Duke Lane

My only question is whether the guy used an eBay MasterCard to get up to $25.00 back ....?

QED.* ------- * For the uninitiated, quod erat demonstrandum ("which demonstrates itself"), proving once again that I can shpell mosht shtuff, even Latin, when I want to.

There seems little hope in resolving this issue, especially when each party to the discussion considers the other to be too stupid, naive, dull or hard-headed to understand or appreciate what the other is saying, and unable or unwilling to grasp the obvious validity of the argument, methodology or conclusions either one has employed or reached. They are at a hopeless impasse, each unable or unwilling to concede any point to the other, and clearly unable to combine their intelligence and expertise - to whatever degree one will concede that the other possesses any of - to reach a common ground. Some things just flat-out stump me, one being the apparent use of two-dimensional measurements and projections to plot a three-dimensional perspective. In one case, a trajectory from the "Picket Fence Gunman" is shown along the "gun barrel's" length and projected to JFK's position as if left-to-right is the only valid measurement, and that front-to-back perspective is immaterial. In a three-dimensional world, the appearance of a particular angle is affected by the rotation of the object, thus what appears to be, for example, a 45° downward angle in a photo may actually be a 30° downward angle because the object is rotated clockwise toward the viewer. The Moorman photo is simply not clear enough to be able to measure the left-to-right rotational angle by, for example, comparing the difference in the circumference of the rifle barrel at the nearest and farthest parts. In another case - which might have been part of another thread - someone decried another's failure to take into account a one-foot change in the elevation of the ground atop the knoll (don't know about you, but that seems like an awful lot to me!), and in another, one pointed out that, in the animated GIFs posted here, the fence line "drops and rises so dramatically between the images" simply because "the camera angle looking at the knoll is different than Moorman's." So here we have the ground "moving" as well as the fence. Oh, and the fence is no longer in the same spot nor the same height - either or both of which have an effect on perspective - as it was in 1963, although if that's so, I've seen no mention of measurements; dates don't particularly matter except to prove it happened. (Somewhere, someone called it a "five-foot" picket fence while what is there today is a six-foot picket fence; if so, making the fence taller and moving it either closer or farther will certainly change its apparent height, relative to a person standing there or not.) It seems that there are altogether too many variables - fence, ground and clearness of imagery ... not to mention relative intelligence, imagination and skill or lack thereof - for anyone to reach any sort of definite conclusion. Mostly, this discussion just seems to be a contest of who can insult the other better and more imaginatively (my favorite to date: "I could solicit the assistance of an organ-grinder's helper monkey and probably get it to offer up a better finished product than what you posted." You go! That almost convinces me that ... whatever it is this thread is trying to convince me of!). It's almost not unlike an argument between two people whose only exposure to this whole deal is the "JFK" film each trying to convince the other whether or not Lee Oswald did it alone and unaided: not enough data and hardly the expertise. Which one is the photogrammetrist? Neither has even spelled it right. Me, I'm just a humble professional photographer and don't have a clue about this shtuff.

TV is a perfect world. The truth is that we only hope that law enforcement (and intelligence) agencies are sharing information and garnering new leads in faster, more efficient ways. A whole new bureaucracy was invented, as a matter of fact, to ensure that entrenched, territorial bureaucracies would interact (or, to be generous, would interact better) with other entrenched, territorial bureaucracies ... that as a reaction to the fact that, as late as September 11 2001, those bureaucracies were not playing well together in the sandbox.Call it what you will: an "intelligence failure" or simple inter-service rivalry, but it's been there for years. The murder of a president didn't change it, any more than the desire to keep 220 floors of American businesses from crumbling down prevented it. Hopefully, reality will take a lesson from TV. As I'd pointed out, the Dave's interview was done by the FBI in Dallas within 10 days of the assassination; the Retting interview was conducted by the USSS in Los Angeles a day or two later. Those reports were not emailed to headquarters, subjected to rules-based computer logic, and disseminated to agencies with a need to know over a high-speed secure connection. They filtered their ways through the respective field offices of each agency, evaluated by the SAIC, compiled into larger reports and transmitted in printed form to the respective headquarters, where they were probably copied and circulated and compiled again into even larger reports, approved and eventually forwarded to the Warren Commission, which received similar voluminous reports from both agencies and others (and at least one envelope from CIA). How many hundreds if not thousands of cubic feet of documents was it that were eventually filed? A typical "banker's box" file is only two cubic feet. We're talking about more paper than you and I could read together in a year, and the WC did it in about three months. Efficiently, you think? (If decades-later experience is any indicator, the "need to know" was determined by the simple principle that select people within an agency had one, but nobody from another agency did. Maybe, just maybe, we're getting past that syndrome now, and probably only reluctantly, at the lower levels anyway.) Thus, when the WC got these reports - many of several hundred pages each - someone had to go through them and evaluate the material within. Chances are that this was not one person, and that every word written was not read. It's a reasonable presumption that one person might've read the FBI report (which might have reached the WC as late as February or March; remember, they didn't really even open their doors until late January) while another read the USSS report. Their job - as in any bureaucracy or even a large company - is to cull important things out for the bosses, the busy counsel and assistant counsel who were already working on the skeleton of the Commission's Report and planning their depositions; it wasn't Arlen Specter and Joe Ball going through all that raw material, and damned sure Hale Boggs and Earl Warren weren't burning the midnight oil looking for anomalies like this for FBI investigation. Assume for the moment that the guy reading the USSS report might actually have known about - or even read - the FBI report on Dave's, or vice versa. Did he think it was important? Did he bring it to anyone's attention? Certainly, he was in no position to tell Hoover and his FBI to send someone out to Dave's to re-interview anybody. But let's say that he got somebody's attention: it undoubtedly went up the line for evaluation (and, presumably, approval) and added in to the batch of stuff that the WC needed to get or wanted to bring up with either agency, most likely the FBI. That meeting was going to be next week. In the meanwhile, more reports had come in, other questions had arisen, and maybe that question about the scope wasn't that big of a deal anyway since we already know that Oswald had gotten the rifle from Klein's, and the USSS's interviewee - an expert in the field, after all - had speculated that the "most logical" place he'd have gotten the scope was from Klein's, so since it was possible - and logical - that must be the way it happened. File this, willya? (Or maybe J. Edgar just didn't think it was important and it didn't get done.) That's not the kind of reality they depict on TV, but it is a reality. Um ... you didn't really buy that "Truth is our only client" hooha, did you? Remember, as counsel learned more about what had happened from interviewing witnesses, they were admonished that "it's time to be closing doors, not opening them." The truth was not going to keep them waiting past election time, and that's all there was to that. They barely made it. Let me know how the view is.

