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Speaker 1: Welcome to the MLK Tapes, a production of I Heart

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Speaker 1: Radio and Tenderfoot TV. The views and opinions expressed in

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Speaker 1: this podcast are solely those of the podcast author or

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Speaker 1: individuals participating in the podcast, and do not represent those

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Speaker 1: of I Heart Media, Tenderfoot TV, or their employees. Listener

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Speaker 1: discretion is advised to understand the context of this killing.

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Speaker 1: You should understand that Emmett Till, Medgar Evers, for civil

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Speaker 1: rights workers who were buried in the levee, We're all

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Speaker 1: slain within about fifty or sixty miles of Memphis. Memphis

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Speaker 1: as an interesting reputation of being the first degree murder

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Speaker 1: capital of America. And in that context we're not talking

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Speaker 1: about street crime but organized land hits. So that explains

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Speaker 1: why this. If you were gonna kill somebody, Memphis was

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Speaker 1: the place to do it, and you pull off the killing,

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Speaker 1: and meanwhile, some other folks have done the skull duggery

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Speaker 1: and got some SAPs set up to take the dive

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Speaker 1: and fifty years later argue about who did what I

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Speaker 1: called the Union Hall. I said, a matter of life

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Speaker 1: and death. I said, I think these people are planning

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Speaker 1: to kill Dr King. The authorities were parade. Oh, we

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Speaker 1: found a gun that James ol Ray bought in Birmingham

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Speaker 1: that killed Dr King. Except it wasn't the gun that

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Speaker 1: killed Dr King. James Lay was upon for the official

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Speaker 1: story from My Heart Radio intended for TV. The plan

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Speaker 1: was to get King to the city because they wanted

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Speaker 1: it handled. In Memphis were dead and in cat Hamon

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Speaker 1: and I have lived with it so long, my sion,

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Speaker 1: and they scared for me. The Lord told me to

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Speaker 1: not the word. I've been want to tell it all

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Speaker 1: my life on Bill Claybourn and this is the MLK tapes.

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Speaker 1: At the top of this episode, we heard Judge Joe

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Speaker 1: Brown speaking at AEEN symposium at Duquesne University marking the

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Speaker 1: fiftieth anniversary of the assassinations of Martin King and Robert Kennedy.

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Speaker 1: Judge Brown had just completed a fifteen year run as

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Speaker 1: a judge on a TV reality show, but before that

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Speaker 1: he had been a real judge in Tennessee and had

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Speaker 1: presided over the last attempt to get James Earl Ray

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Speaker 1: a trial. That case had been brought by Bill Pepper,

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Speaker 1: Ray's attorney at the time, and from the stage of

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Speaker 1: the same symposium, Pepper spoke about Judge Brown and those

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Speaker 1: events of some twenty years before. We were very pleased

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Speaker 1: to have Judge Brown on the bench because finally there

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Speaker 1: was an impartial object of and I might say courageous

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Speaker 1: man up there who was prepared to do what he

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Speaker 1: believed was right. No better expert on ballistics did we

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Speaker 1: find anywhere than Judge Brown. Judge Brown was indeed an

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Speaker 1: expert when it came to guns, and when he spoke

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Speaker 1: that day on the shooting of King, he focused on

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Speaker 1: race rifle. Was it really the murder weapon? But before

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Speaker 1: we get to forensics, the race of twist lands and

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Speaker 1: grooves and all that, let's hear what Brown had to

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Speaker 1: say about what it was like to be black in

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Speaker 1: Memphis in the bad old days. Joe Brown had a

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Speaker 1: unique perspective because he had not grown up in Tennessee.

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Speaker 1: He had come of age in sunny California, and after

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Speaker 1: law school at U c. L A. He accepted a

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Speaker 1: challenging legal fellowship in the nation's heartland. Joe Brown arrived

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Speaker 1: in Memphis in nineteen seventy three. He noticed the difference

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Speaker 1: right away. Appeared for one of the poverty law centers

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Speaker 1: I was working at with five clients at the local

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Speaker 1: juvenile court. The judge, who had a sixth grade education,

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Speaker 1: he dropped out of the sixth grade, thought I was

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Speaker 1: on his docket and he called me the inn words.

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Speaker 1: So we had at it. But that was the attitude.

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Speaker 1: And I've actually been in court rooms in front of

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Speaker 1: a jury and the judge used the in word to

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Speaker 1: the jury in describing um some of the defendants on trial.

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Speaker 1: So it's not unusual now. I also happened to be

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Speaker 1: the first black prosecutor for the city in Memphis, and

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Speaker 1: one of the interesting, rather disgusting charges that I would

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Speaker 1: see on records when I would be asked to make

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Speaker 1: an offer on something was something like this reckless eyeballing

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Speaker 1: by a colored person. That's a quote on what the

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Speaker 1: charge was, colored person refusing to remove from sidewalk for

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Speaker 1: passage of white person. This was the interesting one, acting

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Speaker 1: too colored in public. So I would see these kind

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Speaker 1: of charges on people's rap sheets, and that was the atmosphere.

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Speaker 1: In the early nineteen seventies, you still had that thing

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Speaker 1: going on. And describing his shock at Landing and what

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Speaker 1: for him was the wild West, Judge Brown recalled a

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Speaker 1: particular evening in a Memphis courtroom. Well, we had this

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Speaker 1: old guy late eighties maybe early nineties, and he was

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Speaker 1: on the dockets. So I asked the judge if I

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Speaker 1: could advance the case since the arresting officer was coming

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Speaker 1: in that evening on a traffic matter. So the judge

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Speaker 1: gave me permission. I got the file jacket brought to

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Speaker 1: the courtroom and I'm standing around waiting for this case

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Speaker 1: to come up. When the back door the courtroom is

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Speaker 1: kicked in, and he was an old man. He had

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Speaker 1: his Model nineteen three fifty seven Smith up in the air,

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Speaker 1: and the many officers in the courtroom, instead of doing

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Speaker 1: what you think they do, they all dived under the

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Speaker 1: cover of the pews. So he walked in and he said,

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Speaker 1: who the devil? Et cetera, et ceter was cussing and

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Speaker 1: put his hands on my nigro. So nobody touched my

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Speaker 1: nigga's and my hunting animals but me. So he walks

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Speaker 1: up to the cop in question, grabs him by the collar,

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Speaker 1: puts the pistol to his head and said, I'll blow

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Speaker 1: your brains out. I kill you, your granty looking wife,

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Speaker 1: all your children, your livestock, and your hunting animals, if

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Speaker 1: you ever do this again? Who he walks over and

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Speaker 1: shut up. Robert, that was the judge's name. I used

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Speaker 1: to do your mama. You you maybe wanna mind it.

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Speaker 1: I don't know about it. O. Judge said, Mr Brown,

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Speaker 1: whatnover is? He had the dock and I said, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I th show those this this. So he walked out

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Speaker 1: of here. I said, why didn't nobody do what he thin?

