Liver Disease Puts James Earl Ray Back in Hospital

James Earl Ray, the jailed assassin of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., was hospitalized again over the weekend with chronic liver disease.

Ray was taken to Nashville Memorial Hospital late Saturday in critical condition. His condition was upgraded to serious Sunday evening, hospital spokeswoman Freda Herndon said.

Ray’s lawyer, William Pepper, said earlier this month that Ray would die within months unless he gets a liver transplant. Ray, 68, is not on the national liver transplant list and his supporters are searching for a donor to provide a liver directly to him.

This is Ray’s third recent hospitalization outside prison. He spent slightly more than a week in the Nashville hospital in late December, and was hospitalized there from Jan 3. to Jan. 10. He then went back to the prison hospital, where he was first admitted in September.

Ray is serving a 99-year sentence for the April 4, 1968, shooting of King.

He initially admitted killing King but almost immediately recanted--and has been trying to win his freedom ever since. He has a state court hearing in Memphis, Tenn., on Feb. 20 on a request for new scientific tests on the rifle identified as the murder weapon.