Mark, according to CE1799, the postal inspectors, including in particular Harry Holmes, interviewed a Mr. and Mrs. C. P. Schneider of Irving, Texas, in the neighborhood of the Paines and Randles, on November 22, 1963, at 6pm. They said that Mrs. Ed Roberts, i.e. Dorothy Roberts, told them that "Willie Randle" had driven Oswald to work that morning. She apparently didn't know that it was Wesley Frazier who drove Oswald to work that morning. The Secret Service however took the name Willie Randall and tried to connect it with firearm sales. They should have looked up Buell Wesley Frazier instead.Thanks Roy! Nice job. Randle had left that morning bound for Austin with a fellow employee of his brother's firm named Berry Castor. Maybe Roberts mistook Castor for Oswald?Greg, thanks. My reading of the exhibit is that Roberts was told that "Randle", which she couldn't spell, or the SS guy spelled phonetically, drove Oswald to the depository that morning. Consequently, the authorities figured Randle, whose first name she got wrong, and whose last name she didn't know was really Frazier, might be an accomplice of Oswald since he, Frazier, drove him to work that morning along with a rifle. The authorities thought they were investigating that young boy (Willie Randall). But why the scope investigation, rather than the rifle. Had someone at the TSBD found a rifle without a scope, or one with a scope that they thought had been purchased separately? Still some questions here to be answered. Well, clearly Linnie May's husband could as easily gone by "Willie" as Bill or William, and Dorothy Roberts said that Linnie May - along with Ruth Paine and Marina Oswald - had made a habit of coming over to her house fairly frequently. If the Schneiders merely repeated the story Roberts had told them - complete with the name that either or both Dorothy and/or Linnie Mae called Linnie Mae's husband, there you have that; "Randle," of course, has the same phonetic sound as "Randall." I agree that it makes sense that "Willie Randall" would be investigated as a possible accomplice, but it doesn't make sense that postal folks didn't go the extra step in determining where this "Willie Randle" lived and interview him, even if only to get his name spelled correctly! Being aware of Buell Frazier, it also doesn't make sense that, if they were going to gain an interest in investigating "Willie Randle" whom Oswald had driven to work with, that they didn't also have an interest in investigating Frazier along the same lines. Or perhaps they had, and figured they'd follow up on this "new" fellow! More suprising, however, is the bland acceptance of Martin Retting's pronouncement that, although he had sold a quantity of scopes to Dave's House of Guns at 2544 Elm Street in Dallas, "Klein's Sporting Goods would be the logical place of business that Oswald would have purchased the gun sight as well as the gun." What would make a mail order location in Chicago more "logical" for a Dallasite to do business than a place in Dallas? As to: ... it might be noted that Goldstein was interviewed "within 10 days of the assassination," i.e., on or before December 2, 1963; Retting wasn't interviewed until December 3, 1500 miles away, and by agents of a different agency. If there is anyone who would expect the Secret Service to relay the results of an interview to the FBI a day or two before the Secret Service interview took place has not had much experience in dealing with either the US Government or with reality; to expect it to be relayed to the proper persons within days or even weeks after the event is itself unrealistic.

Thanks. I just tripped across this article and they were talking about "this time next year" ... in 2004! I figured something must've transpired in the three years since "this time next year," but apparently not a lot.