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Speaker 1: He said, that's Jimmie Thompson. That's death in Carnie Brown

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Speaker 1: didn't know who Jimmy Thompson was, but during a recess

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Speaker 1: he was pulled aside by some old timer who tried

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Speaker 1: to fill him in. Turns out, Jimmie Thompson had at

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Speaker 1: one time been sheriff in Memphis for some sixteen years.

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Speaker 1: Here's old guys, let me tell you store about when

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Speaker 1: I was a young deputy with the sheriff departing. Before

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Speaker 1: I got on, the police departing said we was out

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Speaker 1: and you know we busted two good old of a

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Speaker 1: couple of good old boys and they were drunk. Jimmy

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Speaker 1: Thompson pulled up in his V twelve packet automobile and

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Speaker 1: he stopped. He came on, say I know this man.

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Speaker 1: He's saying, none but scumb He said, who you? So

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Speaker 1: the guy told him, he said, you take care of

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Speaker 1: your wife and children. He said, well, yes, sir, I tried,

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Speaker 1: so you that's wrong to that right, Get on up

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Speaker 1: out of here. He says, I'm wondering what the Sheriff's

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Speaker 1: gonna do. He pulls his revolver, I shoots the other

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Speaker 1: man in the head. Tways said, I told this scarm

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Speaker 1: he ain't on dirty up my jail. No more call

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Speaker 1: to meet wagon. So that was my first time meeting

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Speaker 1: to share a face to face. He said, Jimmy's gonna

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Speaker 1: kill forty five fifty people in his career. So when

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Speaker 1: Jimmy pull out a gun, everybody diving for couple because

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Speaker 1: somebody likely to that. But you see, this is the

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Speaker 1: background in Memphis, Tennessee at this point in time. Joe

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Speaker 1: Brown would go on to be the first black prosecutor

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Speaker 1: in the city of Memphis, and after that he began

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Speaker 1: his own law practice. In he became a criminal court

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Speaker 1: judge in Shelby County, which includes Memphis, US In Bill

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Speaker 1: Pepper brought a lawsuit seeking to reopen the case against

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Speaker 1: James Earl Ray with that time had been imprisoned for

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Speaker 1: twenty five years. The case landed in Judge Brown's courtroom,

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Speaker 1: a lucky break for Pepper and Ray, because Brown took

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Speaker 1: an active interest in the cases that came before him,

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Speaker 1: and I did a lot of trial work. And one

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Speaker 1: of the things that I did was I helped train

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Speaker 1: the Capitol defense team for the Public Defender's Office. So

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Speaker 1: that wound up getting me involved in forty forty two

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Speaker 1: first degree murder cases. They're fascinating. One of the things

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Speaker 1: I learned from trying that kind of case is when

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Speaker 1: you get it, go to the scene, take a look

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Speaker 1: around and see if what you see on the ground

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Speaker 1: matches the theory. Well, one of the problems that came

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Speaker 1: out when I got the Ray case is that some

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Speaker 1: of the evidence, as far as I was concerned, did

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Speaker 1: not match the circumstances. First off, let's get a clarification

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Speaker 1: in here. The news media likes to put it out

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Speaker 1: James Earl Ray, the self confess killer of Dr Martin

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Speaker 1: Luther King. Well, that's an error. He never confessed. He

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Speaker 1: always denied it. This might seem like a strange thing

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Speaker 1: for Judge Brown to say, because in nineteen sixty nine,

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Speaker 1: James L. Ray did plead guilty to the explicit charge

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Speaker 1: of murdering Dr Martin Luther King. If you were with

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Speaker 1: us in episode four, you heard about the strange circumstances

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Speaker 1: under which that plea was made. And as we heard

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Speaker 1: from his first attorney, Art Haynes Jr. Ray always said

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Speaker 1: that he did not shoot King or anyone else that day.

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Speaker 1: So that is what Judge Brown is referring to the

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Speaker 1: little known fact that James Earl Ray always said he

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Speaker 1: did not shoot Martin Luther King. Of course, the authorities

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Speaker 1: said that he did, and their best evidence was not

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Speaker 1: the drunk who said he saw Ray running from the scene,

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Speaker 1: but the rifle found on the street, the one Ray

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Speaker 1: had bought just two days before. But Judge Brown was

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Speaker 1: far from convinced that this rifle raised rifle was the

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Speaker 1: actual murder weapon. The state claimed that its reasonable factual

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Speaker 1: basis was raised rifle a thirty odd six caliber Remingtons

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Speaker 1: seven sixty game Master, a pump rifle. The interesting thing

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Speaker 1: is is that that really went astray at that point

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Speaker 1: because the FBI claimed that they could not make a

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Speaker 1: ballistics match between Ray's rifle and the bullet they pulled

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Speaker 1: out of King's body. They said it was too distorted

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Speaker 1: to test that is the death's lug. However, examining the

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Speaker 1: evidence and the evidence room, it most certainly was not there.

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Speaker 1: It was a big bruga about me ordering the rifle reachsted.

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Speaker 1: In most cases, when you test fire a gun to

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Speaker 1: see if it's the weapon used in a particular murder,

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Speaker 1: you're creating a bullet that can be compared to the

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Speaker 1: death slug. If the markings on the two bullets are

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Speaker 1: a perfect match, you have determined that this gun fired

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Speaker 1: the fatal shot to the exclusion of all other guns

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Speaker 1: in the universe. Very often the match is less than perfect.

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Speaker 1: In this case, if the class characteristics are the same,

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Speaker 1: like the caliber bullet, you have determined that the weapon

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Speaker 1: tested could have fired the bullet, and that's the best

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Speaker 1: the FBI could do. In essence, King was killed with

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Speaker 1: a thirty caliber bullet, and raised rifle could fire a

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Speaker 1: thirty caliber bullet. So what did Judge Brown discover about

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Speaker 1: the rifle and the bullet when this case landed in

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Speaker 1: his courtroom? Recognize thats the seven sixty game master and

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Speaker 1: evidence in this case? Did you have a cadianum to

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Speaker 1: consider this weapon as a murder weapon in this case,

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Speaker 1: some degree of debt and careful consideration. I did so.

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Speaker 1: And when was that? That was during the course of

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Speaker 1: proceedings brought by the lady James or A Ray and

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Speaker 1: what is known as the post conviction relief proceedings to

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Speaker 1: challenge his inviction. You're listening to Judge Joe Brown testify

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Speaker 1: at the civil trial. Brown a few years earlier had

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Speaker 1: presided over the lawsuits seeking to reopen the case against

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Speaker 1: James Earl Ray. The man asking the questions is Bill Pepper,

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Speaker 1: who at the civil trial is representing the King family. Now,

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Speaker 1: Judge Brown, how long did you pres over those sin

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Speaker 1: I'd like to say about three years. It all sort

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Speaker 1: of shifts into a blur that got in my courtroom.

