Pat Speer

OUCH!!! That was painful. Well put together, but gutless, and a bit of a con. The ending presents this false dichotomy where one is supposed to choose between thinking the sloppiness of the evidence is part of a vast conspiracy or not, accent on the not. Our 30 year old wunderkind also asks why go to the trouble of killing JFK in a complicated plot when someone could have just walked up and shot him. He seems oblivious to the possibility 1: the killers wanted to get away with it; and 2. they wanted to blame someone else. Yes, OBVIOUSLY, 90% of conspiracy talk is nonsense and a distraction. But this young techie attitude that well we'll never know, kinda interesting, huh? is just pathetic. For example, the video gets into the weeds of the Vickie Adams story and then just kinda throws up its hands. Well, he said, she said, let's move on. It doesn't delve into Ball/Belin's refusal to get to the bottom of this beyond noting that they failed to do a reconstruction. Similarly, it discusses the problems with the size of the bag, and that it wasn't filmed in situ, without noting that NONE of those first on the scene, including Fritz, saw such a bag. No, instead, it quotes a motorcycle cop, Brewer, who wrote nothing and said nothing about the bag until more than 4 months after the shooting...when Belin realized he needed SOMEONE ANYONE to say they saw the bag in the sniper's nest, seeing as EVERY officer who'd been questioned on the matter had denied seeing it during the initial investigation. It goes on and on. Style over substance.

Let's be clear. The bullet broke the skin and broke the fascia. It did not "enter" the underlying muscle. Entering implies the whole bullet entered the body and was surrounded by tissue. Many "experts" have pushed that the bullet must have transited, because it "entered" and bullets don't just work their way out once in the body. Some even say that it is purported to have turned around within the body. What they miss, or refuse to see, is that Humes' testimony strongly suggests that the bullet never entered the body. I think Specter knew this, moreover. He took Humes' claim there was bruising on the front of the neck and spun it into their being brushing high on the back of the back, where the bullet slid between two muscles. This is a deception. Beyond that Humes noted no such bruising, there is only one muscle in the presumed location of the wound.

It's in Humes' testimony. He said it was a defect in the fascia that did not continue into the muscle. The fascia is the layer just below the skin. IOW, the "hole" they observed was just a few millimeters deep. Later, after finding out about the throat wound and realizing they couldn't come to a single-assassin solution if the bullet failed to transit, they conjured up that the bullet somehow magically passed through the back and exited the throat without making a hole in the Trapezius muscle. It was a magic bullet, long before Specter came along and made it even more magical.

The bullet never entered the back. That is what Humes observed. It left a divot at the surface. But did not enter.

It should also be noted that Baden has long pretended Finck had no hands-on experience. This is a con he pulls so that people will believe his colleagues' claim the autopsy doctors were idiots, and incorrectly placed the bullet entrance on the back of the head. Finck lived a long time after Baden started playing this game. Unfortunately he moved to Switzerland and washed his hands of the matter. If he hadn't, and had confronted Baden on his slander, well,, that would have been interesting.

The pointy-headed bullet comes from Thompson's book, and has been repeated many times in many places. Thompson got it from one of the guys who handled the bullet at Parkland. If you were someone who'd worked at Parkland and you were trying to ingratiate yourself with the "research" community, a quick mention of a pointy-tipped bullet would do the trick. As for Landis, my impression is that he thinks the bullet he picked up was CE 399.

He doesn't really debunk Landis. He just expresses doubt. That's only natural. It's like two college buddies having a 70 year reunion, whereupon one "admits" he'd had sex with the other guy's girlfriend in the dorm when the other guy was sleeping. And the other guy says "Nope, you were dreaming!"

