By Rich McKay

(Reuters) – The family of militant civil rights leader Malcolm X, who was assassinated nearly 60 years ago, filed a $100 million federal lawsuit on Friday accusing the FBI, CIA and New York Police Department of allowing the murder to take place. carried out.

The lawsuit, filed by Malcolm

“We believe they all conspired to assassinate Malcolm X, one of the greatest thought leaders of the 20th century,” civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who represents the family, said at a news conference. he said.

The wrongful death lawsuit was announced at the memorial center in New York City where Malcolm X was killed. Crump said this study aims to answer questions about the assassination and draw an accurate history of the events. It is also intended to provide compensation to the family.

A spokesman for the New York Police Department was not immediately available for comment, but the department previously told Reuters it would not comment on the case when it was announced last year.

The FBI and CIA did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Malcolm X rose to prominence as the national spokesman for the Nation of Islam, an African-American Muslim group that espoused Black separatism.

After more than a decade with the group, he publicly left the group in 1964. He softened some of his earlier views on racial discrimination, angering some Nation of Islam members and prompting death threats.

Talmadge Hayer, then a member of the Nation of Islam, admitted in court that he was one of the three assassins. However, speculation that the government may have been aware of and authorized the assassination plot had been going on for decades.

Shabazz was just two years old when his father was killed as he prepared to speak at New York’s Audubon Ballroom on February 21, 1965. He was there with his mother and siblings when the assassination took place.

(Reporting by Rich McKay in Atlanta; Editing by Rod Nickel)