March 14, 2022 • 35 mins
Lennie Curtis works at the police rifle range where sharpshooter Frank Strausser talks about killing King. On the fatal day, Strausser practices all morning with his new rifle. When Strausser leaves for town, Curtis tries to warn King, but fails. Years later, Pepper confronts Strausser.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the MLK Tapes, a production of I Heart
Radio and Tenderfoot TV. The views and opinions expressed in
this podcast are solely those of the podcast author or
individuals participating in the podcast, and do not represent those
of I Heart Media, Tenderfoot TV, or their employees. Listener
discretion is advised. He laid it on the counter to Lenny,
(00:26):
how you like that scount book that baby? It's a
rifle actor wrestler, right, it's noisy, just a special one
that baby special did right? It looked like a regular
hunt gun which site with thing along boul what I said,
looking like one of the old Brown and gun. That's
what I always said, because I guess Ramanton Brown is
(00:48):
about that. I would know, but uh I didn't touch it,
and I don't know who I didn't because it was
on the counter there and land right in front of me.
Did you look like it's a new gun? Was it new?
It was branded? Right, said? Looked like it hadn't never
been It wasn't hadn't been abet at all been fired.
Looked like I did have a scope on it, I think,
(01:09):
I said, had a scope on top. It did have
a scope. It was brown it was nice. What I
guess you's macall and woodwork. It was a good looking
made a lot of noise. Yeah, it didn't make a
lot of noise. It didn't look like the type of
going to do that, all right. It's a strange looking,
all right, But it made a tremendous noise every time
(01:31):
he would shoot it down in that gun, right down. Oh,
this is his first time. I saw him that day
and that day only that he shot that right and
he started all day. He spent time with it all
that day. I called the Union Hall. I said, a
(01:53):
matter of life and death. I said, I think these
peoples are planning to kill Dr King. The authorities parade. Oh,
we found a gun the James l. Ray bought in
Birmingham that killed Dr King. Except it wasn't the gun
that killed Dr King. James l. Vay was a paw
(02:13):
or The official story from My Heart Radio and Tenderfoot TV.
The plan was to get King to the city because
they wanted it handled in Memphis. Were dead in named
Cat Hammond. I'm Bill Claibourg and this is the MLK tapes.
(02:39):
Lenny Curtis was a black custodian at the Memphis Police
firing range in April of night he witnessed several disturbing
things that the King was shot, and in the days
leading up to it, afraid for his family. He kept
those events to himself for over thirty years, but Curtis
did tell a friend of his who contacted Bill Pepper.
(03:00):
Pepper convinced the friend to at least let him speak
to Curtis. Lenny told me the story, and then I
convinced Lenny to go under oath in a deposition and
be filmed and tell the story, but in front of
Mark M. King the third, and he did all of that.
The deal was that I would not reveal what he
(03:23):
said whilst she was alive. The Curtis deposition was recorded
in April of two thousand and three, but the tape
itself remained in the custody of Bill Pepper, as per
his agreement with Lenny Curtis. Also in attendance was Martin
King the third, an attorney Louis Garrison, who would ask
many of the questions as well. Hear now back in
(03:47):
miss Curtis, you were employed by the Memphis Police Department,
and at that time you were working at the firing
range cost out. Okay, but four April fourth, nineteen sixtight,
you knew I have an officer there whose name was
Earl Clark and my corrector, Captain Cloud. Yes. And also
(04:10):
there was an aufer named Frank Strausser is that he
was a patrol Now, MS courtis just tell us before
April four some things you had heard from both of
those sources about Dr King's present here in Memphis. Here,
Uh Mrs Strailer said that somebody I was gonna blow
his I don't say it, blow his mother fucking brains out. Okay.
(04:35):
We had set two TVs in which we call a
lounge in a lounge area, and that they had reserve
police officers which was rookie police. You know they didn't
you know, you could tell. So they was in uniform
waiting on a standby and they would listen to looking
at the TV. And uh Mrs Straiser came in and
(04:57):
stood up, stopping the lounge while TV was on, and
he made the statement that oh he'd get a fucking
brain blow it out. And he went on down into
the area where the gun room room down on the basement.
And that's what the first gave me. I started thinking
because we were in the area where he couldn't see us,
(05:18):
and we were in the kitchen, in the cook area
of the lounge. He couldn't see us. So I told James,
and not just saying anything. So we just do it,
and we talked about it, and I told Jane, I said, so,
I don't feel good about that because he was shooting
that gun all that day. When Curtis refers to the
(05:40):
gun that Frank Strausser was shooting at the range as
that gun, he was talking about a particular rifle, the
special Baby with a polished wood stock, that had been
shown to him just a few days before by a
close friend of Strousser's, a fireman named Roy Young. And
when Curtis was asked to describe what he saw or
heard on the day King was killed, it went right
(06:02):
back to Frank Strausser and that gun. He was shooting
the gun all day. But when he came up, it
was during the time that we was getting ready to
leave and we were in the same location. We were
doing lunch. I mean about what time the day was,
would you say? That was about three o'clock? Okay, So
we were cleaning up and here he'd come up out
of the thing with the rifle, that same rifle, like
(06:27):
the same rifle to me, what do you do? He
went to Mr young car. He had a voice wagon.
Mrs Streis did but he left and Mr Young's car
that date ruffles, however, and then he turned to what
I said, fire because he had a white T shirt on,
blue pants and put a pair of dog sunglass on.
When he left, the top back all right. And then
(06:49):
you saw him leave, said he got in the car
and pool law. When he left, I wait until he
got out of the drive and I went across the
street to the Board of Education. I had only a
two phone called fair. I called the Union Hall, talked
to them later. It was a reception there. The young
lady I spoke to. I told her, I said this
(07:09):
is something very important and she said what is it
to I said, it's a matter of life and death,
and she said, what fool's life? And what you know?
I said, I think these people are planning to kill
Dr King? And I said I wanted to talk to
Reverend Smith. She said what he probably with Dr King?
I said, no way, ma'am, you could get in touch
with him. She says, not not at this time. Sir,
(07:32):
so I called Dr Vasco Smith. I let his phone
rang for I don't know how long. No one never answered.
I don't guess nobody was there. So I had no
more money. I went back to the police problem across
the street and I sat over there for a while.
Then I left him, going home. And when I got home,
my wife and I was in the kitchen and it
(07:53):
came over radio, and it just knocked me down. And
I have lived with it so long as the fact
that I thought, I said, well, now, am I not
honly somebody that could have helped? And I did all
I could, and I could I think about moving? Or
am I safe here? And and you know I've been
to a thing with this thing with me and my
(08:13):
seron and they they scared for me, you know, it's
scared for me. But the Lord told me and not
the word I wanted to tell this here. I've been
wanting to tell it all my lions. But Curtis's worries
didn't stop when King was killed. They increased because Frank
Strousser seemed to think that Lenny Curtis had seemed too
(08:36):
much and had put the pieces together that he knew
what Strausser had done. He was aware that Lenny saw
everything that was going on. I knew everything that was
going on, so he definitely intimidated Lenny. For quite a
period of time. Curtis tried to stay out of the
way whenever Frank Strouser came around, but he could feel
(08:57):
Strousser looking at him. Some months after the King killing,
after he hadn't said a word to Curtis since the murder,
Strausser approached Curtis and asked him to come with him
on an errand Curtis felt an immediate fear. He said,
I think he contacts you one day and sq back
riding down to pick up the pay roll. That was
surprising to me. Coach you before said nothing to me.