But her story makes no sense. I have spent a lot of time in hospitals, and my family is largely nurses and bio-med techs. Nurses don't just throw themselves into emergency situations unless no one else is there or they were asked to do so. That's someone else's job. It would be like a coach going out to hit in the bottom of the ninth. It could happen. But someone would notice. Nowhere in her statements does she mention what would be the one thing that could give her credibility--that another nurse or doctor asked her what she was doing there and that she said she was told to help... and that they then told her to go away. There's an old expression--extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. And yet when it comes to the JFK case, we have numerous people making extraordinary claims with no proof at all. And getting accepted anyway just because their claim is something people want to believe. We see this on both sides of the conspiracy/no conspiracy divide. A few years back an old SS agent came forward and said something about Oswald's address book--that there was a kill list in it or something like that. Some LNs jumped right on it. But most LNs and CTs alike dismissed his claims as nonsense. Audrey Bell's claims about JFK's wounds and Hall's claims about everything should similarly be dismissed, IMO. But not Landis. He has mentioned seeing a fragment for 40 years. So it seems he saw something, and that his story/memory changed over time.

A couple of points. 1. All the details offered up by Hall that conform to the official record were well-known and published prior to her ever coming forward. 2. I'm fairly certain all the televised interviews you mention appeared AFTER the 50th anniversary, where she appeared out of nowhere to be included in a number of articles and on a number of programs. How did this happen? Did she join this forum? Did she ask to speak at Lancer? No, she went straight for the main stream media and they gobbled her up without double-checking anything she said with those who might know better. It's just nard to see her as anything more than an attention-seeker.

She said she saw the bullet in the hall. It does not confirm Landis. It doesn't discredit him either, seeing as someone may have moved the bullet from Trauma Room One to the stretcher in the hall. Hall, strangely enough considering her name, is another story. We have no reason to believe anything she's said.