So whatever became of this? Just curious .... Tape of Kennedy's Killing Is Getting Digital Analysis By MICHAEL JANOFSKY Published: August 3, 2004 © New York Times (link to original) About a year from now, one of the most vexing mysteries in American history may finally be solved: Did Lee Harvey Oswald act alone? Scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have begun work on a digital scanning apparatus that they believe will be able to reproduce sound from the only known audio recording of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas. The recording was made through an open microphone on a police motorcycle during Kennedy's motorcade into Dealey Plaza, where the president was shot to death. The sounds were captured onto a Dictaphone belt at police headquarters, but scientific analyses of them over decades proved anything but conclusive, fueling arguments about how many people were actually involved in killing the president. The federal government's official inquiry into the assassination, the Warren Commission, concluded in 1964 that Oswald was a lone gunman, firing three shots from the Texas Book Depository building high above the plaza. But a House committee that investigated the shooting 15 years later concluded that four shots were fired, including three from the book depository and one from another location, giving rise to all manner of conspiracy theories. Like old 78 r.p.m. records, the Dictaphone belt became worn and damaged through constant replay for analysis using a stylus. When it became property of the National Archives in 1990, the technical staff recommended that no further efforts be made to replicate its sounds through mechanical means. That left preservationists with a daunting and historically important challenge: How could the sounds on the old plastic belt be captured for posterity, and if they could, would they provide unequivocal evidence of how many shots were fired? Leslie C. Waffen, an archivist with the National Archives, said he believed not only that the sound could be captured but also that, using digital analysis to map the sounds, scientists could remove extraneous noise like static and distant voices to reveal gun shots. ''This is big,'' said Mr. Waffen, whose unit has custody of the belt as well as the original 8-millimeter home movie by Abraham Zapruder, which showed the assassination in color but utter silence. ''That's why we called the experts in. They came up with a recommendation to do this.'' After a June meeting of the National Archives Advisory Committee on Preservation, the job was left to Carl Haber and Vitaliy Fadeyev of the Berkeley laboratory, who have used a digital optical camera to replicate sounds on fragile Edison cylinders and long-play records. The process involves scanning the grooves of the Dictaphone belt electronically to create a digital image of the sound patterns. Once that is achieved, Mr. Waffen said, the scientists could ''clean it up, like peeling layers off an onion to get down to the sound floor'' of the recording. And that, he said, could reveal how many shots were fired. It is a question that has bedeviled government officials, law enforcement agents and historians since the actual event, leading to an array of conspiracy theories involving the mob, Fidel Castro, Lyndon B. Johnson, Russians or, as the film director, Oliver Stone, would have audiences believe, the ''military industrial complex.'' Among the strongest and most persistent alternative theories to the Warren Commission report has been the involvement of a second gunman on a sweep of land above the motorcade route that came to be known as the grassy knoll. It gained widespread currency after the 1979 Congressional investigation, which relied, in part, on a graphic comparison of the sounds on the Dictaphone belt and a test of gunshots in Dealey Plaza. They produced evidence that four shots were fired, with indications that the first, second and fourth shots came from the book depository and the third came from the grassy knoll. But three years later, in a subsequent acoustical analysis, the National Academy of Science concluded that the noise that others ascribed to gun shots was merely static or something else. That was the last time the belt was played. Once it became the belt's custodian, the National Archives was faced with two questions: What should be done with it? And how could its evidence be accurately captured and made public? For years, the questions were unanswered, until it became clear that new technologies might produce evidence that was unreachable through older, less sophisticated analytical methods that risked further damaging the belt. The advisory commission concluded that the National Archives had a responsibility to provide a true copy of the sound, if not enhance it. That, the panel members said, could be left to the researchers. ''People want to know,'' said Gary Mack, curator of the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza, which opened in the book depository building in 1989. ''The Warren Commission said it was one guy. The House Committee said it was Oswald and someone else. There hasn't been any resolution.'' Mr. Waffen said it was about time to get one. ''Scientists have studied these sounds for 25 or 30 years and have still reached different conclusions,'' he said. ''But with today's technology, we can get a better reading and answer the question, one way or the other.''

Some comments on several of the items from this thread .... Working strictly from memory, it has always amazed me that the dual arguments have been put forth - often by the same people - that NAA provided an "exact match" to the MC ammo used in the assassination (although I think the words used were along the lines of "consistent with"), and that the same tests found that there was a wide disparity not only among the bullets of a particular batch of MC bullets, but even within a single bullet. The wonderful duality here is that "inconsistency proves consistency." Hal Weisberg successfully sued for the release of the actual NAA tests and found that the measurements between the various samples were anything but "identical," hence the rise of the "explanation" of the inconsistency of composition. "They were different, which proves they were the same." Like DNA evidence where only "some" of the strands matched, but were "consistent with" a curly-haired man, such as the defendant. That said, in considering the evidence of the bullet used in the Walker shooting as either "steel-jacketed" or "copper-jacketed," we must consider the evidence in the Tippit case as perhaps instructive. In this, we find a mismatch of shells and slugs, there being three (3) Winchester-Western slugs and one (1) Remington-Peters slug (only one of which was turned over to the FBI for several months), "coupled" with two (2) Winchester shells, and two (2) Remington shells. We won't delve into the questions about markings on the shells found at the scene and all of that, but merely point out that evidence was handled cavalierly at best. See Cortlandt Cunningham testimony at 3H473 et seq., particularly his statement that ... it is my understanding the first bullet was turned over to the FBI office in Dallas by the Dallas Police Department. They reportedly said this was the only bullet that was recovered, or that they had. Later at the request of this Commission, we went back to the Dallas Police Department and found in their files that they actually had three other bullets. If DPD didn't know what it had in terms of evidence in the murder of "one of their own" well enough to keep track of it, with what certainty can we state that anyone knew whether the bullet considered as "Walker evidence" was in fact the actual bullet that was fired at Turtle Creek? The officer who originally identified it at the scene held it in his hand, not looking at a photo; he was not just a traffic cop who happened to be driving by, but a trained investigator: can it be said that he "mistook" copper for steel? He was not asked to identify it for the record, so its pedigree is questionable at best. Even if we stipulate that the bullet was fired from the C2766 rifle, who here - or anywhere - can put Lee Oswald behind it squeezing the trigger? These days - and in those, too - notables from around town are quoted and quizzed endlessly in the news, but rarely if ever does anyone refer to "Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, who lives at 1234 Anystreet," or to Ross Perot or Tom Hicks or Jerry Jones, any more than articles of the time were likely to have said "General Walker of 4011 Turtle Creek ...." How did Oswald supposedly even know where Walker lived? If it was a setup of some sort, there was no actual need to have Oswald pulling the trigger, only a gun that could be associated with him. Given that there's some speculation that he might've been involved with the Senator Thomas Dodd investigation into mail-order weaponry, he was probably reporting to someone if so (not directly to Dodd), and may have given the rifle over to someone. Even still, until after November 22, it was a completely unrelated "crime" in which the evidence didn't match; afterward, it seems to have. (I'm recalling that the original report claimed a steel-jacketed, .30+ cal ammo, no? Tight fit in a .223 Carcano if so.) The possibility of Walker (or one of his cohorts) alerting the German press to the "assassination attempt" against him "by Oswald" would certainly have taken some of the edge off of any perception of the right wing having been behind Kennedy's assassination, for it would make little sense that the Oswald would attempt to kill both the "leftist" President as well as his adversaries on the right: talk about biting the hand that feeds you! "See? He tried to kill me, too, which proves me and my people weren't behind it." QED. As someone brought up in the Soviet Union, where people disappeared to the sounds of footsteps in the night and filled with anti-American propaganda that painted the USA with the same brush as we painted the USSR (albeit with greater justification), how would this twenty-something girl who spoke only broken English know that the FBI was any different than the KGB? Was she not spirited away "for her own protection" when her husband was "hurt," held incommunicado in accomodations that were certainly better than Lubyanka, but every bit short of torture as intimidating as a brief stay there? Federal agents taking custody of you are, when all is said and done, federal agents taking custody of you. Wherein lies the difference in this young girl's mind?If she were more aware of her surroundings, she'd have known that she couldn't have been compelled to give any evidence against her husband; instead, she was advised of the benefit of "cooperating" with the investigation (shades of Mother Russia! It really is no different here, just like they told us back home!). Did she think she could return home to a ticker-tape parade after defecting to the USA? If she were deported (as the FBI intimated ... and one hardly imagines J. Edgar Hoover being soft on "the little Communist bitch" and being overly concerned about her rights), where exactly would she go? As the "wife of the assassin," who could she look to to support her if she were sent home? I have to agree about being able to put any credence on the "fanciful and forced testimony of his understandably frightened wife. (It's a nicely alliterate turn of phrase, too!) All in all, while I agree that there is "something" to the Walker shooting, I don't necessarily agree that it had anything to do with Lee Oswald until long after the fact, when it became "convenient" to deflect attention and suspicion away from the "Radical Right," of which Walker was a member, if only unofficially. Given DPD's questionable handling of evidence and the many members of the force who were either supporters or members of right-wing organizations, it isn't entirely inconceivable that "proof" was "manufactured" in the course of collecting evidence in the assassination investigation. Once in a while, you can get shown the light ...!

