NEWSPAPER ARTICLE: CONSPIRACY

• Document Type: SPECIALCOLLECTION
• Collection: Records Related to the Assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 00459873
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: June 6, 2025
• Document Release Date: June 12, 2025
• Publication Date: June 13, 1969

a June 13, 1969 Los Angeles Free Press ed Petitr=fiCvnay published reports why did� he pleeAr guii which supported speculation. that. �"ve free 'vlin7.44.4. two entirely different men were.. the OnsPirO9rIviuge Identified as George Ramo4nEtyd� that he'copld:b0riduc '� have. felt ';a9cure, (T,E. Ray) in London and tliltt the .,.;posure? They must hay possibility of a conspiracy the'':.�ed that in prison RayW death of Dr. M.L. King was very real indeed. There is still au aura of suspicion and mystery surrounding the Ilt...Enes Earl Rey. affair, and the. following. is: a further .report by Mr. Dawnay-, which should possibly 'shed some �� light on that mystery. Although � the FREE PRESS does not fully:. subscribe to Mr. Dawnay's the-'' ones, we feel that his investiga..; tion contains enough information.' of substance to merit close' a(., tention. � Ed.) � James Earl Ray,itsin p trison while the na ion March 21 and May 2, other � questIonS Immediately a-, ; .Innaeri,:le that name not famil- epplates pr#autions were taken to see that .41 �;(:- cameras..111 LondoIvirs, Tho.; the LA FREE PRESS' '� rise. If Ray go nor alictp,! Ring, ,,'� iar to yeti?' enquiged the officer. no 'photographs of the prisoner man saw. the film onitelevisloilr� �,.'4; at his ' Indeed, eyery paper that morning were published. The newspapers and she swears '00,4004:0143i had the story Of how a man call- onlyparriedplatUras of the crowd man : who stayecl�t al'-;�hethOtel..,71 ed Sneyd arriving from Lisbon outside the courthouse and of the Does this peanithat?the4400fidI had been arrested. Pollee yell oln way back topri- Sneyd' was. switcrocOor4ajnes-fr,,, On the day 'that this Sneyd left son aite4lire &ring. In court, Earl ,Raye,�,Or' dfclittrilesil..t.hsi,...,ie the New Earls Court, another man the Prisoner ls surrounded by: !" thii; men Vai! tP814f,14 &y all , ldquit&4J had checked in at the Pax Hotel ' burly pollee �ers, Making it along? along? Intetestinglenoughi, anit.c..1 probably be willing to talk, par-. , Although he was also called Ra- ' impossible fo spectators in the'. � AP dispatch bf�N6Yet4128 ticularly if he were offered the -':. � mon George Sneyd, he was not gallery to g k a, good look at',, the day that ..Forethall t00:500r;:., opportunity to turn states' evi- only quite differentinappearance him. When th 'extradition Pro- the case, said.: this::;,, bSfirY ors ,41 dence, who bad seen hill :114.41Pilitsi" If one is to accept Ray as a public � appearance 51040.:'1440 fall-guy, then one has to accept appeared more drawn'theala the: that both the Judge and his own past,' It ' will . be :reinernbered ' defense counsel were doing the that, the second Sneydf s. face was bidding of the conspirators. Al- drawn, whereas. the firSt*was though that may not seem too far not.. .-; - ' L. �*:14.',:',`, �;,',:� fetched, the fact is that Ray I believe that the',clUe te this fired an attorney who was pre- puzzle lies in Mane's, comment pared to defend him, on the eve on Ray's brothers'quote poye; "They cotild not, run:: the, ease , eginhd 4FIO 40. ;. exealiz- - to the first man, but also dif- fered in manner and behavior, He was between' 5' 11" and 6' 1", and was yery lightly built and slender. He had a sort of crew- cut and there were very tight curls in his dark brown hair. He was sun-tanned and wore horn- rimmed spectacles, was aged somewhere between 30- and 40, PETER DAWNAY James Earl Ray was born ,in Alton, Illinois, a steel mill town about 30 miles northeast of St. Louis. He was a drop-out from school and he Joined the army when he was 18. In 1949, he was, convicted of burglary in Los An- geles and was arrested in 1950 for vagrancy. In 1951 he was charged with driving an automo- bile *Ithout a license*, and in 1952 he collected a two-year sentence for robbing a Chicago cab driver of $11. Later he col- 'ected another two-year sentence jp Kansas for forging postal mon- �ey orders. Finally, in 1959, he received a twenty year sentence '1or robbing a grocery store in St. Louis. It is the typical