Deaths of Witnesses

[Gary Buell]

Came across an interesting new blog about Karyn Kupcinet that might be worth keeping an eye on.

http://thecloakofdarkness.blogspot.com/

[Paul Jeffery]

On the subject of mysterious deaths, I would like to re-iterate my plea for information regarding the death of Clint Peoples (see earlier post).

Although the majority of posts on this thread are from a while ago, I would like to add my opinion that I believe the vast majority of these deaths were suspicious and are connected. As time goes on people do die, but the wealth of evidence is overwhelming.

It troubles me that as late as Nov 2004 in a Radio 5 Simon Mayo interview (UK-live), people can laughingly dismiss the idea of witnesses being removed. Everyone-look at the evidence, the facts are there-no need to speculate.

[Stephen Roy]

Good piece! Even some new bits for me. Maybe you could edit it to include Rose Cheramie. Very significant mysterious death.

I like to add this:

David Ferrie died a mysterious death, which was ruled a suicide, only two days before he was scheduled to testify in the famous trial of District Attorney Jim Garrison

Not true.

[Nic Martin]

Good piece!  Even some new bits for me. Maybe you could edit it to include Rose Cheramie. Very significant mysterious death.

I like to add this:

David Ferrie died a mysterious death, which was ruled a suicide, only two days before he was scheduled to testify in the famous trial of District Attorney Jim Garrison

Not true.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Seconded. Ferrie's death was ruled a cerebral hemorrhage, and there was no suicide note found at the scene ( one thing Jim Garrison & I disagree on )..

Not to mention, Ferrie died in 1967. The Shaw trial was in 1969.

Edited October 1, 2005 by Nic Martin

[John Simkin]

Hi John,

I didn't see these two witnesses to the JFK assasination on your very comprehensive list, nor had I come across their names before.

http://www.courier-gazette.com/articles/20...news/news01.txt

John Locke

[Stephen Roy]

Seconded. Ferrie's death was ruled a cerebral hemorrhage, and there was no suicide note found at the scene ( one thing Jim Garrison & I disagree on )..

Not to mention, Ferrie died in 1967. The Shaw trial was in 1969.

True. The timing of Ferrie's death was very striking, but there is some controversy as to the means of death.

My main objection was the notion that Ferrie was about to be called as a witness in the Shaw trial which, as you note, was two years later! Nor is there any evidence that Ferrie was about to re-called for questioning, as popular legend has it. A member of Garrison's staff said recently that Garrison had decided to "let Ferrie stew in his own juices" for a while. Ferrie had been frantically trying to arrange a meeting with Garrison, contacting the latter's old friend Pershing Oliver Gervais for that purpose. Sciambra and Ivon had gone to Ferrie's apartment just 4 days before his death but found the interview unproductive.

Sometimes in this case, one overzealous writer or source will make an erroneous statement, and it is picked up by other writers as fact, and it becomes part of popular legend.

[Allan Eaglesham]

John:

For reasons detailed since you wrote this, available at

http://www.manuscriptservice.com/Pitzer.html

I believe that William Pitzer's name should no longer be on the list of mysterious deaths.

While on this subject, Dan Marvin's credibility may be seen as in further doubt as a result of an article recently published on the Net by Greg Szymanski at

http://www.arcticbeacon.com/articles/artic...18131/33218.htm

The article includes these words from Marvin, who is relating what (he claims) he and comrade Special Forces trainees were told by CIA instructors in 1964:

>We were told that there were four Mafia shooters involved in the Kennedy assassination, two were Americans and two were from the Corsica Mafia.<

This is not the first time that LTC Marvin has made reference to Corsican Mafia involvement. The following passage appears in an article he authored in the May 1995 issue of the Fourth Decade:

"...French-born Lucien Conein was awarded the Napolean Eagle and the Corsican Cross; Conein boasted that these accolades provided access to the Corsican Mafia's highest councils. There is an interesting link here -- Corsican hit men, contracted by La Cosa Nostra, have been implicated in the JFK assassination (see the documentary video 'The Men Who Killed Kennedy,' 1992 G&G Communications, Producer Nigel Turner)."

