JAMES DiEUGENIO SAID:
>>> "Autopsy report number one: Burned by Humes and testified to by him before the ARRB. He said it three times and it's in the transcript." <<<
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Dr. Humes admitted to the Warren Commission in 1964 that he burned the first draft of the autopsy report [2 H 373].
So we certainly didn't have to wait until Humes' 1996 ARRB testimony to learn about that particular burning episode.
And the very fact that Dr. Humes admitted to burning a draft of the autopsy report is a very good sign that that burning was not done with CONSPIRATORIAL intent or with the thought of a COVER-UP in Dr. Humes' mind.
For Pete sake, if Humes had been part of a cover-up and/or conspiracy, the last thing in the world he would have ADMITTED to the Warren Commission at 2 H 373 is that he was burning autopsy papers in his home fireplace. Get real, Jim.
>>> "Autopsy report number two: The one rewritten after the murder of Oswald by Ruby." <<<
That was Draft #2 of the ONE AND ONLY autopsy report. Humes burned the first draft in his fireplace on 11/24/63. Humes told the ARRB that the first draft "may have had errors in spelling" [Humes' exact words], therefore that draft was not the final draft of the report that he wanted to save as the official (and final) report. Quite obviously, in Dr. Humes' mind, the second draft was the proper version to keep as the official report.
But it's silly to think that those two "drafts" of essentially the exact same report constitute TWO separate and wholly different autopsy reports. Especially if you believe, as Doug Horne does, that Dr. Humes was a major part of a massive cover-up operation BEFORE the autopsy even started on the night of November 22nd.
And Vincent Bugliosi covers this topic very nicely in his book (via an abundance of common sense). I do, however, disagree with Vince on one point. Bugliosi doesn't think Humes burned a "first draft" of the autopsy report at all. Vince is of the opinion that Humes burned only his "notes", but not a "draft" of the autopsy report. I don't think Vince is correct in that belief, however.
The language Dr. Humes used in his Warren Commission testimony makes it pretty clear (IMO) that he was talking about an actual "draft" of the autopsy report, and not just "notes". Here is that segment of Humes' WC testimony:
"In privacy of my own home, early in the morning of Sunday, November 24th, I made a draft of this report which I later revised, and of which this represents the revision. That draft I personally burned in the fireplace of my recreation room."
And Dr. Humes clarified things even more in his 1996 ARRB deposition when he said this:
"It was handwritten notes and the first draft that was burned."
Quoting Vincent Bugliosi:
"It apparently has not entered the minds of the conspiracy theorists...that since we’re dealing with the same person, Humes, if one believes that Humes was willing to lie on his autopsy report (his draft notes reflecting the true and different situation), why wouldn’t he likewise have been willing to lie on his notes, thereby obviating the need to destroy them?
"Did those behind the assassination come to Humes AFTER he wrote the first draft and convince him, FOR THE FIRST TIME, to join the conspiracy, he agreed, and then they told him what they wanted his autopsy report to say?
"But what about Drs. Boswell and Finck? Did they join the conspiracy too? Because if they didn’t, how is it that their conclusions just happened to coincide with Humes’s new, conspiratorial conclusion?
[...]
"Just a moment’s reflection on the allegation by the conspiracy theorists that Humes burned his first draft of the autopsy report (which presumably pointed away from Oswald as the killer) reveals its outlandish dimensions.
"If, in fact, Humes had done such a thing, this would make him a willing and conscious accessory after the fact to Kennedy’s murder, a very serious crime. Why in the world would he want to do something so enormously ignoble and dangerous to him? The conspiracy theorists don’t say, nor do they even ask the question.
"But even if Humes were insane enough to engage in such conduct, since two other pathologists, Boswell and Finck, were also present at the autopsy, when Humes presented the new, supposedly bogus draft of their combined findings for their review, comments, and eventual signature, wouldn’t they have immediately recognized that the draft presented to them was terribly erroneous and refused to sign off on it? Or do the terminally absurd buffs want us to believe that Boswell and Finck decided to join in with Humes in becoming accessories after the fact to Kennedy’s murder?
"And there is another point to make. The conspiracy theorists, whose taste for conspiracy skews their thinking processes, are not stopping to realize the obvious. If Humes, did, in fact, do the extremely serious and criminal thing that they accuse him of doing, why in the world would he choose to volunteer before the Warren Commission, and hence, the world, that he had done this?
"I mean, who else but HIM could ever possibly know his secret? In fact, on the very day he burned his notes, November 24, 1963, Humes certified, on a Naval Medical School document, that he had done so (CE 397, 17 H 48)." -- Vincent Bugliosi; Pages 276-277 and 280 of "Reclaiming History" (Endnotes)
>>> "Autopsy report number three: The Clark Panel. This moves both wounds in JFK, the head wound from the bottom to the top of the skull, and the wound from the neck to the back. Plus they write up fragments in the neck area. For all intents and purposes there were three reports." <<<
No, Jim. There was (and still is) only ONE official autopsy report....this one, which was signed by all three of President Kennedy's autopsy doctors:
The Clark Panel evaluated the photographs and X-rays and came to the proper conclusion about the entry wound in JFK's head being located higher on the head than the autopsy physicians concluded.
But anyone with eyeballs can easily determine that the autopsists were definitely wrong with respect to the precise location of the head entry wound. That wound, as the Clark Panel determined by looking at the photos and X-rays in 1968, was located 100 millimeters above the level of the EOP, which places it in the cowlick area--high on JFK's head. And the autopsy photo shown below proves that fact for all time:
And, Jim, why in the world you think the Clark Panel changed anything with respect to the location of the entry wound in JFK's upper back is a mystery. The Clark Panel's conclusion regarding the location of that wound, in fact, is identical to what we find in Dr. Humes' 1963 autopsy report:
"There is an elliptical penetrating wound of the skin of the back located approximately 15 cm. medial to the right acromial process, 5 cm. lateral to the mid-dorsal line and 14 cm. below the right mastoid process." -- Via the Clark Panel's final report
If you insist on calling the Clark Panel report an official "autopsy report", well, go right ahead. It's a free country. But you're wrong. The Clark Panel's work mainly was an evaluation of the autopsy photos and X-rays.
And the Clark Panel wrote up a report of their findings and conclusions, which were findings and conclusions that totally corroborate the one and only official autopsy report signed in 1963 by Drs. Humes, Boswell, and Finck in the following critical respect:
"President Kennedy was struck by two bullets fired from above and behind him, one of which traversed the base of the neck on the right side without striking bone and the other of which entered the skull from behind and exploded its right side." [direct quote from the Clark Panel's final report]
David Von Pein
September 2010