(09:21):
They had never even spoken to you before other than
just remark you heard. And my mind told me to go, okay,
what do you say? Remember said LENNI said, you got
your boy caught up? And I just said you. He said, uh,
you wanna write down with me to pick up a check?
And I went and I knew what he was gonna
ask me, but I didn't know where he was gonna
(09:42):
ask me. We we went and got in the car, Yeah,
it's going on. I was looking at it. He put
his hand on his gun. He didn't put his hand
on it. He didn't touch it because I was watching it. Yeah,
but just two I get in the car too. It
was in the car, thank you, said he was. Mary
asked me when I'm mayor? Then who We got down
by the Popular in the North Parkway. He turned and
(10:04):
went through the wood area. Why the zoo, you know?
And I'm one. Of course, we're own Poplar. All we
gotta do. Go straight down to the deal High. When
we got around them, cured while you get deep the grass,
He's said, let it. What are you thinking about that
guy Ray killing king things like that? I saw all
he did. I said, it's no doubt about it. You know.
(10:25):
I had to say that. I said, no, no doubt
about it. I said, I know he did it. Everybody
know he did it. Talking about Mr Ray. And then
they asked me, said you're still doing privor detective word
now I was insecured, doing secure the guards. I said year.
He said, you're still working with those lbis and periodic.
I had some couple of FBI that would bring me,
(10:48):
won't it posts I said, yeah, I said, periodic I
we worked together, and he told me, he said, let him,
you'd be careful him. But Frank Strousser always seemed to
feel that Lenny Curtis was a danger to him and
to him, and again Strosser would stalk Curtis, either to
frighten him or possibly worse. Strange thing was happening to
(11:12):
me at one time, and with the own box says,
somebody turned my gas off and turned it back home.
But it was in one of time, and I got
cold and woke up and smelled to gad. And so
that next week I noticed a car sitting across the street.
It was a Lincoln, or I was a Lincoln, and
I was looking at I said that I was a
car that don't supposed to be there before I come out.
(11:35):
I always do that in the morning, because, like I said,
I was scared. At one time, I was really scared.
So I noticed the cobs there of the car, and
I looked at the real careful and kept looking at.
I saw a head moved, and I said, So by
that time I went back into in the house. I
got my pistol and I loaded it, put it in
(11:56):
my pocket, and like I normally do. I would go
out and stop my car later on this time something
that Lulow I told me. He told me he said,
when you get ready to go, go, don't warm your
motor up or nothing. So I got him a car
and turn in this and took off without even turn
my lights on. And just as I went to pull out,
(12:18):
he pulled out and it was him Strousser. And at
that particular time they were they were doing Christmas time.
They were saying something about they had new evidence. Every
time they come up with new eleness, he would pop
up some kind of way as something. In recounting the
day King was killed, Curtis gave an interesting description of
(12:38):
the way Strauser looked as he left the firing range.
Curtis said, quote, he turned into what I said was
a fireman, referring to Strouser in the informal dress of
a fireman, complete with white T shirt, ruffled hair, and sunglasses.
He also left in a fireman's car. I asked Bill
Pepper about this. He was driving Roy Young's car. Ry
(13:01):
Young's had privileges at the fire station number two, so
he was able to park the car there, and he
did change his his physical appearance yes he did, and
since the fire station erupted like a beehive as soon
as King was shot, being dressed like a fireman wouldn't
(13:21):
be a bad way to blend in and then disappear,
if that's what happened. Once Bill Pepper heard Lenny Curtis's testimony,
he naturally began to look at Frank Strausser, though he
had to be cautious because sudden interest would put Curtis
in danger, something Pepper had promised not to do. Pepper
found out that Strausser was new to the Memphis Police
(13:42):
force at the time of the King killing, having recently
returned from Vietnam, where he had been wounded and lost
her brother. Pepper also found a cop who had briefly
served as Strousser's partner in a squad car. He told
Pepper that Strausser was out of control, acting as though
he was untouchable, with numerous abuses of power, like when
he went into a black bar screaming nword this and
(14:04):
nword that, and emptied his pistol into the jukebox. Pepper
also ran across a reference to Strausser in It Came
from Memphis, a book by Robert Gordon about the music
scene in the sixties. Gordon described Strousser as a brawler
recently back from Nam, quoting here, he got wired on
his own adrenaline in the Vietnam jungle, and the chill
(14:27):
rush of danger in his lower backbone had become as
necessary to him as air going in and out of
his lungs. Upon returning to Memphis, he'd become a cop,
the paramilitary uniform and the weapon sort of a methodon.
The book would go on to describe how Strausser would
muscle in on the pimps and dope dealers working Beal Street,
(14:48):
and how after hours he would team up with a
friend and go to bars looking for people to beat up.
For most people, such a character reference might be enough
to just stay clear of the man, But when Lenny
Curtis died in Bill Pepper decided to find Strausser and
talk to him. I didn't necessarily expect that I would
(15:09):
get anything out of it, but I thought I would
be remiss if I didn't try to have some conversation
with this guy. I saw him where he was living.
I just went out there one day. He was doing
his laundry, and then he came out to see me,
and I introduced myself to him, and I said, I'd
like to talk to you at some some point. You
(15:30):
were an officer at the time of the killing, and
I'd like to I'd like to know what you what
you believe happened, and so forth. Then I invited him
to have lunch with me, and I offered him five
hundred dollars if he would sit down a restaurant have
lunch with me, which he did. So Bill Pepper decided
to have lunch with the man he believed killed, Martin
(15:51):
Luther king Strouser, in his seventies, was driving a cab
to support himself, and five dollars seemed like good pay
for an hour work, so he said yes, and a
date was set for the dining room of the Peabody
Hotel in Memphis. Pepper then called his court reporter, Brian Dominsky.
Bill asked that that I have him wired for sound,
(16:13):
and we did a rudimentary attempt at that recorder in
his pocket. Besides the recorder, it was also thought a
good idea if Pepper had additional people in the room,
so Dominski and an associate were already at a nearby
table when Strousser and Pepper sat down at the Peabody,
unbeknownst to Strousser, we were sitting one table away. But
(16:34):
Bill welcomed him and they sat down and they had
about a forty five minute chat about what life was
like in in Memphis. But the small device that Bill
had in his pocket wasn't up to the task. Given
the normal noise of a dining room, what it recorded
was barely decipherable. Dominski, however, was able to produce a
(16:54):
transcript parts of which voice actors will perform for us
right after the break, m how are you, Frank? How
(17:16):
are you doing? You all right? Yeah? Well, I did
something in my back, so I'm not really all right.
Bill Pepper rises awkwardly from his chair to greet Frank Strousser,
who notices his pain. Pepper says that he did something
to his back, referring to something that was done to
his back decades earlier. Pepper then Hans Strousser an envelope
with five Strousser nods, puts it in his pocket and
(17:40):
takes his seat. Once settled, it is Strausser who asked
the first question, So what's on your agenda? You write
in a book. Yeah, I've written too on this case.
