The family of Dexter Scott King, the younger son of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Coretta Scott King, announced his death Monday from prostate cancer. His age was 62.
"He transitioned peacefully in his sleep at home with me in Malibu," his wife, Leah Weber King, said. He fought this dreadful condition to the death after giving everything. He confronted this issue bravely and powerfully, as he did all his life."
King was 7 when his father was killed in Memphis, Tenn., in 1968. His father, who pastored Montgomery, Ala.'s Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in the 1950s, graduated from Morehouse College. He also resembled his father.
King was chairman of the King Center, which legally safeguards Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy, and president of the King Estate.
Bernice King, CEO of the King Center and King's sister, remarked, "Words cannot express the heart break I feel from losing another sibling." I need strength to get through this tough period. In 2007, their sister Yolanda died.
The immediate shock is severe, said his brother Martin Luther King III. These are difficult times to say the proper thing. The King family needs your prayers now.
The King Center stated a memorial ceremony will be announced later.