A couple of things here. First is that, according to Jerry Hill, they left the theater, went around the block (east on Sunset) to Zangs, and north on Zangs. Thereafter, there's no discussion of how they got to City Hall. Taking the most direct route (according to Google Maps), 13 minutes to cover about 4 miles at "regular speed." I've found Google's time estimates to be on the high side, for example Tippit's drive from Kiest and Bonnie View to 8th and Lancaster is estimated at 11 minutes; I've done it numerous times - at the speed limit - in eight. At 30 mph - slower than the speed limit ... and Hill did say, "we got the suspect to the city hall as rapidly as possible without using the siren and red light, but we took advantage of every open spot we had to make a little speed," suggesting speeds higher than that - it would take just eight minutes to cover four miles, plus time for red lights, etc. Hill's narrative (his testimony was not taken in the usual question-and-answer fashion) regarding their arrival at DPDHQ is: [We] got him out on the third floor, walked him into the homicide and robbery office, placed him in the first interrogation room inside the homicide and robbery office, and left Officer Walker there with him. At this point I stood in the door of the, or at the door of the room he was in. Reporters wanted to see the pistol. I held it up to them but never relinquished control of it. I asked Baker at this time, who was Detective T. L. Baker, if he wanted the pistol, and he said, "No; hold on to it until later." I explained to trim that this was the suspect on Tippit and did he want us to make up the arrest sheet, or would they make them up. We were trying to get together to decide who was going to make the offense report and get all the little technicalities out of the way when a detective named Richard Stovall and another one, G. F. Rose, came up, and the four of us were standing when Captain Fritz walked in. He walked up to Rose and Stovall and made the statement to them, "Go get a search warrant and go out to some address on Fifth Street," and I don't recall the actual street number, in Irving, and "pick up a man named Lee Oswald." And I asked the captain why he wanted him, and he said, "Well, he was employed down at the Book Depository and he had not been present for a roll call of the employees." And we said, "Captain, we will save you a trip," or words to that effect, "Because there he sits." And with that, we relinquished our prisoner to the homicide and robbery bureau, to Captain Fritz. I don't know that he's unequivocal about standing "in the door of the, or at the door of the room he was in" throughout the entire period; it is merely where he was at that point in time. One imagines that, during the course of conversation, the men may have moved around a little - walked down the hall to an office, say, or just wandered a few yards away from the door - so the possibility exists of Leavelle's having ten minutes to talk with Oswald, but Leavelle himself denied it under oath, closer to the time of the actual event (or non-event) than the later interview. This reminds me in a way of the "oral history" interview of Patrolman Smith, who was on the railroad tracks when the parade came through the plaza. In 1964, he testified that he'd gone to the north end of the bridge and then had done something else, I don't recall offhand what, but that he did not search the railroad yards or rail cars. For Larry Snead's No More Silence, he said that he spent about 15 minutes searching the railroad cars. Who knows, maybe both are true: he didn't search them, but only for 15 minutes. Like Leavelle: he'd never spoken to Oswald before the interrogation with Fritz, but only for 10 minutes. On a slightly different topic, someone had once remarked that, at the time, the two incidents - the JFK and JDT murders - were not connected. The response was to the effect that "a beginner cop would wonder about the connection as soon as the guy was brought in ... and perhaps while he was on the way." I said that, sure, it's a reasonable assumption, but only after the fact, when "blessed with 20/20 hindsight." That elicited a response, exclaiming "two highly significant shootings within 45 minutes and you thinking it's hindsight to wonder at the time if they were connected? And you're serious?????????" Duh. All I've got to base that on is a guy who had been a cop for 14 years and a homicide dick for five, who said "at the time I didn't realize there was any connection between Oswald and the shooting of Tippit - or the one that they had arrested in the Texas Theatre for the killing of Tippit and the Presidential assassination. I thought it was two different things altogether." Stupid me: I relied on the insight of an idiot! I wonder: was he serious?????????? And to think that they put this klutz on TV and treat him like some sort of expert! Sheesh! Sounds like the kind of guy who could accidentally shoot someone with an unloaded gun, and they gave him a badge! It's pointless to argue with an acknowledged expert, I guess, cuz you're never gonna be right unless you're singing the same song from the same hymnal.

