Pre Autopsy Surgery

[Ron Bulman]

I've reached a point that I personally don't question if it happened.  My main focus at the moment is where it did.  Why did it happen?  To remove too many bullets/fragments and alter wounds that indicated any shots from the front (E.G. the throat entrance wound, while removing a bullet or fragments of one?).  We can discuss that and how (E.G. body transfer) later.

For now, three possibilities on where it happened.

Back in 1980 David Lifton's Best Evidence stated (from the recorded Air Force tapes).  From Airforce One in the air, SSA Roy Kellerman in communication with SSA HQ "The body will go to Walter Reed, have an ambulance from Walter Reed to take the body there."  And, also from AF1 in air "Admiral Burkley to Army Surgeon General Heaton : did you contact MWD in regards to Taking Care Of the remains of President Kennedy, taking him directly to Walter Reed?  It has been speculated that retrieval and alteration happened there.  Jenkins and Law traced the route live in 8 minutes from WR to Bethesda.  Dennis David said the driver of the black hearse (Not grey navy ambulance) that delivered the shipping casket at 6:35-45 told him they came in the back gate.  A direct route to WR.

Doug Horne, in his interview with William Law in In The Eye Of History is pretty emphatic that this occurred at Bethesda by Dr.'s Humes and Boswell, before Finick's arrival between 6:35 and 8:00.  The reason for keeping the FBI agents and others out of the morgue upon their arrival.  He should be in a position to know as head of the Military Medical Review aspect of the ARRB.  Probably seen more newer information than anyone out there on the subject.  Yet the also credible James Jenkins, in the morgue from 3:30 in the afternoon until after the autopsy and mortician were done, assisting Humes, at his shoulder during it asserts the discrepancies he observed were already present when the body was taken from the shipping casket on the floor to the autopsy table*.

The last possibility I've seen mentioned (in I believe Eye of History) is a animal teaching facility at Bethesda that included a morgue located somewhere behind the hospital/it's morgue.  If I remember right Paul O'Connor heard of this possibility on the base.  In any case, O'Connor and Jenkins agree, the death stare photo was not taken in the Bethesda morgue.  No stainless steel u shaped bracket used to hold the President's head up in use there.  They used a wooden block, Jenkins, rubber block, O'Connor.

Edited December 14, 2018 by Ron Bulman

[Ron Bulman]

It would be nice to hear Mr. Law's opinion on this as he interviewed both Mr. Horne and Mr. Jenkins in his book then assisted Mr. Jenkins with his.  Even through an intermediary if he doesn't wish to post here.

[Lawrence Schnapf]

have you concluded when the body was switched from the Parkland coffin to the shipping coffin. There doesnt seem to have been much of an opportunity to do this. Obviously, the easiest option would have been to alter photos rather than the body. Couldnt the increased in the size of the head wound from Parkland to Bethesda been from skull pieces breaking off during transit as well as the fractured skull pieces pulling back with the scalp when it was retracted? 

[Lawrence Schnapf]

I interviewed Jim at the CAPA conference. he is very credible and ernest. He believes he saw a shipping casket but also explained in his book and in the interview  how the skull wound became enlarged as they retracted the scalp

[Ron Bulman]

4 hours ago, Lawrence Schnapf said:

have you concluded when the body was switched from the Parkland coffin to the shipping coffin. There doesnt seem to have been much of an opportunity to do this. Obviously, the easiest option would have been to alter photos rather than the body. Couldnt the increased in the size of the head wound from Parkland to Bethesda been from skull pieces breaking off during transit as well as the fractured skull pieces pulling back with the scalp when it was retracted? 

From what I've read, like the pre autopsy surgery there are three possibilities.  I defer to the second proffered by Doug Horne of the Military Medical Inquiry aspect of the Assassinations Records Review Board in his interview for In The Eye Of History by William Law.

The first is at Parkland.  Somehow after he was placed in the Bronze casket by nurses and orderlies his body was removed and taken separately to AF1.  Some have claimed this is why the Secret Service reportedly picked up and pinned against the wall or pulled a gun on the Dallas coroner to get the "empty" casket by him.  I've also read the elevator at Parkland goes down a floor below the Emergency Room to a hall leading to a back freight dock, and, this is the way LBJ left the building for safety reasons.  Possibly along with JFK's body.

