Pat Speer

What do you mean by blow out hole in the rear of the skull, Jim? Because your friend Milli agrees with me that most of the drawings of this "blow-out" are garbage.

This photo actually helps exonerate one person: Bill Greer. He's driving along. He sees a bunch of people up in front of him, standing directly over the President's path. He hears a loud sound. Did they have something to do with it? Better look back and see what's going on. He momentarily takes his foot off the gas and taps the brakes. He sees a commotion in the back seat and realizes Kennedy and/or Connally have been hit. He turns around and high-tails it out of there, praying those on the bridge aren't involved. One of the ongoing theories that makes me cringe is that Greer stopped the limo to facilitate the shooting. This makes sense to those not invested in actually researching the case, IMO. The reality is that any shooter from distance would have been tracking the limo and would have preferred his target maintain a consistent speed. Greer's erratic driving, then, could have saved Kennedy's life. But it wasn't his day. Nor was it the country's.

Thanks, Sandy. That is pretty much what I expected. He's confused a bunch of people over the years, and changed his mind about things without acknowledging as much. His initial use of the OD readings was to cast doubt on the authenticity of the 6.5 mm fragment on the x-rays (which he strangely believes was added onto the back of the head after the autopsy), and the large white patch towards the back of the head (which I feel certain is overlapping bone). He then began claiming the readings on the A-P x-ray showed a missing piece on the back of the head that was the exact size of the Harper fragment. He then switched to saying it was the lateral x-rays that showed the missing piece at the back of the head. There was a problem, though. When at a conference he pointed to where the hole begins he pointed to the very location where he used to say the white patch ends. In other words, what used to be the divide between an area that he said was overly white and an area of normal density, had become a divide between an area that he stills says is overly white, but now the adjacent area formerly representative of normal bone density was a hole. And he said we couldn't see this with our eyes because one can't see holes on the back of the head on a lateral x-ray with one's eyes, and that only he could see it with his OD reader. He failed to understand or at least admit of course that this would have been a very large hole that curved around significantly from the far back of the head, and would have been readily visible to the numerous radiologists who have studied the films without the use of a densitometer.

If you're suggesting this transcript be disregarded, I totally disagree. If we reject evidence because we don't like it, we're no better than the WC's staff. My recollection is this didn't come from Myers. It was Mack who dug it up and evidently sat on it awhile as it damaged his Badgeman argument. And he didn't dig it up from a questionable source. It came from the papers of the director of Rush to Judgment, and it's obviously legit, or a very very clever fake--way too clever for someone like Myers to make up. There are a number of transcripts in that historical society's archives that support the CT side, including, on the whole, Bowers', as he once again describes the last two shots as bang bang. There appears to have been no tampering there. And when you compare what Bowers says in the transcript to his WC testimony it's clear he hasn't really changed anything, it's just that he appears to have changed things because of the spin Lane put on the original testimony, and the editing of the Rush to Judgment interview for Lane's movie. So, yeah, Dale Myers scored a point. Let him have it. He's scored a number of points. But he's still behind like 100-10. We most certainly agree on that.

Thanks. All the time in the hospital and the chemo, etc, cost me a few brain cells, I'm afraid. It was the Wisconsin historical society.

As I recall, the transcript was created for the director of Rush to Judgment and gifted with some of his personal items to an historical society in Minnesota. It was not an official document.

Can you provide the exact quotes? That might prove helpful. Thanks.

This is one of the problems I've had with Mantik. He's changed his opinions a number of times without admitting he's changed his opinion. He originally told the CT community the so-called white spot covered up the hole from which the Harper fragment derived. This was the right side of the head behind the ear. He then came to believe the Harper fragment derived from the FAR back of the head, the middle of the back of the head. So he switched to saying that the white spot covered an area of missing brain, not skull, and that you couldn't see the hole on the FAR back of the head on the x-rays, the middle of the back of the head, with the naked eye, and that only he can see it with his superior vision and optical density readings. To be clear, then, the alterations Mantik proposes occurred to the x-rays involved placing a white patch on the side of the head to hide missing brain and draw attention to the dark area in front, and placing a white circle on the frontal x-ray to suggest a 6.5 mm fragment was found at the back of the head.

Thanks, Gary This means a lot coming from you. If you'd like to send your 3rd book to someone who'll appreciate your efforts and achievements, you have my email.

