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Newly found documents shed light on MLK's convicted killer

Recently discovered photos and letters are giving an inside look at the man convicted of assassinating the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

On April 4, 1968, King was shot and killed by a sniper as he stood on a balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, where he was trying to mediate a garbage workers' strike.

Little was known of Ray's state of mind in his months in jail before his guilty plea -- until Shelby County, Tennessee, officials came across a bundle of documents about five years ago in a local archival building.

That bundle -- an unassuming, mustard-yellow folder with tape crisscrossing it -- had inscribed on it in black marker, "Public Defender James E. Ray. Do Not Destroy."

Inside was a wealth of information, including photos of the newly incarcerated accused murderer, as well as letters to family and his attorney during the eight months he was detained at the Shelby County jail....

Read entire article at CNN