I'm not terribly sure about this: Reading Lyon's report of December 4, 1963, regarding the "Arrest of Lee Harvey Oswald," I don't find anything that such "suggests" any such thing, do you? I quote in full: "On November 22, 1963 at approximately 2:00 p.m., Detective B.K. Carroll and I were instructed by Lieutenant E. Kaminsky to go to the Oak Cliff area where Officer J.D. Tippit had been shot. "While en route to Oak Cliff, we received information on our police radio that the suspect had entered the Texas Theater, 231 W. Jefferson. When we arrived at the Texas Theater, we were told that the suspect had gone to the balcony. While searching the balcony, I heard someone call from the lower floor that the suspect was down there. I ran down the steps, and as I neared the bottom, I sprained my left ankle. "I then proceeded to the location where Officers P.L. Bentley, M.N. McDonald, C.T. Walker, and other officers were attempting to disarm Lee Harvey Oswald. During this time, Lee Harvey Oswald kept yelling 'I am not resisting arrest. I am not resisiting arrest. I want to complain of police brutality.' "Captain W.R. Westbrook then told several of the officers to take Oswald directly to the City Hall. "Officers B.K. Carroll, Sergeant Jerry Hill, P.L. Bentley, C.T. Walker, and myself transported Oswald to the City Hall. "En route to the City Hall, Oswald refused to answer all questions, and he kept repeating 'Why am I being arrested? I know I was carrying a gun, but why am I being arrested?' "Lee Harvey Oswald was released to Captain Fritz at the Homicide and Robbery Bureau by the transporting officers. "Respectfully submitted, "K.E. Lyon, #1276 "Patrolman - Vice Section "Special Service Bureau" [source: Commission Exhibit 2003, page 91, at WCH 24/240] Of course, officers filed several reports, and this may not be the one that Gary is referring to. If not, a citation is definitely due other than Gary's own off-the-cuff expertise. In any case, I don't see that this report "confirms" any such oral history except as such purveyors of oral histories would like it to. I think the question has always been: yes ... but what? The question that Gary Mack fails to answer (as an expert on the matter, quotable by the New York Times) is what "someone or something prompted Bentley to ask Oswald about killing Kennedy" when there is no actual proof (as opposed to "suggestions") that such a question was ever asked.According to the "official" line (spin?), nobody had a clue that there was any connection between the crimes until Oswald was brought into DPHQ and identified by co-worker affiants there as also having worked in the building associated with the murder of the President. It was then - and only then - that the connection was supposedly made. Of course, afterward any cop who "didn't realize" the potential for such a connection was clearly clueless (see Jesse Curry's book extolling the virtues of DPD's investigation). As I think Jerry Rose once put it (to the effect that), "a few minutes and a few blocks away, the connection made sense; 45 minutes later and [just?] three miles away, it wasn't so obvious." The Times has its answer from The Sixth Floor's expert, it's not going to confuse its readers by arguing facts.

Well, when you put it that way, who indeed? And why? I'm not recalling if any of them were asked to identify the ammo, but I'm pretty sure I don't recall any of them saying "hmm, yeah, that looks like one of 'em: it doesn't have a firing pin mark on it. Oh, and this could be another of 'em: it doesn't either!" Dale Myers quotes Jim Leavelle to the effect that "some officers do things and they get in over their heads," I think it was in reference to Poe's marking the shells he'd received. The same might apply here: do we know for a fact that any of the guys who saw this "firing pin mark" were actually trained to see dents on a cartridge, any more than Poe was trained to scratch his initials on anything? This is what a lack of training will do. They were clearly in over their heads.

When several police officers testify to there having been a dent in the shell made by the firing pin of a weapon, and there appears NO dent in the evidence entered, then the taint goes to the evidence, not the deponents. If, on the other hand, several officers testify that there was NOT a dent, and NO dent appears, but one officer believes that there was such a dent, it is more likely that his memory is mistaken and the evidence is valid.

... And, of course, his Dallas Morning News obituary. I'd only met Paul Bentley once, and was surprised at his having much less of a gruff demeanor (and being much more soft spoken) than I'd have expected from his cigar-chomping photo in front of the Texas Theater. Of course, it was many years after that photo that I met him; he was older, probably mellower (a grandfather a couple of times over), no longer a cop and with an audience. In all, I found him very pleasant for the short time I was around him.

