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 147 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…
13. All records pertaining to any alleged or contemplated witness, including any statements, transcripts, reports, or memorandums from any source whatsoever.

14. All correspondence of the following persons, regardless of origin or however obtained:

Bernard Fensterwald

Percy Foreman

Robert W. Hill

William Bradford Huie

James H. Lesar

Albert Pepper

Carol Pepper

James Earl Ray

Jerry Ray

John Ray

J. B. Stoner

Harold Weisberg

15. All letters, cables, reports, memorandums, or any other form of communication concerning the proposed guilty plea of James Earl Ray.

16. All records of any information request or inquiry from, or any contact by, any member or representative of the news media pertaining to the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. since April 15, 1975.

17. All notes, memoranda, correspondence or investigative reports constituting or pertaining to any re-investigation or attempted re-investigation of the assassination of Dr. King undertaken in 1969 or anytime thereafter, and all documents setting forth the reasons or guidelines for any such re-investigation.

18. Any and all records pertaining to the New Rebel Motel and the DeSoto Motel.

19. Any records pertaining to James Earl Ray's eyesight.

20. Any records made available to any writer or news reporter which have not been made available to Mr. Harold Weisberg.

21. Any index or table of contents to the 96 volumes of evidence on the assassination of Dr. King.

22. A list of all evidence conveyed to or from the FBI by any legal authority, whether state, local, or federal.

Not linked to a story yet.

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.