William F. Pepper

William Francis Pepper was born in New York City.{{cite book |last=Hubbell |first=Martindale |date=September 1998 |title=Martindale-Hubbell International Law Directory, Volume I: Europe, Asia, Australasia, Middle East & Africa |publisher=Martindale-Hubbell |isbn=9781561603244}} Pepper received a B.A. and M.A. from Columbia University, and studied abroad at the London School of Economics,{{cite book |last=Printing Office |first=U.S. Government |date=1969 |title=Extent of Subversion in Campus Disorders: Hearings Before the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee To Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws, Ninety-First Congress, First Session, Parts 1-3 |location=Washington, D.C. |publisher=United States Government Publishing Office }} Ed.D. from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and J.D. degree from Boston College Law School.Boris Lurie Art Foundation. [http://borislurieartfoundation.org/William_Pepper "Dr. William F. Pepper."] Retrieved November 5, 2010. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110416232443/http://borislurieartfoundation.org/William_Pepper |date=April 16, 2011 }} He was admitted to the Bar in 1977.{{cite web|url=http://www.martindale.com/William-Pepper/2427323-lawyer.htm |title=William Pepper Lawyer Profile |publisher=martindale.com |access-date=November 5, 2010}}

In September 1967, Pepper served as executive director of the National Conference for New Politics, which sought to unite disparate peace and civil rights groups. After feminists Jo Freeman and Shulamith Firestone were publicly denied a chance to speak at the event, Freeman recalled, "Pepper literally patted [Firestone] on the head and said, 'Cool down, little girl. We have more important things to talk about than women’s problems.'” Freeman, Firestone, and Ti-Grace Atkinson all became influential feminist activists in the wake of the conference.{{Cite book |last=Bingham |first=Clara |title=The Movement: How Women's Liberation Transformed America 1963-1973 |publisher=One Signal/Atria |year=2024 |isbn=978-1982144210 |location=New York |pages=76-78}}

Pepper stated Martin Luther King Jr. contacted him after seeing his photo essay, The Children of Vietnam, which was published in the January 1967 issue of Ramparts magazine. It depicted victims of napalm in Vietnam.{{cite web |url=http://sandiego.indymedia.org/en/2003/02/4025.shtml |title=William Pepper Calls Martin Luther King's Murder an Execution |last=Gabrish Conlan |first=Mark |date=February 2, 2003 |website=San Diego Indy Media |publisher=Zenger's Newsmagazine |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031127064955/http://sandiego.indymedia.org/en/2003/02/4025.shtml |access-date=November 4, 2020 |archive-date=November 27, 2003 }} Pepper, who supported the Communist cause, later wrote "it was not then clear to Dr. King that Ho-Chi Minh’s reverence for Jefferson, Lincoln, and American democracy, as he idealized it, made him the legitimate father of a unified Vietnam"{{cite news| url=https://www.salon.com/2018/01/15/inside-martin-luther-king-jr-s-final-radical-year/| author=William F Pepper| title=Inside Martin Luther King Jr.'s final, radical year | work=Salon| date=January 15, 2018}} Pepper later claimed that his conversation with King contributed to King's more adamant position against the Vietnam War, and that he was present at King's Riverside Church speech on April 4, 1967, in which King publicly attacked the war.

James Earl Ray pleaded guilty to King's assassination but soon recanted his confession. Pepper, who was Ray's last attorney, has postulated that Ray was not the shooter but was framed by the FBI, the CIA, the military, the Memphis police, and organized crime figures from New Orleans and Memphis.

Pepper represented James Earl Ray in a televised mock trial where Ray was found not guilty. Pepper's appeals to higher courts, and even the Supreme Court, failed. According to Pepper, "It looked like we were at the end of the road and then I came up with an idea, 'Well, look, why don't we try to have a real trial on television?" A mock trial was broadcast on HBO. The television jury found Ray not guilty.Johnson, Carrie. [https://www.npr.org/2018/04/04/598826351/despite-swirl-of-conspiracy-theories-investigators-say-the-mlk-case-is-closed "Despite Swirl Of Conspiracy Theories, Investigators Say The MLK Case Is Closed."] National Public Radio, April 4, 2018.

King's youngest son, Dexter King, met with Ray on March 27, 1997, at the Lois M. DeBerry Special Needs Facility. King subsequently said, "In the name of truth and justice, our family is calling for a trial, a trial James Earl Ray never had. ... I don't think his trial—if he is granted a trial—will necessarily give us the unequivocal proof, but at least in regard to new evidence, we will know more than we do now."Bragg, Rick. [https://www.nytimes.com/1997/02/04/us/king-family-seeks-trial-for-ray-before-he-dies-with-his-secrets.html "King Family Seeks Trial for Ray Before He Dies With His Secrets."] The New York Times, February 4, 1997.

