TONY FRATINI SAID:
All the eyewitnesses who saw LHO with said package (2 of them) stated that the package was between 24—27 inches. .... Do you really believe that Jack Dougherty, with a clear view of the back entrance from the wrapping table, somehow missed this?
He did recognize that it was LHO who entered and he did see his hands.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Jack Dougherty said he only saw Oswald enter the back door "out of the corner of my eye" [6 H 377].
Therefore, why would Dougherty have been expected to notice anything in Oswald's hands? He could have easily missed seeing the package because he wasn't really LOOKING at Oswald at all.
And yet, to hear conspiracy theorists tell it, Dougherty is a rock-solid witness whose testimony positively PROVES Oswald never had any package with him on 11/22/63.
Once again, in my opinion, CTers fail to properly evaluate the sum total of JFK evidence. (Do they ever?)
DAVID VON PEIN LATER SAID:
So, Tony, do you think Buell Frazier was a liar?
Frazier said this....
"I saw him [Oswald] go in the back door at the Loading Dock of the building that we work in, and he still had the package under his arm."
-- Buell Wesley Frazier; 11/22/63 Affidavit
I'll also add this....
An excellent LNer named Bud at another online forum once speculated that Oswald could have conceivably concealed the rifle package somewhere BEFORE entering the building itself.
In other words, Bud was suggesting that the loading dock door was separate from another INNER door which led to the building itself. I'll admit my stupidity on this point concerning any detailed knowledge of the doors within the TSBD Building. So I'm not sure if Bud's theory about another possible door is correct or not.
[NOTE -- See my "EDIT" below, in which I eradicate my "stupidity" on this subject. There was, indeed, a second door.]
However, in the photo below (which I extracted from the David Wolper movie "Four Days In November", which was filmed in 1964, within just months of the assassination), it looks to me as if there might be a door leading to the loading dock area. And I doubt this is the door that Dougherty saw Oswald enter through on November 22. But, anyway, the door in the picture below is almost certainly the door Buell Frazier was referring to when he said: "I saw him go in the back door at the Loading Dock of the building that we work in."
So if there's another door, it would have been possible for Oswald to stash his package out on the loading dock somewhere BEFORE he entered the building to be seen by Dougherty.
I haven't been interested enough [until March 21, 2015] in the configuration of the Depository doors to look into it very deeply---mainly because I don't think it matters one bit. We KNOW Oswald went into the building carrying a long brown bag, because Buell Wesley Frazier CONFIRMED that fact in his November 22 affidavit. So the constant protests of CTers who want to believe Oswald had NO BAG at all with him that day aren't worthy of consideration---with or without the "corner of my eye" testimony of one Jack E. Dougherty.
EDIT ----
After looking up some documents in Warren Commission Document No. 496 at the Mary Ferrell website, I now see that there definitely WAS a second door that Oswald would have had to go through in order to get to the place on the building's first floor where he was seen by Jack Dougherty.
Therefore, the possibility does exist that Oswald COULD have stashed his rifle package temporarily in the loading dock area BEFORE he entered the door leading to the first floor. Here's the diagram of the TSBD's first floor....
DAVID VON PEIN ALSO SAID:
Let's review the facts concerning the paper bag....
1.) Oswald puts long-ish package in back seat of Buell Frazier's Chevy sedan on morning of 11/22/63.
2.) Frazier sees Oswald pick up package off of the back seat after arriving at work at the TSBD on 11/22/63.
3.) Frazier sees Oswald carrying the package as he walks toward TSBD Building on 11/22/63.
------------
So, what should "Number 4" on my above list be? Should it be this?.....
4.) Oswald loses the large brown package between the time he picked it up off of Frazier's back seat and the time LHO entered the back door of the TSBD Building.
Or maybe this solution is the correct one for CTers to use.....
4.) Oswald swallows contents of large brown package (including the brown wrapping paper too) prior to reaching the loading dock of the Texas School Book Depository Building on 11/22/63.
Somehow I doubt that either "Number 4" option above is going to pass anybody's laugh test. (Not even a CTer's.)
Therefore, the logical "Number 4" choice is this one (which, of course, is exactly what happened)....
4.) Oswald entered the back door of the TSBD Building carrying a long brown homemade paper bag on 11/22/63.
TONY FRATINI SAID:
No one is disputing that LHO had some bag with him - IMHO, it wasn't CE 142.
COLIN CROW SAID:
I have no problem with a 24” package carried under his [Oswald's] arm as Frazier described. This package could easily have been missed by Dougherty if carried in such a manner. It is your dilemma that it has to be a foot longer. I feel your pain.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Well then, let me now add a few more items to the "common sense" list regarding Oswald's brown paper bag....
5.) After the assassination, a 38-inch-long EMPTY brown paper bag is found near the very same window from where an assassin fired some rifle shots at President John F. Kennedy. (And at least four different police officers said they DID see the empty brown bag lying on the floor of the sixth-floor Sniper's Nest PRIOR to the time it was picked up off of the floor. So the "planted bag" theory goes nowhere for conspiracists---as usual.)
6.) The 38-inch bag has two of Lee Harvey Oswald's prints on it.
7.) No "24-inch" or "27-inch" brown paper bag is found anywhere in the TSBD Building.
8.) No "curtain rods" are found anywhere in the TSBD Building.
9.) Lee Oswald did not have any large-ish brown bag with him when he drove to Oak Cliff in William Whaley's taxicab shortly after the assassination.
10.) Oswald did not carry any brown bag with him into his room at 1026 North Beckley Avenue in Oak Cliff on the afternoon of November 22, 1963.
11.) And no large-ish bag was found in Oswald's room on Beckley Avenue after the assassination.
Therefore, logic and common sense would dictate (given the above set of facts) that....
12.) The EMPTY 38-inch brown paper bag that was found by the police in the Depository's Sniper's Nest is the VERY SAME brown paper package that Buell Wesley Frazier and Linnie Mae Randle observed in Oswald's hands prior to the assassination on the morning of 11/22/63. And those two witnesses--Frazier and Randle--were simply wrong when they estimated the bag's length to be about 24 to 27 inches.
Perry....your witness.
COLIN CROW SAID:
We need no further "common sense" shopping list, David.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Yes, you do. All CTers need such "common sense" lists shoved in their faces daily. And this "paper bag" topic is no different. Most of the conspiracy promoters I have encountered utilize no common sense whatsoever whenever they discuss this topic.
We KNOW Oswald took a LONG-ISH bag into the Book Depository on 11/22/63. Only people like Jim DiEugenio and Ian Griggs dispute such an obvious fact. So we know Lee had a long bag--brown, homemade, with tape on it.
And what is found in the Sniper's Nest after the shooting? ....
Voila!
A long bag--brown--homemade--with tape on it. And it's EMPTY. And it's got two of LHO's prints on it. (Imagine that.)
And what is on the other side of that same sixth floor?
Answer -- Oswald's Carcano rifle. Which is a rifle, when disassembled, that can fit very nicely inside that EMPTY 38-inch brown bag on the other side of the sixth floor. And there's a nifty "connection" there too --- OSWALD'S rifle and OSWALD'S fingerprints on the bag (and on the rifle too remember).
Plus:
The "curtain rod" story of Oswald's was an obvious lie. And that's why people like DiEugenio are forced to look even sillier by claiming that it wasn't OSWALD who lied about the "rods"---it was, instead, Buell Frazier doing the lying. (At this point, it becomes easy to label a CTer's theory "ridiculous" or "preposterous". Why? Because it is.)
So, where does "common sense" take a reasonable person who considers all this stuff? Should it take that person down DiEugenio's and Griggs' "NO BAG AT ALL" path? Or should it perhaps lead a reasonable person to think that (perhaps) Mr. Frazier and Mrs. Randle were merely incorrect in their estimates about the length of the brown bag they saw in Lee Oswald's hands?
