Duke Lane

Your point is well taken, Ray. I was thinking from the standpoint of records of incoming calls being made at DPD, such official records having more likelihood of surviving to today than those of a private company that - unless they had a Sylvia Meagher on staff! - might not have realized in the course of the (non-)investigation that they might have been important, and thus - just like several government agencies (TFIC) - would have routinely destroyed them. The investigation zeroed in on Ruby, et al., almost immediately, and certainly within the time frame that a customer - such as Ruby - might have called requesting a second copy of their bill, and thus was able to get ahold of them. After a period of time - say, six months? - other records would have been destroyed; I wonder, for example, if the 1963 phone company's successor company still has Ruby's records available 45 years later, as historically important (or at least curious) they might be? (I know for a fact that the Civil Air Patrol has none of Oswald's records available, the originals and all copies having been rounded up during the WC investigation.) Ruby's phone calls survive because someone "made a record" of them. Unless someone did the same with the Davises', etc., then no "record" was presumably made. Is it possible, much less likely, that the phone records for Dallas, November 22, 1963, were preserved out of simple historical importance? Wouldn't THAT be a find!! So to continue the thinking, if no official anybody requested copies of the relevent (and inconvenient) phone records for those particular individuals, my guess is that they've vanished into the ether. If the investigators had deemed these inconvenient witnesses' records relevent, I'm sure they'd have been saved ... but they were, after all, inconvenient, so why save them?

L.J. Lewis was at the same dealership that Warren Reynolds was. Reynolds' testimony doesn't say that he did. His brother Johnny owned the place. It would have been or would be easy to ascertain the time of the call, but only if a record was made of it.

Absolutely correct, Ron: Tippit's death was estimated by the "citizen" radio call at 1:16, which if the so-called "critics' tape" is to be trusted, is accurate. The police and WC had other evidence, however, that showed Tippit's murder actually taking place prior to 1:10. This caused a problem because, while we might argue whether Lee Oswald could have walked/run from his rooming house to 10th & Patton in 11 minutes (1:04 to 1:15), he clearly could not have walked it - and run it only as a record-holder - in two to four minutes. Contrary to the axiom that "when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth," investigators started with a conclusion and made the facts fit the theory, ignoring those that made it impossible. Markham's having to catch the 1:12 bus and consequently being at the corner at "approximately 1:06" was one such inconvenience; the arrival of T.F. Bowley on his way to pick up his wife to go on weekend trip was another inasmuch as he glanced at his watch and saw that it was 1:10. He arrived after several people had gathered around Tippit's car. Domingo Benavides had pulled his pickup truck to the side of the road about a car-length east of the patrol car on the opposite side of the street when he heard the first shot. He heard two more shots, then looked up to see the shooter leaving. Benavides watched him round the corner onto Patton Street, then "set there for a few minutes" to be sure the shooter wouldn't be coming back and "start shooting again." He got out of his truck, crossed the street and checked over the fallen officer, whom he believed "was dead when he hit the ground, because he didn't put his hand out or nothing." The patrol car door was open about half-way. Benavides then: I don't know if I opened the car door back further than what it was or not, but anyway, I went in and pulled the radio and I mashed the button and told them that an officer had been shot, and I didn't get an answer, so I said it again, and this guy asked me whereabouts all of a sudden, and I said, on 10th Street. I couldn't remember where it was at at the time. So I looked up and I seen this number and I said 410 East 10th Street. ... Then he started to--then I don't know what he said; but I put the radio back. I mean, the microphone back up, and this other guy was standing there, so I got up out of the car, and I don't know, I wasn't sure if he heard me, and the other guy sat down in the car. The "other guy" was T.F. Bowley, who as we've already seen had come upon the scene after people had already gathered around the police car. He had parked about half-way down the block because his grade-school daughter was with him and he didn't want her to see what he already perceived as something tragic. He walked the rest of the way to the patrol car, saw Benavides inside of it trying to use the radio, but didn't believe that Benavides was getting through. When Benavides got out of the car, Bowley got in and made the call. Police took an affidavit from Bowley on Monday, December 2, after he had returned from his week-long vacation; he didn't give it on Friday because, he told investigators on the scene, he hadn't actually seen the shooting and was late picking his wife up, so he was let go with the promise to file a statement when he returned, which he did. This affidavit is part of CE2003 and was available to both police and, subsequently, the WC (who must have known about it since they culled several other affidavits from it when taking testimony, but did not call this inconvenient witness to testify). I've spoken with both men and they do not sound anything alike either in person or on the phone. There is only one "citizen" voice on the radio tape; it sounds more like Bowley to me. Bowley, however, is unable to say for certain that it is he, and his daughter likewise is unsure. I don't know if Benavides has ever heard the tape. I cannot state with absolute certainty which of the two it was, but I'm more inclined to posit it being Bowley. Since both DPD and the WC had already determined that Oswald was the killer, and likewise knew he could not have travelled on foot from his rooming house to the murder scene in under two to six minutes (at least, not without an accomplice driving him there ... and then inexplicably leaving him there!), they were obliged to ignore the only facts they had - that Helen Markham had seen the crime committed at "approximately 1:06" and Bowley had arrived at "1:10" - and reconstruct Oswald's movements as follows: Oswald was next seen about nine-tenths of a mile away at the southeast corner of 10th Street and Patton Avenue, moments before the Tippit shooting. (See Commission Exhibit No. 1119-A, p. 158.) If Oswald left. his roominghouse shortly after 1 p.m. and walked at a brisk pace, he would have reached 10th and Patton shortly after 1:15 p.m. Tippit's murder was recorded on the police radio tape at about 1:16 p.m. [Report, page 165] The average walking pace of an adult male is approximately 4.3 feet per second. There are about 4750 feet in 9/10 of a mile, which would take about 1100 seconds or roughly 18 minutes to cover the distance. To cover that same distance in 11 minutes requires someone to be moving at about 1½ times that speed, or at a brisk walk, a trot, or intermittently running or jogging. Nobody saw Oswald travelling from one place to the other - possibly because they were glued to the TV like Earlene Roberts was, and possibly because it was in the middle of a work day - which leaves open the possibility that he did, in fact, make the trip, and make it in the requisite time. Thus, to make the "facts" conform to the conclusion, they then had to have Benavides making the call, which they did: Benavides stopped and waited in the truck until the gunman ran to the corner. He saw him empty the gun and throw the shells into some bushes on the southeast corner lot. It was Benavides, using Tippit's car radio, who first reported the killing of Patrolman Tippit at about 1:16 p.m. [Report, page 166] This required Benavides' no longer "set[ting] there for a few minutes" after he had seen the gunman round the corner, and getting out of his truck immediately to make the radio call. It had to be he who made the call, for otherwise it would have had to have been someone else, namely the inconvenient Bowley who'd have testified to having been there earlier than Oswald could have been. Which would mean that Oswald couldn't have done the shooting - it was impossible and had to be excluded - or else he had an accomplice who drove him there (and again, inexplicably left him there). With no known associates who drove him to Oak Cliff, and his not having made a phone call to anyone while at the rooming house, who could this mysterious accomplice have been who eluded identification, much less capture? Since he wasn't in custody, and nobody went looking for him, and Oswald didn't admit to the shooting much less having help, he therefore could not have existed. So if Oswald couldn't go 9/10 of a mile in four minutes, and didn't have an accomplice, then either <a> Oswald didn't shoot Tippit and another suspect had to be identified (or a cop-killing left uninvestigated), or <b> the facts were "wrong" and had to be ignored.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/05/02/...in4065454.shtml Thanks for that, Ray! You should give me a call again sometime ... today (Wednesday) is a good day.

