Business as usual or meet the lone gunman(UA-66627984-1)

The Bottle

The Bottle

 

During my Lancer 2023 presentation (at 51:21) I brought up the find of a bottle that stood closely to where Prayer Man (aka Lee Harvey Oswald) was standing. This bit gets very little mention in my book Prayer Man More Than a Fuzzy Picture. It is something I had started to look into years ago already while studying the Prayer Man footage in the Darnell and Wiegman films.

I based my initial find of a bottle on some still and moving frames of the Dave Wiegman film where we can see Prayer Man is moving an object that is partially illuminated, with his right hand only, closer to his face. Not many objects can be illuminated like that, but I know one thing that does and that is glass. For those that are not too familiar about this whole matter; Oswald got a coke for his lunch!

 

Wiegman close-up frames of Prayer Man drinking in slow motion by Stan Dane.

After the assassination there is a find of a bottle that stood in the westerly corner of the TSBD steps and that was captured by William Allen of the Dallas Times Herald in a few of his photos of the front of the TSBD as shown below. To the best of my estimation these pix were taken between 13:00 and 14:30 that day. The DPD did not cordon the building off until 20-25 minutes after the assassination.

In the William Allen contact strips below in the green sectioned area it shows that frames nos 11-13 show many people standing on and in front of the TSBD front steps, these people are gone in the subsequent image, with the very first frame (no 14) showing the sighting of the bottle. This is the first photograph of the gallery of four images above.

William Allen photos. Click to enlarge.

In the photos below the front of the TSBD is managed by the DPD and TSBD employees can only be seen behind the glass front inside or when leaving the building. All photos by William Allen – Dallas Times Herald. These images come from The Portal to Texas History.

At the Education Forum Chris Scally jumped on to this specific bit of my presentation and posted a William Allen photograph of Herbert Sawyer of the DPD, holding a Dr. Pepper bottle while standing on the Texas School Book Depository’s steps. Sawyer had setup his command post right there and was seen interviewing Howard Brennan inside a patrol car right in front of the Texas School Book Depository’s front steps shortly before. Scally did not base his ‘find’ on anything substantial other than to assume that Sawyer had littered his bottle on those steps. Something for me hard to accept for being plausible in those days.

Herbert Sawyer on the left, Marvin Wise to the right. Photo: William Allen/DTH. From The Portal to Texas History. Click pic. to enlarge.

I managed to pinpoint roughly when the image was taken (just before 13:00 hrs) by getting hold of some of Allen’s contact sheets with thanks to Dennis Morissette. Check out the green marked image and you can see that the tramps, escorted by Marvin Wise are his next shots. Then in the following frames on the strip below we can see Gerald Hill shouting from the sixth floor before his departure to the Tippit murder and Oswald’s subsequent arrest at the Texas Theatre. Finally at the end of the bottom strip is Larry Florer’s arrest. That arrest of Larry Florer (image 17), whose arrest happened at about 12:50 – 13:00.

 

The decisive part for me is that Oswald’s lunch bag rolled up and jammed between the bottle and the step from a close-up seen below. The bottle that Sawyer is holding has Dr Pepper stamped on, it is not a label of some sort.

If only they had tested that bottle and sack for fingerprints………

A Closer Look at Bart Kamp’s Prayer Man

A Closer Look at Bart Kamp’s Prayer Man

 

I had not noticed this Dec 4th article at KennedysandKing.com  until yesterday, and I know only now about it thanks to Vinny at ROKC. In this article Jake Fernandez has reviewed Prayer Man: More Than A Fuzzy Picture at Kennedysandking.

Here is a quote from his review: “As we navigate through Kamp’s exploration, encountering historical figures, overlooked sketches, and clandestine meetings, we are prompted to view the “Prayer Man” not as a static element in a photograph but as a key to unlocking the best-kept secrets regarding the Kennedy assassination.”

JFK Lancer 2023 Conference

JFK Lancer 2023 Conference

  Below some pictures of the crowd at the JFK Lancer Conference while my presentation was on in Dallas on Nov 19th 2023.

With thanks to Peter Antill for the photographs.

And here is the video of it, added Nov 24th.

The Lone Gunman Podcast- More Than a Fuzzy Picture

The Lone Gunman Podcast – More Than a Fuzzy Picture.

 

I had the pleasure speaking again with Rob Clark of the Lone Gunman Podcast. And as always great fun to do and had a very relaxed and mostly unscripted chat.

Listen to it HERE.

Thank you Rob!!!

The Opperman Report

The Opperman Report

  I spoke with Ed Opperman on Sept 25th about Prayer Man.

You can listen to it on Spreaker HERE.

Enjoy!

Prayer Man More Than a Fuzzy Picture reviews

Prayer Man More Than a Fuzzy Picture reviews

 Since its early September release the book Prayer Man More Than a Fuzzy Picture has been received very well. It is hovering at an average 4.5 mark on Amazon for which I am very grateful. So thanks to those who purchased it and also left a high rating and a few kind words.

And earlier today Jim DiEugenio posted a comprehensive book review at his Kennedysandking website. It is a ten minute read, but it is well worth the time spent on it as it gets to some of the core matters of my research.

Out Of The Blank #1495

Thanks to Robbie Robertson for featuring me again on his out of the Blank podcast.

 

Also my book Prayer Man More Than A Fuzzy Picture is now also available through Barnes & Noble.

Prayer Man More Than A Fuzzy Picture

Prayer Man More Than A Fuzzy Picture

 

Prayer Man More Than A Fuzzy Picture Book Cover

So here it is, something I did not think I would be putting together,  a book! Especially after finishing my papers just over a year ago, ‘blame’ Malcolm Blunt who said to me in June 2022 “You should do a book.” It meant more research and many more hours of work, which enabled me to conclude on some things I had not thought thought of, like the fingerprints, palm prints and above all the connection between the rifle and Lee Oswald on Nov 22nd.

That editing and finalising the book was going to be such a slog (10 weeks) and that stressful was unbeknown to me, but hey I am an experience richer. Same goes with publishing it thru Amazon, which was virgin territory as well.

I hope you enjoy it, like the ones who have ordered it already!

To order from Amazon click below
E-book.
USAUKAUS 
Soft back
USAUKAUS
Update Sept 18th 2023.
It is now also available through Barnes & Noble.

The Dallas Action – Episode 206

The Dallas Action – Episode 206

 

I had the pleasure once again to talk with Doug Campbell about my forthcoming book “Prayer Man: More Than A Fuzzy Picture”.  This time we talk about what happened in front and inside the TSBD. Click the picture below to go to Spreaker to listen to the podcast.

JFK Lancer 2023

JFK Lancer Conference 2023

 

I will be doing a one hour presentation remotely at the 27th Annual JFK Lancer Conference!
This event is being held on November 17th – 19th, 2023 at the Lorenzo Hotel, Dallas, Texas.

I shall be speaking about some of my key findings from my book Prayer Man: More Than a Fuzzy Picture.

The Book

The Book

 

So when I finished my papers last year in June Malcolm Blunt said to me “you should do a book”. And that was something I had not planned on doing at all. I was completely against it when I set off on this ‘journey’ of writing it all down in 2016. I enjoyed the approach of the interactive papers with its inserted evidence right there and then.

Had it been anyone else I would not have heeded much notice to that remark, but in this case I did nothing until September 2022 and then started to look into what needed to be done to add and turn it into a book. Producing a book is not really something I have done before, it’s my first.

So here goes….

Since Autumn 2022; the fingerprints, palm prints and nitrate tests have been dug into. Oswald’s psych reports at Youth House in 1953 as well. There will be partial transcripts of interviews done by Ed Ledoux  with Roy Edward Lewis in 2018 & 2022.  On top of that some serious finds added purely based on the documented evidence at hand from the Malcolm Blunt archive and not brought forward before on  this website or anywhere else.

The e-book version will have all its evidence ( 1,200 foot notes) linked but for the hard copy book version I refer you to this website’s special section of the book. Which is a set of pages that has the book chapters’ numbered links to all evidence neatly organised for those that are interested. So you can use your electronic device at the same time to check out the foot notes while reading on that particular page of your hard copy.

This section I put together instead of having to go back and forth within book.

The book will have three chapters:

  1. Prayer Man.
  2. Inside the TSBD.
  3. The Interrogations.

Setting up this whole thing is virgin territory to me and took a few weeks longer than originally thought, but now I hope to release the e-book by July 10th and the hard copy version to be released a week later.

Quick Hits Episode #43

Quick Hits Episode #43

 

Time for another chat with Doug Campbell & Rob Clark of the Quick Hits podcast. I think it was my fifth time and as always great fun to attend to. Talked about a few bits that will appear in the forthcoming book, which I hope will see the light of day by the end of this month in e-book shape and a hard copy version to follow in June/July.

Click the pic below to take you to that episode. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did in partaking it.

Lee Harvey Oswald – Youth House NY – Psychiatry Test 1953

Lee Harvey Oswald – Youth House NY – Psychiatry Tests 1953

 

One aspect of this case I wanted to include was Oswald’s Youth House psychiatry tests in 1953. He stayed at Youth House due to his increased absence from school late 1952 to the beginning of 1953, in New York, while being a young teenager. Youth House was a remand centre for delinquent boys who had gotten into trouble with the court and were remanded to Youth House for a brief period of diagnostic study. These psychiatry tests could be giving us some sort of insight into who Lee Harvey Oswald was. And do these tests have any relation to his behaviour while being incarcerated on Nov. 22nd – 24th 1963?

Oswald is admitted on April 16th 1953 and his psychiatry test was taken and reported upon on April 21st 1953 by John Carro, Some of the pages of the above linked document are very hard to read due to the terrible reproductive quality. The first 4/5 pages (of the 33) is the report that has been made up by Carro. Pages one & two start with Oswald’s background and then on that second page it states that Lee is a boy of average height and weight and the boy impressed the P.O. of a boy of normal mental and physical development. Lee was pleasant and friendly though withdrawn to himself. During the interview the boy’s expression was one of indifference. He more or less of’ a blank expression, registered little enthusiasm nor emotions. When questioned, he generally answers affirmatively by saying “I guess so”. He tried to evade an impression of unconcern as to what had taken place. The P.O. observed that the boy is somewhat shallow and seems to be immature to have little capacity for comprehension.

On page three Marguerite Oswald describes Lee as an introvert who has difficulty making friends after moving to NY in the midst of different nationalities and move into a crowded apartment and has retreated into a shell. On page four it is stated that the boy, the P.O.’s observed, is a friendly, likeable boy who portrays very little emotions. Rendition to the present situation (absence from school-BK) was one of indifference. The P.O. feels that we are dealing with a boy who feels a great deal of insecurity and the need for acceptance. As it does not seem that this can be done with the boy remaining at home, but it was felt that perhaps placement in an institution where these needs can be met would be beneficial at this time. However, recommendation is being held in acceptance pending the receipt of the psychiatric examination.

John Carro is called up by the Warren Commission and in his testimony  he does not relay much valuable info as to Oswald’s personality but there is an exchange as to what was in the planning for Oswald.

Mr. LIEBELER – You mentioned that the boy was going to go to your own psychiatric clinic. That is a different proposition from the Youth House, is it not?

Mr. CARRO – Yes. This is the psychiatric court clinic, that is on 22nd Street, which in some instances, where we are not able to effect the kind of placing we need or so, we will utilize that as a last resort, and the boy would go there periodically and be seen by the psychiatrist.

Mr. LIEBELER – It would be an outpatient-type situation?

Mr. CARRO – An outpatient-type of situation, yes.

And

Mr. LIEBELER – Would you say that Oswald was more mentally disturbed than most of the boys that you had under your supervision at that time?

Mr. CARRO – Not at all, actually. I have handled cases of boys who committed murders, burglaries, and I have had some extremely disturbed boys, and this was one of the problems, this was just initially a truancy situation, not one of real disruptive or acting out delinquent behavior.

Back to the psychiatric reports document and on that same page four Dr Renatus Hartogs continues with his summary on May 1st 1953. This 13 year old well built boy has superior mental resources and functions only slightly below his capacity level in spite of chronic truancy from school which brought him into Youth House. No finding of neurological impairment or psychotic mental changes could be made. Lee had to be diagnosed as a personality pattern disturbance with schizoid features and passive aggressive tendencies. Lee has to be seen as an emotionally, quite disturbed youngster who suffers the impact of really existing emotional isolation and deprivation, lack of affection, absence of family life and rejection by a self involved and conflicted mother. Although she denies that he is in need of any other form help other than “remedial” one, we gained the definite impression that Lee can be reached through contact with an understanding and very patient psychotherapist and if he could be drawn at the same time into group psychotherapy. We arrive therefore at the recommendation that he shouldnbe placed on probation under the condition that he seek help and guidance through contact with a child guidance clinic, where he should be treated preferably by a male psychiatrist who coud substitute, to a certain degree at least for the lack of a father figure. At the same time, his mother should be urged to seek psycho therapeutic guidance through contact with a family agency. If this plan does not work out favourably and Lee cannot cooperate in his treatment plan on an out-patient basis, removal from the home and placement could be resorted to at a later date, but it is our definite impression that treatment on probation should be tried out before the stricter and therefore more harmful placement approach is applied to the case of this boy.

Renatus Hartogs. Photo by Martha Holmes.

On May 7th (page nine) Hartogs writes another report: He is a tense, withdrawn and evasive boy who dislikes intensely talking about himself and his feelings. He likes to give the impression that he doesn’t care about others and rather likes to keep to himself so that he is not bothered and does not have to make the effort of communicating. It was difficult penetrate the emotional wall behind which this boy hides and he provided us with sufficient clues, permitting us to see increase anxiety, shyness, feelings of awkwardness and insecurity as the main reasons as the main reasons for the withdrawal tendencies and solitary habits. Lee told us: “I don’t want a friend and I don’t like to talk to people.” He describes himself as stubborn and according to his own saying likes to say “no.” Strongly resistive and negativistic features were also noticed but psychotic mental content was denied and no indication of psychotic mental changes was arrived at.

He is a youngster with superior mental endowment functioning presently on the bright range of mental efficiency. His abstract thinking capacity and his vocabulary are well developed. No retardation in school subjects could be found in spite of his truancy from school.

An excerpt of Hartog’s WC testimony.

Mr. LIEBELER. In your capacity as chief psychiatrist for the Youth House did you have occasion at any time to interview Lee Harvey Oswald?

Dr. HARTOGS. Yes.

Mr. LIEBELER. Would you tell us when that was and all that you can remember about that interview in your own words?

Dr. HARTOGS. That is tough. I remember that-actually I reconstructed this from what I remembered from the seminar. We gave a seminar on this boy in which we discussed him, because he came to us on a charge of truancy from school, and yet when I examined him, I found him to have definite traits of dangerousness. In other words, this child had a potential for explosive, aggressive, assaultive acting out which was rather unusual to find in a child who was sent to Youth House on such a mild charge as truancy from school. This is the reason why I remember this particular child, and that is the reason why we discussed him in the seminar. I found him to be a medium-sized, slender, curly haired youngster, pale-faced, who was not very talkative, he was not spontaneous. He had to be prompted. He was polite. He answered in a somewhat monotonous fashion. His sentences were well structured. He was in full contact with reality.

Mr. LIEBELER. He was?

Dr. HARTOGS. He was in full contact with reality. I found his reasoning to be intensely self-centered, his judgment also centering around his own needs, and the way he looked at life and his relationships with people. This was mostly in the foreground. So this is what I remember actually.

Hartog’s recollection is not based on the documentation made in 1953/54 but on a seminar in which he and colleagues discussed the case in an informal non-documented manner. What is not explained is why he did not use his original report?

During the same testimony Hartogs claims Oswald was recommended to be sent to an institution. But the paperwork signed by Hartogs in 1953 does not support this at all, it was all on a probationary basis!

Mr. LIEBELER. Do you recall what recommendation you made to the court in respect of Oswald?

Dr. HARTOGS. If I can recall correctly, I recommended that this youngster should be committed to an institution.

Mr. LIEBELER. What type of institution, do you recall?

Dr. HARTOGS. No; that I don’t recall.

Mr. LIEBELER. But you are quite clear in your recollection that you recommended that he be institutionalized immediately because of the personality pattern disturbance; is that correct?

Dr. HARTOGS. Yes; that is right. That I remember; yes.

And a little later.

Mr. LIEBELER. Can you recall what kind of institution you recommended that Oswald he committed to?

Dr. HARTOGS. I never make a recommendation as to the name, the specific institution. This is a prerogative of the court.

Mr. LIEBELER. Do you make a recommendation as to the type of institution which you recommend a child?

Dr. HARTOGS. Yes; I do that, either a mental hospital or training school or residential treatment center, but I do not recall in this case what I recommended.

Mr. LIEBELER. But you do recall quite clearly that you did recommend, because of this boy’s personality pattern, disturbance?

Dr. HABTOGS. Yes; that he should not be placed in the community.

Mr. LIEBELER. Or placed on probation?

Dr. HARTOGS. Yes; that is right.

Mr. LIEBELER. Do you recall being interviewed on this question by the FBI?

Dr. HARTOGS. Yes.

Mr. LIEBELER. Do you remember approximately when they interviewed you?

Dr. HARTOGS. No; I don’t know the date.

Mr. LIEBELER. Do you remember that you told them the same thing, that is, that you recommended institutionalizing Oswald as a result of his psychiatric examination which indicated that he was potentially dangerous?

Dr. HARTOGS. Yes.

Dr Renatus Hartogs is exposed and criticised for his contradictory remarks in the New York Post in Nov. 1964.

Hartogs himself gets convicted of having sexual relations with a patient of his in 1975,

Renatus Hartogs in 1975.

Evelyn Strickman, a social worker questions Lee as well and writes a report on May 7th (pages 19-24).

Lee Oswald is a seriously detached, withdrawn youngster of thirteen years, but volunteered almost nothing by himself spontaneously. Despite the fact that he is very hard to reach, Lee seems to have some ability to relate which in view of the solitary existence he has been leading, is somewhat surprising. There is a rather pleasant, appealing quality about this emotionally starved, affectionless youngster which grows as one speaks to him, and it seems fairly clear that he has detached himself from the world around him because no one in it ever met any of his needs for love.

Laconic and taciturn, Lee answered questions, but volunteered almost nothing about himself spontaneously. Despite the fact that he is very hard to reach, Lee seems to have some ability to relate which in view of the solitary existence he has been leading, is somewhat surprising. There is a rather pleasant, appealing quality about this emotionally starved, affectionless youngster which grows as one speaks to him, and it seems fairly clear that he has detached himself from the world around him because no one in it ever met any of his needs for love.

Lee was able to respond to expressions of understanding for his lonely situation, but he denied that he really felt lonely. Questioning elicited the information that he feels almost as if there is a veil between him and other people through which they cannot reach him, but he prefers this veil to remain intact. He admitted, however, the tearing aside of the veil is talking to a social worker was not as painful as he would have anticipated. He was not comfortable in talking but he was not as disturbed in talking about his feelings as he thought he might be. When this was used as an opportunity to inquire into his fantasy life, he responded with a reminder that “This is my own business”. He agreed to answer questions if he wanted to, rejecting those which upset him and acknowledged fantasies about being powerful, and sometimes hurting or killing people, but refused to elaborate on this. None of these fantasies involved his mother, incidentally. He also acknowledged dreaming but refused to talk about the dreams other than to admit that they sometimes contained violence, but he insisted that they were pleasant.

Observation of Lee’s relationship with other boys during his stay at Youth House showed that he detached himself completely, and repulsed any efforts at friendship by others. Although he reacted favourably to supervision and did whatever was asked of him without comment when on his floor he sat by himself and read. At 8:15 every evening he asked to be excused so that he could go to bed. The other boys appeared to respect his seclusion and didn’t force themselves on him. He did not encourage conversation with anyone, and when asked questions was very terse in his replies. He was very neat and clean and always finished his work before going out to the floor.

In the recreation area he was usually quiet and withdrawn sitting by himself. If he did become involved in any minor altercation he was very hostile and belligerent and somewhat defiant of supervision. He seemed to be respected by group members who left him alone.

This pattern was some very minimal movement in his relationship with his social worker, although it was so small as to be almost not noticeable. Ordinarily when approached he remained polite but uncommunicative but when he was shown some special attention and concern when he had an earache, he responded somewhat. He never sought his caseworker out, and asked for nothing, nor did he volunteer anything further about himself.

Lee Oswald is a seriously withdrawn, detached and emotionally isolated boy of 13, who is at Youth House for the first time on a charge of truancy.

Lee became a reclusive child who was thrown upon himself and his own resources and he never made friends with other children. His mother who worked and who, when he was an infant, demonstrated her need to shift responsibility for him by leaving him with her sister and then placing him for a while in a Home, appears to be a rigid, self-involved woman with strong ideas and she has little understanding of this boy’s behaviour nor of the protective shell he has drawn around himself in his effort to avoid contact with people which may result in hurt for him. It is possible that her own negative attitude about casework help and probation officers may communicate itself to Lee, interfering with his chances for help. On the other hand there would be little accomplished by placing him in the impersonal setting afforded by an institution without seeing, first, if he can be reached in therapy. Despite his withdrawal, he gives the impression that he is not so difficult to reach as he appears and patient, prolonged effort in a sustained relationship with one therapist might bring results. There are indications that he has suffered serious personality damage but if he can receive help quickly this might be repaired to some extent.

Strickman also appears in front of the Warren Commission, but she does not elaborate anything further during that short session on Oswald’s personality.

*****

The FBI requested the test become part of the evidence and New York judge Florence Kelley grants the FBI their request due to extraordinary circumstances.

Judge Florence M. Kelley. Click to enlarge.

There is another FBI document, although released in full, it has no online appearance at all. Then there is this hefty 143 pager “Oswald Youth” document of which I only have the RIF sheet, the other pages are nowhere to be seen elsewhere online.

The psychiatric report from Apr 17 1953 by Irving Sokolow states: “All his scores are above the average for his age group, appreciably so in the verbalization of abstract concepts and in the assembly of commonly recognizable objects. His method of approach was generally an easy, facile and a highly perceptive one. Although presumably disinterested in school subjects he operates on a much higher than average level.”

This FBI report quotes from Evelyn Strickman on Apr. 30 (pages 2 & 3): “This is a seriously detached withdrawn youngster who has preserved some ability to relate, but is very hard to reach, He is laconic and taciturn and while he answered questions he volunteered almost nothing about himself. Toward the end of the interview he occasionally would say something gratuitously without my asking him but on the whole everything had to be pulled from him. What is really surprising is that this boy has not lost entirely his ability to communicate with other people because he has been leading such a detached, solitary existence for most of his life.” The full assessment can be read on pages 11-14 of the Youth House report.

Edgar A. Buttle of the law firm Finch & Schaefler writes to Melvin Roman of the Domestic Relations Court on Dec 14th 1953 (page 25) It is my thought that some serious consideration should be given to having the boy receive private clinical treatment if it is really necessary. It has been my impression that the boy has the feeling he is being kept under surveillance so extensively that he is beginning to feel abnormal. While I am highly in favour of psychiatric treatment and its accomplishments, I feel in this case it is being overdone.

Three days later Bessie Ford (page 26), a chief psychiatric social worker of the Domestic Relations Court states that the family has moved to New Jersey.

On Dec 30th 1963 the FBI writes a report about Buttle and his then contact with the Domestic Relations Court about the handling of Oswald and states that “it was conceivable that the problem of the boy in question could be the result of too close supervision of the boy by the court or school officers, resulting in a psychiatric condition being forced upon the youth.”

Sources:

Malcolm Blunt Archives

Harold Weisberg Archives.

Lee Shepherd for the Carro video link.

Out of the Blank #1366

I had a chat with Robbie Robertson two weeks ago. Was not really in the mood, but got ‘chatted’ into doing it. I ended up talking about the fingerprints, palm prints and the nitrate tests and also a bit on Oswald at Youth House. An article on that is in the works. It is an element that had to be added to the interrogations chapter.

Furthermore I am working hard on the book. I hope to have it done in electronic form in about 2-3 weeks (famous last words….). A physical copy follows in and around May/June. There will be some exclusive content in that book. Watch this space.

Also I am doing another Quick Hits show with Doug Campbell and Rob Clark in April, so more to come.

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Paraffin Casts

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Paraffin Casts.

 

The paraffin casts are interesting as it appeared to be able to confirm whether Oswald had fired a weapon or not. I will share all my available information that I have managed to gather and my special thanks go to Malcolm Blunt for the documentation. I thank Terry Martin for the scans of the hallway photographs. I also used documents from NARAMFFAARC, History Matters and UNT.

Joseph L Thimes on gunshot wounds and their residue tests. This four page summarisation is a great way to familiarise yourself with the subject matter at hand. Also some article and book excerpts on the paraffin casts and its tests, from Malcolm Blunt Archive, are worth checking out as well. At the Weisberg Archive is a chronology of some of the reports and DPD statements released by Dallas Police. Jesse Curry and C.W. Brown seem to be most vocal about the tests.

The Warren Report on the paraffin casts

The Warren Report states on page 561: In fact, however, the test is completely unreliable in determining either whether a person has recently fired a weapon or whether he has not.

A positive reaction is, therefore, valueless in determining whether a suspect has recently fired a weapon. Conversely, a person who has recently fired a weapon may not show a positive reaction to the paraffin test, particularly if the weapon was a rifle. A revolver is so constructed that there is a space between the cylinder, which bears the chambers, and the barrel. When a revolver is fired, nitrate-bearing gases escape through this space and may leave residues on the hand. In a rifle, however, there is no gap between the chamber and the barrel, and one would therefore not expect nitrates to be deposited upon a person’s hands or cheeks as a result of his firing a rifle.

An agent of the FBI, using the C2766 rifle, fired three rounds of Western 6.5-millimeter Mannlicher-Carcano ammunition in rapid succession. A paraffin test was then performed on both of his hands and his right cheek. Both of his hands and his cheek tested negative.
The paraffin casts of Oswald’s hands and right cheek were also examined by neutron-activation analyses at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Barium and antimony were found to be present on both surfaces of all the casts and also in residues from the rifle cartridge cases and the revolver cartridge cases.  Since barium and antimony were present in both the rifle and the revolver cartridge cases, their presence on the casts were not evidence that Oswald had fired the rifle.

In short the Warren Commission wasn’t too impressed with the paraffin tests from an evidentiary point of view. Oswald, while working at the TSBD that morning definitely had gotten into contact with printing ink (nitrates). Which would have been enough to have contaminated the paraffin test from the beginning.

W.E. Barnes

 

Jim Murray/Black Star. Scanned by Terry Martin/ROKC from the Richard E Sprague archive at NARA.

When W.E. Barnes is photographed in the corridor after applying the casts it becomes clear that he has an empty(!) tin of wax in his hands (here is a close-up), but there are no paraffin casts on display, allegedly he dropped these off on the fourth floor, as per his  WC testimony, and the three of them did their appearance in the corridor with the evidence afterwards.

Mr. BELIN. At the time you carried back the paraffin casts?
Mr. BARNES. No. We came back and got the palm prints after I delivered the paraffin tests upstairs. 

