ATLANTA — Dexter Scott King, who devoted much of his life to upholding the civil rights legacy of his parents, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King, has died after a battle with prostate cancer. , passed away on Monday. He was 62 years old.
The King Center in Atlanta, where Dexter King was president, announced that the civil rights icon's second son died at his home in Malibu, California. His wife, Leah Weber King, said in her statement that he died “peacefully in his sleep.”
“The sudden impact is devastating,” Martin Luther King III, the Rev. Dexter King's brother, said in a statement. “It's hard to find the right words in a moment like this. Please keep the entire King family in your prayers at this time.”
Dexter King, the third of the King family's four children, was named after Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama. Dexter King, whose father served as a pastor, rose to national prominence during the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott following Rosa's arrest. park.
Dexter King was just 7 years old when his father was assassinated in April 1968 while supporting a sanitation worker strike in Memphis, Tennessee.
“He turned that pain into action and dedicated his life to advancing the dreams that Martin and Coretta Scott King had for their children,” the Rev. Al Sharpton said in a statement. and so on. Dexter King “left us too soon,” he said.
Sen. Raphael Warnock, senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Martin Luther King Jr. preached, said he prayed with the King family on Monday and expressed his “deepest sympathy to them at this time of mourning and grief.” We express our condolences and express our strength and solidarity.” ”
Dexter King spoke about the impact his father's murder had on his childhood and later life in his 2004 memoir Growing Up King.
“Ever since I was seven years old, I've felt like I had to be formal,” he wrote, adding: The drama of life throws at you. ”
As an adult, Dexter King looked so much like his famous father that he was cast to play him in a 2002 TV movie about Parks starring Angela Bassett.
He also worked to protect the King family's intellectual property. In addition to serving as chairman of the King Center, he was also president of the King Estate.
Dexter King and his siblings shared control of their family's estate, but they did not always agree on how to preserve their parents' inheritance.
One particularly sharp disagreement was between Dexter King and his brother in 2014 about the Nobel Peace Prize, which their father won in 1964, and the civil rights leader's award, which President Barack Obama used at his second inauguration. An attempt to sell the Traveling Bible led the brothers to a court battle. . Bernice King said she found the idea unthinkable.
The King brothers resolved the dispute in 2016 with former President Jimmy Carter acting as mediator. The items were handed over to the brothers, but other terms of the settlement were kept secret.
Decades ago, Dexter King made headlines by publicly declaring that he believed James Earl Ray, who pleaded guilty to murdering his father in 1969, was innocent.
The two met in a Nashville prison in 1997, amid a failed push by the King family to bring Ray to justice, in hopes that the case would uncover evidence of a broader conspiracy.
When Ray said during a prison interview that he was not a murderer, Dexter King replied, “I believe you and my family believes you.” However, Ray was never tried. He died the following year of liver failure.
Dexter King is survived by his wife and brother Martin Luther King III. his sister, the Rev. Bernice A. King; and a teenage niece, Yolanda Renee King.
Coretta Scott King passed away in 2006, and Yolanda Dennis King, the King's eldest child, passed away in 2007.
“Words cannot express the pain I feel over the loss of my brother,” Bernice King said in a statement.
A memorial service will be announced at a later date, the King Center said. The family had scheduled a news conference in Atlanta for Tuesday.