Ladies and gentlemen of the jury....I ask you --- which conclusion regarding the paper bag should a reasonable person reach?
TONY FRATINI SAID:
Whatever LHO had in the 24-inch bag--be it magazines, an instruction manual on the radio codes for the U-2 spy plane, or just lunch--it is irrelevant. The important thing is that it didn't have a wooden stock of a MC rifle.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Why did Oswald need to tell the "curtain rod" lie (twice) to Buell Frazier if his innocuous 24-inch bag contained only magazines, etc.?
Was Lee afraid he'd be accused of assassinating JFK with a sharp corner of Page 39 of the latest issue of Playboy?
TONY FRATINI SAID:
The FBI received CE 139 and CE 142 at the same time from [DPD Lieutenant J.C.] Day. The FBI found nothing on the rifle in terms of prints - that can't be good. Day obviously didn't tell the FBI that he had a partial print until much later.
The FBI reads the note written by Day on CE 142.
CE 142 returns one day later with partials on it.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/Oswald, His Rifle, And The Paper Bag
COLIN CROW SAID:
Let's debate bones and bags, Dave......it seems that Johnson, who saw Montgomery unfold the bag, did not support a 38-inch bag after all.
The summary you posted appears to be rather simplistic and biased.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Colin [and Tony],
If you want to think the paper bag (CE142) is a fake bag and was planted (or some other theory about it not really being a bag that was handled by Lee Oswald), then you are free, of course, to believe that if you wish.
But that bag has 2 of LHO's prints on it, which must have been planted also, if LHO never touched it; or were Latona and Mandella liars too?
And it's a bag that contained fibers consistent with the blanket that Oswald's rifle was known to have been wrapped in. (More liars? Stombaugh?)
Were the Dallas cops so thorough that they "planted" fibers in the bag that just happened to generally match fibers from the blanket (CE140)?
RAY MITCHAM SAID:
Only two people said they saw Oswald carrying a package. Frazier and his sister.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
And given the circumstances, why would you expect anybody else to necessarily have seen Oswald with the package?
It's early in the morning on Nov. 22. Lee walks toward the Frazier house. Linnie Mae happens to be looking out the window and sees LHO with the package. Then the only other person that I would have completely EXPECTED to see the package---Buell Wesley Frazier---sees the paper bag on the back seat (and sees LHO carry it into the TSBD Building).
And, as mentioned previously, it's quite possible that Oswald might have stashed the bag/rifle in the Loading Dock area BEFORE he ever entered the inner door that led to the TSBD's first floor (where Jack Dougherty was). But we also know that Dougherty said he only saw LHO that morning out of the "corner" of his eye. So why would you expect him to have necessarily seen any package even if Lee had it with him at that time?
So, IMO, the argument about "Only Two People Saw Him With The Package" is a very weak argument given the time of day and the conditions of Oswald putting the package in the back seat of Frazier's car (where nobody BUT Frazier and Oswald himself could possibly see it on the way to work). Therefore, I wouldn't necessarily expect anyone else to see that brown bag. And, quite obviously (given the overall evidence and testimony), I'm right---nobody else did see it.
RAY MITCHAM SAID:
No shit, Sherlock. You are right, as I have been telling you all along. Nobody else saw the package. Therefore, they could both be lying.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Brilliant logic, Ray. ~eyeroll~
No wonder you're lost. Even the easy things are beyond your grasp.
Tell me, what's the official number of people who you think are required to witness an event in order for you to consider those people "truth tellers" instead of "liars"? Is the number 3, 4, 5? 55? (We know, of course, it's not as low as "2".)
PAT SPEER SAID:
The only people who saw something said it wasn't what the Warren Commission claimed it was. That's the whole point. Can we say they might have been wrong? Yes. But should we ASSUME they were wrong, a la the Warren Commission? NO.
No one knows what was in the bag, but Buell Frazier has said from day one it was far too small to have held the rifle.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Which eliminates the silly idea right there of there being NO BAG AT ALL, as some CTers allege. Because if it was merely a bag made up from whole cloth by Buell Frazier, then Buell would have certainly said his make-believe bag was big enough to hold the rifle. Otherwise, what would be the point of creating an imaginary bag in the first place?
So, once we get past the absurd notion that there was no bag at all, we're left with these core facts (mentioned previously):
1.) Oswald carries a "long-ish" brown paper bag into the TSBD on 11/22/63.
2.) Oswald lies to Buell Frazier about the contents of that bag. (There were no "curtain rods". I think even most conspiracy believers will stipulate to that fact.)
3.) An empty "long-ish" brown paper bag---with Lee Harvey Oswald's prints on it---is later found by the police near the place from where shots were fired at President Kennedy. (And at least four different Dallas police officers said they saw the long-ish brown bag on the sixth floor.)
4.) Oswald's rifle is also found on the sixth floor after the assassination.
I don't even need to break a sweat to figure this one out.
RAY MITCHAM SAID:
You either believe Frazier was telling the truth about the bag or you think he was lying.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
So you don't even allow for the possibility of Frazier being "mistaken" about the length of the paper bag? Is that correct, Ray?
As I said, it's no wonder you're lost.
COLIN CROW SAID:
Another "basics" question for you, Dave:
Why did Oswald not take any laundry with him to work on Thursday morning? Marina usually did his washing. It was normal for him to take his laundry on Fridays and return with his laundry bag on Monday (to the TSBD). Yet on this "unusual trip", no one mentioned this "unusual behaviour".
No "where's your laundry bag, Lee" from anyone.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Yeah, Colin, I've wondered about that myself. I really have no idea.
I haven't checked Marina's or Ruth Paine's testimony in detail on this point, but I assume that it's possible that Lee didn't ALWAYS take his laundry out to Ruth's house. Perhaps he only did that SOME of the time.
Granted, there weren't very many weekends between October and November 22 for Lee to have established any such "laundry" pattern. And that's a point often made by the CT crowd too---i.e., they'll say that Oswald really didn't have enough time to establish any firm and lasting PATTERN of behavior for when he would visit Marina at Ruth Paine's house. He only had 5 or 6 weeks. But the fact remains that except for visiting his wife (who just gave birth) on the Monday following Rachel's birth (October 21st), Lee never went out to Ruth's residence on any day other than a Friday---until Thursday, November 21st.
As for his "laundry" pattern---I plead ignorance. I haven't the foggiest. But I have wondered about it myself.
I will say this....
Since Lee did sometimes take his laundry with him to Irving, the fact that he did NOT do this on 11/21/63 indicates to me that Lee had his mind on other things that day --- like his last-minute plan to kill the U.S. President.
The fact that he wasn't concerned about his laundry getting washed surely can't be used by CTers as some sort of sign that Oswald had no plans to kill JFK---can it? (I sure don't see how that connection can be made.)
TONY FRATINI SAID:
BRW [Bonnie Ray Williams] was snacking on his chicken lunch and drinking a soda pop within the SN [Sniper's Nest].
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Dead wrong. Why are you making this stuff up about Bonnie Ray?
TONY FRATINI SAID:
How do you think the assassin got BRW to "vacate" the SN?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
No need for it, because BRW was never INSIDE the SN at any time on 11/22/63. And there's no testimony to that effect from BR Williams at all. So why did you say it?
COLIN CROW SAID:
The consolidated evidence indicates BRW lied and spent time before vacating the SN leaving his chicken sandwich unfinished.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Beautiful. One more "liar" to add to a CTer's list. What a surprise. Everybody's a liar except Lee Harvey.
COLIN CROW SAID:
Who moved the chicken twice, David? If BRW is truthful it goes from the two wheeler to the SN and back to the two wheeler.
BRW did not vacate his position until just a few minutes before the shots. Why not take his uneaten chicken with him?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
I doubt there was ever any chicken bones right AT or IN the Sniper's Nest. Or on the SN boxes. The chicken bones and lunch sack and Dr. Pepper bottle were further WEST, where Bonnie Ray Williams said he ate lunch.