W.E. ‘Pete’ Barnes and his empty tin of paraffin wax. Pic.: Ft Worth Star Telegram.

 

Effectiveness of a paraffin cast on a cheek to determine whether a rifle had been fired

  • W. E. ‘Pete’ Barnes who had been doing these tests for quite a few years, had not applied this test to a suspect’s face ever before. He did this test on orders of Will Fritz. And it would not have made any difference in determining whether Oswald had fired a rifle that day! For this I refer you to Barnes’ W.C. testimony.

Mr. BELIN. Well, let me ask you this. Of the paraffin tests that you have made, how many have you made of a cheek or cheeks?

Mr. BARNES. One.

Mr. BELIN. Was that with Lee Harvey Oswald?

Mr. BARNES. It was.

Mr. BELIN. Other than that, you have never made a paraffin test of anyone’s cheek?

Mr. BARNES. No.

Mr. BELIN. Any particular reason why you might not have in any other case?

Mr. BARNES. It has never been requested of me before.

Mr. BELIN. Based on your knowledge and information about the science of paraffin tests, do you know whether or not it is a common practice or not a common practice to make it of one cheek?

Mr. BARNES. It is not a common practice.

Mr. BELIN. Any particular reason it is not a common practice that you can think of or know of?

Mr. BARNES. Firing a revolver, should he fire a revolver, I would say the revolver most likely would be far enough away where powder residue wouldn’t reach his cheek.

Mr. BELIN. What about a rifle?

Mr. BARNES. Firing a rifle, you get your chamber enclosed with steel metal around it, and the chances of powder residue would be very remote.

Mr. BELIN. Have you fired a bolt-action rifle at all before?

Mr. BARNES. Many times.

Mr. BELIN. How close would the chamber be to the cheek as you would be looking through the sight of the gun?

Mr. BARNES. Be several inches to the rear of the chamber.

Mr. BELIN. Would this have any effect on the paraffin test at all?

Mr. BARNES. It sure would.

Mr. BELIN. What about telescopic sights? Would that push your face back further or not?

Mr. BARNES. Push it even further back.

Mr. BELIN. Would this have an effect on the paraffin test?

Mr. BARNES. The further you get from the chamber, the less possibility of getting powder residue on it would be.

A little later during the same testimony.

Mr. BELIN. Did Lee Harvey Oswald say anything to you as you were removing these casts, that you remember?

Mr. BARNES. Very little, other than what I repeated to you before, that he knew what I was trying to do, and that I was wasting my time that he didn’t know anything about what we were accusing him of.

Barnes is also quoted in a summarisation of a DPD/WC document that taking a paraffin cast of Oswald’s hand was ok with him.

  • Carl Day says pretty much the same during his C. testimony:

Mr. DAY. I directed them to make it, and also paraffin casts or just of a piece of paraffin on the left side of the face to see if there were any nitrates there.

Mr. BELIN. On the left side or right side of the face?

Mr. DAY. Right side.

Mr. BELIN. Do you know what the results of the paraffin tests were?

Mr. DAY. The test on the face was negative.

Mr. BELIN. Had you ever done a paraffin test on a face before?

Mr. DAY. No; actually–had it not been for the particular type of case and this particular situation here we would not have at this time. It was just something that was done to actually keep from someone saying later on, “Why didn’t you do it?” Actually, in my experience there, shooting a rifle with a telescopic sight there would be no chance for nitrates to get way back or on the side of the face from a rifle.

Mr. BALL. Is it usual to find any trace of nitrate on the face if a rifle has been fired? 
Mr. HICKS. That is the first time that I had the opportunity to make a paraffin test on a person’s face.
Mr. BALL. You never made one before?
Mr. HICKS. Never before.
Mr. BALL. The other tests were always on the hands?
Mr. HICKS. Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. Was there some reason for that?
Mr. HICKS. I had never had the occasion arise that I know of where anyone had that suggested, that a paraffin test be made of a cheek. On other occasions they were only interested in the hand.

The admissions during the W.C. testimonies of Barnes and Day mean that the paraffin cast of Oswald’s right cheek was not going to give them the confirmation of Oswald’s connect to the rifle.

Paraffin test before or after fingerprints?

Then there is the small, but pivotal matter of whether the fingerprints and palm print were taken before the paraffin tests. During Barnes’ testimony something jumps out. And that is whether the finger prints and palm prints were administered before or after the paraffin tests. If they did them before then these paraffin tests would have been useless from the beginning due to the nitrates from the ink being present.

Mr. BELIN. Sergeant, did you make any other tests or obtain any other evidence or information from Lee Harvey Oswald other than the paraffin that you made?
Mr. BARNES. I obtained palm prints from Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. BELIN. When did you do this?
Mr. BARNES. Immediately before we made—no, immediately after, I am sorry, immediately after we made the paraffin test.
Mr. BELIN. I would assume you did it afterwards?
Mr. BARNES. That is right. It was after we made the tests. 

According to Ramparts Magazine (page 4), Oswald had his palm prints and finger prints taken before those paraffin tests. In a report submitted by Richard Sims and Elmer Boyd it states that the fingerprints were taken before the paraffin casts.

Barnes is also interviewed for the HSCA on April 17th 1978. And he does not misspeak again and sticks to the order of the paraffin casts being taken first on Oswald and then having his finger and palm prints taken. At the end of the statement it says that J.B. Hicks was not present to be interviewed since he had left town to go fishing.

What happened with the casts?

The paraffin casts are sent in three envelopes to DCCCIL at Parkland hospital by George Doughty (page 5). The results from these tests are not obtained until the next day. In this ten page report it is brought forward that the results are showing nitrate patterns consistent with the subject having discharged a firearm on exhibits #2 and #3. A pattern on exhibit #3 is typical of the patterns produced in firing a revolver. None of these point to Oswald firing a rifle. Nor are they able to differentiate the powder residues, after a Neutron Activation Analysis, to see which particles are from a revolver or from a rifle. There is more additional technical info from Vincent Guinn and articles here. Guinn himself defends the work he and others have done in a newspaper article on Oct 13 1964.

The FBI also releases a report in the afternoon of Nov 23rd which states the same. The FBI earlier that day is keen to obtain the test results for section Chief Jim Handley. The second page is peculiar as it states the paraffin tests were taken at 10:45 AM and that a doctor was present who conducted it!

The findings get repeated in another FBI document alongside the mention of Louie L Anderson, of the Dallas City Council Criminal Investigative Laboratory who washed and taken the paraffin casts home since they were marked to be discarded.

Norman Redlich writes to his fellow Warren Commission member Allen Dulles on July 2nd  1964 and states rather concisely what the Neutron Activation Analysis had managed to achive. Which is not much.

Marrion Johnson of NARA confirms on Feb 3 1966 (page 2) that he has examined seven pieces of paraffin cast and an empty wax tin among the FBI evidence exhibits.

In conclusion, there was not a shred of evidence that tied Oswald to the rifle, not the fingerprints, the palm prints nor the nitrate tests.

Add on that the DPD had no clue about the Hidell ID on the 22nd what did they actually have to charge Oswald with the murder of John Kennedy? Nothing!

Dave Methany – Minnesota Daily Feb 20 1964 Click to enlarge.

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Palm Prints

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Palm Prints.

 

The palm print is of major interest and that is because eventually Oswald’s palm print was linked to the rifle, but before it got to that it went through some interesting moves. I will share all my available information that I have managed to gather and my special thanks go to Malcolm Blunt for some of the documentation, Terry Martin for the scans of the hallway photographs. Also NARAMFFAARC and UNT. And additional research by Michael T GriffithHarold WeisbergHenry Hurt and David Lifton. Sylvia Meagher is one of the very first ones, in Dec. 1964, who writes about this.

The palm print cards.

There are two sets of Nov. 22nd palm prints known to me. Both signed by Hicks, and referred to as CE 735 & 736. A better quality set is also at the Malcolm Blunt archive in a FBI report from May 19 1978.

Then at UNT, the second set (left & right) is also signed again by Hicks and the images are referred to as the Commission Exhibits. This means that these photos come from the WC and are not reproductions from the DPD themselves. The black edging and numbering give that away. These sets are not originals.

These sets differ from each other once you check the annotations and the positions of the printed fingers of the palm prints in the photographic reproductions.

Carl Day and the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle.

Taking a closer look at Carl Day and his statements about the alleged palm print lift. It was allegedly underneath the barrel and ‘protected’ by the wood stock. Day was the only person who handled the rifle.

Lieutenant Day is seen in this Helmer Reenberg compilation of various clips handling the weapon on the sixth floor of the TSBD, near the front entrance and inside the third floor corridor of the DPD. Below a set of photos of Day in the third floor corridor on his way to Room 317 of Robbery & Homicide which was Will Fritz’s office and where Marina Oswald was to be shown the rifle for identification. She was of no help to them. There are no reports of Marina positively identifying the rifle there and then.

In his W.C. testimony he explains where he found the print and what happened during the process of developing the palm print.

Mr. DAY. I took it to the office and tried to bring out the two prints I had seen on the side of the gun at the bookstore. They still were rather unclear. Due to the roughness of the metal, I photographed them rather than try to lift them. I could also see a trace of a print on the side of the barrel that extended under the woodstock. I started to take the woodstock off and noted traces of a palmprint near the firing end of the barrel about 3 inches under the wood-stock when I took the woodstock loose.
Mr. BELIN. You mean 3 inches from the small end of the woodstock?
Mr. DAY. Right–yes, sir.
Mr. McCLOY. From the firing end of the barrel, you mean the muzzle?
Mr. DAY. The muzzle; yes, sir.
Mr. BELIN. Let me clarify the record. By that you mean you found it on the metal or you mean you found it on the wood?
Mr. DAY. On the metal, after removing the wood.
Mr. BELIN. The wood. You removed the wood, and then underneath the wood is where you found the print?
Mr. DAY. On the bottom side of the barrel which was covered by the wood, I found traces of a palmprint. I dusted these and tried lifting them, the prints, with scotch tape in the usual manner. A faint palmprint came off. I could still see traces of the print under the barrel and was going to try to use photography to bring off or bring out a better print. About this time I received instructions from the chief’s office to go no further with the processing, it was to be released to the FBI for them to complete. I did not process the underside of the barrel under the scopic sight, did not get to this area of the gun.

Mr. BELIN. At what time did these same photographs which are the same as Commission Exhibit 720 and 721 of this print—-
Mr. DAY. About 8 o’clock, somewhere around 8 o’clock, in that neighbourhood.
Mr. BELIN. Of what date?
Mr. DAY. November 22, 1963.
Mr. BELIN. What about the lift which has previously been marked as Commission Exhibit 637?
Mr. DAY. About what?
Mr. BELIN. When did you turn that over to the FBI?
Mr. DAY. I released that to them on November 26, 1963. I did not release this—-
Mr. BELIN. You are referring now—-
Mr. DAY. On November 22.
Mr. BELIN. You are referring to Commission Exhibit 637?
Mr. DAY. Yes.
Mr. BELIN. Is there any particular reason why this was not released on the 22d?
Mr. DAY. The gun was being sent in to them for process of prints. Actually I thought the print on the gun was their best bet, still remained on there, and, too, there was another print, I thought possibly under the wood part up near the trigger housing.
Mr. BELIN. You mean the remaining traces of the powder you had when you got the lift, Exhibit 637, is that what you mean by the lift of the remaining print on the gun?
Mr. DAY. Yes, sir. Actually it was dried ridges on there. There were traces of ridges still on the gun barrel.
Mr. BELIN. Can you tell the circumstances under which you sent Commission Exhibit No. 637 to the FBI?
Mr. DAY. We released certain evidence to the FBI, including the gun, on November 22. It was returned to us on November 24. Then on November 26 we received instructions to send back to the FBI everything that we had.
Mr. BELIN. Did you do that?
Mr. DAY. Yes, sir; and at that time I sent the lift marked—-
Mr. BELIN. 637.

But then Day admits photographing the rifle again. He had another chance to photograph the rifle but did not bother about that all important lift again!

Mr. BELIN. I am now going to hand you No. 737 and ask you to state if you know what this is.
Mr. DAY. Yes, sir. This is the rifle found on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository November 22, 1963.
Mr. BELIN. Who took that picture?
Mr. DAY. I took it myself.
Mr. BELIN. When?
Mr. DAY. About 9 or 9:30 p.m., November 22, on the fourth floor of the City Hall in my office.

Carl Day and the Mannlicher Carcano. Click to enlarge.

Day will not confirm for 100% that Oswald’s palm print is CE 637 without checking it first.

Mr. BELIN. Based on your experience, I will ask you now for a definitive statement as to whether or not you can positively identify the print shown on Commission Commission Exhibit No. 637 as being from the right palm of Lee Harvey Oswald as shown on Commission Exhibit 629?
Mr. DAY. Maybe I shouldn’t absolutely make a positive statement without further checking that. I think it is his, but I would have to sit down and take two glasses to make an additional comparison before I would say absolutely, excluding all possibility, it is. I think it is, but I would have to do some more work on that.

He is questioned about the palm print at the very end by John J McCloy and his statement is very telling.

Mr. McCLOY. Can you restate again for the record what you can positively identify in terms of fingerprints or palm prints and Oswald’s—-
Mr. DAY. The palmprint on the box he apparently sat on I can definitely say it is his without being in fear of any error. The other, I think it is his, but I couldn’t say definitely on a witness stand.
Mr. McCLOY. By the other, you mean the other palmprint?
Mr. DAY. The palmprint and that tracer print aside the trigger housing or the magazine housing.

In an FBI interview from Sept. 9 1964 J.C. Day states on page 4: It appeared probable these prints were from the right palm and fingers of Lee Harvey Oswald, but the rifle was released to the FBI, to be sent to Washington, D .C. before the examination was completed and positive identification of the prints could be made. The prints were not very good for comparison purposes.

Later on he states that after the palm print lift he only told Jessy Curry and Will Fritz about it that evening. He was not able to state the exact time of the discovery nor when he relayed the result to Curry and Fritz. He only knows it is prior Vincent Drain’s collection of the evidence. Yet Curry is asked about the fingerprints that same evening and Will Fritz early on the 23rd and both answered negative.

Hard to believe this as Fritz would have used this there and then since he had nothing that tied Oswald to the rifle at that time. On Dec. 23 1963 Will Fritz has a report made up about the evidence and the palm print is briefly summarised in it. All irregularities are swept under the carpet.

Carl Day and the Mannlicher-Carcano. Click to enlarge.

In Carl Day’s HSCA interview on Oct. 18 1977 he states that Will Fritz ordered him to bring it downstairs and display it to Marina Oswald. Day could not understand whether she recognised the rifle or not. Only after his return to the fourth floor does he ‘discover’ part of a print on the metal bit underneath the barrel where it sits on the stock.

Will Fritz tells him twice to stop as the FBI is taking the rifle with them. No mention of Jesse Curry who was originally stated as the man who told Day to cease his work on the rifle.

He did not give the FBI the print lift as he thought the FBI would do a better job. When the rifle returns to Dallas, Day is disappointed that the FBI did not find the print on the barrel. And once the FBI requires the rifle to be sent back again. Day sent the print lift alongside with the rifle.

He did not make a positive ID with the print he lifted off the barrel as belonging to Oswald. He felt (!) it was Oswald’s, but would not have testified that it was, under oath without further examination.

 Henry Hurt for his book Reasonable Doubt interviewed Carl Day and Vince Drain in 1984 (page 109). Day remains adamant that the Oswald print was on the rifle when he first examined it a few hours after the shooting. Moreover, Day stated that when he gave the rifle to Agent Drain, he pointed out to the FBI man both the area where the print could be seen and the fingerprint dust used to bring it out. Lieutenant Day states that he cautioned Drain to be sure the area was not disturbed while the rifle was in transit to the FBI laboratory. Drain flatly disputes this, claiming that Day never showed him such a print. “I just don’t believe there was ever a print,” said Drain. He noted that there was increasing pressure on the Dallas police to build evidence in the case. Asked to explain what might have happened, Agent Drain stated, “All I can figure is that it [Oswald’s print] was some sort of cushion, because they were getting a lot of heat by Sunday night. You could take the print off Oswald’s card and put it on the rifle. Something like that happened.”

In First Day Evidence by Gary Savage & Rusty Livingstone Savage writes Captain Doughty came in at about 20:30 – 21:00 hrs and told Day to stop working on the rifle (p 108).

Also in the book, on page 108, “He then placed a strip of 2” scotch tape over the developed print and rubbed it down before finally lifting the tape containing the print off and placed it on a card. He said he then compared the lift to Oswald’s palm print card and was certain (!) that it was Oswald’s. He also said that after the lift, he could still see an impression of the palm print left on the barrel.

This is hard to believe when Day stated previously stated that he did not do such a thing.

Next, Lieutenant Day had intended to photograph the area of the rifle barrel from which the palm print lift had been made, but was again interrupted by Captain Doughty at about 10:00 pm. He was told once again to stop working on the gun and release it to FBI Agent Drain, who would arrive about 11:30 pm. Lieutenant Day did not have time to write any reports about what he had found, but did have time to reassemble the rifle before Drain arrived.

 So we have a third person entering the fold as to teling Day to stop working on the rifle! He is at first told by Will Fritz to cease working on the rifle, then Max Doughty tells him twice at 22:00 and then in a statement made by Day to the FBI (page 5) he said that the call from Jesse Curry to get the evidence ready for the FBI to collect came just before midnight! Curry btw makes no mention of this in any of his WC testimony.

Day said that a few days after the evidence was turned over, an FBI agent came to his house. He wanted too know when Lieutenant Day had lifted the palm print included in the evidence they had received because they had positively identified it themselves as Oswald’s palm print. Lieutenant Day got the impression that they had missed it and he could “envision J Edgar Hoover going into orbit.” (pages 109&110).

Lieutenant Day believed at the time that he had not completely obliterated the palm print on the barrel after his lift and later stated he had pointed out the area of the palm print to FBI agent Drain when turning the rifle over to him. Drain on the other hand did not recall being show the palm print (page 110).

 In this ARRB document from Dec. 19 1996 they question the course of the narrative regarding the palm print and the lack of contemporaneous evidence and wonder whether they should question Carl Day again.

Henry Wade.

It is Dallas DA Henry Wade who mentions the alleged palm prints first and that is during the press conference on Nov 24, while Oswald is dead.

 The FBI.

he FBI‘s Vincent Drain collects the rifle. Day and others reports state that he handed the rifle over to Drain at 23:45. This time is hard to accept as being correct. When Oswald speaks to the press at 00:15 he is still wearing his shirt. That shirt was part of the collection of evidence taken by Drain to Washington. Furthermore Henry Wade held a press conference after Oswald’s and Drain is seen standing next to Wade. The earliest Drain could have collected it and taken it away with him would have been 00:30.

The FBI (J Edgar Hoover) writes on Nov. 23rd to DPD Chief Jesse Curry and have found nothing. He states the following on page 7: The latent prints appearing in the photograph taken of the rifle K1, by the Dallas Police Department, are too fragmentary and indistinct to be of any value for identification purposes. Photographs of this weapon taken by this Bureau have failed to produce prints of sufficient legibility for comparison purposes.

After processing the rifle the FBI returns the rifle to the Dallas Police on Nov. 24. The FBI could not find anything, but the DPD produces a palm print lift four days after the evidence has travelled back and forth from Dallas to Washington already.

Then the evidence is turned back over to the FBI by Carl Day to Vincent Drain on Nov. 26th. And this time the palm print lift is included with the rest of the evidence. The official report by Day.

The FBI states in a report, titled “LATENT FINGERPRINTS EXAMINATIONS”, from Nov. 28 that fingerprints and palm prints have been discovered on certain items, but there is no mention of any found on the rifle.

On Nov 29. 1963 the rifle is back in FBI custody after it had been back in DPD custody from Nov 24.

In this report by the ARRB all rifle transporations are logged.

The FBI on Feb. 23 1964 questions the initial missing photographs of the palm print (page 2).

Sebastian Latona.

Sebastian Latona, who is the FBI’s supervisor of the latent fingerprint section of the identity division, in his WC testimony states the following about the quality of the weapon and its connection to fingerprints:

 

Representative BOGGS. Now, does a weapon lend itself to retaining fingerprints?

Mr. LATONA. This particular weapon here, first of all, in my opinion, the metal is very poorly finished. It is absorbent. Believe it or not, there is a certain amount of absorption into this metal itself. It is not finished in the sense that it is highly polished.

Representative BOGGS. So this would be conducive to getting a good print, or would it?

Mr. LATONA. It would not.

Representative BOGGS. I see-because it would absorb the moisture.

Mr. LATONA. That’s right. Now, there are other guns-for example, Smith and Wesson, which have exceptionally nice finishes, the blue metal finishes are better surfaces for latent prints. Where you have a nickel-plated or silver plated revolvers, where it is smooth-they are much more conducive to latent prints than some of these other things, say like the army type, the weapons used in wartime that are dull, to avoid reflection-things of that type-they are not as good.

Latona has various photographs taken of the rifle and also looks for any other prints.

So I made arrangements to immediately have a photographer come in and see if he could improve on the photographs that were taken by the Dallas Police Department. Well, we spent, between the two of us, setting up the camera, looking at prints,… highlighting, sidelighting, every type of lighting that we could conceivably think of, checking back and forth in the darkroom-we could not improve the condition of these latent prints. So, accordingly, the final conclusion was simply that the latent print on this gun was of no value, the fragments that were there. After that had been determined, I then proceeded to completely process the entire rifle, to see if there were any other prints of any significance or value any prints of value I would not know what the significance would be, but to see if there were any other prints. I completely covered the rifle.

Then he is asked whether he dusted the rifle himself.

Mr. EISENBERG. We will get other evidence in the record at a subsequent time to shon those were the prints of Oswald. Mr. Latona you were saying that you had worked over that rifle by applying a gray powder to it. Did you develop any fingerprints?

Mr. LATONA. I was not successful in developing any prints at all on the weapon. I also had one of the firearms examiners dismantle the weapon and I processed the complete weapon, all parts, everything else. And no latent prints of value were developed.

When it comes to the palm print Latona’s testimony confirms that they had no knowledge of it until seven days after the murder. They only knew of the trigger guard prints wrapped in cellophane. Nor did he see any trace of markings of a lifting on the gun.

Mr. EISENBERG. Now, Mr. Latona, as I understand it, on November 23, ‘therefore, the FBI had not succeeded in making an identification of a fingerprint or palmprint on the rifle, but several days later virtue of the receipt of this lift, which did not come with the weapon originally, the FBI did succeed in identifying a print on Exhibit 1303

Mr. LATONA. That is right.

Mr. EISENBERG. Which may explain any inconsistent or apparently inconsistent statements, which I believe appeared in the press, as to an identification?

Mr. LATONA. We had no personal knowledge of any palmprint having been developed on the rifle. The only prints that we knew of were the fragmentary prints which I previously pointed out had been indicated by the cellophane on the trigger guard. There was no indication on this rifle as to the existence of any other prints. This print which indicates it came from the underside of the gun barrel, evidently the lifting had heen so complete that there was nothing left to show any marking on the gun itself as to the existence of such even an attempt on the part of anyone else to process the rifle.

Mr. DULLES. Do I understand then that if there is a lifting of this kind, that it may obliterate—

Mr. LATONA. Completely.

Mr. DULLES. The original print?

Mr. LATONA. That is right.

Mr. EISENBERG. So that you personally,

Mr. Latona, did not know anything about a print being on the rifle which was identifiable until you received, actually received the lift, Exhibit 637?

Mr. LATONA. On the 29th of November.

Mr. EISENBERG. Seven days after the assassination. And in the intervening period, correspondicgly, the FBI had no such knowledge?

Mr. LATONA. As far as I know.

The WC and the FBI try to iron out the creases.

On Aug 28 1964 Wesley Liebeler reports to J Lee Rankin and mentions the Carl Day’s WC testimony and points out the issues regarding the lift of the palm print. He makes mention of FBI agent Sebastian Latona who makes contradicting statements about the barrel, the fingerprint powder, the prints and the lack thereof.

On Aug 28 1964 in a FBI document to Alan Belmont it is noted that the Warren Commission has some questions about the timing of the actual lift of the palm print. They also wonder aloud whether Day had taken actual photographs of the lift or the barrel and this is something he had not done.

In WC Exhibit 2637, a letter from J Edgar Hoover on Sep 4 1964 to J Lee Rankin. Hoover states that the attached photos of the palm print are the ones that were found under the barrel of the rifle.

In a DOJ document of Sep 11 1964 Day is mentioned as having lifted the palm print and that it belonged to Oswald. And that the FBI also tested it and came to the same conclusion. This record is based on the Sep 9 interview (see previous paragraph) of Carl Day by the FBI.

And when the Warren report is published the whole ‘discovery of the palm print’ is rubber stamped.

 

 

Related: Lee Harvey Oswald’s Fingerprints.

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Fingerprints

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Fingerprints.

 

Updated Dec 12 2022 with Nov 23 fingerprint info.

Updated Dec 14 2022 I have sectioned the piece and grouped content and also added some more additional text.

This is a chapter I, at first, did not want to write, and it shows as I started to type some things down on this matter over four years ago. This is part 1 of 3 about Lee Harvey Oswald’s fingerprints. The palm prints and the nitrate test are the other two. In this I will share all my available information that I have managed to gather and my special thanks go to Malcolm Blunt for the documentation, Terry Martin for the scans of the hallway photographs. Also NARA, MFF, AARC, History Matters and UNT. And research by Michael T Griffith, Harold Weisberg, Henry Hurt and David Lifton.

In this WC draft document (pages 1-3) they present their side of this fake story. Here’s mine.

There have been quite a few researchers discussing the finger prints in conjunction with the rifle. A good one is a letter from Michael T Griffith to the ARRB in Dec 1996, this shows how there were no finger & palm prints that evening tying the rifle to Lee Oswald!

In the 1980’s Jerry D. Rose tried to dig into this with articles in Penn Jones’ The Continuing Inquiry in April 1984 and also in a follow up article in The Third Decade in May of 1985. The annotations are not mine in case you are wondering. They are Harry Livingstone’s. By reading both these articles and combining these with the photographs of the fingerprints that are now available from UNT we are a little wiser, yet some issues remain.

Oswald is being visited in Will Fritz’s office by Captain George “Max” Doughty, Detective J.B. “Johnny” Hicks and Sergeant William E “Pete” Barnes. They arrived to take Oswald’s finger and palm prints, but also apply a nitrate test to determine whether he had fired a rifle.

The Search for the Original Fingerprints sets.

Only a few of the fingerprint sets are available to see publicly in archives and as Warren Commission Exhibits. Original sets that have been digitally reproduced are yellowish in colour. Some are at The Portal to Texas History. Further investigation of those sets shows that not one of the Oswald inked & original fingerprint sets seem to be from Nov 22nd. They only have reproductions of WC exhibits in their archives for that date.

One of the first to report on any fingerprints is Nat Pinkston in his late afternoon report of the 22nd. Day has found a partial print and he wishes to photograph it before it gets lifted.