The Third is during the landing at Andrews AFB in Washington.  No evidence of this.  Something I read somewhere.  Would carefully planning conspirators wait until that point?  Jackie, Powers, and O'Donnell among others were reputedly with the casket until landing. Then RFK rushed on board and they came out onto the scissor lift with the casket as seen on national tv.

Horne's some might say expert analysis based on his position and thus access to any then "new" information is the second chronological possibility.  Seat's were removed in the back of the plane to accommodate the casket.  They were near access to the (trough the galley?) aft luggage area below decks so to speak.  A few feet away.   I recently read Jackie went to compose her self privately after coming on board (contrary to other reports), then went to LBJ's swearing in ceremony.  This is the time suspected by Mr. Horne for the switch.  Read Eye of History, pg. 94.

Yes, this would have involved members of the Secret Service.  But some of them were already complicit. 

Can anyone find pictures by Jamie Sawa taken of Airforce One mentioned in the book?  I googled it to no avail. 

Edited December 18, 2018 by Ron Bulman

[Ron Bulman]

A google search for Jamie Sawa JFK get's you this https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Body_Alteration.html

Nothing about him or his pictures of the interior of Airforce One of 1963.  Horne talks about him locating the aircraft in I think Indiana or Ohio and taking pictures of the interior of the plane including the fore and aft baggage compartments and access to them.  Seems there was an outside access door  to the aft compartment on the side opposite where the Bronze casket, Jackie and RFK went out onto the scissor lift.  

[Ray Mitcham]

Ron , this is a link in Mary Ferrell's site.

 

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=4885#relPageId=33&tab=page

[Lewis Reynolds]

Interesting read Ray. Also interesting '...certain photographs depicting the interior of the plane on its return from Dallas on November 22, 1963 are still classified....'

[Pat Speer]

A little food for thought...

Lifton and Horne et al have long claimed the body was altered, and that the wound as seen at Bethesda was 4-5 times larger than the wound seen at Parkland.

Now Jenkins comes along and says no, the wound he saw was small, about 1/5 the size of the wound Dr. McClelland says he saw at Parkland. And he says as well that the large hole seen at Bethesda was seen after the scalp was pulled back and skull fell to the table. And that, furthermore, he was with the body from the beginning, and no pre-autopsy surgery was conducted at Bethesda.

So now, Horne, who claims the body was altered at Bethesda, and Jenkins are totally at odds. But Lifton and Jenkins are also at odds. While Jenkins has a feeling the brain he saw was not Kennedy's actual brain, and had surreptitiously been placed back in the skull before the autopsy, his statements force those believing the body was altered into a corner. If they find Jenkins credible, Lifton and Horne's theory is finito, and there was no pre-autopsy surgery performed to disguise the nature of the skull wounds. (Jenkins, after all, now claims he saw an exit wound on the back of the head and an entrance wound by the ear). And if they find Jenkins not credible, well, then, that shoots down the alterationist argument we need to listen to the witnesses and ignore the photos and x-rays.

So...which is it?

Edited December 19, 2018 by Pat Speer

[Ron Bulman]

On ‎12‎/‎19‎/‎2018 at 3:36 AM, Ray Mitcham said:

Ron , this is a link in Mary Ferrell's site.

 

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=4885#relPageId=33&tab=page

Thank you Ray.  I'm not nut's after all?  I think Sawa showed Horne clearer and more pictures than in the article.  Horne spoke of pictures detailing the aft baggage compartment and access to it in relation to the location of the Bronze casket.  

[Ron Bulman]

Yes Pat it is perplexing.  And it only gets more so.  In this old Probe article from K & K FBI SA O'Neil tells the ARRB over half the brain he saw at the autopsy was missing.  Further, when shown the pictures in the National Archives he could not identify it as the one he saw that night, saying there was "too much" brain in the picture.  Then photographer Stringer says the brain he photographed was sectioned and the pictures of a almost whole brain he was shown from the Archives were not taken by him.

It is all disconcerting and hard if not impossible to reconcile.  However, it all is more convincing to me that something was rotten in Bethesda regarding JFK's brain(s).  One half gone, one almost whole, at least sectioned, or not.  Humes didn't reportedly say a half brain almost fell out into his hands (without cutting the carotid arteries or brain stem).  Surely he would have noted such.  If the autopsy was on the up and up.

BTW, if you read the full article Horne is pretty convincing there were two examinations of two brains about a week apart.  One with Stringer present with Humes and Boswell, one with Finick present but not Stringer.

https://statick2k-5f2f.kxcdn.com/images/pdf/horne-two-brain-memo.pdf