From: Brad Pierce <pierce@CS.UCLA.EDU>
Subject: CAIB: The Murder of Martin Luther King Jr. (2/3)
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: ?
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 08:15:09 GMT

Spying on King

By 1977, with the revelations by the Church Committee of major 
abuses by U.S. intelligence agencies, public opinion about the 
political assassinations of the 1960s had reached such heights 
that Congress was forced into forming the House Select Committee 
on Assassinations to investigate the murders of John F. Kennedy 
and Martin Luther King Jr.

Beset with political problems and threats to its funding, the 
HSCA nonetheless did manage to address, if inconclusively and 
frequently inadequately, the majority of the issues and points 
raised by critics of the official story in the King case. Its 
final report dated March 29, 1979 concluded that James Earl Ray 
was indeed guilty of killing Martin Luther King Jr. but there had 
been co-conspirators after all. An informant's report in the 
FBI's St. Louis office, previously overlooked, led to the 
discovery that a $50,000 bounty for the death of Martin Luther 
King Jr. had been offered in that city in 1967. [14. Final Report 
of the U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on 
Assassination (hereafter referred to as the {HSCA Report}) (New 
York: Bantam, 1979).]

However, blaming the King assassination on a conspiracy of St. 
Louis organized crime figures, with Ray acting as the killer, 
leaves many disturbing questions unanswered. One of these 
questions is, how could Ray simply walk into a predominantly 
black section of Memphis teeming with police, informants, and 
undercover agents, shoot King and then leave unmolested? The 
extent of the police surveillance on King was remarkable and the 
notion that Ray shot King and escaped undetected is even more 
remarkable. Recently, the true nature and extraordinary extent of 
the official presence in Memphis in April 1968 became clear.

Retired Memphis police officer Sam Evans confirmed that King's 
chauffeur and the manager of the Lorraine Motel were paid police 
informants. It is also known that Marrell McCoullough, one of the 
first to reach King's fallen body, although ostensibly a member 
of the radical black group, the Invaders, was in fact an 
undercover agent of the Memphis Police Department. [15. This was 
not revealed by investigators in 1968 but was acknowledged by the 
HSCA after writers like Mark Lane and Dick Gregory had drawn 
attention to it. See Mark Lane and Dick Gregory, {Codename Zorro: 
The Murder of Martin Luther King, Jr.} (New York: Pocketbooks, 
1977).

The so-called Intelligence Unit of the Memphis Police Department 
(MPD) had been planting bugs and agents at all the strategy 
meetings of the sanitation workers and the Invaders. 
Nevertheless, they continue to deny having had any source, human 
or electronic, at the heart of the Southern Christian Leadership 
Conference (SCLC) (the group King headed) that day. A senior 
police officer claimed that military intelligence and the U.S. 
Secret Service had also deployed agents throughout Memphis. [16. 
Interview with investigative journalist Wayne Chastin in June 
1989.]

It is now known that a member of the SCLC and leaders of the 
local NAACP were in the pay of the FBI. And another figure close 
to the SCLC - Jay Richard Kennedy - had been reporting his fears 
of communist control over King to the CIA. [17. This information 
was revealed in documents released under the Freedom of 
Information Act and published by David Garrow in {The FBI and 
Martin Luther King, Jr.} (New York: Penguin, 1983). It was also 
discussed by Kennedy for the first time on camera in an interview 
conducted in June 1989.]

Despite the presence of numerous people engaged in the 
surveillance of King, apparently not one of them spotted the 
assassin arriving, shooting Dr. King, or escaping the scene.

Given that the Memphis Police Department had in the past provided 
extensive security for Dr. King on previous visits and was aware 
of the vulnerability of the Lorraine Motel, it seems incredible 
that a contingent of police bodyguards assigned to King on his 
arrival should have been removed the day of the shooting, 
apparently without the knowledge of the police chief, Frank 
Holloman.

Just two hours before the assassination the MPD's patrolling "TAC 
Units," each comprising three cars, were pulled back five blocks 
from the vicinity of the Lorraine Motel. Police chief Holloman 
claimed that he did not know of that decision until afterwards. 
Inspector Sam Evans, who was in charge of the units, denied that 
they were pulled back, even though it is now an acknowledged 
matter of public record. [18. This point of fact was established 
in the HSCA investigation. However, when interviewed in June 
1989, Sam Evans continued to deny it.]