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Speaker 1: There was at that time a set of laws and

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Speaker 1: cases that have been decided that basically caused me to

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Speaker 1: deny the petition of James or a Raid. So what

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Speaker 1: I've ordered was that the petition would be denied, but

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Speaker 1: I will allow the petitioner to put on what is

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Speaker 1: known as a proper of proof. In other words, if

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Speaker 1: he will allowed to present this evidence, this is what

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Speaker 1: it would show. So on appellate court could determine whether

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Speaker 1: or not the law need to be needed to be refused. Well,

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Speaker 1: in any event, I ordered that the rifle will be retested.

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Speaker 1: It went to the Port of Criminal Appeals who went

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Speaker 1: along to the prosecutorial side of things and declined to

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Speaker 1: allow that rifle to be retested. And issue of state

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Speaker 1: the blue that Judge Brown just mentioned has to do

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Speaker 1: with the fact that the rate case in his court

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Speaker 1: dragged on for the better part of three years to nine.

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Speaker 1: It was a legal battle over whether Ray would have

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Speaker 1: the right to present evidence that might overturn his conviction,

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Speaker 1: even though the statute of limitations for doing such a

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Speaker 1: thing had long ago run out. There were orders, stays, appeals,

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Speaker 1: changes in state law, more stays. Most of the time

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Speaker 1: was spent waiting around for a ruling on some appeal

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Speaker 1: of a ruling made in Judge Brown's court. It was

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Speaker 1: a frustrating, messy affair that defies any simple description, but

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Speaker 1: we will touch on some of the important points. As

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Speaker 1: Judge Brown said, the Court of Appeals initially prevented him

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Speaker 1: from ordering a test firing of the rifle, but it

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Speaker 1: didn't prevent him from going through the case files. Sometime

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Speaker 1: in ninety six, he had the death slug fragments put

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Speaker 1: under a high powered electron microscope. When he did this,

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Speaker 1: sure enough, the rifling had a right hand twist, just

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Speaker 1: as the FBI said. But as he told the court

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Speaker 1: that day, there was something else, something that required a

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Speaker 1: little high school trigonometry. It appears that the death slugged

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Speaker 1: it was taken out of King's body, was fired from

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Speaker 1: a rifle that had a rate of rifling twist of

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Speaker 1: one turn in every eleven and a quarter inches. Raised rifle,

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Speaker 1: for those who are interested, had a rate of rifling

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Speaker 1: twist of one turn in ten inches. If you've got

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Speaker 1: an eleven and a quarter inch rate of rifling twist,

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Speaker 1: you're talking custom barrel and James Drew Ray I assure

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Speaker 1: you had no access to anybody making custom barrels at

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Speaker 1: that time. If Judge Brown's calculations are correct, and you

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Speaker 1: could get the case back in court, it would go

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Speaker 1: a long way to proving that raised rifle was not

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Speaker 1: the murder weapon. More certain still, Judge Brown's poking around

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Speaker 1: like that was beginning to make people uncomfortable. Most judges

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Speaker 1: don't use microscopes to look at bullets. Most judges don't

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Speaker 1: think in terms of metallurgy or rates of twist, but

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Speaker 1: Judge Brown did, and the pressure to relieve him of

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Speaker 1: his duties increased, and strange things were starting to happen.

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Speaker 1: Judge Brown told me of several incidents. In one ninety seven,

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Speaker 1: his house was invaded by men wearing ski masks. He

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Speaker 1: had gotten home late, fallen asleep at the kitchen table,

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Speaker 1: and then woke up. I heard some noise and I

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Speaker 1: was sitting in my kitchen and I became aware of

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Speaker 1: some shadows out back and some out front. And to

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Speaker 1: make a long story short, two people tried to break

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Speaker 1: in the front, three in the back at the same time.

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Speaker 1: They jammie the screens out of the windows and took

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Speaker 1: wild glass cutters to cut the pain out so they

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Speaker 1: could open the windows. Were dressed in pretty much the

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Speaker 1: same thing, dark clothing, balaklavs with just the eyes out,

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Speaker 1: and apparently they had on some heavy kevlar armor and

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Speaker 1: they had side arms on the side. I was thinking,

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Speaker 1: why the police raiding me? And then I said, these

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Speaker 1: aren't police. I'm a sitting judge. This is three thirty

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Speaker 1: am in the morning. And they came in and there

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Speaker 1: was a shootout. I wound up having to patch the walls.

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Speaker 1: I called my friend Winfrey, who was the director of

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Speaker 1: the police at that time. He came out. We looked around.

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Speaker 1: We found some blood trails out front, out back, and

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Speaker 1: there was no report of anyone being treated in an

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Speaker 1: emergency room and no reports of this incident. So that's

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Speaker 1: a little wild. But actually my disposition I found it intriguing.

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Speaker 1: Intriguing or not. According to Judge Brown, nothing ever came

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Speaker 1: of that into in but one afternoon, not long after that,

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Speaker 1: Brown said he got a phone call while he was

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Speaker 1: in court. What's going on, Judge, is to Detective Song.

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Speaker 1: So and Song so we're out in the parking lot.

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Speaker 1: Somebody's trying to break in your lexus. Okay. Five minutes later,

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Speaker 1: Judge the Song so they were trying to plant two

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Speaker 1: key loads of coke in your car. Oh wow, all right,

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Speaker 1: we got them. What's going on? They stayed there, were

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Speaker 1: with a federal agency and uh, they made a mistake

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Speaker 1: during this sting. But your name's on your parking place,

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Speaker 1: you know. Stuff like that. It's hard to know just

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Speaker 1: what to make of such stories, but Judge Brown feels

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Speaker 1: they were related to his handling of the race case,

302
00:19:46,960 --> 00:19:49,760
Speaker 1: and things were starting to heat up because, although he

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Speaker 1: had initially been prevented from having the rifle test fired,

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00:19:53,200 --> 00:19:56,440
Speaker 1: Judge Brown finally won permission to do that very thing.

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Speaker 1: The rifle was tested by ballistics expert Robert Hathaway at

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Speaker 1: the University of Rhode Island Crime Lab, and two weeks

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00:20:04,840 --> 00:20:09,639
Speaker 1: later the results were revealed in court. After hearing testimony

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Speaker 1: from ballistics experts, Memphis, Judge Joe Brown decided further examination

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Speaker 1: of test fire bullets from James R. Ray's rifle maybe needed.

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Speaker 1: This was one headline the day after the test results

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Speaker 1: of the rifle were announced. Hathaway testified that he fired

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Speaker 1: and recovered eighteen bullets like the one that killed Dr. King.

