Speaker 1: Welcome to the MLK Tapes, a production of I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and Tenderfoot TV. The views and opinions expressed in
Speaker 1: this podcast are solely those of the podcast author or
Speaker 1: individuals participating in the podcast, and do not represent those
Speaker 1: of I Heart Media, Tenderfoot TV, or their employees. Listener
Speaker 1: discretion is advised. In August of nine sixty three, Dr
Speaker 1: Martin Luther King spoke from the steps of the Lincoln
Speaker 1: Memorial to a crowd of more than two hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty thousand in Washington, d C. So even though we
Speaker 1: faced the difficulties up today and tomorrow, I still have
Speaker 1: a dream. His iconic I have a Dream speech is
Speaker 1: one of the most famous speeches in history, and one
Speaker 1: you're probably familiar with. Nearly six decades later, a few
Speaker 1: hand pick sentences from that speech have come to define
Speaker 1: him in the popular mind. But King was not afraid
Speaker 1: to travel more dangerous roads. Four years later, at Riverside
Speaker 1: Church in New York, Martin Luther King would give a
Speaker 1: speech that wasn't about the fight for civil rights in America.
Speaker 1: It was about the horrific war in Vietnam, and it
Speaker 1: may have cost him his life. This business of burning
Speaker 1: human beings with napalm. Sending men home from dark and
Speaker 1: bloody battle fields, physically handicapped and psychologically derain cannot be
Speaker 1: reconciled with wisdom, justice and love. King's speech that night
Speaker 1: shook the country. Many thought he had crossed a line
Speaker 1: by speaking against the war he was supposed to stick
Speaker 1: to civil rights. Life magazine called a speech demogogic slander
Speaker 1: that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi, referring to
Speaker 1: the radio station in communist North Vietnam, and for some,
Speaker 1: King's speech was an act of treason. A year later,
Speaker 1: to the day, Martin Luther King, just thirty nine years old,
Speaker 1: would be dead. My name is Bill claybour On, an
Speaker 1: author and researcher, and most recently co creator of the
Speaker 1: RFK Tapes, a podcast about the assassination of Robert Kennedy.
Speaker 1: I was in law school when doctor King was shot.
Speaker 1: My first thought was that hidden forces, perhaps in our
Speaker 1: own government, were likely behind the murder. But then a
Speaker 1: man named James Earl Ray was arrested. He pled guilty
Speaker 1: to the crime and spent the rest of his life
Speaker 1: in prison. He was a lone gunman, we were told,
Speaker 1: brought to murder by racial hatred, and that spent the
Speaker 1: official narrative for over fifty years. It would be decades
Speaker 1: before I discovered the real story behind the murder of
Speaker 1: doctor King. It came to me in boxes, cardboard boxes
Speaker 1: with dozens of audio tapes. Just as he got to
Speaker 1: the door, shot rang up, and somebody came out of
Speaker 1: the bushes and handed him a smoking rifle, and he
Speaker 1: broke it down and wrapped it in a table ball
Speaker 1: and put it back in the door room. When I
Speaker 1: heard the shot, when I saw him get hit, and
Speaker 1: when I saw him go down. Now I'm no doctor,
Speaker 1: but there was no question to me that the man
Speaker 1: was hit hard. I mean he was hit hard. So
Speaker 1: I immediately turned around and go that direction. It was
Speaker 1: like once the shot went off, it was every dog
Speaker 1: for his own, every dog for his own. The voices
Speaker 1: on these tapes are from people who were there, people who,
Speaker 1: in the passing years have overcome their fear to speak
Speaker 1: about what they saw, what they heard, and in some cases,
Speaker 1: what they did when Martin Luther King was killed. Welcome
Speaker 1: to the MLK tapes. Doctor King's assassination is a critical
Speaker 1: moment in American history. Let's go back to March nine
Speaker 1: in his campaign to fight not only for civil rights
Speaker 1: but for economic justice. King had come to Memphis to
Speaker 1: support the sanitation workers in their request to form a union.
Speaker 1: Striking workers peacefully carrying signs that said I Am a
Speaker 1: Man was an image they hoped would penetrate the conscience
Speaker 1: of the nation. But this hope was shattered when the
Speaker 1: peaceful march King had wanted to lead was disrupted by
Speaker 1: rioting writing that may have been set off by people
Speaker 1: sent in to start trouble, and because of the awful
Speaker 1: images coming out of Memphis, King's critics were now saying
Speaker 1: that he had lost control of his movement, that he
Speaker 1: could no longer lead a peaceful protest. So we returned
Speaker 1: to Memphis to support the sanitation workers and prove his
Speaker 1: doubters wrong. Dr King, You're a march here on Monday
Speaker 1: has apparently been enjoyed the federal injunction. If that holds up,
Speaker 1: what are your plans? Will you march or not? We
Speaker 1: do feel that it would be a basic denial of
Speaker 1: First Amendment privileges to have an injunction take effect that
Speaker 1: would prevent us from marching. We stand on the First
Speaker 1: Amendment and in the past, we've on the basis of
Speaker 1: conscience had to break injunctions, and that may very well
Speaker 1: happen in this situation. But breaking an injunction was not
Speaker 1: King's only worry. By returning to Memphis, he was also
Speaker 1: putting his life on the line, and he knew it.