Note that Tippit, in stopping his car outside 404, pulls to a halt ahead of the gunman, and not alongside the gunman, and that the gunman walks up to Tippit's car from behind. This suggests that Tippit and the gunman were travelling in the same direction, and that Tippit overtook the gunman. She saw a patrol car stop and a man "walk up" to it, on the side "opposite the driver's side," which would be the right side of the car. Am I correct in understanding that one can only "walk up" to a "side" from a particular direction? One can only "walk up" to it from the rear? What would she have said (tho' you're "not concerned" with that!) if he had approached from the front of the car? That he had "walked down" to the side opposite the driver's side? "Walk up" only means "approach" and one can do that from any direction. There is nothing in Mrs. Markham's statement that says that Tippit stpped "ahead of the gunman" or that the young white man approached the car "from behind." If there is, please point it out to me. I really do need to know where you draw your inferences when no such words exist. You will note in this statement, Mrs. Markham did not even say that she saw the patrol car pass in front of her, only that she saw it when it stopped in front of 404. "Confirmed?" She saw this man "approach" the patrol car "on the passenger side" and lean up against it, but nowhere does she say she saw the man approach the car from behind ... nor does she say she saw him approach the car from in front, but merely that he "approached" it. When two people are walking down the street toward each other, is one "approaching" the other? What if one was walking behind the other and walks up to him as the second man pauses to look into a window: is the first man "approaching" the other? What about if he comes from across the street? The word "approach" does not imply a direction. One can approach from the front, rear or side equally. It is obvious from this statement (and from those above) that the Tippit and his assassin were both travelling in the same direction. Tatum's belated statement does in fact say what you quote. Nevertheless, even while Tatum's statement does make the distinction of both the patrol car and the pedestrian moving in an easterly direction toward Tatum, it is the only one of the three you've quoted that does indicate any direction of the pedestrian. It nevertheless was made 15 years after the fact, which certainly permits for some slight factual errors, including whether he actually saw (or noticed) either the patrol car and/or pedestrian in motion. That possibility is emphasized by your further quotation of Tatum, in which he explains that he didn't come forward (or remain on the scene) in 1963 because "there were more than enough people there and I could not see what I could contribute." Please note what he said before that: "I sped off in my auto" and "All I saw [was?] him [run?] to the intersection and run south on Patton towards Jefferson." So where did the "more than enough people" come from? Did Scotty beam them all down to stand around the patrol car nanoseconds after the shooting took place? Did they appear in a puff of smoke? As Tatum "sped off," Donnie Benavides was still hunkered down in his pickup truck, Helen Markham was still at the corner watching the gunman thru her fingers, Bill Scoggins was slinking out of his cab in the hope of not being seen, Bill Smith and Jimmy Burt were still around the corner on Denver, Frank Wright was still in his house, Tom Bowley hadn't shown up yet, the men at the lots over on Jefferson were still down the street until after the shooter had run by them onto Jefferson, and Acquilla Clemons was still west of where Tatum had been when he "sped off," or more accurately, made the decision to speed off. It took them a couple of minutes to gather 'round the scene of the shooting by which time Tatum, if he "sped off" would have been a block or more away, if even still in sight. If Jack Tatum did what he said he did and saw what he said he saw, then he could not have seen "more than enough people there" because they simply hadn't gotten there by the time the gunman started running toward him and he sped off. (If he did see "more than enough people there," then he came by at least a couple of minutes after the shooting had taken place, and could not have seen the gunman, in which case his disclaimer that he "could not see what [he] could contribute" makes much better sense that the disclaimer of a man who was one of only two people - not counting Tippit and his killer - who were in his sight, three if he saw Scoggins in his cab ... not quite "more than enough people.") If he thinks he saw those "more than enough people" when clearly he couldn't have (if his description of speeding off is accurate!), then he may also simply think that he saw the patrol car and pedestrian in motion; they may only have been standing there facing him ... and that only if Tatum was actually there, which based on his "more than enough people" statement, I'm not convinced that he was. Remember that his statement was simply an interview, not given under oath (ergo not an "affidavit" as Myers calls it), and given to committee investigators and not to law enforcement personnel. All of that said, outside of the questionable statement of Jack Ray Tatum, there is no proof of what direction the pedestrian was walking - or even if he was walking, as opposed to just standing there. It appears to be there only because you seem to wish it to be there, because the words you quote simply don't exist in the statements you draw from.