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Speaker 1: Twelve of those eighteen emerged with unique markings matching them

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Speaker 1: to each other and to the rifle itself, but they

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Speaker 1: didn't match the fatal slug recovered from Dr. King. But

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Speaker 1: six bullets did not have those particular markings, even though

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Speaker 1: they were fired from the same weapon. Hathaway's tests strongly

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Speaker 1: suggested that the death slug was not fired from Ray's rifle,

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Speaker 1: but it was short of proving that if six bullets

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Speaker 1: could have been fired by the rifle but not be

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Speaker 1: with certainty trace back to it. Then the same could

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Speaker 1: be true for the death slog. There was immediate talk

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Speaker 1: of retest. More scientific tests may be conducted on James

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Speaker 1: Earl Ray's rifle to see if it was used to

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Speaker 1: kill Martin Luther King. Tests described Friday were inconclusive, though

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Speaker 1: a build up of material and the rifle barrel could

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Speaker 1: be to blame. But today experts told that Joe Brown

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Speaker 1: James L. Ray's rifle had not been thoroughly cleaned since

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Speaker 1: the last test firing, and that build up within the

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Speaker 1: barrel may have jeopardized the accuracy of this testing. As

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Speaker 1: soon as the results of the rifle test were announced,

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Speaker 1: Bill Pepper asked for the rifle to be tested again.

333
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Speaker 1: Judge Brown then asked the Appeals Court for permission to

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Speaker 1: retest the gun after it had been cleaned. What we

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00:21:48,080 --> 00:21:51,200
Speaker 1: wanted was to get everything out so we could get

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Speaker 1: a pristine bore and get the best sample possible. There's

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Speaker 1: a company called Outers and they made cleaning supply is

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00:22:00,160 --> 00:22:05,440
Speaker 1: for weapons. They had a reverse plating device known as

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00:22:05,480 --> 00:22:09,119
Speaker 1: a foul out, and what you do is when you

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Speaker 1: hook the weapons rifle up to this, you get an

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00:22:12,119 --> 00:22:18,359
Speaker 1: electric current going which causes any fouling in the bore

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Speaker 1: to come out without having to scrub it. But the

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00:22:22,280 --> 00:22:26,200
Speaker 1: authorities were not keen on this proposal. State witness Tommy

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Speaker 1: Heflin of the Tennessee Bureau of an Investigation testified, cleaning

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Speaker 1: the rifle may damage it and could alter the markings

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Speaker 1: on the bullets win fire. So you're gonna change and

347
00:22:36,160 --> 00:22:39,120
Speaker 1: either take away or you're gonna add things to them.

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00:22:39,880 --> 00:22:41,800
Speaker 1: They had the idea of what you're gonna do is

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Speaker 1: take a wire brush and run it up and down

350
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Speaker 1: the boar, and they were worried about that damaging the rifle.

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Speaker 1: They had a very peculiar thing that they put in

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Speaker 1: their documentation to state said if the rifle is tested

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Speaker 1: at this point, it may become damaged, which would quote

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Speaker 1: prevented from being retested in the future unquote. Now that

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00:23:11,600 --> 00:23:14,320
Speaker 1: one eludes me. If you don't want it tested now,

356
00:23:14,560 --> 00:23:18,440
Speaker 1: why do you want it tested in the future. As

357
00:23:18,440 --> 00:23:21,359
Speaker 1: it turned out, Judge Brown never got permission to test

358
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Speaker 1: the rifle again, and what finally happened to raise appeal.

359
00:23:25,520 --> 00:23:29,000
Speaker 1: Here is Judge Brown's response to that very question asked

360
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Speaker 1: by Bill Pepper at the civil trial. Well, they're removed

361
00:23:34,320 --> 00:23:36,840
Speaker 1: from the case. He said, I'll be biased for James

362
00:23:36,920 --> 00:23:41,280
Speaker 1: row a rate which I found rather astonishing. Anybody knows

363
00:23:41,400 --> 00:23:43,640
Speaker 1: me to be being a biased in favor of itself

364
00:23:43,640 --> 00:23:47,080
Speaker 1: about racist and bigot is just absolutely disgusting in the

365
00:23:47,160 --> 00:23:50,840
Speaker 1: concept what I've always tried to do to be fair

366
00:23:50,920 --> 00:23:54,560
Speaker 1: and Parson wotfully detached, straight down the middle and sometimes

367
00:23:54,600 --> 00:23:57,880
Speaker 1: with another that upsets people when things don't go as

368
00:23:57,920 --> 00:24:00,760
Speaker 1: they expect them to go, or you were ruined by

369
00:24:00,840 --> 00:24:04,480
Speaker 1: the from a case by Whome Tennessee Cord from Peas

370
00:24:06,320 --> 00:24:09,359
Speaker 1: So Judge Brown was removed and another judge was brought

371
00:24:09,400 --> 00:24:13,359
Speaker 1: in and raised petition for post conviction relief was dismissed.

372
00:24:14,240 --> 00:24:18,680
Speaker 1: But the mystery surrounding Raise Rifle have only deepened. Anyone

373
00:24:18,760 --> 00:24:21,160
Speaker 1: today who looks into the case can learn soon enough

374
00:24:21,520 --> 00:24:23,879
Speaker 1: that the FBI could not match the death slug to

375
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Speaker 1: Raise rifle. But at the time of the murder and

376
00:24:27,040 --> 00:24:30,399
Speaker 1: raise subsequent plea hearing a year later, the common wisdom

377
00:24:30,440 --> 00:24:32,680
Speaker 1: in the country was that a match had been made.

378
00:24:33,320 --> 00:24:53,320
Speaker 1: How had this come about? It is incumbent upon the

379
00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:55,800
Speaker 1: state in a plea of guilty to murder in the

380
00:24:55,880 --> 00:24:59,640
Speaker 1: first degree to put on certain proof for your consideration.

381
00:25:00,400 --> 00:25:02,640
Speaker 1: We have to put on proof of what we lawyers

382
00:25:02,720 --> 00:25:06,639
Speaker 1: call the proof of corpus delicti, which is the body

383
00:25:06,840 --> 00:25:10,479
Speaker 1: of the crime. This is a reading of the words

384
00:25:10,520 --> 00:25:14,680
Speaker 1: of Assistant Attorney General James Beasley, spoken at Ray's plea

385
00:25:14,760 --> 00:25:18,919
Speaker 1: hearing in March nineteen sixty eight in Tennessee. At the time,

386
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Speaker 1: after a person had pleaded guilty to murder, the state

387
00:25:22,720 --> 00:25:25,560
Speaker 1: was obligated to present some of the evidence they would

388
00:25:25,560 --> 00:25:28,840
Speaker 1: have offered had there been a trial. So the state

389
00:25:28,920 --> 00:25:32,560
Speaker 1: put on an abbreviated and uncontested version of their case.