Here is the list of officers responding to the Oak Cliff "Signal 19, officer" – 37 in all – subject to any additions or corrections: 105 – J.M. Poe and L.E. Jez 93 – H.M. Ashcraft 19 – Sgt. C.B. Owens 79 – B.N. Anglin 211 – Ray Hawkins (and) Baggett 95 – M.N. McDonald and T.R. Gregory 85 – R.W. Walker 221 – H.W. Summers 91 – W.D. Mentzel 223 – C.T. Walker 75 – E.G. Sebastian ??? – T.A. Hutson 76 – H.H. Horn 111 – J.G. Pollard 77 – W.E. Smith 22 – L.L. Hill 550 – Capt. W.R. Westbrook and Sgt. R.D. Stringer (with unknown officer) 550/2 – Sgt. G.L. Hill 15 – Capt. C.E. Talbert 29 – J.N. Williams 66 – F.S. Williams 242 – B.E. Thornhill Officers Walker (85) and Mentzel (91) were already in Oak Cliff at the time of the shooting of Officer Tippit. Officer J.N. Williams (29), a canine corps officer, arrived in Oak Cliff following the call to the theater. Officer F.S. Williams first appeared on the scene (via radio) just before the 1:34, and Officer B.E. Thornhill (242) radioed being at "R.L. Thornton and Marsalis" at approximately 1:40. Patrolman H.H. Horn (76) radioed "en route over there" shortly after 1:27, and Sergeant R.D. Shipley (16), Area Commander for the Northeast Substation, radioed that he was "out on East Jefferson" at about 1:28, but both later reported[ii] that they had been dispatched to the TSBD and remained there the rest of the afternoon." Criminal Investigation Division Detective B.K. Carroll, Vice Squad Officer K.E. Lyons, and Detective Paul Bentley, the senior polygraph operator for the department, were also present during the search and arrest at the Texas Theater. Detective Bentley had ridden down to 10th and Patton with crime scene investigators W.A. Barnes and Captain G.M. Doughty. Lieutenant E.L. Cunningham together with Detectives E.E. Taylor, J.B. Toney and M.A. Buhk, were dispatched by Captain O.A. Jones at the Trade Mart to proceed to the Elm and Houston scene, but diverted themselves to Oak Cliff.[iii] Detective Toney filed a similar report, but indicated that they had been "cruising the Oak Cliff area" at the time.[iv] This "cruising" is explained by both Lt. Cunningham and Detective Buhk, who noted that they had arrived in Oak Cliff in time to participate in the surrounding of the library.[v] (Interestingly, Lieutenant Cunningham reported that, while the four men had been en route from the Trade Mart to Elm and Houston, they received a radio call for "all available units to report" to the Oak Cliff shooting scene. No such broadcast was made. Detective Buhk, on the other hand, noted that they "heard the report of an officer being shot," and that Lt. Cunningham had "decided we could do more good by going to that location immediately rather than by way of the scene of the President's shooting" [emphasis added], an estimation held by several officers, as has been shown. Buhk implies that they expected that they would be dispatched to Oak Cliff after arriving at Elm and Houston to attend to the officer's shooting instead of the President's.) Unit 305, manned by any or all of Detectives Landle, Beck and/or Boyce from the Criminal Investigation Division was also heard on the radio only a short while after it was announced that a "suspect on the shooting the police officer is apprehended and en route to the station," telling dispatch to "tell that squad to stand by there for me with that man." In addition to the 32 officers named above, Officers B.L. Jones and M.D. Hall (district 102), and G.W. Hammer (districts 26 and 27) stated in separate reports that they had responded to the Oak Cliff "Signal 19," as did Officer J.M. Lewis (districts 35 and 36). Finally, Detective J.R. Leavelle is reported to have been at the scene,[vi] making a total of 37 officers known to be in Oak Cliff in response to the shooting of Officer Tippit. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- In an unusual turn of events, Officers J.N. Williams and S.E. Norman of the canine corps were requested by Captain Talbert to report to Elm and Houston because, Talbert radioed following his request at about 1:00, the Depository building would "be a hard one to search out thoroughly without those dogs." Williams and Norman were dispatched to retrieve their dogs from home at about 1:16, and Williams was assigned at about 1:35 by dispatch to "Marsalis and Jefferson," the site of the library. When Norman called in at 1:48 asking where to go, Captain Talbert said that they were not needed at the Oak Cliff murder scene, but told dispatch to "send him to the Texas Theater, if they don't need him down at the book bindery." Dispatch at first assigned him to also go to Oak Cliff, but upon hearing that Williams was just two blocks from the theater, changed Norman's assignment to Elm and Houston. [ii] Commission Document 1108, pages 151 and 153 [iii] Detective Taylor related in his report (CE 2003, page 97, at WCH 24/243) noted that he, Lt. Cunningham, and J.B. Tony remained at the theater following the arrest "and took the names and addresses of the occupants of the theater." No such list was ever entered into evidence, despite several orders at the time, including by Captain Westbrook, to produce it. [iv] Ibid. at WCH 24/244 [v] Ibid. at WCH 24/236 (Cunningham) and 24/234 (Buhk) [vi] Ibid. at WCH 24/254

True, but that was only two or three blocks. See map here.