Aha! The fog clears. Someone had said it was another nurse who'd said she saw a bullet. I'd remembered that nurse as saying she saw the bullet in the hall, not Trauma Room One. Now it turns out that further "corroboration" for Landis comes from Hall? Give me a break. Hall is perhaps the least credible "witness" to emerge in decades. By her own admission, she was not an ER nurse and had no business in the ER. She just sauntered in, saw stuff, and sauntered out, only to emerge right before the 50th and revel in all the attention. It's bs. I reported on all the books, articles, movies and TV shows regarding the 50th anniversary in a blog on my website entitled The Onslaught. Here are four sections in which Hall is mentioned. November 3: an article appears in The Telegraph, in which four witnesses of the events of 11-22-63 are interviewed. Two of these witnesses, James Tague and former Parkland nurse Phyllis Hall, admit they believe there was a conspiracy to kill Kennedy. What? Never heard of Hall? Here's her story: “Phyllis Hall, a nurse in the outpatient clinic who happened to be talking with a friend who worked on the triage desk in the emergency ward, was about to be swept up in the whirlwind of history. 'The supervisor said there had been a call to say there was an accident in the president’s motorcade,' she said. The words were hardly out of her mouth when the doors burst open. 'Among the first in was Lyndon Johnson, the vice president, who was very pale and sweating heavily. Then I heard the groans of someone calling out in grave pain. It was Governor John Connally, who was seriously injured in the attack. Then they carried in a second stretcher. I could just see a man from his waist down as there was a lady lying across his head and shoulders. A doctor told me: 'We need you here.’ We were whisked into the Trauma One room, where it was immediately clear that this was President Kennedy. I started to feel for his vital signs. I couldn’t find any, there was no pulse. His eyelids were half-closed, his pupils were fixed and dilated, and his skin was blueish-grey, indicating that no oxygen was circulating.' As the doctors worked frantically to resuscitate their patient, Mrs Kennedy stood next to her husband, her right hand on his left foot. 'We were desperately searching for any sign of life, but there was nothing,” said Hall. “The treatment the president received that day was outstanding but futile. I believe he was dead when he arrived at the hospital.' At 1 pm, Kemp Clark, a senior surgeon, pronounced the president dead. Mrs Kennedy did not flinch. 'There was no response,' said Hall. 'I have never seen anyone in such profound shock in my life. She had the same blank look on her face. She just looked down and stared blankly.'” November 10: the Daily Mail runs an article on Phyllis Hall, the woman claiming to have been one of Kennedy's nurses previously discussed in an article in The Telegraph. It begins: "A nurse who was part of desperate attempts to save the life of President John F Kennedy after he was assassinated has claimed he was shot by a 'mystery bullet'. Phyllis Hall, who was 28 at the time, says she was dragged into the operating room by a secret service agent as medics scrambled to help the president, who was fatally shot in Dallas, Texas on 22 November 1963. While cradling his head, which had been torn apart by gunshots fired from the famous 'grassy knoll', Mrs Hall says she spotted an unusual bullet, which was promptly removed and never seen again. She described the bullet in an interview with the Sunday Mirror which she said looked completely undamaged, and bore no resemblance whatsoever to bullets later shown as evidence in investigations into the President's murder. She said: 'I could see a bullet lodged between his ear and his shoulder. It was pointed at its tip and showed no signs of damage. There was no blunting of the bullet or scarring around the shell from where it had been fired. 'I’d had a great deal of experience working with gunshot wounds but I had never seen anything like this before. It was about one-and-a-half inches long – nothing like the bullets that were later produced. 'It was taken away but never have I seen it presented in evidence or heard what happened to it. It remains a mystery.' Mrs Hall, who had six years of nursing experience at the time, says she was caught up in the effort to save the President by accident, as she had been visiting a friend who worked on another ward. She described the chaos as Mr Kennedy's entourage burst through the doors, and recalled clearly the vacant expression of First Lady Jackie Kennedy. Mrs Kennedy reportedly gripped the President's right foot as surgeons wages a losing battle to save him. Mrs Hall, now 78, says she offered her condolences after a neurosurgeon pronounced Mr Kennedy dead after a 43-minute struggle by as many as 20 staff. However, she says the shocked First Lady simply stared into the distance. As her shift didn't finish until the evening, Mrs Hall continued working for hours after the President was declared dead, and didn't even tell her husband what she had witnessed. However, in recent interviews she revealed that she is 'a big believer in the conspiracy theories' surrounding the Mr Kennedy's death." Well, this is the kind of stuff the lone-nuts love to complain about. There is no support offered in the Warren Commission's files indicating that Phyllis Hall was ever in Trauma Room One. There is no support offered from anyone known to have been working at Parkland in 1963 that she was anywhere near the emergency room. And yet, she gets quoted in a prominent paper/news website, and tells a crazy story that has no support whatsoever from anyone known to have been at Parkland. That she's lying is supported, moreover, by her claiming she was visiting someone on another ward, and didn't tell her husband what she'd witnessed. In the words of the Church Lady on Saturday Night Live: "Now, ain't that convenient!" It's also intriguing that Ms. Hall is totally unknown in the States, but is suddenly a celebrity in England. November 17: The Los Angeles Times runs an article on three witnesses to the events of 11-22-63. Tina Towner says nothing of substance as to conspiracy or no conspiracy. Pierce Allman says he feels guilt because if he'd looked up and saw Oswald in the sniper's nest window he could have stopped Oswald at the doorway and stopped him from killing Tippit. And then there's Phyllis Hall, who I feel fairly certain is a fake. Her story this time around: "Suddenly, Hall saw a man carrying a long gun approach. FBI, police and Secret Service agents were everywhere, and many were armed. "He put his hand on my back and said, 'We need you back here,' and directed her to Trauma Room No. 1, she said. The small room was filled with so many doctors, nurses and others that at one point Hall was forced against a wall. Kennedy's face was deep blue around the eyes, and she could see a bullet hole near his Adam's apple. Hall checked for a pulse but didn't feel one. She watched as doctors performed a tracheotomy through the president's neck wound. Hall saw Jackie Kennedy standing nearby, her pink Chanel suit spattered with her husband's brain matter. A doctor lifted the president's hair to reveal the gaping wound. 