390
00:25:33,400 --> 00:25:36,320
Speaker 1: They called witnesses who saw doctor King brought down by

391
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Speaker 1: a bullet. They introduced a doctor who said that doctor

392
00:25:39,600 --> 00:25:42,760
Speaker 1: King died because of that bullet, and a police officer

393
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Speaker 1: who found a thirty caliber rifle on the street. Beasley

394
00:25:47,080 --> 00:25:50,399
Speaker 1: then spoke of an expert who would testify that he

395
00:25:50,560 --> 00:25:54,359
Speaker 1: discovered the fingerprints of James Earl Ray on that rifle,

396
00:25:54,960 --> 00:25:58,600
Speaker 1: and then the clincher assistant A. G. Beasley spoke of

397
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Speaker 1: an FBI man who testify at the trial had there

398
00:26:02,160 --> 00:26:05,639
Speaker 1: been one, as to his examination of the death slug

399
00:26:06,000 --> 00:26:09,919
Speaker 1: and its relationship to the found rifle. He examined the

400
00:26:09,960 --> 00:26:13,199
Speaker 1: cartridges the whole from the chamber of this rifle the

401
00:26:13,320 --> 00:26:16,800
Speaker 1: slug removed from the body of doctor Martin Luther King, Jr.

402
00:26:17,040 --> 00:26:20,800
Speaker 1: And would testify to his conclusions as follows. The death

403
00:26:20,840 --> 00:26:24,399
Speaker 1: slug was identical in all physical characteristics with the five

404
00:26:24,480 --> 00:26:28,120
Speaker 1: loaded thirty at six Springfield cartridges found in the bag

405
00:26:28,200 --> 00:26:31,480
Speaker 1: in front of cannipes. The cartridge case had in fact

406
00:26:31,560 --> 00:26:34,639
Speaker 1: been fired in this thirty at six rifle, that the

407
00:26:34,680 --> 00:26:38,040
Speaker 1: death slug removed from the body contained land and groove

408
00:26:38,080 --> 00:26:42,320
Speaker 1: impressions and direction of twist consistent with those that were

409
00:26:42,320 --> 00:26:46,560
Speaker 1: in the barrel of this rifle. To the jurors and

410
00:26:46,600 --> 00:26:49,680
Speaker 1: the newsmen in the room, it seemed that nothing more

411
00:26:49,760 --> 00:26:53,040
Speaker 1: needed to be said. But Mark Lane, who would be

412
00:26:53,119 --> 00:26:56,679
Speaker 1: raised attorney eight years later, said the following about what

413
00:26:56,800 --> 00:27:01,119
Speaker 1: had happened in his book Murder in Memphis. Quote. The

414
00:27:01,240 --> 00:27:05,040
Speaker 1: veteran lawyers in the courtroom smiled to themselves in much

415
00:27:05,080 --> 00:27:08,840
Speaker 1: the same way as professional magicians might do when they

416
00:27:08,880 --> 00:27:12,040
Speaker 1: observed an audience puzzled by a simple but well performed trick.

417
00:27:13,119 --> 00:27:16,439
Speaker 1: So what was the trick? All the fancy talk of

418
00:27:16,480 --> 00:27:20,399
Speaker 1: direction of twists and landing grooves impressions being consistent with

419
00:27:20,480 --> 00:27:23,520
Speaker 1: the barrel of Ray's rifle didn't mean that the bullet

420
00:27:23,520 --> 00:27:26,399
Speaker 1: had been matched to the rifle. It only meant that

421
00:27:26,520 --> 00:27:30,040
Speaker 1: Ray's rifle could have fired that bullet, along with thousands

422
00:27:30,040 --> 00:27:33,959
Speaker 1: of other thirty caliber rifles. But to the newsmen present

423
00:27:34,040 --> 00:27:36,679
Speaker 1: and the American people who would read their stories, the

424
00:27:36,760 --> 00:27:40,080
Speaker 1: case was a slam dunk. Not only had Ray entered

425
00:27:40,080 --> 00:27:42,959
Speaker 1: a guilty plea the police that found his rifle and

426
00:27:43,040 --> 00:27:46,040
Speaker 1: determined that it was the gun that killed King, but

427
00:27:46,200 --> 00:27:50,399
Speaker 1: just below the surface, practically in plain sight, was a

428
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:53,560
Speaker 1: much more troubling problem about the attempt to match the

429
00:27:53,640 --> 00:27:56,480
Speaker 1: death slug to the gun purchased by James Earl Ray.

430
00:27:57,520 --> 00:28:00,520
Speaker 1: But as simple as it was, it took any five

431
00:28:00,600 --> 00:28:05,439
Speaker 1: years for it to raise its ugly head. Captain, do

432
00:28:05,480 --> 00:28:11,800
Speaker 1: you recognize this photograph? I recognize the body directs a

433
00:28:11,920 --> 00:28:14,760
Speaker 1: bullet that was there as being a photograph that I

434
00:28:14,840 --> 00:28:19,080
Speaker 1: took at the morgue of Dr Martin Luther King. This

435
00:28:19,119 --> 00:28:23,960
Speaker 1: audio comes from the HBO trial. Bill Pepper is cross

436
00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:28,200
Speaker 1: examining Captain Tommy Smith, who was a Memphis Police lieutenant

437
00:28:28,320 --> 00:28:31,080
Speaker 1: at the time of the murder. Off to the side

438
00:28:31,400 --> 00:28:35,000
Speaker 1: next to where Pepper is standing. Dr King's lifeless back

439
00:28:35,400 --> 00:28:40,000
Speaker 1: is displayed on a screen. Attorney Pepper gestures towards the image.

440
00:28:40,680 --> 00:28:43,600
Speaker 1: When you're pointing to the bullet. Are you indicating this

441
00:28:43,920 --> 00:28:48,680
Speaker 1: lump here? Dr King's back by his shoulder blade area?

442
00:28:49,040 --> 00:28:53,080
Speaker 1: Did you attempt to determine the from outside the skin

443
00:28:53,200 --> 00:28:57,080
Speaker 1: the structure of that bullet under the skin? Yes? Or

444
00:28:57,120 --> 00:29:00,680
Speaker 1: I did, and you could take your finger and pinch

445
00:29:00,800 --> 00:29:03,920
Speaker 1: and fea and roll that bullet under the skin. But

446
00:29:04,120 --> 00:29:06,640
Speaker 1: did you do that? I did? And what did you

447
00:29:06,720 --> 00:29:09,680
Speaker 1: feel as you pinched? And I felt a very good

448
00:29:09,720 --> 00:29:12,920
Speaker 1: bullet and was very thankful that we had a bullet

449
00:29:12,960 --> 00:29:16,720
Speaker 1: to compare, And was it in one piece? And intact

450
00:29:16,840 --> 00:29:20,640
Speaker 1: what I could fea was in one piece? In preparing

451
00:29:20,680 --> 00:29:24,280
Speaker 1: for the televised mock trial, Pepper had discovered the photograph

452
00:29:24,320 --> 00:29:27,600
Speaker 1: of King's back in the police files. When he found

