The King Assassination and CNN Disinformation by Dr. William F. Pepper

[reprehensor]

As a friend and colleague of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., during the last year of his life, James Earl Ray’s attorney, for the last ten years of his life and, finally, lead Counsel for Dr. King’s family in the 1999 civil trial which brought forward evidence from 70 witnesses over 30 days in Memphis, I am compelled to comment, for the record, on the most recent documentary on the assassination by CNN which is being aired on an ongoing basis. The fact that my participation in the program was used to give it some credibility makes this comment even more relevant.

It is one matter to distort the truth of how this great American prophet was taken from us, but quite another to have mainstream media perpetuate disinformation on matters of such public importance to the citizens of the Republic. An expert witness, at the King family civil trial, William Schapp, set out the historical use of government disinformation through mainstream media, dating back to the 1920’s.

The first half of the program was dedicated to James and his background and history. While the program notably failed to provide a motive as to why this escaped convict would even consider such an act, and racism had been excluded by the earlier Congressional investigation, it was hinted at by a reference of his refusal to go to a work farm attached to the Missouri prison because of the number of blacks in that facility. In fact, James was afraid of becoming tied into drug activity which was going on there and having his term extended. He would regularly roll dice with black co-workers when he worked in a shoe factory.

The program went on to allege that he and his brother robbed a bank in Alton, Illinois, on July 12, 1967. This, allegedly, was the source of his funds, so he did not need the handler he identified as Raoul, who we would eventually identify. I don’t know the former detective they brought on camera, but closer to the time, 1978, I spoke with the president of the bank and the Chief of Police, and both told me that the Ray brothers had never been suspects, and in fact they believed that they knew who did the robbery, but did not have enough proof to charge them. Further, they confirmed that despite mainstream published reports they had never been interviewed by the Congressional investigators, the FBI or the reporting media’s investigative reporter. ...

Continued...
http://911blogger.com/node/16353

[reprehensor]

1. Digg...

http://digg.com/politics/The_King_Assassination_and_CNN_Disinformation

[Doctor_J]

2. Excellent read - and ties in nicely with

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x368086

[MinM]

3. Judge Joe Brown

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?s=5953320ce38d22c9a28106877859bdab&showtopic=12603&st=0&p=142209&#entry142209">Judge Joe Brown was forced off the case before they could get to the bottom of it.

Much like Richard Sprague of the House Select Committee on Assassinations and Jim Garrison before them.

[autorank]

4. That last sentence does it for me k*4

Oh, so lets see, the story was these folks were interviewed. And they were not. So what's that about.
I guess it's called total contempt for the public, like we'll never check it out. Well, Pepper did
and this is a very damning point. It's small but revelatory. They casually lie about work they do
to cover the truth and then don't even bother to tell the subjects of their lies to shut up.

In this case, the bank just wants to catch the bad guy, get the money. But they can't, probably,
because it runs afoul of the official story. So who investigates bank robbers? Right!

[H2O Man]

5. When both the

"authorities" and media push lies knowingly, one has good reason to be suspicious. I've followed Pepper's work, as well as Mark Lane's, and they helped uncover the truth. What's more, those familiar with Dick Gregory (who combined efforts with Lane) know that members of the House Comittee from the 1970s told Dick what they actually knew to be true, but were handcuffed from saying publicly.

Nominated.

[autorank]

6. Thanks for the Gregory info

I hadn't known that about his back channel to the committee. His outrage is now clearer and a perfectly normal reaction to an insane situation.

"Hand culffed" with what;) Let old Dick take the fall. Amazing.

[H2O Man]

7. Some of the

people who had been associated with Martin Luther King, Jr. in the 1960s, and who were in Congress in the 1970s, were handcuffed by fear. They were intimidated by forces that had been with J. Edgar Hoover, and allowed others in the House Committee's investigation to close certain avenues. I'm not saying that as a knock on them, for if Martin's level of bravery was common, we would not remember him as being so special.

Dick was very active in the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s, of course. He was good friends with Malcolm X. Dick played an important role in Selma. So he was friends with a few House members. One told him, and this is a fairly close quote, "Dick, we know Hoover had him killed." But they didn't ever say that publicly. Luckily, others have.

