That was likely because the FBI withheld key files about both men from the Committee. Though, as mentioned earlier, the Committee in 1979 "concluded that there was a likelihood of conspiracy" in King's assassination, and "financial gain was Ray's primary motivation."
Not that you'd know about the Committee or its conspiracy conclusion from the mainstream press coverage of King's assassination.
That's largely because some key files about King's murder -- including those about Marcello and Milteer -- are still being withheld from Congress, despite the 1992 JFK Act which required their release by October 2017.
When the FBI, CIA, Secret Service, and other agencies made last-minute appeals to keep certain files secret, Trump created a new deadline of April 26, 2018. However, many of the most important files about King's and JFK's murders won't be released then, because they aren't even on the master list -- prepared by the National Archives -- of documents and tapes that might be released.
Luckily, key files have sometimes slipped through the declassification process and historians, journalists, and researchers often share their efforts, so more information about King's murder continues to come to light. For the past four years, Waldron has been working on an as-yet-unpublished new book about King's assassination, which includes new information about Milteer and Marcello's roles in the crime, from exclusive files about each.
King's 1968 murder and Nixon's Southern Strategy were created the same year, and both continue to have enormous impact on America today. There are also surprising connections between the players involved in each.
For example, Justice Department files show that Nixon received two separate million-dollar bribes from Carlos Marcello and his associates, one in September 1960 (when Nixon was vice president) and the other for President Nixon's December 1971 release of Jimmy Hoffa from prison (with special conditions the Mafia wanted).
Nixon was also the first proponent of Donald Trump running for president, according to the man who introduced them, Roger Stone, and all three had ties to Roy Cohn, the notorious Mafia lawyer and fixer. Donald Trump even boasted, in 1985, that Roy Cohn was his most important mentor.
Cohn, who got his start with Joe McCarthy and became a mob favorite, wasn't a typical lawyer; Cohn specialized in using threats, intimidation, and blackmail to get what he wanted (for himself and for his Mafia clients).
Ironically, in 1985 -- the same year Cohn was mentoring Donald Trump -- FBI files show that Carlos Marcello tried to hire Roy Cohn to help spring him from prison.
If cream rises to the top, one wonders what the reverse of that is, where men like Nixon, Marcello, Milteer, Cohn, Trump, etc., always seemed to find a new low.
*Lamar Waldron, called "one of the best investigative journalists" by the Chicago Tribune, most recently authored The Hidden History of the JFK Assassination.(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
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