1978 INTERVIEW
WITH DR. PIERRE FINCK






The audio player above contains a 19-minute interview with one of President Kennedy's autopsy doctors, Pierre A. Finck. The interview was recorded on
March 12, 1978, by the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA).

I found the above interview to be quite fascinating in multiple ways. Listen for Dr. Michael Baden's excellent evaluation and analysis of this autopsy photograph:



Dr. Baden's analysis is spot-on perfect, IMO, and ultimately that same analysis given by Baden was agreed upon by the majority of the members comprising the HSCA's Forensic Pathology Panel....because it couldn't be any more obvious (when viewing the above autopsy photo) that the "white spot" near the hairline (which Dr. Finck kept insisting was actually the location of the bullet's entry hole at the back of JFK's head) was certainly not located ABOVE the EOP on Kennedy's cranium. It's not even close, despite Dr. Finck's commentary on the matter.

And, as we know, the autopsy report (authored by lead autopsist Dr. James J. Humes, and signed by all three autopsy physicians, including Finck and Dr. Boswell) clearly indicates that the bullet entry wound at the back of the head was located ABOVE (not below) the external occipital protuberance:

"Situated in the posterior scalp approximately 2.5 cm. laterally
to the right and slightly above the external occipital protuberance is
a lacerated wound measuring 15 x 6 mm. In the underlying bone is a
corresponding wound through the skull which exhibits beveling of the
margins of the bone when viewed from the inner aspect of the skull."

Also of interest during the 19-minute audio file linked above is when Dr. Cyril Wecht decides to interrupt Dr. Baden's analysis and questioning of Dr. Finck. This interruption by Wecht served to more-or-less completely undermine Baden's perfectly-reasonable analysis with respect to why Finck had to be incorrect about his "near the hairline" placement for the entry wound on JFK's head.

It was a pretty good tactic by Wecht to steer things away from Baden's very logical view of things, and Wecht's interjection also served as a springboard to get Finck to now say that "It's possible" that he might have made an error when he said that the entry wound was located ABOVE the EOP, rather than significantly BELOW it. (And the wound would have to have been located below the EOP if Finck's low wound placement is to be accepted as fact.)*

* = The "It's possible [I could have been mistaken]" statement made by Dr. Finck, of course, flies in the face of the autopsy report that the same Dr. Finck examined and SIGNED on November 24, 1963....and it also contradicts the other two autopsy doctors, who also signed that same autopsy report and who also said that the entry wound was positively located ABOVE the EOP, not below it.

Also:

Another portion of Dr. Baden's analysis as he was questioning Dr. Finck about the location of the head entry wound struck me as one of those "Why Didn't I Ever Think Of That Before?" moments, when Baden talks about how this autopsy picture is almost certainly being taken by the photographer to FOCUS IN ON and CENTER ON the red spot in the area of JFK's cowlick, rather than the very-irregular-shaped white spot near the VERY BOTTOM of the photograph.

The red spot near the cowlick is certainly the entry wound, and it is almost dead-center in the middle of the photograph, right next to the ruler being held up in the picture too, which is a ruler that is almost certainly being placed very close to the ACTUAL ENTRY WOUND near the cowlick.

I had never thought about that type of logical "The Photo Is CENTERED On The Red Spot Near The Cowlick" argument until I heard Dr. Baden make that argument when he confronted Dr. Finck in that 1978 interview.

So, unless the photographer (John Stringer) was having a really bad day and suddenly had no idea how to properly frame an important autopsy photo on 11/22/63 or unless Stringer HIMSELF was very confused about which "spot" on JFK's head was the real entry wound, it stands to reason (based on the PRIMARY area of JFK's head that is being depicted in the above-linked autopsy picture) that the red spot near John Kennedy's cowlick was, indeed, the actual entry hole for Lee Harvey Oswald's Mannlicher-Carcano bullet.

Additional HSCA interview segments with Dr. Finck (and others) can be
heard HERE.

David Von Pein
July 2008