This is gonna be the final one, so I'm trying
to cover all the bases. I'm gonna go through a
lot of stuff with you and take some notes if
I may. And I want to first ask your recollection
(18:01):
of what things were like around the time this went on,
this killing. Sure, let's start with what you recall in
the police department and what the atmosphere was like around
the time of the assassination. Okay, the department at that
time was an old school police department. There was before
we started hiring for quotas and everything. So most of
(18:22):
the officers were a dying breed. They were dinosaurs. Basically
an all white force, very few blacks, so it was
a very tight knit group of men. Now Halliman came in,
when was that? What was your impression of him? Harmon
came in somewhere around January. I didn't have that much
to do with him. Those FBI guys pretty much stay
(18:45):
with their own. He was in a street coup. Yeah,
he was with Hoover for a number of years. What
was the attitude toward Martin King, I mean amongst the police,
I don't think they had any liking for him. The
sanitation workers went on strike and then we monitored them,
rode with them when they marched. The police officers were
just doing their job. So what was the atmosphere in
(19:07):
the city were outside the police force in terms of
was it explosive? Was it ready to know? Not? Really?
What did that? What changed the whole thing? Was you
mean the assassination or the assassination sanitation workers going out.
Prior to that, there weren't demonstrations, and then after the assassination,
(19:27):
the blacks and everybody come downtown, thieves, pickpockets. They ruined it,
the rioters, whoever you want. Before then, everyone came to
town to shop, and after nobody came. So I think
prior to that the relationship was much better. Since then,
Memphis has evolved into a racially charged city. Frank Strausser
(19:50):
starts his history of Memphis by referring to the police
at the time of the king killing as dinosaurs, as
if he has somehow moved on, But then he candidly
puts himself back among them as he reveals his belief
that it was the blacks who ruined the city. Things
were much better before the sanitation workers got all stirred
up about a union. Of course, the city might have
(20:10):
saved itself a lot of trouble had they just paid
their garbageman a living wage. But Pepper doesn't argue because
he is pleased with the conversation. He had been half
expecting Strousser to take the money and then become hostile
or uncooperative. Pepper wants to keep the words coming, so
he steers the conversation to something they had in common.
(20:31):
From what I know about you, you've had an interesting
career because you were in the military. Correct in Vietnam.
That was in Vietnam and I got I got hit
pretty good. What a year that's when I was there.
Really were you military? No? No, I was a journalist,
went there in the spring of sixty six and took
(20:52):
myself out to the Central Islands. I was in a
C one thirty and we were landing in Plaku and
they hit us. Going in plane made a very bad
rough landing and it started my back problems then. But
those things happen. Those things happen. But you must have
seen rough action. How was that? A couple of good ones.
I ended up in the hospital in Osaka, needed skin grass.
(21:16):
My brother wasn't so lucky. He died there. M hm.
I'm sorry to hear that, younger brother, two years younger.
I understand that you were given some serious award, the
Army Commendation Medal for valor. But they gave it to
you at the police roll call. Isn't that unusual? It
was good pr The conversation so far had gone better
(21:37):
than Bill Pepper could have expected. Frank Strauser was calm
and willing to talk about what things were like in
Memphis back in the day, but that's all he had
signed on to do. He hadn't agreed to talk about
the murder of Dr. King, and Pepper didn't expect to
get Strousser to fess up to anything or rat out anybody.
But he also didn't want to squander at the opportunity
(21:59):
to poke a ound. Do you remember where you were
when King was shot? Uh? Yeah, I was at home.
I wasn't home. I had had been at home. I
forget what time he got killed. He got killed about
six o'clock in the afternoon, because I was I think
I was working seven to seven. I know I was
working seven to seven, so I was on my way
to work because I heard it on the radio that
(22:21):
he had been assassinated, and I was on my way
to the precinct down at headquarters to go to work.
Do you remember hearing it on the radio driving to work? Yes,
driving to work. Then I'll hell broke loose. I guess
what happened. The riots broke out downtown. There was so
much going on that I went on twelve hour shifts
probably for the next six weeks. Pepper, of course, is
(22:44):
quite certain that Frank Strausser was not at home or
in his car when King was killed, but Strouser is
disarmingly relaxed about it all. So Pepper decides to lay
a few more cards on the table. Do you know
what I've done? Who I am? I have no idea.
I was James Earl Ray's lawyer from until he died.
(23:07):
Oh okay. I only took him on after I spent
ten years convincing myself that he wasn't guilty of the crime.
I tried desperately to get him a trial. I failed.
Banham locked up all the way. Family knew Martin Luther
King the last year of his life. After he was killed,
I just walked away from it all. Politics and everything.
(23:29):
Then in seventy seven, Abernathy called and asked me to
question Ry in prison. I said, what are you talking about?
They got the right guy. But six months later I
spent five hours with James Earl Ray and it was
clear to me that he wasn't the shooter. The family
asked me to look into it further. I want to
know what happened to have closure. Strousser at first isn't
(23:53):
sure how to respond to this. He stumbles just a
touch and ends up by denying that he had ever
anything to do with James ol Ray. Bill Pepper had
never suggested it. Do you know, if you have children,
you know you want to find out who did it.
I'm just, I'm just I had no dealings with James
Earl Ray, never saw him. So Pepper tells Strausser that
(24:18):
he knows he didn't know James ol Ray. It was
an easy call because no one in Memphis knew James
el Ray. Strousser then follows with a remarkable opinion as
to why the case against Ray doesn't make much sense.
I'll just say this much, and I have a profound
belief in this. I don't think James el Ray could
(24:39):
have put all this together. You're right about that. Now
where it goes from there? Bill, I don't know. I
could be totally incorrect. But with the kind of criminal
background he had, this guy was, you know, he was
a petty criminal. How can a guy like this I
don't think I ever had this thought before. Why would
he want to kill Martin Luther King? Yes, there's no motive.
(25:02):
He's a black leader and you're a James are array
over here? What's the reason for killing exactly? I mean
to drift into Memphis and to suddenly have access to
a room across the street and a rival, and then
to drop the rival in a bag or a mattress
or wrapped up in something. Give me right, he didn't
do it. There must have been other people involved. One
(25:25):
of the things I enjoy while trying to unravel this
mystery is that people who are likely neck deep in
the murder don't seek refuge in the official story of
how the King killing went down. You heard similar stuff
from Lloyd Jowers when he spoke to Andrew Young and
Dexter King. Oh Ray couldn't have done all this, not
in a million years. The official story is so weak.
(25:48):
The framing of Ray so obvious that even the beneficiaries
of this story run away from it. So Strouser thinks
there were other people involved. But who Pepper has an
idea too. The thing is as hard as I've looked,
I never found any indication that the CIA or the
agency was involved in the killing of Martin King. I
(26:10):
have found strong indications that the FBI was involved, and
that Hoover was involved. Hoover hated King, hated him. He
used Clyde Toulson, his number two, to come in here,
bring money and set it up through the Dixie Mafia.
