Here is one of two attempts by Melvyn Ayton to reconcile the “Official” LAPD damage to the RFK shooting.

Wrote Melvyn:

Quote On
There are a number of possibilities that can be used to explain the
trajectories of the shots without resorting to the possibility of a
second gun.

Remember Thomas Noguchi and Dan Moldea said there was no one who could
positively say to a 100% degree of certainty how the bullets travelled. [sic]

A ********number of possible explanations, which are contrary to the official
version, can account for the paths of the bullets.***********
There were four stray bullets:

1. The bullet that passed through Kennedy's jacket without striking him
2.The through and through bullet that exited from his chest.
3. The bullet that struck the ceiling and exited through one of the
ceiling tiles.
4. The bullet that was supposedly lost in the ceiling interspace.

In its official inventory of the bullets fired by Sirhan the LAPD
claimed that Schrade was wounded by the bullet that went harmlessly
through the shoulder pad of RFK's suit. Moldea maintains this is wrong.

Moldea believes the first shot hit Paul Schrade. Moldea also believes
that the shoulder pad bullet probably struck one of the four shooting
victims and this is consistent with the fact that Sirhan's revolver
could only fire 8 shots.

I believe the following scenario is entirely plausible, although there
are other scenarios that could account for the 8 shots - as Vincent
Bugliosi said, "If (Wolfer's) report is in error, for whatever reason,
then there might be an explanation for some of these things: ricochets,
parts of bullets, fragments. This whole notion of a second gun is
premised on the assumption (Wolfer's) report is correct."

BULLET 1 - Missed Kennedy and struck Paul Schrade in the forehead.
BULLET 2 - The shoulder pad shot as RFK was raising his arm - this
bullet then possibly hit one of the other four victims after travelling [sic]
upwards to the ceiling tiles and ricocheting. The main candidate for
this shot is Evans. Evans was bending down at the time of the shooting
- the bullet could have ricocheted off the pantry floor then struck
Evans in the head. This bullet could account for two of the ceiling tile
holes, entry and exit.
BULLET 3 - The bullet that hit Kennedy in his right armpit and lodged
in the back of his neck. This bullet was recovered.
BULLET 4 - The bullet that hit RFK in the mastoid. This was the shot
that was fatal. Bullet fragments were recovered.
BULLET 5 - The bullet that went through Goldstein's left pant leg
without striking him - this bullet could have hit Stroll - the bullet
was recovered during surgery.
BULLET 6 - The bullet that hit Weisal [sic (The victim’s name was Weisel)] in the abdomen and which was recovered during surgery.
BULLET 7 - The bullet that was lost in the ceiling interspace.
BULLET 8 - The bullet that hit Goldstein in the thigh and which was
recovered.

Three ceiling tile holes are accounted for in the above 'scenario'. The
alleged bullet holes in the pantry door divider were too small to be
made by .22 caliber bullets. [Ayton is 100% wrong here. The small object in the door behind the ***podium*** was too small to have been caused a bullet. No measurements for the size of the holes in the ***pantry*** divider were ever listed. Not once. Ayton just made that up. J.H.] The hole In fact they were not made by bullets at
all as Moldea ably demonstrates.
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This is supposed to be Ayton’s “entirely plausible” scenario accounting for the wounds and damage using no more than the 8 shots Sirhan was capable of firing.

The trouble is, Ayton’s loose grasp of the RFK assassination evidence is betrayed by several obvious, critical errors, two of which I will outline here.

CRITICAL MISTAKE #1

The first (and most embarrassing) error is that Ayton gave us an “entirely plausible" 8 shot scenario…except he FORGOT to account for an ENTIRE wound set; A careful reading of his scenario reveals that Ayton left out the shot that went in RFK's right rear armpit and came out through the front chest!!! Oops!! Ayton Add in the shot Ayton left out and Melvyn just gave us a 9 shot scenario while attempting prove an 8 shot scenario.

