Suppose that, instead of being arrested at Heathrow, MLK assssin James Earl Ray manages to dodge Scotland Yard and get to Rhodesia, as he had apparently been planning.
I suppose the most likely-seeming sceanrio is that Rhodesian authorities would just hand him over to the US, since, whatever sympathy they may have had with Ray's politics, it remained the case that he was a wanted man, by no less than the freaking FBI, and the evidence against him was pretty substantial.
On the other hand, as any defense-lawyer can tell you, if you stare at a set of facts long enough, you're bound to find something that can be passed off as a discrepancy, at least to someone who is ready to be convinced of the falsity of it all. Even the King family, in later years, were buying into theories that Ray was framed, so it probably wouldn't have been too tall an order for Salisbury to officially reach a similar conclusion, if they wanted an excuse not to send him back to the states.
Bonus points if Ray goes into Rhodesian politics and becomes prime minister. Just joking(mostly).
I suppose the most likely-seeming sceanrio is that Rhodesian authorities would just hand him over to the US, since, whatever sympathy they may have had with Ray's politics, it remained the case that he was a wanted man, by no less than the freaking FBI, and the evidence against him was pretty substantial.
On the other hand, as any defense-lawyer can tell you, if you stare at a set of facts long enough, you're bound to find something that can be passed off as a discrepancy, at least to someone who is ready to be convinced of the falsity of it all. Even the King family, in later years, were buying into theories that Ray was framed, so it probably wouldn't have been too tall an order for Salisbury to officially reach a similar conclusion, if they wanted an excuse not to send him back to the states.
Bonus points if Ray goes into Rhodesian politics and becomes prime minister. Just joking(mostly).