I think Luke Mooney was incorrect [as were some other police officers] about the precise location where the bones were found. There's also confusion over the FIFTH or SIXTH floor for the chicken remnants, as Tom Alyea and Gerald Hill discuss in this 1993 video....
TONY FRATINI SAID:
Here we go - now DVP is moving the chicken lunch sack and the chicken bones! We know that [Gerald] Hill stuck his head out of the correct floor with the lunch sack/piece of chicken in his hand. It was Hill who initially moved the evidence from the boxes behind the SN.
[Quoting Jim Ewell's words as they appear in Larry Sneed's book] "No More Silence"....
"Jerry Hill worked his way up to the sixth floor, leaned out an open window, and he had what was thought to be Oswald’s little fried chicken lunch. It was in a little pop box. Jerry was holding that box and holding up one of the chicken bones exclaiming to everybody that listened to him down on the street that the fried chicken was what he had been eating. About that time there was a commotion around one of the squad cars, and we could hear a radio saying that an officer had been shot in Oak Cliff."
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
I'm not "moving" the chicken bones to the fifth floor. Tom Alyea does that in that 1993 video. He's certain there were bones on the fifth floor. And maybe there were. I'm not sure.
But Bonnie Ray certainly never said he left any bones on any boxes....
Mr. BALL. Where did you put the bones?
Mr. WILLIAMS. I don't remember exactly, but I think I put some of them back in the sack. Just as I was ready to go I threw the sack down.
Mr. BALL. What did you do with the sack?
Mr. WILLIAMS. I think I just dropped it there.
Mr. BALL. Anywhere near the two-wheeler?
Mr. WILLIAMS. I think it was.
Also....
From Vince Bugliosi's book....
[Quote On:]
"During a search of the sixth floor after the assassination, a detective for the Crime Scene Search Section of the Dallas Police Department found a lunch bag with chicken bones, a piece of waxed paper, and a little piece of Fritos in it in front of the “third” double-window over from the southeasternmost window on the sixth floor of the Book Depository Building. He also found a Dr. Pepper bottle nearby. (7 H 146, WCT Robert Lee Studebaker; CD 1245, p.84, FBI interview of Robert Studebaker on May 29, 1964)
Since Bonnie Williams had chicken, Fritos, and a Dr. Pepper for lunch at that exact place, that should have been the end of it. Lieutenant J. C. Day dusted the Dr. Pepper bottle for fingerprints, and no prints of Oswald’s were found. When Day later found out the food and drink had belonged to Williams, he decided the lunch bag and Dr. Pepper bottle had no value to the case and threw the sack and bottle away. (CD 1245, p.83)
Not so fast, said conspiracy theorist Sylvia Meagher, who said that since Day “saw no need to check the empty bottle for fingerprints other than Oswald’s, we will never know if fingerprints were on the bottle, or whose they were.” And even though Studebaker, whose job it was to search the sixth floor, saw the food and drink next to the third double-window over, and several other witnesses said they saw them in the same place (e.g., 6 H 330–331, WCT William H. Shelley), and Williams himself said that’s where he ate his lunch, Meagher proceeded to cite other witnesses who said they saw food elsewhere, for example, Luke Mooney (3 H 288–289), who said he saw a piece of chicken on top of the boxes surrounding the sniper’s nest. (Meagher, Accessories after the Fact, pp.39–41)
Other than her and her colleagues’ insatiable passion for pointing out normal (not to them) inconsistencies in the recollections of witnesses, nowhere does Meagher tell her readers what the relevance of these inconsistencies was. Was it her point that Williams was lying, that the chicken eater was the assassin in the sniper’s nest (who wasn’t, Meagher would assure us, Oswald), or Williams was not lying, but the assassin in the sniper’s nest was also eating chicken while he waited to kill the president?
I wish the theorists would tell us the relevance of the many inconsistencies they cite in the Kennedy case instead of feeling that the inconsistencies are an end in themselves and nothing else has to be shown or argued." -- Vincent Bugliosi; Page 23 of Endnotes in "Reclaiming History"
MARTIN WEIDMANN SAID:
Do you believe [all this] [which is a link that is no longer available due to a crash-and-burn event at Duncan MacRae's JFK Assassination Forum in January 2018], David? Let me guess... I just focus on the wrong things, right?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Oh, you absolutely do focus on all the wrong things. All the time. Just as all JFK conspiracy theorists do. That couldn't be more obvious. But for some reason, the CTers don't realize this (or just won't admit it). ~shrug~
Anyway, not a single one of the things you mentioned affects Oswald's PROVEN guilt in the Tippit murder. But several of those items you mentioned are things I've discussed with other people in the past, even with LNer John Fiorentino, who for some reason decided to put his normal common sense on hold while discussing the Tippit case with me (CLICK HERE for that complete discussion).
CTers feel the need to point out and highlight (with zeal) every inconsistency and discrepancy surrounding the JFK and Tippit cases. But a reasonable person who knows the sum total of the evidence in the Tippit case, for example, knows that relying on an ESTIMATED time given by a witness is a fool's errand and is not 100% reliable. Such as the Markham and Bowley timelines, which are, of course, merely estimates and are not times that can ever be fixed in stone, e.g., Markham's "1:06" time for the Tippit murder taking place. That time isn't an established FACT and everybody knows it. But CTers act like there was a Naval Observatory clock hovering over Markham's head on 11/22/63, flashing the time of "1:06" when Tippit was shot. It's ridiculous.
The things you SHOULD be focusing on, of course, are the things that can be PROVEN beyond all reasonable doubt -- such as the FACT that Lee Harvey Oswald had the Tippit murder weapon ON HIM just 35 minutes after Tippit was killed. The four bullet shells Oswald left at 10th & Patton prove that particular FACT. Ergo, Oswald has to be guilty. ~Mark VII~
MARTIN WEIDMANN SAID:
I take it you won't be addressing the discrepancies any time soon, right?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
I already addressed several of the things in your post. But I guess you decided not to read them. Oh well, your choice. But here they are again....
http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/06/tippit-timelines.html
I think the only thing on your list of nitpicks that I didn't touch on is this....
"Callaway made his radio call after he had helped to load Tippit into the ambulance, which makes no sense at all."
Where did the above idea come from, Martin? The DPD radio tapes show that both Bowley's call and Callaway's radio call from Tippit's car occurred practically within seconds of each other---at about 1:19 PM. Callaway must have gotten into the police car within seconds of Bowley vacating it, with Ted not realizing Bowley had already called it in.
[...]
Just read Callaway's own testimony. It dovetails perfectly with the DPD radio transcript....
TED CALLAWAY -- "I saw a squad car, and by that time there was four or five people that had gathered, a couple of cars had stopped. Then I saw--I went on up to the squad car and saw the police officer lying in the street. I see he had been shot in the head. So the first thing I did, I ran over to the squad car. I didn't know whether anybody reported it or not. So I got on the police radio and called them, and told them a man had been shot, told them the location, I thought the officer was dead. They said we know about it, stay off the air, so I went back. By this time an ambulance was coming."
------------------
So, as we can easily see, Callaway said he used the police radio BEFORE the ambulance got there. If the DPD radio tapes (excerpted HERE) could be enhanced and cleaned up, I wouldn't be surprised if the siren from the ambulance could be heard in the background as Callaway made his call from Tippit's patrol car.
So, was Ted Callaway a liar in that Warren Commission testimony shown above, Martin?
MARTIN WEIDMANN SAID:
I don't know. All I know is that it doesn't add up. .... If Callaway is correct in his testimony, then the first ambulance did not arrive until he made his call at 1:20 pm. Is that even plausible with the funeral home being only a short distance away and the ambulance being called at 1:18 pm?