'Jackie just stood at the foot of the carriage with her hand on his foot,' Hall said. 'She was in such deep shock, she was just staring at his face. At some point the supervisor came in and asked if she would like a chair out in the hallway and she said no, she was going to stay with him. We all wanted to do whatever we could, but there was nothing we could do.' Dr. William Kemp Clark, who to Hall looked like an old schoolmaster with beady eyes behind small glasses, pronounced Kennedy dead at 1 p.m. 'Call it,' the doctor said and then strode out past Jackie Kennedy, barely stopping as he said, 'Madam, your husband is dead.' Hall approached the first lady and said, "I am so sorry for your loss," but Kennedy just stared straight ahead and didn't seem to hear." Well, my God! This woman's story is so obviously false. There is no record of her being in the room. And here she is changing her story from being asked into the room by a doctor to being forced into the room at gunpoint. She says she took the vitals. She says she spoke to Mrs. Kennedy afterward. Horse feathers! More telling than that, though, is the L.A. Times' leaving out a key feature of Hall's story--the wound's being on the back of Kennedy's head! November 17: The Smithsonian Channel follows up Kennedy's Suicide Bomber with The Day Kennedy Died. While I miss its first showing, I check to see if it's up on youtube, and find some promo videos for the program. One of them races around an animated Dealey Plaza pointing out various conspiracy theories and the snipers and smoke supposedly seen in the Plaza. After awhile, it runs out of easy targets and starts throwing out facts that aren't theories at all, such as Kennedy's brain being missing, or the hole on his clothes being too low to support the single-bullet theory. It then zooms in on the sniper's nest and has three shots fired in six seconds. The net effect is an insult to the research community. The description of this video, furthermore, reads: "Conspiracies surrounding the assassination of JFK have proliferated in the 50 years since his death, but in the end, only one lone gunman fired the shots that would change history." My God! Could they be more insulting? I mean, who was behind this show? Credible researchers? Some punk kids? Certainly not anyone who knows anything more than what they've read in Posner or Bugliosi... I later read a review of this program in The Telegraph, in which it mentions both that the "the documentary sensibly navigated us away from conspiracy theories" and that its use of witnesses Buell Frazier, Clint Hill, and Robert McClelland was a "coup." This makes me a bit sick. This implies that these witnesses were once again used as window-dressing to push something none of them believe. Frazier, after all, insists Oswald didn't bring the rifle with him to work that morning. Hill, after all, disputes the single-bullet theory. McClelland, after all, claims he saw a big hole on the back of Kennedy's head, and that the fatal shot came from the front. Do the creators of these programs have no shame? I finally get to see the program on December 15, and discover it's not as bad as I feared. Not as bad, but still pretty bad. As but one example of its subtle but ever-present badness, the program repeats what has now become the standard trick, and has Buell Frazier describe Oswald bringing a package of curtain rods into the building on the morning of the shooting. It never lets on that Frazier has always insisted that the package was far too small to hold the assassination rifle. No, Oswald's guilt is not to be doubted. Not in this program. At another point, the narrator, Kevin Spacey, describes Oswald shooting Officer Tippit, (as opposed to someone shooting Tippit, whom witnesses would later identify as Oswald). The program is not without its surprises, however. It doesn't show Oswald firing the shots. It doesn't say that Oswald was a complete nut who woke up one day and decided to kill the President, nor that Jack Ruby so loved Mrs. Kennedy he couldn't help but kill Oswald, or any similar nonsense. No, it tells its story mostly through witnesses. It has Ruth Paine relate how horrified she was when she saw an empty blanket in her garage that had at one point held Oswald's rifle. She relates that she knew then that Oswald had killed the President. It later has Detective Jim Leavelle, who'd interrogated Oswald in connection to the Tippit murder, admit that Oswald was actually a "pleasant individual." Of course, he then turns around and says Oswald enjoyed all the attention he received at the police station, seeing as "he wanted to make a name for himself and he knew he was making it." Leavelle then repeats the untrue fact that when Oswald held up his handcuffs for the press to see he'd been arrested, he was making an "iron-fisted salute for Russia" with a "pleased expression on his face." (The footage and photos, of course, show no such pleased expression, but a look of wordless protest, as if to say "I can't believe this is happening.") A bit later, Buell Frazier is brought on to talk about his own problems with the Dallas Police, who suspected him of being a co-conspirator with Oswald. There is no mention, of course, that Frazier told the Dallas Police the bag he saw Oswald carry towards the building that morning was too small to hold the rifle found in the building, and that he passed a lie detector test when he said so. While discussing Oswald's time at the police station, moreover, Kevin Spacey tells us that Oswald's palm print was found on the rifle. Uhhh...this is misleading. The Dallas Crime Lab never conducted a thorough comparison of the lift supposedly taken from the rifle with Oswald's prints until asked to do so by the Warren Commission, months later. Spacey then discusses the autopsy, and says "the autopsy concludes that two bullets struck the president; one passed through his back and exited through his throat; the fatal shot hit the back of his skull, and exploded his brain." Uhhh...this is also misleading. We don't really know what the autopsy concluded, because Dr. Humes changed his conclusion the next day after discovering that the tracheotomy incision had obscured a bullet wound. And notice how the program's creators play it safe, and fail to let Spacey tell the viewers WHERE the bullet hit Kennedy in the back of the head? Well, it seems more than a coincidence that this allowed them to avoid the strange circumstance that the bullet entrance observed and described at autopsy was subsequently "moved" four inches by a secret government panel. This would not make for nice, safe, Oswald-did-it-and-we-can-now-go-back-to-sleep, entertainment, after all. The program then concludes with Ruth Paine, Clint Hill, Buell Frazier, and PHYLLIS HALL (yes, here she is again) talking about the traumatic effect the assassination had on their lives.