[MinM]

8. Eyewitness to Murder: The King Assassination

Reviewed by James DiEugenio

The show did examine J. Edgar Hoover's racially tinged and neurotic campaign against King. It even produced some of the famous FBI COINTELPRO memos and talked about some of the surveillance activities used by Hoover against King. O'Brien interviewed people who believed in and have written about Ray's innocence. And she let them speak about it on camera, e.g. Jerry Ray and William Pepper. She talked about two problems in the case against Ray. She specifically stated that the bullet that killed King has never been matched to the rifle in evidence. And the fact that no person ever identified Ray either in the bathroom of the flophouse where he was supposed to have fired that rifle, or fleeing the scene...

She also uses this "evidence" when she mentions the purchase of the 30.06 Remington Gamemaster rifle. Ray bought this weapon at the Aeromarine Supply Company in Birmingham, Alabama on March 30, 1968. Ray made this purchase under the name of Harvey Lowmeyer. And he said it was done at the request of Raoul. But O'Brien leaves out an interesting fact about the incident. On March 29th, Ray had purchased a .243 Winchester at the same store. The next day, he returned the Winchester and purchased the Remington. Why he did this or why Raoul would ask him to do so has never been explained. But it did give the attendant, who refused to appear on camera for CNN, an opportunity to clearly recall the incident, and remember Ray's face.

Speaking of this rifle, O'Brien makes one of the most irresponsible, laughable statements on the show. Looking at the glass-enclosed weapon with a museum attendant next to her, she describes the 200-foot shot as so easy that either of them could have made it. This statement was completely vitiated during Judge Joe Brown's ballistics hearings in Memphis in the late nineties. Brown, a very experienced marksman, determined that this particular rifle cannot be properly sited in manually. With this rifle, that process can only be done by a machine. A machine which Aeromarine Supply Company did not have at the time. Brown estimated that a non-practicing rifleman, which Ray was in 1968, would miss the target by twenty feet without that adjustment. (Probe Vol. 5 No. 5 p. 28) Brown also made another startling discovery about the ballistics evidence in this case. The bullet taken from King's body is not from the same lot as the other bullets purchased, and does not match the cartridges either. (Ibid. p. 29) Our indefatigable reporter never addressed these two issues. But they do help explain why Brown was never allowed to complete his ballistics investigation...

Another area CNN skimps is the whole issue of Marrell McCollough. McCollough was the undercover cop who had infiltrated the radical black youth group the Invaders, prior to King's arrival in Memphis. And it was the Invaders who had provoked a show of violence during King's first visit to Memphis in March. They did this by disrupting a demonstration by the Sanitation Workers, who were on strike at the time. This incident actually resulted in the shooting death of a young man named Larry Payne. In turn, this caused King to make his return visit in April. McCollough's assignment was the result of a secret program inside the Memphis Police Department. But it had been ordered by Hoover, and assisted by the CIA. (Probe Vol. 7 No. 6 p. 4) Before joining the Memphis Police Department, McCullough had been in the army as an MP. His first assignment with the police was this one. As an agent provocateur with the Invaders, his reports were forwarded to the FBI. Besides helping provoke the King riot, he also helped set up a drug bust in which many of the Invaders top leadership were entrapped. A local reporter in Memphis once wrote that McCullough was working for the FBI before the Memphis police recruited him. (Ibid. p. 5) This strongly indicates that he was part of the COINTELPRO operation against both Black Nationalist groups, and perhaps, King. He stayed within the police department until he later joined the CIA in 1974. Three years later, he testified before the House Select Committee on Assassinations. When asked his occupation, he said he was a Memphis policeman. Which, at the time, he was not. Further, he denied any connection to any intelligence agencies in 1968. In other words, he lied. As Doug Valentine notes, he appears to have done this because the HSCA had evidence that it was McCullough who provoked the riot that caused the death of Larry Payne. And made necessary King's return, which resulted in his assassination. (Ibid.) All O'Brien has to say about the compelling and perhaps crucial figure of McCullough is this: he was a policeman who worked undercover against a Black Nationalist group. He ended up on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel after King was shot. Six years later he joined the CIA. That's about it. I'm not kidding...

All in all, a seriously disappointing effort. Not quite as bad as the network JFK specials by Dan Rather and Peter Jennings. But still, it's pretty shabby. In light of the recent Discovery Channel's documentary on the RFK case, I had hoped for more from a cable network...