# data[].attributes.body
Hoover, the director of the FBI, was obsessed with Martin Luther King Jr. and tried to find dirt against him with wiretaps and surveillance.

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Eric Galt was convicted of armed robbery and spent 7 years inside the Missouri State Penitentiary at Jefferson City.

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Eric was behaving strangely. He practiced "yoga," plowed through travel books about Mexico, and checked out an English-Spanish dictionary from the library. He applied walnut dye to make his skin darker, and drank considerable amounts of mineral oil.

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Eric Galt escaped prison in a bread truck which was being sent to the honor farm. With the help of an accomplice, he folded himself into a box and with a fake bottom.

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Martin Luther King Jr. was in South Carolina for the SCLC’s annual conclave. He used this to announce a new direction for the SCLC, the Poor People’s Campaign.

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After Eric Galts escape, he made his way into Puerto Vallarta on Highway 200. He checked in to the Hotel Rio.

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Accompanied by his friend Manuela Aguirre Medrano, Galt went to the Casa Susana where a black man accidentally touched Manuela’s arm. Galt yelled slurs and offensive things to the group the man was with, but he sat back down. Then, he went to his car and grabbed his gun, but Manuela stopped him from killing the men.

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Galt didn't stay in Puerto Vallarta for much longer, his relationship with the girl he met, Manuela, fizzled so he took up with another local woman, named Elisa.

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Galt came to a conclusion that he couldn't accomplish anything in Mexico so he would move to the US.

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After realizing he couldn’t accomplish anything in Mexico, Galt stuffed the inner tube of his Mustang’s spare tire with cannabis and headed out of town, moving to California.

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Martin Luther King Jr. pressed forward with his ambitious plans to lead his Poor People’s Campaign to Washington the following summer.

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Martin Luther King was increasingly troubled by a new political development, George C. Wallace.

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Eric Galt arrived in L.A. and soon found himself drawn to the city's restless energy. He made home at the St. Francis Hotel on Hollywood Boulevard. Following his move, Galt began supporting George Wallace's independent party presidential campaign. He urged everyone he knew to support Wallace as well.

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In Memphis a terrible accident happened with a garbage crew. It ended up killing 2 of the 3 garbage workers. The accident scarcely made it into the news.

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As a result of the killed sanitation workers, thirteen hundred employees from the city's sanitation, sewer, and drainage departments went on strike, their most prominent slogan being "I AM a man."

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Martin Luther King stepped up his travels around the country to promote the Poor People's Campaign.

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Galt visited a prominent plastic surgeon and scheduled a rhinoplasty.

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King delivered a sermon titled "The Meaning of Hope", where he said that hatred was becoming a national disease.

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King helped rally in Memphis for the Poor People's Campaign.

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Eric Galt swung his mustang into Selma, Alabama where he seemed to be stalking Martin Luther King Jr.

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Eric Galt found his way into Atlanta, Georgia, where he located a rooming house at 113 Fourteenth Street Northeast.

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King's plane arrived in Memphis.

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The Beale Street march began, but it went awful. King left the march and was put in room 801 of the Holiday Inn Rivermont, causing a lot of public backlash.

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Galt went to a store called Aeromarine Supply Company to buy a gun and lied about his name.

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President Johnson dropped from the running.

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Sometime in the morning, King held a meeting with SCLC executives to discuss where to go after the Memphis march. There, many people disagreed with King continuing the Poor People's Campaign. King ended up having an outburst and everyone decided to return to Memphis and give the march another chance.

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Galt is now on the way to Memphis.

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There is a threat to blow up Martin Luther King Jr.'s plane on his way back to Memphis.

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Returning to Memphis, Abernathy spoke for Martin Luther King Jr. at the Mason Temple to address what's happening in Memphis, but King later arrived and spoke for himself upon seeing the supportive crowd.

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Galt arrived at Bessie Brewers and stayed in room 5B.

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Galt bought binoculars from York Arms Company.

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Galt shot king from the bathroom window of his rooming house and ran away within 45 seconds. He dropped a bundle of his belongings and the gun outside of a store.

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Police investigate the room and ask those around about any suspicious activity.

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Andrew Young called to tell Coretta King her husband was shot. She reacted calmly, likely because she knew the day would come eventually.

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Now, King is at St. Joseph's Hospital and is being treated.

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King was pronounced dead.

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President Johnson is informed about King's death and met with his staff to make plans, aware that this will cause a disturbance in America.

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Riots and violence erupts all over Memphis. A 7:00 PM to 5:00 AM curfew is put in place. There are shoot-to-kill orders on looters, roadblocks, and peremptory searches and arrests. Gas station and liquor stores are shut down and death threats are being sent to Mayor Loeb, blaming him for the assassination of King. By this point, the police are searching for the killer, Galt, all over major cities.

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President Johnson gives a speech to the nation regarding the death of King and giving condolences to his family.

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Around this same time, Abernathy was summoned to identify king's body and his wife approved the autopsy.

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Evidence from the autopsy of King were delivered to a crime lab in Pennsylvania.

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A plane carrying government officials with the means to kick of the investigation in King's assassination lands in Memphis. Police and National Guardsmen surround the perimeter and flags fly half staff.