[Dale] Myers wrote in "With Malice" that the ambulance arrived at 1:18:59 pm and left the scene at 1:19:49 pm. But Michael Chambers timed the actual recording between Bowley's and Callaway's call and found that (if the recording is authentic) Callaway's call wasn't made until 1:20:06 pm. How do you reconcile that? By only superficially looking at the evidence, perhaps?
Btw... you (again) seem to only reply to comments you think you can debunk. Why not address my comments about Markham and Bowley, or do they simply make too much sense for you to handle?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Martin,
Despite the time discrepancies among the witnesses in the Tippit case, there is nothing (IMO) that can debunk the fact that Lee Oswald was caught red-handed with the Tippit murder weapon in his own hands just 35 minutes after Officer Tippit was slain with that very same gun.
You can try to cast doubt on whether the bullet shells were planted or not, but IMO that argument is an empty one that cannot be believed---because there were THREE separate civilian witnesses who first picked up those shells, and two of those shells did not go through J.M. Poe's hands. And we know that only ONE gunman was dumping shells out of ONE gun on Tenth Street. So the math is not too complicated there, is it?
Tell me why should I dismiss the two shells recovered by Barbara and Virginia Davis? Do you have any valid and legitimate reason(s) to doubt the authenticity of those two bullet shells? And if not....then Oswald's guilty. Plain and simple. (Regardless of the Markham and Bowley timestamps.)
MARTIN WEIDMANN SAID:
Let me get something straight here: I am not trying to cast doubt on anything. I am trying to make sense of the evidence. The transcripts and witness testimony is evidence, right? Show me where I have mentioned one thing that can not be found in the evidence?
For the record, I do not believe for a second that the bullet shells were planted. I do believe that the killer threw those away before leaving the scene, which seems an odd thing to do. Just how dumb is this guy supposed to be? First he leaves a rifle that can be traced to him at the TSBD and then he throws shells around at the Tippit scene only to leave a jacket behind as well.
Boy, this must be some idiot.... The only problem is of course that people who knew him had a different opinion of him. This guy Oswald is leaving mixed signals all over the place. He teaches himself to speak perfect Russian yet - according to Ruth Paine - the letter he wrote on her typewriter in English was full of mistakes. Very weird indeed.
[And...]
Who said that you had to dismiss those shells? They are evidence, but by themselves they do not prove anybody's guilt at all. At best they become part of a circumstantial case. But why are you bringing this stuff up when you should be replying to the fairly conclusive argument I made about Markham and Bowley?
Could it be that you have nothing to counter that with? One more time, David. No matter how much spin you put on it, if Oswald physically couldn't have been there when Tippit was shot, he lacked means and opportunity. To just say that other evidence points towards Oswald's guilt does not alter that fact. It merely means that there must me another way to reconcile the two.
Now, perhaps you should try to address my comments about Markham and Bowley and the sequence of events.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
It's nothing but insignificant chaff. I've got all the wheat. But you won't acknowledge it. I wonder why not? You insist those timelines mean something, even in light of Oswald being caught with the murder weapon on his person in the Texas Theater. Why would anyone prefer the estimated timelines over the ballistic (bullet shells) proof of the killer's guilt? That's the 51-year mystery. ~shrug~
And now Martin is suggesting that there just MIGHT be something sinister and hinky about the "chain of custody" for S&W Revolver No. V510210 that the cops took away from Oswald. Such a suggestion also leads to the idea (entertained by many Internet CTers) that the Dallas cops, with their brother officer not even cold in the morgue yet, had a desire to frame Oswald and just let the real killer of their fellow policeman get away unpunished. Such an idea is not only ludicrous---it's obscene.
There is also this enlightening information regarding comments made by Lee Oswald just after his arrest.
MARTIN WEIDMANN SAID:
Since you are so eager to believe the DPD officers about Oswald's arrest, do you care to comment on Paul Bentley's statement on television on 11/23/63 that he took Oswald's wallet from him in the car and found a drivers license and a credit card?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Your memory is short, Martin. You and I already hashed this one out last fall -- CLICK HERE (the "credit card" topic is near the bottom).
TONY FRATINI SAID:
David,
When LHO walked up to Tippit's car and placed his hands on the passenger's side window while conversing with the Officer, did he leave prints?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
I don't think he placed his hands on the car at all. He put his elbows on the car's door sill, according to Helen Markham. From the way Markham described it, it's hard to tell whether any part of Oswald's hands would have been touching the police car or not. But, anyway, LHO's prints weren't found on the car.
TONY FRATINI SAID:
Why would LHO approach Tippit and lean his body on the car door and engage in a conversation?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Are you suggesting Oswald DIDN'T approach Tippit's car and (at the very least) kind of "lean in" toward the window to talk to Officer Tippit through the window?
Did Markham get that wrong too? Did Helen get anything right---other than pinpointing the exact time of the Tippit murder smack-dab on the nose (6 minutes and 21.87567805 seconds past 1 o'clock)?
CARMINE SAVASTANO SAID:
DVP,
I have the distinct feeling you do not want to talk about that evidence? Why is that?
I can make an educated guess if you wish.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Carmine,
I took a look at your first post in this thread, and I see nothing that undermines or debunks the idea that Oswald alone killed Kennedy.
You say "Casasin suspected..." at one point. But where's the PROOF that Oswald was an "agent"? All you've got are suspicions and speculation. Nothing more.
We, of course, know that the CIA hid the plot to kill Castro from the Warren Commission. But the HSCA investigated that angle and still declared Oswald guilty. That's discussed briefly during Gerald Ford's HSCA testimony here.
CARMINE SAVASTANO SAID:
DVP,
It is quite impolite to not answer someone. I am very disappointed in you.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
I'm heartbroken, Carmine. Tell me it ain't so!
And, btw, I did answer some of your questions in an earlier post----didn't I?
CARMINE SAVASTANO SAID:
This legendary supporter of the Commission without a solid answer. Perhaps you should not tease those who disagree with you.
You do have a lot of evidence on your site, yet you seem averse to discussions of it here. Why is that? Dulles, Hoover, and Helms...
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
I'm no expert on any three of those gentlemen. Far from it. But I don't need to be in order to have an opinion on who shot JFK and J.D. Tippit.
But I can offer up this little tidbit of common sense regarding J. Edgar Hoover that the CTers never seem to want to admit....
http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/08/hoover-and-oswald.html
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
In short, if nobody can prove beyond reasonable doubt that all (or most) of the physical evidence that shows Oswald to be a double-murderer was somehow "faked" or manipulated after the fact, then any reasonable, honest, and straight-thinking man or woman who has studied and examined the physical evidence associated with the JFK murder case literally has NO CHOICE (to paraphrase my favorite author and lawyer, Vincent T. Bugliosi) but "to return to this courtroom with a verdict of 'Guilty' against the defendant Lee Harvey Oswald!"
PROVE (definition) -- "To show the existence, truth, or correctness of (something) by using evidence, logic, etc."
ANDREW MASON SAID:
Do you also suggest that the SBT is an essential component of that proof and that it, too, is proven to the same standard?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Yes and yes.
No other explanation comes close to matching the Single-Bullet Theory.
Can anyone here look at the following looped Zapruder Film clip ten times consecutively and honestly say this to themselves?....
After seeing that Z-Film clip, there is no way in the world that JFK and Governor Connally were struck by the same bullet! They don't react at the same time at all!
Is anyone here willing to utter the above words after viewing this clip? If so, that person resides on another planet....
