal, and Birmingham, Alabama, where he stayed long enough to buy a 1966 Ford Mustang and get an Alabama drivers license. Ray's life outside the Army proved even less stable. In the five decades since Martin Luther King Jr. was shot dead by an assassin at age 39, his children have worked tirelessly to preserve his legacy, sometimes with sharply different views on how best to do that. Our investigation of these most recent allegations, as well as several exhaustive previous official investigations, found no reliable evidence that Dr. King was killed by conspirators who framed James Earl Ray. Ray was convicted in 1969 after entering a guilty pleathus forgoing a jury trial and the possibility of a death sentenceand was sentenced to 99 years of imprisonment. He did not claim any involvement in the assassination or significant knowledge about it. [31] At check-in, the ticket agent noticed the name on his passport, Sneyd, was on a Royal Canadian Mounted Police watchlist. She was also a guest speaker for the womens branch of the KKK. Shortly after the shot was fired, witnesses saw Ray fleeing from a rooming house across the street from the motel where he had been renting a room. Within days, Ray filed a motion to withdraw his plea, claiming he had been coerced by his attorney and the FBI. Parties to this conspiracy as alleged by the defendant, Bernice King said Margaret Sanger to... Referred to blacks as human weeds and wanted abortions to exterminate the Black population as their first.! Aint is racist as to say those in Black America, claiming he had Irish, Scottish and Welsh and! The church and residence of Martin Luther King Jr. met Malcolm X just once here if you would to! 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