There is a set of photos made by Jim Murray/Blackstar of the three above mentioned policemen holding Oswald’s fingerprints, palm prints and paraffin test tools. They are paraded around the third floor corridor for the world press to see. The policemen appear out of Room 317 one at a time. W.E. Barnes holds the palm prints, George Doughty shows two fingerprint cards and J.B. Hicks carries an empty tin of wax a brush, a small jar and a scraper.

Careful study of the fingerprint sets put on display by the DPD in the third floor corridor show these sets in enough detail of the prints themselves to ascertain where they are positioned on the fingerprint card. This is based on the comparison with the 5 rows wide and 2 rows down squares printed on the cards and the positions of certain fingerprints of Oswald on these cards.

At first, with just the above linked photos available, I was under the impression that Doughty showed off just one set of fingerprints.

Captain George Doughty with Lee Harvey Oswald’s finger print cards. Photos: Jim Murray/Black Star. Scans by Terry Martin for ROKC from the National Archives in the Richard E. Sprague Collection. Click to enlarge.

A video of this scene in the 3rd floor corridor shows that there are two cards shown. But I can only see one set due to the angle of the camera.

As luck would have it, in Malcolm Blunt’s archive, in a folder titled ‘Newspapers’, I come across the second set. Photographed up close by a news photographer from that opposite angle. And again that set of prints cannot be reconciled with any of the known fingerprint cards that are publicly available in any archive, nor are they presented as Commission Exhibits.

Lt. George Doughty showing off the second set of fingerprints. Thanks to Malcolm Blunt. Click to enlarge.

I came across another set of finger prints also signed by J.B. Hicks, this set is known as CE 627, but is not part of one of the sets shown that evening to the press.

While the HSCA was active a record is made on Jul 7 1978. It states that the original fingerprints and palm prints cannot be found in the archives. While scanning documents from Malcolm Blunt I came across three pages of which two were RIF sheets (ending with 48 and 49) and a cover sheet which states that the files have been withdrawn. After looking at these more carefully I can state that the RIF sheet ending with 49 is the same as the file stored online at the National Archives. But the RIF sheets are not equal as to the font used, check for yourself and compare the one below with the one at the link. The file with the RIF number ending with 48 is nowhere to be found. It gets no mention in Google and this in combination with cover sheet that the file consisting of four pages has been withdrawn by the F.B.I.  Now what is so compromising in those four pages for the file to disappear?

From thereon a search ensues and some are eventually found. The find of these fingerprints, shown on the next page, and the palm prints in the FBI archives described in this undated FBI document is quite something and you wonder whether the other two sets suffered a similar fate and not re-appearing.

During Carl Day’s W.C. testimony however it appears that he had these original sets with him. So what happened to the originals?

Mr. BELIN. With the permission of Commissioner McCloy, would it be possible to have Xerox copies substituted for these so that the original can go back with Lieutenant Day?
Mr. McCLOY. Yes.
Mr. BELIN. As I understand it, these are the last original copies you have of palm prints of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. DAY. Yes.
Mr. BELIN. Were you there when these prints were made?
Mr. DAY. No, sir. The prints that were made in my presence, which I compared with these, I can state are his, were sent to the FBI.
Mr. BELIN. Would these be the same prints as shown on Commission Exhibit 628 and 629?
Mr. DAY. No, sir. They are still not the originals. They had my name on it when I saw them sign it. But I did compare these with ones I saw made personally of Oswald, and I can say this is his left hand, his left palm, and his right palm.
Mr. BELIN. So you are saying 735 and 736 are his right and left palms. What about 628 and 629?
Mr. DAY. 629 is the right palm, and 628 is the left palm of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Mr. BELIN. What about 627, can you state what that is, if you know?
Mr. DAY. That is a set of fingerprints, standard set of fingerprints, of Lee Harvey Oswald taken by Detective J. B. Hicks on November 22, 1963.
Mr. BELIN. You have just examined these with your magnifying glass, is that correct?
Mr. DAY. Yes, sir.
Mr. BELIN. And you so identify these?
Mr. DAY. They are the fingerprints of Lee Harvey Oswald, whose palm prints appear in 735 and 736.

Fingerprints of Lee Harvey Oswald on Nov 22 signed by J.B. Hicks. Undated FBI document (page 6) from the Malcolm Blunt archives.

The signature of Lee Harvey Oswald on that card, is not his own. Oswald would not sign any of the fingerprint cards, so the DPD did it for him.

W.E Barnes in his WC testimony.

Mr. BELIN. Did he request that he have an attorney present at all, or not?
Mr. BARNES. He didn’t request one. He would not sign the fingerprint card when I asked him. We have a place on this card for the prisoner’s signature, and I asked him would he please sign that, and he said he wouldn’t sign anything until he talked to an attorney.
Mr. BELIN. Did he ask for an attorney or say anything about an attorney when you took the paraffin test?
Mr. BARNES. None to me.
Mr. BELIN. What did you say when he said he would not sign the fingerprint card?
Mr. BARNES. That was all right with me.

Mr. BELIN. Did you just take the palm prints, or did you also take fingerprints?
Mr. BARNES. We took both.

Then there are inkless fingerprints, of which there is a set at UNT, these were also made by J.B. Hicks.

Lee Harvey Oswald – Ink free fingerprint set. from UNT. Click pic to enlarge.

He makes mention of taking these inkless prints during his WC testimony.

Mr. HICKS. Let me see now, I took a set of Oswald’s prints from him that night some time. I do not recall.
Mr. BALL. 9 o’clock or so?
Mr. HICKS. It was some time in that area.
Mr. BALL. Where were you when you took the prints?
Mr. HICKS. I was in Captain Fritz’s office. In other words, I made those on an inkless pad. That’s a pad we use for fingerprinting people without the black ink that they make for the records.

Mr. BALL. Did you do any identification work on either the assassination of President Kennedy or the investigation of Tippit’s murder?
Mr. HICKS. Do you mean as far as fingerprints?
Mr. BALL. Yes; and things of that sort.
Mr. HICKS. Let me see now, I took a set of Oswald’s prints from him that night some time. I do not recall.
Mr. BALL. 9 o’clock or so?
Mr. HICKS. It was some time in that area.
Mr. BALL. Where were you when you took the prints?
Mr. HICKS. I was in Captain Fritz’ office. In other words, I made those on an inkless pad. That’s a pad we use for fingerprinting people without the black ink that they make for the records.

Things get even more peculiar when I come across an inkless set in the book First Day Evidence by Gary Savage & Rusty Livingstone. This set differs from the one at UNT, simply by comparing the positions of Hicks’ signature on both. This set is also not known outside this book, it’s unique. it looks like a reproduction of an original to me and dare I say it that this set has been ‘taken’ from the evidence locker, since there is no other archival / online presence of this set of prints. A souvenir.

Reproduction of the fingerprint card inside First Day Evidence by Gary Savage & Rusty Livingstone..

 

 

The inkless set, from the book First Day Evidence by Gary Savage & Rusty Livingstone further above in this article, is ascribed to being taken at Parkland on Nov 25th when Oswald is in the morgue.

Fingerprints Lee Harvey Oswald from Nov 25 1963. From: Getty Images. Click to enlarge.

Oswald’s fingerprints from the morgue are taken early on Nov 25th 1963. Paul Groody, a Dallas mortician, in a sworn statement on Oct 23 1979 (pages 26 & 27) states:

Q: While the body was in the prep room did the FBI or the Secret Service come into the prep room?

A: Yes, I am not sure which, but members of those kind of company, those kind of departments, did arrive with photographic equipment and fingerprinting equipment and go in and fingerprint because we had to clean the fingers off afterwards, and therefore there was that further work done by some authorities.

Q: Did you have to clean each finger on each hand?

A: If I remember correctly, we did. I am not positive on that but at least we know they took fingerprints. We were used to it.

Q: The substance they use is a black, very noticeable substance is that not correct?

A: Yes, that’s true. The black ink they use, and all usually. Its quiet difficult to get good prints, especially after embalming, and especially this one because they don’t come out so good. There is a lot of wrinkling and a lot of drying, you might say, and they wouldn’t have been great prints. I am sure of that, but could be distinguishable.

In a video from the movie The Men Who Killed Kennedy in 1988, Groody states that “agents would come” early on the 25th and that they had fingerprinting equipment with them and had left ink on Lee Harvey’s hands. Showing that they had finger and palm printed him. And they had to remove this ink to make the body be ready for burial.

In Henry Hurt’s book Reasonable Doubt (page 107). In 1983 FBI Agent Drain, who was closely involved in the investigation stated in an interview (with Hurt-BK) that he could not think of any logical reason that the FBI would want further prints from Oswald, since they had already taken sufficient ones for the case. What was even more puzzling to Drain was the report that the agents went to the funeral home, when there had been ample earlier opportunities.

It is hard to believe that the men that were either USSS or FBI agents since both agencies used the widely available set i their documentation. The next two sets from the Secret Service Report are identical to the ones above. These have additional type info added. I have enhanced these two images as they were in quite a bad state on the Mary Ferrell website.

Lee Oswald’s fingerprints in Secret Service CD 78. Pic. from Mary Ferrell. Click to enlarge.

 

Lee Oswald’s fingerprints in Secret Service CD 78. Pic. from Mary Ferrell. Click to enlarge.

In First Day Evidence by Gary Savage & Rusty Livingstone Savage writes on page 111 Rusty and J.B. Hicks rolled at least three inkless cards and inked card of Oswald that Sunday night in the Parkland morgue.

If the FBI or the USSS did take fingerprints besides the DPD then these have not been shared publicly. And why did they just stick with the same copies shared by the DPD in their documentation? Groody tactfully avoids who they were that walked in with fingerprint equipment.

The Trigger Housing of the Carcano.

Further in the book First Day Evidence by Gary Savage & Rusty Livingstone Savage writes on page 105 “Crime Lab detective Barnes was in the office at the time Lieutenant Day photographed the trigger-housing fingerprints. He later compared the trigger-housing photographs himself to a card of Oswald and told us that he found 3 points of identity. Pete told Rusty and me that there was no doubt in his mind that it was Oswald’s fingerprint.” That by itself is nothing short of astonishing as Barnes never uttered anything of the sort in his WC interview. Besides, three points of identity are not enough anywhere in the USA. A minimum of 10-12 would be ok. The FBI, in 1959, aimed for twelve points of identity. So three points of identity amounts to not much.

The Media.

Dallas newsmen Joe Long and Gary DeLaune of KlIF radio station (RG272 E19 Reel 20 at NARA) both broadcast reports that the rifle contained no fingerprints. “Once again, that late report from police headquarters. No fingerprints found on the weapon which had been located in the building from which the fatal shots were fired. The…rifle, turned over to the FBI, is being sent to Washington …but this is a big disappointment to those investigating today’s assassination.”  I have tried to find the statement on any of the YouTube videos of available recordings.

On Saturday when Captain Fritz was asked by WFAA (RG272 E19 Reel 20 at NARA): “Were Oswald’s prints found on the rifle?” He replied “No, Sir.” From: Best Evidence by David Lifton (page 354).

Vincent Drain

After the press conference Oswald is being searched again, has his shirt taken away for the F.B.I. to take with them. It is Vincent Drain who leaves with the rifle, the pistol, fingerprints, palm prints and some of other Oswald’s belongings on a special military plane towards Washington. Drain took possession of the evidence after Henry Wade’s press conference at about 00:30, and not at 23:45 as officially stated by everyone. At 23:30 Vincent Drain is spotted seen behind Wade and Fritz (scroll to bottom) while they talk to the gathered press in front of Room 317 of Robbery & Homicide. Then there is Oswald’s brief press conference at 00:15 and he is still wearing his shirt that becomes part of the evidence that Drain took with him to Washington. Then Oswald has been moved upstairs to the fourth floor to be processed and hands his shirt over. At the same time Henry Wade is giving his press conference with Drain seen standing next to him.

Dallas District Attorney Henry Wade giving his press conference after Oswald’s. Pic.: Fort Worth Star Telegram. Click to enlarge.

Drain handed it over at Headquarters. J Edgar Hoover wrote to DPD Chief Jesse Curry and listed the evidence received in Wa. on Nov 23rd. Oswald has his finger & palm prints taken again since all fingerprint and palm print cards were taken by the FBI. There are two original fingerprint original fingerprint cards at UNT. These sets that are marked Nov 23rd. The signature belongs to Karl P Knight who was the head of the fingerprint division (page 19). The first set below is not dated, but the second one is. Again it appears that Oswald refused to sign the fingerprint cards.

On Nov 29 1963 Vincent Drain creates a report, confirming what Hoover wrote on the 23rd, listing all items of evidence that were taken early on Nov 23. The latent prints appearing in the photograph taken of the rifle, k1, by the Dallas Police Department, are too fragmentary and indistinct to be of any value for identification purposes. Photographs of this weapon taken by this Bureau also failed to produce prints of sufficient legibility for comparison purposes.

Carl Day.

Carl Day in his WC testimony is not sure and would need to further investigate when he knows that the quality of them is not up to sufficient quality.

Mr. McCLOY. Am I to understand your testimony, Lieutenant, about the fingerprints to be you said you were positive—you couldn’t make a positive identification, but it was your opinion that these were the fingerprints of Lee Oswald?
Mr. DAY. Well, actually in fingerprinting it either is or is not the man. So I wouldn’t say those were his prints. They appeared similar to these two, certainly bore further investigation to see if I could bring them out better. But from what I had I could not make a positive identification as being his prints.

When Carl Day passed the rifle on to Vincent Drain he had no positive ID from what he had found near the trigger guard of the rifle and the fingerprints of Oswald delivered to him that evening by Hicks and Barnes. Day was not holding back since he was under oath. He also states this in his statement from Jan 8th. 1964.

 

Related: Lee Harvey Oswald’s Palm Prints.

The Killing Floor

The Killing Floor.

 Recently a video was posted on YouTube titled The Killing Floor. This video, narrated by Rich Negrete, discusses Barry Ernest’s work and his book The Girl on the Stairs. The book delves into the search for Victoria Adams, which takes Ernest quite a few decades to get hold of and talk to her and then he also manages to find and talk to Sandra Styles and Dorothy Garner. I read it more than ten years ago and liked it quite a bit. It was also a fast read which for a JFKA book is quite rare. I read it when I was still reading books and had not started my own research yet. I credit this book for getting me interested into the happenings inside the TSBD and becoming the subject for delving deeper into in 2013.

If you have read this book by Barry Ernest then not much new is mentioned in this entire video. Actually I am of the opinion, that besides the addition of some WC related material there is a lack of serious new findings. This is to its detriment since the large majority of the body of work is more than ten years old.

The video, as the book, treats the second floor lunch room encounter as an event that actually happened, whereas I and others have presented a ton of evidence that shows that this encounter is a total fake event. The encounter is presented as a ‘way’ to make Oswald look guilty as the shooter that came from the 6th floor down, whereas he was nowhere near the sixth floor let alone the second floor after the President was shot.

Then this video also omits some very important facts such as:

Lovelady’s presence on the steps after the shooting has serious consequences for the alleged sighting of the ladies coming down the stairs, just after the shots were fired. Lovelady was nowhere near those steps and as the ladies confirmed they were met by a tall black man, which points to Eddie Piper.

 

  • And then there is the fourth floor matter that the fifth floor black guys stopped briefly on the fourth floor during their descent and spoke to the women that were looking out the windows on the west side of the TSBD which gave them a perfect view of the happenings in the railroad yard behind the picket fence. This actual happening is swept under the carpet by the WC. Just like the women on the third floor who did not ‘hear’ the shots. Read about this in my Anatomy of the TSBD paper.

 

 

Overall it is a decent attempt in bringing Ernest’s book to the masses by means of a video presentation, but the lack of new material is a bit of a letdown.

 

 

Dallas Action Podcast Aug 21st 2022

Dallas Action Podcast Aug 21st 2022

 

I did a two hour talk with Doug Campbell of the Dallas Action Podcast and we only discussed Oswald ‘s interrogation and more to the point only the first few hours of his incarceration and his first interrogation. There’s plenty of detail being shared. I hope everyone listening enjoys it as much as I did doing it.

Click the pic to be taken to the podcast. Thank you Douglas!

 

Out Of The Blank with Greg Parker

Out Of The Blank with Greg Parker

 

Out Of The Blank

Out of the Blank

 

Robbie Robertson contacted me a few weeks ago for a chat and that is what we did late July.

Here is the result, which I am pretty happy with.

June 2022 update

Greetings!

First of all a small discovery in Darnell, finally some better focus on the group in  the James Darnell film that is about to and is ascending the steps on the bottom left stairs. We can see two women who ascending who both look to the left down on Elm St. Click the photo below. This shot, even though at miserable quality, allows me to discern what is actually happening on the bottom left of the steps. In other Darnell copies the frames are way over exposed and blurred.   #payattentionbrian !!!!

The TSBD workers ascending the stairs. Click to enlarge.

At this time my money is on Patricia Ann Donaldson being the woman with the scarf over her head. And the other lady in black (ID still unknown) is the one who stood next together on Elm.

Patricia Ann Donaldson in the Dave Wiegman film on Nov 22 1963. Click to enlarge.

Then the Anatomy papers, I like to think I am done for now. There has been about a two year delay due to my activities with the Malcolm Blunt archives. This delay was needed due to the quality of documentation found at Malcolm’s. And the problem with that was that it was spread all over his filing cabinets inside many unmarked folders. I was not just digitising the archives, but I was discovering at the same time.  So that meant that getting these papers ready took way longer than originally thought. After April 2021 I barely looked at them until I had finished with scanning the first phase of Malcolm’s documents in Nov last year. In Dec I started to research, create two new papers and  and make amendments to earlier released papers.

Yet I also know that there will be some updated content in the form of quotes of interviews of various people being added in the near foreseeable future.  We spoke with Roy Edward Lewis in 2018 and 2022 and this material is being transcribed as we speak. Plus a set of other interviews, so that update will be there by end of Summer. The only other question remains is to condense all work into one file instead of four.

And thanks for the great feedback on my previous article, a newish chapter of the Anatomy of the Second Floor Lunchroom Encounter

I reckon in about a week the papers shall be released for y’all to plough through. Until then!

 

The Destruction of Lee Oswald’s Alibi & The Invention of the Second Floor Lunchroom Encounter

The Destruction of Lee Oswald’s Alibi & The Invention of the Second Floor Lunchroom Encounter.

 

I have been investigating the second floor lunchroom encounter for several years now and have offered plenty of evidence that shows that this particular event was a fugezi from the word go. My first paper Anatomy of the Second Floor Lunchroom Encounter which had its first release in 2016 showed a lot of evidence that questioned this so called encounter. Three years later the paper had doubled in size with  a ton more evidence to show this encounter was one of the worst fakes created. This is a new amended chapter which will appear as part of my new Anatomy of the Second Floor Lunchroom Encounter paper. This paper and the other two will be released early June.

In my second paper, I discuss the interrogations of Lee Oswald in depth, but here I will only add the parts in relation to the first floor and the second floor lunch room encounter.

During the first interrogation Will Fritz spoke with Oswald (and have detectives Richard Sims and Elmer Boyd sit in with him). This was a standard tactic for having an extra person or two sit in with the one who did the questioning, this was to support in court what was being said. In the USA there were no tape recorded interrogations until two decades later. Fritz, Boyd and Sims must have been alone with Oswald for 30-45 minutes as FBI agents Hosty and Bookhout did not arrive and joined this interrogation not until 15:15 hrs. No one knows what was said during that period. From this first interrogation with the FBI present are a few notes and reports to look at. The official FBI report that represents the questions and answers of this first interrogation is the joint Bookhout & Hosty report. However this was not made up until the next day Nov 23rd  

James Bookhout and James P Hosty FBI Report Nov 23 1963. Click to enlarge. From Mary Ferrell.

James Bookhout and James P Hosty FBI Report Nov 23 1963. Click to enlarge. From Mary Ferrell.

James Hosty and James Bookhout of the FBI state in their joint November 23 report: “OSWALD stated that he went to lunch at approximately noon and he claimed he ate his lunch on the first floor in the lunchroom; however he went to the second floor where the Coca-Cola machine was located and obtained a bottle of Coca-Cola for his lunch. OSWALD claimed to’ be on the first floor when President JOHN F. KENNEDY passed by his building.” 

This Nov 23rd report:

  1. Does not mention the specific location of Oswald on the first floor at the time of the assassination, which Oswald did tell them (more about that in a mo).
  2. Nor does it mention any encounter involving Oswald, a police officer and Roy Truly.
  3. He got the coke for his lunch not after the assassination!

This was the only official report from that first interrogation issued the day after it had happened. No one of the Dallas police had issued a report and when they did, it was after Oswald’s death.

By James Hosty’s own admission he did take notes during that first interrogation and he was the only one. First in his own notebook. He scribbled partial phrases in his notebook that I am reproducing below.

Notebook notes from James P Hosty of the FBI. From NARA, thanks to Malcolm Blunt. Click to enlarge.

James Hosty claimed he had destroyed these notes, after the report had been typed up and submitted, as per FBI procedure, yet when his book Assignment Oswald was released according to him these notes had ‘re-appeared’ in his desk drawer. A miracle or was Hosty breaking bureau protocol keeping these notes as a souvenir?

In relation to Oswald’s whereabouts the following sticks out: “First floor outside office” which could relate to where Oswald was when the motorcade passed by. And I tend to lean that way, mainly after comparing the notes above with the ones I post a little further below. And also after comparing these with Fritz’s handwritten notes, more about these later on. Also make yourself aware of the so called ‘sectioning’ on these notes. It seems to group unrelated bits together.

But! Once again there is not a mention of any altercation with Marrion Baker nor a mention of Roy Truly.

But then in Feb. 2019 I found a document amongst a set of so called “Hosty files” in Malcolm Blunt’s archive collection. This particular document, written on the back of a sheet of printed affidavit paper of the Dallas police states something that eventually was deep sixed by Hosty and the others only to re-appear when Malcolm Blunt copied the entire set of Hosty papers twenty years ago at the archives in Washington. Through investigating I have found out that Hosty handed these over to the ARRB in 1996. Malcolm himself did not realise he had this bomb shell in his filing cabinet and only when I went through the whole folder to scan it all in for the new D.P.U.K. website did it appear. I decided to publish this document right away at my website’s diary.

James P Hosty Sept 1975. Click to enlarge.

The text that is key to Hosty’s handwritten report is: “O stated he was present for work at the T.S.B.D. on the morning of the 22nd and at noon went to lunch. He went to 2nd floor to get a coca cola to eat with lunch and returned to 1st floor to eat lunch. Then he went outside to watch P. Parade.”  It is safe to say that P. stands for Presidential.

An important element of this paragraph is that he got his coke for his lunch which was before the shots were fired. This aspect is re-confirmed in the joint Hosty/Bookhout report. Again no mention of a lunchroom encounter, Baker and/or Truly.

And then there is the hammer that states that Oswald was outside to watch the Presidential Parade. This lead was swept under the carpet by all those who were present and never repeated again.

Oswald interrogation notes Nov 22 1963. James P Hosty. Thanks to Malcolm Blunt. Click to enlarge.

In Hosty’s book Assignment Oswald he described how he kept on taking notes even after the interrogation. “I headed back to Fritz’s office, where I knew the police were keeping Oswald’s personal belongings. Nothing there, but in the second inner office, which belonged to Lieutenant Walter Potts, I spotted Oswald’s things, which had been removed from his person and from his apartment at the Oak Cliff rooming house. Among the items on Potts’s desk was Oswald’s black address book. I pulled out my pad of blank police affidavit forms and started transcribing the entries in his book, thinking I might find some interesting leads or even some possible co-conspirators”.

 Then if you compare the notebook pages and the handwritten partial draft statement above, something else becomes apparent. They show near identical sections.

James P Hosty interrogation notes and pre-report. Graphic: BK. Click to enlarge.

James Hosty used his notebook notes to compile this draft on D.P.D. affidavit paper, and this also means that the phrase “1st floor entrance office” in Hosty’s notebook notes directly relates to Oswald’s whereabouts as described in the draft on the D.P.D. affidavit paper (the green highlighted areas on both documents). Before the Feb. 2019 find it was assumed that “first floor entrance office” was related to Warren Caster’s visit when he showed Roy Truly and a few others two rifles he had brought in. But closer study of the sections show that inside there are unrelated matters “grouped” together. “First floor entrance office” means first floor entrance of the office.

He writes in his book Assignment Oswald, about an exchange, from his memory how the questioning went on during that first interrogation.

Okay now, Lee, you work at the Texas School Book Depository, isn’t that right?

Yeah, that’s right.

When did you start working there?

About October fifteenth

What did you do down there?

I was just a common labourer.

Now, did you have access to all floors of the building?

Of course.

Tell me what was on each of those floors.

The first and second floors have offices. The third and fourth floor are storage. So are the fifth and sixth.

And you were working there today, is that right?

Yep.

Were you there when the president’s motorcade went by?

Yeah.

Where were you when the president went by the book depository?

I was eating my lunch in the first floor lunchroom.

What time was that?

About noon.

Were you ever on the second floor around the time the president was shot?

Well, yeah. I went up there to get a bottle of Coca-Cola from the machine for my lunch.

But where were you when the president actually passed your building?

On the first floor in the lunchroom.

And you left the depository, isn’t that right?

Yeah.

When did you leave?

Well, I figured with all the confusion there wouldn’t be any more work to do that day.

Again Oswald, according to Hosty’s recollections, be it almost 40 years later, Oswald got the coke for his lunch and makes no mention of an encounter with Baker. Hosty also makes mention of the reason why Oswald left work. But what is significant is that the 2nd floor lunch room encounter simply does not exist at that time.

Not for long that is, so get ready for a lil’ twist.

Nat Pinkston.

Unbeknown to James Hosty and James Bookhout, their colleague, Nat Pinkston is busy inside the TSBD shortly after the first interrogation to ‘rectify’ matters so Lee Harvey Oswald becomes the guilty party.

In Sept. 2019 I posted an article called Nat Pinkston and the Snack Room Encounter. This article contained the document I had found that year in Malcolm Blunt’s archive and is to me the first documented evidence of a mentioning of an encounter in the second floor lunchroom. The document is dated L1/22/63 and I am not sure what L1 stands for, but let’s assume it stands for November 22nd. The other thing is that Nat Pinkston submitted other reports on Nov 22 using this L1 in the date.

Besides the description of the encounter there is another element that is very interesting and helps with dating this even more precise.

The last two paragraphs relate to the sighting of guns inside the building in front of Roy Truly’s office being observed by Oswald. This particular matter is being recorded during the first interrogation of Oswald by James Hosty in his notes. This of course is being reported to FBI HQ and investigated further, and in this case Pinkston questions Roy Truly about this. So a few hours after this, the second floor lunch room encounter is being ‘created’ as such & written up in this report. This is the closest piece of reporting of creating a 180 and assign blame to Oswald for shooting The President. This document is released before the joint Bookhout-Hosty report. That by itself is a miracle since it was Bookhout & Hosty that were present at the interrogation and Pinkston was not! And he introduces this new accusation that cements Oswald’s guilt of shooting The President. This report runs parallel with the joint Book-Hosty report and it is even released before theirs.

Nat Pinkston’s Nov 22 1963 report. Inserting the second floor lunchroom encounter.
With thanks to Malcolm Blunt.. Click to enlarge.

