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The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. stands with other civil rights leaders on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn., on April 3, 1968, a day before he was assassinated at approximately the same place. From left are Hosea Williams, Jesse Jackson, King, and Ralph Abernathy. The 39-year-old Nobel Laureate was the proponent of non-violence in the 1960's American civil rights movement. King is honored with a national U.S. holiday celebrated in January. (AP Photo) ( KING BALCONY )

Civil rights leader Andrew Young (L) and others standing on balcony of Lorraine motel pointing in direction of assailant after assassination of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who is lying at their feet. (Photo by Joseph Louw/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Magnolia leaves frame some of the thousands of mourners who lined up to view the body of slain civil rights leader, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in Atlanta, April 7, 1968. (AP Photo/Jack Thornell)

Civil rights leader Rev. Ralph Abernathy is shown after he concluded a short memorial service for the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in Memphis, Tenn., April 5, 1968. Abernathy assumed the duties of the president of the Southern Christian Leadership after King was assassinated. (AP Photo) ( Abernathy 1968 )

FILE - Coretta Scott King, center, widow of slain civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is comforted in the doorway of an airliner in Memphis, Tenn., April 5, 1968, as her husband's body is brought up the ramp. The civil rights leader was standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel when he was killed by a rifle bullet on April 4, 1968. James Earl Ray pleaded guilty to the killing and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. He died in prison in 1998. (AP Photo) ( King Anniversary Photo Gallery )

Floral pieces line the rail outside the room that Dr. Martin Luther King occupied in a motel in Memphis, Tennessee, April 7, 1968. It was outside this room while leaning on the rail that Dr. King was struck and killed by a sniper's bullet on Thursday. An unidentified staff member looks out over the flowers and the direction of the shot. (AP Photo) ( MLK Assassination )

9th April 1968: Thousands of people lining the streets of Atlanta, Georgia, for the funeral of Civil Rights leader Dr Martin Luther King Jnr who was assassinated by James Earl Ray. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images) ( 97m/16/huty/6827/20 )

This aerial photo shows fire-gutted buildings, some still smouldering, along a block on H Street between 12th and 13th Streets in the northeast section of Washington, D.C. on April 5, 1968. Rioting broke out after the assassination of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in Memphis, Tenn. on April 4. (AP Photo) ( MKL ASSASSINATION RIOTS D.C. )

Smouldering ruins remain where a building stood on 7th Street, N.W. in Washington, D.C., April 6, 1968. Numerous fires accompanied the second night of turmoil in the nation's capital following the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in Memphis, Tenn., April 4. (AP Photo) ( MLK ASSASSINATION RIOT )

Glass and mannequins litter sidewalk at this clothing store in Northwest Washington, April 4, 1968 after crowds in the predominantly black neighborhood broke into and looted some stores. Crowds gathered following news that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had been slain. (AP Photo/Charles Harrity) ( MLK Assassination Rioting )

Coretta Scott King (5th-R) leads a "March on Memphis" 09 April 1968, five days after the assassination of her husband, US clergyman and civil rights leader Martin Luther King. On her right, her daughter, Yolanda, walks with her sons Martin and Dexter; on her left appear King's successor, the Rev. Ralph Abernathy, and Andrew Young, later US President Jimmy Carter's ambassador to the United Nations and mayor of Atlanta. Martin Luther King was assassinated 04 April 1968 in Memphis, Tennessee. James Earl Ray confessed to shooting King and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. King's killing, three years after the assassination of black civil rights leader Malcolm X and months before Sen. Robert Kennedy's, sent shock waves through American society. (Photo credit should read -/AFP/Getty Images) ( SAPA980403379780 )

More than 200,000 civil right militants rather 28 August 1963 on the Mall in Washington DC Washington Monument in background) during the "March on Washington". The civil rights leader Martin Luther King said the march was "the greatest demonstration of freedom in the history of the United States." Martin Luther King was assassinated on 04 April 1968 in Memphis, Tennessee. James Earl Ray confessed to shooting King and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. King's killing sent shock waves through American society at the time, and is still regarded as a landmark event in recent US history. (Photo credit should read AFP/AFP/Getty Images)

