Documents / FOIA release
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.
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O MURKIN 16 MAY 1968 MEMORANDUM FOR: Director Federal Bureau of Investigation Attention: Mr. S.J. Papich McGowan SUBJECT : Investigation in Japan of Report on Suspicious Actions of Gerald Lee Richards, Originally Described as Resembling Suspected Assassin of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 1. Reference is made to the report concerning the above subject made by telephone to Mr. S.J. Papich at 0930 on 17 April 1968. Following is a full account of the investigation made in this case: A. On 16 April 1968 a United States National Maritime Union official in Yokohama reported that one Gerald Lee Richards, who bore a general physical resemblance to the description given of the suspected assassin of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had arrived in Japan about 15 April 1968 and requested a position aboard any ship going anywhere. Richards became agitated when asked for a contact address in Japan and refused to divulge his Japanese residence. The National Maritime Union official described Richards as 5' 10" tall, 155 pounds, with brown hair, a receding hairline on both sides, and a not very prominent scar two and one-half inches long traversing the center forehead, his most outstanding characteristic being a disconcerting, idiotic grin resembling a constant grimace. According to Richards' documents and statements, he was born 8 April 1937, applied for seaman's papers in San Pedro, California, 16 June 1964 and registered there as a United States National Maritime Union member on 21 February 1968 but never shipped out. His Social Security Number is 562-46-5078; his United States Coast Guard Number Z 2711-782. cc Diffortini , Ltd 2258 714 REC 11 44-38261-3785 3146 CHAP 1 SELECT THE ELECTRICITY CONSTRUCTION AND TIMING
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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. The text was read from the page images by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word. 295 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.