Speaker 1: It's the evening of April three, as thunderstorms rage outside Martin,
Speaker 1: Luther King speaks on behalf of the sanitation workers to
Speaker 1: several thousand followers in downtown Memphis. That's the question before
Speaker 1: you tonight. Not if I stopped to help the sanitation workers,
Speaker 1: what will happen to my job? The question is if
Speaker 1: I do not stop to help the sanitation workers, what
Speaker 1: will happen to them? That's the question. But there was
Speaker 1: something else that needed to be put into words. King's
Speaker 1: playing into Memphis had been delayed by a bomb scare,
Speaker 1: and threats on King himself were an increasing, almost daily occurrence.
Speaker 1: And then I got into Memphis and some began to
Speaker 1: say the threats I talk about what would happen to
Speaker 1: me from some of a sick white brothers. His words
Speaker 1: that night were a chilling foretelling of his own death.
Speaker 1: Like anybody I would like to live a long life.
Speaker 1: Longevity has its place, but I'm not concerned about that now.
Speaker 1: I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed
Speaker 1: me to go up to the mountain and I've looked
Speaker 1: over and I've seen the promised land. King didn't look away.
Speaker 1: He could feel what was coming. I may not get
Speaker 1: there with you, but I want you to know the
Speaker 1: night and we as a people will get to the
Speaker 1: promised Land. So I'm happy tonight. I'm not worried about anything.
Speaker 1: I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the
Speaker 1: glory on the coming of the Lord. The next morning,
Speaker 1: King's lieutenant Andrew Young went to court to challenge the
Speaker 1: injunction prohibiting the upcoming protest march. Well. King mostly stayed
Speaker 1: around the Lorraine Motel and met with people who came
Speaker 1: and went. Late in the day, Young returned to report
Speaker 1: that they had won. The march could go on. That
Speaker 1: was happy news because the soul food dinner was waiting
Speaker 1: at the Reverend Billy Kyle's house and everyone could now
Speaker 1: rely acts and have a good time. At six pm,
Speaker 1: Martin Luther King stepped out of Room three oh six
Speaker 1: onto the motel balcony. On his way to the dinner.
Speaker 1: As he waited for Ralph Abernathy to join him, he
Speaker 1: watched below as the diminutive Andrew Young shadow box with
Speaker 1: the Reverend James Orange, who was six ft four and
Speaker 1: near three hundred pounds. Don't hurt him, Andy King shouted.
Speaker 1: Then King spotted Ben Branch, a musician who was to
Speaker 1: play at the party after dinner. He asked Branch to
Speaker 1: be sure to play Precious Lord, take my hand, play
Speaker 1: it real, pretty, said King. There was a sudden sound
Speaker 1: like a firecracker, and Doctor King collapsed. Abernathy ran out
Speaker 1: of the room and knelt beside the fallen King. He
Speaker 1: cradled his wounded head and saw, as he put it,
Speaker 1: the understanding drain from his eyes. By the time Young arrived,
Speaker 1: blood was everywhere. Oh God, Ralph, he said, it's over.
Speaker 1: They said. They shoot an all points bulletin for a
Speaker 1: world rushed young white man scene running from the scene.
Speaker 1: Officers also reportedly chased and fired on a radio equipped
Speaker 1: car containing two white men. King was rushed to Saint
Speaker 1: Joseph's Hospital, where he died within the hour. Meanwhile, out
Speaker 1: on Main Street, the police would find a rifle in
Speaker 1: a box near a mysterious bag. In the bag were binoculars,
Speaker 1: nine bullets, a transistor radio, a pair of players, a
Speaker 1: couple of beers, and a copy of that day's newspaper.
Speaker 1: On this evidence, investigators would find the fingerprints of a
Speaker 1: man named James Earl Ray, a fugitive who would escape
Speaker 1: from prison the year before. They also discovered that a
Speaker 1: man fitting raised description had rented a room at a
Speaker 1: boarding house near the Lorraine and add access to a
Speaker 1: small bathroom with a line of sight to doctor King's
Speaker 1: position on the motel balcony. So the Memphis Police now
Speaker 1: had a suspect, but where was he? An enormously wide
Speaker 1: police hunt is now going on for an unidentified thirty
Speaker 1: year old white man who has been reported to be
Speaker 1: driving a large, fast, white sports car very recklessly. It
Speaker 1: took two months to find him, but finally on June eighth,
Speaker 1: Ray was arrested at London Heathrow Airport with a fake
Speaker 1: Canadian passport. The forty year old petty criminal and escaped
Speaker 1: convict was brought back to Memphis. At his arraignment, Ray
Speaker 1: was charged with the murder of Martin Luther King. He
Speaker 1: pleaded not guilty wishes of not guilty. Of course, criminals
Speaker 1: commonly plead not guilty, so Ray's initial plea doesn't mean
Speaker 1: a thing. It was rumored that Ray had Old King
Speaker 1: out of a vicious hatred, but no one knew for sure,
Speaker 1: because for the next eight months Ray was held in communicado.