Yikes! I think Gary Shaw embarrassed himself a bit with his claim this book was no accident. As if the CIA is in the habit of promoting a small low-budget self-researched book that few will ever read, when they could be spending the money on drones or big budget films promoting their perspective.

Yeah, that's her. She seemed perfectly reasonable, which alienated a lot in attendance who were hoping for something more exciting.

Is that the book on Bowers' traffic accident? I once met a woman who'd spent years studying his accident, only to come away concluding it was an accident, and not a murder. She was a CT, who thought she'd cleared up one piece of the puzzle. Of course, most everyone ignored her at the conference afterwards.

To be clear, I wanted to believe someone was behind the fence. It seems near certain, based upon the earwitnesses and smoke witnesses, that some sort of diversion (or even a shot) came from there. As far as the glint or whatever Bowers saw, it could have come through the gap as the limo drove by. I don't object to someone thinking someone had crept up behind the fence without Bowers noticing. My objection is to people continuing to pretend the men Bowers saw were not the men on the steps in the Muchmore film, when his description is a perfect match. And this underlies my objection to much of what's passed as "research" from (literally and figuratively) both sides of the fence. If an x-ray shows you something you disagree with or don't understand, claim it's been faked. If an autopsy photo shows you something you disagree with or don't understand, claim it's a fake. If the Z-film shows you something you disagree with or don't understand, claim it's a fake. If you don't like what the witnesses say, say they are lying because they're scared. And conversely, if the back wound doesn't line up with the throat wound, move it. If the entrance wound on the head doesn't line up with the supposed exit wound, move it. If the Z-film, autopsy photos and x-rays show you something you disagree with or don't understand, hire some expert to present a bs theory that explains why... And that's not even to mention the preparing of witnesses and parsing of testimony prepared by Ball, Belin, and Specter, to keep the record "clean" per Warren's request. It's like everyone, even today, is afraid to look at what actually happened, based upon the actual evidence. I set out to do so roughly 19 years ago, and came to some surprising conclusions, some of which have crept into the community. But the bulk of what I've discovered has remained buried under a mountain of bs piled on from both sides of the fence, from people more interested in defending the status quo or having fun with theories than actually looking at evidence.

I remember when Tink first talked about the seemingly obvious forward movement being nothing but blur. It was at the 2013 Wecht Conference. I talked to a number of people afterwards who love Tink as much as I do. But none of them were buying it.

Here are the relevant sections of the Bowers transcript created for Rush To Judgment: (Unreleased segments of Bowers' 1966 interview with Mark Lane, from a transcript of the interview found in the papers of Rush to Judgment director Emilo de Antonio at the Wisconsin Historical Archives, and published online by Dale Myers, 2004)) (When asked if there were any pedestrians between his location and Elm Street) "Directly in line - uh - there - of course is - uh - there leading toward the Triple Underpass there is a curved decorative wall - I guess you'd call it - it's not a solid wall but it is part of the - uh - park....And to the west of that there were - uh - at the time of the shooting in my vision only two men. Uh - these two men were - uh - standing back from the street somewhat at the top of the incline and were very near - er - two trees which were in the area...And one of them, from time to time as he walked back and forth, uh - disappeared behind a wooden fence which is also slightly to the west of that. Uh - these two men to the best of my knowledge were standing there - uh - at the time - of the shooting...Ah - one of them, as I recall, was a middle-aged man, fairly heavy-set with - what looked like a white shirt. Uh - he remained in sight practically all of the time. The other individual was uh - slighter build and had either a plaid jacket or a plaid shirt on and he - uh -is walking back and forth was in and out of sight, so that I could not state for sure whether he was standing there at the time of the shots or not..." (When asked if he saw anyone suspicious in the area) "Other than these two and the people who were over on the top of the Underpass who - that were, for the most part, were railroad employees or were employees of a Fort Worth welding firm who were working on the railroad, uh - there were no strangers out in this area." (When returning to the question of whether or not anyone was shooting from behind the fence) "Now I could see back or the South side [Note: here MYERS adds "BOWERS is actually speaking of the north side of the fence] of the wooden fence in the area, so that obviously that there was no one there who could have - uh - had anything to do with either - as accomplice or anything else because there was no one there - um - at the moment that the shots were fired." As I recall, this transcript was discovered by Gary Mack while he was looking for evidence for Badgeman. Instead, he found evidence that Mark Lane had deceived the public when he made out Bowers had seen men on his side of the fence. This was discovered more than 17 years ago. Plenty of time for people to get up to snuff. Now I adore Tink and am friends with Aguilar and DeSalles, who were shown in the program. But there's no excuse for them repeating and pushing things that they feel are true rather than what the evidence suggests. I asked one of them why the program showed the Harper fragment to the left of the limo's location at 313 when as far back as 1969 Harper showed researchers where he found it and it was a hundred feet or so down the road, just past the steps. And he said that he thought Harper was mistaken. Similarly, David Mantik has claimed that someone must have moved it before Harper discovered it. That's what I mean by GIGO. Instead of following the evidence, people are choosing to cherry pick the evidence and follow what they want to believe. And then putting what they want to believe on TV to sell their theories. That's what the LN'ers have done when it comes to the SBT and bullet trajectories. And that's what our friends and colleagues are doing now that they've been given access. I'd like to believe we deserve better.

