Thus, Jackman wrote near the top of his long column:
In the five decades since Martin Luther King Jr. was shot dead by an assassin at age 39, his children have worked tirelessly to preserve his legacy, sometimes with sharply different views on how best to do that. But they are unanimous on one key point: James Earl Ray did not kill Martin Luther King.
For the King family and others in the civil rights movement, the FBI's obsession with King in the years leading up to his slaying in Memphis on April 4, 1968 -- pervasive surveillance, a malicious disinformation campaign and open denunciations by FBI director J. Edgar Hoover -- laid the groundwork for their belief that he was the target of a plot.
That wasn't so hard, was it?
Memphis Commercial Appeal investigative reporter Marc Perrusquia has been a kindred spirit to Jackman. Based on extensive reporting for his newspaper, Perrusquia documented a new book released last month A Spy In Canaan: How the FBI Used A Famous Photographer To Infiltrate the Civil Rights Movement. This is the story of Ernest Withers, who took iconic photos of King and others civil rights leaders during the 1950s and 1960s. The implications are disturbing given the smear campaign against King especially before his death. All this is necessary to know to prevent reoccurrences.
Tone Deaf NPR Falls Flat
Sadly, straightforward reporting can be uncommon in these kinds of sensitive cases, particularly if a news outlet decides to prioritize flawed or outright misleading previous coverage or seek the ongoing goodwill of law enforcement sources with a vested interest in covering up the misdeeds of their predecessors and patrons.
Thus, typical of MLK death anniversary coverage was the April 3 report on National Public Radio's All Things Considered show by NPR's Justice Correspondent Carrie Johnson. Previously, she was a Washington Post reporter for a decade ending in 2010 covering justice issues .
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