So even lowly patrolman understood at the time that j
Edgar Hoover hated Martin Luther King. Not a great character
(26:31):
reference for the man who was ultimately put in charge
of the murder investigation. But Pepper's mention of the Dixie
Mafia brings forth an unexpected confession from Strousser. Years ago.
There was this article in the press, Simitar about people
who had some connection to the Dixie Mafia, and my
name was in there. You could have sued him, you
could have. No. To be quite candid, I guess they
(26:54):
got it right because I had not been involved directly.
But I had known some pretty questionable characters, you know,
from the Dixie Mafia to the actual mafia, and it
was well now that I was in a lot of
activity with people who were involved in that sort of livelihood.
Frank Strousser has just admitted that over the years he
(27:16):
had engaged in a lot of activity with some pretty
questionable characters, and Pepper thinks this might be the time
disturb the pot. He tells Strouser that after the murder,
the Memphis police made a plaster cast of a fresh
footprint in the yard behind Jours Place. This is true,
a size thirteen footprint, and that's significant because not that
(27:37):
many men have a size thirteen hoof. So Pepper then
asked Strousser the size of his shoe, and years later
he told me what he saw on Strousser's face, and
he said thirteen and a half with a little grin
on his face. He was telling me something, wasn't he.
Pepper may have gotten a grin from Strousser, but if
(27:58):
he thought he'd get more of a reaction and he
was wrong. So Pepper decided to try something else. He
told Strousser that as Jowers near death, he had named
him as the shooter. This was not true. Jowers had
done no such thing. He had named Captain Clark and
by extension, himself as being out in the yard, but
(28:18):
he never named Strousser, and Pepper believes that this was
because he was afraid of Strousser, who, unlike Clark, was
still very much alive. So in search of the truth,
Bill Pepper tells the following lie. Well, Frank, let me
raise something that I've got to raise with you. First
of all, I appreciate your candor thank you for that
(28:40):
and for your time. As you may know, I represented
the King family here in Memphis, and we sued Lloyd
Jowers for wrongful death and the King killing. There was
a civil trial thirty days and seventy witnesses. The jury
came back in fifty nine minutes and found for the
family against hours. Jowers, as you know, is dead. Maybe
(29:04):
he didn't know, Yeah he did, but it wasn't just
the jury. Before he died, Jowers admitted to myself, Andrew
Young and Dexter King. He admitted his involvement in the assassination.
He did, Yes, he admitted it. Betty Spates had nailed
him because she was at the back door in the
kitchen when he brought the rifle in. After the shooting,
(29:25):
Jowers had the rifle. Jowers brought the rifle in, but
before he died. Hold on yourself. He named you as
the assassin. He did that, Yes, he named you. Why
he did this, I don't know. And I found Jowers
to be a liar on a lot of things, but
he did. He named you. This surprised me because for
(29:49):
a long time I thought Clark was the shooter. Clark
was a hell of a shot, and he lied about
where he was that afternoon, there was no longer a
grin on Frank Strouser's face. Earl Clark was a good
friend of mine. He had strong feelings about certain things.
Was he a good shot? Oh yeah, and you are
(30:12):
a hell of a shooter from what I understand, I'm
a dead shot. I was then, certainly not now. But
I don't have any idea why Jowers would do that.
If the purpose of the lie about being named by
Jowers was to Jossel Strausser into a revealing emotional response,
(30:36):
it would appear to be a failure. Strousser doesn't get
upset or angry over the accusation, he just acts perplexed.
But then Pepper tells Strousser that for a good while
he had thought Captain Clark was a shooter. Strousser's response is,
Earl Clark was a good friend of mine. He had
strong feelings about certain things. These two sentences are the
(30:58):
most real things. Strausser says. The entire afternoon he had
strong feelings about certain things might be seen as Strousser's
inter justification for Clark's roll in the murder. And Earl
Clark was a good friend of mine appears to put
Strousser right next to Clark in the yard facing the
Lorraine Motel. How do we come to that? According to
(31:22):
the literature, a proper sniper team has a spotter and
a shooter. The shooter has a site on the target
at all times, but the spotter takes a wider view
of what's going on around the target. Each man needs
to know the other well down to how he sounds
when he's breathing, and it's the spotter who is in
charge who gives the command to shoot. If Jowers primary
(31:45):
function is to provide the yard and take the gun
and hide it. And we say for the moment that
Clark is the spotter. Who might we imagine the shooter
to be first, it would have to be someone who
was an excellent shot. Then you would need someone who
was tight with Captain Clark, and someone who shoots guns
regularly with Clark, say at the police firing range. And
(32:07):
this is why Earl Clark was a good friend of mine.
Is a tell because Strousser was the perfect fit for Clark. Plus,
according to Lenny Curtis, Strausser was the one shooting a
special rifle all morning and into the afternoon on the
day King was killed. Does Curtis has sworn testimony prove
that Frank Strousser was out in the yard facing Lorraine
(32:28):
that day? No, it doesn't, but it does point in
that direction. So from what we've been able to piece together,
it appears that Jowers, Clark, and perhaps Strouser you've heard
the evidence, you can decide for yourselves, were in the
yard facing Lorraine and one of them fired the shot
that killed King. If that is true, have we solved
the case? Not hardly, Because no matter how knowing and willing,
(32:52):
the men in the yard were and how knowing and
willing were those who put them there. They were all
just pawns in this game. To solve this crime, we
need to know who planned the murder and who helped
look the other way or went along for the ride.
(33:12):
Next time on the MLK tapes he was for McCarthy
ass right wing vision of America. Mr Hunt looked over
and he says, John, I've just about had a beneful
of the Kennedy boys. They both need to go. We
have seen today the dark side of those activities where
many Americans who were not even suspected of crime, we're
(33:35):
not only spied upon, but they were harassed, They were
discredited and at times endangered. My aunt had been the
victim of Jegor Hoover, you know, lying to her. After
the march on Washington, there was an acceleration. He was
(33:56):
defined because of his speech in that demonstration in Washington
as the most dangerous and effective leader in the country,
and there was a paper battle between within the bureau
was to how best to attack him. That he was attacked,
So the main focus of that meeting was really trying
to figure out how to take down Martin Luther King.
They were quite explicit about laying out a campaign to
(34:18):
destroy King. Thanks for listening to the m l K Tapes,
a production of I Heart Radio and Tenderfoot TV. This
podcast is not specifically endorsed by the King Family or
the King of State. Damail Ka Tapes is written and
hosted by Bill Claiper. Matt Frederick and Alex Williams are
(34:39):
executive producers on behalf of I Heart Radio, with producers
Trevor Young and ben Keebrick. Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay
are executive producers on half of Tenderfoot TV with producers
Jamie Albright and Meredith Steadman. Original music by Makeup and
Vanity Said. Cover art by Mr Soul two six with
photography by Artemis Jenkins. Special thanks to Owen Rosenbaum and
(35:02):
Grace Rowyer at u t A, The Nord Group, back
Median Marketing, Envisioned Business Management, and Station sixteen. If you
have questions, you can visit our website the email k
Tapes dot com. We posted photos and videos related to
the podcast on our social media accounts. You can check
them out at the email k Tapes. For more podcasts
(35:22):
from I Heart Radio and Tenderfoot TV, please visit the
I heart radio, app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows.
