CHRISTOPH MESSNER SAID:
They [the forever-unnamed "real killers" of JFK] came down with Jack Dougherty by one of the northwest elevators, David, that's what I assume.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Both of the freight elevators were hung up on the fifth floor right after the assassination. We know this is true because Roy Truly and Marrion Baker were yelling (from the first floor) for somebody to release the elevators. And this was about one minute or so after the shooting.
So there's no way any "mystery gunman" could have used those elevators. In such a make-believe case, the mystery killer takes one of the elevators to the first floor...and then the elevator used by the mystery killer needed to go back UP to the fifth floor and get stuck...all before Truly and Baker arrived at the back of the building. That's just silly.
The reason Victoria Adams and Sandra Styles didn't see Oswald on the stairs is incredibly simple...but no CTer wants to believe it:
Oswald was on the stairs BEFORE Adams and Styles used those same stairs. That fact couldn't be more obvious.
Plus: CTers never bother to answer this sticky-wicket of an inquiry either:
Why didn't Styles and Adams SEE or HEAR Truly and Baker as those two men were making their way up those very same stairs?
Again, the obvious answer is --- The women weren't on the stairs until AFTER all three of the other people (Oswald, Truly, and Baker) had already utilized the stairs to get where they were going.
TONY FRATINI SAID:
Do you totally discount anyone taking an elevator down immediately following the shooting?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Yes, I do totally discount that possibility. And that's due to the timing that's involved here. We know for a fact that Truly and Baker rushed to the back of the building in an effort to use those elevators within about 60 to 70 seconds (or so) of the last shot being fired. And when Truly and Baker reached the northwest corner, both elevators were stuck on an upper floor.
So if Dougherty had utilized one of those elevators to get from the fifth floor to the first floor, it stands to reason that the elevator that was used by Dougherty would probably have still been on the first floor when Truly and Baker scurried to the back of the building within about a minute after the shooting.
Yes, I suppose it would have been physically possible for Dougherty (or someone else) to use one of the two freight elevators, and to take that elevator down to Floor #1, and then have the elevator go back UP to the fifth floor (where it got stuck and couldn't be brought down by Roy S. Truly just seconds later).
But if that latter scenario is an accurate one -- who was it who called for the elevator to go back UP to the fifth floor after Dougherty (or whoever) used it? Or did Dougherty supposedly utilize the one "automatic" elevator among the two freight elevators that were available?
I.E., maybe he closed the gate on the elevator after he got down to the first floor, so that the elevator would automatically go back UP to the floor Dougherty just vacated. Which is just exactly what Lee Oswald wanted Charles Givens to do with that very same elevator at approximately 11:55 AM on November 22nd, with Oswald asking Givens (possibly twice) to send the elevator back up to him on the sixth floor.
But, then too, if that last paragraph I just wrote is true, you need to ask yourself -- Why did Jack Dougherty (or whoever) want to send an empty elevator back up to the fifth floor at approximately 12:31 PM on 11/22/63?
Or do some conspiracy theorists want to speculate that Mr. Dougherty was a "conspirator", and that he sent the elevator back upstairs so that it couldn't be used by the police immediately after the assassination?
I think there ARE some conspiracy buffs who DO like to call Jack Dougherty a "mysterious" figure in the assassination mosaic. But if that's so, those CTers should be scratching their heads really hard when it comes to Dougherty's claim that he didn't remember seeing anything in Lee Oswald's hands when Dougherty saw Oswald enter the Depository at about 8:00 AM on the morning of November 22nd.
Because if Dougherty had been in the process of "framing" Lee Oswald that Friday in Dallas, then why on Earth would Dougherty tell the Warren Commission that Oswald probably did NOT carry any lengthy package into the building on 11/22/63? It doesn't add up.
TONY FRATINI SAID:
Now, if Jack Dougherty was on the 5th/6th floor collecting stock, why couldn't he have called the elevator (East one) back up?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
You mean AFTER Dougherty had already descended to the first floor after the assassination? As asked previously, why would anyone want to do that?
Footnote about Dougherty:
I've heard from a few people that Jack Dougherty was possibly a little bit mentally unstable as of 11/22/63. I've never confirmed that piece of information however (nor have I ever attempted to confirm it, quite frankly). But if Dougherty wasn't quite playing with a full deck, it would certainly explain some of the very odd (and laughable) things that he told the Warren Commission in 1964. More on that HERE.
David Von Pein
August 12, 2009
AND THE BOOK DEPOSITORY ELEVATORS:
