RAY'S HOPE

WILL THERE BE A TRIAL FOR KING'S ALLEGED ASSASSIN?

Every day for the past 28 years, James Earl Ray has held firm to his story: he didn't kill Martin Luther King Jr. Eight times he has petitioned state and federal courts to reopen the case. Eight times judges have turned him down, upholding the guilty plea that Ray made 11 months after King's assassination in April 1968, then recanted three days later. Even statements by the King family asserting their belief that Ray deserves a full trial have led nowhere. Last Friday, however, a criminal-court judge in Memphis, Tenn., provided Ray with a glimmer of hope.

Giving a preliminary interpretation...

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