Welcome to the MLK Tapes, a production of I Heart
Radio and Tenderfoot TV. The views and opinions expressed in
this podcast are solely those of the podcast author or
individuals participating in the podcast, and do not represent those
of I Heart Media, Tenderfoot TV, or their employees. Listener
discretion is advised. He laid it on the counter to Lenny,
(00:26):
how you like that scount book that baby? It's a
rifle actor wrestler, right, it's noisy, just a special one
that baby special did right? It looked like a regular
hunt gun which site with thing along boul what I said,
looking like one of the old Brown and gun. That's
what I always said, because I guess Ramanton Brown is
(00:48):
about that. I would know, but uh I didn't touch it,
and I don't know who I didn't because it was
on the counter there and land right in front of me.
Did you look like it's a new gun? Was it new?
It was branded? Right, said? Looked like it hadn't never
been It wasn't hadn't been abet at all been fired.
Looked like I did have a scope on it, I think,
(01:09):
I said, had a scope on top. It did have
a scope. It was brown it was nice. What I
guess you's macall and woodwork. It was a good looking
made a lot of noise. Yeah, it didn't make a
lot of noise. It didn't look like the type of
going to do that, all right. It's a strange looking,
all right, But it made a tremendous noise every time
(01:31):
he would shoot it down in that gun, right down. Oh,
this is his first time. I saw him that day
and that day only that he shot that right and
he started all day. He spent time with it all
that day. I called the Union Hall. I said, a
(01:53):
matter of life and death. I said, I think these
peoples are planning to kill Dr King. The authorities parade. Oh,
we found a gun the James l. Ray bought in
Birmingham that killed Dr King. Except it wasn't the gun
that killed Dr King. James l. Vay was a paw
(02:13):
or The official story from My Heart Radio and Tenderfoot TV.
The plan was to get King to the city because
they wanted it handled in Memphis. Were dead in named
Cat Hammond. I'm Bill Claibourg and this is the MLK tapes.
(02:39):
Lenny Curtis was a black custodian at the Memphis Police
firing range in April of night he witnessed several disturbing
things that the King was shot, and in the days
leading up to it, afraid for his family. He kept
those events to himself for over thirty years, but Curtis
did tell a friend of his who contacted Bill Pepper.
(03:00):
Pepper convinced the friend to at least let him speak
to Curtis. Lenny told me the story, and then I
convinced Lenny to go under oath in a deposition and
be filmed and tell the story, but in front of
Mark M. King the third, and he did all of that.
The deal was that I would not reveal what he
(03:23):
said whilst she was alive. The Curtis deposition was recorded
in April of two thousand and three, but the tape
itself remained in the custody of Bill Pepper, as per
his agreement with Lenny Curtis. Also in attendance was Martin
King the third, an attorney Louis Garrison, who would ask
many of the questions as well. Hear now back in
(03:47):
miss Curtis, you were employed by the Memphis Police Department,
and at that time you were working at the firing
range cost out. Okay, but four April fourth, nineteen sixtight,
you knew I have an officer there whose name was
Earl Clark and my corrector, Captain Cloud. Yes. And also
(04:10):
there was an aufer named Frank Strausser is that he
was a patrol Now, MS courtis just tell us before
April four some things you had heard from both of
those sources about Dr King's present here in Memphis. Here,
Uh Mrs Strailer said that somebody I was gonna blow
his I don't say it, blow his mother fucking brains out. Okay.
(04:35):
We had set two TVs in which we call a
lounge in a lounge area, and that they had reserve
police officers which was rookie police. You know they didn't
you know, you could tell. So they was in uniform
waiting on a standby and they would listen to looking
at the TV. And uh Mrs Straiser came in and
(04:57):
stood up, stopping the lounge while TV was on, and
he made the statement that oh he'd get a fucking
brain blow it out. And he went on down into
the area where the gun room room down on the basement.
And that's what the first gave me. I started thinking
because we were in the area where he couldn't see us,
(05:18):
and we were in the kitchen, in the cook area
of the lounge. He couldn't see us. So I told James,
and not just saying anything. So we just do it,
and we talked about it, and I told Jane, I said, so,
I don't feel good about that because he was shooting
that gun all that day. When Curtis refers to the
(05:40):
gun that Frank Strausser was shooting at the range as
that gun, he was talking about a particular rifle, the
special Baby with a polished wood stock, that had been
shown to him just a few days before by a
close friend of Strousser's, a fireman named Roy Young. And
when Curtis was asked to describe what he saw or
heard on the day King was killed, it went right
(06:02):
back to Frank Strausser and that gun. He was shooting
the gun all day. But when he came up, it
was during the time that we was getting ready to
leave and we were in the same location. We were
doing lunch. I mean about what time the day was,
would you say? That was about three o'clock? Okay, So
we were cleaning up and here he'd come up out
of the thing with the rifle, that same rifle, like
(06:27):
the same rifle to me, what do you do? He
went to Mr young car. He had a voice wagon.
Mrs Streis did but he left and Mr Young's car
that date ruffles, however, and then he turned to what
I said, fire because he had a white T shirt on,
blue pants and put a pair of dog sunglass on.
When he left, the top back all right. And then
(06:49):
you saw him leave, said he got in the car
and pool law. When he left, I wait until he
got out of the drive and I went across the
street to the Board of Education. I had only a
two phone called fair. I called the Union Hall, talked
to them later. It was a reception there. The young
lady I spoke to. I told her, I said this
(07:09):
is something very important and she said what is it
to I said, it's a matter of life and death,
and she said, what fool's life? And what you know?
I said, I think these people are planning to kill
Dr King? And I said I wanted to talk to
Reverend Smith. She said what he probably with Dr King?
I said, no way, ma'am, you could get in touch
with him. She says, not not at this time. Sir,
(07:32):
so I called Dr Vasco Smith. I let his phone
rang for I don't know how long. No one never answered.
I don't guess nobody was there. So I had no
more money. I went back to the police problem across
the street and I sat over there for a while.
Then I left him, going home. And when I got home,
my wife and I was in the kitchen and it
(07:53):
came over radio, and it just knocked me down. And
I have lived with it so long as the fact
that I thought, I said, well, now, am I not
honly somebody that could have helped? And I did all
I could, and I could I think about moving? Or
am I safe here? And and you know I've been
to a thing with this thing with me and my
(08:13):
seron and they they scared for me, you know, it's
scared for me. But the Lord told me and not
the word I wanted to tell this here. I've been
wanting to tell it all my lions. But Curtis's worries
didn't stop when King was killed. They increased because Frank
Strousser seemed to think that Lenny Curtis had seemed too
(08:36):
much and had put the pieces together that he knew
what Strausser had done. He was aware that Lenny saw
everything that was going on. I knew everything that was
going on, so he definitely intimidated Lenny. For quite a
period of time. Curtis tried to stay out of the
way whenever Frank Strouser came around, but he could feel
(08:57):
Strousser looking at him. Some months after the King killing,
after he hadn't said a word to Curtis since the murder,
Strausser approached Curtis and asked him to come with him
on an errand Curtis felt an immediate fear. He said,
I think he contacts you one day and sq back
riding down to pick up the pay roll. That was
surprising to me. Coach you before said nothing to me.