It's GIGO. It is a forensic fact that blood spatters from the entrance as well as the exit, and if there's only one spatter it's presumed to be an entrance. And yet here we have a large section of the program based around the non-fact the blood and brain matter ALL went towards the left of the limo, and that this indicates a shot from the knoll. It does nothing of the sort. But even if it did, it would indicate the shot came from the left of the limo, not right. There were numerous other non-facts in the program as well. It was so bad I had to speed through it. But the program pretended the Harper fragment was found to the left of the limo's location at 313, when Harper showed numerous researchers where he found the fragment, and it was 100 feet or so in front of the limo's location at 313. There was also of course the misrepresentation of what Lee Bowers said. In the transcripts for his filmed interview for Rush to Judgment, it is made clear the men he saw "behind the fence" were behind the fence from his location, i.e. Emmett Hudson and the man with him on the steps, who I've concluded is F. Lee Mudd. To continue pretending he said the men were on his side of the fence at this point in time is embarrassing, IMO. In short, this program was a long-overdue presentation of an old theory that has since been largely debunked. In that way it's not much better than another rehash of the Warren Report.

Well, you are 100% wrong. It's like you're saying Jack Ruby sat next to Kennedy in the limousine. He did not.

I must admit I haven't watched the entire program, but this sounds like nonsense. It was a military autopsy. Finck was the top expert on gunshot wounds at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology. This idea that Finck wasn't qualified to conduct a Forensic Autopsy is nonsense started by Dr. Baden to help explain why the autopsy doctors concluded the bullet entered low on the back of the head. Which, of course, it did... Apparently, it was unthinkable to Baden and his colleagues on the FPP that Dr. Russell Fisher could be wrong when he contradicted the autopsy doctors and said the bullet really entered high on the back of the head. But that's the truth. Fisher told the Justice Department what they wanted to hear even though it made no sense, and no one in his profession had the balls to call him on it. In his best moments, of course, Baden admitted that neither he nor any of his colleagues had experience with military rifle ammunition, and that he'd consulted with an Irish doctor named Tom Marshall, who'd conducted the autopsies on the Bloody Sunday victims. It was later determined, however, that what Tom Marshall thought were standard military rifle ammunition wounds were really wounds caused by bullets with weakened casings, aka dum-dum bullets.

The red arrow in your Zapruder frame is not pointing to person being pointed to by a red arrow in the Bronson photo.

The red arrow on the left does not point to either one of the two guys in the image at right. It points to John Templin, who ID'ed himself in the film numerous times and was standing next to Ernest Brandt. The two young guys are not visible in that frame of the film. Zapruder is filming sharply to his left and they are to the right of his camera. As stated, I spent months going through the images and statements to help identify who was standing where and what they had to say, and there's a clear pattern. Those near the Thornton Freeway sign thought the first shot rang out when Kennedy was out in front of them. Since they were looking to their left, moreover, this probably means just before he reached their location on the street. In any event, those to the east of them uniformly said the first shot rang out after Kennedy had passed them. Thus, there is NO real mystery as to where Kennedy was when the first audible shot rang out.