Portrait of Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. as he delivers the 'Give Us the Ballot' address as the Prayer Pilgramage for Freedom event on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, Washington DC, March 17, 1957. (Photo by Paul Schutzer/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is welcomed with a kiss by his wife Coretta after leaving court in Montgomery, Ala., March 22, 1956. King was found guilty of conspiracy to boycott city buses in a campaign to desegregate the bus system, but a judge suspended his $500 fine pending appeal. (AP Photo/Gene Herrick)

Alabama state troopers swing nightsticks to break up the "Bloody Sunday" voting march in Selma, Ala., in this March 7, 1965, file photo. John Lewis, front right, of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee is put on the ground by a trooper. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference is inextricably tied to some of the civil rights movement's greatest accomplishments, from the 1963 March on Washington to the "Bloody Sunday" march that led to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Under the leadership of co-founder Martin Luther King Jr., the organization became a leading voice of a generation galvanized by sit-ins, protests and freedom rides.(AP Photo/File)

Dr. Benjamin Spock (2nd-L), child-care expert, Martin Luther King (C), clergyman and black civil rights campaigner, Father Frederick Reed and Cleveland Robinson, unionist leader, lead 16 March 1967 in New York a huge pacifist rally protesting United States involvement in the Vietnam war. (Photo credit should read AFP/AFP/Getty Images)

Heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali, left center, talks to the media in Louisville, Ky., after conferring with civil rights activist Dr. Martin Luther King, right center, regarding the boxer's draft status in this March 29, 1967 file photo. Ali was in his hometown for his court suit to prevent his Army induction April 28 in Houston. Later, the NAACP Legal Defense Fund represented Ali when the high court struck down his conviction for refusing to serve in the military. (AP Photo)

A Montgomery (Ala.) Sheriff's Department booking photo of The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. taken Feb 22, 1956, with the words ''Dead and the date of 4-4-68'' scrolled on it, is shown Friday, July 23, 2004, in Montgomery, Ala. Dozens of photographs from the civil rights-era were recently discovered in a storage room used by the Montgomery County Sheriff's office. Chief Deputy Derrick Cunningham said he was performing some house cleaning duties when he found a photo-album containing well-preserved mug shots of protesters who were arrested during the Montgomery bus boycott in 1956. (AP Photo/Montgomery County (Ala.) Sheriff's office)

Demonstrators, including Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., stream over an Alabama River bridge at the city limits of Selma, Ala., in this March 10, 1965 file photo, during a voter rights march. (AP Photo, File)

Civil rights leader Martin Luther King (C) waves to supporters 28 August 1963 on the Mall in Washington, DC, during the "March on Washington." On April 4, 2008 the US marks the 40th anniversary of the assassination of King, just as the first African-American candidate with a viable shot at the White House reinvigorates the King's civil rights "dream". In 1968, King was killed by a single bullet to the head while on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in downtown Memphis, Tennessee. The Nobel peace prize winner was just 39 years old; he would have turned 79 in January. The mystery surrounding his assassination has swirled for years, with escaped convict James Earl Ray convicted of the murder and sentenced to 99 years in prison. AFP PHOTO/FILES (Photo credit should read -/AFP/Getty Images)

Pictured left to right at the Freedom Pilgrimage rally at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington, D.C., May 17, 1957, are: Roy Wilkins of New York, executive secretary of the NAACP; the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. of Montgomery, Ala.; and A. Philip Randolph of New York, president of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. (AP Photo/Charles Gorry)

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., is seen in this undated file photo. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated on April 4, 1968 in Memphis. (AP Photo/file)

This 1966 photo is the last official portrait taken of the entire King family, made in the study of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. From left are Dexter King, Yolanda King, Martin Luther King Jr., Bernice King, Coretta Scott King and Martin Luther King III. In 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. declared, "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." (AP Photo/Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

In this Sept. 16, 1963 file photo, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gives a news conference in Birmingham, Ala. announcing he and other African American leaders have called for federal Army occupation of Birmingham in the wake of the previous day's church bombing and shootings which left six blacks dead. (AP Photo)

