Documents / FOIA release

FOIA on Martin Luther King

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

  • p. 22 …Summer of 1952 she had revisited UN headquarters in the role of a communist organizer. The…
  • p. 53 …CHIEF, INFORMATION REVIEW STAFF 7 C 28 Headquarters FORM 1.75 3533 OBSOLETE PREVIOUS EDITIONS (13…
  • p. 110 …full details from the files of CIA Headquarters at Langley, Virginia, together with all background information…
  • p. 113 …full details from the files of CIA Headquarters at Langley, Virginia, together with all background information…
  • p. 137 …3-Headquarters w/attach as noted. FULL TEXT COPY - DO NOT RELEASE 51-28A
  • p. 188 …The headquarters are in Washington, D.C. (at 1520 16th Street, N.W.). In the four…
  • p. 208 …Chase Manhattan Bank's New York City headquarters, has proved useful. Engineered by Walter Kidde & Co…
  • p. 220 …LOCATION OF THE HEADQUARTERS OF GENERAL BUSINESS OFFICES OF THE PUBLIC, ETHICAL, AND FINANCIAL PUBLICATIONS Berkeley…
  • p. 224 …Kennedy, and who were arrested seeking to bug Democratic National Headquarters at 2:30 a.m…
  • p. 234 …Golden was also security director of Nixon's convention headquarters in Miami that year, and was…
  • p. 236 …Central States, Southeast and Southwest Pension Fund headquartered in Chicago, has become a bankroll for some…

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# Administrative - Internal Use Only

15 July 1976

MEMORANDUM FOR: Office of General Counsel

ATTENTION C/FOIA/PA

SUBJECT Request For Opinion--FOIA (b)(6) & Privacy Act

REFERENCE : FOIA Request 76-382, copy attached

1. Mr. Weisberg has requested under the FOIA information on:

a. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

b. Earl Ray

c. Other individuals involved with the assassination of Dr. King.

2. To ensure consistency in making determinations for release under both the FOIA exemptions (b)(6) and the Privacy Act, of requests such as Mr. Weisberg's, would you please state the current legal criteria to apply to these type cases. Specifically, it would be helpful to the DDO to have a clearly enunciated legal opinion regarding what, if any, privacy rights the family of a deceased individual might have vis-a-vis the deceased individual. Further, what, if any, privacy rights does a convicted felon have.

3. We are aware that each case must be judged on its own facts. Hence, we would be grateful for your opinion regarding the criteria to apply to Mr. Weisberg's request. However, a general rule applicable to the type of request also would be very useful, would expedite the processing of such requests, and would apply some consistency in the decision-making process.

Charles A. Briggs Chief, Services Staff

Attachment: Reference

cc: Paul Haefner, OPS/ITG

Administrative - Internal Use Only

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About this file

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.