Wow, Steve, that's some work!! Find a place to put this permanently! I've added some comments/corrections based on my most recent studies, do with as you like. "Clear" generally means "available for duty," but was sometimes used as an equivalent to "out," meaning "out of service" for any reason. These guys were actually part of what I refer to as the "wild ambulance chase" because there was no ambulance heading to Parkland from Dealey Plaza (the one carrying the epileptic had long since arrived). Dispatchers kept up the pretense until a Sergeant demanded a location, at which point these guys were sent downtown. Stringer was assigned call sign 551, but didn't use it that day because for the most part, he was with Capt Westbrook (550). Lewis didn't go downtown right away, and it's not even certain that he ever did other than that he said he was going to ... within five minutes of being told to "remain in service" in his patrol district ... which he wasn't even close to! Part of the problem - by no means intended to disparage this work - is that a lot of officers went there (and to Oak Cliff) without ever saying so on the radio. Just off the top of my head, Jim M. Valentine #104 also went to DP, but did not call in (although 550/2's transmission indicates "550/2 and 104 en route to Elm and Houston, Code 3"), and Capt. Westbrook #550 actually walked to DP so didn't even have a radio to call in on! Of course, Capt. Fritz was also there, but did not radio either his arrival or his departure. You'd never be able know these things without reading testimonies and reports. Of course, this also doesn't include the officers (see CD81b) who were assigned to DP at the tail end of the motorcade, those who were just a block or two away and may have gone when they heard the shots, or any of the sheriff's deputies who were watching from in front of DCSO at Main and Houston. For my immediate purposes, it may be sufficient just to note the number who responded to the Signal 19 call, and note the officers assigned to parade duty in DP and the sheriff's deputies ...? For the sake of adding to the list, this is an initial and incomplete list of the 20+ officers who reported to the Oak Cliff Signal 19, more or less in the order they arrived: 105 - Ptm. J.M. Poe (and) L.E. Jez 19 - Sgt. C.B. Owens 211 - Ptm. Ray Hawkins (and) Baggett 85 - Ptm. R.W. Walker 91 - Ptm. W.D. Mentzel (85 & 91 were already in Oak Cliff) 75 - Ptm. E.G. Sebastian 76 - Ptm. H.H. Horn 16 - Sgt. R.D. Shipley 77 - Ptm. W.E. Smith 93 - Ptm. H.M. Ashcraft 79 - Ptm. B.N. Anglin 95 - Ptm. M.N. McDonald 221 - Ptm. H.W. Summers 223 - Ptm. C.T. Walker ??? - Ptm. T.A. Hutson 111 - Ptm. J.G. Pollard 22 - Ptm. L.L. Hill 550 - Capt. W.R. Westbrook (and) Sgt. R.D. Stringer (and another unnamed officer) 550/2 - Sgt. G.L. Hill 15 - Capt. C.E. Talbert In addition, Dets. Lyon and Carroll and Sgt. Paul Bentley were in the area, along with FBI SA Bob Barrett, and R.C. Nelson (87) also arrived there, albeit after Oswald's arrest. Supposedly, R.W. Courson was also there - I've read somewhere he was the first on the scene - and he is listed both as being #153 (on motorcycle) and as a trainee under W.D. Mentzel. Finally(?), according to Sgt. Hill, a patrolman Bob Apple (#243?) was also there.

Now there's an interesting character, Jack! Can you expound upon that? How about lunch to discuss?

It's a start, Chris, and I appreciate the effort! One of the problems, of course, is that several officers went to either location without indicating that on the radio (Paul Bentley in Oak Cliff, for example, and another whose 3-wheeler broke down and he rode with two others), or only were clear about where they'd gone after the fact (R.C. Nelson at the TSBD, for one). I was kind of hoping that someone had gone through the transcripts as well as the "after action" reports and testimonies to come up with a list or lists. That could take more than just "a few days!!"

Does anyone know of a resource that can provide a list of all of the officers who responded to either or both of the "Signal 19" (shooting) calls in downtown and/or Oak Cliff? I'm not having any luck and if it's already been done, I don't want to have to reinvent the wheel. Many thanks for any leads ....

I thought I'd answer the question - "How difficult was it to get out of Dallas on 22 November?" - graphically by way of Putnam Exhibit 1, below. This is the color key: Red - "all squads in the downtown area" ordered to report "Code 3 with caution" to Elm & Houston; except Yellow - initial responders outside immediate downtown area (including "downtown" officers); Green - those who later reported they had gone downtown, whether broadcast or not; Light yellow - those who reported they were assigned to Parkland; Light blue - those who were not in their districts for other reasons; Pink - those who reported that they remained on patrol in their districts; Dark blue - the TSBD district, center of activity; Light green - Tippit's district (78) and new assignment (91/92, "central Oak Cliff"); and White - those who were not on radio and filed no report, presumed to have been in district. So the answer is, if someone wanted out of town, as long as they didn't run into a pink or white district, they were home free. The short answer to "how difficult was it" is: not very.

Hey, I'm having trouble with this: there is (no longer?) a "Samuels" in Dallas, tho' there is - and was - a "Samuell" that is part of Everett's district. Likewise, there is no "Pleasant Grove" - singular or plural - anywhere along Samuell, the closest name being "Grove Hill."Any guesses about this?

Greg, your whole argument centers around a report made by the FBI - which didn't assign anybody anywhere - based on the reports from cops' reports about how they weren't in Oak Cliff in car 207 beeping in front of Oswald's rooming house trying to get him to hurry up or whatever. Read the report all you want: it doesn't establish a damned thing other than the officers' "alibis" because either Earlene Roberts was entirely mistaken, or there was at least "a" Dallas cop-car in front of the house. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to have been driven by a Dallas cop. Hmmmm.... Since you mention Talbert's command and his "making assignments" (for his platoon - who were they?) I suppose you can also document his making these assignments? I think his call sign was 15, or was it 5? Either way, not every cop in Dallas went downtown first to personally get his orders from Talbert or anyone else: Talbert was in charge at the scene, and did not make assignments outside of that area. Not all of them went to the scene, even though a large number of them did, from points surprisingly far away from "the downtown area." According to your own quote, he only made assignments to officers who actually went to DP. Can you either document who went there to get such assignments, or explain why other patrol units were advised by dispatch to remain on assignment in their areas without their having "reported" to Talbert, or without Talbert having told dispatch who he did and didn't need downtown or elsewhere? ... and further to your comment about McDonald, he was far from the only cop in Dealey Plaza who took off and went to Oak Cliff when he heard another cop had been shot. Most of them did not report doing so on the radio, and some even said that they didn't say anything to anybody, ever, but just left to go hunt down the cop-killer. (Smart move on the cop-killer's part, especially if he knew President-killers were still downtown, doncha think? As for my "befuddlement" over things that were "supplied" to me, don't you know what the source of what Talbert had to say to the FBI? They are not "alternative" sources, but primary sources; I didn't "assume" them, I read them. Just because you're unaware of them doesn't mean that I'm "befuddled." Do a search for either "car 207" or "Valentine" on MFF and you'll find the originals sooner or later. The FBI report, via Talbert, only reiterates them. Slow down there, Duke. You'll burst a vein. The information comes directly from the person who made the assignments for that platoon on that day.Well, no it doesn't ... but that was one helluva sentence, don't you think? I think I deserve a grammarian's medal for that!! The radio is the primary source. If you have another one - recorded phone conversations, for example - you're certainly welcome to post that. The report is nothing more than second-hand hearsay. What you're failing to recognize here is the difference between Talbert (and others under different circumstances) saying "he did this" and "I told him to do this."Did Talbert want to say that the men under his command simply disappeared, en masse, when they heard about Tippit getting shot, or did he want to say that going to Oak Cliff - despite being at the scene of the assassination of the President of the United States, not exactly an everyday occurrence or your run-of-the-mill infraction - was exactly what he wanted them to do, all 30-some-odd of them? McDonald was far from the only one he "covered" for, not least among them being himself.

