Documents / FOIA release

FOIA on Martin Luther King

Central Intelligence Agency · 2025-06-12 · 295 pages · text by OCR

This Central Intelligence Agency FOIA release, dated 2025-06-12, collects 1976 CIA paperwork on Harold Weisberg's request (76-F-382) for records on Martin Luther King, Jr. It includes routing slips, an Operations Staff memorandum listing releasable press items and exempt cables, dispatches and memoranda, and a CI Staff reply citing a 1968 Office of Security memo on Coretta Scott King. It also contains a 16 May 1968 memo to the FBI reporting that Gerald Lee Richards, investigated in Japan, did not resemble suspect James Earl Ray.

Open the PDF at page 11 Original source ↗

“Nevers”14 pages

  • p. 167 …mysterious autopsy photographs which the Warren Commission never saw—do they support the Commission's lone…
  • p. 169 …The Kent State incident had never been fully cleared up. But one subject seemed to loom…
  • p. 170 …I worked there years and never saw or heard any-suggesting the Agency was involved assassination…
  • p. 171 …There was occasional stress, but it never reached the high level I was finding in the…
  • p. 172 …The bullets never gained perfectly intact, as the one found the stretcher, they became twisted lumps…
  • p. 173 …The word "never" was a perfectly "trimmed hedge." "I have found nothing since that time." he…
  • p. 206 …and documents were destroyed through some catastrophe never resumed business or were permanently closed down within…
  • p. 250 …mysterious autopsy photographs which the Warren Commission never saw—do they support the Commission's lone…
  • p. 252 …The Kent State incident had never been fully cleared up. But one subject seemed to loom…
  • p. 253 …I worked there three years and never saw or heard anying suggesting the Agency was involved…
  • p. 254 …There was occasional stress, but it never reached the high level I was finding in the…
  • p. 255 …The bullets never mained perfectly intact, as the one found in the stretcher; they became twisted…
  • p. 256 …The word "never" was a perfectly "trimmed hedge." I have found nothing since that time." he…
  • p. 291 …Union member on 21 February 1968 but never shipped out. His Social Security Number is 562…
# CONFIDENTIAL

(d) B-75, dated 9 April 1968; Subject: Attempted Anti U.S.-Demonstrations in Kingston, according to the Special Branch of the Jamaican security service; exempt under (b)(1)(5)B(1).

(e) Memorandum, dated 16 April 1968; Subject: Tentative Plans of Senator Robert Kennedy to Visit West Berlin on 1 May. Incidental referenc to the Subject; exempt under (b)(3)(a) and (b)(6).

(g) B-88, dated 18 April 1968; FBI provided our representative in Mexico with composite photos of suspected killer; exempt under (b)(3)(a).

(f) EX-1623, (rewritten) dated 17 April 1968; Subject: Biographic Summary on Hayden, Thomas Emmett, incidental reference to the Subject; exempt under (b)(3)(a) and (b)(6).

(h) B-89, dated 22 April 1968; Subject: Radio Messages for Stokely Carmichael during April 1968 riots in Washington, D.C. Incidental reference to the Subject; exempt under (b)(3)(a) and (b)(6).

(i) B-92, dated 23 April 1968; Subject: Arrival of James Rufus Forman in Paris; incidental reference to the Subject; exempt under (b)(3)(a) and (b)(6).

(j) B-97, dated 25 April 1968; Subject: Investigation of Death of Martin Luther King, Jr. concerns a subject who did not appear to be identical with FBI's suspect; exempt under (b)(3)(a).

(k) EX-1183 (rewrite of 19 July 1967), dated 26 April 1968; is a Biographic Sketch of Howard Zinn; incidental reference to the Subject; exempt under (b)(3)(a) and (b)(6).

(1) EX-1490, dated 14 June 1968; is a Biographic Summary on Mark William Rudd; incidental reference to the Subject; exempt under (b)(3)(a) and (b)(6).

(m) EX-2148, dated 4 September 1968; is a Biographic Summary on Szymanski, Albert John Jr, incidental reference to the Subject; exempt under (b)(3)(a) and (b)(6).

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About this file

FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. The text was read from the page images by an OCR model; expect the odd misread word. 295 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.