Latest news with #DrKing
RTÉ News
22-07-2025
- Politics
- RTÉ News
Breaking Martin Luther King Jr. assassination files released by US Justice Dept
The US Justice Department has released more than 240,000 pages of documents related to the assassination of Rev Dr Martin Luther King Jr., including records from the FBI, which had surveilled the civil rights leader as part of an effort to discredit the Nobel Peace Prize winner and his civil rights movement. Files were posted on the website of the National Archives, which said more would be released. Dr King died of an assassin's bullet in Memphis, Tennessee, on 4 April, 1968, as he increasingly extended his attention from a nonviolent campaign for equal rights for African Americans to economic issues and calls for peace. His death shook the United States in a year that would also bring race riots, anti-Vietnam war demonstrations and the assassination of presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy. Earlier this year, President Donald Trump's administration released thousands of pages of digital documents related to the assassinations of Robert Kennedy and former President John who was killed in 1963. Mr Trump promised on the campaign trail to provide more transparency about President Kennedy's death. Upon taking office, he also ordered aides to present a plan for the release of records relating to the assassinations of Robert Kennedy and Dr King. The FBI kept files on Mr King in the 1950s and 1960s - even wiretapping his phones - because of what the bureau falsely said at the time were his suspected ties to communism during the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union. In recent years, the FBI has acknowledged that as an example of "abuse and overreach" in its history. The civil rights leader's family asked those who engage with the files to "do so with empathy, restraint, and respect for our family's continuing grief," and condemned "any attempts to misuse these documents." "Now more than ever, we must honor his sacrifice by committing ourselves to the realization of his dream – a society rooted in compassion, unity, and equality," they said in a statement. "During our father's lifetime, he was relentlessly targeted by an invasive, predatory, and deeply disturbing disinformation and surveillance campaign orchestrated by J. Edgar Hoover through the Federal Bureau of Investigation," the family, including his two living children, Martin III, 67, and Bernice, 62, said, referring to the then-FBI director. James Earl Ray, a segregationist and drifter, confessed to killing Mr King but later recanted. He died in prison in 1998. Dr King's family said it had filed a wrongful death civil lawsuit in Tennessee in 1999 that led to a jury unanimously concluding "that our father was the victim of a conspiracy involving Loyd Jowers and unnamed co-conspirators, including government agencies as a part of a wider scheme. "The verdict also affirmed that someone other than James Earl Ray was the shooter, and that Mr. Ray was set up to take the blame. Our family views that verdict as an affirmation of our long-held beliefs." Mr Jowers, once a Memphis police officer, told ABC's Prime Time Live in 1993 that he participated in a plot to kill Dr King. A 2023 Justice Department report called his claims dubious.
Yahoo
04-02-2025
- General
- Yahoo
ServiceFest honors MLK legacy in Youngstown
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio (WKBN) – Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said everybody can be great because anybody can serve. Tuesday, YSU held its ServiceFest, which was rescheduled from a January postponement. The event was a new event to let students do something for local charities. Some were making blankets and care packets of hygiene items were put together, too. There were even snuffle mats being assembled for pets. The idea was to show good works by creating useful items for those in need. 'I think sometimes we need a spark. And, you know, we take advantage of the week that honors Dr King, and we put something into motion so that maybe people get like a spark in their mind and want to keep doing service projects. So that's why,' said Kathy Leeper, associate director of Kilcawley Center. ServiceFest was three hours long and included speakers who shared their thoughts on Dr. King, while students were participating in the service projects. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