rec- of his trial, and then hired an- other one who pow claims that he did not pressure Ray into plead- ing guilty. The defense which the first attorney had prepared was based precisely on the premise that Ray was a dupe and a fall- guy. If this really were the case, what did lay have to complain' about? And why did he wait until thirty-six hours before the trial began to fire this attorney? In order to find 'a possible solution to this problem, we must go back to the first week of June, 1968, in fact the last week which Ray spent at liberty: During that week there were in London two men using the same alias,Ramon George Sneyd. One stayed at the New Earls Court Hotel' from the 2Ath May until thp!Sth nf.Tuna. HP and was deeply 'suntanned. He had a, cleft in his chin, he looked al and drawn and his cheeks were aunken. His accent was' Cana- ', dian. � ' The Pax is a small hotel, run by Mrs. Thomas who owns it. It was she who opened the door to him, and she felt from the first that there *as a mystery about � him. Her first impression was that he was drunk but as there was no smell on his breath she came to the conclusion that he was under the influence of drugs. She made sure that he paid in . advance. , During the next three days, Mrs. Thornas became convinced that Sneyd was severely mentally . ill. He spent all day in his room only going out to buy food which ceeditigs were .over, he was flown out � of England: in the utmost secrecy, in the:dead of night, in an American �Air Force plane. Was there only One prisoner on that plane; or were there two? When Ray arrived In Memphis, there was the same secrecy and stringent � security. ,The Press was not allowed to photograph the man but a picture taken by the Sherriff,s office was released for publication. It showed a man in glasses, trussed almost' like a chicken, and with heed bowed. The facial features were thus not easy to distinguish, but Mrs. Thomas felt that it was not the man who had stayed at the Pax. , Arthur Hanes, Ray's attorney at the time, was Putting out the suggestion that King's life had been taken as a result of a com- munist plot. It is possible that Hanes really believed this but it is equally 'possible that it was not intended as a serious defense and that it was designed solely for the purpose of throwing peo- ple off the scent of the real, right-wing plot. Whatever it was, there seemed little doubt that the case would proceed to trial, when, with thirty-six hours to go, Ray fired Hanes and immediately re- tained the services of one of the most highly paid lawyers in the United States. The trial was then postponed for four whole months. Arthur Hanes was 'not un- naturally flabbergasted by this turn of events. It was simply a subterfuge to procure a delay, he announced. But a subterfuge nn whrutP nart, Why should Ray with me as ,the lawyer.* Ray's' brothers must harvelrealised'ths.,.., Hanes was not' wqringtii best interest of 'his Client;,-/Thk):`.7, had claimed that he Wai.nothintM but a fall-guy from the mornent�9 of his indictment. .It must .haveif, been clear, to them lhat...Hane's,:i, supposed communist fake designed In part' # 'any rate to � take the wind out of their own sails' But obviously they 44410 only have been prepared' t0':1.3x7; - change � Hanes to aoniething bet- ter� ' I It so happens � that :it Was' 4,1��;!',.',".: ing the month- 91.,.9etober :that I made the discoveryf2;:that two Sneyds had been arreited. I have � every reason to believe that Scot- land � yard was aware of what I knew. During October MTS.:Tho- mas was visited by Officers from Scotland Yard together With a" man from the.. FBI who told her', that she woul&be'required to give eyidence at the trial and that she was not to discuss the case with anybody.. The FBI man insisted � that she was not to,. say that he � had been in'this ..country and .practically called her altar when :she mentioned the needle and syringe found in Sneyd,s room. A sergeant from the Yard said w use standing even among crim- erage Lama aria wore giasses witii taais must have been exceed. thick plastic rims. He seemed to ingly low, be in good health, to be aged be- And yet this petty thief, who tween 30 and 35, and his hair was , 'appears to have been lacking both , not crew-cut, tiejlitd not have , tim intelligence and resource; )5 '. Sunken cheeks,. 