Judge Could Rule In MLK Estate Dispute

Martin Luther King Jr.’s traveling Bible has not gone on regular display since President Barack Obama used it while taking his second oath of office.  Moreover, the public has not seen King’s 1964 Nobel Peace Price medal in recent years. 

Both of these relics reside in a safe deposit box, the keys of which are held by an Atlanta judge presiding over a fight between King’s heirs. 

The Estate of Martin Luther King Jr. Inc., controlled by Martin Luther King III and his younger brother, Dexter Scott King, asked a judge a year ago to order their sister Bernice to turn over their father’s Nobel medal and Bible.  The brothers planned to sell them to a private buyer.  Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney could decide the case at a hearing or let it go to trial.  When he ordered Bernice to hand over the Bible and medal to the court’s custody, it appeared likely the estate will win the case. 

See Kate Brumback, Judge Could Rule In Dispute Over MLK Bible and Nobel Medal, SF Gate, Jan. 11, 2015. 

Special thanks to Joel Dobris (Professor of Law, UC Davis School of Law) for bringing this article to my attention.