When the Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Easter Sunday Collide

This year, with fitting irony and great poignancy, the anniversary of the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination falls on Easter Sunday.

For millennia before Christ, and long before it had been given a name, Easter has marked a time of rebirth, of resurrection from the dead of winter. It celebrates a time when day outlives night.

And yet April can be the cruelest month, and on April 4th, 1968, one of America's leading lights, perhaps its brightest, was snuffed out.

For the crime of opposing a profitable bloodshed in a faraway land, he was brutally silenced. For the transgression of bringing together a divided people to oppose poverty, he was marked for death by the powerful among his own countrymen.

Today, as efforts to divide black from white from brown intensify, as speech is muzzled and the speakers are canceled, as millions who have lost their jobs and small businesses plunge into poverty, as sabres rattle once more and new powers of darkness rise over the earth, we might take some comfort in these words from a sermon Dr. King gave on a long ago Easter Sunday in 1959, with so many struggles already behind him and so many others still ahead:

"And so this morning, let us not be disillusioned. Let us not lose faith. So often we’ve been crucified. We’ve been buried in numerous graves—the grave of economic insecurity, the grave of exploitation, the grave of oppression. We’ve watched justice trampled over and truth crucified. But I’m here to tell you this morning, Easter reminds us that it won’t be like that all the way. It reminds us that God has a light that can shine amid all the darkness."

The Assassination of Malcolm X & the FBI

On February 21, 1965, Malcolm X was shot down in the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, New York—right in front of an audience that included friends, supporters, his wife, and four young children. Three members of the Nation of Islam were convicted for the murder, though two have maintained their innocence.

Four years after Malcolm X's death, the FBI shared a memo about their counter intelligence program, or COINTELPRO, and its direct effect on the rift between the Civil Rights leader and the Nation of Islam. This program's mission was to spy on, infiltrate, discredit, disrupt, and destroy domestic organizations and individuals it deemed "subversive." At the time of Malcolm X's death, the FBI was directing much of its attention to groups such as the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and the Nation of Islam.

Official FBI documents, articles, and recommended reading on the Bureau's role in the life and assassination of Malcolm X can be found below.

Articles and more official FBI documents:

An eyewitness account of the assassination and the aftermath in a nearby police station that tells a different story

"FBI should acknowledge complicity in the assassination of Malcolm X"

The public FBI records on Malcolm X

Recommended reading:

The Judas Factor: The Plot to Kill Malcolm X by Karl Evanzz

Malcolm X: The FBI File by Clayborne Carson

The Autobiography of Malcolm X as Told to Alex Haley

New Evidence in Malcolm X Assassination Comes To Light

On the eve of the 56th anniversary of his death, Malcolm X’s daughters are presented with new evidence of official involvement in the crime

One day before Malcolm X's 56th death anniversary, civil rights attorney Ben Crump and co-counsels Ray Hamlin and Paul Napoli will hold a news conference on Feb. 20 at 12:30 p.m. ET to discuss new, explosive findings regarding the civil rights icon’s murder investigation.

“Ray Wood, an undercover police officer at the time, confessed in a deathbed declaration letter that the NYPD and the FBI conspired to undermine the legitimacy of the civil rights movement and its leaders,” reads a statement sent to NewsOne.

“Without any training, Wood’s job was to infiltrate civil rights organizations and encourage leaders and members to commit felonious acts. He was also tasked with ensuring that Malcolm X’s security detail was arrested days prior to the assassination, guaranteeing Malcolm X didn’t have door security while at the Audubon Ballroom, where he was killed on Feb. 21, 1965.”

Wood’s letter will be read aloud by Reggie Wood, a relative and administrator of his estate, and handed to three of Malcolm X’s children, Qubiliah Shabazz, Ilyasah Shabazz, and Gamilah Shabazz, who will be in attendance. According to the statement the findings will also be shared with the Manhattan District Attorney.

Malcolm X was gunned down in front of an audience at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem on February 21, 1965. He was 39-years-old. While arrests were made in his murder case, questions and conspiracies remained regarding his loss of life.

The recent accusations echo theories raised in the 2020 Netflix documentary, “Who Killed Malcolm X?” The series followed Abdur-Rahman Muhammad, an activist and self-trained investigator who dedicated his life work to solving the civil rights icon’s murder. In the documentary Muhammad interviews several important figures involved in the investigation, explores different conspiracy theories including possible federal and state law enforcement involvement. Muhammad also attempts to explore an accusation that Malcolm X’s alleged killer was a Newark community leader who worshipped at a local Mosque.

After the documentary aired, the Manhattan District Attorney’s office announced it review the case, with the possibility to reopen if leads proved sufficient.

Three men were jailed for the 1965 murder of the activist. Talmadge Hayer – later known as Mujahid Abdul Halim – admitted he took part in the murder, while two other men, Norman 3X Butler (who later changed his name to Muhammad Abdul Aziz) and Thomas 15X Johnson (who took the name Khalil Islam), maintained their innocence. Aziz was released on parole in 1985; Islam was released in 1987 but died in 2009; Halim was released in 2010.

Malcolm X’s assassination along with that of President John F. Kennedy, his brother Robert Kennedy, and Martin Luther King Jr.’s in the 60’s changed the course of history. Sign our petition to support our efforts to uncover the truth of those four pivotal assassinations.