Ernie's Secret | E7 Harm / No Harm?

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The FBI’s abusive domestic surveillance is exposed and after years of keeping his identity as an informant secret, Bill Lawrence and Ernest must testify under oath about their relationship. How far will they go to protect each other and preserve Ernest’s legacy as a hero of the civil rights movement?

Dr. King returns to Memphis on April 3 to make good on his promise to lead a non-violent march. But first he has to get the militants on board. Ernest is relaying dozens of tips from inside every meeting and negotiation. Eye-witnesses share details of King’s final hours, and Ernest is instrumental in getting the most iconic and intimate images out to the world.

We begin the story of Martin Luther King Jr.’s last eight days alive. A sanitation workers' strike brings King to Memphis - but by this time, March 1968, the movement is splintered. A homegrown Black Power group called the Invaders wants more active resistance, a non-violent protest turns into a riot and Ernest, now a paid racial informant, provides the FBI with a front row seat to an unfolding disaster.

Ernest was an informant, but just how much damage did he actually cause? To what extent do the sins of the government fall on one man’s shoulders? Two people look over their FBI records and what Ernest revealed about them and arrive at very different conclusions.

The FBI launches a massive, illegal intelligence dragnet to gather information that could be used to disrupt, discredit and damage people and groups it deems a threat. A lot of people get caught up in providing information to the law enforcement, including Ernest. So what made him different?

Being on the front lines was dangerous - especially for a Black man with a camera. But Ernest puts himself at the center of the action. It’s easy to make friends with the Northern “agitators” pouring into West Tennessee and feed the FBI’s growing demand for their pictures.

Ernest’s relationship with the FBI blossoms in 1961 in Fayette County, Tennessee where Black sharecroppers are kicked off their land just for trying to vote. FBI Special Agent Bill Lawrence and Ernest show up to help, but end up seeing something more sinister in the works.

How did Ernest operate and why did he do it? Two daughters bring us as close as we can get to the minds of the men at the center of our story, Ernest and his handler FBI Special Agent Bill Lawrence.

The FBI has a license to lie and it takes a landmark lawsuit to force them to hand over a trove of secret records detailing Ernest’s years as an FBI informant.