Although, earlier in the TFD article, Marvin tells of how his CIA instructors had remarked on how well things had gone in Dealey Plaza, he makes no mention of Corsican involvement. In fact, he makes no mention of US-Mafia involvement either. To the contrary, he states the following:

"It is likely that a distancing of certain powerful, organized crime families from the clandestine operations division of the CIA in the Fall of 1963 took a toll on the availability of MAFIA hit men and placed an immediate demand to draw from some other resource." Marvin goes on to hint that Special Forces men were involved in the JFK assassination.

Fast forward to 2005. LTC Marvin now claims that, back in 1964, the CIA told him it was purely a Mafia hit.

Allan Eaglesham

[John Simkin]

I am arguing in the Assassination, Terrorism and the Arms Trade: The Contracting Out of U.S. Foreign Policy: 1940-1990 thread that the Military Industrial Congressional Complex was responsible for the assassination of JFK.

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5799

I have also argued in this thread that Brown & Root was part of this conspiracy. If that is the case, other Brown & Root executives might have known about what was going on. Yet none of them came forward during the 1970s and spoke to the House Select Assassinations Committee. It therefore crossed my mind that these people might have had “accidents” to prevent them giving information on this story. After all, it seems to have happened to a lot of people in the 1970s who had information about this conspiracy. I did some research into this and discovered that in a 12 month period, five senior Brown & Root executives died in mysterious circumstances. What is also interesting is that these deaths started taking place only weeks after George Brown resigned from the company (his brother and main partner, Herman Brown, had died several years earlier).

In January, 1976, G.A. Dobelman, Warren T. Moore, Wolf Pabst and Vic Abadie died when their small plane crashed in Anchorage, Alaska.

That only left Foster Parker, the president of Brown & Root, left alive. A year later, in January, 1977, Parker committed suicide. It was immediately suspected that Parker had been murdered. Just before his death he told the police he believed his life was in danger. There was no suicide note. The .357 Magnum that he used also raised issues about his death. It was not the sort of weapon people usually use to kill themselves.

Parker had not owned a gun until he purchased the Magnum a week before he died. He told the owner of the shop where he bought the gun that he needed to protect his family. Despite the claims from friends and family that Parker was not the kind of man to kill himself, officially it was ruled a suicide.

There is also the John Connally connection to this story. Connally was a key figure in the Suite 8 F Group and had been a director of Brown & Root since 1969. He was seen as Lyndon Johnson’s replacement when he left power in 1968.

Richard Nixon had attempted to make John Connally his vice president when Spiro Agnew was indicted for corruption. Connally had therefore been chosen by Nixon as the next president of the United States.

Connally was one of those who knew where all the bodies were buried and this would have worried the CIA. Nixon was forced to back down and select Gerald Ford instead. As a member of the Warren Commission he also knew where the bodies were buried. But the FBI and the CIA knew he had been fully compromised by his membership of the WC and posed them no threat.

Connally was Nixon’s Secretary of the Treasury. However, this all came to an end when in 1975 Connally was accused by Jake Jacobsen of taking bribes. He was defended by Edward Bennett Williams, who managed to prevent the jury from hearing a recording of a conversation that took place between Connally and Richard Nixon in March 1971. On the tape Connally says to Nixon:"It's on my honor to make sure that there's a very substantial amount of oil in Texas that will be at your discretion," the treasury secretary said. "Fine," said Nixon. "This is a cold political deal," Nixon continued. "They're very tough political operators." "And they've got it," Connally said. "They've got it," Nixon agreed. "Mr. President," Connally concluded, "I really think you made the right decision."

Connally was not found guilty. He later said that: "To be accused of taking a goddamned $10,000 bribe offended me beyond all reason." According to Evan Thomas (The Man to See): "Among cynics in the firm, there was a sneaking suspicion that Connally's indignation stemmed from the fact that he had been indicted for taking such a small payoff. The joke around the firm was that if the bribe had been $200,000, Williams would have believed the government, since, in Texas politics, $10,000 was a mere tip."

Brown & Root survived these scandals and in 1977 won a $800 million contract with the Iranian government to build two naval bases along the Gulf of Oman. However, that is another story.

[Mark Stapleton]

Interesting post, John. Nixon attempting to make Connally his VP? That's a bizarre scenario considering they were politically opposed but nothing would surprise me.

Attempting to determine the identity of the conspirators by tracing the trail of suspicious deaths is probably the best short cut to solving the case. It's got to be better than wading through the disinformation swamp.