What follows next is another report from J Doyle Williams and Nat Pinkston on that very same day of Roy Truly. It apparently has been dictated on the 22nd, but is not typed up until the day after. The phrase “they saw no one else in the building at that time” further below in that statement rings hollow, since two black employees (Troy Eugene West and Eddie Piper) were on the first floor, Truly even spoke with Piper! The fourth floor had several women near the staircase within minutes after the shooting looking at the scenes in the railroad yard down below. Also closer inspection of the Darnell film, of the people on the stairs showing that several people made their way up to go inside before Baker & Truly.

FBI Affidavit Roy Truly by J Doyle Williams & Nat A Pinkston. Click to enlarge. From: Mary Ferrell.

FBI agent Kenneth B Jackson interviews Roy Truly again on the 23rd.

FBI Affidavit Roy Truly by Kenneth B Jackson Nov 23 1963. Click to enlarge. Mary Ferrell.

Then you have the joint Hosty and Bookhout report from the 22nd, but not dictated until the 23rd, and it shows that the so called “second floor lunchroom encounter internal communique” has not been passed on to both Hosty & Bookhout as they just create the report that is based on James Hosty’s notes and their collective memory of that interrogation, which once more, does not contain any encounter at all, since Oswald got his coke for his lunch.

So while Hosty and Bookhout create their real report there is already a fake one in play by Nat Pinkston only just after the first interrogation has been finished.

And then Bookhout gets the nod and produces another report on the 24th. Oswald has been shot dead earlier that day and this report contradicts his joint report with James Hosty on a few occasions.

FBI Affidavit James W Bookhout Nov 25 1963. Click to enlarge. From: Mary Ferrell.

In the above solo report by James Bookhout on November 24 things are turned around a bit, but not for the better.

“Oswald stated that on November 22 1963, at the time of the search of the Texas School Book Depository building by Dallas police officers, he was on the second floor of said building, having just purchased a Coca-Cola from the soft-drink machine, at which time a police officer came into the room with pistol drawn and asked him if he worked there.

Mr. Truly was present and verified that he was an employee and the police officer thereafter left the room and continued through the building. Oswald stated that he took this Coke down to the first floor and stood around and had lunch in the employee’s lunch room. He thereafter went outside and stood around for five or ten minutes with foreman Bill Shelley.”

First, he mentions “at the time of the search of the Texas School Book Depository building by Dallas police officers” while Baker was the only police officer in that building for a fair amount of time (5 mins is reasonable to assume) and that is if Baker went in as fast he said he went; everyone else on the force was busy in the railroad yard. Or this is an indication that Oswald was in the building much later than he has been ‘credited’ for? Like 15 minutes by any chance?

Secondly, Oswald had purchased a coke, which from a timing perspective makes it already ‘interesting’ (getting the correct change out, putting it in the machine and waiting for the bottle to appear and take the cap off). Neither Truly nor Baker saw anything in his hands. Although Baker messed that up with his handwritten report on Sept. 23rd 1964, the day before the W.C. report was issued and it was sent rapido to Washington.

Thirdly, Oswald stood around and had lunch after the shooting, and even stood outside with Bill Shelley for 5/10 minutes after having had his lunch. Shelley who was not seen outside the building after returning from his ‘trip’ with Billy Lovelady and seen much later escorting Garcia and Williams to a police car. So how long was Lee Oswald in that building?  According to this second report, for quite some time, which makes one wonder, how the bus/cab ride transpired, changing his clothes and ‘grabbing his gun’ and walk towards 10th and Patton and blow Tippit away. Nor does this rhyme with the W.C. conclusion that he was gone in 2.5 minutes! This cannot be done at any time from a timing perspective as described by James Bookhout!

This document is used to toe the line with the creation of the second floor lunchroom encounter.

So far we have only seen the reports and notes of Hosty and Bookhout of the FBI. James Hosty mentions in his Church Committee testimony that he was the only person taking notes during that very first interrogation. Hosty was called away from any further interrogations whereas Bookhout stayed on until Sunday morning.

  • Will Fritz only made up an official undated and unsigned report weeks after. This report has been seen in various versions. Fritz was not seen taking any notes during that first or any other interrogations. He himself claimed he took no notes, as this wasn’t his style of interrogating someone. He had ample opportunity to call in a camera and/or audio recording equipment since the corridor was filled to the brim with reporters and cameramen. One of the typists inside the Robbery & Homicide office could have assisted him transcribing the session. None of these options were used by him.

In my Anatomy of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations paper I quote several people regarding the recording of Fritz’s interrogations (pages 9-13). That notes were made by him must have taken everyone by surprise when they came to light thru an anonymous donation to the ARRB in late 1996. These notes were ‘buried’ for more than 33 years! So people had to make do with Fritz’s undated and unsigned statement from Dec. 1963 and his Warren Commission testimony. The handwritten notes are not contemporary, as a matter of fact no one knows when these were made. Some suspect Fritz copied Bookhout’s notes.

Will Fritz outside room 317, Homicide & Robbery Bureau. Click to enlarge.

Fritz’s interrogation notes display a few interesting bits when it comes to Lee Oswald’s location just before, during and just after the assassination. But they have to be considered carefully due to the fact that they were made after the interrogations.

Will Fritz’s Oswald interrogation notes. Page 1. Click to enlarge. From: Mary Ferrell.

On page 1, above, it states:

claims 2nd floor coke when

off came in

Oswald had a coke from the 2nd floor when the officer came in. Came in where? 1st? 2nd? “when off came in” looks inserted at a later time.

More about this in a  minute.

to first floor had lunch

Oswald had lunch on the 1st floor.

out with Bill Shelley in front

Oswald knew Shelley was standing in front of the building. And that is before the shooting, not after! As Shelley had departed almost immediately after the shooting from the TSBD steps. Entering the T.S.B.D. from the west side. And he was not seen again outside until 13:30.

Will Fritz’s Oswald interrogation notes. Page 3. Click to enlarge. From: Mary Ferrell.

On page 3 of the same set of Fritz’s interrogation notes from Nov. 23rd the Domino Room and Oswald’s lunch come into play. Something Fritz never investigated any further, why not?

says two negro came in

one Jr + short negro – ask? for lunch says cheese sandwiches + apple

-Oswald saw Jarman and possibly Norman come in to the Domino room while he had his lunch. Lunch consisted of cheese sandwiches and an apple.

Looking at both these pages one thing becomes evident. That is that a new sentence does not start on a new line, but midway as well, this leaves his notes open to interpretation. A forum post by Sean Murphy explains this with samples.

In his report to Chief Curry from November 23 1963 Fritz says: “We also found that this man had been stopped by Officer M.L. Baker while coming down the stairs. Mr. Baker says that he stopped this man on the third or the fourth floor on the stairway, but as Mr. Truly identified him as one of the employees he was released”. The third or fourth floor refers to Baker’s first statement.

 Fritz’s undated report, in draft mode states: “I asked him what part of the building he was in when the president was shot, and he said that he was having his lunch about that time on the first floor. Mr. Truly had told me that one of the police officers had stopped this man immediately after the shooting near the back stairway, so I asked Oswald where he was when the police officer stopped him. He said he was on the second floor drinking a coca cola when the officer came in.” This just blends it all very nicely together.

Will Fritz‘s typed report from December 23 states: “We also found out that this man had been stopped by officer M.L. Baker while coming down the stairs. Mr. Baker says that he stopped this man on the third or the fourth floor of the stairway, but as Mr. Truly identified the man as one of his employees, he was released. This very same report falsely claims that Oswald’s working area was mostly on the second floor! It would actually be one of the least frequented areas for him actually.

Will Fritz’s typed report from Dec 23rd 1963. From: UNT.

His W.C. testimony:

Mr. BALL. Did you ask him what happened that day; where he had been?
Mr. FRITZ. Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. What did he say?
Mr. FRITZ. Well he told me that he was eating lunch with some of the employees when this happened, and that he saw all the excitement and he didn’t think, I also asked him why he left the building. He said there was so much excitement there then that “I didn’t think there would be any work done that afternoon and we don’t punch a clock and they don’t keep very close time on our work and I just left.”
Mr. BALL. At that time didn’t you know that one of your officers, Baker, had seen Oswald on the second floor?
Mr. FRITZ. They told me about that down at the bookstore; I believe Mr. Truly or someone told me about it, told me they had met him, I think he told me, person who told me about, I believe told me that they met him on the stairway (Fritz has trouble composing himself-BK), but our investigation shows that he actually saw him in a lunch room, a little lunch room where they were eating, and he held his gun on this man and Mr. Truly told him that he worked there, and the officer let him go. (so regardless of an encounter on the stairway Fritz declared it happening inside the lunchroom???-BK)
Mr. BALL. Did you question Oswald about that?
Mr. FRITZ. Yes, sir; I asked him about that and he knew that the officer stopped him all right.
Mr. BALL. Did you ask him what he was doing in the lunch room?
Mr. FRITZ. He said he was having his lunch. He had a cheese sandwich and a Coca-Cola.
Mr. BALL. Did he tell you he was up there to get a Coca-Cola?
Mr. FRITZ. He said he had a Coca-Cola.

Martha Joe Stroud corresponded with the Warren Commission that Fritz was not happy with his deposition and would not sign it unless corrections were applied. Nor would have the original archived as such at NARA. And there seem to be two versions of his statement. I would love to see the difference between the two!

Thanks to Robin Unger. Click to enlarge.

Oswald has gone for lunch and stayed in the Domino Room after he had gotten his Coke from the second floor. Many must have seen him getting his coke, since the ladies from the 2nd floor offices started to have their lunch at about 12:00 in the second floor lunch room, some of whom did not leave to watch the parade until 12:20-12:25.

The Domino Room was in the back at the north eastern end of the building, and the infamous back stairs were not far away and had direct access to them. And as stated above In the Hosty & Bookhout notes and statements he got the coke for his lunch.

The Secret Service was present too, Forrest Sorrels and Thomas J Kelley were there during some of Lee Oswald’s interrogations on the 23rd.

  • Thomas J Kelley is the only one who supplies an interrogation report that actually goes so far as to claim that Oswald explicitly admitted to not having watched the motorcade. In his First interview with LHO he states:

“At this time Captain Fritz showed a Selective Service Card that was taken out of his wallet which bore the name of Alex Hidell. Oswald refused to discuss this after being asked for an explanation of it, both by Fritz and by James Bookhout, the FBI Agent. I asked him if he viewed the parade and he said he had not. I then asked him if he had shot the President and he said he had not. I asked him if he has shot governor Connally and he said he had not”.

Now look at the bottom of the page of the Fritz notes and compare and you see that Fritz may have been a bad record keeper, but I doubt he would have left a jewel of the ‘parade’ question and answer like that out in his notes. Kelley’s bit is suspect as a 3 dollar bill.

Not one word about the parade. And that is because he did not give that answer at all.

Will Fritz’s Oswald interrogation notes. Page 4. Click to enlarge. From: Mary Ferrell.

JFK Revisited Through The Looking Glass & Destiny Betrayed

JFK Revisited Through The Looking Glass & Destiny Betrayed

 

Last November 2021 the new Oliver Stone & Jim DiEugenio documentary film JFK Revisited Through The Looking Glass was released. Oliver Stone had quite a mission getting this documentary shared to the masses as National Geographic and Netflix had passed on screening it. It was his visit and showing at the Cannes festival that got things on track and he managed find distributors. I have watched a fair bit of JFK assassination documentaries these last 20 years, but I always have an issue with all of them, they all intend to cram in as much info as possible in them. Take a detective like Jim Leavelle i/e who was there over the three day period and summarises it in two or three sentences, where is the value in that? It never seems to work, the real evidence is missing and it is only his opinion. Also due to this assassination from a subject p.o.v. being so widespread, there is simply too much information available to squeeze in the allotted time. It is a recipe for failure. These two documentaries suffer the same issue a bit, but this one also has a huge advantage over all the others, it is evidence based for almost 100%. The people you see talking on the screen are the ones that went to the archives in Washington and pulled the records out. Not opinionated lone nutters or conspiracy theorists who never hunted for the evidence ever before. Actually labelling these people in the documentaries as conspiracy theorists is a massive insult especially when it is only archival evidence that is presented. Some reviews of these two films seem to have missed that particular meeting or just have a grudge against Stone from the word go. These type of clowns were there 30 odd years ago and obviously they are present now.

For the record I watched the 2 hour version on Showtime in Nov. 2021 and Feb 2022. And the four hour version on SKY in Dec 2021 and Feb 2022. It appears that the rest of the world gets its chance early March. I will try not to spoil too much, if you cannot handle a spoiler here and there then I suggest you quit now.

The 2 hour version, by the looks of it, uses the same material as the four hour version, but it is edited in a different way and there are some bits that get more prominence in the two hour version than they have in the 4 hour one. I will start with the two hour version titled “JFK: Revisited Through The Looking Glass”. The documentary starts with the announcements of JFK, eventually being shot and next it goes to footage of Parkland hospital where the DPD is busy cordoning the entrance off. The first thing you notice is that some of the HD film scans look very lush. At the same time some of the grainier material looks even grainier. Digitising film either makes it look great or just the opposite, there is no middle ground here. But when it does look great it really does.

DPD and USSS in front of the limo at Parkland hospital. Malcolm Kilduff in the centre of the pic. Click to enlarge.

There is also a shot of reporters leaving the press bus and make their way towards the area above. In this shot we can see at least four Dallas P.D. detectives, wearing their distinctive hats, conferring in front of this bus in the background.

Dallas PD detectives in front of press bus at Parkland hospital while the reporters rush towards the entrance. Click to enlarge

Following is a sequence of footage of Oswald in the third floor corridor inside City Hall, getting shot by Ruby and also the Warren Commission. This sequence differs with the four hour version. The issue I have with it is that there is no proper chronology factor in the footage present and everything is just mixed up and even the audio is just randomly mixed in. It is for dramatic effect, and not much else. Trying to put it in the right order is very difficult, I know as I have tried and managed to put some segments at the right time in my Anatomy of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations paper (new updated version out in April 2022), but there are also some bits where I have no exact timestamp since some of the footage is silent.

Then the bullets and especially the magic bullet are discussed. The interactive sequence showing the NARA pictures of the Magic bullet (CE 399) and also the chain of evidence is very convincingly presented. The rifle is next with Brian Edwards adding his commentary. I am just over 30 minutes in and the evidence presented up till then is already the death of the Warren Commission’s conclusion and moreover crucifies the sloppy and contradictory work of the DPD, USSS and the FBI.

Barry Ernest and his work on Victoria Adams is next and I will get back about this later as it has more in the longer documentary. The autopsy and its photographs and the people who are involved with them are next. Especially the photographic aspect of it all is lapped up by me, I simply love it.

Parkland hospital and nurses – JFK headshot. Click to enlarge.

New Orleans is next, we get to see William Gaudet of which Malcolm Blunt gathered a fair bit of documents here and here and the other usual aspects such as David Ferrie, Guy banister and Clay Shaw are featured. The James P Doyle film of Oswald handing out pamphlets of the FPCC is of good quality. Then we move to various subjects such as Oswald/CIA/Defection to Russia/Chicago Plot/Africa that are discussed in more detail in the four hour version further below. Overall the two hour version has some really good bits, there is more emphasis on specific elements like the magic bullet in this film. And if you like(d) the two hour version then you will be in hog heaven with the four hour one: JFK: Destiny Betrayed.

The intro music and footage of this one is superb, it is the same music brought to everyone back in the early 90s with Stone’s film, that tension element of it hasn’t aged one single bit. The film starts with the antics of the Warren Commission.

Members of the Warren Commission on their Dallas visit in 1964. Click to enlarge.

There is a bit of Cuba and the CIA/Anti-Castro matters entwined that were being played out in the late 50’s and early 60s. Then it is back to more WC. And then the documentary goes further afield by bringing the mess that the Belgians had left behind in Congo and the CIA is heavily involved with removing and killing Patrice Lumumba and all this is dropped in JFK’s lap and he works hard on getting things sorted. This episode by itself is very interesting to read about. There is also a very good documentary about this era called Murder in the Bush: Cold Case Hammarskjöld. I suggest you try and find it.

Just when you have settled in with a subject matter things change into a different direction. I understand there is only that much time for putting a case forward, but why present it this fragmented? And some of these subjects do return in following chapters. I am reasonably well read on the entire subject matter, but the majority of viewers are not and may be getting confused by this scattered approach. While the Africa segment is good, it deserves some more time. It then switches to the committees such as Church, Schweiker and the HSCA. There are still many documents from these three commissions redacted, classified or simply gone without a trace. My time with Malcolm Blunt’s huge personal archive has given me some good insights about what was going on, but even with what I was able to digitise it still is largely incomplete. Richard Schweiker’s remark on Jack Ruby and the Warren Commission is simply priceless. I will not spoil it any further.

Next is Robert Groden, a person I am not too comfortable with due to his truth economics. I have seen and read a couple myself and I have issues with that. I also find his Zapruder film copy not that good now shown in 2K, that is if it actually has been scanned recently and is not the same copy of what was used in Stone’s movie 30 years ago. I am looking forward seeing this all in 4K. For someone who does not own one iota of copyright on all these films and photos he has submitted for usage he sure has turned it into a lucrative business over the last 40 years. He is credited as a photographic consultant. It seems that the Sixth Floor Museum would not assist Stone with their cache of film and photo materials and this does get brought up somewhat, i/e with the Zapruder film. The Sixth Floor Museum should have cooperated with the Stone crew since they have a goldmine of great quality material. This likewise deserves a frown….it tends to point as to what side they are still on.  I reckon Groden, who was part responsible for the HSCA creation and Stone whose film got the ARRB erected have something in common and in part can credit themselves for what they did in retrospect.

Robert Groden, Dealey Plaza. Click to enlarge.

Next thing the first episode of the documentary brings up is Oswald’s alibi and I can only conclude that the makers make a whopper of a mistake by solely relying on the research of Barry Ernest and that is just not good enough. Perhaps ten years ago it may have carried some weight, but not any more. Plus if you can go all guns blazing on the autopsy related matters and bring a set of researchers forward then why not on Oswald’s last 46 hours. In the last ten years there has been a wagon load of new evidence brought up. This website digs a lot deeper than what Ernest wrote and a huge opportunity to set the record straight was missed. I am not sure whether this is because certain politics are being played in the background and only put forward a theory which many older conspiracy theorists have subscribed and cemented themselves to. This is something an uber liar like Will Fritz and fellow law enforcement personnel have put forward and has been a ‘belief’ of these conspiracy theorists ever since. There is a ton of evidence which disputes this lunchroom encounter ever happening. Furthermore there is nothing put forward with regards Oswald’s interrogations and the reports thereof and where and what he was doing during these crucial moments of the JFK Assassination. The job done on this segment of the documentary is a letdown, to say the least. I wish to make clear that I am not putting myself forward as someone that should have been part of this documentary. I will be doing my own thing later this year. The case I have to present will be multi faceted and would not stand a chance, due to time constraints, on a platform as this docu.

Episode two and it’s autopsy time, quite a few heavy hitters are there and it is fact after fact that gets presented to the viewer and I have to say that it is great to see them doing this, for the 2 hour version this was my fave section. The medical & autopsy sections, could fill more than a solid hour by itself. Again the facts obliterate the official version. What does deserve a separate mention is Malcolm Perry who stated during a press conference, of which all audio has been suppressed/confiscated/stolen fill in by yourself, but a transcript 1327 C still exists, and I suggest to check out page 5. The throat wound is an entrance wound and ‘people’ called Dr Perry that same evening and wanted him to change that. That amounts to two frontal shots…….

Then it is back to foreign policy; Vietnam, Algeria, Iran, Guatemala, Indonesia and so on. Followed by more Warren Commission and the shooting sequence, the rifle and the bullets.

Carl Day and the Carcano.

Then Oswald gets his chance to appear and there is a fair bit of hallway footage of which most is already available on YouTube, this is just better quality, but there is too much cutting for my liking. Nor is there any chronology in this segment. Pivotal bits are left out. BUT! The biggest faux pas is the horn honking in the basement sequence just before Ruby kills Oswald and is presented as some sort of ‘go’ signal for the killing to be happening. Nothing could be further removed from the truth. If you watch the entire sequence of film taken way before the shooting you would understand that several times horns are honking as the armored truck which was supposed to be taking Oswald to prison was replaced for Fritz’s car. In the video you can see a car coming in and going out and the horn is being used to alert the gathered cops and press of their movements. The first double honk is at 11:10, the next one at 11:44, then 11:48, at 12:25 a car is coming through and the press needs to break up at roughly the spot where Ruby was positioned before he leaped out, 12:51 another honk, at 13:21 Will Fritz becomes visible and the horn honks again and finally at 13:25 just while Ruby is leaping out the final honk. Nothing funny nor conspiratorial about it. The car is actually coming down the ramp while Oswald is being shot. As you can see Ruby’s jacket is being lit up by the front head light and the car rolled down the ramp while Ruby had jumped in. The car slightly touches Ruby and makes him lose his balance a tad, and is enough for the cops to jump on him and wrestle the gun away from him. This is a blemish on otherwise a very strong documentary. And that is because it did not check the evidence properly.

Jack Ruby shoots Lee Harvey Oswald. Will Fritz has a so called ‘HUH’ moment. Click to enlarge.

That this whole transfer was as amateurish as a local village cabaret show is beyond any reasonable doubt. Will Fritz walked way too far ahead of Oswald and his escort and created a gap for Ruby to jump in to kill him.  Fritz’s response to this ‘thing’ was even more laughable and can be seen in the shot above when Ruby has shot Oswald already.

George G Burkley. Click to enlarge.

Episode three starts of with Rear Admiral George G Burkley and more of the autopsy, and he does not care to be quoted on how many bullets entered Kennedy’s body. Well if that isn’t telling then what is. Then over the next 30 or so minutes more facts are coming forward related to the autopsy itself, the photos, the brain and so on, all this has a significant meaning. I will not spoil it any further, see it for yourself while you are machine gunned with documentation and statements. Then it goes into the bullets and the limo. And then it changes direction with Washington politics and the rest of the world. Latin America, Middle East, Cuba and Vietnam are for obvious reasons part of it. All of it is very interesting. John Newman, Doug Horne, James K Galbraith are the select few to add their knowledge to it. Lastly we get to the Air Force One tapes and General Curtis LeMay and the Bethesda autopsy where he was present and smoking a cigar.

The fourth and final episode begins with the intelligence angle(s) related to this case. Oswald being at the centre of it all while in Russia and the intelligence games surrounding it. Tennent ” Pete” Bagley is part of this segment, Bagley is someone Malcolm Blunt has been researching deeply and has been in contact with several times while he visited him in Brussels.

Malcolm Blunt & Oliver Stone. Click to enlarge.

Then it moves to whether the CIA was fully briefed and had records on Oswald and as Jefferson Morley points out that they had him on their radar once he defected to Russia in 1959. Up to a week before the assassination reports were being sent, a find by the ARRB. This is followed by the New Orleans chapter and of course the usual suspects pass by Guy Banister, David Ferrie, Clay Shaw, George Joannides and of course the DRE . The New Orleans chapter by itself would need at least an hour to do it some justice as the material that is around is vast (I should know as I scanned loads of it in).

Then the destruction of the Secret Service records is next, they did this after the ARRB had requested them. They were held in complete disregard and the USSS went along with the destruction anyway. This is then followed by the FBI’s cancellation (by Marvin Gheesling) of the Oswald FLASH only a few weeks before the assassination of JFK. It would mean that Lee Harvey Oswald was not on the security index and the Secret Service would not deem him to be a person of interest. If he had been then they would make sure he would not be in close vicinity of The President’s motorcade. The Chicago and Tampa plots are brought up as well, and it is especially the Chicago one that has some very disturbing facts to present. Jim Gochenaur talked to Elmer Moore and I suggest you check out some of these YouTube interviews after watching his part in this documentary. It is a pity Abraham Bolden is missing from this documentary.

Next are the Civil Rights issues that were a huge thing in the south of the US at that time. The funny thing is that this is very much overlooked when it comes to discussing the JFK Assassination. I myself find elements protruding into the investigation of the TSBD and the DPD in general. People rather avoid talking about it, yet it was quite a big part of Southern society at that time when the after effects of the horrific Jim Crow laws were still in play.

Finally it is back to foreign policy, better yet the change thereof after the assassination of JFK. John Newman shines a strong light on NSAM 273 of which some of the lingo is being deleted and re-written which is ordered by LBJ. Then the final moments are of MLK and RFK, as they were assassinated too. All three in a 5 year timespan.

Overall and taken both works into consideration my end verdict is 8.5/10. Of course there are bits that could have been done better, but take all of it into account and you are looking at a very solid documentary. It baffles me how some people review this documentary and try to nitpick through the wealth of evidence presented and then try to sow doubt or just hammer on about a small dispute without providing one iota of evidence against it. These losers deserve nothing but scorn for their agenda driven rubbish.

I say go watch them both, maybe not all in one go, but there is nothing else of this calibre around. I am upping the ante a tad more by stating that most other JFK assassination documentaries look like dog shit in comparison to the Stone & DiEugenio attempt.

It’s on SKY in the UK.

The links to some of the documents are from Malcolm Blunt’s archive. With thanks.

Jack Ruby shoots Lee Harvey Oswald

Jack Ruby shoots Lee Harvey Oswald.

I came across some film footage which shows Oswald being shot by Jack Ruby. It was of half decent quality and once taken a set of stills of these films I came across two elements I had not seen before. Most people know that Jack Ruby did shoot Lee Harvey Oswald and some excellent photographs were made of that particular moment, but the chaos that ensued did prevent people from seeing the gun, although I had seen one close-up of L.C. Graves holding the gun down, but that was it.

Click on the photograph to see a slightly larger version.

The facial expressions of Jim Leavelle’s horror speaks volumes.

Jim Leavelle reacts just after Jack Ruby shot Lee Harvey Oswald.

Jim Leavelle and others struggle take control of Ruby and the gun he holds in his hand.

In this set we can see Lee Oswald on the ground and Jim Leavelle standing pretty much above him while the others are scrummaging with Jack Ruby  and L.C. Graves trying to pry the gun from Ruby’s hand. To view slightly larger samples, please click on the photograph(s).

Oswald down on the floor in front of Leavele who tries to provide some sort of cover.

 

Leavelle and Oswald on the left in the middle of the scrum of coppers you can see L.C. Graves’ hand holding Ruby’s gun.

 

L.C. Graves holds the gun and has managed to step away from the scrum of policemen who are trying to detain Ruby.

Afterwards Oswald is stretchered into the back of the ambulance.

 

Lee Harvey Oswald being searched

Lee Harvey Oswald being searched

 

This article is derived from my up and coming update to the Anatomy of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations paper, which will be released in Q2 2022.

Since my work with the records of Malcolm Blunt’s archives beginning in Feb. 2019 I have come across many interesting documents which have enabled me to piece a few extraordinary things together. I had no intention of writing about Lee Harvey Oswald being searched until the find of some statements that cause a contradiction too significant to ignore.