Speaker 1: The only persons allowed to see him were his attorney
Speaker 1: and his brother. So what most people didn't know, and
Speaker 1: as a supposedly informed law student, I didn't know, was that,
Speaker 1: while admitting he was in Memphis that day, James Earl
Speaker 1: Ray always said that he did not shoot Martin Luther King.
Speaker 1: Ray wanted to go to trial, even though he knew
Speaker 1: that if he could not convince the jury, the penalty
Speaker 1: was likely to be the electric chair. He didn't care.
Speaker 1: He said he didn't do it, and he wanted his
Speaker 1: chance to prove it in court. Race famous criminal defense
Speaker 1: attorney Percy Foreman came on saying that Race case would
Speaker 1: be the easiest one he ever argued. But his Race
Speaker 1: trial date approached, Foreman suddenly changed his tune and pressured
Speaker 1: Ray to plead guilty, which he finally did. Are you
Speaker 1: play didn't did the murder in the plash degree in
Speaker 1: this case? Because you killed Dr Martin lived the King
Speaker 1: on the such circumstances that would make you legally guilty
Speaker 1: murder in the flash degree under the law is explained
Speaker 1: to you by your lawyers. Ray's answer was barely audible
Speaker 1: on the recording system used by the court. What he
Speaker 1: said was quote, yes, legally guilty. Uh huh. Three days
Speaker 1: after his guilty plea, James Earl Ray petition Judge Preston
Speaker 1: Battle to change his plea to not guilty. Often, in
Speaker 1: the interests of justice, such a petition is granted, and
Speaker 1: many observers expected Judge Battle to do that. But the
Speaker 1: day was to act, Battle was found slumped over his desk,
Speaker 1: dead from an apparent heart attack, and James El Ray
Speaker 1: was led off to prison no trial. Years passed and
Speaker 1: the vast majority of Americans didn't give the case much
Speaker 1: thought King had been killed and Ray was in prison
Speaker 1: because he was the one who shot him. But if
Speaker 1: you lived in Memphis, you might have been aware of
Speaker 1: strange stories and odd bits of evidence that didn't fit
Speaker 1: with the official count of the crime. People who heard things,
Speaker 1: people who saw things, things that didn't fit with the
Speaker 1: story of a loane drifter killing King. Also in nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy six, during congressional hearings, it came to light that
Speaker 1: the federal government had been wire tapping King's office and
Speaker 1: home and bugging his every hotel room. Why was the
Speaker 1: government so concerned with surveilling King? Was this in any
Speaker 1: way connected to his death? A man named William Pepper
Speaker 1: thinks it was. Pepper was a friend of Doctor King,
Speaker 1: and he spent many years gathering evidence that tells a
Speaker 1: very different story than the one we've all been told,
Speaker 1: Evidence about who really killed Martin Luther King and why
Speaker 1: he was murdered. In April nineteen seven, I traveled to
Speaker 1: New York City to join a massive anti war rally.
Speaker 1: There were more people marching than I had ever seen.
Speaker 1: As we approached the United Nations Plaza, we were too
Speaker 1: far away to see Dr King, but we could hear
Speaker 1: his unmistakable voice, stop the bombing, Let us save our
Speaker 1: national honor, stop the bombing, and stop the war. Sharing
Speaker 1: the stage with Dr King was a journalist named Bill Pepper.
Speaker 1: Pepper had been a friend of Dr King, and he
Speaker 1: had been an important influence on King's position against the
Speaker 1: war in Vietnam. I because of my writings on the
Speaker 1: war had been asked to introduce Martin King, which I did.
Speaker 1: It was a very significant movement because Dr King went
Speaker 1: against the advice of most of the civil rights leaders,
Speaker 1: who believed that he was going to cost them a
Speaker 1: great deal of money for their movements with his anti
Speaker 1: war position. But that was that was the nature of
Speaker 1: Dr King. He was amount of conscience. He spoke courageously
Speaker 1: on that day as well. Fifty years after that rally
Speaker 1: in New York, I would interview Bill Pepper while working
Speaker 1: on the RFK Tapes podcast. I wanted his take on
Speaker 1: the Robert Kennedy murder, and he had a lot to
Speaker 1: say about that, but he had even more to say
Speaker 1: about the killing of Martin Luther King because he had
Speaker 1: spent the last forty years of his life investigating the
Speaker 1: murder of his friend. There was more to tell than
Speaker 1: time would allow. So we agreed to meet again, and
Speaker 1: one warm afternoon in May, I traveled to Bill Pepper's
Speaker 1: home in South Harlem, where told me the remarkable story
Speaker 1: of how he had come to know Martin Luther King
Speaker 1: and the stunning things he had discovered about the assassination.
Speaker 1: I got my credentials as a journalist, and I went
Speaker 1: to Vietnam in nineteen sixties six. I was seeing whole
Speaker 1: villages raised and burned. I was seeing children badly injured
Speaker 1: by the napalm and the white fosphors, and I was
Speaker 1: seeing total devastation among the civilian population. So it was
Speaker 1: clear to me that war crimes are being committed by
Speaker 1: the Americans in massive amounts. I had heard about things
Speaker 1: like that, but I'd never seen anything like that in
Speaker 1: my life. I took photographs as much as I could.