Furthermore, immediately after the shooting, no "All Points 
Bulletin" was issued which might have ensured that the major 
escape routes out of Memphis were sealed. No satisfactory 
explanation has ever been provided for that failure.

In another bizarre incident, on the day of the assassination, an 
erroneous message was delivered by a Secret Service agent to the 
Memphis Police headquarters stating that there had been a death 
threat against a black police detective. The detective, Ed 
Redditt, was stationed at a surveillance post next to the 
Lorraine Motel. Shortly after the first message, a corrected 
message arrived saying that the threat was a hoax but the police 
intelligence officer who received it nevertheless, went to where 
Detective Redditt was stationed and ordered him to go home. This 
was two hours before the assassination. Why did the intelligence 
officer send Redditt home even though he knew the threat to be 
false? When we approached the officer, who has now left the 
police force, he refused to be interviewed. [19. See G. Frank, 
{An American Death} (New York: Doubleday, 1972).]

Some of these circumstances are explained by the police as a 
series of coincidences, errors, and oversights. Some are not 
explained at all. While the HSCA's final report fell short of 
accusing the police of complicity in the assassination, it 
lambasted the Memphis Police Department for incompetence and 
latent racism.

Perhaps the HSCA's final conclusion would have been different if 
it had obtained undoctored intelligence reports from the Memphis 
Police Department. While doing research for his book "The Murkin 
Conspiracy," Philip Melanson, obtained an MPD intelligence report 
regarding the King assassination. When he compared it to the same 
report published by the HSCA, he found that all the footnotes and 
most of the references to undercover police agents in Memphis had 
been deleted from the HSCA version. Numerous paragraphs were 
missing and certain sentences were rewritten to play up the 
violent nature of Memphis civil rights activists and strikers. 
[20. {Op. cit.}, n. 4, p. 80.] Why didn't the HSCA get the 
originals? When confronted with this discrepancy, Representative 
Louis Stokes (Dem.-Ohio), the former Chair of the HSCA, admitted 
that he did not know that the Memphis Police Department had 
provided the Committee with altered documents. [21. Interview 
with Representative Louis Stokes, Washington, D.C., June 1989.]


The Role of the FBI

It is also enlightening to look at FBI actions both prior to and 
after the King assassination. Former Atlanta FBI agent Arthur 
Murtagh has given some indication of the prevailing mood at the 
Bureau in King's home city.

Murtagh related in an interview that "Me and a colleague were 
checking out for the day when the news came over the radio that 
Dr. King had been shot. My colleague leapt up, clapped his hands 
and said `Goddamn, we got him! We finally got him.'" When asked 
if he was sure of this statement Murtagh was adamant that his 
colleague said "we," not "they." [22. Interview with Arthur 
Murtagh, June 1989.]

For years, through its COINTELPRO operations, the FBI had been 
spying on, bugging, falsifying letters, and sowing discontent 
among the leadership of the SCLC in an attempt to discredit and 
"neutralize" Dr. King. [23. See Garrow, {op. cit.}, n. 17; also 
see HSCA report.]

Suddenly, after the King assassination, the FBI began what was 
called the greatest, most expensive inquiry in Bureau history - 
the hunt for King's killer. All the technical and human resources 
of Hoover's FBI focused on the bundle of evidence conveniently 
left at the crime scene - a bundle which only pointed to one man 
- Eric Galt, a.k.a. John Willard, a.k.a. Paul Bridgman, a.k.a. 
George Sneyd, whose real name is James Earl Ray. At the same 
time, white racist groups braced themselves for an FBI assault, 
but to their astonishment no one asked them any questions. "It 
was strange," recalled white supremacist J.B. Stoner, "[It was] 
almost as if they knew they didn't have to look this way." [24. 
Interview with J.B. Stoner, Atlanta Georgia, April 1989.]

The HSCA, like the Justice Department which had already conducted 
an investigation into the FBI's handling of the King 
assassination, found no evidence of a coverup. In the end, the 
Committee did conclude that the Bureau had contributed to a moral 
climate conducive to the murder of Dr. King, but it stopped short 
of accusing the Bureau of actual involvement in the killing. [25. 
{Op. cit.}, n. 14.]

