Did Pierce Almann see Lee Harvey Oswald when he entered the TSBD?

Pierce Allman was manager of programming and production at WFAA and an important witness to the assassination. He had a prime spot, only a few meters down on Elm from where Tina Towner was standing. 

Pierce Allman was a manager of programming and production at WFAA and an important witness to the assassination. He had a prime spot to see what happened when JFK ws assassinated and was only a few meters down from the turn of Houston St on to Elm St. Pretty close to where Tina Towner stood and was filming.

Pierce Allman (centre of photo with his back towards the lens) in Willis 6. Photo: Phil Willis. Click pic. to enlarge

After the shots were fired Allman went down on Elm (see above), and then made his way, like many others, towards the picket fence / grassy knol area. This is where he encountered Bob Jackson and also spoke with the Newmans.

He then realised he needed to get to a telephone, call the WFAA office and relay what he just had witnessed. The TSBD was the nearest place where he thought he could do this. He made his way up the steps and went inside the building through the half open front door where he asked a young man where the nearest phone was. He was directed by him to go further inside the shipping area. And from there Allman reported (at 08:48) what just had happened. There is another tape of him a few hours after that same day, as well available here.

Allman was not sure whether this individual weho directed him to the phone was or wasn’t Lee Harvey Oswald. The phone in question, used by Allman, is the one being used by one of the two men in the background in the still capture of the Tom Alyea film below.

Virgie Rachley being interviewed by Kent Biffle. Click photo to enlarge.

The first report of this interaction starts with Thomas J Kelley’s report from Nov 29 1963 (page 5) on Lee Harvey Oswald’s interrogation. I refer to the highlighted bit.

From the document: Oswald said he was standing in front of the TSBD to Thomas Kelley, this would make him the third person (after Will Fritz & James Hosty) referring to where Oswald said where he was. Bear in mind that this report was about the first interrogation on Nov 23rd. Kelley did not get to Dallas until Friday the 22nd later that evening (he is seen in the corridor and later on during Oswald’s press conference). Meaning: Oswald stated that he was outside in front of the TSBD on the 23rd as well. Something not mentioned by Fritz nor Bookhout in any of their reports from that session.

US Secret Service – Thomas J Kelley – Nov 29 1963. Click to enlarge.

Let’s move to Allman and his possible sighting of Oswald. In the Feb 3 1964 report by US Secret Service agents Roger Warner &  Forrest Sorrels, Allman was interviewed inside the WFAA offices on Jan 29 1964. This document below is very interesting since it delves pretty deep into what happened when he went into the TSBD. Upon arrival inside the TSBD no one bothered to ask him who he was. Allman filed his report and went off the air only after an Army Intelligence Officer asked him to stop using the phone. This Military Intelligence Officer is James Powell. According to Powell he saw only two persons inside the TSBD near a desk, one of which was Allman. The other person was described by Powell as about 30 years old and being tall. That second person was Terrence Ford. He is on page 3. But I wish to draw your attention to the middle of page 2 where Allman’s encounter is recorded.

I quote: Mr. Allman then stated that he ran full speed into the Texas School Book Depository building with intention of locating a phone and calling his televsion station WFAA. Mr. Allman stated that after he had entered the front door of the building, he had emerged into a hallway and there he met a white male whom he could not further identify. He asked this white male for the location of a telephone. Mr. Allman stated that he did not identify himself to this person; stated that he was extremely excited at the time and that he could not remember anything about the person except for the fact that he was a white male. Mr. Allman had seen pictures of Lee Harvey Oswald and could not positively state whether or not he is the one of whom he inquired. Mr. Allman stated that the person pointed out a phone to him which was located in an open area on the first floor of the Texas School Book Depository; that he immediately went to the telephone and stayed at this position for approximately 25 minutes talking to his office. Mr. Allman stated that he was accompanied by a felow worker Terry Ford.

I quote from page 2: Mr. Allman then stated that he ran full speed into the Texas School Book Depository building with intention of locating a phone and calling his televsion station WFAA. Mr. Allman stated that after he had entered the front door of the building, he had emerged into a hallway and there he met a white male whom he could not further identify. He asked this white make for the location of a telephone. Mr. Allman stated that he did not identify himself to this person; stated that he was extremely excited at the time and that he could not remember anything about the person except for the fact that he was a white male. Mr. Allman had seen pictures of Lee Harvey Oswald and could not positively state whether or not he is the one of whom he inquired. Mr. Allman stated that the person pointed out a phone to him which was located in an open area on the first floor of the Texas School Book Depository; that he immediately went to the telephone and stayed at this position for approximately 25 minutes talking to his office. Mr. Allman stated that he was accompanied by a felow worker Terry Ford.

