ATLANTA (AP) - The surviving children of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. have met to formally discuss estate business for the first time in five years.

Martin Luther King III, the Rev. Bernice King and Dexter King are the remaining heirs of their father's estate, which is a privately held corporation. The siblings are in the midst of a legal feud, with Martin King and Bernice King claiming Dexter King has acted improperly as head of the estate.

Fulton County Superior Court spokesman Don Plummer says all three appeared in a courtroom Monday for a closed-door shareholders meeting that had been ordered by a judge. The Kings last held an annual meeting to discuss the estate in 2004.

Dexter King has also sued his sister over her handling of their mother's estate, which Bernice King runs.

Family Disputes

The three siblings have been involved in several legal disputes regarding their parents' intellectual property & belonings. Bernice King and Martin Luther King III have accused their brother of tarnishing their parents' legacy with his business decisions, and say he has been operating The King Estate for years without their input.

 

The siblings also still haven't settled three lawsuits involving their parents' estates, including one attempting to force Dexter King to open the accounting books of their father's estate. Another would determine who should control Coretta Scott King's personal items - some of which were at the center of a $1.4 million book deal about their mother's life that fell apart last year.

 

Martin Luther King III said the film approval matter was typical of an ongoing pattern of exclusion.

 

Dexter King, one of the late civil rights leader's sons, said in a press release in early 2009 that he hoped an MLk movie that he had approved of would “be the definitive film” on his father's legacy. Two other King siblings - Bernice King and Martin Luther King III - said they had no input in the deal

 

“It's not that we are against a film,” he said. “It's very interesting to me that a company would engage in a business arrangement knowing that there's severe controversy around many issues pertaining to the estate of Martin Luther King Jr.”