Oswald's Wallet

[Ron Ecker]

Isn't it a lot more likely that the wallet at the Tippit site was Tippit's (if it is even a wallet in the photo) and that a message from the station came out to the patrol car letting them know they'd apprehended a suspect named Lee Harvey Oswald, and that FBI Agent Bartlett ASSUMED it was Oswald's wallet?  How do we know this supposed wallet-sighting occurred BEFORE Oswald was arrested?

Because we know that Barrett and Captain Westbrook, who was holding the wallet and asked Barrett if he knew who Lee Harvey Oswald was, were subsequently present in the Texas Theater when Oswald was arrested.

Westbrook told the WC that he got in Oswald's face when he was handcuffed in the theater and asked him his name, and when Oswald didn't reply, Westbrook yelled, "Get him out of here. Get him in the squad car and head straight to the city hall and notify them you are on the way."

BTW Westbrook is not only credited with finding the killer's wallet at the Tippit scene (though the wallet disappeared and Westbrook can therefore no longer be credited with finding it), and was present in the theater when the killer was arrested, but he also found the jacket that the killer had discarded in his flight. Westbrook was virtually stumbling over evidence that day, inevitably to look the killer in the eye. Was this guy an ace cop or what?

Ron

[Pat Speer]

Isn't it a lot more likely that the wallet at the Tippit site was Tippit's (if it is even a wallet in the photo) and that a message from the station came out to the patrol car letting them know they'd apprehended a suspect named Lee Harvey Oswald, and that FBI Agent Bartlett ASSUMED it was Oswald's wallet?  How do we know this supposed wallet-sighting occurred BEFORE Oswald was arrested?

Because we know that Barrett and Captain Westbrook, who was holding the wallet and asked Barrett if he knew who Lee Harvey Oswald was, were subsequently present in the Texas Theater when Oswald was arrested.

Westbrook told the WC that he got in Oswald's face when he was handcuffed in the theater and asked him his name, and when Oswald didn't reply, Westbrook yelled, "Get him out of here. Get him in the squad car and head straight to the city hall and notify them you are on the way."

BTW Westbrook is not only credited with finding the killer's wallet at the Tippit scene (though the wallet disappeared and Westbrook can therefore no longer be credited with finding it), and was present in the theater when the killer was arrested, but he also found the jacket that the killer had discarded in his flight. Westbrook was virtually stumbling over evidence that day, inevitably to look the killer in the eye. Was this guy an ace cop or what?

Ron

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

SO, Westbrook, who supposedly found Oswald's wallet at the Tippit scene, raced over to the Texas Theater, but DID NOT call Oswald by name, despite having a wallet with Oswald's photo ID in his possession? This makes no sense. Crime scenes are closed off for HOURS. It's highly doubtful to me that Westbrook could have found the wallet, found the jacket, inspected the area, and taken a number of statements in the 20-30 minutes or so from his earliest arrival at the Tippit scene to the Oswald arrest. I suspect Bartlett and Westbrook returned to the crime scene and that they received word of Oswald's name while there. Do we know for fact when the TV station took its footage? They would have to have been on the scene pretty fast to have got that footage before the Oswald arrest.

Edited August 2, 2005 by Pat Speer

[Ron Ecker]

SO, Westbrook, who supposedly found Oswald's wallet at the Tippit scene, raced over to the Texas Theater, but DID NOT call Oswald by name, despite having a wallet with Oswald's photo ID in his possession?  This makes no sense.

Why does it make no sense? First, it was not Westbrook's job to interrogate the suspect, certainly not right there on the spot. He told the WC that after Oswald was taken from the theater, he never saw him again. His job was done. Second, you have to consider the possibility that Westbrook (as suggested by his "finding" the wallet) was complicit in the framing of Oswald, that he knew that Oswald was not supposed to be in the theater, that he was supposed to have vanished. So the less said there in the theater the better.

There is also the possibility that Westbrook did identify Oswald by name in the theater. According to an FBI report on Julia Postal, she said that "as the police took this man from the theater, an officer remarked, 'We have our man on both the counts.' She asked what he meant and he said 'Officer Tippit as well.' She said the man 'was then identified as Lee Harvey Oswald,' that 'the officers arresting Oswald had identified him, Oswald, to her by calling his name." However, the FBI report doesn't say why the police would be telling Julia Postal this, or why Postal didn't mention it in her earlier Sheriff's Office affidavit.

I suspect Bartlett and Westbrook returned to the crime scene and that they received word of Oswald's name while there.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The WC asked Westbrook what he did when he left the theater, and he replied, "I went back to the city hall and resumed my desk."

I wonder why you are so opposed to the idea of the wallet being found at the Tippit scene. To me this wallet has explanatory power with regard to the conspiracy. It tells us that Oswald was not supposed to be killed at the TSBD, or at the Texas Theater, or by Tippit. It tells us that Oswald was supposed to vanish (on his way to Cuba, of course) after disappearing from work and allegedly killing a cop, and a wallet left behind at the murder scene would be incriminating evidence against him. (As someone has previously suggested, luggage left behind at an airport, as Oswald winged his way to Cuba, was probably also in the scenario.) But as we know there was a screw-up regarding Oswald, he did not vanish but got himself arrested, and consequently the wallet that was supposed to help frame him in absentia had to disappear, since he had a wallet on him.

Ron

Edited August 2, 2005 by Ron Ecker

[Robert Charles-Dunne]

Robert, your post is well-taken.  Still, I'm curious as to why you think Tippit was killed and by whom, and why a man looking exactly like Oswald emptying shells from a revolver would mutter "poor dumb cop" while walking in the direction of the Texas Theater.

One could posit any number of hypothetical reasons for a killer saying that, if one is prepared to accept that such a statement was made, and that a witness was close enough to the killer to hear that comment.  If you look closely at Scoggins' testimony, you may find reason to disbelieve that assertion, and much else that Scoggins offered.  [scoggins also remarked on things that are problematic.  You'll note that Scoggins' observed the fleeing killer with a pistol in his left hand.  Presumably the killer was like the rest of us, and would have carried his weapon in his dominant hand.  Was that Oswald?  Scoggins also admitted that, after he'd viewed the lineup, when shown photos of a number of people, the shot of Oswald wasn't the photo he picked.  How can that be?]   

However, if one assumes - arguendo - that Scoggins was correct in this observation  I would suggest that the killer thought it was a shame that he had to kill Tippit, for no reason other than implicating Oswald.  You are free to disregard that response, but you asked for my opinion, and I think that's as reasonable an assertion as any other hypothesis that you or others might be able to offer. 

As for your contention that the killer looked "exactly like Oswald," I think this more the result of your stated conclusion that you think Oswald did kill Tippit than it is based on any uniformity among the witnesses in the descriptions they gave.

The matter of the lineups is most interesting, for example.  We all know about the anomalies that undermine the validity of the lineups, with Oswald being paraded before witnesses in the company of plainclothes cops [while Oswald was in a T-shirt], or in the company of several teenagers.  Despite that process being so heavily weighted against him, you may recall that a number of the Tippit witnesses demurred from picking Oswald, or did so precisely because the process couldn't help but narrow their focus to the one man who stood out like a sore thumb.  In Scoggins' case, he picked out the suspect from a lineup after seeing Oswald's picture in the newspaper.  It may have been unavoidable in this instance, but it's not how these things are supposed to be conducted.  

It appears you're willing to believe second hand info 20 or 30 years after the fact--

Now hang on a second, Pat.  Aren't you the same fellow who just recommended we read Larry Sneed's book [and it's good advice to read everything]?  That book wasn't written until 35 years after the assassination, based on new interviews, not contemporaneous ones.  If you place weight upon what the DPD personnel quoted in it have to say three and one half decades later, why aren't others allowed to do the same with late-arriving revelations of far greater significance?

What's more, people like Barret and Westbrook cannot be faulted for not speaking about it earlier, in that they were never asked about it earlier.  Had the issue of this wallet been addressed by Fritz back when it happened, their comments might have been sought.  Please don't diminish whatever they might have to offer simply because nobody bothered to ask them in a timely fashion.

If the information arrives second-hand, unfortunate for us as that might be, it is not the fault of Barret and Westbrook [at least one of whom spoke to Hosty at the time] but the fault of those tasked with investigating but did not do so.  If old TV footage was still obtainable for Dale Myers in the 90s, it was presumably available to anyone who bothered to seek it in the 60s.  If anything, we should thank both Hosty and Myers [yes, I know how ironic that sounds] for the revelations, rather than discounting them.  Certainly the WC could have located that footage, but anyone who has surveyed the number of photographers and cameramen whose stills and footage were never sought or viewed by the Commission [nearly all of them], will tell you that a Commission that cannot be bothered to view the photographic evidence of the very assassination they've been tasked to investigate will have zero interest in photo evidence regarding the murder of some "poor dumb cop." 

Moreoever, such a sneering attitude toward new revelations all but dooms us to failure.  If not for the hope of new discoveries, why do we bother poring over these details?  If the extant record in 1963-64 revealed everything there was to know about the assassination, how is it that we have been the beneficiaries of several million pages of freshly declassified documents?  

the word of one woman at the Theater--

Contrary to your assertion, Julia Postal's comment wasn't made second hand or 20 to 30 years after the fact.  She advised FBI in February of 1964 of the fact that DPD already knew Oswald's name before he got into the car, and she herself told the WC another anomalous tidbit you may find hard to explain, dealing with how quickly police arrived and convinced themselves of what they really wanted the scofflaw for: 

So, well, I called the police, and he wanted to know why I thought it was their man, and I said, "Well, I didn't know," and he said, "Well, it fits the description," and I have not---I said I hadn't heard the description. All I know is, "This man is running from them for some reason." And he wanted to know why, and told him because everytime the sirens go by he would duck and he wanted to know----well, if he fits the description is what he says. I said, "Let me tell you what he looks like and you take it from there." And explained that he had on this brown sports shirt and I couldn't tell you what design it was, and medium height, ruddy looking to me, and he said, "Thank you," and I called the [film] operator and asked him to look through the little hole and see if he could see anything and told him I had called the police, and what was happening, and he wanted to know if I wanted him to cut the picture off, and I says, "No, let's wait until they get here." So, seemed like I hung up the intercom phone when here all of a sudden, police cars, policemen, plainclothesmen, I never saw so many people in my life. And they raced in, and the next thing I knew, they were carrying----well, that is when I first heard Officer Tippit had been shot because some officer came in the box office and used the phone, said, "I think we have got our man on both accounts." "What two accounts?" And said, "Well, Officer Tippit's," shocked me, because Officer Tippit used to work part time for us years ago.

against the cumulative testimony of many others, who said they did not know Oswald's name until after he was dragged into the car. Far beyond just a case of Fritz making evidence go away, you're calling a number of officers perjurers--including Hill--who said he saw the Hidell ID while in the car.

Yes, Pat, that is precisely what I am doing.  Please examine the testimony of all those in the car with Oswald, and tell me if you can suss out who actually found the "Hidell" ID on his person.  That's a hot potato that none of them seems anxious to claim credit for in their testimony.  I invite you, cordially, to pore over their claims and tell me if you can make heads or tails of the dog's breakfast they served up to the WC. 

But, even more appropriate, please find a single instance in which any of the officers in that car made any contemporaneous mention of the "Hidell" ID in either their written statements or reports, or in their media interviews that day. 

You seem to take umbrage at the notion that these sterling cops would lie.  I am somewhat gobsmacked by what seems to be your implication that DPD personnel did not lie under oath.  From this, I can only assume that you've either never bothered to read all the testimony given by DPD staff, or failed to try reconciling what one officer said with what others said.  You'll find far more in the way of disconnects and dissonance than agreement among them.  When there are conflicts in their testimony, how does one explain that without assuming that one or more of them lied?   

Isn't it a lot more likely that the wallet at the Tippit site was Tippit's

Since it went to the hospital with Tippit, where it was found among his effects, no.

(if it is even a wallet in the photo) and that a message from the station came out to the patrol car letting them know they'd apprehended a suspect named Lee Harvey Oswald, and that FBI Agent Bartlett ASSUMED it was Oswald's wallet?  How do we know this supposed wallet-sighting occurred BEFORE Oswald was arrested?  When you take into account that the DPD's top forensics and crime scene investigators would have been at the TSBD, it's not hard to imagine that the Tippit crime scene would have been closed off for hours.  Do we have Bartlett's statements as to the timeline of his heading out to the Tippit site and how long he stayed there?  It's at least a 10 minute drive from downtown.  He might very well have not even been there before Oswald was arrested.  I certainly have my doubts that an FBI agent would leave the site of a Presidential assassination and respond to a cop-killing (not in his jurisdiction)

The assassination wasn't in FBI jurisdiction either, Pat. 

BEFORE there was any awareness of a connection between the two crimes.

Yet that is precisely what seems to have happened, Pat.  You're free to make of it what you will.

However, I noted that you began your contribution to this thread with an admission that you hadn't expended much energy on this aspect of the case, having already concluded Oswald killed Tippit, with a 95% probability.  Aside from suggesting the obvious - that analysis should be the precursor to conclusions, not vice versa - I would ask you to compare the testimony you may not have paid sufficient attention to in this regard.  You may ultimately reach the same conclusion that you already have, but some of your comments in this thread make it clear that you argue against the evidence you cite, rather than with it.  Your misstatements about when and to whom Julia Postal's observations were made are simply one example.

I've read your posts here for the past half year, Pat, and admire your keen common sense and facility with language.  Even when I disagree with you, I invariably understand why you've reached a conclusion, or why you are prepared to play Devil's Advocate on an aspect of the case.  In this instance, you seem [to my mind] uncharacteristically shrill and insistent.  Perhaps your conclusion about Oswald's guilt in the Tippit murder could benefit from a reassessment in view of the 'second wallet' evidence, rather than a blanket denunciation that what you've come to accept is the only possibility.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[Mark Stapleton]

Having read this fascinating thread from beginning to end twice, this is what I've got from it so far;

1. Captain Fritz was aware of suspicious planting of evidence re Oswald/Hidell from the beginning--though I'm not necessarily implying that he knew who was behind it.

2. The scenario put forward by Robert and backed by Ron ie. that the original plan was for LHO to vanish with all the planted evidence tracing him to Cuba is a plausible one, especially since Ruby's nervous presence seems to begin with LHO's capture. Could he have liased with a contact while he was loitering at Parkland Hospital and recieved instructions?

3. Corrupt elements within the DPD lied and obfuscated throughout the whole thing (this I already knew).

Now I need aspirin.

[Pat Speer]

I've read your posts here for the past half year, Pat, and admire your keen common sense and facility with language. Even when I disagree with you, I invariably understand why you've reached a conclusion, or why you are prepared to play Devil's Advocate on an aspect of the case. In this instance, you seem [to my mind] uncharacteristically shrill and insistent. Perhaps your conclusion about Oswald's guilt in the Tippit murder could benefit from a reassessment in view of the 'second wallet' evidence, rather than a blanket denunciation that what you've come to accept is the only possibility.[/color]

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Robert, as I said, I was 95% convinced Oswald killed Tippit, not 100%. My snottiness on this thread has been for two reasons. One is to encourage people like yourself to try and convince me of Oswald's innocence, so that I can learn from them. Two is to encourage people still learning about this aspect of the case to not drink the kool-aid. There is a tendency for assassination researchers everywhere to doubt the official story at all times, and to automatically trust any witness whose testimony calls the official story into doubt. The truth, however, is that human memory is fallible and an over-reliance upon the recollections of one witness is a sure road to confusion. I'm in a similar argument with Tom Purvis on JFK's wounds--he holds Boswell's statements over those of Humes and Finck when it's clear Boswell was the most confused of the three, with the weakest memory.

You're right about Postal. I forgot it was in her FBI statement, not something she said years later. The problem is that in order to believe her you have to disbelieve a number of others, men who otherwise would appear to have no connection to the assassination. It seems far more likely to me that she simply was an exciteable person whose memory exaggerated certain aspects of what she witnessed.

I just re-read Westbrook's interview with Sneed and he acknowledges they went to the Texas Theater assuming the man who shot Tippit also killed the President. He says he went directly to the Tippit shooting from the TSBD. (In retrospect, I suppose it makes sense for an FBI agent to go over there as well, just in case.) He says that they received rumors that the shooter was in a library along the way. He says that the body was gone when they got there, but that he interviewed a woman who'd seen the killing (Good old Helen Markham, I suppose). He says that as he started walking up an alley, he and two other officers spotted the jacket. And THEN they went to the theater and confronted Oswald. He notes that he was the ranking officer at the scene. He says he went back to his car and drove to City Hall.

Since he was Internal Affairs, and not Homicide, this scenario makes a lot more sense than I first would admit. His presence at the Tippit site was not necessary for them to conduct their investigation. Evidently, he did not go back to the Tippit scene, after having been there only 15-25 minutes.

While I have on other threads expressed the opinion that the DPD may have framed Oswald with the backyard photos, this thread is of a different sort. Your theory holds that the DPD failed to investigate the murder of one of their own--that they knew someone had tried to frame Oswald and that they looked the other way. I just don't buy this. I believe if they'd found a second wallet the Birch-oriented DPD would have claimed the commie Oswald was going around killing cops and leaving his ID at the scene as a taunt. That he was a psycho cop-killer. And the American people would have believed them. The cover-up of the second wallet makes no sense. I don't believe it happened.

Edited August 3, 2005 by Pat Speer

[David G. Healy]

I've read your posts here for the past half year, Pat, and admire your keen common sense and facility with language. Even when I disagree with you, I invariably understand why you've reached a conclusion, or why you are prepared to play Devil's Advocate on an aspect of the case. In this instance, you seem [to my mind] uncharacteristically shrill and insistent. Perhaps your conclusion about Oswald's guilt in the Tippit murder could benefit from a reassessment in view of the 'second wallet' evidence, rather than a blanket denunciation that what you've come to accept is the only possibility.[/color]

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<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Robert, as I said, I was 95% convinced Oswald killed Tippit, not 100%. My snottiness on this thread has been for two reasons. One is to encourage people like yourself to try and convince me of Oswald's innocence, so that I can learn from them. Two is to encourage people still learning about this aspect of the case to not drink the kool-aid. There is a tendency for assassination researchers everywhere to doubt the official story at all times, and to automatically trust any witness whose testimony calls the official story into doubt. The truth, however, is that human memory is fallible and an over-reliance upon the recollections of one witness is a sure road to confusion. I'm in a similar argument with Tom Purvis on JFK's wounds--he holds Boswell's statements over those of Humes and Finck when it's clear Boswell was the most confused of the three, with the weakest memory.

You're right about Postal. I forgot it was in her FBI statement, not something she said years later. The problem is that in order to believe her you have to disbelieve a number of others, men who otherwise would appear to have no connection to the assassination. It seems far more likely to me that she simply was an exciteable person whose memory exaggerated certain aspects of what she witness.

I just re-read Westbrook's interview with Sneed and he acknowledges they went to the Texas Theater assuming the man who shot Tippit also killed the President. He says he went directly to the Tippit shooting from the TSBD. (In retrospect, I suppose it makes sense for an FBI agent to go over there as well, just in case.)

dgh01: makes sense if he had nothing else to do, perhaps. I suspect at the moment, every FBI agent west of Washington, D.C. had things to do. Primarily, listening for commandments issued from JEdna's office...

For what it's worth, the presidents murder or Tippet's were not federal crimes -- other than curiosity, he had no reason at all for being at that theater...

He says that they received rumors that the shooter was in a library along the way. He says that the body was gone when they got there, but that he interviewed a woman who'd seen the killing (Good old Helen Markham, I suppose). He says that as he started walking up an alley, he and two other officers spotted the jacket. And THEN they went to the theater and confronted Oswald. He notes that he was the ranking officer at the scene. He says he went back to his car and drove to City Hall.

Since he was Internal Affairs, and not Homicide, this scenario makes a lot more sense than I first would admit. His presence at the Tippit site was not necessary for them to conduct their investigation. Evidently, he did not go back to the Tippit scene, after having been there only 15-25 minutes.

While I have on other threads expressed the opinion that the DPD may have framed Oswald with the backyard photos, this thread is of a different sort. Your theory holds that the DPD failed to investigate the murder of one of their own--that they knew someone had tried to frame Oswald and that they looked the other way. I just don't buy this. I believe if they'd found a second wallet the Birch-oriented DPD would have claimed the commie Oswald was going around killing cops and leaving his ID at the scene as a taunt. That he was a psycho cop-killer. And the American people would have believed them. The cover-up of the second wallet makes no sense. I don't believe it happened.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Edited August 3, 2005 by David G. Healy

[Pat Speer]

But as we know there was a screw-up regarding Oswald, he did not vanish but got himself arrested, and consequently the wallet that was supposed to help frame him in absentia had to disappear, since he had a wallet on him.

Ron

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I've been trying to figure out why this story of the planted wallet fails to pass my "smell" test, and I think I've figured out why. It's because the wrong wallet disappeared! If there was a mass plot to frame Oswald and cover up the existence of two wallets, involving mass perjury by the DPD, the right call would have been for them to accept the wallet found at the Tippit site and deny the one found on Oswald. After all, no one filmed them with a wallet at the theater. Furthermore, by denying the existence of the wallet at the Tippit site they would have been denying themselves a valuable piece of evidence, without which establishing Oswald's presence at the Tippit site would become much more difficult. Since the decision to hide the wallet at the Tippit site would have to have been made within hours, before Oswald's death, they would have been denying themselves a link in the chain with which they hoped to hang Oswald for the murder of a cop, in exchange for what? that Oswald had his wallet on him... how incriminating is that? If they'd have agreed on the story that the wallet was found at the site, on the other hand, they could have used Oswald's sneaking into the theater as supporting evidence, and EVERYONE would have bought it.

[Ron Ecker]

Pat,

If something happened, it happened, and it seems to me that the only way to argue that the wallet at the Tippit scene didn't happen is to assume that FBI agent Bob Barrett was lying when he said, yea insisted, that Westbrook had a wallet in his hands, before Oswald's arrest, and asked Barrett if he knew of Oswald or Hidell.

I can't imagine why Barrett would make up such a thing and insist that it happened. There is also photographic evidence that a wallet arousing much LE curiosity was there, plus there is reserve sergeant Croy's story that a wallet was there. But let's just concentrate on Barrett, since this story and whatever that TV crew filmed seems to be mainly his fault.

The sources for Barrett's insistence, as far as I can tell, are Myers and Hosty. Why would those two LNers buy this story? Hosty says that Barrett personally told him about this. I don't have a copy of Myers's book, but maybe someone can tell us if Myers quotes Barrett as telling him personally about this, or whether Myers is depending on Hosty or some other source.

I don't know how it was decided which wallet would continue to exist. But it seems to me that with respect to a wallet at the Tippit scene in fact once existing, you will simply have to grin and Barrett.

Ron

[Robert Charles-Dunne]

Robert, as I said, I was 95% convinced Oswald killed Tippit, not 100%.  My snottiness on this thread has been for two reasons. One is to encourage people like yourself to try and convince me of Oswald's innocence, so that I can learn from them. Two is to encourage  people still learning about this aspect of the case to not drink the kool-aid.  There is a tendency for assassination researchers everywhere to doubt the official story at all times,

This is unavoidable.  One can be lied to only so much before one suspects that everything is a lie.  And from a logiical standpoint, I think it's a good thing, because it requires each individual to reassess everything, to figure out what makes most sense, rather than lazily assume that some things are above and beyond question.  Obviously, this leads to much disagreement, but what doesn't?  Give a hundred guys a copy of the Bible and you get a hundred different interpretations and religious sects as a result.

For the record, I also prefer the most mundane solution, where it is compelling.  Where the official rationale or explanation doesn't convince, I seek an alternative that makes sense, and resolves contradictions.

and to automatically trust any witness whose testimony calls the official story into doubt.  The truth, however, is that human memory is fallible and an over-reliance upon the recollections of one witness is a sure road to confusion.  I'm in a similar argument with Tom Purvis on JFK's wounds--he holds Boswell's statements over those of Humes and Finck when it's clear Boswell was the most confused of the three, with the weakest memory.

You're right about Postal.  I forgot it was in her FBI statement, not something she said years later.  The problem is that in order to believe her you have to disbelieve a number of others, men who otherwise would appear to have no connection to the assassination.  It seems far more likely to me that she simply was an exciteable person whose memory exaggerated certain aspects of what she witness.

A few points to consider, Pat.  Postal told FBI prior to her WC appearance that the cops had already identified Oswald before placing him into the car.  Seems to me that this should rightly have caused WC staff to ask both her, and the arresting officers, a few followup questions, out of mere curiosity if nothing else.  Postal's testimony was over within only minutes, and she was asked nothing about it.  WC staff displayed virtual disinterest in this during the testimony of arresting officers, presumably because they, too, thought it unlikely that a single witness would tell the truth while several officers dissembled.  Of course, by failing to ask either Postal or the arresting officers about this contention, the WC initially succeeded in keeping this anomaly out of the public record.  It came to light only when researchers compared Postal's FBI statement with what the WC contented had transpired.

On the point of who discovered the "Hidell" ID, Gerald Hill credits Bentley with that, while in the car on the way downtown.  CE Walker recalls nothing of the kind, only that there was such a "Hidell" card - "Just an identification card. I don't recall what it was." - once they got to the station.  Now, if Oswald was sandwiched in the back seat between Bentley and Walker, and Bentley discovered the "Hidell" ID and mentioned it loudly enough for Hill to hear it in the front seat [per Hill's testimony], how is it possible that Walker, on the other side of Oswald, didn't witness this?

Of course, it would be nice to get the straight goods from Bentley's testimony, but the man who actually found the "Hidell" ID doesn't seem to have been called to testify.  Another rather puzzling oversight.  None of Bentley's various contemporaneous statements or comments seem to include any admission that he was the one who found the "Hidell" ID, or even a mention of the alias. 

Pat, you wrote: "The problem is that in order to believe her you have to disbelieve a number of others, men who otherwise would appear to have no connection to the assassination." 

But that's not exactly true.  Gerald Hill was the chap present when the shells were found at the Tippit scene, and radioed into HQ that they were .32 automatic shells.  He also instructed Officer Poe to mark the shells to establish a chain of possession for this critical evidence, which Poe maintained that he did.

[subsequently, the shells introduced into evidence were neither .32 automatics, nor marked by Poe.  Far from having "no other connection to the assassination," Hill seems to have been a party to the introduction of falsified evidence regarding the Tippit murder.  Obviously, I cannot state with certainty whether Hill did this voluntarily or under duress from superiors.  However, I imagine that Hill and others were leaned upon to alter their stories in minor and subtle ways, if for no other reason than to ensure that the guilt resided with Oswald, and that the taint that fell over Dallas Police that weekend was erased to the extent that it could be.]

I just re-read Westbrook's interview with Sneed and he acknowledges they went to the Texas Theater assuming the man who shot Tippit also killed the President.  He says he went directly to the Tippit shooting from the TSBD. (In retrospect, I suppose it makes sense for an FBI agent to go over there as well, just in case.) He says that they received rumors that the shooter was in a library along the way. He says that the body was gone when they got there, but that he interviewed a woman who'd seen the killing (Good old Helen Markham, I suppose). He says that as he started walking up an alley, he and two other officers spotted the jacket. And THEN they went to the theater and confronted Oswald.  He notes that he was the ranking officer at the scene.  He says he went back to his car and drove to City Hall.

Since he was Internal Affairs, and not Homicide, this scenario makes a lot more sense than I first would admit.  His presence at the Tippit site was not necessary for them to conduct their investigation. Evidently, he did not go back to the Tippit scene, after having been there only 15-25 minutes. 

While I have on other threads expressed the opinion that the DPD may have framed Oswald with the backyard photos, this thread is of a different sort.  Your theory holds that the DPD failed to investigate the murder of one of their own--that they knew someone had tried to frame Oswald and that they looked the other way.  I just don't buy this.

That's OK, Pat, because I'm not trying to sell it.  Replying to your contention that DPD was consciously letting Tippit's killer go, I don't see it that way.  On the contrary, I suspect they all thought Oswald had done the deed, in part because he was thoughtful enough to leave behind "his" wallet.  It's just that after Oswald died, the damning contents of that wallet - sequestered by Fritz, as the evidence receipts from FBI indicate - had to bleed from one wallet into the other in order to seal his guilt.  As lies go, this was more of a helpful little white fib than an outright baldfaced lie.   

I believe if they'd found a second wallet the Birch-oriented DPD would have claimed the commie Oswald was going around killing cops and leaving his ID at the scene as a taunt.  That he was a psycho cop-killer.  And the American people would have believed them.  The cover-up of the second wallet makes no sense.  I don't believe it happened.

Then perhaps you'd care to explain the fact that the name "Hidell" was never mentioned by anyone until after the rifle had been traced to Oswald's PO box in that name?  If Chief Curry and DA Henry Wade spent the weekend itemizing for the media the reasons for suspecting Oswald, perhaps you could explain why they failed to point to his use of this "Hidell" alias, when they did mention his rental of the boarding house room under an assumed name?  [it is as though nobody but Fritz knew anything about "Hidell," you would concede?]  Perhaps you could provide a rationale for Fritz failing to pass the second wallet onto FBI on that day, irrespective of whose it was or what it contained, along with all the other evidence against Oswald?     

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[Greg Parker]

But as we know there was a screw-up regarding Oswald, he did not vanish but got himself arrested, and consequently the wallet that was supposed to help frame him in absentia had to disappear, since he had a wallet on him.

Ron

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I've been trying to figure out why this story of the planted wallet fails to pass my "smell" test, and I think I've figured out why. It's because the wrong wallet disappeared! If there was a mass plot to frame Oswald and cover up the existence of two wallets, involving mass perjury by the DPD, the right call would have been for them to accept the wallet found at the Tippit site and deny the one found on Oswald. After all, no one filmed them with a wallet at the theater. Furthermore, by denying the existence of the wallet at the Tippit site they would have been denying themselves a valuable piece of evidence, without which establishing Oswald's presence at the Tippit site would become much more difficult. Since the decision to hide the wallet at the Tippit site would have to have been made within hours, before Oswald's death, they would have been denying themselves a link in the chain with which they hoped to hang Oswald for the murder of a cop, in exchange for what? that Oswald had his wallet on him... how incriminating is that? If they'd have agreed on the story that the wallet was found at the site, on the other hand, they could have used Oswald's sneaking into the theater as supporting evidence, and EVERYONE would have bought it.

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Pat, who said anything about a mass plot?

The following has been established so far in this thread (at least to the satifaction of most involved in the discussion):

1. The wallet could not have belonged to Tippit. Do you accept that? Do you even accept yet that what is shown in the film is a wallet?

2. Not one of the five officers who escorted Oswald to City Hall mentioned anything about dual IDs in their earliest statements. Do you accept that this is highly unusual -- if indeed Oswald actually had dual ID on him?

3. Bentley (who was the one LATER specifically credited with finding the dual ID on Oswald in the squad car) was not called to give evidence before the WC, and the only officer who attested to the Hidell alias being found in this way had to be led in questioning to arrive at that damning statement. So why wasn't Bentley called? He supposedly not only found this evidence, but was also involved in the actual arrest.

3. Fritz did not question Oswald until the Saturday about the alleged Hidell alias. Do you accept that this was at the very least, curious - especially given that for all Fritz supposedly knew... there may have actually been a real "Hidell" out there who was either in league with Oswald, or had vital information about him?

4. Barrett has consistently maintained that wallet was Oswald's. Why do you cast aspersions at Hosty over Barrett's claim?

I can now add that researcher, Martha Moyer, in the late '90s interviewed another cop present when the wallet was found - Leonard Jez. He confirmed to Martha that the wallet was Oswald's.

Once it is accepted that Oswald did not have any ID on his person, other than his own (and I accept it on the basis that it is inconceivable that all of the cops in the car had simultaneous memory loss on the day they gave their statements, and equally inconceivable that they all decided it was not worth mentioning in those statements), you have to take the next step: where did the Hidell ID come from, if not from Oswald's arrest wallet? The logical place is the place where a wallet, said by an FBI agent and a Dallas cop to contain such ID, was found.

As for Dallas cops wanting to avenge Tippit's murder by finding the REAL culprit/s -forget it. Ever wonder why Tippit was never promoted? If the shooter DID say "poor dumb cop", it may be because he knew him. Read his personnel files in the DPD records. It wasn't just an expression - it was (even if just by accident), an apt description. He was a loner, and not bright (among other evidence for this is that others had to write his police reports). Oh, and he possibly suffered PTSD from his experiences in Korea, judging from comments made by neighbours who were questioned about his character for entry into the DPD. In short, if any cop was expendable to other cops, it was Tippit.

Edited August 3, 2005 by Greg Parker

[Robert Charles-Dunne]

I've been trying to figure out why this story of the planted wallet fails to pass my "smell" test, and I think I've figured out why.  It's because the wrong wallet disappeared!  If there was a mass plot to frame Oswald and cover up the existence of two wallets, involving mass perjury by the DPD, the right call would have been for them to accept the wallet found at the Tippit site and deny the one found on Oswald. 

I don't suggest that there was a "mass plot" involving "mass perjury."  There was only Fritz's decision with withhold the Tippit crime scene wallet from FBI, for which I'd appreciate your ideas of a rationale.  The FBI evidence receipts indicate that he did so.  Why did Fritz do this? 

Recall also that on the day of the event, the name "Hidell" meant nothing to anyone within DPD.  It was only after the rifle had been traced to that alias, via Oswald's PO box, that the damning "Hidell" ID might have proved useful.  But, at that later point, how to insert that into the evidence pool from the confines of Fritz's desk drawer?  And how to explain the emergence of that evidence, if not through the acknowledgement of at least one officer at the Texas Theatre scene that it was found upon Oswald's person?

After all, no one filmed them with a wallet at the theater.  Furthermore, by denying the existence of the wallet at the Tippit site they would have been denying themselves a valuable piece of evidence, without which establishing Oswald's presence at the Tippit site would become much more difficult.

At the time Fritz decided to segregate the Tippit crime scene wallet, he already knew that Oswald had a wallet upon him when arrested.  Hence, the crime scene wallet may have seemed to Fritz less so evidence against Oswald than it was evidence somebody tried to implicate Oswald.  That alone may have inclined him to keep it tucked up his sleeve, until he could determine whether this would be a trump card or a reason to suspect a frameup.  In either case, Fritz no doubt felt that the shells found at the scene would match the handgun taken from Oswald, and that the numerous Tippit murder witnesses would unanimously identify Oswald as the shooter, making the wallet all but irrelevant.  It may have seemed to Fritz that the wallet, while superficially damning of Oswald, might raise more questions than it answered, hence his decision to hide it. 

Since the decision to hide the wallet at the Tippit site would have to have been made within hours, before Oswald's death, they would have been denying themselves a link in the chain with which they hoped to hang Oswald for the murder of a cop, in exchange for what? that Oswald had his wallet on him... how incriminating is that?  If they'd have agreed on the story that the wallet was found at the site, on the other hand, they could have used Oswald's sneaking into the theater as supporting evidence, and EVERYONE would have bought it.

This is all entirely true.  Again, anyone wishing to explain these anomalies must provide a reason for Fritz sequestering that wallet for an additional five days, before handing it over to FBI.  If you have a tenable explanation for this, I look forward to your comments.  I've outlined my hypothesis; please give us yours.

In the meantime, it seems useless to claim that the wallet didn't exist.  Several law enforcement officials have stated unequivocally that it did, it was filmed while being examined at the crime scene, and it was passed from Fritz - quietly, along with other suspicious or possibly "tainted" evidence - to the FBI many days later.         

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Edited August 3, 2005 by Robert Charles-Dunne

[Steve Thomas]

David,

I just re-read Westbrook's interview with Sneed and he acknowledges they went to the Texas Theater assuming the man who shot Tippit also killed the President. He says he went directly to the Tippit shooting from the TSBD. (In retrospect, I suppose it makes sense for an FBI agent to go over there as well, just in case.)

dgh01: makes sense if he had nothing else to do, perhaps. I suspect at the moment, every FBI agent west of Washington, D.C. had things to do. Primarily, listening for commandments issued from JEdna's office...