The difficulty lies in that there were at least six witnesses who saw a man or men upstairs: Rowland, Amos Euins, Ronald Fischer, Robert Edwards, Ruby Henderson and Carolyn Walther. Ronald Fischer said he saw one man in the southeast corner window, whom, he said: "... had--he had on an open--neck shirt, but it-uh--could have been a sport shirt or a T-shirt. It was light in color; probably white, I couldn't tell whether it had long sleeves or whether it was a short-sleeved shirt, but it was open-neck and light in color." He did not mention a second man. Robert Edwards, who was downtown to watch the parade with Fischer, described the one man he saw upstairs as wearing a "light colored shirt, short sleeve and open neck." Ruby Henderson (24H524) said she'd seen two men, one wearing a white shirt, the other wearing a dark shirt, and that the man in the white shirt - the one that everyone else described - had dark hair and dark complexion, and was "possibly a Mexican, but could have been a Negro. All she would say about the other man - in the dark shirt - was that he was taller than the other. Carolyn Walther (24H522) reported seeing a man leaning out of the southeast window of "either the fourth or fifth floor" holding a rifle in his hands, the rifle pointing downward. He was wearing a white shirt and had either blond or light brown hair. She also saw a second man behind and to the left of the first whom she said was "apparently wearing a brown suit coat," although she said that she could only see the right side of him from about his waist to his shoulders. She had no recorded opinion as to his further appearance. Amos Euins saw a man shooting the rifle, but offered no opinion - stated, in fact, that he could not distinguish - whether the man was white or black or somewhere in between. This man, he said, had a "bald spot" that he could clearly see and which captured his attention. Rowland said of the first man in the southwest window: "He was was just slender in build in proportion with his widthwas just slender in build in proportion with his width. ... He appeared to be fair complexioned, not fair, but light complexioned, but dark hair. ... I would say either a light Latin or a Caucasian. ... He had on a light shirt, a very light-colored shirt, white or a light blue or a color such as that. This was open at the collar. I think it was unbuttoned about halfway, and then he had a regular T-shirt, a polo shirt under this, at least this is what it appeared to be. He had on dark slacks or blue jeans, I couldn't tell from that I didn't see but a small portion." The second, of course, he said "seemed to me an elderly Negro" whom he "didn't pay very much attention to." Of all of these descriptions, there are only two suggestions of a dark complexion, one of them on the man in the lighter shirt in the forefront, not the man in the background, and no other indication of his being elderly (which is distinct, I might add, from "old," even to a 19-year-old, "elderly" usually connoting white hair, slack skin, etc. A 50-year old man such as myself is "old" to my 20-year-old stepdaughter, but I daresay I'm not "elderly" to her!). It's also noteworthy that Rowland made two mentions of the man he'd seen who was "at the time I saw the man in the [southwest] window, I saw this man hanging out the window ... the one on the east end of the building, the one that they said the shots were fired from." He was "a colored man, I think." In full light of day, unobstructed by dirty windows, he was not quite certain that the man was black. This is the same man he later said was "elderly," whom he "didn't pay very much attention to," and only said "I think" he was black. The point of all this so far is that there is only one other mention of a black man, who was possibly a Mexican and who was wearing a white shirt; Rowland's "elderly Negro" wasn't described as wearing anything in particular at all, so can we presume it was a white shirt? In almost all cases, a man in a white shirt is who is described as doing the shooting and/or holding a rifle, in some cases there being another man in the background, dressed in darker clothes. Does this mean, then, that this "black man in a white shirt" who, like others described as wearing a white shirt and leaning out of the window to one degree or another, must've been the shooter? I'm having trouble constructing it any other way. If Rowland's "elderly Negro" was not the shooter, what became of him? Was he the man in the background described by Walther and Henderson, neither of whom offered a description of his complexion? Even if Eddie Piper was on the sixth floor near that window, what was the deal with him being described as "leaning out of the window" while the only other(?) person similarly described was also described as holding a rifle? That hardly describes someone who was there against his will. There also seems to be a propensity toward assuming that any such "elderly Negro" must've worked in the building. Says who? Just because there was such a description that the FBI inquired of TSBD management, and TSBD management - Bill Shelley in particular - made the connection (or was led to the connection) to who that worked for the TSBD fit that description, does not mean that any such "elderly Negro" did work for the TSBD. Hence, any such person seen in that window fitting that description is not limited to being only West and Piper, or Bonnie Ray Williams for that matter. If a white guy could've gotten into the TSBD and gotten upstairs, the so could a black man - or a Mexican (or a Cuban!) or anyone else - just as easily. The added propensity of your theory to extend any possibility to make this person Eddie Piper (why not Troy West? Nobody said they saw him either!) such that 50-55 years old would be "elderly" to a 19-year-old and that the "white spot" seen by Amos Euins (on the shooter's head) could've been Piper's glasses (since he was old enough to maybe need them, tho' I'm not