ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, February 23, 1997 TAG: 9702240101
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-11 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: NASHVILLE, TENN.
SOURCE: Associated Press
DURING AN INTERVIEW, the convicted killer lent support to theories that he didn't act alone in killing the civil rights leader 29 years ago.
James Earl Ray, promising much and revealing little in a prison interview, said Friday he would tell the true story of Martin Luther King's assassination if he is granted a trial.
``Put me on the witness stand and you'll find out what really, what really, what took place,'' Ray said haltingly to talk show host Montel Williams.
Ray, who is 68 and suffering from terminal liver disease, appeared frail but alert as he gave the 15-minute interview from a wheelchair at a state prison hospital. It came a day after a judge's decision that keeps alive his bid to take back his guilty plea and get a trial in the 1968 slaying.
Asked if he killed the civil rights leader, Ray responded, ``No, no. I didn't, didn't do it.''
Williams plans to air the interview Friday.
Ray's brother, Jerry Ray, said Williams got the interview because he promised to help in the search for a liver transplant donor. But Williams denied that, and said that no money was exchanged, either.
``He said that he appreciates the fact that now there are people outside of just himself who are asking for a trial,'' Williams told reporters. ``And he feels that if that happens, his exact words were, `I hope they open the grab bag.'''
Ray pleaded guilty a year after King's slaying and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. But he almost immediately reversed himself and has been requesting a trial ever since.
Conspiracy theorists have long argued that Ray, a bungling petty criminal, could not have pulled off the assassination alone. Many of the theories note that authorities have never proven that Ray's gun was the murder weapon.
Judge Joe Brown in Memphis said Thursday that new technology might be able to prove if a hunting rifle with Ray's fingerprints on it was the murder weapon. A state appeals court must review his decision before Brown can rule on whether to allow tests on the rifle and the bullet taken from King's body.
King's widow and son spoke in court in support of a trial for Ray.
On Friday, King's eldest daughter, Yolanda King, added her voice to the call, saying it could resolve questions about Ray's involvement.
``Where did he get the resources?'' she said, speaking at the University of Southern Maine in Portland. ``Clearly, if he did indeed do it, he did not act alone.''
LENGTH: Medium: 56 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. A frail but lucid James Earl Ray told talk show hostby CNBMontel Williams he is grateful to the King family, which has joined
the call for a new trial. The taped interview will air Friday.