Three daughters of Malcolm X have filed a lawsuit against the CIA, FBI and New York Police Department, among others, demanding $95 million for their involvement in the 1965 assassination of the civil rights leader.
In the lawsuit filed Friday in Manhattan federal court, the daughters alleged that the agencies and police forces were aware of and involved in the murder conspiracy and failed to prevent the killing.
Attorney Ben Crump outlined the lawsuit today during a press conference with the family members, stressing that he hopes federal and city authorities will realize "all the cowardly acts that were committed by their predecessors" and try to right these historical wrongs.
For decades, there have been more questions than answers about who was to blame for the death of Malcolm X, who was 39 when he was assassinated on February 21, 1965, at the Audubon Ballroom on West 165th Street in Manhattan, while he was giving a speech to several hundred people.
Born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska, Malcolm X later changed his name to El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz.
Three men were convicted of murder charges, but two of them were exonerated in 2021 after investigators reviewed the case and concluded that some evidence was questionable and that authorities had withheld information.
In the lawsuit, the family says the prosecution suppressed the government's role in the assassination.
The lawsuit alleges that there was a "corrupt, illegal and unconstitutional" relationship between law enforcement and "vicious killers that went unchecked for many years and were actively concealed, tolerated, protected and facilitated by government agents" leading up to Malcolm X's murder.
According to the lawsuit, the New York police, in coordination with federal law enforcement agencies, arrested the activist's bodyguards days before the murder and intentionally removed their officers from the ballroom where Malcolm X was killed.
Meanwhile, the lawsuit says, federal agencies had personnel, including undercover agents, in the ballroom but failed to protect it.
The lawsuit was not filed earlier because the defendants withheld information from the family, including the identities of undercover “informants, agents and provocateurs” and what they knew about the planning that preceded the attack.
Malcolm X’s wife, Betty Shabazz, the plaintiffs, “and their entire family have suffered the pain of the unknown” for decades, the lawsuit says.
“They did not know who murdered Malcolm X, why he was murdered, the level of orchestration by the NYPD, FBI and CIA, the identity of the government agents who conspired to secure his death or who fraudulently covered up their role,” they say.
“The harm done to the Shabazz family is unimaginable, immense and irreparable,” the family says, adding that it had announced its intention to sue the government agencies and law enforcement agencies earlier this year.
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