Yes, really. The word within days of the shooting was that a bullet was found on a gurney in the hospital. Over the years, people started saying they saw that bullet, etc. That's to be expected. That's the way we work. I did a few years' worth of research on human cognition and memory when I first fell down this rabbit hole. It shocks me that so few have ever followed up on this. Latter-day witnesses just aren't reliable. Period. In this case, Landis has some back-up, in that he said he saw a fragment on the seat 40 years ago, and continued to say it till 10 years ago or so. So it seems probable he saw something. But his latest story? Of waltzing into the emergency room and putting a bullet on JFK's stretcher? With a bunch of doctors gathered around him? And saying nothing to nobody? And keeping this a secret for 60 years? Not likely. Sadly, it reminds me of Audrey Bell, who even Lifton came to conclude was full of beans. Thirty years on, she coughed up this story about her parading up to Perry in Trauma Room One, and him lifting JFK's head to show her the head wound. Absolute garbage. Total nonsense. Nurses not involved in the treatment of a patient don't walk up to doctors treating the patient and ask about the patient. And doctors most certainly don't move patients around to show off their wounds to looky-loo nurses.

I don't recall that he destroyed the file. My recollection is that he destroyed the note left for him by Oswald telling him to leave Marina alone.

As I recall, that nurse said she saw JFK outside in the hallway, and not in trauma room one. Is that correct? If so, her story hardly backs up Landis.

Yes, because of the grooves on its outside, which were a good match for the grooves made by the rifle.

Bullets are rarely if ever fingerprinted. The bullet would be in its shell when handled by the shooter, and whatever smears may be on the top would presumably be burned off. Now, in this case, it seems they probably should have fingerprinted CE 399 to help with the chain of custody. But think about it. By the time it reached the crime lab it had been handled by multiple men, so whatever smears had been from the "finder" of the bullet would be smudged. And besides, fingerprints are only rarely found on intact shells. TV makes out that the crime scene people pick up the shell with a pencil and never touch it in an effort to preserve prints. But prints are rarely found--to the extent that many crime scene investigators don't even bother looking for them.

There's no reason to believe that he studied the wound. As a consequence, he is almost certainly remembering where he saw it depicted afterwards. He could be thinking of the wound in CE 388. But he's admitted reading Thompson's book in 2014 or so. So he's probably thinking of the wound in the so-called McClelland drawing.

No surprise there. Most of the witnesses recall its being on the top back of the head ABOVE the ear. What sucked me down the rabbit hole was that so many took their stating it was on the far back of the head as "proof" it was really on the back of the head AT THE LEVEL of the ear. Hubba-wha? I don't know what that is but it most certainly isn't rational, IMO.

Oy vey. The assumption has always been that the bullet wasn't fired at full velocity. According to Humes it did not enter the back, it essentially made a divot--which is totally consistent with the bullet's being found on the rear seat.

I think we are in alignment on this. He may very well have put it on a gurney in the hallway, thinking it was JFK's gurney. His current claim he put it on the gurney in Trauma Room One while JFK was surrounded by medical people doesn't pass muster, IMO.

Unless it never made its way inside the shirt... Some like to twist Humes' statements into his saying the bullet penetrated an inch or so. His testimony is clear, however, that it barely broke the skin. if so, this would 1) indicate that the bullet was under-charged, and 2) be in keeping with Landis' current recollection of seeing an intact bullet in the rear compartment.

Posner may be relying on Sturdivan and Rahn, who claimed (falsely) to have resuscitated Guinn's findings. Or maybe he's just full of it, replaying the nonsense he's used to playing. If so, well, he's not alone. There are plenty of CT's doing this very thing, whether it be claiming Oswald is in Altgens or that Greer shot JFK, etc. I think that K and K or some other website should create a tally board, with a list of 20 or so issues, along with the current feelings of the most prominent researchers on these issues. This would be of help to the media in cases like this one. While the media will almost certainly depict Landis' story as a CT/LN issue, it could very well turn out that some LNs think there's something to it, and that many CTs find it unreliable. Such a tally board would also be helpful to TV producers tasked with deciding what is credible vs incredible. It seems probable that if such a list were in existence at the time. nonsensical shows like The Lost Bullet and The Smoking Gun would not have been made.

I just went back and re-read the Vanity Fair and NY Times articles, and they present a different story. Both tell Landis' story second-hand. The facts in the story conflict. In one the bullet is found on the seat. in the other it is found at the top of the back of the seat. While this conflict could be because the journalists couldn't understand exactly what he was saying--at least 20-30% of articles in the assassination make such a mistake--it might also be taken as an indication he's erratic--which would not come as a surprise due to his age and the time involved. I think I'll wait to see what he says in his book and the interviews to come before coming to a conclusion as to his reliability.

From patspeer.com, Chapter 11: "And should one still have any doubts, and still cling to the notion that the bullet hitting Connally must have remained on his person or in the limousine, and could not possibly have been cleaned-up, stolen, lost or overlooked, there is this: there is at least one fragment that disappeared after the shooting. Yes, in 2010, with the release of The Kennedy Detail, Secret Service Agent Paul Landis related that after Kennedy and his wife were pulled from the limousine, he noticed a bullet fragment sitting on the back of the car by the headrest. He claimed he then put it on the seat. Well, you guessed it, no fragment was found on this seat. This, then, suggests this fragment was "cleaned up" in some manner, for one reason or another." Unfortunately, I am not positive where I saw his 2010 comments about the bullet, but it may have been in the TV program The Kennedy Detail, which was first broadcast 12-2-10. Note that Landis now says he brought it into Trauma Room One, when he originally said he put it on the seat. This is quite interesting, IMO. Perhaps then he is covering for Kinney. He put it on the seat and Kinney took it in.

I think the implication is that someone put it there, and not that it landed there on its own.