(2).gif)
ALAN EWALD SAID:
How did a back wound cause JFK's throat wound then? The base of the back of the neck is still a neck wound despite the linguistic flimflammery.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
"Undoubtedly, one factor that has contributed to the mistaken illusion that the bullet entered at a point lower on the president's body than it exited is that one's back is below one's neck, and the bullet entered the president's back and exited in his throat (neck). But this ignores the reality that the front of one's neck extends farther downward (i.e., lower) into one's body than the back of one's neck does." -- Vince Bugliosi; Page 424 of "Reclaiming History"
--------------------
"Via the autopsy photos below, it's very easy to illustrate the fact that the wound in President Kennedy's upper back was certainly well ABOVE the wound in the front of the neck/throat. Because if a line is drawn straight across from the throat wound toward JFK's back in the photograph on the left (even allowing for the limitations of such crude line-drawing on a two-dimensional photograph, which really cannot be done and expect complete accuracy regarding specific measurements), where would that place a wound on the "back" portion of John Kennedy's body? Certainly not anywhere near the "neck". And also nowhere near where we find the actual upper-back wound via the autopsy photo of Kennedy's back." -- DVP; January 7, 2007
ALAN EWALD SAID:
Thanks for sourcing the linguistic flimflammery. However, I think Bugs [i.e., Vincent T. Bugliosi] is short-changing Gerald Ford's invaluable contributions to the endeavour.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Who needs Gerry Ford for any description when we now have the photos to look at for ourselves? And after viewing these pictures, side-by-side, I don't see how anyone (even the HSCA's FPP members, who were dead wrong when it comes to this matter, IMO) can conclude that the throat wound was anatomically HIGHER than the back wound....
TONY FRATINI SAID:
You can not draw any conclusions from your representation, David. JFK was sitting erect in his limo, not in a state of rigor mortis.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
You're being silly.
And you think rigor mortis is suddenly going to make the bullet holes in Kennedy's body appear to be in completely different locations than they were while he was living and breathing?
How many inches (or feet) did this back wound MOVE due to rigor? ....
MICHAEL WELCH SAID:
Hi David,
I was just wondering why Mr. Vincent Bugliosi in his book says the single bullet theory could have happened anywhere between frames z-210-z-222 [he actually usually says it happened around z-210], yet you seem so confident that it had to happen at z-224.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Vince was playing it safe. He's not completely sure at WHICH exact frame the SBT occurred, so he did just what the Warren Commission did -- he provided a range of frames. And I admire the WC for doing that. They weren't going to be pinned down by claiming the bullet hit exactly at a certain Z-frame. And they still got it right too. Their "range" of Z210-Z225 includes the frame when the SBT most certainly did happen.
With better quality versions of the Zapruder Film now readily available, and with the ability to now toggle between a series of frames back and forth to our heart's content via this great tool called "The Internet", it's my opinion that the exact frame CAN be arrived at---and I favor Z224.
And if Mr. Bugliosi would ever get himself a computer and go to my webpage below, I'd be willing to bet that the clips on that webpage would even convince him that the SBT is occurring at just that point--Z224....
http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2013/02/sbt-clips.html
MICHAEL WELCH SAID:
Hi David,
Here is a still frame [of] z-224. Is this the same film version that you like to use? If it is, what are you seeing that shows a hit on both men simultaneously?
I can see President Kennedy's hands up or going up towards his throat. Is there any blood on Governor Connally's shirt?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Michael,
You need to watch the film in a LOOPED and MOTION sequence. Just isolating Z224 isn't going to prove anything. And that's a big reason Governor Connally, when he looked at merely STILLS from the Z-Film, said he was hit in the Z230s. But when viewed in MOTION, and on a loop to see it over and over again, it becomes quite clear that both JFK and Connally are reacting starting at Z225.
And Kennedy's hands are NOT moving UP to his throat by Z224. The upward arm motion of JFK doesn't start until Z226, which is the exact same frame when Governor Connally's right arm (the arm/wrist that WAS injured during the shooting) starts to rise also. Just like their arms are being controlled by the same string....
But, Michael, as we can see in the isolated clip below, Kennedy's right hand is still coming DOWN from his last wave between Z224 and Z225....
JOHN MYTTON SAID:
The Dallas Police had enough evidence to convict Oswald on the very first day...
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Indeed they did, John. And that's a key point that I've been harping on for about a year now at various forums. And I don't think a single CTer has ever answered this question with a reasonable and/or believable response....
Since when do TOTALLY INNOCENT people get officially charged and arraigned for TWO murders they didn't commit within 12 hours of those murders being committed if the authorities (in this case, the Dallas Police Department) have amassed NO EVIDENCE whatsoever against the person they are charging with those TWO murders?
TWO murders. And TWO murder charges against Lee Harvey Oswald before midnight on 11/22/63.
And yet, according to some conspiracy theorists I've talked to on the Internet, neither the DPD (nor I) have ever produced one single piece of evidence that would indicate Oswald was guilty of EITHER of those murders.
Yeah, right.
DAVID VON PEIN LATER SAID:
Thank you, Tony Fratini, for posting Arnold Rowland's testimony about seeing a black man in the Sniper's Nest PRIOR to 12:15. I stand corrected on that point. I had forgotten that that Warren Commission testimony existed. I was thinking Rowland's testimony only indicated he had seen a black man in the Sniper's Nest [SN] window AFTER the assassination. I was wrong. So thank you for the correction.
But witnesses like Brennan, Fischer, and Edwards never said they saw a black man in the SN window at all that day. They said they saw only a white man in that window who would generally match Oswald's description. The exact timing of WHEN Brennan, Fischer, and Edwards said they FIRST saw the white man in the SN window might have been a little bit LATER than when Rowland said he saw a black man in the SN. But after having checked Arnold Rowland's testimony just now, Rowland did say that he saw a black man in the SN window approximately 6 minutes before the motorcade arrived in Dealey Plaza, and that certainly does NOT gel together with Howard Brennan's testimony, who only saw a white man in that same window at almost that very same time....
ARLEN SPECTER -- "So that you observed this colored man on the window you have marked "A" within 5 minutes prior to the time the motorcade passed in front of you?"
ARNOLD ROWLAND -- "Approximately 5 minutes prior to the time the motorcade came, he wasn't there. About 30 seconds or a minute prior to that time he was there."
I'll also add this.....
Author Vincent Bugliosi doesn't believe Arnold Rowland's story at all. In "Reclaiming History", Bugliosi covers Rowland's story in some depth (see the book excerpts cited below), with Vince coming to the conclusion that Arnold Rowland was probably lying about (at the very least) certain portions of his story.
But I disagree with Mr. Bugliosi about the idea that Arnold Rowland simply invented his ENTIRE story AFTER the assassination. And the reason I doubt he invented ALL of it is because his wife, Barbara Rowland, as early as the day of the assassination itself in her 11/22/63 affidavit, fully corroborated the portion of Arnold's testimony about how Arnold nudged her at about 12:15 (before the motorcade arrived in Dealey Plaza) and pointed to the west side of the Depository and asked her if she wanted to see a security guard in the window.
So if ARNOLD Rowland was a liar, then BARBARA Rowland would likely have to be labelled a liar too. And I doubt that was the case.
Bugliosi, however, might be of the opinion that Arnold Rowland made up his story even BEFORE President Kennedy entered Dealey Plaza on November 22nd. But if that had been the case, it would have been a pretty amazing piece of fiction for Arnold to have just made up out of whole cloth just a mere fifteen minutes before JFK was shot with rifle bullets from the very same building (and the VERY SAME FLOOR--the sixth floor--albeit on the other end of the building!) where Rowland FALSELY claimed to have seen a man holding a RIFLE. That would have been quite a remarkable hunk of crystal ball-like story-telling, indeed.
Anyway, here are the excerpts from Vince Bugliosi's book concerning Arnold Rowland.....
[Quote On:]
"The most famous (and most widely quoted by conspiracy theorists) of all the Dealey Plaza witnesses who claim they saw people and happenings on the upper floors of the Book Depository Building that differ from the weight of the evidence and conclusion of the Warren Commission is Arnold Rowland. Rowland was a clearly intelligent and fairly articulate eighteen-year-old high school student who was watching the motorcade with his wife in front of the sheriff's office on the east side of Houston Street. While waiting for the president's arrival, they discussed the security measures being taken to protect the president, noting the number of police officers in the Plaza.