CRITICAL MISTAKE #2

Wrote Ayton: “BULLET 2 - The shoulder pad shot as RFK was raising his arm – this bullet then possibly hit one of the other four victims after travelling [sic] upwards to the ceiling tiles and ricocheting. The main candidate for this shot is Evans. Evans was bending down at the time of the shooting - the bullet could have ricocheted off the pantry floor then struck Evans in the head. This bullet could account for two of the ceiling tile
holes, entry and exit"

Ayton’s second critical gaff?? He linked the shot that went into the ceiling and ricocheted back into the pantry with Elizabeth Evans’ headwound. The LAPD ran that trajectory on the night of the assassination and it lead to the divider at a point above everyone’s head. The attached graphic demonstrates the absurdity of Ayton’s RFK SBT shot, with the LAPD version included for reference purposes.

Once we divorce the ceiling shot from the Evans shot, we add yet another bullet to Ayton’s “entirely plausible” 8 shot scenario. The brings Melvyn up to 10 shots. Oops!!

I posted this same message at alt.assassination.jfk and Ayton never attempted a rebuttal.

Dan Moldea and Ken Rahn would not attempt to explain the Moldea scenario using Moldea’s "Schrade Shot" conclusion. Now along comes Melvyn Ayton, who gave it a go. Although he tried to rehabilitate Moldea, laughably, Ayton leaves us with a scenario that demands 10 bullets at a minimum. Now that's rich!!


John Hunt

Nobody I know can say with absolute certainty what happened to the four stray bullets at the crime scene of Senator Kennedy's murder: 1) the bullet that passed through Kennedy's jacket without striking him, 2) the through-and-through bullet that exited from his chest, 3) the bullet that struck the ceiling and exited through one of the ceiling tiles, and 4) the bullet that was supposedly lost in the ceiling interspace.

In its official inventory of the bullets fired by Sirhan, the LAPD claimed that Paul Schrade was wounded by the bullet that went harmlessly through the shoulder pad of Senator Kennedy's suit coat. Some people clearly believes the LAPD's flawed and widely-discredited bullet count. I do not.

Instead, I believe that the shoulder-pad bullet probably struck one of the other four shooting victims - someone other than Schrade. So, regardless of how much some critics try to twist and torture the crime-scene evidence, my explanation does not add a single bullet to the final bullet count.

In short, I stand by what I have written, especially my conclusion that Paul Schrade was hit by the first shot - which is completely consistent with the fact that Sirhan's eight-shot revolver could not fire more than eight bullets. Once again, the simple truth is that Sirhan murdered Senator Kennedy, and he acted alone.

Dan,

I appreciate your taking the time to participate in discussion of the RFK assassination evidence.



Do you dispute that any of these four points of damage existed?? As a matter of clarification, when you say “the bullet that was supposedly lost in the ceiling interspace,” are you saying you have doubts about whether or not that really was a bullet hole??




Nor I.



Firstly, the shot through the shoulder pad went upward at a severe angle. In order for that shot to have struck another victim, the holes in RFK’s jacket would have to aligned along the horizontal. (See attached graphic.) If RFK was pushed up against the steam table as you concluded, that didn’t happen.

And even if it did, that still leaves you with nine shots. To wit:

Bullet # 1 – Paul Schrade (Forehead).

Bullet # 2 – RFK (Through and through bullet hole in jacket, striking Goldstein (for instance)).

Bullet # 3 – RFK (Headshot, non-transiting).

Bullet # 4 – RFK (Armpit, non-transiting).

Bullet # 5 – RFK (Armpit, transiting upward).

Bullet # 6 – Goldstein pants (Transiting, ricocheting, and striking Stroll in the shin (non-transiting).

Bullet # 7 – Evans (For the sake of the argument we will say that she was struck in the head by the bullet which entered a ceiling tile, ricocheted of the ceiling, and reentered thorough the ceiling tiles (non-transiting))

Bullet # 8 –. Weisel (Abdomen (non-transiting)

Bullet # 9 – Hole in the ceiling tile, (Sharply upward, not recovered).


Marrying the RFK shoulder pad shot to any victim does not negate the necessity of a ninth shot if you conclude (as you have) that Schrade was hit by a shot unto itself.

Additionally, if we divorce the ceiling re-entry bullet from Elizabeth Evans’ headwound, that puts the bullet count at 10.




Outline the plausible scenario for us.



