Martin Luther King Jr.'s mother, Alberta Williams King, was killed by Marcus Wayne Chenault. On June 30, 1974, Chenault, a 23-year-old Black Hebrew Israelite from Ohio, shot Alberta King while she was playing the organ during a service at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia
. Chenault claimed he had originally planned to kill Martin Luther King Sr., but shot Alberta King because she was nearby. He said he considered all Christians his enemies and viewed Black ministers as a menace to Black people. During the attack, Chenault also killed a church deacon, Edward Boykin, and wounded a retired schoolteacher, Jimmie Mitchell
. Chenault was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death, but his sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment, partly due to the King family's opposition to the death penalty. He died in prison in 1995 after suffering a stroke