sure we know he actually did wear them, are we?) and that the newpaper's "porter" story could only describe a janitor, i.e., Eddie Piper, only stands when a bunch of "if's" are satisfied. Perhaps I'd be more inclined to buy into it if someone had said, for example, that they'd last seen Piper walking toward the elevators (since it seems there'd be a reason to ask people, just as Bill Shelley was asked, what the two "elderly Negroes" in TSBD's employ were seen doing), a positive statement that "I didn't see him" (as opposed to simply nobody volunteering that they did), or if perhaps even Rowland had volunteered a clothing description that might've matched what a janitor might be expected to wear (certainly not, for example, a brown sportscoat ... how about a white shirt?). As it is, however, we have only a tenuous statement about an "elderly Negro" ("I think ... I didn't pay very much attention to him"), an inquiry about "elderly Negro" employees to Bill Shelley, and a leap that such a "elderly Negro" must've therefore been either West or Piper (or a TSBD employee at all!), and more likely Piper because of a newspaper article about a building "porter," who must be a janitor. Did anyone at all even try to glorify Piper's janitor job by calling him a "porter?" Yet this taking upstairs business happens at the same time Piper would later claim he spoke to Oswald with Oswald telling him he was going up (or out) for lunch. There is more to come on this, but I haven't had the "peace and quiet" time I need to put it all together. I'd say he was "mistaken" in that I don't believe it was Oswald - which was why he was scared out of his wits (part of what is to come) and was persuaded to change the story. Then Williams would be committing perjury - which he did in other ways. I'm clearly going to have to show you how to do this "quote" stuff so you don't have to use those atrocious colors: bright violet just doesn't cut it!! Something I don't quite get: you allow for the possibility that Piper was "scared out of his wits" and could've been "persuaded to change his story," but conversely don't allow for the possibility that Williams, et al., might've likewise been "persuaded." Why not? Consider Williams being on the sixth floor, encountering the shooter(s) in the midst of his (their) preparations. Clearly, Williams cannot be let go; he might raise the alarm, dash the assassination plans, and get everyone arrested to boot. Not a good idea. So there he sits with all of this stuff going on, "bad guys" waiting for Kennedy's motorcade to arrive, sweating for his life just as you imagine Piper would've been. (Let me add here that Billy Lovelady and Danny Arce were supposed to have met back upstairs, but obviously did not ... or at least didn't end up there. Lovelady claimed to have gone to the second floor to "get a coke" after having washed up; Arce said he'd eaten lunch with Jack Dougherty ... the only person to have given Jack any sort of alibi, incidentally. A close analysis of the timing of what all of the boys did on the first floor shows that Lovelady took an inordinate amount of time to go upstairs, get a coke, and come back downstairs before going out almost immediately. The possibility exists that they did go upstairs, but were shooed back down before they saw anything of significance.) Anyway, there's Bonnie Ray, wondering if he might be a second casualty, shot while the assassin made his getaway so no witnesses would be left behind. He couldn't be killed before the motorcade arrived: it would've attracted attention. Then, before any action could be taken on this - that is, before the motorcade arrived - we hear voices and footsteps of other people on the floor below. Now we have a problem of disposing of not just one, but possibly several witnesses: could our patsy Oswald credibly accomplish that? Chances are, not. So Williams is spared and led downstairs with the admonishment not to even try to leave the building, and not to say anything to anyone on threat of serious bodily harm to himself, whomever he might tell, and possibly his family: they know who he is and will hunt him down if even a hint of treachery comes to their ears. To ensure that no such attempt at escape is made, perhaps Jack Dougherty stands guard "ten feet west of the west elevator" (where he said he was when he heard "a backfire") so there is no possibility of Williams - or Jarman or Norman - using either the stairs or elevator to leave the fifth floor. According to your apparent reckoning, Williams and company would tell the absolute truth about his and their actions the first time out, with anything else added being a mere concoction, perjury as it were. Piper, without any indication of his having been upstairs other than the fact that nobody mentioned seeing him (and that he might be considered an "elderly" Negro), would not tell the absolute truth at the start and would be "persuaded" to "change his story" only after he told the "real" one to a newspaper reporter but not the police. Williams and company's earliest statements would seem to reflect that they were only upstairs a short time, got up only to the fifth floor (not the sixth floor, no sir! We didn't see nothin'!), etc. Yet their testimonies - made outside the hearing of any local authorities and with no apparent expectation that it would be published for all the world to see - suggest that all is not as they told people locally: Bonnie Ray wasn't upstairs for only two or three minutes, but until, oh, around 12:20; Hank and Junior didn't go upstairs at any 12:15, but after they'd heard the motorcade was on Main (12:22 or later), arriving three to five minutes before the shooting and before Bonnie Ray came from wherever he was to join them, after 12:20 and very possibly after 12:25 or 12:28 when Jarman estimated they'd gotten upstairs. My point here being that these were some tremendous opportunities to cinch the case against Oswald that were apparently overlooked. Oops.

