 [Daily Mail, where America gets its news] - A Manhattan judge on Thursday formally dismissed convictions of Muhammad Aziz, 83, and Khalil Islam, who died in 2009 aged 74: both were found guilty of Malcolm X's 1965 assassination in Harlem
- Aziz spent 22 years in prison before he was released on parole in 1985; Islam was released in 1987
- Both men had maintained their innocence for decades and their stories were the subject of numerous books and articles, plus a six-part Netflix documentary released last year, Who Killed Malcolm X?
- The FBI and New York Police Department had evidence of Aziz's and Islam's innocence within hours but ignored and suppressed it, a lawyer for both men said
- Prosecutors and defendants' lawyers agreed that new evidences suggested they played no part in the murder of the civil rights leader
- FBI files showed that the late FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover ordered agents to tell witnesses not to reveal that they were informants when talking with police and prosecutors
- One FBI report from September 28, 1965, even contains a description of the man whom some experts have concluded was probably the killer who wielded a shotgun — William Bradley, who died in 2018
- Aziz said in a statement he was victimized by the criminal justice system, adding: 'I do not need this court, these prosecutors, or a piece of paper to tell me I am innocent'
- Experts believe that Aziz and Islam's relatives could seek $1 million each in damages for the wrongful conviction
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