Vinson’s Variety: Ray wants rifle for further testing
For those who read the Jan. 1 edition of the Southern Standard, you very well may have come across and read a story titled, “Ray still seeks rifle suspected of killing MLK.”
The Standard picked up the story from an Associated Press (AP) release, as newspapers all across the nation could have done. Concerning that story, allow me to clear up a couple matters for this reason: I was in Memphis with Jerry Ray, brother of James Earl Ray, the alleged – yet disputed – assassin of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., when Jerry was interviewed by the Associated Press.
James Earl admitted buying the alleged MLK murder rifle, a .30.06 Remington 760 Gamemaster pump-action, from Aeromarine Supply Company in Birmingham, Ala., on March 30, 1968. However, as he claimed in an interview I conducted with him just prior to his death from liver disease, he handed over the rifle to a smuggler named Raoul the day before King’s assassination, April 3, 1968, and never saw it again. The alleged murder rifle was found near the scene of MLK’s death just minutes after MLK was gunned down, April 4, 1968.
Prior to his death, April 23, 1998, James Earl named brother Jerry Ray executor of James Earl’s estate. Included in that estate is the alleged MLK murder rifle. As the Associated Press reported, three ballistics tests have been conducted on said rifle, 1968, 1977, and 1997, and all three proved inconclusive, meaning: Never has it been proven the slug that took MLK’s life was fired from the alleged MLK murder rifle. At a COPA (Coalition On Political Assassinations) convention in Dallas Tex., November 2000, Judge Joe Brown, who once presided over the King-Ray case, now of television court fame, said the Memphis District Attorney General’s office, which had/has prosecutorial domain over the case, never actually had a murder weapon with which to charge James Earl Ray for killing MLK. Simple: The death slug never has been ballistically matched to the alleged murder rifle and no one witnessed James Earl Ray pull the trigger. A classic example of reasonable doubt.
Since James Earl’s death, Jerry has been fighting relentlessly to take possession of the rifle. Jerry’s primary objective for seeking possession is to have the rifle retested until a ballistics conclusion is reached: Either the death slug was fired from said rifle or it wasn’t. Just as relentlessly, Memphis prosecutors/State of Tennessee have fought against Jerry Ray taking possession.
One could surmise if Memphis prosecutors/state truly felt they have as evidence the actual MLK murder rifle, they would demand it be retested until a ballistics conclusion is reached, for sakes of civil-historical-legal-political correctness and public appeasement, if nothing else. On the flipside, if Jerry Ray is convinced that James Earl Ray, indeed, shot MLK with the alleged murder rifle, then Jerry would not be so adamant about having it retested until a ballistics conclusion is reached. The stances here appear to be in reverse order.
Jerry Ray’s reason for traveling to Memphis was to file a motion in Memphis Probate Court and keep alive his attempt to take possession of James Earl’s estate, again, inclusive of the alleged MLK murder rifle. While in Memphis, Jerry and I visited the National Civil Rights Museum, the old Lorraine Hotel & Motel, site of the MLK assassination. The alleged murder rifle is displayed inside the museum.
Jerry and I requested to take a photo of Jerry standing next to the rifle. With utmost courtesy, the museum director informed us the museum has a standing policy of not allowing anyone to take any photos inside the museum. While at the museum, the Associated Press conducted an interview with Jerry, and that’s how the AP story came to be.
(Mike Vinson is a Warren County columnist. He can be reached at [email protected].)