"He came to national fame in the late 1970s as the recipient of what is known in criminal conspiracy circles as the Byers Bounty-a $50,000 offer to kill Martin Luther King Jr. The Byers Bounty has long been considered the key to understanding whether there was a broader undiscovered conspiracy to murder the civil rights icon. It is a theory about King's assassination that many still believe, including several who investigated the crime."
"The official history of King's death goes like this: The civil rights leader was assassinated on April 4, 1968, while standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. Initially, law enforcement agents believed they were searching for several possible killers. But two weeks after the murder, the FBI matched fingerprints found at the scene and announced that the fugitive assassin was one man, James Earl Ray, an escapee from the Missouri State Penitentiary."
Russell Byers died on Oct. 11 at age 94 in Creve Coeur, Missouri, after a long life of criminal activity without ever serving prison time. He stole cars and art, acted as a fence, and threatened people while denying involvement in murder or drug dealing. His attorney described him as one of St. Louis's most dangerous criminals, yet indictments never led to incarceration. Byers became nationally known for the "Byers Bounty," a $50,000 offer to kill Martin Luther King Jr., a claim central to theories of a wider undiscovered conspiracy. The official account identifies James Earl Ray as the lone assassin.
Read at Slate Magazine
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