Speaker 1: Pepper returned to the United States determined to tell about
Speaker 1: what he had seen, but his photographs were rejected by
Speaker 1: mainstream and progressive publications. He finally found a taker in
Speaker 1: Ramparts magazine, so the Ramparts piece came out in January
Speaker 1: of nineteen sixties. Heaven Martin King noticed as he was
Speaker 1: going on a trip to photographs. I think caught his
Speaker 1: attention that he read the article and asked to meet
Speaker 1: with me. I showed him whatever additional material that I
Speaker 1: had at that time, and I talked to him about
Speaker 1: what was going on there, and he wept. He saw
Speaker 1: all of this horror that was being done by his government.
Speaker 1: He couldn't believe it. And that was how I became
Speaker 1: involved with Doctor King, and I became close to him
Speaker 1: during the last year, but only the last year of
Speaker 1: his life. Pepper's article and photos helped Dr King come
Speaker 1: to grips with the harsh connection between poverty, race, and war.
Speaker 1: Then on April four seven, King delivered his famous speech
Speaker 1: on Vietnam at Riverside Church in New York. When machines
Speaker 1: and computers, profit motives, and property rights are considered more
Speaker 1: important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism,
Speaker 1: and militarism are incapable of being conquered. A year later,
Speaker 1: Doctor King was dead and Bill Pepper was devastated. But
Speaker 1: in the midst of the pain and heartbreak, his skills
Speaker 1: as a campaigner were still being courted, notably by Robert Kennedy,
Speaker 1: who had just recently announced he was running for president.
Speaker 1: We went from Memphis to Atlanta, where we buried Martin,
Speaker 1: and Bobby asked me and others to come up to
Speaker 1: his hotel to discuss his presidential campaign, and I said, no,
Speaker 1: I'm through his politics. After King was laid to rest,
Speaker 1: Bill Pepper went to work in education and at the
Speaker 1: same time earned a law degree. Ten years after King's murder.
Speaker 1: Pepper was pursuing a legal career in New York City.
Speaker 1: One afternoon, the phone rang. It was Ralph Abernathi, King's
Speaker 1: former number two. Abernati asked me in sev to go
Speaker 1: up to the prison Brushing Mountain Penitentiary and interrogate James
Speaker 1: Earl Ray, and I told Ralph I didn't know anything
Speaker 1: about the case. I thought James el Ray had been guilty,
Speaker 1: and I had not done any intensive investigation, so I
Speaker 1: would need some time in order to do that. In
Speaker 1: August of v I interrogated James for five torturous hours
Speaker 1: to put him under enormous stress, and James remained as
Speaker 1: calm as he could be, and he answered the questions
Speaker 1: as best as he could. For ten years, Bill Pepper
Speaker 1: had thought that James Earl Ray had murdered his friend
Speaker 1: Martin King, and he entered his interview with Ray still
Speaker 1: believing that. But the quiet understated Wray he met wasn't
Speaker 1: the man he expected to meet. Ray admitted that he
Speaker 1: had been in Memphis that day, had rented a room
Speaker 1: in Bessy Brewer's boarding house, and had bought the rifle
Speaker 1: in Birmingham. But he also calmly insisted that he did
Speaker 1: not shoot doctor King and didn't know the King was
Speaker 1: going to be shot. The men spent hours going over
Speaker 1: and over how it was he came to Memphis and
Speaker 1: what he was doing when King was killed. Each one
Speaker 1: of us, in our everyday lives has our own ways
Speaker 1: of deciding whether a person is telling the truth or not.
Speaker 1: It may be how they meet our eyes or the
Speaker 1: sound of their voice. But after five hours of questions
Speaker 1: and answers, both Bill Pepper and Ralph Abernathy came away
Speaker 1: with the same judgment. We left the room believing that
Speaker 1: he was not the shooter, but we didn't know what
Speaker 1: role he might have played. But he raised enough questions
Speaker 1: so that from that time on in night I began
Speaker 1: to go into Memphis and examine specific issues related to
Speaker 1: the case. As he went deeper into the evidence, Pepper
Speaker 1: came to believe that James Earl Ray was not only
Speaker 1: not the shooter, but was himself a victim of manipulation. Eventually,
Speaker 1: in an incredible twist of fate, Bill Pepper would become
Speaker 1: the attorney representing James Earl Ray, the man convicted of
Speaker 1: murdering his friend Martin King. Pepper was determined to get
Speaker 1: ready the trial he never had, and in so doing
Speaker 1: revealed to the world the evidence he was uncovering. I
Speaker 1: came to represent James in nine. He had been denied
Speaker 1: relief in the state courts, so we followed the abeous
Speaker 1: proceeding in the federal district court. We were denied in
Speaker 1: the Federal District Court. Then we went to the six
Speaker 1: Circuit Court of Appeal. We were denied there. Then we
Speaker 1: filed for a rit of sircir I with the Supreme Court.
Speaker 1: When we lost our appeal to the final appeal to
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court, we thought that was pretty much going
Speaker 1: to be the end of it. Though the legal avenues
Speaker 1: were seemingly close to them, there was one last recourse
Speaker 1: open to Bill Pepper and James Earl Ray, the court
Speaker 1: of public opinion. I talked to a producer whom I new,
Speaker 1: and HBO agreed, and so we worked on a plan
Speaker 1: to do an HBO special tonight in an effort to
Speaker 1: probe the mystery of Dr King's death. James Earl Ray
Speaker 1: will finally have his day in court. The defense team
Speaker 1: will be led by William Pepper, an American lawyer who
Speaker 1: practices in London. Pepper has been raised unpaid counsel for
Speaker 1: the past five years. It would be a formal trial
Speaker 1: with a randomly selected jury from all of the country,
Speaker 1: a and impartial judge. They asked Hickman Ewing, who was
Speaker 1: a former U S attorney for the Memphis area, and
Speaker 1: asked Hickman if he would be lead prosecutor. Hickman agreed,
Speaker 1: and so we tried the case three. The trial was
Speaker 1: a full knockdown, drag out trial. Prosecution maintains that the
Speaker 1: truck came from a bathroom, the bathroom in the rooming house,
Speaker 1: the defense suggests, and the proof and the evidence indicates
Speaker 1: the shot came from the brush from the bushes down below,
Speaker 1: from the backyard. Totally unscripted. We got James to testify
Speaker 1: by camera and he was subject to cross examination. I
Speaker 1: want to show you the chart of the ins out
Speaker 1: of the rooming house. You went up the south stairs.
Speaker 1: You went and saw Mrs Brewer said you wanted a room.
Speaker 1: It's a fact, is it not. She showed you room
Speaker 1: eight first, did she not? She showed me one room first.
Speaker 1: She said it was a lighthouse keeper room. And you
Speaker 1: looked at that room and then y'all walked down over here.
Speaker 1: She showed you that room, and you said you'd take
Speaker 1: five beat? Is that correct? Yes? I told her I
Speaker 1: wanted to sleeping room. That's great. This room right here,
Speaker 1: you can't see anything out of ken ken you, Mr Ray,
Speaker 1: you could have had room eight or you could have
Speaker 1: had room five B, and you chose room five beat.
Speaker 1: Is that right? Yes? There was two rooms there and
Speaker 1: I picked out that one. Is The HBO trial gave
Speaker 1: Bill Pepper an opportunity to call into question every aspect
Speaker 1: of the official story. If there is no significance of
Speaker 1: the brush in the back of the rooming house, why
Speaker 1: was it cut? Was this the police to find evidence? No,
Speaker 1: The defense suggests the brush was cut so that it
Speaker 1: could never be suggested that there was enough brush there
Speaker 1: to conceal a sniper. Could James Earl Ray cause the
Speaker 1: scene of a crime to be tampered with in this way?
Speaker 1: Reverend Jose Williams, who was one of Dr King's closest aids,
Speaker 1: testified for the defense that Martin's hotel room and the
Speaker 1: hotel itself, the reservations itself, were changed. Could James el
Speaker 1: Rey arranged this? Could James el Ray do this. We
Speaker 1: didn't know the verdict. They kept the verdict as secret
Speaker 1: as they could. The jury took seven hours plus and
Speaker 1: eventually it aired on April four. I guess, and we've
Speaker 1: sat up at the at the prison. James was there.
Speaker 1: Hickman and his team were on the left, and Jeanie
Speaker 1: and I were on the on the right, and the
Speaker 1: whole trial played on HBO and verdict came out. We
Speaker 1: the jury find the defendant not guilty. When the verdict
Speaker 1: came out, Hickman was startled. I was gonna have a
Speaker 1: heart attack. Even though it wasn't a real court proceeding,
Speaker 1: this mock trial demonstrated that the case against James Earl
Speaker 1: Ray didn't pass the test of reasonable doubt. A jury,
Speaker 1: when presented with the evidence that Pepper and others had uncovered,
Speaker 1: decided that Ray was not guilty. This should have been
Speaker 1: big news, but it got almost no mention in the
Speaker 1: American press. But it did shake the tree a little,
Speaker 1: and a few new people came forward with what they knew.
Speaker 1: At the same time, Bill Pepper published his book Orders
Speaker 1: to Kill, where he laid out the case for Ray's
Speaker 1: innocence and alleged that elements of the government may have
Speaker 1: been involved in Dr King's assassination, but most outlets in
Speaker 1: the mainstream media didn't review it, considering the importance of
Speaker 1: the man who was murdered and the evidence laid out
Speaker 1: for the reader. The question is why wasn't it reviewed
Speaker 1: the York Times reviewer and was told to pull it.
Speaker 1: This was the first time in twenty five years that
Speaker 1: he was told to pull book preview, and so it
Speaker 1: was pretty clear the story was going to be buried.
Speaker 1: But the book did reach the hands of an important
Speaker 1: person who would come forward and change the trajectory of
Speaker 1: the case. In his years searching for the truth, Bill
Speaker 1: Pepper had carefully stayed away from the King family, feeling
Speaker 1: that they had suffered enough. But once his book Orders
Speaker 1: to Kill was published, his work was out there for
Speaker 1: anyone to see, and one person who bought and read
Speaker 1: the book was Martin King's nephew, Isaac Farris, who recently
Speaker 1: sat down with us in Atlanta. I knew that uncle
Speaker 1: and may all maybe was a little different because one
Speaker 1: thing I would notice that the Thanksgiving dinners is that
Speaker 1: he would always be the last to get there, and
Speaker 1: most times he would, you know, start out by taking
Speaker 1: a nap, you know. I took an old of that,
Speaker 1: but I really didn't get a sense of of who
Speaker 1: he was till after he died. And that started the
Speaker 1: night he was assassinated. We were at home and the
Speaker 1: announcement came across the TV. Just based on my mother's reaction,
Speaker 1: I could tell something was up. Faris was just a
Speaker 1: boy when his uncle m l as he was called,
Speaker 1: was murdered. He saw the pain and the devastation it wrought,
Speaker 1: but he also saw strength in the family. The older generation,
Speaker 1: including his mother and his aunt Caretta, dealt with their
Speaker 1: pain by immersing themselves in the creation of the King
Speaker 1: Center and working towards a national holiday honoring Dr. King.
Speaker 1: What doubts they had they kept to themselves, but the
Speaker 1: younger generation felt less constrained. I would constantly have conversations,
Speaker 1: theoretical conversations with my other cousins, particularly his kids, about
Speaker 1: what might have happened, who might have been involved. To
Speaker 1: be told that an escape criminal followed my uncle across
Speaker 1: the country never sounded right to us. I mean, generally,
Speaker 1: an escape criminal is trying to keep a low profile,
Speaker 1: and escape criminal is not following a high profile individual around.
Speaker 1: So high profiled that law enforcement is probably in the area.
Speaker 1: So Isaac Farris brought a book on the murder of
Speaker 1: his uncle, and he was stunned by what it contained.
Speaker 1: But who's Bill Pepper? I personally did a little investigating
Speaker 1: about Bill Pepper the man, because at that point I
Speaker 1: did not realize that there was even a relationship between
Speaker 1: Bill Pepper and my uncle. And the more and more
Speaker 1: I looked into the man, and the more and more
Speaker 1: I read his story, things checked out. In January of nine,
Speaker 1: Farrest decided to call a meeting and put the story
Speaker 1: in front of the family. I said, look, we've all
Speaker 1: known that, you know this is not right. You know,
Speaker 1: we've all said that, we've all admitted that, but we've
Speaker 1: just kind of stopped there. Here's an opportunity, I think
Speaker 1: for us, at least if we don't find out every
Speaker 1: little detail, we can at least kind of put it together.
Speaker 1: The next step was to bring Bill Pepper to Atlanta
Speaker 1: to meet everyone and answer questions. According to Faris, it
Speaker 1: was a tense first hour. First, I guess we were
Speaker 1: challenging him on his personal integrity. Why are you, you know,
Speaker 1: doing this? What's your angle here? What what's your purpose,
Speaker 1: I mean that you're just trying to sell a best seller.
Speaker 1: And in a nutshell, we determined that Bill was since
Speaker 1: here that that he felt a sense of responsibility for
Speaker 1: what happened to my uncle, because Bill, uh doing my
Speaker 1: uncle's lifetime, was one of the people around my uncle
Speaker 1: who was actually trying to really push him to run
Speaker 1: for president. You know, I think Bill felt like, you know,
Speaker 1: whoever assassinated him knew of his plans, and so he
Speaker 1: felt a responsibility and we accepted that. So once we've
Speaker 1: got comfortable with him the man personally, and then it
Speaker 1: was like, Okay, well let's really look at your case
Speaker 1: and what you're talking about, and how did you come
Speaker 1: to this and and what's all it is based on.
Speaker 1: Bill Pepper didn't mind the questions. His friendship with Dr
Speaker 1: King had been real, and so was the work he's
Speaker 1: done on the case a great personal cost to himself,
Speaker 1: and he understood that just by being there, he was
Speaker 1: picking out a scab that covered a deep wound. I
Speaker 1: think it was very traumatic and devastating for the um
Speaker 1: to come to grips with the fact that this this
Speaker 1: good and peaceful man who had the values of not
Speaker 1: only his faith, but of a representative democracy was actually
Speaker 1: taken away from them and from all of us by
Speaker 1: governmental action. It's a very traumatic piece of information to digest.
Speaker 1: But we decided that night, Okay, now you know, we
Speaker 1: need to take this to the world, and how do
Speaker 1: we do that. We agreed to kind of get involved
Speaker 1: and help him and do whatever we could, and as
Speaker 1: a result of that, we found out further information. The
Speaker 1: family's first effort was to aid Bill Pepper's attempt to
Speaker 1: get ready the trial he never had. There was an
Speaker 1: urgency now because just a few months earlier Ray had
Speaker 1: almost died in the hospital from complications arising from cirosis
Speaker 1: of the liver. He had recovered from that crisis, but
Speaker 1: the clock was clearly ticking. So in March, in an
Speaker 1: effort to get a trial for Ray, Dexter King sat
Speaker 1: down with James el Ray with media present. The meeting
Speaker 1: lasted about half an hour, and at one point King
Speaker 1: asked Ray the question, did you kill my father? No? No,
Speaker 1: I didn't know. I want you to know that I
Speaker 1: believe you, and my family believes you, and we are
Speaker 1: going to do everything in our power to try and
Speaker 1: make sure that justice will prevail. Isaac Ferris also met
Speaker 1: with Ray, but without the cameras. I have met James
Speaker 1: el Ray. I want to be careful how to say this,
Speaker 1: but James el Ray is not the smartest cookie on
Speaker 1: the block. Okay. In fact, every crime did he committed,
Speaker 1: he bungled. I mean, he was just a bungler as
Speaker 1: a criminal. I mean, if you look at his history,
Speaker 1: I mean, and he would get caught doing dumb things.
Speaker 1: One time he robbed a place and apparently he was
Speaker 1: bare footed or something, and and took high heeled shoes
Speaker 1: from there, and then he tried to run in high
Speaker 1: heeled shoes away from the cops. But I go back
Speaker 1: and forth on whether or not you know, James knew
Speaker 1: okay I'm part of a plan to kill Dr King,
Speaker 1: or you know, whether or not he just was a
Speaker 1: person that was taking advantage of but his level of intelligence,
Speaker 1: it's possible that he could have been duped. It's possible
Speaker 1: he could have been a part of this and never
Speaker 1: known that this is a plan to kill Dr King.
Speaker 1: For a while, it seemed as though the effort to
Speaker 1: get ready of trial was going to bear fruit, as
Speaker 1: Bill Pepper got the case in front of Judge Joe Brown,
Speaker 1: who appeared ready to let them present their evidence. And Memphis,
Speaker 1: Joe Brown was a criminal court judge who was on
Speaker 1: the verge of giving us a trial, a new trial
Speaker 1: for James all right. We had made a strong presentation
Speaker 1: to Joe Brown. He was very skeptical of the official story.
Speaker 1: He was and is an expert in ballistics. Had determined
Speaker 1: for himself that the rifle, the throwdown rifle, could not
Speaker 1: have been the murder weapon, was not the murder weapon.
Speaker 1: He was on the verge of ruling for a new trial,
Speaker 1: and I was shortly after that that he was simply
Speaker 1: removed from the case by the administrative judge and a
Speaker 1: new judge was put in who would be more compliant,
Speaker 1: but on equal time ran out for James Errol Ray,
Speaker 1: James ol Ray, as we just heard his dead, and
Speaker 1: there are fears that the truth about Martin Luther King's
Speaker 1: assassination may have died with him. Ray died of kidney
Speaker 1: failure and come locations or liver disease on Thursday. With
Speaker 1: Ray gone, it may have seemed like the end, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't. Because Bill Pepper had one more idea. As
Speaker 1: new evidence emerged after the HBO trial, it had become
Speaker 1: clear that one man, Lloyd Jowers, had played some role
Speaker 1: in the murder. The back door to his bar and
Speaker 1: grille opened unto the brush covered yard just opposite King's
Speaker 1: room at the Lorraine, and a few people who worked
Speaker 1: for Jowers had come forward with what they had seen
Speaker 1: the day of the murder, and Jowers himself had made
Speaker 1: what seemed to be self incriminating statements. So Pepper went
Speaker 1: back to the King family. What if they sued this
Speaker 1: man and various unnamed government agencies for wrongful death. It
Speaker 1: would be a civil suit, not a criminal trial, but
Speaker 1: it would represent an opportunity to get the evidence as
Speaker 1: it then existed, recorded under oath in a court of law.
Speaker 1: The downside said it would open old wounds. Would the
Speaker 1: family be up for such an ordeal? Once we became comfortable,
Speaker 1: and then the family felt that they should share this
Speaker 1: with the world because we knew even if it was ignored,
Speaker 1: it's still there in history. So even if fifty years
Speaker 1: from now people have a different look on this and
Speaker 1: are prepared to accept the facts, is there for them.
Speaker 1: And the family agreed that we would bring a civil action,
Speaker 1: and since we had so much on this man, has
Speaker 1: been Jowers, we would name him as a defendant and
Speaker 1: his lawyer cooperative. His lawyer, Lewis Garrison, a very good
Speaker 1: and solid, decent man, said his client was just a
Speaker 1: pawn used by powerful forces. It was, you know, a
Speaker 1: long trial. Was thirty days or so and seventy witnesses.
Speaker 1: Was a very very long trial. But it did give
Speaker 1: us an opportunity to put forwards what evidence that we
Speaker 1: had at that point in time. For over thirty years,
Speaker 1: Creti Scott King had borne the grief of her husband's
Speaker 1: death with grace and dignity. She never expressed a doubt
Speaker 1: that James ol Ray had pulled the trigger, although she
Speaker 1: did sometimes wonder aloud if other hands had helped him
Speaker 1: do it. But for three weeks in November, Mrs King
Speaker 1: went to a courtroom in downtown Memphis, took her seat
Speaker 1: and listened as witness after witness gave their testimony. On
Speaker 1: the final day, Bill Pepper rose and addressed the jury.
Speaker 1: Let me close by saying to you that long after people, yet,
Speaker 1: what has been said in this courtroom? Are you going
Speaker 1: to remember the verdict of the student because you have
Speaker 1: heard evidence that has never before been put on in
Speaker 1: Soivan would have been put on Mr Ray's trial if
Speaker 1: he had ever been granted the trunk. No one has
Speaker 1: heard detailed evidence that you have behalf of the family
Speaker 1: at Martin Wood became junior. We asked you to find
Speaker 1: that conspiracy existed once and for all. Give this plaintive
Speaker 1: found justice, and let's plans the city and this nation
Speaker 1: of the ignorance who has pervaded this case for so long.