'Illi.Ile had ,iipposed to have murdered, 'a,e�,1:',.a . souther*0 ntrtHriliaNvi leading political figure in broad " did not have a:p 0, ,tilybilchin... t daylight at a time when a large He.dld noCipend mtiCh tirhe In number of policemen had been his room during the clay and 'al- especially alerted to prevent just ways handed in his keyi, that from happening, to have get, ; went out. He usually 9 ten clean. away from thescene--- the night soon after of the crime and to ha(p t e, about 9:30 pan. ' mained at large for two Months He was exceptional hen he In-for nor rat. , . by ang "One of the two Sneyds'arrested In LOnii;on. was Ray. The question is, Which?'. In neither of them resembled the phot9groph published in the press." while half the police forces of the world were hunting him, And he did this, despite the fact that he had ' left the murder weapon behind covered with his finger prints amongst numerous other clues pointing to his identity. What possible motive can one attribute to such a man for suet) a crime? Did he believe that this would make him a hero amongthe segregationists of the South? Did he not comprehend that he would be' a hunted man for the rest of his lite? Did he not know that Ray, the assassin, would be sear- ched for with far greater dili- gence than Ray, the escaped con- vict? One has only to ask these questions, to realize that Ray's level of intelligence must haye been remarkably low. But is there not some other solution to this problem? Is it not possible that Ray was, in fact, only marginally involved in the killing of King,that he was merely a dupe who was made into an unwitting decoy or fall- guy? Was there not perhaps a large scale conspiracy into which Ray was drawn with the intention of using him in order to conceal the very existence of the con- spiracy from the public? � Although one is tempted to ,say, 'Yes, obviously; that must be the case," such an answer does .ri,ot dispose of every problem. For 1 I. nervous, and conversation with him was almost painful. The re- ceptionist, who was quite a pret- ty young thing, felt quite sure that he .would not have had the cour- age to ask her out. She felt � sorry for him in a way, and once spent an hour going through . leaflet on English currency with him. But he seemed tq her to be unusually unintelligent and unab- le to take it in. The reception- � ist identifies him positively ass" the man whose photograph was issued by the Royal Canadian . Mounted Police soon after the arrest. When he left, he took a.cab to the air terminal to leave his bag and announced his intention 0 catching a plane that night. It is almost certain that he flew to Lisbon and flew back again three,. days later to find two senior po- � lice officers waiting for .him on ' arrival. The day after the arrest, the' receptionist received a call from the police in the early part of the, morning. � The officer !muted to: know if the New Earls Court Hotel had issued a deposit re- ceipt with a certain number. She verified that it had and said that it was in the name of Sneyd. Had the man stayed at the hotel, 'the � officer asked. Yes said the re- - ceptionist. "You Ave probably � seen about the arrest In today's � � t . CU UU4J1'. 411111U4i. eV121) 448lIG asiC passed his door she noticed that it was open a crack and that he was furtively crouching behind it watching her as she went by. He cpnpl�to her constantly of ,aed kent asking.� her*. Wins, She had the im- � preasip0;lhat lie did not seem to 10101W where he !as, as if he were completely dazed. Whall:he departed suddenly On the .rtioraing, of Saturday, June fifri. Thomas could not help say, ing' to herself: 11God riddance." After he had "gone, she found a plastic. yringe,, styffed 'doh the waste ;pips'.'01 washbasin in ,his room...kite 'waste paper basket, wad i'hYpedermie needle which fitted lt:;.; � � � Through.