dupe

You got me, I don't recall your take on Euin's statements. ... It was in the post prior to the one you've replied to. I had to break the reply in two because I had too many blocks of quoted text. I take the opposite view. In his description of the other man, Rowland would not be pushed to give more than he was sure of. His description of this person as an "elderly Negro" was again, as much as he was sure of. Greg, there is another recent thread - should be on the first page - where this is being discussed; the one about the Man in Brown Sportscoat," this post in particular (mine; I never said I was humble!). In addition to Arnold Rowland and Amos Euins, there were at least four other people on record describing a man or men on the upper floors. Of them, only one described anyone of a darker complexion. There are similarities in their descriptions, but none of them describe an "elderly Negro," or for that matter, anyone "elderly." As close as anyone comes to that is suggesting that one of them might have had blond or light brown hair. (You'll find Henderson and Wather's statements at 24H524-28, by the way.) I agree that Rowland only would say as much as he felt comfortable with, but he also didn't insist on the "elderly Negro" description, qualifying it by saying that he didn't pay much attention to the man, and certainly not that he was "sure" of it. It may have been his impression either at the time or after a period of months, but it was not a clear and distinct impression, one that he'd "swear to" (yes, even despite being under oath!). None of the other witnesses who saw two men corroborated the "elderly Negro" description, and clearly their own impressions (recalling that both Henderson and Walther's statements were taken much closer to the event) don't even agree with each other's. So it's not actually even an established fact that there was such a person up there, much less that it was the building janitor. The business about the newspaper report of the "porter" taking Oswald up to the sixth floor fails to stand up as probative inasmuch as it makes little sense that someone would make that statement while Oswald was still alive, yet fail to mention it - and by so doing bolster the case against Oswald - after he was dead. The same is true of Bonnie Ray: what if Eddie Piper had said testified that he'd brought Oswald upstairs, and Williams that he'd watched him construct the "sniper's nest" (and Jack Dougherty saying that Oswald had run down the stairs afterward, almost knocking him over)? Would we even be having this discussion? No; there would have been eyewitnesses whose testimony would've been hard if not impossible to refute. That they didn't cement Oswald's guilt when they had the chance after he was dead and posed no threat to them is highly suggestive of the fact that they couldn't implicate Oswald. If the "porter" story is true, but that said porter didn't actually take Oswald upstairs, how can we be sure any of it's true? Also, as noted earlier, nobody was specifically asked if they had seen Piper, so the fact that nobody corroborated his whereabouts is not particularly striking just because they didn't volunteer the (unimportant) information. By the same token, nobody said they saw Jack Dougherty, yet Jack himself said that he was on the fifth and sixth floors during the shooting, and directly in the path of the supposedly fleeing Oswald; why doesn't he figure into your theory?

Unfortunately don't have the time right now to go through all that you'd said (but thank you for all your efforts!), but at least for now, here's what Google Maps is showing for the locations of the barbershop and cafe: The odd numbers are on the south(ern) side of the street. This would presumably put the cafe in the black-roofed building at the far right of this image, or perhaps in the building to the east of it, which is not shown, IF the 600-block started at Marsalis; if it started at Lansing (which is the apparent alleyway that goes nort from where 10th makes its jog to go directly east), then it could also be in what appears to be perhaps a strip mall at the southwest corner of 10th and Marsalis. Never having checked it out, I'm guessing that Benavides' parts store is the building at the northwest corner of 10th & Marsalis ...? Anyway, an observation is that if the barbershop and/or cafe are or were located in the latter place, then anyone having been seen walking past them could have come from Marsalis, which is probably the route that JDT would have taken into central Oak Cliff (i.e., to Top Ten Records) from his last reported position at Lancaster and 8th (Lancaster does not run through all the way to Jeff; Marsalis is the next thoroughfare to do so - and enable JDT to approach from the west - after his passing that location. If the barbershop and/or cafe were/are located east of Marsalis, this is not out of bounds, really, for someone to have been walking west from there toward Patton, although I can only think of a couple of reasons, in context, why someone would want to go that route. East of Marsalis, the next intersection is East Jefferson. I will check with a friend, meanwhile, who has a 1963-ish Cole's City Directory to see what might've been located in that area, or if either of the two cited businesses existed at the time (actually, unbeknownst to most people, the 1963 City Directory would only have shown who was there in 1962, as it took - and as of 20 years ago, still took - a year to compile from on-site surveys). As Myers said, however, it looks as if Burt's 1968 account of seeing a man walking westward has never been corroborated. Unfortunately, with him being dead and unless his interview is available in full (or if Armstrong's interviews with the others are), it's impossible to determine whether the guy that the folks at the cafe/barbershop say they saw was even dressed in the same way as Burt's suspect. Otherwise, all you've got is an average-looking "Joe" walking down the street with no reason to even pay attention to him, much less remember him. After all: nobody knew anybody was going to shoot anyone beforehand, so there was no reason to pay attention. If you've ever sat waiting at a salon or diner, you may have seen a whole bunch of people walk by, but why would you notice any of them in particular?