Evidence nonetheless exists suggesting that elements within the 
FBI may have played a significant role in the political 
assassination. Consider, for instance, Myron Billett's story.

In early 1968, Myron Billett was the trusted chauffeur of Mafia 
chief Sam Giancana. Giancana asked Billett to drive him, and 
fellow mobster Carlos Gambino, to a meeting at a motel in upstate 
New York. Other major Mafia figures from New York were there as 
well as three men who were introduced as representatives from the 
CIA and FBI. There were a number of subjects on the agenda, 
including Castro's Cuba. [26. Interview with Myron Billett, 
Columbus Ohio, June 1989.]

According to Billett, one of the government agents offered the 
mobsters a million dollars for the assassination of Martin Luther 
King Jr. Billett stated that Sam Giancana replied, "Hell no, not 
after you screwed up the Kennedy deal like that." As far as 
Billett knows, no one took up the offer.

Billett relayed this information in an interview conducted just 
weeks before he died of emphysema. Given his condition, there 
appears to be no particular reason for him to lie. While his 
allegations are mentioned in the HSCA's final report, it makes no 
judgement as to their validity - the HSCA report simply states 
that is was unable to corroborate his story.

There is another instance in which FBI agents were heard 
discussing bounties and the recruitment of professionals to kill 
King. In September 1965, Clifton Baird, a Louisville, Kentucky 
policeman was informed by fellow officer Arlie Blair of a 
$500,000 offer to kill Dr. King. Louisville was the home of 
King's brother, the Reverend A.D. King. Baird said he overheard 
other police officers and several FBI officers discussing the 
contract. The next day, Baird tape-recorded Blair referring to 
the contract again. Later, the HSCA heard the tape and verified 
its authenticity. [27. {Op. cit.}, n. 14.]

FBI agent William Duncan, liaison with the Louisville Police, 
admitted that the discussion had taken place and named two other 
agents who would confirm it. But he also claimed the offer was 
initiated as a joke by police Sergeant William Baker. Both of the 
other FBI agents denied any knowledge of the conversation and 
Baker had died. The HSCA ran out of leads. [28. {Ibid.}]

There are also witnesses afraid to discuss what really happened 
on the day of the assassination due to continuing harassment and 
intimidation. For example, ever since a black Tennessee grocery 
store owner named John McFerren first told his story, he has been 
threatened, burgled, beaten up, and shot at. Now he is very 
reluctant to tell it again.

On the afternoon of the assassination, McFerren was at a Memphis 
produce store when he overheard the store's manager say on the 
phone "Get him on the balcony, you can pick up the money from my 
brother in New Orleans and don't call me here again." The man on 
the phone was Frank Liberto. His brother, Sal, who lived in New 
Orleans, was associated with Mafia kingpin Carlos Marcello. As 
incredible as it seems, the FBI did not pursue McFerren's 
allegation after they initially questioned Liberto and he denied 
it. [29. Interview with John McFerren, Memphis, Tennessee, June 
1989. It should be noted that because McFerren is terrified of 
retribution, he refuses to be interviewed on camera.]

These connections, and other evidence that members of the Mob 
were involved in the assassination, were discovered by 
investigative reporter Bill Sartor. While doing research for a 
book, Sartor had gone undercover and infiltrated the peripheries 
of both the Memphis and the New Orleans Mafia. Sartor died 
mysteriously in Texas as he was completing his first draft and 
two autopsies failed to reveal the cause of death.

There are other Memphis locals, particularly in the vicinity of 
the Lorraine Motel and Jim's Grill, who are still afraid to talk 
or who have suddenly changed their original stories. At least one 
of them is still visited from time to time by a man reminding him 
to stay silent. There is also the allegation that someone posing 
as an advance security person appeared at the Lorraine Motel two 
days before the assassination and ordered Dr. King's room changed 
from the ground floor to the first. Finally there was the known 
presence in Memphis on the day of the assassination as well as a 
week after, of a notorious anti-Castro mercenary and CIA contract 
employee. Years later, when questioned about why he was in 
Memphis on the day of the assassination, he admitted "it was my 
business to be there."

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