XPost: mn.politics, alt.los-angeles, alt.politics.democrats.d   
   XPost: alt.disney   
   From: rkoch@banmlkday.com   
      
   NASHVILLE, March 27— In an extraordinary face-to-face meeting in   
   a prison conference room, James Earl Ray told the youngest son   
   of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. today that he did not   
   assassinate his father, and the son, Dexter Scott King, told Mr.   
   Ray that the King family was convinced of his innocence.   
      
   As Mr. Ray seeks to clear his name before dying of liver   
   disease, Mr. King's assertion reflects a remarkable evolution by   
   the family of the slain civil rights leader.   
      
   For most of the nearly three decades since Dr. King was shot in   
   Memphis on April 4, 1968, the King family has maintained a   
   studied silence about the guilt of Mr. Ray, who confessed to the   
   crime, then recanted after being sentenced to a 99-year prison   
   term. But in the last two months, with Mr. Ray's health   
   deteriorating rapidly, the King family has become his outspoken   
   ally: first by telling reporters that there were legitimate   
   evidentiary questions to explore, then by testifying in support   
   of a new trial and finally by declaring today that Mr. Ray was   
   innocent.   
      
   ''I just want to ask you, for the record, did you kill my   
   father?'' Mr. King, 36, asked Mr. Ray as the two men sat facing   
   each other, a yard apart, in wooden armchairs.   
      
   Mr. Ray, 69, replied: ''No, no, I didn't, no. But like I say,   
   sometimes these questions are difficult to answer, and you have   
   to make a personal evaluation.''   
      
   Mr. King said: ''Well, as awkward as this may seem, I want you   
   to know that I believe you and my family believes you, and we   
   are going to do everything in our power to try and make sure   
   that justice will prevail. And while it's at the 11th hour, I've   
   always been a spiritual person and I believe in Providence.''   
      
   Aides to Mr. King said he had been trying to arrange the meeting   
   with Mr. Ray -- the first between Mr. Ray and a member of the   
   King family -- for several months. As president of the Martin   
   Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta,   
   Mr. King has served in recent years as the principal spokesman   
   for his mother, Coretta Scott King, and his three siblings.   
      
   Accompanied by William F. Pepper, Mr. Ray's lawyer, Mr. King   
   arrived 15 minutes late for the meeting at the Lois M. DeBerry   
   Special Needs Facility, a boxy state prison in Nashville for   
   sick and disabled inmates. Shortly after Mr. King was ushered   
   into the concrete-block conference room, Mr. Ray was guided into   
   the room in a wheelchair.   
      
   The frail Mr. Ray, dressed in prison blues and cloth slippers,   
   rose to greet the robust Mr. King, who wore a navy suit, a bold   
   red tie and shiny black shoes. As they shook hands, Mr. King,   
   who bears a striking resemblance to his father, said, ''Glad to   
   meet you. Thank you for letting me come and impose on your   
   time.''   
      
   Like heads of state at a White House photo op, the two men sat   
   in facing chairs with their hands folded over their laps and   
   with tiny microphones clipped to their jackets. After about 25   
   minutes, the few reporters allowed to witness the scene were   
   dismissed, and Mr. King and Mr. Ray spoke privately for 20   
   minutes.   
      
   During the public part of the meeting, Mr. King did most of the   
   talking. The conversation was awkward and stilted, with Mr. King   
   filling the silences left by Mr. Ray and with Mr. Ray rambling   
   far from the topic of his role in Dr. King's killing. His face   
   etched with creases, Mr. Ray has been severely weakened by   
   cirrhosis, and he complained to Mr. King that his stomach was   
   distended.   
      
   ''My stomach is kind of falling out, and I need minor surgery,   
   but other than that we're just, you know, taking things day for   
   day, I guess you could say,'' he said. ''And, of course, you've   
   got your problems, too. You've had them for a long time now.''   
      
   It took Mr. King nearly 15 minutes to pose the question he had   
   come to ask. He first told Mr. Ray that he considered their   
   meeting ''a spiritual experience.''   
      
   ''I guess in some strange way our destinies, that of my father   
   and yourself, somehow got tied up together, and we still don't   
   feel as a family that we have all of the questions answered,''   
   he told Mr. Ray.   
      
   Later he added, ''In a strange sort of way, we're both victims.''   
      
   At one point, Mr. Ray volunteered, ''I ain't had nothing to do   
   with shooting your father.''   
      
   Since Dr. King's assassination on the balcony of the Lorraine   
   Motel, most official inquiries, including a Congressional   
   examination, that of the House Select Committee on   
   Assassinations, have concluded that Mr. Ray probably fired the   
   fatal shot. Mr. Ray's original confession still stands in the   
   opinion of every judge who has heard him out.   
      
   A bank robber who had escaped from a Missouri prison at the time   
   of the shooting, Mr. Ray had rented a room in a boarding house   
   across the street from the motel. His fingerprints were found on   
   a rifle that was dropped outside the house. After the shooting,   
   he fled to Atlanta, Canada, Portugal and England before being   
   arrested. He pleaded guilty in 1969.   
      
   But after his sentencing, Mr. Ray said he had pleaded guilty   
   under pressure from his lawyers to avoid the death penalty. He   
   has said since then that he had been framed ''as a patsy'' by a   
   shadowy figure named Raoul. And Mr. Pepper, his lawyer for the   
   last 19 years, has suggested a number of conspiracies that he   
   outlined two years ago in a book.   
      
   Mr. Pepper has argued that modern tests would prove that Mr.   
   Ray's rifle did not fire the bullet that killed Dr. King, an   
   assertion questioned by some ballistics experts. Last month Mr.   
   Pepper asked a judge in Memphis to order the new tests,   
   believing that favorable results would force a new trial. The   
   judge has referred the question to an appellate court, which has   
   not ruled.   
      
   Without a ruling from the court and a liver transplant for Mr.   
   Ray, Mr. Pepper said today, ''We're going to be stalled out of   
   existence.''   
      
   At a news conference after the meeting today, Mr. King declined   
   to say what evidence had convinced him of Mr. Ray's innocence.   
   He also denied that his interaction with Mr. Ray was designed to   
   generate interest in a movie deal that Mr. King and the agent   
   for Dr. King's estate, Phillip Jones, have been negotiating with   
   Oliver Stone, the film maker.   
      
   ''I'm not Oliver Stone,'' he said. ''I'm not a conspiracy   
   theorist.''   
      
   But Mr. King made it clear that he had been influenced by Mr.   
   Pepper's theories, and he briefly mentioned the story of Lloyd   
   Jowers. Mr. Jowers, a former Memphis tavern owner, said on   
   national television in 1993 that he had a hired a man -- not Mr.   
   Ray -- to kill Dr. King at the request of a grocer with reputed   
   mob connections. His story has never been proved.   
      
   Asked who killed his father, Mr. King said, ''I don't know.   
   Again that's why a trial, I think, is so necessary. I do think   
   that attorney Pepper has some very compelling evidence that will   
   lead in that direction. You know, I can't prove this. I'm a very   
   instinctual person. My instincts tend to tell me when things are   
   not right. I can't always put my finger on it but I can say   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)