Rowland spoke to several members of law enforcement in Dealey Plaza right after the shooting. It appears he first spoke to Dallas deputy sheriff Roger Craig. Craig testified that Rowland told him that around 12:15 p.m., he saw two men, one holding a rifle with a telescopic sight on it, walking back and forth two windows over from the west side of the sixth floor, not the east side where the sniper's nest was located. He assumed they were Secret Service agents. When he looked back a few minutes later, he only saw the man with the rifle.
In Craig's report filed the day after the assassination, he not only does not mention the Rowlands, he makes no reference to anyone claiming to have seen two men (one with a rifle) on the sixth floor of the Depository moments before the shooting.
C. L. "Lummie" Lewis, the Dallas deputy sheriff who escorted the Rowlands to the sheriff's office to make a statement, did mention the Rowlands in his report of November 23, noting that Arnold Rowland "saw man in bldg about 15 min before shooting with a gun. Wife Barbara was with him," but not one single word about Arnold Rowland seeing a second man.
Rowland then told Dallas police detective F. M. Turner that he saw a white man with a rifle that had a telescopic sight standing in the background of an open window on the southwest side of the sixth floor, but made no reference to seeing any second man on the floor.
And he told Forrest Sorrels, the special agent in charge of the Dallas office of the Secret Service, that he saw a man (he again made no reference to seeing any second man) standing with a rifle several feet back from an open window that was two windows from the westernmost side of the building. (If Rowland told him what floor, Sorrels didn't say.) The man, whom Rowland said he "could not" identify, was holding the rifle, per Rowland, at the ridiculous formal military position of "port arms".
Rowland was taken inside the sheriff's office that same afternoon, where he gave a notarized affidavit that reiterated what he had told Turner and Sorrels, except that now the man was holding the rifle at the military position of "parade rest," but again made no reference to seeing a second man.
In two separate FBI interviews on the day of the assassination and the following day, Rowland told the FBI essentially the same story, again not referring to a second man. On November 24, Rowland gave a signed statement to the FBI. He said he only saw the man "momentarily" on the sixth floor, and this time he was once again back to holding the rifle at "port arms." Again, there was no reference to seeing anyone else in the window, or anywhere else on the sixth floor.
Three and a half months later, in his March 10, 1964, testimony before the Warren Commission, Rowland repeated the essence of his previous statements about the man with the rifle he claims he saw around 12:15 p.m. He definitely was holding the "high-powered" rifle, he said, at "port arms," not parade rest, either one of which would be a laughably inappropriate way to hold a rifle for a man about to kill the president.
But the devil was in the details he added and his additional observations. Unbelievably, even though he told the FBI he only saw the man "momentarily" (indeed, he told the Commission that he told his wife about the sighting of the man immediately after he saw him, and when she looked up the man was already "gone from our vision"), he gave the Commission incredible details. The man had "dark hair" that was "well-combed or close cut," was a "light Latin or Caucasian," had on a "very light-colored shirt" that was "open at the collar" and (get this) "unbuttoned about halfway," was wearing "a polo shirt under" the shirt, and was wearing "dark slacks or blue jeans." Rowland didn't mention the state of the man's shoeshine, but only because he couldn't see more than "six inches below his waist."
This was not looney bird time. This clearly was fabrication time. "There was nothing dark on the man's face, no mustache," Rowland testified, but he allowed that "there could have been a scar, if it hadn't been a dark scar."
Rowland now added, for the first time that has been recorded in any statement of his, that on the same floor the man with a rifle was on, he saw, around five minutes before the shooting, an elderly "colored man . . . hanging out the window . . . that they said the shots were fired from," the "southeast corner" of the building, and that on the floor directly below the colored man, he saw "two Negro women" (obviously, the two black men, Harold Norman and Bonnie Ray Williams) looking out adjacent windows.
But when his wife was asked by Warren Commission counsel if her husband "ever told you that he had seen anyone else on the sixth floor other than this man with the gun?" she responded, "No, sir."
"Has he ever told you that he told anyone else that he saw anyone else on the sixth floor?"
"No, sir."
It was obvious that Rowland had no credibility left to squander, but Rowland tried hard to prove this conclusion wrong in the remainder of his testimony. He said he saw "three women" and a "couple of boys" on the freeway overpass (though we know from the testimony of several witnesses that neither were there), and that "all the officers . . . 50, maybe more" converged on the railroad yards behind the picket fence right after the shooting" (again, we know this is not true).
Since no one else but Arnold Rowland claimed to see a man holding a rifle on the west side of the sixth floor of the Book Depository Building, and since there is no physical evidence that Kennedy was shot from a window on the west side of the building (e.g., no shell cases were on the floor), and certainly no evidence at all that Oswald had any accomplice helping him that day, there appear to be several possible explanations of what happened here.
Rowland may have seen Oswald himself holding the rifle, around fifteen minutes before the shooting, on the west side of the sixth floor. Another possibility is that Rowland was simply mistaken as to what he thought he saw. This would be consistent with the well-known phenomenon that whenever there are multiple witnesses to an event, almost invariably there is very wide divergence as to what people think they saw.
But if I were to guess, I'd say that Rowland made the story up for his wife, and then later ran with it, exaggerating and embroidering his yarn along the way. Rowland said that just prior to his alleged sighting of the man in the window, he and his wife "were discussing . . . the different security precautions. I mean, it was a very important person who was coming and we were aware of the policemen around everywhere, and especially in positions where they would be able to watch crowds . . . We had seen in the movies before where they had security men up in windows . . . with rifles." His wife, Barbara, confirms this conversation.
Further support that Rowland may have made his sighting up is that it doesn't ring true—that he immediately told his wife of his sighting, but when she looked up shortly thereafter, the man who had been holding his rifle at port arms, no less, suddenly vanished, her husband telling her "the man had moved back."
True, his wife was nearsighted and she wasn't wearing her glasses at the time, but she said she "saw the window plainly, and I saw some people . . . looking out of some other windows."
[...]
As to Rowland's exaggerating and embroidering the story as he told it to subsequent people, we've seen that he conducted his own self-immolation on this point."
-- Vincent Bugliosi; Pages 833-835 of "Reclaiming History"
[End Bugliosi Book Quotes.]
Here's what I think happened.....
Arnold Rowland did what I believe other witnesses on the ground in Dealey Plaza did that day --- he got his floors mixed up. He saw a black man (Harold Norman) in the FIFTH-floor window, directly underneath the Sniper's Nest window, and Arnold thought that the black man (Norman) was on the SIXTH floor. But Norman, of course, was one floor below the assassin.
And I say all of the above even though Rowland said in his Warren Commission testimony that he ALSO saw "two Negro women, I think" in the fifth-floor window. But it's fairly clear that Arnold was a bit mixed up there, and his use of the words "I think" would indicate a certain amount of uncertainty on this point, because we know there were not two "women" visible in the fifth-floor windows on November 22nd. Those "two Negro" individuals were, of course, Harold Norman and Bonnie Ray Williams, neither of whom resemble "women" to me (even from a considerable distance).
I also think Amos Euins made the very same mistake when he said in some of his statements that he saw a black man in the sixth-floor assassin's window. Euins, too, simply got the floor number wrong. He also most likely saw Harold Norman looking out of the fifth-floor corner window and later thought Norman was on the SIXTH floor.
Norman, Williams, and Jarman were SO CLOSE to the actual assassin's window (being just one floor below the gunman when Oswald killed the President from the sixth floor) that, in my opinion, it's very understandable how various witnesses could have been confused and rattled when they attempted to re-create in their minds the precise details regarding the floor numbers.