(09:21):
They had never even spoken to you before other than
just remark you heard. And my mind told me to go, okay,
what do you say? Remember said LENNI said, you got
your boy caught up? And I just said you. He said, uh,
you wanna write down with me to pick up a check?
And I went and I knew what he was gonna
ask me, but I didn't know where he was gonna
(09:42):
ask me. We we went and got in the car, Yeah,
it's going on. I was looking at it. He put
his hand on his gun. He didn't put his hand
on it. He didn't touch it because I was watching it. Yeah,
but just two I get in the car too. It
was in the car, thank you, said he was. Mary
asked me when I'm mayor? Then who We got down
by the Popular in the North Parkway. He turned and
(10:04):
went through the wood area. Why the zoo, you know?
And I'm one. Of course, we're own Poplar. All we
gotta do. Go straight down to the deal High. When
we got around them, cured while you get deep the grass,
He's said, let it. What are you thinking about that
guy Ray killing king things like that? I saw all
he did. I said, it's no doubt about it. You know.
(10:25):
I had to say that. I said, no, no doubt
about it. I said, I know he did it. Everybody
know he did it. Talking about Mr Ray. And then
they asked me, said you're still doing privor detective word
now I was insecured, doing secure the guards. I said year.
He said, you're still working with those lbis and periodic.
I had some couple of FBI that would bring me,
(10:48):
won't it posts I said, yeah, I said, periodic I
we worked together, and he told me, he said, let him,
you'd be careful him. But Frank Strousser always seemed to
feel that Lenny Curtis was a danger to him and
to him, and again Strosser would stalk Curtis, either to
frighten him or possibly worse. Strange thing was happening to
(11:12):
me at one time, and with the own box says,
somebody turned my gas off and turned it back home.
But it was in one of time, and I got
cold and woke up and smelled to gad. And so
that next week I noticed a car sitting across the street.
It was a Lincoln, or I was a Lincoln, and
I was looking at I said that I was a
car that don't supposed to be there before I come out.
(11:35):
I always do that in the morning, because, like I said,
I was scared. At one time, I was really scared.
So I noticed the cobs there of the car, and
I looked at the real careful and kept looking at.
I saw a head moved, and I said, So by
that time I went back into in the house. I
got my pistol and I loaded it, put it in
(11:56):
my pocket, and like I normally do. I would go
out and stop my car later on this time something
that Lulow I told me. He told me he said,
when you get ready to go, go, don't warm your
motor up or nothing. So I got him a car
and turn in this and took off without even turn
my lights on. And just as I went to pull out,
(12:18):
he pulled out and it was him Strousser. And at
that particular time they were they were doing Christmas time.
They were saying something about they had new evidence. Every
time they come up with new eleness, he would pop
up some kind of way as something. In recounting the
day King was killed, Curtis gave an interesting description of
(12:38):
the way Strauser looked as he left the firing range.
Curtis said, quote, he turned into what I said was
a fireman, referring to Strouser in the informal dress of
a fireman, complete with white T shirt, ruffled hair, and sunglasses.
He also left in a fireman's car. I asked Bill
Pepper about this. He was driving Roy Young's car. Ry
(13:01):
Young's had privileges at the fire station number two, so
he was able to park the car there, and he
did change his his physical appearance yes he did, and
since the fire station erupted like a beehive as soon
as King was shot, being dressed like a fireman wouldn't
(13:21):
be a bad way to blend in and then disappear,
if that's what happened. Once Bill Pepper heard Lenny Curtis's testimony,
he naturally began to look at Frank Strausser, though he
had to be cautious because sudden interest would put Curtis
in danger, something Pepper had promised not to do. Pepper
found out that Strausser was new to the Memphis Police
(13:42):
force at the time of the King killing, having recently
returned from Vietnam, where he had been wounded and lost
her brother. Pepper also found a cop who had briefly
served as Strousser's partner in a squad car. He told
Pepper that Strausser was out of control, acting as though
he was untouchable, with numerous abuses of power, like when
he went into a black bar screaming nword this and
(14:04):
nword that, and emptied his pistol into the jukebox. Pepper
also ran across a reference to Strausser in It Came
from Memphis, a book by Robert Gordon about the music
scene in the sixties. Gordon described Strousser as a brawler
recently back from Nam, quoting here, he got wired on
his own adrenaline in the Vietnam jungle, and the chill
(14:27):
rush of danger in his lower backbone had become as
necessary to him as air going in and out of
his lungs. Upon returning to Memphis, he'd become a cop,
the paramilitary uniform and the weapon sort of a methodon.
The book would go on to describe how Strausser would
muscle in on the pimps and dope dealers working Beal Street,
(14:48):
and how after hours he would team up with a
friend and go to bars looking for people to beat up.
For most people, such a character reference might be enough
to just stay clear of the man, But when Lenny
Curtis died in Bill Pepper decided to find Strausser and
talk to him. I didn't necessarily expect that I would
(15:09):
get anything out of it, but I thought I would
be remiss if I didn't try to have some conversation
with this guy. I saw him where he was living.
I just went out there one day. He was doing
his laundry, and then he came out to see me,
and I introduced myself to him, and I said, I'd
like to talk to you at some some point. You
(15:30):
were an officer at the time of the killing, and
I'd like to I'd like to know what you what
you believe happened, and so forth. Then I invited him
to have lunch with me, and I offered him five
hundred dollars if he would sit down a restaurant have
lunch with me, which he did. So Bill Pepper decided
to have lunch with the man he believed killed, Martin
(15:51):
Luther king Strouser, in his seventies, was driving a cab
to support himself, and five dollars seemed like good pay
for an hour work, so he said yes, and a
date was set for the dining room of the Peabody
Hotel in Memphis. Pepper then called his court reporter, Brian Dominsky.
Bill asked that that I have him wired for sound,
(16:13):
and we did a rudimentary attempt at that recorder in
his pocket. Besides the recorder, it was also thought a
good idea if Pepper had additional people in the room,
so Dominski and an associate were already at a nearby
table when Strousser and Pepper sat down at the Peabody,
unbeknownst to Strousser, we were sitting one table away. But
(16:34):
Bill welcomed him and they sat down and they had
about a forty five minute chat about what life was
like in in Memphis. But the small device that Bill
had in his pocket wasn't up to the task. Given
the normal noise of a dining room, what it recorded
was barely decipherable. Dominski, however, was able to produce a
(16:54):
transcript parts of which voice actors will perform for us
right after the break, m how are you, Frank? How
(17:16):
are you doing? You all right? Yeah? Well, I did
something in my back, so I'm not really all right.
Bill Pepper rises awkwardly from his chair to greet Frank Strousser,
who notices his pain. Pepper says that he did something
to his back, referring to something that was done to
his back decades earlier. Pepper then Hans Strousser an envelope
with five Strousser nods, puts it in his pocket and
(17:40):
takes his seat. Once settled, it is Strausser who asked
the first question, So what's on your agenda? You write
in a book. Yeah, I've written too on this case.
This is gonna be the final one, so I'm trying
to cover all the bases. I'm gonna go through a
lot of stuff with you and take some notes if
I may. And I want to first ask your recollection
(18:01):
of what things were like around the time this went on,
this killing. Sure, let's start with what you recall in
the police department and what the atmosphere was like around
the time of the assassination. Okay, the department at that
time was an old school police department. There was before
we started hiring for quotas and everything. So most of
(18:22):
the officers were a dying breed. They were dinosaurs. Basically
an all white force, very few blacks, so it was
a very tight knit group of men. Now Halliman came in,
when was that? What was your impression of him? Harmon
came in somewhere around January. I didn't have that much
to do with him. Those FBI guys pretty much stay
(18:45):
with their own. He was in a street coup. Yeah,
he was with Hoover for a number of years. What
was the attitude toward Martin King, I mean amongst the police,
I don't think they had any liking for him. The
sanitation workers went on strike and then we monitored them,
rode with them when they marched. The police officers were
just doing their job. So what was the atmosphere in
(19:07):
the city were outside the police force in terms of
was it explosive? Was it ready to know? Not? Really?
What did that? What changed the whole thing? Was you
mean the assassination or the assassination sanitation workers going out.
Prior to that, there weren't demonstrations, and then after the assassination,
(19:27):
the blacks and everybody come downtown, thieves, pickpockets. They ruined it,
the rioters, whoever you want. Before then, everyone came to
town to shop, and after nobody came. So I think
prior to that the relationship was much better. Since then,
Memphis has evolved into a racially charged city. Frank Strausser
(19:50):
starts his history of Memphis by referring to the police
at the time of the king killing as dinosaurs, as
if he has somehow moved on, But then he candidly
puts himself back among them as he reveals his belief
that it was the blacks who ruined the city. Things
were much better before the sanitation workers got all stirred
up about a union. Of course, the city might have
(20:10):
saved itself a lot of trouble had they just paid
their garbageman a living wage. But Pepper doesn't argue because
he is pleased with the conversation. He had been half
expecting Strousser to take the money and then become hostile
or uncooperative. Pepper wants to keep the words coming, so
he steers the conversation to something they had in common.
(20:31):
From what I know about you, you've had an interesting
career because you were in the military. Correct in Vietnam.
That was in Vietnam and I got I got hit
pretty good. What a year that's when I was there.
Really were you military? No? No, I was a journalist,
went there in the spring of sixty six and took
(20:52):
myself out to the Central Islands. I was in a
C one thirty and we were landing in Plaku and
they hit us. Going in plane made a very bad
rough landing and it started my back problems then. But
those things happen. Those things happen. But you must have
seen rough action. How was that? A couple of good ones.
I ended up in the hospital in Osaka, needed skin grass.
(21:16):
My brother wasn't so lucky. He died there. M hm.
I'm sorry to hear that, younger brother, two years younger.
I understand that you were given some serious award, the
Army Commendation Medal for valor. But they gave it to
you at the police roll call. Isn't that unusual? It
was good pr The conversation so far had gone better
(21:37):
than Bill Pepper could have expected. Frank Strauser was calm
and willing to talk about what things were like in
Memphis back in the day, but that's all he had
signed on to do. He hadn't agreed to talk about
the murder of Dr. King, and Pepper didn't expect to
get Strousser to fess up to anything or rat out anybody.
But he also didn't want to squander at the opportunity
(21:59):
to poke a ound. Do you remember where you were
when King was shot? Uh? Yeah, I was at home.
I wasn't home. I had had been at home. I
forget what time he got killed. He got killed about
six o'clock in the afternoon, because I was I think
I was working seven to seven. I know I was
working seven to seven, so I was on my way
to work because I heard it on the radio that
(22:21):
he had been assassinated, and I was on my way
to the precinct down at headquarters to go to work.
Do you remember hearing it on the radio driving to work? Yes,
driving to work. Then I'll hell broke loose. I guess
what happened. The riots broke out downtown. There was so
much going on that I went on twelve hour shifts
probably for the next six weeks. Pepper, of course, is
(22:44):
quite certain that Frank Strausser was not at home or
in his car when King was killed, but Strouser is
disarmingly relaxed about it all. So Pepper decides to lay
a few more cards on the table. Do you know
what I've done? Who I am? I have no idea.
I was James Earl Ray's lawyer from until he died.
(23:07):
Oh okay. I only took him on after I spent
ten years convincing myself that he wasn't guilty of the crime.
I tried desperately to get him a trial. I failed.
Banham locked up all the way. Family knew Martin Luther
King the last year of his life. After he was killed,
I just walked away from it all. Politics and everything.
(23:29):
Then in seventy seven, Abernathy called and asked me to
question Ry in prison. I said, what are you talking about?
They got the right guy. But six months later I
spent five hours with James Earl Ray and it was
clear to me that he wasn't the shooter. The family
asked me to look into it further. I want to
know what happened to have closure. Strousser at first isn't
(23:53):
sure how to respond to this. He stumbles just a
touch and ends up by denying that he had ever
anything to do with James ol Ray. Bill Pepper had
never suggested it. Do you know, if you have children,
you know you want to find out who did it.
I'm just, I'm just I had no dealings with James
Earl Ray, never saw him. So Pepper tells Strausser that
(24:18):
he knows he didn't know James ol Ray. It was
an easy call because no one in Memphis knew James
el Ray. Strousser then follows with a remarkable opinion as
to why the case against Ray doesn't make much sense.
I'll just say this much, and I have a profound
belief in this. I don't think James el Ray could
(24:39):
have put all this together. You're right about that. Now
where it goes from there? Bill, I don't know. I
could be totally incorrect. But with the kind of criminal
background he had, this guy was, you know, he was
a petty criminal. How can a guy like this I
don't think I ever had this thought before. Why would
he want to kill Martin Luther King? Yes, there's no motive.
(25:02):
He's a black leader and you're a James are array
over here? What's the reason for killing exactly? I mean
to drift into Memphis and to suddenly have access to
a room across the street and a rival, and then
to drop the rival in a bag or a mattress
or wrapped up in something. Give me right, he didn't
do it. There must have been other people involved. One
(25:25):
of the things I enjoy while trying to unravel this
mystery is that people who are likely neck deep in
the murder don't seek refuge in the official story of
how the King killing went down. You heard similar stuff
from Lloyd Jowers when he spoke to Andrew Young and
Dexter King. Oh Ray couldn't have done all this, not
in a million years. The official story is so weak.
(25:48):
The framing of Ray so obvious that even the beneficiaries
of this story run away from it. So Strouser thinks
there were other people involved. But who Pepper has an
idea too. The thing is as hard as I've looked,
I never found any indication that the CIA or the
agency was involved in the killing of Martin King. I
(26:10):
have found strong indications that the FBI was involved, and
that Hoover was involved. Hoover hated King, hated him. He
used Clyde Toulson, his number two, to come in here,
bring money and set it up through the Dixie Mafia.
So even lowly patrolman understood at the time that j
Edgar Hoover hated Martin Luther King. Not a great character
(26:31):
reference for the man who was ultimately put in charge
of the murder investigation. But Pepper's mention of the Dixie
Mafia brings forth an unexpected confession from Strousser. Years ago.