In this Aug. 28, 1963 file photo, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, speaks to thousands during his "I Have a Dream" speech in front of the Lincoln Memorial for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in Washington. Actor-singer Sammy Davis Jr. is at bottom right. It has been cited as one of America's essential ideals, its language suggestive of a constitutional amendment on equality: People should "not be judged but he color of their skin but by the content of their character." Yet 50 years after the King's monumental statement, there is considerable disagreement over what this quote means when it comes to affirmative action and other measures aimed at helping the disadvantaged. (AP Photo)

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is shown at a press conference in Atlanta, Ga., in this April 25, 1967 file photo. King's birthday will be observed nationally Monday, Jan. 21, 2002. (AP Photo/File)

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. signs autographs at DU Arena, May 18, 1967. Photo by Bill Peters, The Denver Post

Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., left ,with Rev. Robert Gilmore, center, and rev. L. Sylvester Odom in Littleton, CO. Jan. 25, 1964

Martin Luther King greets a crowd in Baltimore in 1964.

President Lyndon B. Johnson talks with civil rights leaders in his White House office in this Jan. 18,1964 file photo. From left, are: Roy Wilkins, executve secretary National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; James Farmer, national director, Congress of Racial Equality; Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference; and Whitney Young, executive director of the Urban League. Farmer, who served alongside the civil rights giants of the 1950s and '60s, died Friday, July 9, 1999. He was 79. (AP Photo/File)

In a rare public appearance together, the leaders of Civil Rights groups conduct a news conference in Memphis, Tenn., in this June 7, 1966 file photo, in the wake of the shotgun attack on James Meredith near Hernando, Miss. From left, they are: Stokely Carmichael, leader of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee; the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference; and Floyd McKissick, speaking, national director of the Congress of Racial Equality.Kwame Ture, who as Stokely Carmichael made the phrase ``black power'' a rallying cry of the civil rights upheavals of the 1960s, died Sunday, Nov. 15, 1998, in Guinea, a member of Ture's All-African People's Revolutionary Party said. He was 57. (AP Photo/File)

Sanitation workers on strike in Memphis, Tenn., resume their daily marches Friday, March 29, 1968, one day after a march led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., left Main and Beale Streets littered with bricks and broken glass and dappled with blood when about 200 youths began breaking windows and looting. The city was taking no chances on a repeat of the violence as National Guardsmen in armored personnel carriers equipped with 50-caliber machine guns escorted marchers. Within a week, King was dead, killedby an assassin's bullet at Memphis' Lorraine Motel. (AP Photo/The Commercial Appeal, Barney Sellers)

Martin Luther King, Jr. and his civil rights marchers head for Montgomery, the state's capitol, in this March 21, 1965 file photo. (AP Photo, File)

James Earl Ray lowers his head as State Safety Commissioner Greg O'Rear, white hat, and Highway Patrol Maj. Mickey McGuire, dark glasses, lead him to prison in Nashville, Tenn., March 11, 1969. Ray is serving a 99-year sentence in the death of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis. (AP Photo) ( James Earl Ray )

The Remington 30.06 rifle thought to have killed Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., is shown by then Criminal Court property clerk Ben Holley in this 1992 file photo. Tests were scheduled to begin Wednesday, May 14, 1997 to determine if it is the weapon that killed Martin Luther King Jr. A team of weapons and ballistics experts should have a final report next month. (AP Photo/ John L. Focht)

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., third from right and his wife, Coretta King, lead off the final lap to the state capitol at Montgomery, Ala. in this March 25, 1965 file photo. Thousands of civil rights marchers joined in the walk, which began in Selma, Ala., on March 21, demanding voter registration rights for blacks. Rev. D. F. Reese, of Selma, is at right. King's birthday will be observed nationally Monday, Jan. 21, 2002. (AP Photo/File)

Family members and friends of slain civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., follow his casket into an Atlanta funeral home after the body arrived from Memphis, in this April 5, 1968 file photo. From left are, King's brother, the Rev. A.D. Williams King; King's close associate Dr. Ralph Abernathy; KIng's widow, Coretta Scott King; and her two sons, Martin Luther III, and Dexter. When Coretta Scott King's husband died in 1968, then- Georgia Gov. Lester Maddox refused to let Martin Luther King Jr. lie in honor at the state Capitol and was outraged to see state flags waving at half-staff in tribute. Four decades later, the state is paying tribute to King's widow with full honors. (AP Photo/Bill Hudson, File)