The fact of the matter is - there was never any mention of Williams being on the 6th floor - until his WC testimony. Prior to that, he had indicated he went to the 5th from the 1st floor. What I said before about earlier statements having more weight than later ones ...? Close enough. He said 12:25 or 12:28. ... And he said that Bonnie Ray joined them after that. What was Odum's motive for changing Williams' statement of Nov 23 to read that he took the west stairs down to the 5th? I'm clueless as to people's motives, but ... what I'd said previously with respect to Euins' statements ...? I don't have to guess - I know there is more - at least concerning Piper Doesn't seem like it. I'm compelled to note that Rowland added that, as to the man who "seemed to me an elderly Negro" that he "didn't pay very much attention to him." His identification of the man as a Negro was tenuous at best, his description as "elderly" no better.Bonnie Ray said that he was upstairs on six; Eddie Piper made no such claim, nor did anyone make one about him being there. Why then hypothesize that a man whose only "suspicion" is fitting a tenuous description, who said that he'd only been on the first floor and "never" had any cause to go upstairs (it was storage, probably didn't need much sweeping, eh?) was somehow sinisterly involved, while at the same time discounting what one black man says and what he and another man both said he had some "dust" in his hair, all because "his" story wasn't "consistent," and others' testimony likely puts him other than on the fifth floor within just a couple of minutes of the shooting? What, anyway, would Bonnie Ray's purpose be in lying about going up to the sixth floor if he didn't? To explain the "chicken bone sandwich?" Shoot, they already had an explanation for that, that it had been Slim Givens', and that it had been eaten before the lunch break. Wouldn't it have been a whole lot easier either for Slim to admit it, or at least to have lied about something someone else (Bill Shelley) already remembered? Fewer webs to weave .... And you're right, I meant Slim, not Danny.

Is that necessarily so? Consider that, when Williams got down to the fifth floor, Junior Jarman had noticed that he'd had a white dusty or powdery substance in his hair. There is no actual representation of how much of that substance was in his hair. Was it a small spot, say 2 by 2 inches, and only lightly dusted, or did it heavily cover his head? If the latter, could someone have mistaken Williams for being "elderly?" Duke, I can't consider Williams going down to the 5th since I believe he actually went up to the 5th. As for the latter contention about the amount of dust in his hair, I don't believe there was any ever there. He was photographed later with dust covering the front of his shirt. This is likely the result of shifting dusty boxes or plywood that's been lying in the dust, with the boxes or plywood rested against his chest. The testimony of Williams, Jarman and Norman are so aligned on this one issue, it sounds they sound like they were scripted - completely unlike the rest of their testimonies. But for the sake of argument, if there was such matter in his hair, the amount you're talking about would have been a standout characteristic that Rowland was unlikely to forget. Does he say he was a white-haired elderly Negro? No. Any "white spot" seen on this person's head could have been the reflection of reading glasses pushed to the top of the head when not needed. Piper wore such glasses and was indeed, elderly (at least by the standards of a 20 year old). I think you're making quite a stretch when you try to make reading glasses be a "white spot" simply because your man wore them. You want him to be there, and your only "proof" is that nobody else mentioned him being downstairs. There are a lot of people nobody mentioned seeing anywhere. So what? One thing you've apparently forgotten is that "the boys" were laying plywood flooring that morning. How many times does 8 go into 100? One hundred is the length (and width) of the floors in TSBD; "8" is the length of a sheet of plywood. The result is not even, ergo when they got to either end of the building, the entire board could not fit, hence they had to cut it. When one cuts wood, what does one get? If one cuts wood with an electic saw, what does it do? I'll hypothesize that the "dust" could've been sawdust. I should also point out that while more than one person described someone of a darker complexion - e.g., "Mexican, or perhaps a Negro" - only one to the best of my recollection described the so-called "white spot," Amos Euins, and Amos did not say he was a Negro. He said: I seen a bald spot on this man's head, trying to look out the window. He had a bald spot on his head. I was looking at the bald spot. Pressed further for a description of the man, here's the exchange: Mr. Specter. Now, what kind of a look, if any, did you have at the man who was there? Mr. Euins. All I got to see was the man with a spot in his head, because he had his head something like this. Mr. Specter. Indicating his face down, looking down the rifle? Mr. Euins. Yes, sir: and I could see the spot on his head. Mr. Specter. How would you describe that man for us? Mr. Euins. I wouldn't know how to describe him, because all I could see was the spot and his hand. Mr. Specter. Was he slender or was he fat? Mr. Euins. I didn't get to see him. Mr. Specter. Could you tell from where you looked whether he was tall or short? Mr. Euins. No. Mr. Specter. Of what race was he, Amos? Mr. Euins. I couldn't tell, because these boxes were throwing a reflection, shaded. Mr. Specter. Could you tell whether he was a Negro gentleman or a white man? Mr. Euins. No, sir. Mr. Specter. Couldn't even tell that? But you have described that he had a bald-- Mr. Euins. Spot in his head. Yes, sir; I could see the bald spot in his head. Mr. Specter. Now, could you tell what color hair he had? Mr. Euins. No, sir. Mr. Specter. Could you tell whether his hair was dark or light? Mr. Euins. No, sir. Mr. Specter. How far back did the bald spot on his head go? Mr. Euins. I would say about right along in here. Mr. Specter. Indicating about 2 1/2 inches above where you hairline is. Is that about what you are saying? Mr. Euins. Yes, sir; right along in here. Mr. Specter. Now, did you get a very good look at that man, Amos? Mr. Euins. No, sir; I did not. Mr. Specter. Were you able to tell anything about the clothes he was wearing? Mr. Euins: No, sir. As I'll reiterate later, there is a certain caution one should employ when dealing with people's earlier statements versus their testimonies. The caution is that, on the afternoon of November 22, police and sheriff's deputies were taking statements from people, writing down what they said, then sending them off to wait until their statements had been typed up by someone else; they were not witnesses' own handwritten statements. If there was something wrong in the transcription, there wasn't much anyone could do about it except wait to talk to the officer again, amend the statement, have it re-typed ... or just be done with it and sign it. Euins was a prime example of this: Mr. Specter. All right. Let me ask you about a couple of specific things here, Amos. In the statement you say here that he was a white man. By reading the statement, does that refresh your memory as to whether he was a white man or not? Mr. Euins. No, sir; I told the man that I could see a white spot on his head, but I didn't actually say it was a white man. I said I couldn't tell. But I saw a white spot in his head. Mr. Specter. Your best recollection at this moment is you still don't know whether he was a white man or a Negro? All you can say is that you saw a white spot on his head? Mr. Euins. Yes, sir. Mr. Specter. Then, did you tell the people at the police station that he was a white man, or did they make a mistake when they wrote that down here? Mr. Euins. They must have made a mistake, because I told them I could see a white spot on his head. If one wishes to lend more weight to earlier statements than later ones, then your whole "elderly Negro" thing goes right out the window because, according to his earlier statement, Amos Euins said the man was white! ... and moreover, Euins said the man with the "white spot" was the shooter. Even by your own measure, Eddie Piper is in the clear. [continued next post]