453
00:29:27,600 --> 00:29:30,960
Speaker 1: out who had taken it, he contacted Captain Smith, who

454
00:29:31,000 --> 00:29:33,360
Speaker 1: agreed to testify as to what he had seen that

455
00:29:33,520 --> 00:29:37,240
Speaker 1: night and if Smith were correct, if the lump under

456
00:29:37,280 --> 00:29:39,920
Speaker 1: the skin was indeed the death slog, and if it

457
00:29:39,920 --> 00:29:42,160
Speaker 1: were in such good condition that it could roll around

458
00:29:42,240 --> 00:29:45,640
Speaker 1: under the skin at one point in time did it

459
00:29:45,680 --> 00:29:48,920
Speaker 1: become the three grossly misshaped pieces of lead, which is

460
00:29:48,960 --> 00:29:51,960
Speaker 1: what we have of the fatal bullet today. It's a

461
00:29:52,080 --> 00:29:55,920
Speaker 1: valid question and one without a good answer. The problem

462
00:29:55,960 --> 00:29:59,000
Speaker 1: for Pepper was that although Smith had touched the object

463
00:29:59,160 --> 00:30:01,720
Speaker 1: under the skin and rolled it around with his finger,

464
00:30:02,280 --> 00:30:05,800
Speaker 1: he had not actually seen the bullet removed. But then

465
00:30:05,840 --> 00:30:08,480
Speaker 1: Pepper discovered a man who was said to have seen

466
00:30:08,480 --> 00:30:12,600
Speaker 1: the bullet taken from King's body. It was retired homicide

467
00:30:12,600 --> 00:30:16,480
Speaker 1: detective Barry Lynnville, who lived some distance outside of Memphis.

468
00:30:17,240 --> 00:30:20,200
Speaker 1: Pepper called detective Lynnville and asked if he could come

469
00:30:20,240 --> 00:30:23,480
Speaker 1: by with a few questions about the King murder. When

470
00:30:23,480 --> 00:30:27,240
Speaker 1: Pepper arrived, Lynnville asserted that he had indeed been in

471
00:30:27,280 --> 00:30:29,800
Speaker 1: the autopsy room and that he had seen the death

472
00:30:29,840 --> 00:30:34,400
Speaker 1: slug removed from doctor King's shoulder. Pepper then showed Lynnville

473
00:30:34,680 --> 00:30:38,080
Speaker 1: the FBI photo of the three bullet fragments said to

474
00:30:38,120 --> 00:30:42,080
Speaker 1: be what remained of the death slug. Lynville was stunned

475
00:30:42,640 --> 00:30:46,080
Speaker 1: because the fragments in the photo in no way resembled

476
00:30:46,120 --> 00:30:49,680
Speaker 1: what he saw in the morgue. Detective Lynnville could not

477
00:30:49,760 --> 00:30:53,080
Speaker 1: be compelled to appear at the HBO trial. He could

478
00:30:53,080 --> 00:30:56,080
Speaker 1: have stayed out of it, but he was so disturbed

479
00:30:56,200 --> 00:30:59,800
Speaker 1: by what he saw he agreed to testify, where he

480
00:30:59,840 --> 00:31:04,960
Speaker 1: was questioned by Bill Pepper. And were you present when

481
00:31:04,960 --> 00:31:10,040
Speaker 1: the body was received at the Morgan in Dr Francisco's presence, Yes,

482
00:31:10,760 --> 00:31:15,240
Speaker 1: and would you describe? But what happened at that point?

483
00:31:16,160 --> 00:31:18,920
Speaker 1: We're examined the wound and then when we turned the

484
00:31:18,960 --> 00:31:21,720
Speaker 1: body over we could see the bullet underneath the skin

485
00:31:21,800 --> 00:31:26,200
Speaker 1: on the left shoulder. Were you present when that bullet

486
00:31:26,240 --> 00:31:30,240
Speaker 1: was removed? Yes? And how was that done? With a

487
00:31:30,320 --> 00:31:35,480
Speaker 1: scap and who did that, Doctor Francisco? You observed Dr

488
00:31:35,520 --> 00:31:41,360
Speaker 1: Francisco removed the bullet the death slug. Would you describe

489
00:31:41,360 --> 00:31:45,520
Speaker 1: this bullet appeared to be a thirty all six caliber

490
00:31:46,320 --> 00:31:51,560
Speaker 1: UH copper. The entire copper jacket was intact in the

491
00:31:51,680 --> 00:31:55,520
Speaker 1: end of the bullet was flattened out. The lead at

492
00:31:55,520 --> 00:31:57,360
Speaker 1: the end of the thirty dollar six it's got about

493
00:31:57,920 --> 00:32:00,880
Speaker 1: all appropment quarter of an ancient lead and would flattened out.

494
00:32:00,920 --> 00:32:04,320
Speaker 1: But the copper was all intact and showed excellent land

495
00:32:04,360 --> 00:32:07,520
Speaker 1: and bruise. And how many bullets would you say you

496
00:32:07,680 --> 00:32:12,880
Speaker 1: have seen in your homicide career? Foutums And in terms

497
00:32:12,960 --> 00:32:15,920
Speaker 1: of the physical condition of this bullet, how would you

498
00:32:16,040 --> 00:32:20,600
Speaker 1: rate it? I'd rated on our scale of one to day,

499
00:32:20,600 --> 00:32:25,800
Speaker 1: and i'd rated man intact intact. Pepper then displayed the

500
00:32:25,800 --> 00:32:29,800
Speaker 1: official FBI photo of the disclog in three fragments. Do

501
00:32:29,920 --> 00:32:33,800
Speaker 1: you see these three fragments on the screen? These have

502
00:32:33,840 --> 00:32:38,120
Speaker 1: been introduced as the death slug in this case? Is

503
00:32:38,120 --> 00:32:41,520
Speaker 1: this the bullet you saw? No? Does it resemble the

504
00:32:41,520 --> 00:32:44,880
Speaker 1: bullets you saw in any way? No? I have no

505
00:32:44,920 --> 00:32:50,320
Speaker 1: further questions for Prosecutor Hickman. Ewing rose and began his

506
00:32:50,360 --> 00:32:55,120
Speaker 1: cross examination. Lynnville's story of seeing a near perfect bullet

507
00:32:55,240 --> 00:32:59,400
Speaker 1: removed from King's back presented serious problems, problems that had

508
00:32:59,440 --> 00:33:02,480
Speaker 1: never been exp floored before, because for twenty five years,

509
00:33:02,640 --> 00:33:06,160
Speaker 1: the death slug had been represented by three very distorted

510
00:33:06,160 --> 00:33:09,800
Speaker 1: pieces of lead. How could that be if the actual

511
00:33:09,920 --> 00:33:15,120
Speaker 1: bullet had emerged intact? Eing questioned Linnville, but his story

512
00:33:15,200 --> 00:33:18,920
Speaker 1: remained the same. Ewing then had Linnville come down from

513
00:33:18,920 --> 00:33:22,240
Speaker 1: the witness stand and draw on an easel a rough

514
00:33:22,320 --> 00:33:25,840
Speaker 1: picture of the bullet he had seen removed from King's body.

