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King's widow seeks new probe into husband's death
April 2, 1998
King's widow wants a special commission to reopen the assassination probe
Web posted at: 2:30 p.m. EST (1930 GMT)ATLANTA (CNN) -- The widow of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. called for a national commission to investigate the civil rights leader's assassination Thursday, two days before the 30th anniversary of his slaying.
Coretta Scott King said she wants to meet with President Clinton to discuss possible new evidence and recent developments in the case and to ask him to initiate a new investigation.
She, other family members and friends gathered at his crypt in Atlanta, and urged that the whole truth about the assassination be revealed.
"I want to make it clear that I'm not interested in any retribution of anyone. I just want to get the truth, so we can have closure to this tragedy," Mrs. King said.
(217K/20 sec. AIFF or WAV sound)
The commission should have the authority to provide immunity and protection for anyone who comes forward to tell what they know about the death, she said.
Mrs. King also made another plea for a trial for James Earl Ray, the convicted killer who recanted his confession after he was sentenced to 99 years in prison. Because of his guilty plea, he never had a trial.
"It is morally wrong to make Ray the scapegoat when he has never been tried and there's mounting evidence others were involved," she said.
Mrs. King was joined by her sons, Dexter and Martin III, and former U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young, who accused authorities of being reluctant to test the rifle Ray allegedly used to kill King and for failing to interview people who claim to have information pointing to a conspiracy.
Young is a former Atlanta mayor and was a King lieutenant during the 1960s.
30th anniversary of assassination
King was shot on April 4, 1968, as he stood on a balcony outside the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis, Tennessee, where he had gone to try to mediate a strike by garbage haulers.
Young was inside King's hotel room when the fatal shot was fired from across the street. He said his search for answers was not about conspiracy theories but about a search for the truth.
Coretta Scott King and her son, Dexter Young was the one who discussed King's death with the civil rights leader's children.
Rifle tests left issue open
He said he began to question the government's conclusion that Ray acted alone in the killing when Tennessee officials fought against testing the rifle officials say Ray used in the shooting.
"I was ready to believe James Earl Ray did it and had some assistance," he said, "but when they refused to test the rifle, that raised some suspicions."
Ballistics tests on the Winchester hunting rifle in 1968 and 1977 proved inconclusive. Last year, after considerable wrangling, Ray's lawyers prevailed in having a third set of ballistics tests done. They, too, were inconclusive.
Alternate story offered as plausible
In raising questions about the case, Young said Thursday that Lloyd Jowers, who owned a restaurant across the street from the Lorraine Hotel where King was shot, told him he had been paid $100,000 to pay a hit man to shoot King.
Young said Jowers told him he was told to be at the back door of the restaurant at 6 p.m. the night of April 4. Jowers said he heard a shot ring out as he went to the door and, as Young put it, "a man who he knew as a Memphis policeman, a good friend of his, came to the back door and threw him a rifle which was still smoking."
Young said Jowers told him the rifle, kept in the back of the restaurant overnight, had disappeared in the morning.
Jowers never has been interviewed by prosecuting attorneys in the case, and wants to clear his conscience, said his attorney, Louis Garrison, at Thursday's news conference.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Special Section:
Related stories:
- Report: Lawyer says James Earl Ray appeals over - March 18, 1998
- King's brief life left an enduring legacy - January 18, 1998
- James Earl Ray loses bid for hearing - September 18, 1997
- Civil rights leaders urge James Earl Ray to tell all - July 12, 1997
- Ray tells M.L. King's son he didn't kill his father - March 27, 1997
Related sites:
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- Martin Luther King Jr. Tribute - Life Magazine
- Martin Luther King, Jr. Home Page - National Park Service
- Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers Project - Stanford University
- Free at Last: A Gravity Tribute to Martin Luther King
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