Left to right: ? – Richard Sims – Lee Harvey Oswald – Marlin G Hall (partially obscured) – Elmer Boyd. Click pic to enlarge.

The so called official picture is described in a joint report from detectives Richard Sims and Elmer Boyd it states that “Boyd searched Oswald and found five live rounds of .38 caliber revolver pistol shells in his front left pocket. Sims found a bus transfer slip in Oswald’s shirt pocket”  The shirt Oswald allegedly changed into after arriving at his North beckley home. What would be the point of taking that ticket with him?

Joint report Elmer Boyd & Richard Sims. From: UNT. Click pic to enlarge.

 

In the Will Fritz report from Nov 22 1963 (page 7), Boyd and Sims are mentioned as well. As a side note I am amazed at the speed this DPD report apparently has been produced on the very same day of the assassination, as many reports were not produced days if not weeks after the fact.

Case Report on Lee Harvey Oswald by J. W. Fritz. From UNT. Click to enlarge.

The FBI has a statement from Richard Sims as well, on Nov 25th he states:

FBI – Richard Sims Nov 25 h1963. Click to enlarge.

Elmer Boyd’s Warren Commission testimony which contains two passages with regards to the matter at hand. I shall paste in below the relevant text of it. First of all from page 8.

Mr. BILL. Before you went into the showup, did you search Oswald?
Mr. BOYD. Yes; I did.
Mr. BALL. And what did you find?
Mr. BOYD. I found five .38 shells, I believe it was five.
Mr. BALL. Live? Live shells?
Mr. Born. Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. What did you do with them?
Nr. BOYD. Well, I put them in an envelope and put them with the rest of the property up there to be turned in.
Mr. BALL. Did you put any mark on them?
Mr. BOYD. Let me see-1 can look and see.
Mr. BALL. I will show you Commission Exhibit 592 in an envelope, will you take a look at that-at the cartridges?
Mr. BOYD. Yes-1 got my mark on them.
Mr. BALL. You have your mark on all five of them?
Mr. BOYD. I have my mark on the first three-yes, sir-1 have my mark on all of them.
Mr. BALL. On all five of them?
Mr. BOYD. Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. You put those marks on there, did you?
Mr. BOYD. Yes, I did.
Mr. BALL. Now, looking those cartridges over, can you tell me whether these five cartridges, which constitute Commission Exhibit 592, are the cartridges which you took from Oswald?
Mr. BOYD. Yes; they are.
Mr. BALL. And where were you when you put the mark on them?
Mr. BOYD. I was back up in my o5ce.
Mr. BAILL. When you first took them from Oswald, where did you put them?
Mr. BOYD. I put them in my pocket.
Mr. BALL. And after you were back in the office, you put a mark on them, did you ?
Mr. BOYD. Yes.
Mr. BALL. And turned them over to whom?
Mr. BOYD. Well, let me see-it seems like we had a drawer there where we had some more property, where we put it all in there-you know, where they had the other stuff-I have forgotten just exactly where it would be.
Mr. BALL. You turned them over to someone in the police department?
Mr. BOYD. Yes, sir.

Elmer Boyd with Lee harvey Oswald after his first interrogation. Oswald raised his cuffed hands by request of the photographers. Click to enlarge.

Then on page 18 of the same PDF document.

Mr. BALL. When you participated in the search of Oswald and found five pistol cartridges in his pants pocket, was there any discussion of these bullets with him; did he say anything, or did you say anything to him about it?
Mr. BOYD. I just asked him, “What were they doing in there,” and he said, “I just had them in my pocket.”
Mr. STERN. The memorandum mentions the cartridges-bus transfer, except that he had a ring on his finger which he took off and he gave it to Mr. Sims, Do you remember any other items that he had that you got from him during this search?
Mr. BOYD. No, sir; I know that Mr. Sims did get the bus transfer and took his ring. He took his ring off and give it to Mr. Sims, and I got those five shells, and that’s all that I recall being taken from him.

Then there is Detective Richard Sims, who during his WC testimony on pages 16 & 17 says:

Mr. BALL. When you participated in the search of Oswald and found five pistol cartridges in his pants pocket, was there any discussion of these bullets with him; did he say anything, or did you say anything to him about it?
Mr. BOYD. I just asked him, “What were they doing in there,” and he said, “I just had them in my pocket.”
Mr. STERN. The memorandum mentions the cartridges-bus transfer, except that he had a ring on his finger which he took off and he gave it to Mr. Sims, Do you remember any other ite,ms that he had that you got from him during this search?
Mr. BOYD. No, sir; I know that Mr. Sims did get the bus transfer and took his ring. He took his ring off and give it to Mr. Sims, and Mr. BALL. R’ow, during this time, or sometime during this period-sometime between these three showups, you searched Oswald, didn’t you?
Mr. SIMS The first one; yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. And that was what time?
Mr. SIMS. It was 4:05, I believe, but I will have to check my record here and see [checking his record referred to].
Mr. BALL. That was after the second showup?
Mr. SIMS. So, sir; the first one.
Mr. BALL. After the first showup?
Mr. SIMS. It was before the first showup.
Mr. BALL. It was before the first showup the 4:05?
Mr. SIMS. Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. And that was after the first interrogation?
Mr. SIMS. Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. And where were you when you first searched him?
Mr. SIMS We was in the holdover, in other words, the showup room.
Mr. BALL. When you took Oswald down for the first showup and waited in the room outside, the showup room, you searched him?
Mr. SIMS. Yes; Boyd and I.
Mr. BALL. What did you find?
Mr. SIMS. I found a bus transfer slip in his shirt pocket.
Mr. BALL. And what else?
Mr. SIMS Well, Boyd found some .38 cartridges in his pocket.
Mr. BALL. How many?
Mr. SIMS. I don’t know-1 have it here I believe it’s five rounds of .38 caliber pistol shells in his left front pocket.
Mr. BALL. Left-front shirt pocket?
Mr. SIXS. No, sir ; they were in his pants pocket.
Mr. BALL. Left front?
Mr. SIMS. Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. Where was the transfer?
Mr. SIMS. The transfer was in his shirt pocket.
Mr. BALL. Would that be on the left side, I suppose?
Mr. SIMS. I don’t know if he’s got two pockets or not.
Mr. BALL. Let’s take a look at it.
Mr. SIMS. (Examined Exhibit hereinafter referred to).
Mr. BALL. Commission Exhibit 150 is being exhibited for the witness’ examination.
Mr. SIGHS. Well, he’s got two pockets in here and let’s see if I have it on herewhat pocket it was-1 didn’t say-1 don’t remember what pocket he had that in.
Mr. BALL. What did you do with the transfer?
Mr. SIMS. I went back up to the office and I believe initialed it and placed it in an envelope for identification.
Mr. BALL. Who did you turn it over to?
Mr. SIMS. I don’t remember.
Mr. BALL. You don’t remember?
Mr. SIMS. No, sir ; it was either in the lieutenant’s desk or Captain Fritz’ desk.
Mr. BALL. Lieutenant who?
Mr. SIMS. We have two in there-Lieutenant Wells and Lieutenant Bohart.
Mr. BALL. And what about the five rounds of live ammunition, what did you do with those?
Mr. SIGHS. It was also placed in the envelope.
Mr. BALL. And turned over to whom-Fritz?
Mr. SIMS. I don’t know who that was turned over to.
Mr. BALL. Did you ever talk to a busdriver named McWatters?
Mr. SIMS. No, sir ; I remember a busdriver coming up there but I don’t think I talked with him.
Mr. BALL. Did you ever examine the transfer for the punchmark date?
Mr. SIMS. The busdriver did. He identified that as coming from his punchcard.
Mr. BALL. I know, but I want to know about you–did you look at the transfer?
Mr. SIMS. Yes, sir ; I looked at it.
Mr. BALL. Did you look at the date and the time that it was punched on the transfer?
Mr. SIMS I don’t remember if I did or not. I’m sure I looked at it but I don’t remember.
Mr. BALL. You say it was shown to a busdriver and he made some remarks about it ; were you there when it was shown to the busdriver?
Mr. SIMS. No, sir.
Mr. BALL. So, you are just telling me what some other officer told you?
Mr. SINS. Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL. All right.
Mr. SIMS. I didn’t see actually the busdriver, I don’t believe, identify his transfer.
Mr. BALL. Do you know the officer that showed the transfer to the busdriver?
Mr. SIMS. No, sir; I don’t.
Mr. BALL. Did you see any idI got those five shells, and that’s all that I recall being taken from him.

Richard Sims on the far left and Marlin G Hall (eyes closed) while escorting Lee Harvey Oswald. Click to enlarge.

Then later on page 23.

Mr. STERN. Now, the search in which you participated of Oswald at 4:05 on Friday, just before the first show up you have told us that either you or Mr. Boyd found five live rounds of .38 caliber pistol shells, and a bus transfer slip, and an identification bracelet, according to your memorandumOswald took his ring off and gave it to you?
Mr. SIMS. That’s right.
Mr. STERN. Do you recall that?
Mr. SIMS. Yes, sir.
Mr. STERN. Do you remember anything else that was found on Oswald at that time?
Mr. SIMS. No, sir ; I don’t remember anything else.
Mr. STERN. A wallet or identification card?
Mr. SIMS. No, sir ; that had been taken off of him.
Mr. STERN. That had been taken off of him upon his arrest at the time of his arrest?
Mr. SIMS. Well, I don’t know when, but he didn’t have it on.
Mr. STERN. Did you say anything to him at that time about the ownership of these things, about the ownership of the pistol shells-cartridges-did you comment on that ?
Mr. SIMS. No,sir.
Mr. STERN. Did he say anything about it?
Mr. SIMS. No, sir ; there was no comment at all.
Mr. STERN. Or on the bus transfer slip?
Mr. SIMS. No, sir; he was asked something about it, I don’t remember what I asked or what he said.

Besides Boyd and Sims, M.G. Hall was part of the escort of bringing Oswald down (he is spotted in the first three oictures in this article in the background) for the Helen Markham line-up. Hall makes no mention of this so called search that yielded the bus ticket and the five bullets. You would think that these finds would have been noticed or reported as such by Hall, but no…..

DPD statement by Marlin G Hall. From UNT. Click to enlarge.

During my investigations I became aware of a document from the HSCA where Charles Truman Walker is interviewed. And page five Walker states “Being alone in there with him made me think. He could still have a weapon, so I searched him good, but found nothing.” From the way Walker talks you can derive that the search inside the unmarked patrol car

HSCA interview Charles Truman Walker. Click to enlarge.

Charles Truman Walker can be seen in the Stuart Reed photograph below on the left wearing his white cap.

From left to right: DPD patrolman, Charles Truman Walker, Lee Harvey oswald, Paul Bentley and Gerald Hill. Pic: Stuart Reed. Click to enlarge.

That by itself is pretty interesting, but wait there is more.

Paul Bentley, in the photograph above chomping on a cigar and busy posing to secure himself a place in history without any crutches he himself appears with shortly after…

Paul Bentley (Will Fritz partially seen behind him) on crutches in the 3rd floor corridor of City Hall. Posted on Nov 24th in the Chicago Tribune. From Newspapers.com. Click to enlarge.

The FBI report from Feb 3rd 1964.

FBI statement Paul Bentley Feb 3 1964. Thanks to Malcolm Blunt. Click document to enlarge.

Then there is Lt. T.L. Baker who in his undated report on the period Nov 22nd – 24th makes mention of the search on Oswald again as well. Why “again?”

T.L. Baker undated report. From: UNT Click to enlarge.

It is perfect natural to assume that arresting officer(s) search the person they have placed under arrest since it is part of procedure. What is unnatural is to search him two hours after his arrest and the suspect has been interrogated and questioned by quite a few individuals (Gus Rose, Richard Stovall, Will Fritz, Jim Hosty, James Bookhout and Forrest Sorrels). Other researchers have pointed out years ago about the timing of the find of the bullets and the bus ticket. Rightly so, but not produced anything that would prove their case. The Walker HSCA statement did not surface until many years later and the Bentley statement “must have been kept in a drawer”.

This of course has serious consequences for the so called finds of the bus ticket and the actual truth of the bus ride ever happening! More so for the find of the bullets which were part of the revolver ‘found’ on Oswald, as per Gus Rose claims, that Oswald claimed it was tossed to him.

Summer 2021 Update

Summer 2021 Update

 

Ok so this year I did a lot of scanning of Malcolm Blunt’s materials for a soon to be fully accessible archive in Nov 2021. There is a lot of material to plough through if you are a student of certain facets of the JFK Assassination. Law Enforcement Agencies, Committees and various individuals all connected in this case are all well represented in this archive. If you have read a decent amount of books on this matter then this archive can help you gain more additional knowledge.

The work done and still ahead…. Click pic to enlarge. Photo: Bartolomy

By the time of its primary release I think I have about 150.000 pages over about 17,000 PDFs ready to be shared. The work will continue for at least another year with regular updates.

I am going to slow down on scanning for the next few months so I can tidy some bits up in the archives and also put the focus back on my own work and this website. I will put the finishing touches to my forthcoming releases of the four(!) Anatomy papers for starters. They have been dormant for most of this year and some of 2020 as well. I hope to have all this done before the anniversary or it will be a X-Mas release read instead.

In November there will be an article written and photographed by me and published in Garrison Magazine, the article will have exclusive pictures I have made of Malcolm and his archive these past three years.

Malcolm Blunt – Tetbury Apr 2019. Click pic to enlarge. Photo: Bartolomy

I am also creating a set of videos in which Malcolm and I are having a chat about his materials. So far two have been posted and I hope to do a few more over the next few months.

 

Then there are also some talks scheduled such as JFK Lancer, DPUK and Project JFK in November where I will speak in great depth about the above mentioned project and its vast content.

I have some more articles in the pipeline, such as the Minox  camera and Oswald’s fingerprints and once I get my papers finished then I shall be developing those articles as well.

And last but not least the movies, which I hope to make a begin with early next year.

Plenty to get on with.

Best regards.

Bart.

Spaulden Jones Photos at the Sixth Floor Museum

Spaulden Jones Photos at the Sixth Floor Museum

 

Spaulden Jones. Thanks to Phil Hopley.

A few weeks back the Sixth Floor Museum published a set of colour photographs taken by Spaulden Jones inside the Texas School Book Depository. Jones was a regional manager of Macmillan and Company, which were housed on the third floor of the TSBD.  Spaulden Jones believed that he was on the elevator with Lee Harvey Oswald on November 22, 1963 at 08:30 as per his notes seen below.

Click pic to enlarge. Photo: Spaulden Jones – Sixth Floor Museum.

The next day on the morning of the 23rd, Jones took a series of color photographs on the sixth floor of the Depository, and it is just amazing to see the so called ‘scene’ in colour for a change.

I like the photo of the two men in the so called sniper’s nest with one on the phone and the other being close to the sniper’s position and is fairly well concealed from view unless from relative closeness which this shot perfectly demonstrates. Those pipes look like a bother for a right handed shooter.

Click pic to enlarge. Photo: Spaulden Jones – Sixth Floor Museum.

Two other photos stood out to me as they were not  taken on the third floor, where the MacMillan office was based inside the TSBD.

They are of the second floor front entrance of the TSBD office of which there is a similar FBI photograph that was published by the Warren Commission in 1964. A quick comparison immediately shows this to be the same front entrance.

Click pic to enlarge. Photo: Spaulden Jones – Sixth Floor Museum.

Click to enlarge. Photo:  Spaulden Jones – Sixth Floor Museum.

 

Second floor office space entrance, click pic to enlarge. From MFF.

I reckon that potential clients of the companies housed inside the TSBD where received through the second floor front entrance. And that also goes for the conference room photo pasted below. There is no other conference room in the building than on the second floor in the back where the upper management such as Jack Cason and Ochus Campbell had their offices. It is nice to see what the conference room looked like. Obviously the books belong to the publishing companies housed on the second, third and fourth floors. No idea of identifying the people in the photographs above the shelf unit are. Nor the Emblem, could be an award?

Click to enlarge. Second floor conference room TSBD. Photo: Spaulden Jones – Sixth Floor Museum.

Click to enlarge. Second floor conference room TSBD, back of image. Photo: Spaulden Jones – Sixth Floor Museum.

And for more clarification I share the 2nd and 3rd floor plans made by the FBI. For some strange reason rooms 302, 303 and 304 are missing on the third floor plans.

Add on April 14th 2023.

Jones also did an Oral History Interview with the Sixth Floor Museum in 1996.

Spaulden Jones being interviewed in April 1996. Pic.: Sixth Floor Museum. Click to enlarge.

During the first ten minutes he explains what he had done during his career and his position inside the TSBD as a manager for MacMillan book publishing company, he worked from the fourth floor and he had six secretaries working for him.

  • He knew Roy Truly very well. Truly was in charge of the physical shipping of the books.
  • Jones was out for lunch with Herbert Junker (one of his sales reps) at the closeby Blue Front restaurant when JFK was killed.
  • They returned to the TSBD straight after hearing the news. His estimation was that about five or ten minutes had passed.
  • He noticed that there was a lot of confusion.
  • He had five of his office ladies down out in front of the TSBD when he returned.
  • When asking them how many shots they had heard many of them could not precisely recall as to how many they thought they had heard. It differed from 2-4 shots.
  • Some of the women were near the front entrance and some were further down Elm St.
  • He was milling around and he mentions meeting Wes Wise, but also a suited gentleman who was holding a shoe box  which contained a piece of Kennedy’s skull and which he saw being handed over.
  • People were listening to their radios where they would hear that the President was at Parkland hospital. But upon seeing that piece of skull Jones had not much faith in JFK still being alive.
  • They, the office people, were let back into the TSBD, but they couldn’t leave.
  • Upon return inside the women were very much upset and before they let anyone go they were being interviewed in their office. Strangely enough he cannot remember who questioned them, only that they were not wearing uniforms. He thinks they were FBI or USSS. The ladies were interviewed first.
  • He mentions seeing and talking to Doris Burns afterwards. They had questioned her already but would not let her go. After which one of the other older ladies remarked “She won’t tell them her age.”
  • When asked what questions he was asked at that time he states: “How many shots did you hear? Where were you standing?”

 

 

With special thanks to Gary Murr (for the drawings) and Ed Ledoux for some additional research.

Bill Alexander – Charles W Webster and the ACLU

Bill Alexander – Charles W Webster and the ACLU.

 

  I was introduced to Charles Webster in a post at ROKC that was started by Greg R Parker entitled “Send Lawyers, Guns and Money  Part 2” and realised I needed to include him in my Anatomy of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations paper (pages 161-168).

Charles W Webster. Click to enlarge.

Webster was present on the 22nd at the DPD. In what capacity Webster was inside D.P.D. is a bit of a mystery. But through some searching I came across some articles at newspapers.com that show that Charles W Webster was involved with a psychological evaluation of General Edwin Walker. He is also named in that capacity in conjunction with Jack Ruby during his trial for murdering Lee Harvey Oswald.

This may be a stretch but from the information mentioned above I am inclined to think that Webster was around Dallas Police Department’s Robbery & Homicide to observe Lee Harvey Oswald. I have not seen any evidence that he was able to observe him as close as Will Fritz did nor is there any record of him questioning Oswald himself.

It is known that he also had a meeting with Greg Olds of the ACLU, when he, Grier Raggio, Otto Mullinax and L.N.D. Wells Jnr  arrived in the late evening of Nov 22nd. Charles Webster is being mentioned by Greg Olds in his Warren Commission Testimony.

Mr. STERN. Excuse me. Did Captain Fritz say that Oswald did not want counsel at that time, or that he was trying to obtain his own counsel?
Mr. OLDS. What I was told, that he had been given the opportunity and had not made any requests. So, I called our board member back and conferred with him and he suggested that we go down and see about it at the police department, in person, to get further assurances. And he and I and two others of our organization met down there at the Plaza Hotel lobby about 11:15, directly across the street from the police station, and we discussed the matter there, and I called Mayor Earle Cabell at his office, but was told that he was busy at the moment so we went then over to the police station, and we got in there. Let’s see, it was up on the I guess the third or fourth floor, wherever Oswald was being questioned, and Chuck Webster, a lawyer–professor of law, who was known to the other three men with me said he had been there a good part of the time since the assassination, and that–we told him what we were there for, and he said he thought he knew who we could see to get our assurances. Did you have something?
Mr. STERN. No.
Mr. OLDS. We went to–first, we talked-conferred with Captain King, I believe is the right name, who is, I believe, assistant to the chief of police. I’m not sure on that. We all went in with Mr. Webster, and this was shortly after 11:35, or 11:40, and Captain King was, at this time, talking to somebody and said that Oswald had just been charged with the assassination of President Kennedy. He had here earlier been charged with the assassination–I mean the murder of the policeman, Tippit, and we told Captain King what we were there for, and he said, he assured us that Oswald had not made any requests for counsel. And we went outside of the office and went downstairs, at least–I didn’t, but two of the others, I believe, went downstairs to the basement where Justice of the Peace David Johnston was. He was the one that had held the I believe an arraignment, I believe is the right term, at 7:30 when the first charge of murder was filed against Oswald, and he also assured us that there had been an opportunity of–Oswald’s rights had been explained, and he had declined counsel. Said nothing beyond that. I think that was the extent of our inquiry.

Charles W Webster (2nd from left) in 1959. From Legal Center News SMU. Click pic to enlarge.

That is all I have, for now, on Charles Webster around the time of Oswald’s incarceration.

Bill Alexander, an arch conservative or perhaps in today’s terms a right wing extremist had few kind words to say about Charles Webster.

Photo: Fort Worth Star Telegram March 18 1964. From: newspapers.com

From a document that I found in the Malcolm Blunt Archives this is the type of ‘gold’ that is hard to come by. What makes the document below so special is Alexanders abrasiveness. It can be compared to his statement that Earl Warren did not need impeaching, he needed hanging which cost him his job as an assistant DA and from which he went into private practice. That this report is made up by Manning Clements is an interesting side note.

Bill Alexander on Charles W Webster. In a Manning Clements Report. Click pic to enlarge. From the Malcolm Blunt Archives.

Alexander’s baseless remarks are not going very far. From the testimony above nothing indicated that Greg Olds and Charles Webster were affiliated thru the ACLU other than knowing each other thru the profession. Looking at the file below from R. S Westphal to W.P. Gannaway that even from a large suspected group of people who are suspected with their affiliation with the ACLU Charles Webster is not named on it.

Dallas Criminal Intelligence Unit Report on the Dallas ACLU. Click to enlarge.

Dallas Criminal Intelligence Unit Report on the Dallas ACLU. Click to enlarge.

Thanks to Ed Ledoux who noted the existence of some ACLU files at NARA of which one of them is the above document. I shall try and get the other batch.

Lee Harvey Oswald – Alek James Hidell

Lee Harvey Oswald – Alek James Hidell

 

While working on my forthcoming paper Anatomy of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations Vol. 3, which I hope to release in the Autumn of 2021 (more like June 2022!), I came across some documents that made me take a closer look into the find of the Hidell ID and realised something was amiss. This then got me to investigate and trying to figure out how the Alek James Hidell ID came forward during the time that Oswald was incarcerated and interrogated by the DPD until his death. The ‘discovery’ of the Hidell ID on Nov 22 and the significant developments on the 23rd and 24th are this article’s primary focus. And things are not as they are meant to appear at all.

Before I get into the details I suggest you check out Accessories After The Fact by Sylvia Meagher, which to this day, after more than 50 years remains one of the best generic books on the JFK Assassination. In chapter 6 simply titled “Hidell” this matter is already addressed in very good detail. I suggest you read this as it shows how soon after the assassination Sylvia Meagher was close to pointing the many discrepancies on the Hidell matter out. Another good read has been created by Paul Hoch for the Third Decade Magazine who brings in the all important important military intelligence angle, this material was kept far afield from the Warren Commission at that time and only surfaced during the HSCA and also the ARRB investigations. And then there is The Assassination Tapes by George O’Toole. He managed to interview two individuals who were involved with the arrest of Lee Harvey Oswald at the Texas Theatre.

Oswald gets arrested at about 13:50 and is searched while inside the car transporting him towards City Call, where they arrive at about 14:00 or just after. During that journey they radio the DPD dispatch starting at 13:51. A full transcript is on pages 107-110 HERE.

 Sergeant Gerald Hill: Suspect of shooting of police officer is apprehended and en route to station.

Dispatch (Hulse and MacDaniel): 10-4. At the Texas Theatre?

Sergeant Gerald Hill: Caught him on the lower floor of the Texas Theatre after a fight.

A little later.

Sergeant Gerald Hill: Patrolman CT walker is in the car with us. Have someone pick up his car at the rear of the Texas Theatre and take it to station. It’s got the keys in it.

Dispatch (Hulse and MacDaniel): 10-4.

And after that another transmission from Gerald Hill to report they were in a special service unit car and giving their location.

Captain C.E. Talbert: You do have the suspect arrested in the Texas Theatre?

Sergeant Gerald Hill: Yes, sir, him and the gun.

This is what is available from the transcript between the car containing Lee Harvey Oswald, a group of 5 DPD officers and detectives and dispatch. I don’t know whether there is anything missing from that transcript but that is all there is. Now then let’s have a closer look at these 5 lawmen and their statements and interviews during that weekend and thereafter.

  • Paul Bentley, the DPD detective who sprains his ankle during the scuffle to arrest Oswald inside the Texas Theater speaks to gathered press on the third floor corridor. There is no mention of any Hidell ID.

On the 23rd Bentley is interviewed on WFAA TV and asked about the identification cards he pulled from Oswald’s wallet while they are on their way to City Hall. At 08:39 Paul Bentley explains all this in good detail. Is there any mention of the Hidell ID? Nope.

On Dec 3rd 1963 Paul Bentley writes up his report, rather late if I may add, but even then there is not one mention of a Hidell ID. And that makes it even stranger since the Hidell ID has already come into play by then.

During the first half of the 1970’s, George O’Toole in his book The Assassination Tapes (chapter 9 page 160), manages to interview Paul Bentley, who by that time has moved on from the DPD to work for the First National Bank in Dallas.

Bentley: We had no information hat he was the man who had actually committed the assassination of the president until we radioed in that we had a prisoner and gave the names. And I say names, this was taken from his wallet. he used several different names, as you know. But we gave the names. This was when they told us that he was a suspect in the assassination of the president. So we were instructed to bring him directly to Captain Fritz, who was in the homicide and robbery bureau.

O’Toole: He had the names of both Oswald and Hidell?

Bentley: Right, right.

O’Toole: Both of those identifications?

Bentley: Seems to me like he was using another name, also I can’t remember. I’ve got all this stuff at home. I’m not sure. There were several names that he was using on various cards and then we gave the names to the dispatcher who was instructed to bring them to Captain Fritz.


In a second interview by phone  he again asks about the Oswald-Hidell identification (page 163).

O’Toole: Now the identification that he had, though, he had both Hidell and Oswald?

Bentley: Yes, and if I am not mistaken, he had some identification by the other names on him, but I can’t remember offhand what the names were. Seems to me like there were three or four different names that he had in there.

