Read-only, these are the remains of a once-mighty novelty sports message board
https://alligatorunderground.com/backalley/
https://alligatorunderground.com/backalley/viewtopic.php?t=7995
The argument is that they were afraid of his potential to unite blacks and whites against the Vietnam War and kick the revolution into high gear.Nah. Why kill him after his most important work - the Civil Rights Act of 1964 - had already been done? I mean, yeah, there was more to do, but he was hardly the threat to "the establishment" that he was in the '50s and early '60s.
beyond me that anyone would believe such nonsense.The argument is that they were afraid of his potential to unite blacks and whites against the Vietnam War and kick the revolution into high gear.Nah. Why kill him after his most important work - the Civil Rights Act of 1964 - had already been done? I mean, yeah, there was more to do, but he was hardly the threat to "the establishment" that he was in the '50s and early '60s.
Really? Where's the letter? Is it reproduced in his book? Because I can't find anything about it on the interwebs other than this article.People would say, `Well why would he plead guilty? Goodness me.' When you put that question to James his answer was always the same: "Look, he told me all kinds of things. I always wanted this trial. Right down to the end I was trying to get this trial. But Percy said to me, `You know, your Dad's a parole violator. He's going to be sent back to jail fifty years after violating that parole. They'll make sure he's locked up. Your whole family will be harassed forever. They convicted you anyway because the media has got you wiped out as the killer. You haven't got a chance. They're going to fry you Jimmy.'"
But the thing that really convinced him to get rid of Foreman by pleading, was Percy's statement that "I'm not in good health, James. I cannot give you the best defense because I'm not in good health." And he said to me, "That was it. When my lawyer said to me `I'm not in good health and I can't give you the best defense,' that really started to worry me. Foreman said `What you should do is plead guilty, then make a motion for a new trial, get a new lawyer and you overturn the guilty plea and then you're off and away.'" James said, `But I don't have any money for a new lawyer.' So Foreman said, `Don't worry about that James. I'll give your brother Jerry $500 and he can go hire you a new lawyer. But you have got to make an agreement that you will not cause any problems at the guilty plea hearing. You'll just take that guilty plea.'
Percy not only said that. He put it in writing. We got a copy of Percy's letter to James where he said, `Dear James, I'm going to give this $500 to your brother on the condition that you plead guilty and you do not cause any undue disturbances at this guilty plea hearing.' He actually put that in writing. A remarkable admission.
Doesn't sound to me like Percy Foreman was one to back down from a fight. If those stats are true, he was a formidable defense lawyer. Wikipedia backs up his record, citing the fact that he lost only 53 of 1500 death-penalty cases that he tried. Oh, and he died in 1988, by the way, so his health probably wasn't that bad in 1969.In November, Ray fired Hanes and hired Texan Percy Foreman to take his case. Foreman was an extremely competent attorney: by 1958 he had defended 778 accused murderers. One was executed, 52 were sent to prison. The remaining 705 were acquitted of the crimes. Ten years later he had defended another two hundred murderers. Just one was sent to prison on a life sentence.
Foreman spent 30 hours listening to Ray and working with Huie, whose investigation of the case revealed details that even the FBI had missed. As the date of Ray's trial grew nearer, Foreman sat down with Ray. "I assume that you know I can't get you out of this?"
"Yeah, I know you can't," Ray told him.
Foreman tried to convince Ray that his cause was hopeless. "Why go to trial?" he asked. "A defendant in your position should never risk the death penalty unless he has some chance for acquittal. You have absolutely no chance for acquittal."
Oh, come on. Really? REALLY? If the judge who is reviewing your motion for new trial dies before ruling, you automatically get a new trial? Is this like your college roommate dying, entitling you to straight As? I'm not licensed to practice in Tennessee, but I have a lot of trouble believing that. Also, Ray wasn't entitled to a new trial because he never had one to begin with - he was moving to withdraw his guilty plea, which is an entirely different matter. The distinction might be lost on a layperson, but this dude's a lawyer and he should know the difference.On March 31st the Judge, who had sentenced him and who had overseen the guilty plea hearings was reviewing the petition for a new trial, had told some people that he was concerned about certain aspects of the case (whether that is serious or not one doesn't know) and he was found in his office dead of a heart attack, with his head on James' motion papers. You can speculate what that means. It may mean nothing. It just may mean that man was under a lot of stress for a lot of different reasons, he had a heart attack and he happened to be reviewing those papers and when he collapsed and the head down it was on James' papers.
But there is a law in Tennessee that says if a judge dies and you make a motion for a new trial and in the course of that motion before ruling on it the judge dies, you get a new trial automatically. There were two people who had filed those motions before [Judge] Preston Battle. One was James Earl Ray and the other person was the one who got the trial. James didn't, of course. So he went on, all of those years, trying to get that trial and was unsuccessful.