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By this point the police have been searching for Galt. They know his car color and make, but not his name or where he is yet. Some have eyed Galt and his vehicle, but none have suspected the killer of King to be him yet. The police are interviewing people and have acquired few leads on Galt's real name and location.

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Galt returns to the rooming house to collect a few items. He leaves behind a note to throw the police off about his location.

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King's coffin is temporarily put out for display. People, especially Abernathy and the SCLC, mourn his death.

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A man named Stokely Carmichael has been spreading rumors, and, in short, is saying that "all whites are responsible for the death of King." People left school and work early, black store owners boarded up their windows to protect themselves, and fires were set in downtown Washington.

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The FBI have been researching Galt's case. They found more evidence, such as hair and a price sticker on a pair of pliers, which helped to extend the search two thousand miles to the west coast.

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Galt boards a one-way Grey-hound bus north bound.

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Before passing into Canada, Galt gets his face shaven incase the authorities were taking extra precautions.

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Galt arrives in Toronto, Canada. There he paid for a room in a rooming house and laid low, barely leaving his room or talking to anyone.

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A silent march in honor of King is held in Memphis.

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The FBI find what they think is Galt's real name and are now searching for him.

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King it temporarily placed where his Grandmother and Grandfather were buried.

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Three thousand agents were working on finding Galt, with the cases official name being 'MURKIN'. people from all over the country claimed they knew the killer or had leads on who/where he was. The FBI themselves had few leads and looked in the wrong places for Galt.

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Galt buys a makeup kit and changes his appearance a bit.

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Galt gets new passport photos taken.

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The FBI find and identify Eric S. Galt's car. Samples are collected from the vehicle to be tested.

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The FBI gathers leads as to where Galt has been in the past and a picture of him with his eyes shut.

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FBI agents discover Galt had signed up for locksmithing lessons and visited his room at Jimmie Garner’s rooming house where his last lesson was sent, but he wasn’t there. They found road maps marked with the places Galt had been.

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Agents went back to the rooming house and spoke to Jimmie Garner. They also took Galt’s belongings. Garner confirmed the picture they’d collected earlier was of Galt.

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Undersecretary of Labor James Reynolds negotiated with the city council, leading to the end of the sanitation workers’ strike.

- Galt moved to a new apartment and requested a birth certificate under the alias Ramon George Sneyd, a man’s identity he’d stolen. “Sneyd” went to a travel agency and booked a flight to London. There, he also requested a passport.

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Atlanta agents found Galt’s laundry service and learned he’d came the day after King’s assassination. They also found out the fingerprints from the gun and map taken from his room matched. With this and the other evidence, they started putting the puzzle pieces of Galt’s tracks together and realized the names they found before were all the same person.

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The FBI announced a warrant for Eric S. Galt and released his picture publicly.

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Galt got stopped by a cop for jaywalking. He gave a fake name and threw his old driver’s license in the trash.

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DeLoach suspected the name Eric S. Galt was fake and that he is an escapee. The FBI Identification Division for fingerprints begin comparing the fingerprints they found to those on ‘Wanted’ notices.

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The Identification Division finds a match with an offender named James Earl Ray.

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While Sneyd was at the bar, the TV show The FBI announced a reward for information pertaining James Earl Ray.

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The FBI interviewed Ray’s family. They didn’t get anything useful about his whereabouts, but they learned about his past and possible motivations for killing King.

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Sneyd got his passport and ticket.

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The Washington march began in Memphis with eight caravans. The SCLC continued King’s Washington march and planned to build a shantytown called Resurrection City there.

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Sneyd got on a flight to London.

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Resurrection City started being built between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial.

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Sneyd got on a flight to Lisbon, hoping for a cheap flight to Africa.

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The caravans arrived in Washington and Resurrection City opened. By the second week, because of poor management, the city started falling apart and people questioned Abernathy’s leadership.

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Sneyd boarded a flight back to London after being unable to blend in with Lisbon culture.

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Continuous rain at the campsite caused it to literally start falling apart.

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FBI shifted focus to Canada in search of Ray. The Canadian authorities started to examine passport applications for any that could be Ray.

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A passport photo resembling Ray was found by a Canadian constable.

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A detective reached out to the real Ramon George Sneyd and confirmed that someone had stolen his identity. Airline records showed “Sneyd” fled to London. Experts also concluded that the passports’ signature matched Galt’s and Ray’s handwriting, meaning that Ray was in London.

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Sneyd went to the airport for an 11:50 AM flight to Brussels, Belgium. A Scotland Yard detective recognized Sneyd and searched him, found a gun, and detained him.

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Sneyd was questioned and arrested for gun possession.

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Sneyd was confronted by a detective about actually being an American citizen named James Earl Ray. Later, Ray was given a glass of water and his fingerprints matched with the earlier ones taken. It was then released publicly that King's killer was found.

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On a C-135 plane, “Sneyd” was transferred back to America.

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Ray landed in Tennessee where a convoy was waiting for him.

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Ray was taken to the Criminal Courts Building where he was put into a specially made cell until his trial.

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Ray pleaded guilty to killing King and got a 99 year sentence.

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Ray was released from solitary confinement.

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Ray escaped the Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary. 54 hours later, Ray was found by hellhounds and brought back.