In his first HSCA interview (May 4 1978) Bentley only mentions ‘numerous identifications’

But during a second HSCA interview on June 15 1978 he recalls that he had pulled 5-6 ID cards out of Oswald’s wallet with different names. No mention of Hidell or any other details as to what names they were. A first by Bentley to mention this almost 15 years after the fact!

But it gets better during his  Living History talk with the Sixth Floor Museum at 18:08 he even has the nerve to state that Oswald had several aliases. So Mr. Bentley how would you know which name to pick and inform dispatch about this while en route to City hall? There are a few other statements by him during that interview, not context related to this post, that are highly questionable from a truth perspective.

  • Kenneth E. Lyon, another Dallas Police Department detective who was part of the arrest team has his report made up on the 3rd of Dec 1963. Again no mention of any Hidell ID.

Kenneth E. Lyon, on the very right, arriving out of the elevator on the 3rd floor with Oswald just behind him. Still grab of CBS footage. Click image to enlarge. Thanks to Denis Morissette for the ID.

Kenneth E Lyon report Dec 4 1963. From History Matters. Click pic to enlarge.

Mr. BELIN. Was he ever asked his name?
Mr. CARROLL. Yes, sir; he was asked his name.
Mr. BELIN. Did he give his name?
Mr. CARROLL. He gave, the best I recall, I wasn’t able to look closely, but the best I recall, he gave two names, I think. I don’t recall what the other one was.
Mr. BELIN. Did he give two names? Or did someone in the car read from the identification?
Mr. CARROLL. Someone in the car may have read from the identification. I know two names, the best I recall, were mentioned.

  • Another one of the arresting DPD officers is sergeant Gerald Hill. He spoke to the press shortly after as Bentley did and supplied incriminating details, yet not once mentioned the Alek HIdell ID. In a radio interview that same afternoon

Gerald Hill being interviewed inside City Hall. Screen B.K. Click pic to enlarge.

Now Gerald Hill could have forgotten to mention this during that interview, but when he is interviewed for a second time as mentioned In the supplementary volumes of the Warren Report, Hill states to the newsmen, “The only way we found out what his name was, was to remove his billfold and check it ourselves; he wouldn’t even tell us what his name was.” Later in the interview a reporter asks, “What was the name on the billfold?” Hill replies, “Lee H. Oswald, 0-S-W-A-L-D.” No mention at all of the name Hidell.  In another filmed interview (at 02:55) Hill makes no mention of the billfold at all. This video is rather poorly edited and looks incomplete.

And then four months later Gerald Hill is being interviewed by the Warren Commission, and by a miracle the Hidell ID appears.

Mr. BELIN. Now after, from the time you started in motion until the time you called in, do you remember anyone saying anything at all in the car?
Mr. HILL The suspect was asked what his name was.
Mr. BELIN. What did he say?
Mr. HILL. He never did answer. He just sat there.
Mr. BELIN. Was he asked where he lived?
Mr. HILL. That was the second question that was asked the suspect, and he didn’t answer it, either.
About the time I got through with the radio transmission, I asked Paul Bentley, “Why don’t you see if he has any identification.”
Paul was sitting sort of sideways in the seat, and with his right hand he reached down and felt of the suspect’s left hip pocket and said, “Yes, he has a billfold,” and took it out.
I never did have the billfold in my possession, but the name Lee Oswald was called out by Bentley from the back seat, and said this identification, I believe, was on the library card.
And he also made the statement that there was some more identification in this other name which I don’t remember, but it was the same name that later came in the paper that he bought the gun under.
Mr. BELIN. Would the name Hidell mean anything? Alek Hidell?
Mr. HILL. That would be similar. I couldn’t say specifically that is what it was, because this was a conversation and I never did see it written down, but that sounds like the name that I heard.
Mr. BELIN. Was this the first time you learned of the name?
Mr. HILL. Yes; it was.

He repeats this years later in an interview with George O’Toole in his book The Assassination Tapes chapter 9, page 157. “As I say, in the car on the way downtown he was belligerent, he was surly, he wouldn’t tell us who he was. We took his billfold out of his pocket, we found the ID in both names, Oswald and Hidell, that he later was proved to have ordered the gun under. He had library cards and drafty cards in one name, and he had identification  cards from various organizations in the other name.” 

  • Charles Truman Walker was present as well during Oswald’s arrest. His official report, from Dec 2 1963, regarding the Oswald arrest does not mention anything about inside the unmarked squad car during the ride towards City Hall. Then it becomes interesting, during Charles Truman Walker’s HSCA interview (page 5) he takes credit for taking the bill fold out of Oswald’s pants pocket, after dropping him off at City Hall. Something Paul Bentley did in the car already! And he makes mention of the Hidell ID and also mentions that he searched Oswald again.
  • Gus Rose and Richard Stovall ‘deal’ with Oswald next. They arrive at City Hall just before Oswald is brought in and talk with him for about 10-15 minutes after which Will Fritz arrives and sends them to go to Irving. In the joint report by Richard Stovall, Gus Rose and John Adamcik there is only the briefest mention of this ‘interrogation’. Not a word in that statement on an ID carrying the name Hidell. You’d think something like that would be reported no?

Months later on April 8 1964 Richard Stovall’s W.C. testimony mentions the following before he is sent out by Fritz.

Mr. BALL. Do you remember what was said to him and what he said to you?
Mr. STOVALL. I don’t recall exactly–I went in and asked him for his identification, asked him who he was and he said his name was Lee Oswald, as well as I remember. Rose and I were both in there at the time. He had his billfold and in it he had the identification of “A. Hidell,” which was on a selective service card, as well as I remember.

Mr. BALL. That’s [spelling] H-i-d-e-l-l, isn’t it?.
Mr. STOVALL. I’m not positive on that–I believe it was [spelling] H-i-d-e-l-l, I’m not sure. And he also had identification of Lee Harvey Oswald, and I believe that was on a Social Security card and at that time Captain Fritz opened the door to the office there and sent Rose and I to go out to this address in Irving at 2515 West Fifth Street in Irving.

And later during the same testimony.

Mr. BALL. Now, did you do anything else on this investigation?
Mr. STOVALL. No, sir; that’s all I can recall that I did on the investigation. I might add, there was–well, you have that on the list–some property.
Mr. BALL. What is that?
Mr. STOVALL. When we took this identification off of Lee Oswald that had this selective service card, the name Hidell, and he also had his own identification–at the time we were in the garage we found some negatives out there that appeared that he had make a snapshot of a selective service card, and on the back of the negatives it was where the name would have been typed in–there was some stuff on the back of the negatives to block out the name when it was reprinted, and there were some selective service cards that he had printed himself out there from a negative that were blank and which appeared to be the same that he had on him at the time, on the 22nd of November, that had the name of “A. Hidell” typed in on it.

From the handwritten list (made by two individuals) of the evidence taken from Ruth Paine’s house, and unless these negatives were inside the brown box, 13th entry on the first page, then there is no direct link to these so called negatives at all. Again I will apply the benefit of doubt on this one.

A closer look at the University of Texas JFK Collection which stores the DPD evidence on Lee Harvey Oswald has five pictures with negatives on display. It has hard to look at the details, but Negatives, Photographs #2 seems to display a Selective Services card. The issue is that the resolution is too low to actually see anything to be able to ID and conclude what Stovall is attesting to. Nor is there a photograph of the backside of that negative to see the masking of said negative. I tried to enhance and invert the #2 image. But I have not become any the wiser.

Negatives #2 from UNT. Enhancement by B.K. Click pic to enlarge.

Gus Rose behind Buell Wesley Frazier late on Nov 22 1963. Photo: Jim Murray – Blackstar. Scan by Terry Martin at NARA. Click pic to enlarge.

Mr. ROSE. There were some people in the office from the Book Depository and we talked to a few of them and then in just a few minutes they brought in Lee Oswald and I talked to him for a few minutes?
Mr. BALL. What did you say to him or did he say to you?
Mr. ROSE. Well, the first thing I asked him was what his name was and he told me it was Hidell.
Mr. BALL. Did he tell you it was Hidell?
Mr. ROSE. Yes; he did.
Mr. BALL. He didn’t tell you it was Oswald?
Mr. ROSE. No; he didn’t, not right then–he did later. In a minute–I found two cards–I found a card that said “A. Hidell.” And I found another card that said “Lee Oswald” on it, and I asked him which of the two was his correct name. He wouldn’t tell me at the time, he just said, “You find out.” And then in just a few minutes Captain Fritz came in and he told me to get two men and go to Irving and search his house.
Mr. BALL. Now, when he first came in there–you said that he said his name was “Hidell”?
Mr. ROSE. Yes.
Mr. BALL. Was that before you saw the two cards?
Mr. ROSE. Yes; it was.
Mr. BALL. Did he give you his first name?
Mr. ROSE. He just said “Hidell”; I remember he just gave me the last name of “Hidell”.
Mr. BALL. And then you found two or three cards on him?
Mr. ROSE. Yes; we did.
Mr. BALL. Did you search him?
Mr. ROSE. He had already been searched and someone had his billfold. I don’t know whether it was the patrolman who brought him in that had it or not.
Mr. BALL. And the contents of the billfold supposedly were before you?
Mr. ROSE. Yes.

And from this short interview session with Oswald on the 22nd in their Warren Commission testimonies it becomes apparent that Rose and Stovall contradict each other about Lee Harvey Oswald telling them what his name was.. Yet they were inside the same room. They make mention of the Selective Service Car found on Oswald only during their W.C. testimony.

In 1998 in an article from DMagazine Gus Rose mentions the card again. On the table lay the two identification cards. Rose looked down at them. One read “Alec Hiddel.” The other: “Lee Oswald.”

In which case it would be easy to spot for the people involved with interrogating Lee Harvey Oswald shortly after, no?

  • Will Fritz starts to interrogate Oswald, first by himself, backed up by Elmer Boyd and Richard Sims, starting at about 14:30 inside room 317 of Robbery & Homicide. Gus Rose and Richard Stovall could have mentioned the Hidell ID, but they failed telling him. Fritz does not mention anything about the ID during this first interrogation lasting an hour and a half until 16:00..
  • James P Hosty and James W Bookhout join Fritz about 45 minutes later at about 15:15. In those 90 minutes again the Hidell ID is not brought up once by either FBI agent at any time during this first interrogation. It is not found in Fritz’s interrogation notes and his subsequent report, Hosty’s handwritten interrogation notes and the joint Bookhout and Hosty FBI report. And yet they do bring up the O.H. Lee name which is the name accredited to Oswald using it at his North Beckley residence. Which from a timing p.o.v. and compared to the Hidell name is remarkable.

James W Bookhout (in a light colored suit wearing glasses and smoking a pipe) inside Robbery & Homicide. Photo by Jim Murray. Scan by: Terry Martin at NARA. Click pic to enlarge.

During James Bookhout’s W.C. testimony the Hidell name gets brief mentions, but only in the vaguest terms.

Mr. STERN – What sort of question would he refuse to answer? Was there any pattern to his refusing?
Mr. BOOKHOUT – Well, now, I am not certain whether this would apply then to this particular interview, the first interview or not, in answering this, but I recall specifically one of the interviews asking him about the Selective Service card which he had in the name of Hidell, and he admitted that he was carrying the card, but that he would not admit that he wrote the signature of Hidell on the card, and at that point stated that he refused to discuss the matter further. I think generally you might say anytime that you asked a question that would be pertinent to the investigation, that would be the type of question he would refuse to discuss.

And later during the same testimony  when they do discuss the first interrogation of the 23rd.

Mr. STERN – Did you ask any questions in the course of this interview?
Mr. BOOKHOUT – Yes.
Mr. STERN – What were they, and what were the responses, if you recall?
Mr. BOOKHOUT – One specific question was with regard to the selective service card in the possession of Oswald bearing a photograph of Oswald and the name Alek James Hidell. Oswald admitted he carried this selective service card, but declined to state that he wrote the signature of Alek J. Hidell appearing on same. Further declined to state the purpose of carrying same, and—or any use he made of same.

  • Robert E Jones of the 112th INTC contacts the DOJ at 15:15 while Oswald is being interrogated by Will Fritz and in this document Oswald is already marked as the guilty man for the Tippit murder.  Jones provides of plenty information on Lee Harvey Oswald and his previous endeavors in Russia and New Orleans, the majority coming from newspaper clippings. The timing and the sharing of this is most interesting when Oswald is still being interrogated and Hosty and Bookhout have only just walked in. But the hammer of course is that Jones already knows that Oswald was carrying a Selective Service Card bearing the name of A.J. Hidell. This is quite remarkable as well when not one of the arresting officers attested to having found this card that day. Not until months later! Following this report we get a report by the Secret Service on Dec 5 1963 which tries to clarify that the Ana J Hidell is a typo. As much as I want to believe that correction I also know that the Secret Service messed around a lot in their reporting with TSBD workers i/e in early Dec of 1963. But let’s give ’em the benefit of doubt in this instance.

The HSCA investigates and interviews Jones on 3 occasions over the period of a year.

The first time on April 4 1977. The following document is Robert Jones’ HSCA interview from April 20 1978. This session is filled with some good details. In a nutshell Jones got his information from someone inside the D.P.D. at about 13:30-14:00 and that poses quite an issue, since no DPD officer is on record at that time about the Hidell ID or name at that time. Better yet Oswald was arrested at 13:50 after the vaguest description possible was sent through DPD dispatch. Compare that to the one sent out for Charles Douglas Givens just before the DPD entered the Texas Theater.

  • Forrest Sorrells gets about ten minutes to talk to Oswald before he is taken down for his first line-up with Helen Markham. Not a word about Hidell.
  • Then at 16:25 the San Antonio bureau of the FBI sends a report to its director and to the Dallas office. Again Oswald is declared the guilty man for murdering Tippit. Which is remarkable as well since the timing of the cable is ten minutes before Oswald’s first line-up with the hysterical Helen Markham.

 

FBI Report 16:25 Nov 22 1963. Click to enlarge

  • Jim Hosty, later that day and not allowed to be present during the interrogations anymore hangs about Robbery & Homicide Bureau and takes notes of the so called Oswald evidence which is laid out on a table.

James P Hosty (newspaper to his side) speaking to Bill Alexander inside Robbery & Homicide. Photo by Jim Murray. Scan by: Terry Martin at NARA. Click pic to enlarge.

In the photograph above you can see the office with the blinds on the right which is where Oswald was interrogated. The glass window on the left behind Bill Alexander was Walter Potts office where the evidence was laid out.

In Assignment Oswald Hosty states “I decided nonetheless that I would remain at the police station. Just because I couldn’t talk to the police didn’t mean I couldn’t learn things from them. I headed back to Fritz’s office, where I knew the police were keeping Oswald’s personal belongings. Nothing there, but in the second inner office, which belonged to Lieutenant Walter Potts, I spotted Oswald’s things, which had been removed from his person and from his apartment at the Oak Cliff rooming house.” Hosty then starts mentioning Oswald’s address book and the entry of his name in it. Anything about Hidell then? Ehm……no! Keep this in mind when it is Manning Clements’ turn to go through the same evidence not much later.

Then there is the Church Committee testimony that Hosty gave on Dec 13th 1975. On page 138 he mentions the same as above that he goes into the adjoining office and goes through the evidence. And again the direction moves immediately towards the address book. No mention of a Hidell ID. Hosty would have mentioned that if there was one.

  • Manning Clements arrives in the evening of Nov 22nd and sees James Bookhout, and asks him if anyone has, to his knowledge, taken a detailed physical description and background information from Lee Harvey Oswald. Bookhout tells him that such description and background data had not been obtained, and suggests that Clements do it. In his Warren Commission testimony Clements says that he questioned Oswald at about 10 PM, but this is wrong. Thanks to a report by M.G. Hall, who is very precise with his timings. he makes mention of Clements’ arrival at 19:40. Which is very close to the “I’m just a patsy” scene in the corridor. Clements talks with Oswald over a period of just about half an hour, and his questioning the suspect gets interrupted during which time Oswald is taken out for a line-up, which would be the one with the Davis Sisters. While Oswald is gone Clements has a look at the evidence and he, allegedly, sees the Selective Services card with the Alek James Hidell name on it.  In his report made the next day on the 23rd he is the first person that makes an actual mention of seeing the Hidell Selective Services card the day before yet he does not make no mention of any other item from Oswald’s wallet. What boggles the mind even more is that he makes no mention of this ‘fact’ to James Bookhout or Will Fritz who start their third interrogation at 19:55!
  • This FBI report from its director is made up at 10:21 PM on the 22nd of Nov. and it deals predominately about the Hidell link to the FPCC.

FBI report 10:21 PM Nov 22 1963. Click pic to enlarge.

 

  • On Nov 23rd, near the end of the first interrogation just before 11:30 Will Fritz mentions in his notes that FBI agent James Bookhout asks him about the Hidell ID. This handwritten note is the first trace of anyone of the D.P.D. actually asking Oswald about this. James Bookhout and Thomas J Kelley mention this at the end of their reports as well. This is after the mail order for the rifle has been discovered in Chicago earlier that morning. Come on…this is just ‘sheer coincidence’.
  • On the morning of the 24th Harry Dean Holmes has joined Will Fritz, Jim Leavelle, Forrest Sorrels for a last interrogation before Oswald is to be transported to the Dallas jail. Holmes writes in a report in which he stated that Fritz asked Oswald about the Hidell I.D. card, and Oswald “flared up and stated ‘I’ve told you all I’m going to about that card. “You took notes, just read them for yourself, if you want to refresh your memory” Oswald could have been referring to anyone in that room.

In Harry Dean Holmes’ W.C. testimony he states:

Mr. HOLMES. In his billfold the police had found a draft registration card in the name of A. J. Hidell on his person at the time of his arrest, and I had seen it.

And later on during the same testimony session Harry Dean Holmes brings up the ID again..

“Well, who is A. J. Hidell?” I asked him.
And he said, “I don’t know any such person.”
I showed him the box rental application for the post office box in New Orleans and I read from it. I said, “Here this shows as being able to receive, being entitled to receive mail is Marina Oswald.” And he said, “Well, that is my wife, so what?”
And I said also it says “A. J. Hidell.”
“Well, I don’t know anything about that.”
That is all he would say about it.
Then Captain Fritz interrupted and said, “Well, what about this card we got out of your billfold? This draft registration card, he called it, where it showed A. J. Hidell.”
“Well, that is the only time that I recall he kind of flared up and he said, “Now, I have told you all I am going to tell you about that card in my billfold.” He said, “You have the card yourself, and you know as much about it as I do.” And he showed a little anger. Really the only time that he flared up.

  • Walter E Potts’ report states that he had gone to the Beckley address on the 22nd and claims that they checked for the Oswald and Hidell names and then find out that Oswald was registered under the name O. H Lee. The issue with this report is that it is made after the 25th.
  • In Will Fritz interrogation report of which there are half a dozen different versions available and which he wanted amended before it was sent of to the Warren Commission, he makes a brief entry about the Hidell ID.

 

Will Fritz – Interrogation of Lee Harvey Oswald. From: UNT. Click pic to enlarge.

So let’s recap!

There is no report from the DPD on the 22nd of Nov that points to the Hidell name and ID at all. Anyone from that group interviewed by the press makes no mention of this either.

Robert Jones of the 112th INTC was informed by someone of the DPD, name not remembered during his HSCA testimony, early that afternoon of the 22nd about Oswald and the Hidell ID

The FBI claims that Jones rang them and gave them the news after which they shared this with other bureaus.

The Hidell name is not brought up by anyone at all on Nov 22nd even though some law enforcement officers claim they saw the ID, yet when they had the opportunity to question Oswald about this ID it did not happen. This includes Will Fritz, James Bookhout, James Hosty and Manning Clements.

The first real evidence that Oswald was asked about the Hidell name is at the end of the first interrogation close to 11:30 on Nov 23rd 1963. This is confirmed by reports of Will Fritz, James W Bookhout and Thomas J Kelley.

Shortly before, in Chicago, an order for the alleged murder weapon, a Mannlicher-Carcano in the name of Alek J Hidell is found and reported to the FBI.

On Nov 23 1963 Richard Sims of the DPD submits the wallet contents to the Identification Bureau and requests 4 copies of photographs of each item. The description of them is very generic.

On Nov 29 1963 the FBI creates a report of the wallet contents sent from the DPD to the FBI, is there a mention of the Hidell Selective Service Card? Nope. On top of that according the Feds it appears the DPD had failed to photograph this content and requests the FBI to do so…….

In a document dated Dec 19th 1963 the FBI states that it had received Oswald’s wallet and that it did not contain the US Marines Certificate of Service and the Selective Service Card in the name of  Hidell. And that these were subsequently sent as such at a later date. And that the SSC was a complete forgery.

This FBI document from Nov 23 1963 is also not online anywhere else. I have highlighted the Hidell related matters. This document provides a good insight that the Hidell name and rifle order came not in play until Saturday morning the 23rd.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

With thanks to:

Malcolm Blunt for a lot of documents.

Harold Weisberg Archive at Hood College.

UNT.

The Sixth Floor Museum.

Ⓒ Bart Kamp

TSBD Descent Timing by the HSCA

TSBD Descent Timing by the HSCA

 

Too good to keep hidden for any time longer while I am still scanning in for  Malcolm Blunt’s Archives. This document mentions the descent by HSCA Staff members inside the TSBD while on their trip in Sept 1977. From the 19th on to the 29th of that month various staff members, a total of 9 persons, of the HSCA were on a Dallas trip to ascertain more info from several witnesses.

While browsing I came across the following on the last two pages (p 11 & 12) from the bottom paragraph. They met ‘en masse’ at the TSBD, where they took notes and photographs but they also did something much more significant and that was that they timed their descent from the 6th floor (the so called sniper’s window) down to the 2nd floor lunch room via the stairway which could be done in 46 seconds……which compared to the Secret Service Report which claimed it was around a minute and a half and the re-enactment the WC allegedly did.  The Warren Commission made mention of it during the sessions in March 1964. But no one in Dallas while the W.C. was there could attest to this particular re-enactment actually happening!

Still 46 seconds is half the time compared to what both the Warren Commission and the Secret Service came up with about an event that did not take place in the first place ;)

HSCA Dallas Trip Sep 1977. Click pic to enlarge.

HSCA Dallas Trip Sep 1977. Click pic to enlarge.

 

The whole document is at the Malcolm Blunt Archives.

The Malcolm Blunt Archives Update

The Malcolm Blunt Archives Update. 

Greetings and happy new year.  Hope you have had, under these difficult circumstances, a somewhat decent X-Mas break. I know I have not posted that much and the reason for that is that the Malcolm Blunt Archives have kept me occupied for quite some time now. And especially the second half of 2020 has been a very busy period scanning tens of thousands of pages in. I have been working on this project for more than two years now.

Harry Livingstone’s Files April 2019. Click pic to enlarge.

Starting with Harry Livingstone’s material which then slowly transcended into scanning Malcolm’s files, little did I know how much there was, yet at the same time has proven to be an absolute goldmine filled with rare and never before published documents, audio & video recordings.

Documents, tapes and videos. Click pic to enlarge.

Early Dec 2020, while there was a gap in Covid 19 travel restrictions, Peter Antill and I made our way to Malcolm to see what we could get our hands on to take back with us. Peter and I offloaded the 14 bags we had brought with us, yet I managed to bring ten bags back with me and that was only with 90 minutes left to do so. Two bags fill a drawer of a filing cabinet and contain anything between 2-3,000 pages. If you are wondering what type of content there is, well…..almost anything.

This is by far one of the best document collections when it comes to the JFK Assassination, but also for Dallas matters, anti-Castro, CIA, New Orleans, the ARRB, HSCA and a handful of other commissions investigating. At this point I have created roughly 10,000 PDFs. Scanning will continue for most part of this year trying to complete the digitisation of Malcolm Blunt’s entire archive.

For the first time in 18 months I managed to get access to the files I had worked on in the first half of 2019 while in Tetbury. These files have been kept at a storage site and I was very happy being able to regain access to them. The files in here are much more within my remit.

Click to enlarge.

The coloured boxes are of course Harry Livingstone’s files. Malcolm’s materials in here refer a lot to Dallas Police and FBI. Due to some finds of great documents I am preparing a handful of articles which I will start working on more this month when I am taking a break from scanning.

Click to enlarge.

While the Covid 19 restrictions are in place I will not be able to regain access until some time in March this year. But I have plenty to get on with for now and I reckon I will be working on this archive for the rest of the year. Expect a few cool articles to come in the next six months. And of course The Papers I have been working on these past few years and which are being crammed full with not before seen material, so plenty to look out for.

The Hosty document in the documentary: Oswald and JFK UNSOLVED CASES

The Hosty document in the documentary: Oswald and JFK UNSOLVED CASES

 

Last year it was reported by several attendees of the November 2019 Dallas conferences that a Japanese documentary film crew of  NHK World was present filming in Dealey Plaza in Dallas.

Photo by Neil Safaty. Click to enlarge.

I got to know that John Newman and Jefferson Morley were contributing to it so I would definitely want to see the end result.

Shortly after, the November conferences I was contacted by Stu Wexler asking me about a copy of the Hosty document I found in Feb 2019 at Malcolm Blunt’s archives.. Did not think it would be used and forgot about it so to speak. Low and behold when the documentary was released in July this year it featured the all important pre-statement made by James Hosty on the back of a blank Dallas Police Department affidavit sheet with the all important sentence “Then went outside to watch the P. Parade.”

The James Hosty Document.

And it is nice to see the Malcolm Blunt Archive being credited for it. It is a good thing that people outside the so called ‘clique’ get to see this all important document.

 

The documentary itself, has some good bits, bot not enough of it. Would have liked to have seen more of Newman and thought it was a bit overloaded with the dramatisations of the reenactment scenes of which some is rather questionable. The perfect JFKA documentary simply doesn’t exist. Or will Oliver Stone change things when his comes out? Nah….

The fragment with the document is in Part two “The Chessmaster” at 35:00, which you can view here. The first segment “!The Pawn” can be viewed here.

 

The Hosty document with its all important passage here.

 

Nicholas Katzenbach Was Working Hard On Crucifying Lee Oswald

Nicholas Katzenbach Was Working Hard On Crucifying Lee Oswald.

Upda 

Updated Jan 25 2021.

Nicholas Katzenbach. Photo: Boston Globe.

Nicholas Katzenbach was a Deputy Attorney General appointed by President John F. Kennedy in 1962 and worked directly under Robert Kennedy. After the assassination of President Kennedy Katzenbach continued to serve with the Johnson administration until February 11th, 1965.

The first time I came across his name was in the documentary Beyond ‘JFK’: The Question of Conspiracy in which a document from Nov 25th 1963 was brought up.  This document states: “The public must be satisfied that Oswald was the assassin; that he did not have confederates who are still at large; and that the evidence was such that he would have been convicted at trial. Discussions followed on  forums and newsgroups. How could Katzenbach do this at such short notice, and doesn’t this show how biased he was? Eh…..yeah!

Katzenbach Memo Nov 25 1964. Click to enlarge.

When the first batch of previously withheld documents were released in 2017 I found this document, that must have been an ‘inspiration’ for Katzenbach’s document. I just went through the released FBI files and noticed that the sentence used on page 3 was very similar to the Nov 25th doc. I had to dig out that document to make sure that I was not mixing things up. The document below is from Nov 24th. Compare both docs and you see that Hoover and Katzenbach were in cahoots on this matter of issuing something that would convince the public of Oswald’s guilt.

Hoover document Nov 24 1963. Click to enlarge.

 

With that find back then I thought ‘cool I found a link between the two documents.

But there is more. Never thought I would come across this piece while going through the Malcolm Blunt Archives  Two pages which are a shocking read from a timing perspective. Bear in mind that Oswald was arrested at about 13:50 hrs and Katzenbach wants to nail Oswald to the cross by 18:15 Dallas time. Lee Harvey Oswald at that time is being interrogated for the second time. and is less than one hour away from being charged for the Tippit murder.

This all puts the whole Dallas investigation into perspective as in who is calling the shots and wants ‘this thing’ over and done with.

Nicholas Katzenbach. Crick to enlarge.

Nicholas Katzenbach Click to enlarge.

Bob Storey to Lee Rankin

Bob Storey to Lee Rankin.

 

Found in the Waggoner Carr Archives, a letter from Bob Storey of Dallas law firm Storey, Armstrong and Steger. With thanks to Malcolm Blunt.

In this document from June 2nd 1964 Bob Storey relates to J. Lee Rankin that he met up with Waggoner Carr and Leon Jaworski. During that meeting they discuss who else may be of interest to the Warren Commission for witness testimony. Earle Cabell (Dallas Mayor) for his experiences and that of his wife while being in the motorcade during the assassination. Elgin Crull (City Manager) and his role of having the media cram up the corridor on the 3rd floor of City Hall are mentioned before H. Louis Nichols is suggested as well. His visit to Oswald on Nov 23rd around 17:00 hrs is relayed in great detail.

Bob Storey contacted H. Louis Nichols and, as stated in the doc on page 3, pursuant to many complaints from the North and East that “Oswald should be provided counsel”.  That gives us a bit of info as to who got Nichols to show up at D.P.D. HQ. But the next sentence is proper gold. I first talked with Henry Wade and he said in substance, that “he was going to recommend to the Court that the President of the Dallas Bar Association and Dallas Criminal Bar Association be appointed as council for Oswald by the Court as and when he was indicted.” Ther indictment was expected on Monday morning.

Excuse me? Monday morning? Oswald was supposedly pulled out of his cell and indicted at about 01:30 on the 23rd. This is of course is another nail in the coffin to the official story.

The interview by Nichols in front of several reporters and camera men is shown nationwide and seems to satisfy the lawyers that registered their concern earlier.

I find the element that Waggoner Carr was so up to date about what the Warren Commission was doing and even suggesting who to interview in front of them most interesting.

 

Ochus Campbell and Betty Dragoo in Altgens 6

Ochus Campbell and Betty Dragoo in Altgens 6.

 

With help from the Dave Wiegman film we can see Ochus Campbell standing next to Roy Truly. We know this due to their statements that they stood together when the motorcade passed by and as seen in the stills below.

Another good anchor point for the comparison between the Wiegman stills and Altgens 6 (at the bottom of this post) are the police officer and the two children on the right in the photograph below..

Danny Garcia, Betty Dragoo and Ochus Campbell in the Wiegman film. Click photo to enlarge.

Garcia is difficult to spot, but once looking at the Wiegman still and the Altgens 6 photo it becomes more clear.

 

Dany Garcia and Betty Dragoo in the Wiegman film. Click to enlarge.

 

Altgens 6. Click photo to enlarge.

In Altgens 6 Danny Garcia was already found in that photograph decades ago and a close-up was stored in the Weisberg Archive.

Danny Garcia in a close-up of Altgens 6. Click photo to enlarge.

And finally look in the detailed crop of Altgens 6 and what appears to look like a gas mask being held up in the open door window of the Secret Service follow up car is actually an arm right holding the top bit of the door right in front of Ochus Campbell’s face. What people assumed that looked like the tail end of the car is actually his shirt and his tie. The dark edging is his cardigan/jacket.

We also see Betty Dragoo’s face very clear through that same car’s window. Linda Giovanna Zambanini recognised her in the close-up Wiegman shot a few years ago, but her face is so much more in detail in the Altgens 6 photo..

Danny Garcia, Betty Dragoo and Ochus Campbell in Altgens 6.  Enhancements by B.K. Click photo to enlarge.

Richard Dwyer

Richard Dwyer

 

Richard Dwyer talks about criminal investigations on YouTube and his website and in his latest video blog he talks about Oswald’s whereabouts just before and during the JFK Assassination. Needless to say that he picked up on some of my work and others from this website and talks about and refers to Prayer Man. Now for someone who doesn’t do this subject on a daily basis he knows the essentials and makes a simple but astute presentation. See for yourself.

Thank you Mr Dwyer for doing a decent job and thanks to Rob Clark for pointing me to this video.

 

 

Important to Hold That Man by Jerry D. Rose May 1986

Important to Hold That Man by Jerry D. Rose May 1986

 

Once in a blue moon you come across a great article. From The Third Decade; a magazine that has published some of the finest articles in JFK Assassination research. This article below by publisher Jerry D. Rose is no exception. And the reason for me to bring this up is because it falls nicely inside my remit but it is also a great way to compare it with my own work. And Rose does a terrific job. The parts where Truly had stated to the WC he had not seen Oswald after the assassination which of course makes no sense when the second floor lunch room encounter allegedly happened within 90 seconds after the shots had been fired. Rose’s remarks following up on Bill Shelley stating to Roy Truly that he did not see Lee Oswald are simply priceless.

Fritz’s movements and actions from the T.S.B.D. and to the D.P.D. are thoroughly questioned, but his pit stop at Bill Decker’s office is sadly missing from those paragraphs. All this makes Will Fritz look even more suspicious

Oswald being paraded past his fellow employees had more of an effect than Rose describes. He notes discrepancies from a procedural p.o.v. But add on that those fellow employees were told that Oswald had killed a cop at that time which of course meant that these people were distancing themselves from Oswald as much as they possibly could.

A perfect example of someone being too close is Buell Frazier who got it in the neck from early evening onwards from the D.P.D. that day. Joe Molina a worthy second.

The yellow marker (grey on these pages) and pen annotations are from Harry Livingstone whose archive I have been digitising this past year and a bit.

Do read!

Click to enlarge.

Click to enlarge.

Click to enlarge.

Click to enlarge.

Spring 2020 update

Spring update.

  Greetings!

Quick update from me. I have been relatively busy until the beginning of Jan. with the work on my papers that yet have to come out. I hope both the T.S.B.D. (at this point just over 200 pages) and Prayer Man (clocking at 140 pages as we speak)  papers will be released later this year. A taste of one of these papers can be read in the up and coming sixth issue of Garrison Magazine. This will be out near July.

As you have seen recently I posted the Hosty notes story and the two T.S.B.D. related stories, one about Victoria Adams’ fellow employees and a page on Steven Wilson. All these articles are part of the papers coming out later this year.

Then an update of the Anatomy of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations paper will be released just before or at the same time as the other two. I have added about ten pages of extremely rare and important information.

Once the papers are out I will start putting scripts together, based on the papers, for a new set of four movies. of which I reckon there will be an Autumn release of the first one. Otherwise early 2021.

For the past month and a bit I have been scanning pages of Malcolm Blunt’s archive. I did about 10,000 pages but not a lot was really good for Prayer Man related matters. A few T.S.B.D. titbits but nothing much. On other fronts plenty of it. Most of it is already accessible at that archive.

Corona virus has kicked in and that has put a stop to me scanning more pages in at this time. So it’s back to my own work again and perhaps a small article or two from my many drafts ;) We’ll see. Until then stay safe and healthy, look out for another.

B.

The James Hosty notes

The James Hosty Notes.

 

A small part of this material has already been released through my second paper Anatomy Of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations.

Recently a post by Rob Clark at the Education Forum asked “Best of the Year 2019″. In a nutshell the thread was about what were the best finds in 2019 from an evidentiary/research p.o.v. Cliff Varnell mentioned two instances of which one was the discovery of the handwritten note by James Hosty which I found in Malcolm Blunt’s archive in Feb. 2019 and I posted this straight after finding it. This document caused a few ripples within the scene and led to a doubling in my website traffic that same month and a 1.5 x increase the month after. A good indicator of people being curious about this find. The document in question is below.

Pat Speer had the nerve to call it and I quote:  The Hosty notes are not notes perse, but are a first draft of a report. Well he has got that right. And then This draft is important but not for the reason most believe. He mentions in this draft that he confronted Oswald about contacting the Soviet Embassy.  

So a phrase on Oswald’s letter to the Soviet embassy is more important than Hosty recording that Oswald got a coke for his lunch and then went out to watch the P. parade.

Has everyone else stopped rolling around laughing yet? It’s posts like Speer’s that cause nothing but acrimony between researchers. The stuff he writes about in that post Airtel and Ruth Paine has nothing to do with the thread’s subject. What he puts forward is old news and filled with speculative innuendo as well..

But having said that it got me thinking and looking into Hosty’s paper work. Below the document in question, which I found in Feb. 2019.

Handwritten note by James P. Hosty. Click page to enlarge.

It was F.B.I. procedure to destroy handwritten notes once a typed up version was created, Hosty made mention of this during his Schweiker Committee testimony. In Hosty’s book Assignment Oswald two notebook pages appear on one page related to the interrogations of Lee Oswald. These were miraculously found in a pile of papers at his home. What Hosty did not do was post all the other pages I found or even make mention of them.

The world had no idea that these notes existed at all. That was until Feb. 2019 when I visited Malcolm Blunt’s archives and found a folder entitled “Hosty”. This folder at Malcolm Blunt’s archives was filled with more than 200 pages. I only published the one page as it had the most revealing sentence regarding to Oswald’s actions just before the motorcade passed by the T.S.B.D. “Then went outside to watch the P. parade“. That passage reconciles with the handwritten Fritz notes phrase “Out with Bill Shelley, in front”.

The note by itself was a good find in Malcolm’s archives. He himself had no idea that he had this very important document. Nevertheless it was a great addition as evidence to my paper.

*****

The page, showing two notebook pages is part of a set of 3. I shall post the third page below, there is nothing suspicious about the missing page as it makes mention of matters that are happening after the first and only interrogation Hosty was present at. There were more pages in that notebook, but they do not relate to the interrogation. I will get back to these extra pages in a moment.

 

 

Hosty was there along with James Bookhout and three D.P.D. officers (Will Fritz, Richard Sims and Elmer Boyd). On that third page you can see Hosty making mention of the first line-up and even the Sorrell’s talk which got him in hot water due to Secret Service agent William Patterson reporting on this.

If I take the very first notebook page and compare it to the page on D.P.D. affidavit paper I found it becomes clear that the notebook page was written during the interrogations and that the actual page served as the source for the draft report on the right. The result is that the “1st floor entrance office” is the third handwritten source for Oswald’s location when the motorcade passed by the building.

James Hosty handwritten notes. Click to enlarge.

In Hosty’s book Assignment Oswald he described how he kept on taking notes even after the interrogation.

I decided nonetheless that I would remain at the police station. Just because I couldn’t talk to the police didn’t mean I couldn’t learn things from them. I headed back to Fritz’s office, where I knew the police were keeping Oswald’s personal belongings. Nothing there, but in the second inner office, which belonged to Lieutenant Walter Potts, I spotted Oswald’s things, which had been removed from his person and from his apartment at the Oak Cliff rooming house. Among the items on Potts’s desk was Oswald’s black address book. I pulled out my pad of blank police affidavit forms and started transcribing the entries in his book, thinking I might find some interesting leads or even some possible co-conspirators. A little way into my transcribing, I came across a line that made my heart crawl. There, scrawled in Oswald’s handwriting, was the entry:
Nov. 1 James P. Hasty, RI1-
1211, MV8605,
1114 Commerce, Dallas.

I do not share Hosty’s opinion that the name says Hasty. The way it was written down could be interpreted both ways. Oswald’s way of writing an “a” or an “o” appear to be fairly similar. See for yourself in the image which comes from Hosty’s book.

Hosty’s details in Oswald’s notebook. Click to enlarge.

Hosty mentions in his book that he used a pad of blank police affidavit forms. The document at the very top is part of that bloc. The rest which I am posting below show the details of Oswald’s address book. Now whether the draft document from the top was created before or after him taking down the details of that address book will remain a mystery. But all these pages come from D.P.D. affidavit papers.

Then there are more pages from his notebook, and they appear to show a deeper investigation into Oswald’s past. There is a mention of Mrs Cunningham who worked for the Texas Employment Bureau and also Pauline V. Bates. I have no idea what the actual sequence should be, these were stuck together in twos on one page.

 

In Hosty’s book he ‘remembers’ how the conversation went and again mentions Oswald’s location being on the first floor, although he has changed the landing of the T.S.B.D. for the Domino Room.

Okay now, Lee, you work at the Texas School Book Depository, isn’t that right?
Yeah, that’s right.
When did you start working there?
About October fifteenth
What did you do down there?
I was just a common laborer.
Now, did you have access to all floors of the building?
Of course.
Tell me what was on each of those floors.
The first and second floors have offices. The third and fourth floor are storage. So are the fifth and sixth.
And you were working there today, is that right?
Yep.
Were you there when the president’s motorcade went by?
Yeah.
Where were you when the president went by the book depository?
I was eating my lunch in the first floor lunchroom.
What time was that?
About noon.
Were you ever on the second floor around the time the president was shot?
Well, yeah. I went up there to get a bottle of Coca-Cola from the machine for my lunch.
But where were you when the president actually passed your building?
On the first floor in the lunchroom.
And you left the depository, isn’t that right?
Yeah.
When did you leave?
Well, I figured with all the confusion there wouldn’t be any more work to do that day.

It will be an enigma how these papers ended up at the archives. Perhaps Hosty wanted to show the world what was really happening and slipped these notes inside the batch. And the A.R.R.B. completely overlooked this.

Special thanks go to Malcolm Blunt for the documentation.

There were ten women on the fourth floor when it went down

There were ten women on the fourth floor when it went down.

 

From my up and coming paper Anatomy of the T.S.B.D.

 

Updated with a new title, a little text and some pictures on Jan 5th 2020.

Updated with the addition of a gallery of 4th floor drawings on March 12th 2022.

I knew that Victoria Adams’ descent down the back stairs of the T.S.B.D. was one key to the assassination puzzle especially when Oswald was supposedly to go down those same steps “escaping” from the building at about the same time. The ladies had watched among other fourth floor employees the motorcade turn the corner in front of the building on to Elm St. Then they heard the shots fired at the limousine. Adams and Styles almost immediately left the window to go down the back stairs, make their way towards the railroad yard, and upon arrival they were told to go back where they came from, which they did thru the front doors of the T.S.B.D.

The first one who drew my attention to this was Oliver Stone, who brought this segment up during the Garrison trial in the movie JFK.

Actors representing Victoria Adams’ and Sandra Styles’ descent in a re-enactment for the film J.F.K. Click to enlarge.

If there is anyone who researched Victoria Adams’ and Sandra Styles’ descent from the fourth floor to the railroad yard and back into the front of the T.S.B.D. better than anyone else  it is Barry Ernest.

His book The Girl On The Stairs: The Search for a Missing Witness to the JFK Assassination led me to focus more on the T.S.B.D. and its employees.

From his research we know that.

  1. Victoria Adams did go through her W.C. statement and applied corrections even though the document ends with her stating she waivers her signature. The ‘corrected’ statement is being held much longer under lock and key than the first version without any corrections.
  2. She accused the W.C. of inserting the Lovelady & Shelley encounter in her testimony. She described the person she encountered after arriving on the first floor as a tall black man. This was independently corroborated by Sandra Styles who knew Shelley and Lovelady and was sure it wasn’t them who they met. The so called Adams & Styles – Lovelady & Shelley encounter on the first floor is a fugezi to undermine the timing of the ladies’ descent. It shows Jim “I don’t recall” Leavelle of the D.P.D. the maker of this report as a fabricator, who placed the misleading statement inside that report from Feb 1964. Obviously Leavelle is responsible but the decision to do this comes from higher up obviously.
  3. The Martha J. Stroud document Ernest found at the archives in Washington in 1999 confirms Adams’ corrections to her statement, and also states that Dorothy Garner saw the girls leave before the police officer came up to the fourth floor. Garner’s  real statement or anything besides the Stroud letter leading to it has disappeared.
  4. The W.C. discredited Adams’ story. by disbelieving her, nor did it really investigate further. But the W.C. did more to discredit Victoria Adams and it did that by minimising any attention towards the fourth floor.

While reading up about the other T.S.B.D. employees present on the fourth and fifth floors something else becomes apparent. The fourth floor was filled with ladies looking out through the south side windows.

Victoria Adams. Source: Barry Ernest.

Sandra Styles-Baylor Uni, Waco-1962

Elsie Dorman. Source: Life Magazine.

Thanks to Linda Giovanna Zambanini.

Judyth Louise McCully.

Avery Davis. Source E-Yearbook.com.

Mary Hollies. Source: E-Yearbook.com. Thanks to Linda Giovanna Zambanini.

Ruth Nelson. Source Ancestry Family Tree. Thanks to Linda Giovanna Zambanini.

Yola Hopson 1945. Source E-Yearbook.com. Thanks to Linda Giovanna Zambanini.

Betty Alice Foster. Source E-Yearbook.com. Thanks to Linda Giovanna Zambanini.

Think about it. Ten people on the fourth floor when it all went down. Some of them could have easily confirmed when Adams and Styles left. But that is something the Warren Commission, D.P.D., F.B.I. and the Secret Service, by the looks of it, did not bother much with.

Weaver Polaroid. Click to enlarge.

Even though Avery Davis claimed to be on the front steps, she is not recognised in either the Wiegman and Darnell films nor did any other person name her. Davis named Judyth McCully as the person she was on the steps with. McCully’s initial F.B.I. statement states that she was on the fourth floor while it all went down which then got changed to the front steps. Judyth McCully’s daughter told me that this was done at the behest of the F.B.I.

So if I do not know any better then efforts were made to look the fourth floor as a non event as much as possible with moving some witnesses away so original witness statements could not be corroborated.

Some more food for thought are the diagrams of the fourth floor. There were just three large rooms so people were close on each other.

Think about it, there were 10 people on the fourth floor. Some of them stood a few meters away from each other. Adams’ and Styles descent was the kryptonite to the  Oswald ‘escape’.

Then there are the men from the 5th floor and especially Jarman, Norman and Williams. I have made a spreadsheet with all three workers’ answers from every statement they have given and that are available. Download it from HERE.

From left to right: James Earl Jarman, Bonnie Ray Williams and Harold Norman in the Tom Dillard photo. Click to enlarge.

The fourth floor stop is in some statements not to be found, but in the W.C. testimony from Bonnie Ray Williams he states: They paused for one minute on the 4th floor as there were all these women looking out. Then there is James Jarman who during his W.C. testimony disowns the fourth floor stop even after asked about it by John J McCloy by saying I believe we went all the way.

The fourth floor was a direct threat to Oswald’s so called escape, so they thought. Until of course the Prayer Man surfaced and it has transpired Oswald was nowhere near the 6th floor when the shots were fired…

 

Roger Craig inside Robbery & Homicide on Nov 22

Roger Craig inside Robbery & Homicide on Nov 22.

 

Roger Craig 1969

Roger Craig of the Dallas sheriff department is one of the guys who did not cooperate with everyone else in law enforcement about the happenings of investigating the J.F.K. assassination and ended up becoming an outcast who ultimately paid the highest price for it.

My personal research into Roger Craig has been limited to the assassination weekend, especially his observation of seeing Oswald leaving the T.S.B.D. and after that his visit to room 317 of Robbery & Homicide and pointing Oswald out as the person he saw running down the grass and getting into a Nash Rambler.  Room 317 was Will Fritz’s fiefdom.  I have been writing about this before in my Anatomy Of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations paper (pages 96-102).

During the 56th anniversary of the assassination there were two conferences in Dallas happening, one was CAPA, the other was Judyth Vary Baker’s shindig.

Judyth Vary Baker Conference 2019 program cover. Spellcheck anyone? Photo: Vince Palamara.

I was watching some of the live feed on YouTube, to me about the only positive thing of that conference and I thought the panel talk of Steve Cameron, who had a new book on Craig to push, could be interesting.

Besides Steve Cameron there was Roger Craig Jr., Gary Shaw and Robert Groden (no idea why someone who is economical with the truth is still given access to a platform like this ).

Roger Craig panel talk. From l to r: Gary Shaw, Robert Groden, Steve Cameron and Roger Craig Jr. Photo: Vince Palamara.

Roger Craig Jr. kicked things off claiming his dad was murdered in a rather emotional manner and I wasn’t too sure that this was a wise way of opening the panel talk like that, but it is what it is. Then he claimed that his dad was inside room 317 and that the photograph from Jesse Curry’s book was the proof.

Now I am not disputing his presence at Dallas P.D., but the photograph is not proof of Roger Craig’s visit. Here is the photograph in question.

The issue is that there is a tiny likeness, however after seeing other photos of this very same individual inside Room 317 of Robbery & Homicide of the Dallas Police Department below it is definitely not Roger Craig.

In the centre in front of the set of drawers. Pic. Jim Murray. ROKC scan from the Sprague archives at NARA. Click image to enlarge.

 

Speaking to Det. Richard Sims in front of the file cabinets. In front and on the right are detective Johnny Hicks on the phone and sergeant William ‘Pete’ Barnes with Oswald’s palm print on display and . ROKC scan from the Sprague archives at NARA. Click image to enlarge.

 

Pic.: Ft Worth Star Telegram. Click image to enlarge.

There is a small chance that the person noticed in these photos is Secret Service agent Charles Kunkel. But Vince Palamara said that cannot be since Kunkel was not in Dallas on Nov 22nd and these photos by Jim Murray and the Fort Worth Star Telegram were taken around 6 PM that day. At this point I would say nothing further than this man is a government agent, but it is not Roger Craig.

There is however other great evidence showing that Craig arrived inside Room 317. Like this James Bookhout report from Nov. 23rd.

James Bookhout report Nov 23 1963 on Roger Craig’s presence at Robbery & Homicide. Thanks to Malcolm Blunt. Click picture to view larger version.

Furthermore there is Jesse Curry talking to the press in the corridor of the 3rd floor of City Hall. where the D.P.D. resided. He does not quote Craig by name, but he does relay Craig’s story.

 

Craig was there, but it is not the man seen in the photograph from Jesse Curry’s book. Just wanted to set that record straight once and for all.

The Lone Gunman Podcast Explosive New Evidence and Timeline Tweaks About The Interrogations

I had the pleasure to talk with Rob Clark on his Lone Gunman Podcast for two hours no less on Lee Oswald’s interrogations, it flew by as I had such fun.

Thank you Rob.

Ep. 157 ~ Explosive New Evidence and Timeline Tweaks About The Interrogations. 

In case the audio volume is too low for you I have uploaded the file HERE (150 MB to d/l) which sounds a lot better than the Spreaker upload.

John Abt representing Lee Oswald

John Abt representing Lee Oswald

 

John Abt

In my paper Anatomy Of Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations the name John Abt pops up quite a few times. Some people, like Will Fritz, said Oswald wanted Abt to represent him on Friday. This was rubbish as I already shown in that paper that the record stated Oswald made his very first two phone calls in the early afternoon of the 23rd (pages 225 & 226 from the PDF linked to above), almost 24 hours after being dragged in after his arrest in the Texas Theatre. One of those calls was an attempt to call New York. That by itself is a good indicator that Oswald wanted to contact Abt on the 23rd.

In the pages below (thanks to Malcolm Blunt) Abt tells of a CBS reporter contacting him on Saturday morning that Oswald wanted Abt to represent him and unless Oswald himself would make that request not much was going to happen.

Click the images to enlarge them.

 

Then there is a video segment (starting at 5:25, on the third floor of Dallas City Hall, it shows Oswald being escorted through the corridor on his way from Fritz’s office to the jail elevator.

It is shot on Nov 23rd after Oswald’s first interrogation roughly at 11:30, he is in his white t-shirt only and then stops just before entering the door to the jail elevator and being pulled in by the D.P.D. detectives. But Oswald manages to talk to one of the reporters be it for a few seconds. The audio is sadly missing as the microphone was not plugged in. Denis Morissette and I were discussing this segment since this part was ‘new’ to me and he had brought it to my attention.

Later on in the same video segment we can see A.B.C.’s Bob Clark as the man whose microphone Oswald was talking in to and eventually there is a different microphone pushed forward to catch Clark’s voice.

This is the moment where Oswald asked to get in touch with John Abt. Clark talks about this moment in this PBS video (at 46:00) from 2003.  Oswald stated into Clark’s dead microphone “I want to contact Mr. Abt of New York City, to serve as my attorney”.

Saturday Nov 23rd at about 11:30 Oswald made the very first statement that he wanted John Abt to represent him and not any earlier. This by itself is supported by the reports from Saturday morning by Will Fritz himself, James Bookhout and Thomas Kelley made up on the 10:30 interrogation.

Add on Dec 13 2021.

Then there is a document which I found at the Harold Weisberg archive by Peggy Simpson which seems to have been sent before midday on the 23rd and makes mention of Oswald’s request for John Abt during the above mentioned happening in the corridor.

Howard Roffman to Richard Bernabei 1970

Howard Roffman to Richard Bernabei 1970

 

Howard Roffman wrote extensively with Harold Weisberg, but also with Richard Bernabei. I have managed to gotten hold of quite a bit of material myself after contacting his archive in Kingston and I also know that Denis Morissette went there and he sent me quite a few pages as well. I still have to go through all this. While browsing through the folder I came across this letter from 1970 that I gotten hold off in 2016.

It basically discusses the Couch film and Marrion Baker. Roffman did extensive research in the relation between the Couch film and Marrion Baker’s run almost 50 years ago. He also brings Gloria Calvery, Joe Molina and other T.S.B.D. employees’ statements in the fold and uses his common sense as most of his observations still stand today. Cool read.

Pauline Sanders and Sarah Stanton on the steps of the T.S.B.D.

Pauline Sanders and Sarah Stanton on the steps of the T.S.B.D.

 

There are a couple of things that I recently came across and am pretty sure the riddle of Sanders and Stanton step positions is solved. But first the statements by Pauline Sanders.

F.B.I. statement by Pauline Sanders, Nov 24th 1963. Click to enlarge.

Is it not odd that she states in her Nov 24th statement that she did not see Oswald in the lobby that remarkis as significant as Sean Murphy’s find of Roy Truly saying  in his Nov 22nd F.B.I. statement “They saw no one there” once allegedly arriving with Baker in the vestibule/lobby, when at the same time we can see in Darnell several people preceding them going up those stairs. The only reason for putting this in their statements is trying to refute Prayer Man’s or better yet Oswald’s presence,  near the front door. Take Carolyn Arnold’s first F.B.I. statement, the one that got deep sixed, into consideration as well!

CE 1381. F.B.I. statement by Pauline Sanders March 18th 1964. Click to enlarge.

According to Sanders’ statements on Nov 24th 1963 and March 18th 1964 she said that she stood nearest the door and on the top step, but that is only partially true.