- the window, she had seen him' hail'a cab in the street, and later- she, was told by police officers 'that he had gone in this cab to 'London, Airport where he had been arrested. One of these twoSneyds was un- � doubtedly James Earl Ray. � The questiOn Is, Which? In fact neith- er of then) resembled the photo- graphs of Ray which had pre- victeely been published in, the Press, but the first WAS the man in the photo issued ,by the RCMP soon after the arrest. It was the photo supposedly used by Ray in his passport appli- cation. Add to this the fact that this was the first man to be arrested, and there is a strong 'supposition that he is in fact James Earl Ray. But for this, we must of course assume that the first arrest was not made by chance but had been care- fully planned in 'advance. And we must also assume that the se- cond arrest was accidental and not planned. As to the identity of the se- cond man, and the question of what became of him after his ar- rest, it was only possible to guess. All that was known was that both Scotland Yard and the FBI were at very great pains to conceal his arrest.' This in it- self provides fairly clear cut evi- dence of a conspiracy which the authorities did not wish the pub- lic to know. about. After the arrest, enormous � Some SCLICIUe U uicU41.01.1117, Q, Hanes said. ',What for, I don't know. They could not run the case with me as the lawyer,, ey have been working ag And he added, "When � �I:f Ray last Wednesday,441,1, k ew something was up. He was so re- laxed, not even interested in talk- ing, about the trial.* The scheme had evidently been hatched by the 6th of November. . � SO" we are asked' to believe that Rayls ess brothers who inhabit theit e world of petty good for er." On November 6, I sew for the,' first time the receptionist at the New Earls Court hotel..She had moved some way, out of London -4-,shortly .aftehe'aX.Tilat and I had spoken to h9r previously by tele- phone, On IsIbvember410, she gave , in a weeks notice at her new ho- tel and left Selt'90 (.410 lii4or..�.he is now untraceable... :!,;t',. ,.t.'�;�., On November 'i'i,; the 'subpoena ', � � was � formally 'isSbed', en Thomas. Thelektpr ; hich aoccini-.'. : Ray's br. was not. The hers must have real' ed thatJ1Pnes or-king In the interest of his 'client' had claimed that he was nothin9-blt a fall guy from the moment of hts indictment. , crooke as himself were respon- sible for hiring a lawyer who charges a quarter of a million dollars for a murder case. More- over, it now appears that this lawyer showed no interest in proving Ray's innocence. According to -an AP dispatch published on the 15th of March, the deal involving Ray's plea of guilty in exchange for his life was set on foot about five weeks after Foreman took on the case. Hugh, Stanton, the public defen- der, says that he talked with Ca- nale, the District Attorney, a- bout a possible guilty plea about a week before Christmas, and Canale says that he talked about it to the Department of Justice on December 19. On December 31 Canale spoke to Mrs. King's lawyer in New York to see what her reaction would be. The law- yer rang back to say that she was, atopposed in fact and prin- ciple to capital punishment and would snot wish to see Ray ex- ecuted in the electric chair.* Both Ramsey Clark and Gover- nor Buford Ellington of Tennes- see concurred in the deal. Af- ter the trial, Foreman wrote: al .saved his life in the only way it could be saved, I consider this no mean achievement., When Ray was led from the courthouse after being senten- ced, he was filmed by news panted it, stated; ,This will in- form you to disregard, the date of November 12, 1968 as your ap- � pearance date in court. You will be notified at a slater date as to your personal appearance in the," courtroom.' :3 At that time there was no os- tensible reason to 'suppose that' ,( the trial would not commence on November 12, although we have seen that the scheme had, : viously been hatched the dey�ber,:, fore. Since that time ,Mrs, Thomas.: has been persistently an harassed i by Scotland Yard. An officer" has been round tq, see her' and ; has cursed and sworn at her for,4 talking. She has been repeatedly rung up by the yard to remind' her not to. talk. Her telephone has rung inceSsently, but when.,' she answers it, there is � only heavy breathing on the other end,, It seems -clear tome that once Scotland Yard and the FBI knew that the double arrest had been discovered and that the beans might be spilled, they realized that it might not be possible to get away with a fake trial and a fake defense as they have done in the Sirhan case. Somehow a trial had to be avoided and the only solution they could see was to persuade Ray to plead guilty. But how was this to be done? (Please turn to Page 20)