Will run through each of these, but as some are not quoted in public sources - i.e., investigative records, etc. - it may take a while. Of those close at hand, Ronald Fischer said he saw a man in the "sniper's nest" window (not his words), about whom he said: "... And he had--he had on an open-neck shirt, but it-uh--could have been a sport shirt or a T-shirt. It was light in color; probably white, I couldn't tell whether it had long sleeves or whether it was a short-sleeved shirt, but it was open-neck and light in color." This doesn't sound like the same man, does it? Robert Edwards was downtown to watch the parade with Fischer, and he described the man upstairs as wearing a "light colored shirt, short sleeve and open neck," no mention of a jacket. Arnold Rowland said: "He had on a light shirt, a very light-colored shirt, white or a light blue or a color such as that. This was open at the collar. I think it was unbuttoned about halfway, and then he had a regular T-shirt, a polo shirt under this, at least this is what it appeared to be. He had on dark slacks or blue jeans, I couldn't tell from that I didn't see but a small portion." Sounds a bit (a lot?) like Fischer and Edwards' guy, but not like "sportscoat man." This guy was standing at "port arms," according to Rowland. Ruby Henderson said she'd seen two men, one wearing a white shirt, the other wearing a dark shirt, that the man in the white shirt had dark hair and complexion, and might have been a Mexican or a Negro; the other man in the dark shirt was taller than the other. Those were the best descriptions she said she was able to give. Carolyn Walther reported seeing a man in a brown suit "and a very dark [something: red?] shirt" leaning out a third floor window at about the middle of the third floor. I don't know what the deal is on this - no photos immediately on hand - but at this point, I'd have to say that the location - an office - leaves this guy out of the running for being "sportcoat man." Later, she saw a man leaning out of the southeast window of "either the fourth or fifth floor" holding a rifle in his hands, the rifle pointing downward. He was wearing a white shirt and had either blond or light brown hair. She had also seen him a little earlier and thought "there are guards everywhere." She also saw a second man behind and to the left of the first whom she said was "apparently wearing a brown suit coat," although she said that she could only see the right side of him from about his waist to his shoulders. For whatever it may be worth - which may be absolutely nothing - both Walther and Henderson worked in the Dal-Tex building; their employer(s) are not noted. They were interviewed respectively on the 5th and 6th of December. Johnny Powell, an inmate in Dallas jail overlooking Dealey Plaza at time of the assassination, was mentioned 472 in Brown, People v. Lee Harvey Oswald; 412 in Davis, Mafia Kingfish; 94 in Garrison, On the Trail of the Assassins; 195 in Groden and Livingstone, High Treason; 206 in Groden, The Killing of a President; 222 in Kurtz, Crime of the Century; 229 in Posner, Case Closed; 171 in Sample, Men on the Sixth Floor; and 74-75 in Summers, Conspiracy (aka Not in Your Lifetime). Since PvLHO and OTTOTA are works of fiction (as some would say, so was Case Closed), whatever is there can't be entirely credited. Of the others, I don't have all of them and can't look up those citation; perhaps someone can be kind enough to look up TKOAP and MOTSF for me? And the others, too, if possible? I am by no means discounting that any of these men above were seen or that their descriptions were necessarily inaccurate, but there doesn't seem to be a direct link to any such man (singular! where did the other one go?) on Houston Street by two men who couldn't have seen him. I would have to say at this point that there is no evidence of such a man being on Houston Street except, again, from the testimony of two men who couldn't have seen him. That man did not exist ... or at least, what "evidence" we have of his existence certainly doesn't prove it. I will point out, though, that there is yet more testimony of two men coming down from the floors above the second within about two minutes of the shooting, and say also that while only one man saw them - and he is in every other wise a reliable witness - one of the women who worked in TSBD (on the 4th floor, as I recall, name starts with "S" ...?) corroborates the time. Does anyone know of anyone in law enforcement other than Officer Baker who was on the upper floors of the TSBD before Luke Mooney got there? But again, bottom line: there may have been and probably was someone in a dark suit or sport jacket upstairs during the shooting, but if he was the man described as being on Houston Street by two men who couldn't have seen him, there is no proof of his existence there and thus no reason to concern ourselves with him. That man doesn't exist.

