UPDATE NOVEMBER 19, 2021:
NEW YORK (AP) — One of the men exonerated decades after the 1965 killing of Malcolm X says that “I am an 83-year-old man who was victimized by the criminal justice system.” The convictions of Muhammad Aziz and the late Khalil Islam were dismissed Thursday (Nov. 18, 2021) by a Manhattan judge. Prosecutors and the men’s lawyers say a renewed investigation found new evidence that undermined the case against the men and determined that authorities withheld some of what they knew. The two maintained their innocence from the start in the killing at Manhattan’s Audubon Ballroom. Both were paroled in the 1980s. Islam died in 2009.
ORIGINAL STORY NOVEMBER 18, 2021:
NEW YORK (AP) — Two of the three men convicted in the assassination of Malcolm X are to be cleared after insisting on their innocence since the 1965 killing. Lawyers and the Innocence Project said Wednesday (Nov. 17, 2021) that a new investigation found authorities withheld evidence favorable to the defense in the trial of 83-year-old Muhammad Aziz and the late Khalil Islam. Manhattan’s top prosecutor says he plans to ask a court to dismiss the convictions. Aziz says his conviction resulted from a process that was, in his words, “corrupt to its core.” Malcolm X was gunned down in a Harlem ballroom as he began a speech.
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