Oh. I wonder where I got the idea that you were? I dunno ....

"Orders?" What orders? If I call them "assignments", will it ease your befuddlement? Sent by carrier pigeon, maybe? I have no idea how the "assignments" were given, Duke. I'd start the search for that answer by trying to eliminate radio first. Carrier pigeons would come somewhere between smoke signals and two cans connected by a really long piece of string. They were assigned to regular patrol duties, i.e., no special assignment; Correct. Then after the assassination, they were REassigned to set up road blocks. they did "roadblock duty" of their own volitions. That may have applied to Parker, but not to Wallace or Everitt. ... Here's another link that may be handy: http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...bsPageId=146053 ... OK, so what we're seeing here is an FBI report dated June 16, 1964 which twice uses the word "assigned," in reference to Wallace and Everitt, hence you feel as if actual assignments were made by DPD on November 22, almost seven months earlier.We shall eliminate the radio as being the means by which these "assignments" were made: The word "roadblock" or words "road block" do not appear anywhere in the transcript. When used alone, all but two of the occurrences of "block" refer to a block on a street, and two refer to someone being "blocked in." The words "pleasant," "grove," or "samuel" (or any variation of them) also do not appear in the transcript. Wallace, call sign 57, was on the radio only a couple of times:At 12:51 he called dispatch to report being "clear" (available for duty); no assignment was given to him at this time. Dispatch responded "57 clear. 12:51." At 1:52, an hour later, he calls again to say something about "... telephone." Dispatch responds "10-4." He is not called or heard from again through 2:13. [*]Everitt, call sign 65, was a tad busier: At 12:24, he was contacted by dispatch and told to "call 633," and subsequently went "out to use the phone," from which he cleared at 12:36. At about 12:48, he apparently also called in using "67," which was not acknowledged by dispatch. At 1:11, dispatch gave a "signal 16" call at 4700 Scyene Road, which ambulance 603 responded to. Dispatcher then said "65, meet him there," which 65 acknowledged. At about 1:45, he "cleared" (was again available for duty) from, presumably from 4700 Scyene. He repeated the "clear" call at 1:46. At 2:05, 65 and 242 we dispatched to a "signal 7" at Buckner and Hume. He didn't acknowledge this transmission, and just before 2:08, dispatch called to ask him if he was en route; he said "no." He was then told "you'll meet 252 there," which Everitt acknowledged. He also was not called or heard from again through 2:13. If you want to say that they were "assigned," you'll need to come up with something better than a couple of words in a third-hand report made nearly seven months after the fact by someone who wasn't even with DPD, that was based on information received from an assistant chief of DPD, which in turn was gleaned from reports made by cops who were responding to an investigation into a car 207 - or any other police car - tooting its horn in front of Oswald's rooming house. (Naturally enough, none did and Earlene Roberts was simply "mistaken.") If they weren't by radio, they also weren't by phone unless the calls were initiated by the officers themselves, cuz they damned sure weren't allowed to carry cell phones back then! That "really long piece of string" starting to look good to you now? If you don't know how any such "assignments" were assigned, how can you call them "assignments" or "REassignments," or accuse me of "befuddlement" when the only "proof" of such "assignments" was the unsworn reports of cops who were saying, in effect, "it wasn't me that she saw, no siree bob!" And, as we've seen on the maps, what would the point have been to station oneself in one spot in an area so far from the scene of the crimes while traffic continued unimpeded across so many other roads, intersections and highways? Bottom line: I'm not saying that they "failed to carry out their orders;" I'm saying once again that they were never given any.

"Orders?" What orders? Sent by carrier pigeon, maybe? They were assigned to regular patrol duties, i.e., no special assignment; they did "roadblock duty" of their own volitions.Suffice it to say that there is no way that one patrolman or even two can effectively "set up roadblocks" in areas as large as one patrol district, much less two ... or that setting up a single roadblock in any area would have been sufficient to "stop all traffic." To give you an idea of just how ineffective we're talking, here's a modern map of patrol districts 56 and 58, according to Putnam Exhibit 1. Tell me which intersection that you, as a lone patrol officer (or even with a partner), would set up your roadblocks - plural. There are only, oh, a dozen or so places you might choose .... Patrol areas outlined in red, 56 at lower left, 58 at upper right. (Map by Mapsco®) Thanks for the page link, it's handy to have. The officers' reports that parts of this info are gleaned from are also in the published volumes, tho' offhand I don't recall the exhibit name or number. I know what they said they did after the fact, but not all of them told the whole truth. I won't and can't dispute that they did, in fact, set up "roadblocks," I'm merely saying that they could have and did do other things. The bottom line: this thread is about how difficult it was or wasn't to get out of Dallas. The answer is that it would have been easy for anyone to have gotten around these roadblocks even within their own districts. They were so far from downtown that someone on the lam wouldn't even have had to go through their districts! (If you need me to post an overview map and mark out both Dallas and these two districts, I can do that.) You can see how little of I-30 - the Fort Worth Toll Road back then - was even in district 56, and then two whole districts north of it to "block." What are the odds of spotting anyone worth stopping, much less actually stopping them?