Two men exonerated after decades in prison for Malcolm X's 1965 murder
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[November 19, 2021]
By Karen Freifeld and Julia Harte
NEW YORK (Reuters) -Two men who spent
decades in prison for the murder of Black activist and civil rights
advocate Malcolm X in 1965 were exonerated on Thursday after the
Manhattan district attorney apologized for what he called "violations of
the law and the public trust."
Applause broke out in the courtroom as New York State Supreme Court
Justice Ellen Biben vacated the convictions against Muhammad Aziz, 83,
and Khalil Islam, who died in 2009. Both were released from prison on
parole in the 1980s.
Aziz told the court that his wrongful conviction had stemmed from "a
process that was corrupt to its core, one that is all too familiar to
Black people in 2021," and said he hoped the system would take
"responsibility for the immeasurable harm it caused me."
Two of Islam's sons who were also present in court, Ameen and Shahid
Johnson, told reporters outside the courthouse that they felt
"bittersweet" about the exoneration because it could not replace
everything their family had lost.
Ameen was 1-1/2-years old and their mother was pregnant with Shahid when
Islam, who was formerly known as Thomas Johnson, was arrested. The
exoneration was a "very, very long time coming," Ameen Johnson told
Reuters earlier while waiting to enter the courtroom. "I honestly didn't
think I'd live to see the day."
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Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance said in court that new
exculpatory evidence uncovered during a two-year-long investigation had
made it clear that Aziz and Islam were wrongfully convicted for
murdering Malcolm X.
Investigators withheld from both defense and prosecution "dozens and
dozens" of documents from the New York Police Department and the U.S.
Federal Bureau of Investigation, including reports that implicated other
suspects, according to Vance.
The conviction of a third man for murdering Malcolm X still stands.
"IGNOMINY" OF BEING SEEN AS ASSASSINS
Malcolm X rose to prominence as the national spokesman of the Nation of
Islam, an African-American Muslim group that espoused Black separatism.
He spent over a decade with the group before becoming disillusioned,
publicly breaking with it in 1964 and moderating some of his earlier
views on racial separation.
He was shot dead at New York City's Audubon Ballroom while preparing to
deliver a speech. All three of the men convicted were members of the
Nation of Islam.
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![](../images/111921pics/news_e9.jpg)
Muhammad Aziz, 83, one of the two men who spent decades in prison
for murdering Black activist and civil rights advocate Malcolm X in
1965, looks down during his exoneration trial by a New York state
judge at State Supreme Court in New York City, U.S., November 18,
2021. Curtis Means/Pool via REUTERS
![](../images/ads/current/centraldirect_lda_SPONSOR_2021.png)
Before tossing the convictions on Thursday, Biben
said she regretted the court could not give Aziz and Islam back the
years they had lost.
Islam's family and Aziz could each reasonably seek $1 million in
restitution for each year they spent in prison, according to New
York-based civil rights lawyer Richard Emery, who has represented
wrongfully convicted people.
Emery said there were two ways to seek restitution: suing the state
for unjust conviction, and filing a federal civil rights case
against the law enforcement agencies involved.
Still, there's "no hard and fast formula" for such settlements,
according to Zachary Carter, who represented New York City in its
$41 million settlement with five men wrongfully convicted of the
1989 rape of a woman jogger in Central Park.
If Islam's family and Aziz seek settlements, their lawyers likely
will also point to the damage their reputations suffered from the
wrongful convictions, according to Carter.
Aziz and Islam suffered the "ignominy" of being viewed as assassins
of a beloved figure in the U.S. civil rights struggle, Carter said.
"What should be the compensation for having been a pariah in your
community for so many years?"
One of Malcolm X's daughters, Ilyasah Shabazz, said in a statement
on Thursday that she hoped the "long overdue" exonerations would
bring some peace to Aziz, his family and Islam's family. But Shabazz
said her family still wants to know the full truth behind her
father's murder.
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"Full justice will not be served until all parties involved in the
orchestrated killing of our father are identified and brought to
justice," she said.
(Reporting by Julia Harte and Karen Freifeld; Editing by Colleen
Jenkins and Leslie Adler)
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