Speaker 1: After Bill Pepper sat down, the judge gave his instructions,
Speaker 1: and the jury retired to consider the case. But only
Speaker 1: a few hours later they returned with the verdict in
Speaker 1: favor of the King family, finding that the murder of
Speaker 1: Dr Martin Luther King in Memphis had been a planned
Speaker 1: event and that multiple people have been involved. After the trial,
Speaker 1: Mrs King returned to Atlanta. The following day, she called
Speaker 1: a press conference. This is what she had to say.
Speaker 1: This verdict is not only a great victory for my family,
Speaker 1: but also a great victory for America and a great
Speaker 1: victory or truth itself. The jury was clearly convinced that,
Speaker 1: in addition to Mr Jawa's a conspiracy of the mafia, local,
Speaker 1: state and federal government agencies were deeply involved in the
Speaker 1: assassination of my husband. The jury also affirmed overwhelming evidence
Speaker 1: that identified someone else, not James L. Ray, as the
Speaker 1: shooter in Memphis, and that Mr Ray was set up
Speaker 1: to take the blame. So what did Coretta Scott King
Speaker 1: here in that courtroom that made this reserved, careful woman
Speaker 1: speak in such a definite fashion. That's what we'll be
Speaker 1: looking at and talking about in the next eleven episodes.
Speaker 1: The trial, in its verdict should have been a huge doory,
Speaker 1: but the American press did not see fit to report
Speaker 1: on it in any meaningful way. What came instead were
Speaker 1: the op ed pieces by men already invested in the
Speaker 1: official story attacking Mrs King and her family for being
Speaker 1: dupes or in it for the money, as if there
Speaker 1: were any I was disgusted by the coverage and lack
Speaker 1: of coverage of the media. The King family was greatly abused.
Speaker 1: In fact, there was some editorials that were related to
Speaker 1: them as aiding and abetting treason and terrorism and all
Speaker 1: of that. The anger over how the King family was
Speaker 1: treated was still evident on Bill Pepper's face as he
Speaker 1: showed me the photographs of Mrs King bravely standing beside
Speaker 1: him in the courtroom, and photos of him with the
Speaker 1: rest of the King family at a dinner they put
Speaker 1: on as a thank you for his efforts, and there
Speaker 1: was a lot to thank him for. Over the years,
Speaker 1: each time someone stepped forward with new information, Bill would
Speaker 1: sit them down own and record what they had to say.
Speaker 1: In most cases, they were just common people who finally
Speaker 1: overcame their fear and answered their conscience. In the end,
Speaker 1: there were dozens and dozens of audio tapes in boxes
Speaker 1: in different places and attic here, a closet there, and
Speaker 1: some down at the King Center in Atlanta. Many of
Speaker 1: the people on those tapes are dead now, but their
Speaker 1: stories aren't, and you're going to hear them. It's not
Speaker 1: every day that one gets the shadow a lie as
Speaker 1: big as this one. I called the Union Hall as
Speaker 1: says a matter of life and death. I said, I
Speaker 1: think these people are planning to kill Dr King. The
Speaker 1: authorities were parade at all. We found a gun that
Speaker 1: James L. Ray bought in Birmingham that killed Dr King,
Speaker 1: Except it wasn't the gun that killed Dr King. James L.
Speaker 1: Ray was a pond for the official radio from My
Speaker 1: Heart Radio and tender Foot TV. The plan was to
Speaker 1: get King to the city because they wanted it handled
Speaker 1: in Memphis for Dad and nam Cad handle it. And
Speaker 1: I've lived with it so long, my sear and they
Speaker 1: they scared for me. The Lord told me to not
Speaker 1: the world. I've been wanting to tell it all my life.
Speaker 1: I'm Bill Claiburg and this is d MLK Tapes. Thanks
Speaker 1: for listening to the m l K Tapes, a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio and tended for TV. This podcast
Speaker 1: is not specifically endorsed by the King Family or the
Speaker 1: King of State. Dmail K Tapes is written and hosted
Speaker 1: by Bill Claiper. Matt Frederick and Alex Williams are executive
Speaker 1: producers on behalf of I Heart Radio with producers Trevor
Speaker 1: Young and ben Keebrick. Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay are
Speaker 1: executive producers on half of tender Foot TV with produces
Speaker 1: Jamie Albright and Meredith Steadman. Original music by Makeup and
Speaker 1: Vanity Set. Cover art by Mr soul to six with
Speaker 1: photography by Artemus Jenkins. Special thanks to Owen Rosenbaum and
Speaker 1: Grace Royer at u t A, The Nord Group, back
Speaker 1: Median Marketing envisioned Business Management and Station sixteen. If you
Speaker 1: have questions, you can visit our website, the email k
Speaker 1: Tapes dot com. We posted photos and videos related to
Speaker 1: the podcast on our social media accounts. You can check
Speaker 1: them out at the Email k Tapes. From our podcasts
Speaker 1: from I Heart Radio and tender Foot TV, please visit
Speaker 1: the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows,