Just as the Civil Rights Movement was beginning to reach new heights, one of its most prominent leaders and vocal proponents was gunned down in a heinous assassination. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was slain by a gunshot as he stood outside a Memphis hotel on April 4, 1968, at 6:01 p.m. Central time. The details around the shooting of King have been swirled in controversy, although an arrest was made in the case nearly a year later.
Similar to the conspiracy theories surrounding the John F. Kennedy assassination and Lee Harvey Oswald, some speculated that King’s convicted killer, James Earl Ray, was not the true perpetrator. Conflicting reports from ballistic evidence to witness accounts clashed, even prompting Rev. Jesse Jackson to speak on the murky details again in 2004; Jackson was present with King during the time of his passing.