515
00:33:26,400 --> 00:33:29,800
Speaker 1: The bullet he drew was in one piece and perfectly

516
00:33:29,880 --> 00:33:34,640
Speaker 1: shaped except for some flattening on the tip. Ewing was stumped.

517
00:33:35,840 --> 00:33:38,760
Speaker 1: You're saying what you all saw taken out of doctor

518
00:33:38,840 --> 00:33:41,920
Speaker 1: King looked like that. It was. It was perfect in

519
00:33:42,000 --> 00:33:46,000
Speaker 1: every manner. We felt like we'd found a piece of

520
00:33:46,040 --> 00:33:48,479
Speaker 1: gold when we found a bullet. Have you been asked

521
00:33:48,520 --> 00:33:52,120
Speaker 1: about this over the last twenty five years? Is this

522
00:33:52,200 --> 00:33:55,320
Speaker 1: the first time a week ago? Just first time a

523
00:33:55,360 --> 00:33:57,920
Speaker 1: week the first time I've been asked about the bullet? Ever,

524
00:34:02,000 --> 00:34:05,080
Speaker 1: Lynnville said to Ewing that when they discovered the fatal

525
00:34:05,120 --> 00:34:08,239
Speaker 1: bullet in near pristine condition, they felt like they had

526
00:34:08,280 --> 00:34:11,319
Speaker 1: found a piece of gold. He meant that a death

527
00:34:11,360 --> 00:34:14,600
Speaker 1: slug in such good condition carries a lot of information

528
00:34:14,680 --> 00:34:17,759
Speaker 1: that can be very useful in solving a crime. In

529
00:34:17,800 --> 00:34:21,160
Speaker 1: this case, such a bullet might well have proved without

530
00:34:21,200 --> 00:34:24,399
Speaker 1: a doubt, that hadn't been fired by Ray's rifle, as

531
00:34:24,400 --> 00:34:27,319
Speaker 1: the district attorney said it was, or it might have

532
00:34:27,400 --> 00:34:31,000
Speaker 1: proved that race gun had not fired this bullet. This

533
00:34:31,080 --> 00:34:34,319
Speaker 1: is a strange conflict to discover twenty five years after

534
00:34:34,400 --> 00:34:38,000
Speaker 1: an important murder. Regarding the most critical piece of physical evidence.

535
00:34:39,239 --> 00:34:43,160
Speaker 1: Prosecutor Ewing couldn't really argue with Lynnville about what he

536
00:34:43,200 --> 00:34:47,880
Speaker 1: said he saw he wasn't there. Lynnville was, but he

537
00:34:47,920 --> 00:34:52,240
Speaker 1: could challenge his testimony in another way. When ballistics expert

538
00:34:52,320 --> 00:34:55,520
Speaker 1: Charles Morton took the stand, Ewing pointed to the images

539
00:34:55,560 --> 00:34:59,080
Speaker 1: of the three pieces of lead shown in the FBI photograph,

540
00:34:59,520 --> 00:35:02,400
Speaker 1: and then you got these little pieces here, how how

541
00:35:02,480 --> 00:35:04,759
Speaker 1: much would you say that would weigh? Well, I'm in

542
00:35:04,760 --> 00:35:06,840
Speaker 1: an advantage. I read the report that says at sixty

543
00:35:06,840 --> 00:35:08,960
Speaker 1: four grains, which a little bit less than half of

544
00:35:09,080 --> 00:35:12,359
Speaker 1: the weight. You're saying a perfect bullet, it's hundred and

545
00:35:12,400 --> 00:35:18,480
Speaker 1: fifty grains, and this weighed sixty four point four grains right.

546
00:35:19,560 --> 00:35:22,680
Speaker 1: Ewing then wrote the numbers one, fifty and sixty four

547
00:35:23,000 --> 00:35:26,080
Speaker 1: side by side on an easel with Lynnville's drawing of

548
00:35:26,120 --> 00:35:29,400
Speaker 1: the bullet to make his point the bullet fragments weighed

549
00:35:29,480 --> 00:35:32,920
Speaker 1: less than half of what Lynnville said he saw. Ewing

550
00:35:33,080 --> 00:35:35,840
Speaker 1: may have felt as though he had damaged Lynnville's assertion

551
00:35:35,920 --> 00:35:39,239
Speaker 1: of an intact bullet, but to the jurors who would

552
00:35:39,320 --> 00:35:43,520
Speaker 1: ultimately find Ray not guilty, the large difference in appearance

553
00:35:43,560 --> 00:35:46,720
Speaker 1: and wait may well have made them feel that something

554
00:35:47,280 --> 00:35:52,480
Speaker 1: was very wrong. Assuming that Officer Smith and Detective Lynnville

555
00:35:52,520 --> 00:35:54,600
Speaker 1: are telling the truth and I can think of no

556
00:35:54,680 --> 00:35:58,440
Speaker 1: reason for them to lie. We are presented with two possibilities.

557
00:35:59,239 --> 00:36:01,880
Speaker 1: The first is that something happened to the evidence bullet,

558
00:36:02,200 --> 00:36:05,000
Speaker 1: some handling or mishandling to make it look like it

559
00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:08,200
Speaker 1: does today. But how are there no records of this?

560
00:36:08,800 --> 00:36:11,120
Speaker 1: And how does a found bullet lose more than half

561
00:36:11,160 --> 00:36:15,160
Speaker 1: its weight. The other possibility is that the bullet seen

562
00:36:15,200 --> 00:36:18,680
Speaker 1: by Lynnville was discarded and the mangled lead we see

563
00:36:18,719 --> 00:36:21,680
Speaker 1: today was put in its place. I don't know the

564
00:36:21,719 --> 00:36:24,239
Speaker 1: answer here, and this may be a bigger leap than

565
00:36:24,280 --> 00:36:27,279
Speaker 1: some of you are willing to make, But for context,

566
00:36:27,400 --> 00:36:30,200
Speaker 1: I can say that I studied the Robert Kennedy murder

567
00:36:30,239 --> 00:36:32,920
Speaker 1: for years, I wrote a book about it, and what

568
00:36:33,040 --> 00:36:35,520
Speaker 1: I can tell you to a certainty is that the

569
00:36:35,560 --> 00:36:38,799
Speaker 1: police lied about the bullet evidence they recovered, and when

570
00:36:38,840 --> 00:36:41,680
Speaker 1: that lie was about to be exposed, they destroyed the

571
00:36:41,680 --> 00:36:45,360
Speaker 1: evidence itself. Again, I don't know what happened to the

572
00:36:45,360 --> 00:36:47,840
Speaker 1: bullet in the kin case, but when you were looking

573
00:36:47,880 --> 00:36:51,000
Speaker 1: at evidence presented by the authorities, you might do well

574
00:36:51,040 --> 00:36:55,880
Speaker 1: to remember the song. It ain't necessarily so. Also, I

575
00:36:55,920 --> 00:36:58,279
Speaker 1: invite you to go to our website and look at

576
00:36:58,320 --> 00:37:01,719
Speaker 1: the photograph of the death slug fry mints posted alongside

577
00:37:01,760 --> 00:37:04,640
Speaker 1: the drawing of the evidence bullet made by the detective Lynnville.