Assuming that Brown & Root and other memebers of the military industrial complex were behind the assassination, who do you speculate were the mechanics chosen to carry it out? Mobster connected hitmen and anti-Castro Cubans don't fit with me. Too unreliable.

Great post.

[Tim Gratz]

Nixon and Connally were far from "politically opposed". In fact, in 1972 Connally headed Democrats for Nixon and he later switched parties.

He ran for the Republican nomination in 1980. Spent a ton of money but ended up with but one delegate and withdrew from the race.

BTW, MICC did not kill JFK. John has not one scintlla of proof for this scenario.

Moreover, EVEN if some members HAD, they certainly would have kept it close to their chest. According to John the entire Executive Board of Brown & Root knew who did it. This makes no sense at all.

John also fails to mention several salient facts. The bribes Connally was accused of taking had nothing to do with oil. They were allegedly from MILK producers--the AMPI was the name of their organization. And Connally was acquitted. Barbara Jordan was a character witness for Connally.

Edited January 17, 2006 by Tim Gratz

[John Simkin]

Assuming that Brown & Root and other memebers of the military industrial complex were behind the assassination, who do you speculate were the mechanics chosen to carry it out? Mobster connected hitmen and anti-Castro Cubans don't fit with me. Too unreliable.

I agree. I intend to argue that it was the same group of people who organized most of the assassinations that was ordered by this group. I will develop this argument on the Assassination, Terrorism and the Arms Trade: The Contracting Out of U.S. Foreign Policy: 1940-1990 thread:

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5799

[Mark Stapleton]

Assuming that Brown & Root and other memebers of the military industrial complex were behind the assassination, who do you speculate were the mechanics chosen to carry it out? Mobster connected hitmen and anti-Castro Cubans don't fit with me. Too unreliable.

I agree. I intend to argue that it was the same group of people who organized most of the assassinations that was ordered by this group. I will develop this argument on the Assassination, Terrorism and the Arms Trade: The Contracting Out of U.S. Foreign Policy: 1940-1990 thread:

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5799

John,

Without wanting to pre-empt your post, would they be from the same group who attempted the assassination of De Gaulle in '62?

Nixon and Connally were far from "politically opposed". In fact, in 1972 Connally headed Democrats for Nixon and he later switched parties.

He ran for the Republican nomination in 1980. Spent a ton of money but ended up with but one delegate and withdrew from the race.

BTW, MICC did not kill JFK. John has not one scintlla of proof for this scenario.

Moreover, EVEN if some members HAD, they certainly would have kept it close to their chest. According to John the entire Executive Board of Brown & Root knew who did it. This makes no sense at all.

John also fails to mention several salient facts. The bribes Connally was accused of taking had nothing to do with oil. They were allegedly from MILK producers--the AMPI was the name of their organization. And Connally was acquitted. Barbara Jordan was a character witness for Connally.

Tim,

While I acknowledge your determination to solve the case, you can't shoot down plausible scenarios with mere technicalities, especially this long after the event. Appreciate the info on Connally, though. I never knew he ran as a Republican. Nothing surprises me.

[John Simkin]

While I acknowledge your determination to solve the case, you can't shoot down plausible scenarios with mere technicalities, especially this long after the event. Appreciate the info on Connally, though. I never knew he ran as a Republican. Nothing surprises me.

When Lyndon B. Johnson signed the 1965 Civil Rights Act he said the Democratic Party was finished in Texas (as well as the rest of the Deep South). Connally accepted this and began a slow move towards to the Republicans. The Suite 8F Group now began backing the Republican Party. So did the Military Industrial Congressional Complex.

[Tim Gratz]

Mark wrote:

While I acknowledge your determination to solve the case, you can't shoot down plausible scenarios with mere technicalities,

Mark, WADR, one could argue that any scenario in which the "big fish" has "means, motive and opportunity" is plausible (and I would argue that anyone with both motive and money thus possessed means and opportunity).

However, IMO, in order for a scenario to be plausible there must be at least SOME evidence to support it beyond the "MMO" paradigm. The fact that there is not a scintilla of evidence to support John's scenario is more than a "mere technicality".

[Robert Howard]

Came across an interesting new blog about Karyn Kupcinet that might be worth keeping an eye on.

http://thecloakofdarkness.blogspot.com/

Boy. some website, 'UFO in the Hughes Film,' that's nice.