I wonder if Bob Barrett was one of the FBI Agents BILL DECKER sent over:

From his after-action report:

"At approximately 1:30 PM, I received word on Inspector Sawyer's car radio that a Dallas Police Officer had been shot on Jefferson St. in Oak Cliff and that the suspect was supposedly at large in the area on foot. I immediately got ahold of officers who were present, including Deputy Sheriffs, Dallas Police Department Officers and FBI officers who were at the scene (the TSBD) advising them of the shooting, and dispatched them to Oak Cliff to assist in the search."

http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/...Vol19_0239b.htm

Decker must have carried a lot of weight in those days.

Steve Thomas

[Ron Ecker]

I wonder if Bob Barrett was one of the FBI Agents BILL DECKER sent over:

From his after-action report:

". . . I immediately got ahold of officers who were present, including Deputy Sheriffs, Dallas Police Department Officers and FBI officers who were at the scene (the TSBD) advising them of the shooting, and dispatched them to Oak Cliff to assist in the search."

Barrett is assumed to be the man photographed while pocketing a bullet or something around the manhole cover on Elm Street while Walthers is seen standing by.

It's interesting that in May 1964 Barrett requested photos from DPD of the manhole cover. Did Barrett want to see what he was photographed doing? Or did he want the photos for the Barrett family album? Who knows.

See Box 9, Folder 4, Item 19 from the City of Dallas Archives, JFK Collection:

http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/box9.htm

Ron

[Pat Speer]

On the point of who discovered the "Hidell" ID, Gerald Hill credits Bentley with that, while in the car on the way downtown.  CE Walker recalls nothing of the kind, only that there was such a "Hidell" card - "Just an identification card. I don't recall what it was." - once they got to the station.  Now, if Oswald was sandwiched in the back seat between Bentley and Walker, and Bentley discovered the "Hidell" ID and mentioned it loudly enough for Hill to hear it in the front seat [per Hill's testimony], how is it possible that Walker, on the other side of Oswald, didn't witness this?

Of course, it would be nice to get the straight goods from Bentley's testimony, but the man who actually found the "Hidell" ID doesn't seem to have been called to testify.  Another rather puzzling oversight.  None of Bentley's various contemporaneous statements or comments seem to include any admission that he was the one who found the "Hidell" ID, or even a mention of the alias. 

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But Bentley did tell Sneed years later, when he may very well have forgotten what he was "supposed to say," that he took Oswald's wallet out and found the Hidell ID, and that he asked Oswald whether he was Oswald or Hidell,and that Oswald said "you find out the best you can!" (Aha! I found the quote I asked about earlier..)

In order to hide the existence of the wallet found at the Tippit site, Fritz, Hill, Bentley, and Westbrook, at the least, would have to be part of the plot. All cops. All purported liars! All conspiring to hide evidence that may have helped them find the actual killer of a fellow cop! And to what end? What was gained by hiding the wallet? Nothing., They could easily have said that Oswald threw it down to let them know he was responsible. After all, he went crazy that day when his wife wouldn't give him any and decided to kill the President, didn't he? If they were willing to fake and lie to whatever extent necessary, then why DON'T the slugs in Tippit conclusively match Oswald's gun? Why WASN'T the jacket found by Westbrook conclusively linked to Oswald? I don't know, but I have a sneaking suspicion it's because it was the actual evidence the DPD discovered...

As pointed out earlier, the whole scenario espoused by so many on this thread is supported almost solely by Barrett's memory. He is Hosty's source, is he not? . How reliable is this man's memory? How old was he when he made his statements? Admittedly, I haven't spent the time on this others here have. But I've read nothing to make me trust this man's word over a number of DPD officers, who would have no reason to lie. Where can I find Barrett's statements to see what other claims he makes, in order to determine his credibility?

The other two pieces of the puzzle seem to be Postal's statement taken months after the assassination, by which time a number of conversations with police may have blurred togethe in her mind, and some news footage of some cops inspecting something that may or may not be a wallet. (My wallet when opened certainly doesn't look like that.)

I still think the evidence is far from convincing enough to assert that so many men would lie. And the assertion that Tippit was selected for assassination by his superiors based upon his being slow is downright disgusting.

While so many here embrace JFK for his belief in civil rights and human dignity, it doesn't seem like this embrace of compassion and empathy has allowed them to acknowledge that even redneck southern cops care about their co-workers and have professional pride. I don't think Hoover, as piggish as he was, would allow for one of his men to be killed unnecessarily, and I don't believe Fritz and Curry were any different. The evidence collected at the TSBD was enough to convict Oswald--the Tippit killing was completely extraneous to the plot to kill Kennedy. Only a bad script writer would concoct a scenario whereby a cop is killed to frame a man who is already a fugitve from justice and wanted for the murder of the President of the United States. To what end? Perhaps Tippit WAS supposed to take Oswald to the airport, but then changed his mind, and Oswald shot him. Perhaps Oswald was with another man, and the other guy shot Tippit. I don't know. But what I do know is that to assert that Oswald was not even at the Tippit scene, and that someone framed him, and that all the eyewitnesses are wrong, and that every piece of evidence connecting Oswald to the crime scene is fake, and that every piece of evidence connecting Oswald to Hidell is fake, and that even Marina lied about her knowledge of Hidell, is ridiculous. You might as well say that Oswald never even worked at the TSBD.

But, my resistance to this scenario is getting in the way of others sharing info. I don't want to pull a Gratz. Robert said that a wallet was sent ot the FBI some days after the other evidence. Was this a second wallet? Or the one found at the Tippit site? School me.

Edited August 3, 2005 by Pat Speer