-Kacee Biggs-

Cousins!

Muhammad Aziz, a man who was exonerated last year following the1965 assassination of Malcolm X has filed a $40 million lawsuit against New York City for the twenty years he served in prison for a crime he did not commit!

Near the end of Malcolm X’s life, he split with the Black Muslim organization and, after a trip to Mecca, started speaking about the potential for racial unity. This eventually led to the Nation of Islam seeing him as as a traitor. 

Malcolm was later killed Feb. 21, 1965 at the Audubon Ballroom in upper Manhattan. Aziz and Islam, formerly known as Norman 3X Butler and Thomas 15X Johnson, alongside a third man were convicted of the murder in March 1966 and sentenced to life in prison. 

Lawyers for 84-year-old Muhammad filed the lawsuit last Thursday in federal court in Brooklyn over his wrongful conviction in the murder of Malcolm X. 

A Manhattan judge dismissed the convictions of Aziz and Islam in November 2021 after prosecutors said new evidence of witness intimidation and suppression of exculpatory evidence had undermined the case against them. The District Attorney at the time, Cyrus Vance Jr. apologized for law enforcement’s “serious, unacceptable violations of law and the public trust.” 

Attorneys David Shanies and Deborah Francois said in complaints filed in the recently issued lawsuit, that both Aziz and Islam were at their homes in the Bronx when Malcolm was killed. 

They said Aziz “spent 20 years in prison for a crime he did not commit and more than 55 years living with the hardship and indignity attendant to being unjustly branded as a convicted murderer of one of the most important civil rights leaders in history.” 

Islam spent 22 years in prison and died still hoping for a chance to clear his name. “The damage done to Mr. Islam and his family was immense and irreparable,” the lawyers wrote.

According to the NPR, Mayor Eric Adams said in a statement, “As someone who has fought for a fairer criminal justice system for my entire career, I believe the overturning of Mr. Aziz and Mr. Islam’s convictions was the just outcome. We are reviewing this lawsuit.”

(📸:The Times) 

Cousins, let’s hope that Mr. Aziz gets to collect on his rightfully earned coin!