A Man Wrongfully Convicted Of Killing Malcolm X Will Give His First TV Interview In ABC News Special, "X/onerated"
We’ve made it through January in relatively one piece, and Black History Month is already upon us.
To kick off the month-long celebration, ABC News is airing a deep dive into the assassination of Malcolm X, one of the country’s most renowned leaders in the struggle for Black liberation. But the lens will be focused on a man wrongfully convicted of killing him.
On Thursday February 3, the news outlet is presenting a 1-hour special on the exoneration of Muhammad Abdul Aziz. The special, “Soul of a Nation Presents: X/onerated – The Murder of Malcolm X and 55 Years to Justice” will feature the first TV interview with Aziz since his exoneration, and ESSENCE has an exclusive trailer.
WATCH: “X/onerated” trailer- an exclusive first look at the ABC News special
“X/onerated” will be hosted by ABC News “Nightline” co-anchor Byron Pitts, and it will retrace “Malcolm X’s shocking 1965 assassination, Aziz’s decades behind bars and on parole, and the devastating impact on Aziz’s family,” according to a press statement provided to ESSENCE.
The special will also include interviews with Malcolm X’s daughter Ilyasah Shabazz as well as the children of the late Khalil Islam, who was also wrongfully convicted, and posthumously exonerated, for Malcolm X’s assassination.
Aziz and Islam had their convictions thrown out in November 2021. As per the New York Times, “for decades, historians have cast doubt on the case against the two men…who each spent more than 20 years in prison. Their exoneration represents a remarkable acknowledgment of grave errors made in a case of towering importance: the 1965 murder of one of America’s most influential Black leaders.”