[online at: http://ratical.org/ratville/JFK/MLKACT/]
Complete Transcript of the Martin Luther King, Jr.
Assassination Conspiracy Trial
November 15 to December 8, 1999
Memphis, Tennessee
This is a hypertext representation of the complete transcript of
the 1999 trial held in Memphis, Tennessee, brought by the family
of Martin Luther King, Jr. in a wrongful death action against Loyd
Jowers and Other Unknown Co-Conspirators for the April 4, 1968
assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.
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Contents
Acknowledgements
Dedication
Legal Designation of this Lawsuit
Complete Trial Transcript
King Family Press Conference Following The Trial
How This Representation Came About
Notes on This Version
Entry Points / Recommended Reading
Download Contents
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Acknowledgements
This trial and its transcript would not have happened without the
steadfast determination and perseverance of William Pepper,
beginning in 1978, to investigate the circumstances of Martin
Luther King Jr.'s death. The King Family expressed great courage
and understanding in declaring themselves the plaintiffs. By
recounting their experiences, the seventy witnesses at the trial
engaged in truth-telling that made the the facts of Dr. King's
murder tangible and known. From my position I wish to thank John
Judge for his invaluable help addressing many questions I had and
ways of resolving them. Without his support this presentation
would not be possible.
Dedication
This presentation is dedicated to the memory of Wendell Stacy (b.
July 3, 1958, d. August 22, 2007) [1], [2], [3], a first rate
investigative reporter as well as a Memphis television reporter
and cameraman. Other than the courtroom participants, Mr. Stacy
and Jim Douglass were the only two people who attended the trial
-- Mr. Douglass from beginning to end, Mr. Stacy as much as he
could. Wendell Stacy recorded the trial on his own video tapes and
after the trial was fired by his employer Clear Channel because he
had been pushing for more coverage of what had happened in the
trial and on other issues. He sued Clear Channel and years later
won his suit but Clear Channel blocked his ever being paid
anything for it. Using his video recordings he produced an
hour-long documentary on the assassination of Dr. King that aired
on French and German prime time television. After the documentary
was aired he was repeatedly threatened by telephone messages,
experienced a series of break-ins to his home, and his car blew up
when he was about to get into it. His sudden death in 2007 was
from causes that are very difficult to understand. He suffered the
consequences for his dedication to the truth. (Quoting Jim
Douglass in 2009 Black Op Radio interview, #369c, 09:14-13:35
minutes)
The legal designation for this lawsuit is:
The Circuit Court of Shelby County, Tennessee
Thirtieth Judicial District at Memphis
Coretta Scott King, Martin Luther King, III,
Bernice King, Dexter Scott King and Yolanda King,
Plaintiffs,
Vs. Case No. 97242-4 T.D.
Loyd Jowers and Other Unknown Co-Conspirators,
Defendants.
Before the Honorable James E. Swearengen,
Division 4, judge presiding.
- Appearances -
For the Plaintiff:
Dr. William Pepper
Attorney At Law
575 Madison Avenue
New York, NY 10022
(212) 605-0515
For the Defendant:
Mr. Lewis Garrison
Attorney At Law
Law Offices of Lewis K. Garrison, Sr.
100 North Main
Suite 1025
Memphis, TN 38103
(901) 527-6445
Complete Trial Transcript
The Trial began on November 15, 1999 and was conducted over 14
days with closing statements and verdict on December 8, 1999. The
Table Of Contents contains links to each day as well as each
witness who testified.
King Family Press Conference Following The Trial
One day after the conclusion of the trial, the King Family held a
Press Conference on December 9, 1999 in Atlanta, Georgia.
(Original file copy)
How This Representation Came About
In early 2003 I made an annotated transcript of William Pepper's
talk on February 4 at the Modern Times Bookstore in San Francisco
on the release of his book, An Act of State - The Execution of
Martin Luther King. In the process of annotating this transcript,
footnote number 5 was fashioned to reference the complete
transcript of the trial at thekingcenter.com (which has since
changed to thekingcenter.org). Following my usual process when
linking to significant content elsewhere on the web, I made copies
of the entire file set of the trial transcript just in case it
ever went away.
In January 2010 while reviewing the links in William Pepper's talk
to confirm everything still worked, I discovered that the third
through the fourteenth day of the trial transcript no longer
existed on The King Center website. I sent two e-mails to The King
Center to inquire about this and did not receive replies to either
message.
Given the significance of this material, I decided to make a
hypertext representation of the original 14 text files (matching
the fourteen days of the trial) -- plus a copy of the King
Family's December 9, 1999 Press Conference on the results of the
trial -- so that this unique historical record is preserved for
people to read, study, and learn from. In general terms this is
the guiding purpose of rat haus reality, ratical branch: studying
and presenting relevant and critical facts to increase awareness
of our world and provide a more holistic view of our time.
David Ratcliffe
August 2012
editor and publisher
rat haus reality press
Notes On This Version
To make a fully functional hypertext representation of this
transcript certain extensions to the original files have been
implemented includeing:
* formatting has been selectively enhanced to improve
readability,
* text has been hyperlinked to sources internal to the
transcript and external to the web referenced and alluded to
in the transcript,
* all page numbers in each Volume are definied with HTML
anchors for easy linking to these locations. For example, to
make a link to page 1115, do the following:
<a href="http://ratical.org/ratville/JFK/MLKACT/MLKACTvol08.html#p1115">put text here</a>
* corrections to spelling or typographical errors are included
in square braces immediately following the word: ie, see p.
58: "That was April 4th, 1968 [1967], when he actually spoke
out against the war in his first public statement";
additional references and annotations are also included
inside square braces,
* pages 1934 to 1941 were missing in the original files,
* the original files are included for comparison to identify
precisely what was changed in this hypertext version; each
original file is listed in the Table of Contents beneath the
Volume, date, and page range on the left-hand side of each
day's transcript,
* links to PDF and Text-Only file format versions are available
at the top of each hypertext file.
Please let me know if you discover any errors I have accidentally
introduced.
Entry Points / Recommended Reading
A good place to start reading this document are the Closing
Statements in Volume 14. The King Family Press Conference held the
day after the trial is another starting point. Other than the
courtroom participants, Jim Douglass was the only person who
attended the entire trial. His article, "The Martin Luther King
Conspiracy Exposed in Memphis," published in Probe Magazine in
Spring 2000, is an excellent introduction. See also William
Pepper's talk on February 4 at the Modern Times Bookstore in San
Francisco on the release of his book, An Act of State - The
Execution of Martin Luther King (Verso, 2003).
Download Contents
This transcript is in the public record and belongs to all people. It
is available for download in the following sets:
HTML files: MLKACThtml.zip (1.6 MB) MLKACThtml.tar.gz (1.6 MB)
Original files: MLKACTorig.zip (732 KB) MLKACTorig.tar.gz (728 KB)
Text-Only files: MLKACTtxt.zip (708 KB) MLKACTtxt.tar.gz (698 KB)
PDF files: MLKACTpdf.zip (7.5 MB) MLKACTpdf.tar.gz (7.5 MB)
This document is available electronically at:
http://ratical.org/ratville/JFK/MKLACT/index.html (hypertext)
http://ratical.org/ratville/JFK/MKLACT/index.txt (text only)
http://ratical.org/ratville/JFK/MKLACT/index.pdf (print ready)