Two men convicted of killing Malcolm X to be exonerated after Netflix series prompts review
Two men convicted of killing Malcolm X near exoneration after spending decades in prison for a murder they did not commit, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. announced Wednesday.
Why it matters: The Black civil rights leader's assassination was one of the most high-profile murders in the civil rights era. He led the Black Power movement and faced multiple death threats as one of the most prominent African Americans at the time.
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Details: Malcolm X died on Feb. 21, 1965, after three men opened fire in New York’s Audubon Ballroom as he was about to speak. Muhammad A. Aziz and Khalil Islam maintained their innocence but spent decades in prison following convictions in 1966.
Vance's office launched a review after the Netflix documentary miniseries "Who Killed Malcolm X?" revealed new information about the case, per the Guardian.
The 22-month investigation, conducted in tandem with the two men's lawyers, found that the FBI, New York Police Department and prosecutors withheld evidence that would have likely led to acquittals, the New York Times reports.
The review did not identify who is believed to have actually murdered Malcolm X.
The district attorney's office will seek to have the convictions vacated on Thursday. Aziz, 83, was released in 1985 while Islam was released in 1987 and died in 2009.
Our thought bubble, via Axios' Russ Contreras: Scholars and civil rights advocates have long said men charged with killing Malcolm X, later known as el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz, were wrongly convicted.
Some have alleged police and federal agents played a role in his death.
Malcolm X's killing came at a time when the FBI was monitoring civil rights leaders and actively trying to get the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. to kill himself or catch him in a personal scandal. So the convictions never had the confidence of some Black activists.
What they're saying: "This points to the truth that law enforcement over history has often failed to live up to its responsibilities," Vance said in an interview with the Times. "These men did not get the justice that they deserved."
"And at a time when racism and discrimination in the criminal justice system are once again the focus of a national protest movement, it reveals a bitter truth: that two of the people convicted of killing Malcolm X — Black Muslim men hastily arrested and tried on shaky evidence — were themselves victims of the very discrimination and injustice that he denounced in language that has echoed across the decades," the Times notes.
"This wasn’t a mere oversight," Deborah Francois, a lawyer for the men, told the Times. "This was a product of extreme and gross official misconduct."
Vance's office did not immediately return a request for comment.
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