Wesley J. Liebeler - assistant counsel to the Warren Commission

[Adam Johnson]

Over the years i have often wondered how the lawyers selected to represent/assist the Warren Commission in finding the truth in the JFK assassination lived with themselves after the report was published. Especially after their colleagues had time to dissected the report and saw how they interviewed the witnesses and chose to neglect there task of finding the answers to many burning questions by  the way they chose their lines of questioning.

I know David Lifton had close contact with professor Liebeler who seemed to encourage David in his research efforts but this clip from 1967 shows that Leibeler was still defending the report to the world and taking shots at Jim Garrison in the process, when he must have known that the Warren Reports findings were a house of cards.  

Why  would he do this in 67 then a few years later write to J Lee Rankin and Earl Warren and Gerald Ford and others when Lifton found so called "new evidence" (i dont think it was new to these assistant counsels at all)

My personal feelings towards Leibeler, Rankin, Ball and Belin is that they chose to actively pervert the course of justice and betrayed the American people. And for what, what did they gain in the long run.

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=Wesley+J.+Liebeler+&&view=detail&mid=F35C75C2FBD0BE4754A6F35C75C2FBD0BE4754A6&&FORM=VRDGAR

David, if you see this i hope you have the time to express your thoughts I'm sure you respected and admired professor Leibeler, he appears to me to be the only one involved in the commission that showed any desire to improve its findings.......

Adam

 

[Pamela Brown]

Adam Johnson said, "My personal feelings towards Leibeler, Rankin, Ball and Belin is that they chose to actively pervert the course of justice and betrayed the American people. And for what, what did they gain in the long run."

Unfortunately, I have to agree.  I found myself on something of an emotional rollercoaster with what I heard about the possibility of Leibeler's revising his positions and that David Lifton was doing such a great job of clarifying issues for him.  But then I gave up and accepted that he, like the others on the WC, seemed unwilling and/or unable to come to grips with the mental gymnastics and outright falsehoods put forth in the WCR.

[Pat Speer]

Liebeler's encouragement of Epstein and Lifton came in '66. He continued his public defense of the commission for years afterward. There are repeated references to an unpublished book by Liebeler in Willens' book. I suspect it went unfinished/unpublished due to Liebeler's revealing more than others wanted him to reveal. Just a hunch.

[Paul Jolliffe]

15 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

Liebeler's encouragement of Epstein and Lifton came in '66. He continued his public defense of the commission for years afterward. There are repeated references to an unpublished book by Liebeler in Willens' book. I suspect it went unfinished/unpublished due to Liebeler's revealing more than others wanted him to reveal. Just a hunch.

I wonder if his "unfinished/unpublished book . . . revealing more than others wanted him to reveal" was on the verge of being finished/published when Liebeler's small airplane took that strange nosedive into Lake Winnipesaukee in 2002.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/2002/09/29/wesley-liebeler-71/62a51dec-2e61-48e1-b881-c7050283aba7/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.b1229c3bebd9

[Paul Jolliffe]

Of course, just because Hale Boggs died in a similarly  mysterious small plane crash shortly after he publicly demanded that J. Edgar Hoover resign because Hoover had wiretapped members of Congress (including himself) is no reason to wonder if small plane crashes are a favorite disposal method of the Deep State.

Right?

(BTW, note that Gerald Ford  suck up  stuck up for the FBI against Boggs.)

https://www.nytimes.com/1971/04/06/archives/boggs-demands-that-hoover-quit-accuses-fbi-of-tapping-congressmens.html

[Michael Clark]

1 hour ago, Paul Jolliffe said:

I wonder if his "unfinished/unpublished book . . . revealing more than others wanted him to reveal" was on the verge of being finished/published when Liebeler's small airplane took that strange nosedive into Lake Winnipesaukee in 2002.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/2002/09/29/wesley-liebeler-71/62a51dec-2e61-48e1-b881-c7050283aba7/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.b1229c3bebd9

NTSB accident report

https://www.ntsb.gov/_layouts/ntsb.aviation/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20021004X05281&ntsbno=NYC02FA196&akey=1

[James DiEugenio]

Liebeler was an interesting case.

His infamous Liebeler Memorandum was probably the best and most sustained piece of self criticism that the Commission ever produced.  Much of it was quite valid, like predicting that Helen Markham would be the hole in the dike on the Tippit case.  From what I have been able to garner, he was one of the junior counsel who did not want to use her, Brennan, or Marina Oswald, since he felt their liabilities did not justify whatever they brought to the case. IMO, he was correct on that.

But Liebeler was bulldozed on that one during a meeting with Rankin and Redlich.  When asked by the HSCA how he did defending his memo, he replied, well it was sort of like USC vs UCLA in football. Redlich was a hatchet man for the commission.  Which is why I think he hardly ever talked about what he did afterwards.

But Liebeler also understood he was in a rough place.  Which is why he did what he did with Odio. And then when the whole Garrison episode was breaking, he was really in a tough spot, because he was their guy in New Orleans.  For instance, he deposed Dean Andrews.  Ray Marcus called him up and asked him to go ahead and do the right thing.  LIebeler paused, and then replied with, "Mr. Marcus, sometimes we get caught up in things that are bigger than we are."

You can say that again Wesley.

[Guest]

John Hart Ely to Wesley Liebeler.

Thanks to Malcolm Blunt.

