James Earl Ray, who pleaded guilty to assassinating the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., says he was framed to cover up an FBI plot to kill the civil rights leader and wants the government to reopen his case. Ray, 60, was sentenced to serve 99 years for King's murder in Memphis, Tenn., on April 4, 1968. The Tennessee parole board has scheduled a January parole hearing for him, but Ray says he is not hopeful. ``I doubt very much they'll give me a parole,'' he said. ``I think the only way I'll get out of here is through a jury. If they wouldn't grant me a trial I don't see how they'll grant me a parole.'' Ray pleaded guilty on the day his trial was to begin on March 9, 1969, but recanted three days later and has not received a complete trial to prove his innocence. He alleges the FBI threatened to jail his father and brother if he didn't sign a confession. Ray's father was a fugitive from prison and his brother spent several years in jail. In an interview at Brushy State Prison in East Tennessee with talk show host Morton Downey Jr., Ray claimed he was set up in a plot to kill King, whose calls for economic justice for minorities and effective use of non-violent protest drew the wrath of then-FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. He said the government has refused his requests to review the evidence against him, has never conducted ballistics tests on the alleged murder weapon and has suppressed witnesses and investigations that could have cleared him. ``Since they won't, they must be hiding something,'' Ray said of the FBI. The show is scheduled to be aired Nov. 28. King was in Memphis the day of his assassination to support a strike by city sanitation workers seeking higher pay. Ray was identified from fingerprints on a rifle found near the Lorraine Motel in Memphis where King was killed as he stood on a balcony. Hosea Williams, an aide to King present when he was shot, said during taping Monday of ``The Morton Downey Jr. Show '' that ``I've never believed Ray killed Dr. King.'' Williams said King was convinced that Hoover's FBI was plotting his death. He also said he was surprised to find days after the assassination that ``Ray had no political philosophy. He was just a two-bit redneck hustler.'' Many blacks have expressed anger that the Tennessee board has scheduled a January parole hearing for Ray. Under a 1985 law providing parole hearings for inmates held for 20 years, Ray became eligible for parole consideration this month. The law was designed to allow the state to relieve prison overcrowding. James M. Brown, chairman of the Tennessee Voters Council and a member of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. State Holiday Committee, called Ray's parole hearing ``cruel, dangerous and shameful,'' and said he would ask Gov. Ned McWherter to call it off. He noted the hearing in January would coincide with the Jan. 16 holiday honoring King's birthday. But McWherter told reporters Monday that he will not interfere with the decision of the board, which by law is an independent state agency.