In June 1997, Pepper appeared on ABC's Turning Point. He discussed the theory from his book Orders to Kill: The Truth Behind the Murder of Martin Luther King Jr. This theory that held that a hit team from the 20th special forces group was to kill King if a police sharpshooter failed. This group was supposedly led by a man named Billy Eidson, who Pepper claimed had since been killed in a coverup. Eidson was then brought on camera and refused to shake Pepper's hand. Eidson brought a $15 million lawsuit against Pepper's publisher which was later settled for an undisclosed amount.{{cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/1999/nov/28/life1.lifemagazine1|title=Who Killed Martin Luther King?|last=Stark|first=Tony|website=The Guardian|date=November 28, 1999}}{{cite episode |title=Who Killed Martin Luther King? (S1 EP 6) |series=Conspiracy? |network=History Channel |date=2004}}

Following Ray's death, Pepper represented the King family in a wrongful death lawsuit, "King family vs. Loyd Jowers and other unknown co-conspirators". During a trial that lasted four weeks, Pepper produced over seventy witnesses. Jowers, testifying by deposition, stated that James Earl Ray was a scapegoat and not involved in the assassination. Jowers testified that Memphis police officer Earl Clark fired the fatal shots. On December 8, 1999, the Memphis jury found Jowers responsible, and also found that the assassination plot included "governmental agencies." The jury took less than an hour to find in favor of the King family for the requested sum of $100.{{cite news| url=https://www.nytimes.com/1999/12/10/us/dr-king-s-slaying-finally-draws-a-jury-verdict-but-to-little-effect.html| author=Kevin Sack and Emily Yellin| title=Dr. King's Slaying Finally Draws A Jury Verdict, but to Little Effect| work=The New York Times| date=December 10, 1999}}

On February 22, 2012, Pepper and co-counsel Laurie Dusek filed a court brief in District Court in Los Angeles claiming that a second gunman fired the shots that killed Robert F. Kennedy, and petitioning for the release of their client Sirhan Sirhan.{{cite news| url=http://edition.cnn.com/2012/03/04/justice/california-rfk-second-gun/index.html| author=Brad Johnson and Michael Martinez| title=Attorneys for RFK convicted killer Sirhan push 'second gunman' argument| publisher=CNN| date=March 4, 2012}} Pepper believes that Sirhan, who claims to have no memory of the shooting, was programmed under hypnosis to shoot and provide a distraction from the actual gunman who got away. Hypnosis expert Harvard Medical School professor Daniel P. Brown concluded that Sirhan did not act under his own volition and knowledge at the time of the shooting. He was a real "Manchurian Candidate".{{citation | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/true-crime/wp/2018/06/04/the-assassination-of-bobby-kennedy-was-sirhan-sirhan-hypnotized-to-be-the-fall-guy/ |title = The assassination of Bobby Kennedy: Was Sirhan Sirhan hypnotized to be the fall guy?| newspaper=Washington Post}} ABC News said the story had all the makings of a great conspiracy theory.{{citation | url= https://abcnews.go.com/US/robert-kennedys-killer-sirhan-sirhan-brainwashed/story?id=1302905 | title=Assassin's Lawyer Says Sirhan Sirhan Was Brainwashed |publisher = ABC news}}

Sirhan Sirhan was again denied parole on February 10, 2016. On March 30, 2016, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals denied a further appeal launched by Pepper, noting the appellant has not shown that "jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the petition states a valid claim of the denial of a constitutional right and that jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the district court was correct in its procedural ruling."{{Cite web|url=http://sirhanbsirhan.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Denial-9th-circuit.pdf|title=9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judgement|access-date=September 14, 2017|archive-date=June 19, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170619031833/http://sirhanbsirhan.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Denial-9th-circuit.pdf|url-status=dead}}

Pepper died of pneumonia in New York City on April 7, 2024, at the age of 86.{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/19/us/william-f-pepper-dead.html|title=William F. Pepper, 86, Dies; Claimed the Government Killed Dr. King|first=Clay|last=Risen|work=The New York Times|date=April 19, 2024|access-date=April 19, 2024}}

{{external media| float = right| video1 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?160769-1/an-act-state-execution-martin-luther-king Book TV interview with Pepper on An Act of State: The Execution of Martin Luther King]. C-SPAN, January 28, 2003.| video2 = [https://williampepper.com/video/Bill_Pepper08.wmv Conversation with Pepper and Len Osanic]. November 2008.}}

• [https://archive.org/download/children-of-vietnam/Children%20of%20Vietnam.pdf "The Children of Vietnam."] Ramparts, vol. 5, no. 7 (Jan. 1967), pp. 45–68. Photographs and text by William F. Pepper. Preface by Dr. Benjamin Spock.

• [https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/007559110 The Self-Managed Child: Paths to Cultural Rebirth.] New York: Harper & Row (1973). {{ISBN|0060903104}}.
• [https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000232217 Sex Discrimination in Employment: An Analysis and Guide for Practitioner and Student.] Charlottesville: Michie Co. (1982). {{ISBN|978-0872153318}}.
• [https://archive.org/details/orderstokilltrut00pepp Orders to Kill: The Truth Behind the Murder of Martin Luther King, Jr.] New York: Carroll & Graf (1995). {{ISBN|978-0786702534}}.
• An Act of State: The Execution of Martin Luther King. New York: Verso (2003). {{ISBN|978-1859846957}}.
• The Plot to Kill King: The Truth Behind the Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. New York: Simon & Schuster (2016). {{ISBN|978-1510702189}}

{{Reflist}}

• [http://williampepper.com/ Official website]
• {{C-SPAN|48629}}
• {{IMDb name|1187018}}

{{Martin Luther King |expanded=Assassination}}

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Category:1937 births

Category:2024 deaths

Category:Lawyers from New York City

Category:Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

Category:American legal writers

Category:American political writers

Category:American male non-fiction writers

Category:American conspiracy theorists

Category:Columbia University alumni

Category:Alumni of the London School of Economics

Category:University of Massachusetts Amherst College of Education alumni

Category:Boston College Law School alumni

Category:Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy

Category:20th-century American lawyers

Category:21st-century American lawyers