I love Tink buI this program made me wince a few times. There is a problem in the research community that parallels a problem in our society: confirmation bias. But that still doesn't excuse the program's presenting the Harper fragment as being found to the left of the limo at 313, when Harper repeatedly showed researchers where he found it, and it was a hundred feet or so to the west of the location shown in the program. Tink and Doug also claimed Chaney did not receive any blood spray from the deadly head shot. But that's not true. Here's my summary of an interview conducted on the night of the shooting. (11-22-63 interview with Bill Lord on WFAA television, apparently in the early evening) “I was riding on the right rear fender... We had proceeded west on Elm Street at approximately 15-20 miles an hour. We heard the first shot. I thought it was a motorcycle backfiring and uh I looked back over to my left and also President Kennedy looked back over his left shoulder. Then, the, uh, second shot came, well, then I looked back just in time to see the President struck in the face by the second bullet. He slumped forward into Mrs. Kennedy’s lap, and uh, it was apparent to me that we were being fired upon. I went ahead of the President’s car to inform Chief Curry that the President had been hit. And then he instructed us over the air to take him to Parkland Hospital and he had Parkland Hospital stand by. I went on up ahead of the, to notify the officers that were leading the escort that he had been hit and we're gonna have to move out." (When asked if he saw the person who fired on the President) "No sir, it was back over my right shoulder.” (At the end of the interview, Bill Lord, now back in the studio, adds "This patrolman was so close to the president that following the three shots his uniform was spattered with blood."

The link says the program is only available in Australia.

You really should watch Mark's model. And stop each time it flashes to show the photos he used to create his model. Here's an example. The Betzner photo was taken from far down Elm. Three women stand to the east of the boys (one of whom may be Smith). Because the Stemmons sign is behind them, however, it gives the illusion they are standing right in front of it, when they are really standing in front of it from Betzner's angle, and far to the east of it when one looks at them from right across the street. The angles are tricky, but once one gets a feel for the layout the locations of the witnesses are consistent from film to film and photo to photo. I discuss the witnesses and their locations along Elm in excruciating detail, here: https://www.patspeer.com/chapter-7b-more-pieces-in-the-plaza

Forensic Pathologists are trained to look at certain facts and to not let strange circumstances and timing affect their decisions. The problem with this is that it opens the door for any person (or agency) who knows how to fake a death and make it look like natural causes. When I first got sucked into this quagmire, I noticed that a number of U.S. Senators dropped dead in the early 50's, and that this led to several transfers of power between the parties. I then discovered that this was the very period in which the CIA and the KGB were developing poisons to simulate heart attacks, etc. This has always bothered me. The subsequent death of Adlai Stevenson as he walked the streets of Paris is also suspicious, IMO. The point is that we can't trust autopsy protocols as to foul play because there are people and agencies who know how to beat the system. And one of the ironies of this case (or strange coincidences) is that the supposed top expert on poisons among pathologists was Chetta. So...I'm forever on the fence on this one. Another strange piece of the puzzle, which I put together, was the timing of Ferrie's death. It was just a few days after Ramsey Clark told LBJ Garrison was coming after him and that his star witness was Ferrie. Clark tells this to LBJ. Bingo. Ferrie turns up dead. That's a hard one to ignore.

A little background info may be helpful. When Horne's book came out, Fetzer took to this forum singing its praises, and claimed it confirmed that the Z-film was fake. This enraged John Costella, who Fetzer had long claimed was the top expert on the film. You see, Costella had concluded that the film was internally consistent, and that no frames had been removed, etc. He concluded that the whole film would have to have been a fake, and that the once-popular theory a limo stop or a head shot was removed from the original film was inaccurate. Costella then accused Horne of being a government disinformation agent. The point is, then, that those holding the film was faked can't agree on the extent it was faked or how it was faked, and the whole argument is weak sauce. Should one seek to go back through the archives of this forum, one will see how Tink Thompson and I embarrassed Fetzer and his devotees by showing how the supposed eyewitnesses to a limo stop were mostly non-witnesses to a limo stop, with many specifying that the limo did not stop. As far as IDing witnesses on Elm Street, I spent some time on this in 2019 and IDed a few never before IDed, and matched up a number of photos where one can see that there are no discrepancies between the films and photos. Mark Tyler's study of the films and photos for his model confirmed this work. I recommend anyone doubting the integrity of the films and photos to watch Mark's model, and stop when the photos come up so one can see the angles from which the photos were taken.