Let's take Ronald Fischer as a good example of how a witness can get the floor numbers mixed up ---- Fischer, in his 11/22/63 affidavit, said he saw a man on the "fifth floor". He later told the Warren Commission that the "white man" he saw was on either the "fifth or sixth floor". And since we know from the Dillard picture that there was no "white man" in any window on the southeast side of the fifth floor, Fischer was simply mistaken when he said "fifth floor" in his initial affidavit.
And the man who was standing with Fischer in Dealey Plaza, Robert Edwards, made the exact same mistake Fischer made when Edwards filled out his affidavit on November 22 too. Edwards said the man was on the "fifth floor".
So, as we can see from those two examples I just cited, it's certainly not unusual for witnesses to be mistaken when it comes to the Depository's floor numbers.
But the physical evidence isn't lying (even though most Internet conspiracy theorists think the evidence against Oswald IS telling one lie after another) --- that evidence is telling us who shot President Kennedy. And it wasn't a black man. It was Lee Harvey Oswald.
And when it comes to Bonnie Ray Williams' testimony in front of the Warren Commission, I really can't see why he would feel any need to want to start making up stories and telling lies about his exact whereabouts on 11/22/63 --- because it wasn't Bonnie Ray's rifle that was found in the Book Depository. And Bonnie Ray's prints weren't found all over the interior of the Sniper's Nest and on a certain empty brown paper bag in that same Nest.
And Bonnie Ray is certainly cleared as being a GUNMAN in the assassination, because we know he was photographed on the FIFTH FLOOR by Tom Dillard within seconds of the shots being fired at JFK. So Dillard's photo clears Williams in that respect (as an actual participant as a GUNMAN, that is).
And Bonnie Ray also knows that he's got two "alibi" witnesses -- Harold Norman and James Jarman -- who were both with Williams on the fifth floor at the exact time of the assassination. So why does Bonnie Ray Williams NEED to lie---about anything? IMO, he didn't NEED to lie at all. Hence, it's my opinion he did not lie in his testimony.
And even if Bonnie Ray DID leave a chicken bone on top of one of the boxes that surrounded Oswald's Sniper's Nest, I can't really see why that fact is critical when it comes to trying to solve the Kennedy assassination. I mean, even if Bonnie Ray was walking around the sixth floor and had walked right past Oswald's Sniper's Nest (without going INTO the "Nest", which I do not think he did at any time that day), and if Williams had deposited a chicken bone on top of a box near the Nest --- what would that prove?
We already KNOW that Bonnie Ray was up there on the sixth floor eating his lunch fairly near Oswald's sniper's perch at a point in time that was fairly close to the time of the assassination itself. And we know, via the Dillard picture, that Bonnie Ray was not actually ON THE SIXTH FLOOR at the time of the assassination. He moved down to the fifth floor to join his co-workers Norman and Jarman shortly before shots were fired at the President.
So a leftover chicken bone sitting on top of a box near the assassin's lair is pretty much meaningless in the long run, in my opinion.
I think, once again, that some conspiracy theorists are attempting to make something that is totally insignicant seem vitally important. In this instance, they seem to be creating a six-course chicken dinner out of a single leftover poultry bone.
COLIN CROW SAID:
It is clear you are unaware of the timelines witnesses are describing. This is the simple reason why a black man may not have been observed by Brennan for example. He did not take up position on the wall until about 12:25 or so. By this time, Rowland's attention was elsewhere and the man had likely left.
TONY FRATINI SAID:
I don't care what Vincent [Bugliosi] believes or not - it is undeniable that Rowland saw BRW [Bonnie Ray Williams] IN the SN and he was present on the same floor as the sniper was. The WC completely discredited the man for no reason at all.
BRW left evidence IN the SN that he was indeed present. Vincent is merely paying lip service to the WC - anyone can see that, David.
That FACT [regarding Arnold Rowland saying he saw a black man in the Sniper's Nest prior to 12:15 PM on 11/22/63] is a game changer.
He saw BRW first and then he saw the sniper second on the WEST end of the 6th floor at around 12.15 pm. This makes perfect sense because from that position the sniper can see ALL the way down to the SN. The sniper must [have] been wondering who was in the SN.
I believe that both parties knew of each other's presence on the 6th floor. Fear--absolute fear--gripped BRW. He left quick. But he left late, 5 minutes before the arrival of the POTUS. [It] chimes in perfectly with the movements of Norman and Jarman coming back into the TSBD.
What we have in the "official records" in regards to the movement of Norman, Jarman and Williams is nothing but made-up nonsense.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
How does anything uttered by Arnold Rowland change the physical evidence in the case?
In other words, how does Rowland's testimony make Oswald INNOCENT of shooting John Kennedy?
Please explain that to me.
COLIN CROW SAID:
I find Bugliosi's analysis fatuous and imaginative......as with the previous dismissal of the chicken lunch issue.
As for your suggestion that Rowland saw Norman.....timing again David....they weren't there at the times indicated.....sorry...no cigar.
In fact, a proper analysis of Rowland's WC testimony shows he had an excellent recall of people in the windows that day....much better than that of Brennan. A fact helped no doubt by the longer time frame he was viewing the building and the angle he viewed from compared to Brennan.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Does that mean you think Arnold Rowland DID see "two Negro women" in the fifth-floor windows?
COLIN CROW SAID:
I would not expect every detail to be 100% correct given the circumstances. Just as I don't discount Brennan's observations simply because he said the man was sitting on the window sill or thought he was standing.
TONY FRATINI SAID:
So now - because Rowland didn't get every minute detail correct, you're going to do the same thing as the WC and Vincent did?
Rowland's observation of BRW is backed up - now wait for it - by BRW himself and the leaving of physical evidence by BRW himself.
Colin and I have the same material that you and Vince have, yet our conclusions are in stark contrast to you. Why is that?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
I guess there are some conspiracists who must believe that Bonnie Ray Williams was lying through his teeth when he said this to the Warren Commission....
Mr. BALL -- "Where did you eat your lunch?"
Mr. WILLIAMS -- "I ate my lunch--I am not sure about this, but the third or the fourth set of windows, I believe."
Mr. BALL -- "Facing on what street?"
Mr. WILLIAMS -- "Facing Elm Street."
[...]
Mr. DULLES -- "And you were all alone?"
Mr. WILLIAMS -- "Yes, sir."
-----------
So, it's pretty clear from Bonnie Ray's WC testimony quoted above that he did NOT eat his lunch IN THE SNIPER'S NEST on November 22, 1963. And anybody saying he DID eat his lunch in the SN is totally ignoring the BEST witness in this regard---Mr. Bonnie Ray Williams himself.
TONY FRATINI SAID:
If you read [Bonnie Ray Williams'] testimony, you will see that he described initially being in the SN and that he moved on his way out to get to the fifth floor.
Mr. WILLIAMS -- "First of all, I remember there was some boxes behind me. I just kind of leaned back on the boxes first. Then I began to get a little impatient, because there wasn't anyone coming up. So I decided to move to a two-wheeler."
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Absolute nonsense. Williams wasn't describing being in the Sniper's Nest in that testimony. He was talking about leaning back on some of the boxes that we can easily see are stacked up all around the area where Bonnie Ray's Dr. Pepper bottle and the two-wheeler were located. There are boxes everywhere....
COLIN CROW SAID:
Either he [Bonnie Ray Williams] lied,
Or
The assassin had a chicken lunch too that he didn't finish.....that disappeared entirely under the noses of numerous police officers (maybe they were hungry),
Or
The assassin grabbed BRW's lunch after he left......then someone moved it back to the two wheeler,
Or
Feel free to [provide] another possibility, David.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
I don't think anyone lied. Some people were simply mistaken. Like Edwards and Fischer when they said FIFTH floor in their affidavits when they really meant SIXTH floor.