[Jim Hargrove]

And, to point out the obvious, Mr. Ely’s memorandum about the school days of a Lone Nut® with no particular connections to anyone caused such consternation at the Warren Commission that, less than a month later, Jenner would write to Rankin and say, “... there are details about Mr. Ely’s memoranda which will require material alteration and, in some instances, omission.”

No kidding!

[Paul Jolliffe]

15 hours ago, Michael Clark said:

NTSB accident report

https://www.ntsb.gov/_layouts/ntsb.aviation/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20021004X05281&ntsbno=NYC02FA196&akey=1

Thanks Michael for publishing the NTSB accident report. Unfortunately, it does not help to clarify what happened to Liebeler's airplane. The speculation about the difficulty of recovering from a flat spin is interesting, but there is no indication from the quoted witness reports that the plane WAS in a flat spin. 

Actually, two of the three quoted witnesses imply that the pilot was almost able to pull the plane out of its dive just before it hit the water at a relatively shallow angle. 

Does anyone here know how both airplane wings could wind up with "dimpled skin" on the undersides? Since airplanes are NOT designed with "dimpled skin", why did Liebeler's airplane show evidence of it?

Edited July 9, 2019 by Paul Jolliffe

[Stephanie Goldberg]

Without calling foul play, can we speculate a little by playing 'what if' in this case? 

If Liebeler publicly supported the WC report, then he either believed it or was smart enough to say that he did while in public.  So if he did have a book in the works in 2002, he must have felt that he was then safe to reveal his experiences or he would be safe to do so very soon. 

What major events in the JFK assassination research timeline happened between 2000 and 2004?   Did anything anything major happen in those years that would have prompted him to write a rebuttal or write an explanation?  Previously classified file releases?  New testimony from an old witness?  Did a major, suspected behind the scenes player pass away?  

Did his widow say anything about a book or his papers?

 

[James DiEugenio]

Ely was doing some digging.  I like what he says about not relying on Life Magazine for their info.

[Paul Jolliffe]

20 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

Ely was doing some digging.  I like what he says about not relying on Life Magazine for their info.

Yes, he was, Jim. But the curious thing about these memoranda in question, as Jim H. pointed out, is that they deal with the residences of the very young LHO and Marguerite from back in the 1940's and 1950's. 

Yet this required "alteration and omission."

On Liebeler note, his skepticism about the validity of the palm print - supposedly lifted by Carl Day of the DPD - comes through loud and clear in this memo:

---

JFK EXHIBIT No. 34 
[Memorandum] AUGUST 28, 1964. 
To: J. Lee Rankin. 
From: Wesley J. Liebeler.

Messrs. Griffin and Slawson and I raise questions covering the palmprint which Lt. Day of the Dallas Police Department testified he lifted from the underside of the barrel of the K-1 rifle on November 22, 1963. That story is set forth on pages 7-10 of the proposed final draft of Chapter IV of the Report, copies of which are attached. We suggest that additional investigation be conducted to determine with greater certainty that the palmprint was actually lifted from the rifle as Lt. Day has testified. The only evidence we presently have on that print is the testimony of Lt. Day himself. He has stated that although he lifted the palmprint on November 22, 1963, he did not provide a copy of the lift to the FBI until November 26, 1963 (9 R 260-61). He also testified that after the lift he "could still see traces of the print under the barrel and was going to try to use photography to bring off or bring out a better print." Mr. Latona of the FBI testified with respect to the lift of the palmprint, that "evidently the lifting had been so complete that there was nothing left to show any marking on the gun itself as to the existence of such--even an attempt on the part of anyone else to process the rifle" (Id. at 24). Additional problems are raised by the fact that: (1) Mr. Latona testified that the poor finish of the K-1 rifle made it absorbent and not conducive to getting a good print; (2) None of the other prints on the rifle could be identified because they were of such poor quality; (3) The other prints on the rifle were protected by cellophane while the area where the palmprint had been lifted was not, even through Lt. Day testified that after the lift the "[palm] print on gun was their best bet, still remained on there," when he was asked why he had not released the lift to the FBI on November 22, 1963. 
We should review the above circumstances at our conference with Agent Latona and Inspector Malley. The configuration of the palmprint should be reviewed to determine, if possible, whether or not it was removed from a cylindrical surface. The possibility that the palmprint or evidence of the lift was destroyed while the rifle was in transit should be reviewed with them. The exact condition of the rifle at the time it was turned over to the FBI Dallas office should be ascertained. Agent Latona should be asked if he can think of any explanation for the apparent conflict in the above testimony. We should also: (1) Determine whether or not Lt, Day had assistance when he worked with the prints on the rifle. If he did, we should obtain statements from those who assisted him. (2) Lt. Day should be asked why he preserved the fingerprints on the rifle, which were sufficiently Clear to make positive identification, and yet did not preserve the palmprint, which was clear enough for that purpose. (3) Lt. Day should also be asked why he removed only the palmprint and should be requestioned covering his recollection that he saw the palmprint still on the rifle after he made the lift. (4) Lt. Day should be asked if he took any photographs of the palmprint on the rifle after the lift. He may have done so, since he did photograph the less valuable fingerprints, and the palmprint on the rifle, according to his testimony, was still the best bet for identification. It is also significant that Lt. Day stated that he was going to attempt to get a better print through use of photography."

 

[James DiEugenio]

This whole area is such a mess that I actually try and avoid it.

I mean when you throw in what Drain said about the whole matter, namely that Day did not inform him of anything about a print when he got the rifle from him, it gets even messier.

At least good ole Wesley was willing to address the issue.