578
00:37:05,440 --> 00:37:08,840
Speaker 1: The explanation for the difference may be innocent, or it

579
00:37:08,880 --> 00:37:13,080
Speaker 1: may be nefarious, but whatever it is, this is one

580
00:37:13,160 --> 00:37:16,040
Speaker 1: hell of an alteration of a prime piece of evidence.

581
00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:19,960
Speaker 1: A problem with a bullet might also be a reason

582
00:37:20,160 --> 00:37:23,560
Speaker 1: why there was such pressure en Ray to plead guilty.

583
00:37:23,719 --> 00:37:26,560
Speaker 1: For if he had a trial and an attorney serving

584
00:37:26,600 --> 00:37:30,640
Speaker 1: his interests, that attorney may well have discovered the conflict.

585
00:37:31,239 --> 00:37:32,799
Speaker 1: He would have been able to put others on the

586
00:37:32,800 --> 00:37:35,160
Speaker 1: witness stand who had been at the morgue and had

587
00:37:35,160 --> 00:37:38,839
Speaker 1: seen what detective Lynnville and Smith testified too. He could

588
00:37:38,880 --> 00:37:41,680
Speaker 1: have demanded to see documents and photos in the police

589
00:37:41,680 --> 00:37:45,040
Speaker 1: and FBI files. He could have asked the jury, how

590
00:37:45,120 --> 00:37:47,200
Speaker 1: was it that a bullet that might well approve his

591
00:37:47,280 --> 00:37:50,800
Speaker 1: client's innocence could end up as three pieces of tortured

592
00:37:50,840 --> 00:37:54,880
Speaker 1: lad Looking back from a distance of fifty years, it

593
00:37:55,000 --> 00:37:57,200
Speaker 1: is hard for us to sort it out with certainty.

594
00:37:57,680 --> 00:37:59,759
Speaker 1: But it might have been a very different story at

595
00:37:59,840 --> 00:38:12,920
Speaker 1: ray trial if he'd had one Next time on the

596
00:38:12,920 --> 00:38:16,080
Speaker 1: email k tapes, next thing that taken a lot of

597
00:38:16,120 --> 00:38:20,640
Speaker 1: pride in itself. It was paternalist. They had made some games,

598
00:38:21,000 --> 00:38:24,400
Speaker 1: but it was raised to the court. They had a

599
00:38:24,520 --> 00:38:28,920
Speaker 1: list that this clue club plan and citizen Council passed

600
00:38:28,920 --> 00:38:34,560
Speaker 1: a run and the list contained name they called the

601
00:38:34,680 --> 00:38:41,879
Speaker 1: trouble makers with exs behind The plan was get King

602
00:38:42,040 --> 00:38:45,360
Speaker 1: to the city because they wanted it handled in Memphis

603
00:38:45,360 --> 00:38:48,040
Speaker 1: for dead in them could handle it. He told me, he

604
00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:50,080
Speaker 1: he said I had killed it what I had done,

605
00:38:50,480 --> 00:38:52,279
Speaker 1: And I said, what about the other son of a bitch?

606
00:38:52,320 --> 00:38:56,040
Speaker 1: I'll they're taking credit for He says he wasn't known

607
00:38:56,120 --> 00:38:58,320
Speaker 1: about a trouble maker from a suri. He was a

608
00:38:58,440 --> 00:39:02,279
Speaker 1: front man. Last Wednesday morning, the FBI told me they

609
00:39:02,280 --> 00:39:05,640
Speaker 1: didn't believe the story related in any way to the

610
00:39:05,719 --> 00:39:08,919
Speaker 1: King's assassin and they were through with it. He said

611
00:39:08,920 --> 00:39:11,439
Speaker 1: they wouldn't be there. They won't be there that night.

612
00:39:12,080 --> 00:39:14,720
Speaker 1: Did he say there would be a decoy there? Yeah,

613
00:39:15,600 --> 00:39:18,560
Speaker 1: be set up or look black somewhere else done the killings.

614
00:39:25,080 --> 00:39:26,800
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the m l K Tapes a

615
00:39:26,840 --> 00:39:30,360
Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radio and Tenderfoot TV. This podcast

616
00:39:30,400 --> 00:39:32,840
Speaker 1: is not specifically endorsed by the King family or the

617
00:39:32,920 --> 00:39:35,600
Speaker 1: King of State. D email K Tapes is written and

618
00:39:35,640 --> 00:39:38,880
Speaker 1: hosted by Bill Claper. Matt Frederick and Alex Williams are

619
00:39:38,920 --> 00:39:42,279
Speaker 1: executive producers on behalf of I Heart Radio with producers

620
00:39:42,360 --> 00:39:45,960
Speaker 1: Trevor Young and ben Keebrick. Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay

621
00:39:45,960 --> 00:39:49,440
Speaker 1: are executive producers on half of Tenderfoot TV with producers

622
00:39:49,520 --> 00:39:53,360
Speaker 1: Jamie Albright and Meredith Steadman. Original music by Makeup and

623
00:39:53,440 --> 00:39:57,480
Speaker 1: Vanity Said. Cover art by Mr Soul two six with

624
00:39:57,520 --> 00:40:01,799
Speaker 1: photography by Artemis Jenkins. Special thanks to Owen Rosenbaum and

625
00:40:01,800 --> 00:40:04,879
Speaker 1: Grace Royer at U t A, The Nord Group, Back

626
00:40:05,000 --> 00:40:09,640
Speaker 1: Media and Marketing, Envisioned Business Management, and Station sixteen. If

627
00:40:09,680 --> 00:40:12,200
Speaker 1: you have questions, you can visit our website, the email

628
00:40:12,280 --> 00:40:15,920
Speaker 1: k Tapes dot com. We posted photos and videos related

629
00:40:15,960 --> 00:40:18,440
Speaker 1: to the podcast on our social media accounts. You can

630
00:40:18,520 --> 00:40:21,400
Speaker 1: check them out at the email k Tapes. From more

631
00:40:21,480 --> 00:40:24,400
Speaker 1: podcasts from I Heart Radio and tender Foot TV, please

632
00:40:24,480 --> 00:40:27,400
Speaker 1: visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

633
00:40:27,520 --> 00:40:28,760
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows,