Malcolm X family sues FBI, CIA, NYPD for involvement in assassination
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Following decades of uncertainty and injustice, Malcolm X's daughters file a lawsuit against three major US agencies, accusing them of playing a role in the revolutionary's murder.
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Malcolm X speaks to reporters in Washington, D.C., May 16, 1963. (AP)
Three of Malcolm X's daughters have accused the CIA, FBI, and the New York Police Department (NYPD) of being involved in the civil rights leader's assassination in 1965.
In a $100 million lawsuit filed in the Manhattan federal court, the Malcolm X estate and three of his daughters accused the agencies of being aware of and involved in plots to target the leader but of failing to stop the assassination.
The family's attorney, Ben Crump, held a press conference to discuss the lawsuit, expressing hopes that federal and city officials would read it "and learn all the dastardly deeds that were done by their predecessors and try to right these historic wrongs."
While all three agencies did not respond to requests for comments, the Department of Justice, which is also being sued, actively declined to comment.
Malcolm X was assassinated on February 21, 1965 at the Audubon Ballroom on West 165th Street in Manhattan, while speaking to a crowd of hundreds. For almost four decades, questions have surrounded the details of his death but to no clear avail.
Three suspects were then convicted for his death, but two were exonerated, one of them posthumously, in an admission by US authorities of a historic miscarriage of justice, after investigators reviewed the case file and concluded that some of the evidence was not provided by authorities or accurate enough to dictate a sentence.
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In the lawsuit, the family says that the prosecution team intentionally downplayed the government's involvement in the assassination.
The lawsuit argues that there existed a "corrupt, unlawful, and unconstitutional" connection between law enforcement and "ruthless killers" that went unchallenged for years, with government agents actively concealing, condoning, protecting, and facilitating this relationship, which ultimately contributed to Malcolm X's murder.
It further alleges that the NYPD, in coordination with federal agencies, deliberately removed Malcolm X’s security detail just days before his assassination and pulled their officers out of the ballroom where he was killed. Meanwhile, federal agents, including undercover personnel, were present in the ballroom but failed to intervene or protect him.
Lastly, the lawsuit states that the family couldn’t file earlier because the defendants withheld critical information, including the identities of undercover agents and informants, as well as details about the planning of the attack. It also states that Malcolm X’s widow, Betty Shabazz, and their family have suffered for decades from the uncertainty of not knowing who was responsible for his murder, the extent of law enforcement involvement, or the cover-up that followed.
The family had announced their intention to sue the law enforcement agencies early last year.
