Memphis bar owner Lloyd Jowers, who in 1968 ran Jim's Grill, located across the street from the Lorraine Motel, claimed in 1993 that a Memphis produce dealer, Frank Liberto (now dead), gave him $100,000 to hire a hit man to murder King—and the killer he hired wasn't Ray.

After a 7-month investigation, Memphis District Attorney General Bill Gibbons reported that he could find no evidence Jowers had any involvement in the murder. ABC's Primetime Live broke Jowers's story in 1993; in 1998 the same show denounced Jowers as a fraud.