The top landing would have been way to cramped with Shelley and Molina occupying that eastern side already. Plus we know Frazier and Lewis stood inside the doorway. And I doubt she would stand behind Shelley and Molina, same goes for Sarah Stanton.  The width of the eastern or the western side of the steps would allow for two people to stand next to each other and not more. There was no reason to cram next to each other as there was plenty of room to spread out. Here is a picture from the W.C. and two drawings taken by the F.B.I. shortly after the assassination for comparison.

Let’s move on to the Wiegman and Darnell films, we know who said that they stood on the steps. The following women were there: Maddie Reese, Ruth Dean, Pauline Sanders and Sarah Stanton. Dean and Reese have been identified.

We find Pauline Sanders in Wiegman she stands on the 3rd or 4th step. I posted this shot at the Education forum in August 2018.

Pauline Sanders in the Dave Wiegman film. Click to enlarge. Thanks to John Woods.

Careful study of the Wiegman frame shows that next to Sanders is someone with blond hair and a white (or any other light coloured) outfit, you can barely see her but she cuts into Sanders on her left side, so for us that is on the right side. She is partially hidden by the east end of the wall and due to the angle Wiegman is filming from, he is not filming the steps straight on.

Pauline Sanders and Sarah Stanton in the Dave Wiegman film (Kamp/Ledoux version). Click to enlarge.

Pauline Sanders also said in her statements she stood next to Sarah Stanton, she made no mention of anyone else. That gives us an even better idea who to look for in these pix.

In the time period between Wiegman and Darnell (10-15 seconds) Sarah Stanton moved slightly more inwards and Pauline Sanders has moved up to the landing. This is because of Lovelady and Shelley leaving the steps right after the final shot. Otis Williams went inside and Joe Molina moving more centre on the landing therefor creating a gap on the east end of the steps/landing. Sanders could have wanted to get a better view down Elm St. after the shooting and going up a few steps would have helped a bit.

Also consider Buell Frazier who only appears in Darnell and cannot be seen at all in Wiegman, and even Roy Lewis who is starting to appear behind Frazier, again no sign of him in Wiegman.

In Darnell, 10-15 seconds after the shooting she is seen on the landing. Andrej Stancak  found her, but that section of the film shows her only in or or two frames. She went more upstairs compared to the Wiegman sequence and that could be because she stepped up to get a better view down Elm.

 

Darnell frame of the TSBD steps occupants. Sarah Stanton a short heavy set blonde woman is pointed out as such. Click to enlarge.

 

The women on the steps in the Wiegman and Darnell films are now all accounted for. Sarah Stanton is exactly standing where she said she was and all this was confirmed by Frazier.

Buell Wesley Frazier also confirms in some videos that Sarah Stanton was standing to his left, as per her own statement on the East side of the steps along with Pauline Sanders.

At 18:25.

 

At 53:30 Gary Mack, in a 2002 interview with Buell Wesley Frazier for the Sixth Floor Museum, specifically asks him, to his right or left and he points and says left!

In another interview at 06:02, Frazier who uses both his hands indicates only with his left hand outwards.

 

At 53:00 in the Gary Mack interview of Buell Frazier he refers to a lady (most likely Stanton, standing to his left, meaning East on the top of the steps.

And then in a third interview at 18:25.

 

And now we have a slightly better copy of te Darnell film, which shows the only short, heavy set blonde woman to Frazier’s left and it is game over and the Death of Prayer Woman. Doyle will foam at his mouth and will try and lie his way out of this, but Prayer Woman is dead….

Sarah Stanton about 4 ft away from Buell Frazier. Click to enlarge.

Updated Dec 16 2021.

More: Sarah Stanton.

 

Nat Pinkston and the snack room encounter

Nat Pinkston and the snack room encounter

 

Nat Pinkston from the F.B.I. took a statement of Roy Truly on Nov 22nd 1963. Pinkston can be seen as the co-creator of the Second Floor Lunch Room Encounter fakery.

In this document it shows that Pinkston is aware of Oswald’s statement that the only rifles he saw in the building were two days prior when Warren Caster popped round and showed the two rifles to Roy Truly and others. This matter was discussed during the first interrogation of Lee Harvey Oswald.

What was also discussed is that Oswald got a coke for his lunch, and not after, but that got twisted somehow with the fairy tale below.

In my opinion the first and real attempt on making Oswald look guilty.

Nat Pinkston Nov 22 1963 FBI Report. Click to enlarge.

This and Roy Truly’s statement dictated on the 22nd and typed up on the 23rd are the first official statements attesting to an encounter in the snack room.

Roy Truly FBI Report Nov 22-23 1963. Click to enlarge.

 

There are a few more bits on Nat Pinkston at his page.

Thanks to Malcolm Blunt for the Pinkston document.

Roy Truly document from NARA.

The Second Floor Lunch Room Encounter in a Nutshell.

The Second Floor Lunch Room Encounter in a Nutshell.

 

Marrion Baker sees Lee Oswald on Nov 23rd. Click to enlarge.

 

Click HERE (27.3MB) to see the entire paper and be able to refer to the pages.

A PDF of this summary can be downloaded from here.

By: Bart Kamp.

  • The Darnell film ends with Baker just about to step up to the curb. He is at least 10 ft. away from the bottom steps when the camera swerves back. Page 29.
  • Baker does not appear to head for the stairs but to the south east corner of the TSBD building, his WC testimony at first shows he had no idea where exactly the shots had come from. Page 18.
  • Baker uses pigeons lifting off from the roof as an indicator that the shots came from the T.S.B.D., others have seen the same pigeons lift off and fly in different locations. Pages 24-25.
  • Buell Wesley Frazier, Roy Edward Lewis and Joe Molina who stand on the landing of the steps and in front of the door, see no helmeted officer going past them. Molina sees only Truly go in, and even states in his report by B.L. Senkel that Truly stayed on the first floor. Pages 41-43.
  • In April 1964, while being interviewed by Roy Bode, Truly states that he and Baker talked to Howard Brennan before they went in. That by itself contradicts Truly and Baker’s tale of storming up the T.S.B.D. stairs. Furthermore he states Oswald was sighted while leaving the lunch room. Page 40.
  • Foreman Bill Shelley and Billy Lovelady, who have been recorded in film footage and supported with their statements as well, left immediately after the shots had been fired. Their W.C. testimony contradicts this by them claiming that they stayed on those steps for a few minutes, then left the steps and looked back and see Baker and Truly go in the building. In an interview with George and Patricia Nash in 1964 Shelley puts Baker’s and Truly’s entry even at 5-6 minutes. This kills the timing. Pages 33-39.
  • Pauline Sanders is the only person who makes a mention of a helmeted officer going in, but she makes no mention of Truly. She stood on the east side of the steps. Page 44.
  • Baker’s handwritten and typed up statements from the late afternoon of Nov. 22nd mention no lunch room encounter at all. And the only encounter he did have was on the 3rd or 4th Page 74.
  • In that first statement Baker says that when arriving in the vestibule he sees several people standing around and asks where the stairs are (which are to the right once inside the vestibule) and cannot be missed by anyone after which Truly supposedly steps forward (Truly states they had run up the steps together!) and leads him to the back of the building. Roy Truly’s F.B.I. statement from Nov. 22nd states they saw no one there” Page 46.
  • Marvin Johnson, who takes Baker’s affidavit later that afternoon states that Baker pointed out Oswald, while being interrogated by Will Fritz, as the man he apprehended. None of the interrogation reports by either the D.P.D., F.B.I. and S.S. support this part of Johnson’s statement. Page 74.
  • Johnson’s statement also states that Baker searched L.H.O, a physical contact which has not been substantiated by anyone else either. The official story during the confrontation is that Truly vouched for Oswald being a worker after which they continue their ascend to the top. Nor did Baker recognise him in a line-up as is stated. There is no record of this at all and this is something Baker denied happening during his W.C. testimony. Page 78.
  • Eddie Piper states during his W.C. testimony that in a few minutes someone came in the building, “and I looked up and it was the boss man and a policeman or someone.” That contradicts the timing element of Baker and Truly who said they stormed in within seconds after the shooting, also consider that the re-enactments were timed at 75 and 90 seconds. Page 49.
  • Piper gets called in again for a second time during his W.C. testimony, when asked whether Truly was with a white helmeted officer Piper says “I don’t think so.” Pages 50 and 51.
  • Truly makes no mention about any elevators in his statement from the 22nd. Page 52.
  • Marvin Johnson’s statement on taking Baker’s affidavit makes no mention of any elevators either. Page 57.
  • Roy Truly and Marrion Baker contradict each other about who actually said ‘let’s go up the stairs’ after ‘noticing’ the elevators are hung on the 5th Pages 54 and 55.
  • Jack Dougherty’s W.C. testimony states that he took the West elevator down from the fifth to the first floor immediately after hearing a shot. He does not hear Roy Truly yell up the shaft. Page 56.
  • Sandra Styles, many years after the fact, states that Victoria Adams told her offhandedly that she saw the elevator cables move while they made their descent from the fourth floor. Page 57.
  • While Truly and Baker make their alleged ascend up the steps there is more activity being recorded of another employee who use the very same stairs. Otis Williams makes his way from the front stairs to the 4th Victoria Adams and Sandra Styles descended almost immediately after the final shot from the 4th floor. Page 57.
  • Dorothy Ann Garner, in a Martha J. Stroud document had stated that she saw Truly and a police officer come up after the girls, Adams and Styles, had gone down. Page 57.
  • Truly walking ahead of Baker is not recorded until early Dec 1963 by the S.S. That same week and during the months after Roy Truly does 3 interviews, contradicting himself saying that Baker was ahead of him. Pages 61-64.
  • The lunch room encounter can be questioned by Baker’s position upon arriving on the second floor and the viewing angle through the closed door. Roy Truly passed it before Baker and admitted the door was closed as well. Pages 65-70.
  • The door with a self-closing mechanism takes 5 seconds to open and close, there was not a time difference that long after ascending one floor between Baker and Truly. Pages 76-77.
  • During the encounter Oswald is placed at different locations inside the second floor lunch room. Pages 86-88.
  • The second floor lunch room, and the rest of that floor was off limits to manual workers, unless they purchased a coke for their lunch. The manual workers had their lunch ether outside or downstairs on the first floor in the domino room. Page 135.
  • Mrs Robert Reid’s statement and testimony cannot be believed due to the timing aspect, she saw Oswald wearing a white t-shirt contradicting Baker and the presence of Geneva Hine inside the very same office, yet neither noticed each other. Pages 88-91.
  • Geneva Hine was alone in the 2nd floor office from 12:25 to 12:35. Page 90.
  • Oswald’s coke starts as an insertion into Mrs. Reid’s hand written statement. Page 94.
  • Marrion Baker mentions the coke in his hand written Sept. 1964 statement, only for it to be stricken out. In March that very same year, during his W.C. testimony, he said that he saw nothing in his hands. Page 93.
  • The Revill list contradicts Oswald’s departure after 3 minutes. It also shows that certain employees were not recorded on it and some arrived back at the T.S.B.D. much later.  Pages 112-113.
  • Oswald was sighted by Sarah Stanton before the motorcade arrived, near the stairs (which are most likely the front stairs) and asked whether he was going to go out for lunch! She noticed him holding a soda. Page 137.
  • Various law enforcement officers and T.S.B.D. employees make mention of an encounter on the first floor or at the front door in many different newspaper reports on the 22nd and 23rd. Pages 113-121.
  • The first mention of a second floor lunch room encounter in the press on Nov 23rd is at 13:50 hours by Peggy Simpson of the A.P.
  • Carolyn Arnold at first sees Oswald in the vestibule in her Nov. 26th statement, only for her to retract this roughly 15 years later. The retraction can be doubted due to her statement of going back for a glass of water and seeing him in the lunch room instead. Also statements from her co-workers who stated they left the building together. Pages 121-135.
  • Oswald’s alibi is systematically destroyed during his interrogations by D.P.D. Captain Will Fritz and F.B.I. agents James Hosty and James Bookhout. In a new found document, a draft document by James Hosty, states that Oswald had a coke for his lunch and then went outside the watch the P. parade.  Pages 136-146.
  • The re-enactment and its timing aspect of the 2FLRE, have never been confirmed by anyone seeing it actually happening outside and inside the T.S.B.D.. Pages 147-159.

 

COPYRIGHT © Bart Kamp.

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations in a Nutshell.

Lee Harvey Oswald’s Interrogations in a Nutshell.

 

Featured in National Review magazine. Scan from NARA.

Click HERE (32.9MB) to see the entire paper and be able to refer to the pages.

A PDF of this summary can be viewed here.

By: Bart Kamp.

  • Oswald is arrested inside the Texas Theatre and according to Sergeant Gerald Hill Oswald demands a lawyer and complains about police brutality (page 22).

 

  • Frank Underwood is inside the same elevator Oswald is going up to the third floor with. Oswald tells him he did not kill anybody (page 23).

 

  • Gerald Hill who is being interviewed twice shortly after Oswald’s arrest and drop off on the third floor states Oswald’s name in both instances. There is no mention of the Hidell name (page 24).

 

  • Before Oswald is talked to by Rose and Stovall he is frisked by Charles Truman Walker, who was present during his arrest at the Texas Theatre and is part of the group of policemen dropping Oswald off on the third floor of City Hall. He does not find anything in his pockets (page 25). Yet before Oswald’s first line-up with Helen Markham detectives Sims and Boyd find 5 bullets and a bus ticket in his pockets almost 2.5 hours later (page 83).

 

  • Kent Biffle destroys the roll call(s) scenario from Roy Truly from a timing perspective (pages 29-30).

 

  • While Oswald is being talked to by detectives Gus Rose and Richard Stovall it emerges that both detectives contradict themselves during their Warren Commission testimony when it comes to whether Oswald used the Hidell or Oswald name by way of identification (pages 27-28).

 

  • In the past few decades detective Jim Leavelle has positioned himself as the person who interrogated Oswald before Captain Will Fritz did, whereas the statements by him during his Warren Commission testimony and his own written statement contradict this (pages 30-34).

 

  • Detective Joe Cody inserts himself as well as the person who talked to L.H.O. before Will Fritz interrogated him. This is only backed up by him and no documentation (pages 34-36).

 

  • T.L. Baker confirms it was Rose and Stovall who had a chat with Oswald before he was interrogated by Will Fritz (page 37).

 

  • Before Will Fritz returns to City Hall from the T.S.B.D. he makes a detour via Sheriff Bill Decker’s office. Nothing is known about what was discussed between the two (page 38).

 

  • Will Fritz did not audio record the interviews and could have borrowed equipment to do so, nor used a stenographer, during the first interrogation James Hosty is the only person who took notes. Fritz’s handwritten notes are not contemporary.

 

  • During Will Fritz’s first interrogation, according to his handwritten notes, Oswald clearly stated where he was at the time of the shooting. “Out with Bill Shelley, in front.” (page 40). A handwritten document by F.B.I. agent James Hosty states “Then went outside to watch P. Parade” (page 54).

 

  • This very same document by Hosty states that Oswald got his coke for his lunch. And this is repeated in the typed up joint Hosty-Bookhout report (page 65).

 

  • B.I. agent James Bookhout changes this narrative in his solo report from Nov. 24th to an encounter inside the second floor lunch room (page 66).

 

  • After Oswald’s first interrogation with Will Fritz, he is being questioned by Forrest Sorrels of the Secret Service. Oswald thinks he is a lawyer and once known to him that he is S.S. he wonders whether Sorrels is supposed to get him an attorney (page 69).

 

  • There are plenty of indicators that the line-ups were not as impartial as they should have been (pages 84-85).

 

  • The first line-up with Helen Markham is nothing short of a drama as she needs to be sedated beforehand (page 93).

 

  • Helen Markham during her W.C. testimony denied no less than six times recognising Lee Oswald as Tippit’s killer (pages 86-88).

 

  • Marrion Baker overhears Oswald shouting ‘I want a lawyer’ during the second interrogation (page 95)

 

  • Roger Craig sees and reports that Oswald left around 12:42 from the T.S.B.D. running down the hill in front of the T.S.B.D. and confronts him later on in the office of Will Fritz (pages 96 – 106).

 

  • During the second line-up Cecil McWatters has difficulty picking Lee Oswald out as the man who was on his bus (page 104).

 

  • Sam Guinyard and Ted Callaway who work not far away from the location where Tippit was shot, contradict each other during their W.C. testimonies (pages 109-112).

 

  • Ted Callaway also mentions a second person involved in the shooting, and according to Domingo Benavides he asked him what happened and which direction the killer had gone.

 

  • Galloway’s and Guinyard’s statements are taken before the line-up. The two men’s handwritten statements are taken and the No. 2 ID is added on the typed statement after (page 108).

 

  • The biggest absentee from this group of men is Domingo Benavides, he was closest to the Tippit killing and must have been able to identify Tippit’s killer. The D.P.D. does not get a statement from him nor is he asked to identify the killer during the line-up(s) and he only appears in front of the W.C. in March 1964 (page 113).

 

  • At about 19:10 hrs Oswald is arraigned for the murder of officer Tippit by Justice of the Peace David Johnston. There are several detectives present, plus Captain Fritz and Chief of Police Jesse Curry. Their remembrance as to what exactly happened is hazy to say the least (pages 114-116).

 

  • Shortly after the arraignment Oswald is being filmed complaining of not having legal representation present during this hearing and again denies having shot anyone (page 117).

 

  • Oswald’s second line-up for the Davis sisters has the Dallas Police put two blonds in the lineup along with Oswald and Ables (page 118-121).

 

  • After the line-up Oswald appears in the corridor again and asks for legal representation, and also mentions that he did not shoot anyone and that people keep asking him that. At the end of that very short walk back into Fritz’s office he exclaims to be a patsy (pages 122-123).

 

  • Shortly after Henry Wade arrives at City Hall and is surprised to see Jim Allen inside Will Fritz’s Robbery & Homicide office. Allen is a former assistant D.A. and at that time a private citizen yet is a close friend of Fritz (pages 123-124).

 

  • Buell Frazier is brought in the evening and interrogated. There is a report by Frazier that Will Fritz brought in a statement for him to sign that made him an accomplice to Oswald’s killing of J.F.K. to which Frazier refused to go along with. Fritz raised his hand following that, after which Frazier promised him a hell of a fight. Later on that evening Frazier is subjected to a polygraph test, the results of this test have diappeared (pages 126-128).

 

  • In the evening Oswald has his fingerprints and palmprints taken, but the Dallas police also takes paraffin tests of his hands and his right cheek to determine whether he fired a weapon. E. ‘Pete’ Barnes had not applied this test to a suspect’s face ever before. Nor would it not have made one iota of difference in determining whether Oswald had fired a rifle that day and the tests itself can be questioned for the fact that Oswald’s finger prints were taken before the paraffin tests (pages 129-137).

 

  • Assistant D.A. Bill Alexander, along with Jim Allen, wants to charge Oswald with J.F.K.’s murder as part of an international communist conspiracy. Higher ups make him retract this (pages 138-143).

 

  • Howard Brennan appears at City Hall to view a line-up and fails to I.D. Oswald as the sixth floor shooter (pages 144-152).

 

  • B.I. agent Manning Clemments interrogates Oswald on his physical description and background information (pages 153-158).

 

  • Detective John Adamcik (who speaks a little Russian) interrogates Oswald before Oswald makes his appearance at the press conference (pages 159-160).

 

  • Greg Olds and a few of his A.C.L.U. colleagues arrive at City Hall late in the evening to ascertain whether Oswald is having any legal representation, they are given the run around by some of Fritz’s people (pages 162-169).

 

  • In the very early morning of Nov. 23rd Oswald stands in front of the press exclaiming having no idea what the whole situation is about and asks a few times for legal representation in the very short time he is actually allowed to talk (pages 174-179).

 

  • After the press conference Oswald is taken to jail and Henry Wade talks to the press. During this Wade makes mention of a fictitious cab driver by the name Daryl Click. More importantly Wade has to admit that while the papers have been signed to accuse Oswald of killing J.F.K. at least an hour before Oswald is yet to find out. There are strong indicators this was never done (pages 181-183 and 186-223).

 

  • Oswald has finger prints and his mug shot taken after the press conference, he also has to hand over his shirt which is taken in by the F.B.I. and flown to Washington shortly after (pages 184-185).

 

  • Besides Oswald’s bus ride a cab ride is inserted in Fritz’s interrogation notes from the first interrogation on the 23rd, but also the Domino Room situation with junior and one other Negro gets a mention. Fritz barely investigates this, as this would provide Oswald an alibi for the time period after 12:00 whereas J. E. Hoover wants a follow up handled promptly (pages 204-207).

 

  • James Bookhout’s, Thomas Kelley’s reports and Fritz’s notes make a first mention of John Abt during the Saturday morning interrogation (pages 206, 210 and 213).

 

  • During this very same interrogation the Hidell name pops up for the first time according to the reports by Fritz, Kelley and Bookhout and the W.C. Commission testimony of Forest Sorrels (pages 208, 210, 213, 215 and 217).

 

 

  • Inspector Thomas J Kelley of the Secret Service writes in his report of that interrogation that he asked him ‘if he viewed the parade and he said he had not’ this cannot be corroborated by Fritz’s or Bookhout’s notes at all (pages 209-214).

 

  • Joe Molina, of the accounting department of the T.S.B.D., arrives at the D.P.D. after a visit by some heavy weights in the middle of night who searched through his house for a few hours and come up with nothing of significance. He is being kept at the D.P.D. for roughly 7 hours and loses his job about one month later as Chief Curry names him to the press as a subversive person (pages 218-223).

 

  • Harold McDervid, a Chicago lawyer, has offered council to Oswald via telegram after trying via the phone before. His messages are filed away never to reach Oswald (pages 224-225).

 

  • Marina and Marguerite Oswald get to see Lee for about half an hour.

 

  • Oswald is interrogated again for a brief period mainly to ascertain where his belongings are and what his place(s) of residence are (page 226).

 

  • Oswald could not call anyone until Nov 23rd at 13:40 almost 24 hours after his arrest. This is his first attempt at calling John Abt (page 229).

 

  • Oswald’s line-up in front of William Whaley and William Scoggins. This time he is accompanied by three fellow prisoners, of which one is of Mexican heritage. During the transfer to the line-up Oswald is heard bitterly complaining about the difference in appearance by just wearing a t-shirt to anyone who can hear it (231-233).

 

  • William Whaley identifies the wrong man (No. 2) as the killer of Tippit. Oswald was No. 3, and Whaley needed to correct himself during his W.C. testimony. Whaley also admitted signing a statement before he was taken to the line-up and again had to correct himself. Nor did he read the statement before signing it. Whaley’s W.C. testimony with regards to what Oswald was wearing is enough to disqualify him as a reliable witness. (pages 233-242).

 

  • William Scoggins had seen a picture of Oswald in the paper on the morning of the 23r and he described the assailant going west before the murder, this would exclude Oswald being the killer as Helen Markham said the assailant was travelling east (pages 242-246).

 

  • Robert Oswald gets to visit his brother Lee for about ten minutes after a four hour wait, during the conversation they have Lee tells his brother to not form any opinion on the so- called evidence (pages 248-253).

 

  • Lee Oswald makes another call, one of which to Ruth Pain who is anything but helpful. Nobody knows at that time where his wife, Marina, is (pages 254-260).

 

  • Louis Nichols visits Oswald in jail to enquire about whether Oswald has legal representation (pages 261-265).

 

  • Oswald can be heard during a transfer towards Fritz’s office demanding hygienic rights (page 266).

 

  • During the interrogation following the transfer the back yard photos are introduced to Oswald. He denies it is him in the photographs (pages 267-271).

 

  • After this interrogation Oswald is led down the corridor again and is captured saying he “emphatically denies these charges” (page 271).

 

  • Shortly after that Will Fritz appears in front of the reporters and declares Oswald being the killer of The President without going into evidence (pages 272-273).

 

  • In the evening of Nov. 23rd when Oswald comes out of the jail elevator room Marrion Baker happens to stand very near the entrance. Upon spotting Oswald he ducks away (page 273).

 

  • After returning to his cell Oswald makes another phone call which happens to last 30 minutes (page 276).

 

  • An alleged Raleigh call to/from Oswald to John Hurt never happened (pages 277-279).

 

  • On Sunday morning Oswald is interrogated one last time. Postal Inspector Harry Dean Holmes is a new addition to the group of people interrogating him, his report and W.C. testimony of that particular interrogation nullifies the second floor lunch room encounter (pages 281-302).

 

  • Following this interrogation Oswald is transferred and subsequently shot and killed by Jack Ruby (pages 303-307).

 

  • After Oswald’s killing a piece of paper with phone numbers is found on him. One of these numbers has not been in use since 1956 (page 309).

 

  • By having a close look at Fritz’s report after time stamping the daily reports and statements it has become abundantly clear that Will Fritz twisted things round, not in favour of Oswald’s innocence of shooting Tippit and J.F.K., but to ascertain his guilt (pages 310-324).

 

 

 

COPYRIGHT © Bart Kamp.

Goodbye Brian Doyle

Goodbye Brian Doyle

 

Regular visitors know that I have what some may describe as  a nemesis named Brain Doyle. I refer to him as an online troll. Doyle hails from Sanibel Fl. and has made it his mission to stalk whatever I write about and reports about it in the most negative way, he does this on his Prayer Woman Page on FB or at the JFK Assassination forum when not being banned there. I myself am no angel and have retorted in my own harsh way. You see I hate liars, and Doyle has been documented to lie more than 600 times in the past two years. People like Brian Doyle have no place in research, they belong in politics. Not that he would get very far in it, just like in research. There is hardly anyone who believes his fairy tales of scenarios that cannot be substantiated at all.

Doyle posted a video of himself recently and that took things to a new level. I think it is wise to officially announce my retirement from interacting in any possible way with Brian Doyle. This is so creepy you really start to wonder whether there is rope, black bags and tape in the boot of the car….

His postings have become so irate that he has managed to get himself kicked off forums such as the Education Forum, the Deep Politics Forum, Amazon (hundreds of trolling posts were deleted while using 3 IDs) and in July 2019 he was thrown of the JFKAssassinationforum 3x in that very month and in April and May temporary banned as well. When I do an interview on a podcast or radio show I know Doyle will be stalking and commenting, He does not produce one shred of proof in his word salad postings and has made many enemies along the line doing so. He makes Ralph Cinque look like small potatoes.

Doyle is also into Jimi Hendrix (using the nick Scrum Drum), moreover a firm believer that he was murdered. He was banned from forums there as well. This is not an isolated case with him, all these banishments show that there is a pattern going on for years. He also claims to be an expert on these Jimi Hendrix forums, but on the JFK Assassination as well, whereas the opposite is more true. If one needs hundreds of lies to support ‘their research’ then it is time to move on.

Take a look at John Iacolleti’s work, he took the effort to collect Doyle’s falsehoods, lies and fabrications and started to add them together. There are more than 600 bullshit remarks that are made up and have no backing of any evidence whatsoever. Doyle is a grotesque liar.

What made me make solidify this decision, well the video he posted on his FB page did. It is just so creepy and weird.

Goodbye Brian Doyle.