I understand what you are saying, but you haven’t yet given us a plausible explanation. If you are correct in this matter, then you should be able to come up with an eight shot scenario using this “Official” evidence:

1. RFK - Shot in the head, no exit.
2. RFK - Shot in the right rear armpit, with the bullet coming to rest in the flesh beneath the skin at the base of the back of the neck. The bullet was recovered at autopsy.
3. RFK - Shot in the right rear armpit one inch above shot No. 2. The bullet exited through right front chest below the clavicle.
4. RFK - Entry and exit of a bullet which passed through the rear right shoulder of RFK’s suit jacket. The entry and exit were both behind the yolk seam at the top of the shoulder, and penetrated only the outermost layer of fabric.
5. Paul Schrade - Shot in the forehead above hairline near the apex of the head. Bullet fragments remained in the head, with a majority exiting through an exit defect several centimeters behind the entry point.
6. Ira Goldstein - Shot in the left buttock/thigh. The bullet was recovered during surgery.
7. Ira Goldstein - Entry and exit of a bullet that passed cleanly through his left pant leg without striking him.
8. Irwin Stroll - Shot in the left shin. The bullet was recovered during surgery.
9. Elizabeth Evans - Shot in the center of the forehead one inch below the hairline. Fragments of a bullet recovered during surgery were too light to comprise a full .22 round. There was no exit point in the scalp.
10. William Weisel - Shot in the left abdomen. The bullet was recovered near the spine during surgery.
11. Ceiling Tile Hole #1 - A bullet penetrated an acoustic ceiling tile (A), proceeding into the drop-ceiling interspace.
12. Ceiling Tile Hole #2 - That bullet (No. 11) struck the concrete ceiling above the tiles, and ricocheted back down into the pantry through a second ceiling tile (.
13. Ceiling Tile Hole #3 - A bullet entered the same tile as No. 11 above (A), but, we are told, did not exit back down into pantry. That bullet was “lost in the ceiling interspace,” and apparently never recovered.


John Hunt

Readers beware - Hunt has constructed this scenario through one error I made in a previous post when I left out a short phrase. As you will see from the following 'scenario' 8 shots account for all wounds and bullet holes:

There are a number of possibilities that can explain the trajectories of the shots without resorting to the possibility of a second gun. Thomas Noguchi and Dan Moldea concluded there was no one who could positively say to a 100% degree of certainty how the bullets travelled. A number of possible explanations, which are contrary to the official version, can account for the paths of the bullets.
There were four stray bullets:
1. The bullet that passed through Kennedy’s jacket without striking him
2. The through-and-through bullet that exited from Kennedy’s chest.
3. The bullet that struck the pantry ceiling and exited through one of the ceiling tiles.
4. The bullet that was supposedly lost in the pantry ceiling interspace.
There are other scenarios that could account for the 8 shots – as Vincent Bugliosi said, “If (Wolfer’s) report is in error, for whatever reason, then there might be an explanation for some of these things: ricochets, parts of bullets, fragments. This whole notion of a second gun is premised on the assumption (Wolfer’s) report is correct.”
BULLET 1 - Missed Kennedy and struck Paul Schrade in the forehead.
BULLET 2 - The shoulder pad shot as RFK was raising his arm – this bullet then possibly hit one of the other four victims after travelling upwards to the ceiling tiles and ricocheting. The main candidate for this shot is Elizabeth Evans. Evans believed she was bending down at the time of the shooting – the bullet could have ricocheted off the pantry floor, then struck Evans in the head - or, she could have been standing upright when the bullet ricocheted a second time off the floor. This bullet could account for two of the ceiling tile holes, entry and exit.
BULLET 3 – The bullet that hit Kennedy in his right armpit and lodged in the back of his neck. This bullet was recovered.
BULLET 4 - The bullet that hit RFK in the mastoid. This was the shot that was fatal. Bullet fragments were recovered.
BULLET 5 – The bullet that went through Ira Goldstein’s left pant leg without striking him – this bullet could have hit Irwin Stroll – the bullet was recovered during surgery.
BULLET 6 – The bullet that hit William Weisel in the abdomen and was recovered during surgery.
BULLET 7 – The bullet that was lost in the ceiling interspace. This may very well have been the bullet that entered then exited RFK’s chest and travelled upwards.
BULLET 8 – The bullet that hit Goldstein in the thigh and was recovered.
Three ceiling tile holes are accounted for in the above scenario. The alleged bullet holes in the pantry door were too small to be made by .22 caliber bullets. In fact they were not made by bullets at all as Moldea discovered.