I need to add that the Secret Service report above is apparently not the first interview with Allman,  allegedly they also got in touch with him about two/three weeks after the JFK assassination as per his many interviews on TV in later years (scroll down further below). However there is no documentation available about this.

So the questions are, where is that report? Did the USSS talk to Allman in early December 1963 when Roy Truly and others were interviewed by the USSS?

During that same month of Feb 1964 Allman stated in the Criminal Intelligence report of Feb 18 1964 that neither he nor Terrence Ford saw, let alone encountered Oswald. A full-on denial two weeks after the Feb 3 USSS report. Interesting.

Interesting fact is that this type of ‘shift’ in a person’s statement is not a first. I can think of Jim Leavelle’s Feb 15 report (here & here) on Victoria Adams i/e which carries the same date!

Then there is Allman’s HSCA interview from May 10 1978. During this interview that so called denial 14 years prior has softened a fair bit. I refer again to the highlighted part.

In 2014 for the LA Times, Allman speaks again about the moment he goes into the TSBD (at 05:52).

Then there is the video where Almann is being interviewed on the spot where he stood when JFK was assassinated. Watch until the end.

Then CBS do an article with Allman which is published on Nov 21 2013. I quote from this: It was there he had a chance encounter.

“There was a guy standing in the doorway,” remembered Allman, “and I said, ‘Where’s the phone?’ And he jerked his thumb and said, ‘In there!’ And I said, ‘Thank you.’”

Moments later, Allman filed a live report, unaware that he’d just come face to face with the president’s assassin. “This is Pierce Allman from the Texas School Book Depository building…” he reported at the time. Allman would not learn the man’s identity until three weeks later, when the Secret Service paid him a visit.
“They said, ‘Are you familiar with the testimony of Lee Oswald after his arrest?’ And I said, ‘No.’ And they said, ‘He states as he was leaving the depository building, a young man with a crew cut rushed up, identified himself as a newsman, and asked where a phone was. So this was very obviously you.’”

It must have come as something of a shock when Allman realized the guy he asked for directions was the person who just shot the president. “It did,” said Allman. “He didn’t appear stressed in any way.” 

Additionally in 2015 Pierce Allman did an interview with the Sixth Floor Museum and at 30:50 the subject is broached again.

For those that think that there is nothing to ‘see’ here you need to consider the way certain elements inside the DPD/FBI worked back in those days. there are a fair few instances where witnesses have claimed pressure was applied to them and there are more examples where people stated their Warren Commission statements were altered.

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In all these years since have there been others that had said they thought they had noticed Oswald on the first floor?

We know that Vice-President of the TSBD Ochus Campbell stated he saw Oswald on the first floor in the New York Herald Tribune, a quote that was never repeated again.

Then there was Carolyn Arnold who stated in her FBI statement that when she looked back she thought she had seen a fleeting glimpse of Lee Harvey Oswald while looking back toward the TSBD. Evidently that statement was buried for some time and Carolyn Arnold was not asked to appear in front of the WC. In later years, during the HSCA, she refuted this.

Kent Biffle, of the Dallas Morning News, who was also inside the TSBD shortly after, reported about Oswald being seen in a storage room and in his Sixth Floor Museum Oral History interview at 17:00 he states: “I have wondered often if I ran past LHO, in fact, going in with the cops” And at 23:28 one fellow journalist is heard mentioning “Just a little point. You wouldn’t have recognised Lee Oswald if you had seen him”. To which Biffle replies “No I wouldn’t have. I had seen photographs of him, but I am sure that was 3-4 years before and I just blindsided him. So, I wouldn’t have made him out. I have wondered about that since, whether he may have been out front at the time we went in, but I wouldn’t have known it”.

And now we have Pierce Allman saying something to the same effect.

If we also look into Roy Truly’s FBI affidavit from Nov 23rd, where the explicit statement is made that they saw “no one there”, as noted by Sean Murphy back in 2013. That over-emphasis of no one being there in the hallway when the Darnell film clearly shows several people making their way up and towards the stairs already while Truly himself is standing several feet away from them.

No one saw Oswald down there…..hmmmmm.