--- description: Yuri Kochiyama, a lifelong activist who was famously photographed cradling Malcolm X's head the night he was assassinated, has died. title: Yuri Kochiyama, at Malcolm X's Side When He Died, Is Dead at 93 image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8f569b6f5759cc39/69884bed428a9ea6b5cccd77/140602-malcolmx.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Yuri Kochiyama, at Malcolm X's Side When He Died, Is Dead at 93 by [Ben Cosgrove](/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jun 2, 2014 2:04 PM CUT  A photo by Malcolm X's close associate Earl Grant shows Yuri Kochiyama (above left, in glasses) cradling the fatally wounded human rights activist's head at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, Feb. 21, 1965. A photo by Malcolm X's close associate Earl Grant shows Yuri Kochiyama (above left, in glasses) cradling the fatally wounded human rights activist's head at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, Feb. 21, 1965.LIFE Magazine by [Ben Cosgrove](/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jun 2, 2014 2:04 PM CUT Yuri Kochiyama — a long-time political activist who famously appeared in a photo in LIFE, cradling Malcolm X’s head at Harlem’s Audubon Ballroom the night he was assassinated in February 1965 — [died at her home in Berkeley, Calif., on Sunday](http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2014/06/02/318072652/japanese-american-activist-and-malcolm-x-ally-dies-at-93 "undefined"). She was 93 years old. Interned along with members of her family and tens of thousands of other Japanese-Americans during World War II, the California native and her husband, Bill Kochiyama — a Nisei soldier who fought for the U.S. during the war — were in the vanguard of countless civil-rights and social-justice battles over the last six decades. [\[MORE: ‘Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam: Eve Arnold’s Quietly Powerful Portraits’\]](http://life.time.com/history/malcolm-x-and-the-nation-of-islam-eve-arnold-photos/ "undefined")  A photo by Malcolm X's close associate Earl Grant shows Yuri Kochiyama (above left, in glasses) cradling the fatally wounded human rights activist's head at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, Feb. 21, 1965. LIFE Magazine ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3880035/yuri-kochiyama-at-malcolm-xs-side-when-he-died-is-dead-at-93/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3880035/yuri-kochiyama-at-malcolm-xs-side-when-he-died-is-dead-at-93/"},"headline":"Yuri Kochiyama, at Malcolm X's Side When He Died, Is Dead at 93","datePublished":"2014-06-02T14:04:38.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:03:41.193Z","description":"Yuri Kochiyama, a long-time political activist who was famously photographed cradling Malcolm X's head at Harlem's Audubon Ballroom the night he was assassinated in February 1965, has died.","url":"https://time.com/3880035/yuri-kochiyama-at-malcolm-xs-side-when-he-died-is-dead-at-93/","keywords":["History","photography","Civil Rights"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8f569b6f5759cc39/69884bed428a9ea6b5cccd77/140602-malcolmx.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Ben Cosgrove","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8f569b6f5759cc39/69884bed428a9ea6b5cccd77/140602-malcolmx.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Malcolm X Assassination","caption":"A photo by Malcolm X's close associate Earl Grant shows Yuri Kochiyama (above left, in glasses) cradling the fatally wounded human rights activist's head at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, Feb. 21, 1965.","creditText":"LIFE Magazine","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3880035/yuri-kochiyama-at-malcolm-xs-side-when-he-died-is-dead-at-93/","name":"Yuri Kochiyama, at Malcolm X's Side When He Died, Is Dead at 93"}}]}] ```