But the theory I'm hearing in this discussion means you guys need to have Bonnie Ray Williams lying his head off, plus various police officers lying, and the Warren Commission too. It's just plain silly (not to mention totally unnecessary on ANYONE'S behalf)....and surely you know it's silly. But you insist on making mountains out of nothingness anyway. It's in a CTer's blood. You can't help it, I guess.
You guys seem to think the ONLY place where BRW could have possibly leaned back on some boxes on the entire sixth floor was INSIDE the Sniper's Nest itself----even though Williams is clear he was NOT that far EAST on the building's sixth floor when he ate his lunch. But you'll ignore the person who is obviously the best witness to say where he ate lunch----Bonnie Ray himself.
Plus, what makes you think Williams couldn't have MOVED the two-wheeler truck just a little bit (one way or the other)? It was a MOVABLE object, you know. Just as a piece of chicken is MOVABLE.
And a piece of chicken that inexplicably goes from one part of the sixth floor to another (and I cannot explain it; I have no idea why there is the conflicting testimony regarding the chicken bones) is not going to suddenly ERASE the physical evidence of Oswald's guilt. Nor will that piece of chicken (or its bones) erase the known incriminating ACTIONS of one Lee Harvey Oswald on 11/22/63.
Oswald's guilt in both the Kennedy and Tippit murders is rock-solid and will survive the avalanche of speculative nonsense coming from conspiracy theorists about chicken bones and the unsupportable allegations about Bonnie Ray Williams being a liar, etc.
Nobody in this discussion has done anything that diminishes Lee Oswald's guilty status----even if the chicken bones WERE moved around on the sixth floor by somebody (anybody!) on November 22nd.
TONY FRATINI SAID:
BONNIE RAY WILLIAMS -- "Well, at the time I couldn't see too much of the sixth floor, because the books at the time were stacked so high. I could see only in the path that I was standing--as I remember, I could not possibly see anything to the east side of the building. But just one aisle, the aisle I was standing in I could see just about to the west side of the building. So far as seeing to the east and behind me, I could only see down the aisle behind me and the aisle to the west of me."
Bingo - do you want me to draw you a schematic?
If he was at the two wheeler - he could see all the way to the SN, David.
He couldn't see anything to the EAST because he was at the SOUTHEAST corner.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
You actually think a person who is ALREADY AS FAR EAST AS HE COULD POSSIBLY BE on the sixth floor would say something like this?....
"I could not possibly see anything to the east side of the building."
Hilarious!
The above quote by Bonnie Ray Williams quite obviously indicates that the one place on the sixth floor where he definitely WAS NOT located was the Sniper's Nest (i.e., the far southeast corner).
Also....
For Tony....
One of the photos you've been using [this one] comes from the Secret Service re-enactment film. And I believe that film was produced on November 27th, five days after the assassination.
Therefore, what makes you think the box stacks were EXACTLY the same configuration on Nov. 27 as they were when Bonnie Ray Williams was on the sixth floor on Nov. 22? Couldn't they possibly be in a slightly different location five days later?
In addition, the Secret Service agent in that photo (i.e., still frame) is STANDING UP. He's not sitting down or squatting as LHO probably was doing when Bonnie Ray Williams was on the sixth floor on 11/22. And when the SS agent (John Howlett) sits down, he is completely out of sight of anyone else to the west of his Sniper's Nest position on the sixth floor---as Howlett himself demonstrates in the SS film here (about 11 minutes into the film)....
TONY FRATINI SAID:
You cannot place LHO within the SN, like Colin and I have done with BRW using testimony and physical evidence.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Let me pinch myself to see if I really read the above hunk of pure nonsense....
You're actually implying that LNers like myself have NO PHYSICAL EVIDENCE at all to tie Oswald to the assassination or to the "Sniper's Nest" on the sixth floor of the Book Depository?
(Let me pinch myself yet again, because such a statement is just ludicrous.)
OSWALD'S rifle.
OSWALD'S shells. (From his gun, I mean.)
OSWALD'S bullet fragments IN THE LIMOUSINE.
OSWALD'S prints all over the Nest where we know THE KILLER WAS SHOOTING FROM.
OSWALD'S prints on the paper bag (CE142). Like it or not, CE142 is an official piece of evidence, seen by multiple policemen in the SN, and it is irrevocably tied to Oswald via his 2 prints. Pretend it's a fake, but LNers will keep reminding CTers it exists all the same.
And there's, of course, Howard Brennan, who supplied "witness identification" evidence of Oswald's guilt. I know CTers hate Brennan's Johnny-come-lately positive IDing of LHO, but that's in the record too. So you'll have to deal with it (and toss it aside), much the same way I have to deal with Luke Mooney's account of seeing the chicken bones on a SN box. So, life ain't always easy, is it? For LNers or CTers. :)
But to imply that you have somehow destroyed the case against Oswald (or even PART of that case) by way of the "Chicken Bones" topic and/or BRW's testimony and/or Arnold Rowland's timeline of events is just laughable, Tony.
~~pinch, pinch~~
TONY FRATINI SAID:
The real issue, as I see it Dave, is that you don't actually believe any response or research from anyone who disputes the findings of the WC. Isn't that correct? You have already prejudged and predetermined people on the basis of their beliefs? So in essence - EVERYONE here who doesn't believe in the WC findings on LHO's guilt on assassinating JFK is automatically wrong and hence must be a "kook"? Right?
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Tony,
After looking at the evidence that hangs Oswald 10 times over (or more), I believe that the "CTers" on almost all Internet forums are not evaluating the evidence properly or fairly---because that evidence DOES prove Lee Oswald's guilt in TWO murders (IMO). Therefore, anyone who says they think Oswald didn't shoot anybody on 11/22/63 is just flat-out wrong. (Again, "IMO".)
Five years ago, another LNer at another forum summed things up very succinctly and accurately....
"There is almost as much evidence that Oswald shot Kennedy as there is evidence that Kennedy got shot." -- Bud; July 21, 2010
COLIN CROW SAID:
The Bags & Bones series can be found here, David [at the links below]. Save trouble researching....
In Part 1 in this series, I showed, using witness testimony and statements chronologically, how the unfinished chicken lunch and paper bag were originally found in the SN and was eventually moved in two stages. The first westward move, to a position on boxes close to the second set of windows, occurred a few minutes after Mooney discovered the items and was likely performed by Gerald Hill. The second occurred sometime after the rifle discovery (1:23pm) and 2pm involved placing the chicken on the bag and placement near a 2-wheeler about 30 feet from their original positions. The most likely candidate for the second move was Officer Montgomery.
In Part 2, I used the various statements over time by Bonnie Ray Williams, who eventually told authorities that he was on the 6th floor eating a chicken lunch before the shots occurred. Carl Day revealed the final position of the lunch to him 3 days after the assassination and Williams was able to effectively distance himself from the SN. In addition, Williams repeatedly attempted to claim he left the sixth floor, after finishing his lunch, before 12:15 to join Norman and Jarman on the floor below.
In Part 3, I showed that although Jarman and Norman's statements disguised and supported Williams' "story" for four months, they eventually revealed during their appearance before the Warren Commission in March 1964 that they did not take up position on the fifth floor until around 12:25pm. Thus we now know that Williams was positioned in the SN before this time and possibly there for many minutes before departing, leaving an unfinished chicken leg behind on a box about 5 feet from the sniper's position. For some reason, Williams, Norman and Jarman were not totally candid about what happened that day.
In Part 4 [which is a link that's no longer available], I examined the statements and testimonies of Arnold Rowland and Howard Brennan to provide clues to determine the sequence of events that occurred on the fifth and sixth floors in the 20 minutes or so before the shooting.
DAVID VON PEIN SAID:
Thank you, Colin, for providing your synopsis and the various links.
David Von Pein
March 2015 [This forum link is no longer available.]
April 2015
March 2016 [This forum link is no longer available.]