There was this article in the press, Simitar about people
who had some connection to the Dixie Mafia, and my
name was in there. You could have sued him, you
could have. No. To be quite candid, I guess they
(26:54):
got it right because I had not been involved directly.
But I had known some pretty questionable characters, you know,
from the Dixie Mafia to the actual mafia, and it
was well now that I was in a lot of
activity with people who were involved in that sort of livelihood.
Frank Strousser has just admitted that over the years he
(27:16):
had engaged in a lot of activity with some pretty
questionable characters, and Pepper thinks this might be the time
disturb the pot. He tells Strouser that after the murder,
the Memphis police made a plaster cast of a fresh
footprint in the yard behind Jours Place. This is true,
a size thirteen footprint, and that's significant because not that
(27:37):
many men have a size thirteen hoof. So Pepper then
asked Strousser the size of his shoe, and years later
he told me what he saw on Strousser's face, and
he said thirteen and a half with a little grin
on his face. He was telling me something, wasn't he.
Pepper may have gotten a grin from Strousser, but if
(27:58):
he thought he'd get more of a reaction and he
was wrong. So Pepper decided to try something else. He
told Strousser that as Jowers near death, he had named
him as the shooter. This was not true. Jowers had
done no such thing. He had named Captain Clark and
by extension, himself as being out in the yard, but
(28:18):
he never named Strousser, and Pepper believes that this was
because he was afraid of Strousser, who, unlike Clark, was
still very much alive. So in search of the truth,
Bill Pepper tells the following lie. Well, Frank, let me
raise something that I've got to raise with you. First
of all, I appreciate your candor thank you for that
(28:40):
and for your time. As you may know, I represented
the King family here in Memphis, and we sued Lloyd
Jowers for wrongful death and the King killing. There was
a civil trial thirty days and seventy witnesses. The jury
came back in fifty nine minutes and found for the
family against hours. Jowers, as you know, is dead. Maybe
(29:04):
he didn't know, Yeah he did, but it wasn't just
the jury. Before he died, Jowers admitted to myself, Andrew
Young and Dexter King. He admitted his involvement in the assassination.
He did, Yes, he admitted it. Betty Spates had nailed
him because she was at the back door in the
kitchen when he brought the rifle in. After the shooting,
(29:25):
Jowers had the rifle. Jowers brought the rifle in, but
before he died. Hold on yourself. He named you as
the assassin. He did that, Yes, he named you. Why
he did this, I don't know. And I found Jowers
to be a liar on a lot of things, but
he did. He named you. This surprised me because for
(29:49):
a long time I thought Clark was the shooter. Clark
was a hell of a shot, and he lied about
where he was that afternoon, there was no longer a
grin on Frank Strouser's face. Earl Clark was a good
friend of mine. He had strong feelings about certain things.
Was he a good shot? Oh yeah, and you are
(30:12):
a hell of a shooter from what I understand, I'm
a dead shot. I was then, certainly not now. But
I don't have any idea why Jowers would do that.
If the purpose of the lie about being named by
Jowers was to Jossel Strausser into a revealing emotional response,
(30:36):
it would appear to be a failure. Strousser doesn't get
upset or angry over the accusation, he just acts perplexed.
But then Pepper tells Strousser that for a good while
he had thought Captain Clark was a shooter. Strousser's response is,
Earl Clark was a good friend of mine. He had
strong feelings about certain things. These two sentences are the
(30:58):
most real things. Strausser says. The entire afternoon he had
strong feelings about certain things might be seen as Strousser's
inter justification for Clark's roll in the murder. And Earl
Clark was a good friend of mine appears to put
Strousser right next to Clark in the yard facing the
Lorraine Motel. How do we come to that? According to
(31:22):
the literature, a proper sniper team has a spotter and
a shooter. The shooter has a site on the target
at all times, but the spotter takes a wider view
of what's going on around the target. Each man needs
to know the other well down to how he sounds
when he's breathing, and it's the spotter who is in
charge who gives the command to shoot. If Jowers primary
(31:45):
function is to provide the yard and take the gun
and hide it. And we say for the moment that
Clark is the spotter. Who might we imagine the shooter
to be first, it would have to be someone who
was an excellent shot. Then you would need someone who
was tight with Captain Clark, and someone who shoots guns
regularly with Clark, say at the police firing range. And
(32:07):
this is why Earl Clark was a good friend of mine.
Is a tell because Strousser was the perfect fit for Clark. Plus,
according to Lenny Curtis, Strausser was the one shooting a
special rifle all morning and into the afternoon on the
day King was killed. Does Curtis has sworn testimony prove
that Frank Strousser was out in the yard facing Lorraine
(32:28):
that day? No, it doesn't, but it does point in
that direction. So from what we've been able to piece together,
it appears that Jowers, Clark, and perhaps Strouser you've heard
the evidence, you can decide for yourselves, were in the
yard facing Lorraine and one of them fired the shot
that killed King. If that is true, have we solved
the case? Not hardly, Because no matter how knowing and willing,
(32:52):
the men in the yard were and how knowing and
willing were those who put them there. They were all
just pawns in this game. To solve this crime, we
need to know who planned the murder and who helped
look the other way or went along for the ride.
(33:12):
Next time on the MLK tapes he was for McCarthy
ass right wing vision of America. Mr Hunt looked over
and he says, John, I've just about had a beneful
of the Kennedy boys. They both need to go. We
have seen today the dark side of those activities where
many Americans who were not even suspected of crime, we're
(33:35):
not only spied upon, but they were harassed, They were
discredited and at times endangered. My aunt had been the
victim of Jegor Hoover, you know, lying to her. After
the march on Washington, there was an acceleration. He was
(33:56):
defined because of his speech in that demonstration in Washington
as the most dangerous and effective leader in the country,
and there was a paper battle between within the bureau
was to how best to attack him. That he was attacked,
So the main focus of that meeting was really trying
to figure out how to take down Martin Luther King.
They were quite explicit about laying out a campaign to
(34:18):
destroy King. Thanks for listening to the m l K Tapes,
a production of I Heart Radio and Tenderfoot TV. This
podcast is not specifically endorsed by the King Family or
the King of State. Damail Ka Tapes is written and
hosted by Bill Claiper. Matt Frederick and Alex Williams are
(34:39):
executive producers on behalf of I Heart Radio, with producers
Trevor Young and ben Keebrick. Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay
are executive producers on half of Tenderfoot TV with producers
Jamie Albright and Meredith Steadman. Original music by Makeup and
Vanity Said. Cover art by Mr Soul two six with
photography by Artemis Jenkins. Special thanks to Owen Rosenbaum and
(35:02):
Grace Rowyer at u t A, The Nord Group, back
Median Marketing, Envisioned Business Management, and Station sixteen. If you
have questions, you can visit our website the email k
Tapes dot com. We posted photos and videos related to
the podcast on our social media accounts. You can check
them out at the email k Tapes. For more podcasts
(35:22):
from I Heart Radio and Tenderfoot TV, please visit the
I heart radio, app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows.
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