Thanks, Dixie. Two William Smiths certainly can be confusing ... but I can't seem to find anything about any such person. I've checked Walt Brown's Global Index along with a couple others online; WC and HSCA indices; NARA; in With Malice, and naturally, on Google. As close as I come is a William L. Smith who was interviewed in connection with the HSCA MLK investigation. Do you have any cites on this guy? You've included more info than what Ed LeDoux posted (which was only that "Jimmy Burt, across the street from the construction site where W.L. Smith was working, watched the same man as he came from the direction of the Town and Country Cafe and continued walking west on 10th"), and given that and his having "identified ... Oswald," I'd think this information must be available somewhere. The map below (courtesy of Google) shows the entire area as it is today. If Jimmy Burt's brother Billy lived in a house on the corner of 9th and Denver, and if he was, in fact, across the street from where William L. was working in an apartment complex, from the looks of it, that would probably have had to have been the big empty concrete lot on the north side of 9th, east of Denver. Looking down onto 10th, however, there doesn't seem to be much of anywhere that a barber shop and/or cafe might've been, except possibly at the southwest corner of 10th and Marsalis (which is also where Donnie Benavides had gone and was returning from when he came upon the shooting). Jimmy Burt lived with his father-in-law in the second house from the corner of 10th & Denver on the north side of the street; Mr. & Mrs. Frank Wright lived in the house next door, on the corner. It's hard to determine exactly who was where and when. In his FBI interview, William A. said that he had arrived "at Jimmy's house" possibly a little ahead of Jimmy, so perhaps Jimmy hadn't seen the actual shooting, he speculated. He intimated that he meant that he'd been at 505 E 10th, but in reality only said that that's where Jimmy lived. Jimmy told the FBI that both he and Smith had gotten into his car after hearing the first shot, so it appears that they were together ... but where were they? When Smith was deposed by Joe Ball, he said that he had been at Jimmy's house all day - from morning until evening - and that at the time Tippit was shot, he was "in the front yard [at] 505 E 10th," and that Jimmy Burt was with him. He was asked specifically if he had seen the shooter prior to hearing the shot, and he replied that he had not, and did not see him walking. In fact, based on the FBI reports and his testimony, neither he nor Jimmy Burt said that they'd seen the shooter walking west on 10th. Dale Myers cites HSCA RIF 180-10091-10288, an interview with Al Chapman on February 7, 1968, as the source of this information; his 1997 interview with William Arthur Smith did not elicit that same information from Smith, he says (Burt apparently died in a car crash in 1983). Bottom line, tho', is who is William L. Smith and where does all this information come from?

Thanks for making my point, Wim. Weston's account is not Carr's story, but James Richard "Dicky" Worrell Jr.'s, which supposedly "corroborates" Carr's, since both "saw" the man in the brown sport coat. The trouble is that, for supposedly seeing the same man, he did two very distinctly different things: in Carr's account, he got into a Rambler parked on Houston beside the TSBD, which main building (not counting the former loading docks or current museum store section) is just 100 feet long. Worrell's story is that the man "was running towards the intersection of Houston and Elm, where he disappeared among the gathering by-standers. Worrell watched him as long as he could, and ... lost sight of him." So what did the guy do: go around Dealey Plaza and then come back out of the TSBD and get into this Rambler so both Carr and Worrell could have "seen the same man do different things?" One has the man getting into a car within 100 feet of coming out of the building, before the Elm & Houston intersection, the other has him running past the TSBD building and the intersection and disappearing into the crowd. You simply cannot have it both ways! One, the other, or both of them are fabricating. Romack said that he didn't see anybody coming out of the TSBD, and he'd been watching. Weston speculates that the man could have come out when Romack had his back turned to move the barricade, a period in which he says Worrell was watching and did see the man come out and take off running. If that's so - that Romack simply missed him - Carr has him going half-a-block and getting into a car (that nobody else saw), while Worrell has him running at least a block, on foot, and disappearing.

Initially, Bill, I'm saying that Worrell's description of someone wearing any such thing should not be construed as corroboration of someone's existence or actions or observations. Worrell wasn't there. Secondly, in response to your comments above, you will have to un-confuse me with respect to a man in a brown suit jacket "getting into a Rambler," and Lee Oswald "getting into a Rambler." If you are referring to Carr's description of same (on the Houston Street side), then you would seem to be getting onto shaky ground inasmuch as there was no direct line of sight - supposedly - from Carr's position to Elm & Houston. I say "supposedly" because I haven't personally verified it, although I've been told it's true. Nevertheless, Carr's sighting of such an occurrence cannot be corroborated by someone who couldn't have seen it. Recall also that Worrell supposedly watched this guy "until he couldn't see him anymore" (or words to that effect), which pretty much precludes him from being someone who got into the Rambler less than 100 feet from Worrell ... unless maybe his smoking made him blind, too. (He was, after all, quite myopic!) If you're referring to the Roger Craig "getting into a Rambler" thing - which is most often identified with it being Oswald - I'm not certain where the "brown sports coat" thing comes from. As an attorney, I'm sure that you realize that you can't - or at least shouldn't - rely on one questionable witness's testimony to buttress another questionable witness's testimony. "I was drunk when I saw that happen;" "I was drunk and passed out, and I saw it too," ergo it must've happened because two drunks saw and remembered it? After it appeared in the newspapers? If Worrell wasn't where he said he was, he cannot possibly substantiate Carr's statements, and if Carr couldn't see the place in question, Worrell's testimony - however truthful or not - cannot prove Carr right in spite of that fact. That's akin to people who get all the facts wrong, but who nevertheless arrive at the right conclusion. Try prosecuting that in court! ("We convicted him for all the wrong reasons ... which only goes to show that he must've been guilty! And anyway, the important thing is, he's locked up!") Third, specifically what "half a dozen people" saw this supposed person in the/an upper floor window(s) of the TSBD? Euins? Rowland? Baker? Mooney? Outside of Carr and Worrell, who else saw - or claimed to have seen - such a person dressed in such a way doing such things? Please name them and we can examine this further.

No thanks. Let's see, he's dealing with "Duke Lane - Texas" and I'm dealing with "the question originator?" Something a little disparate here, where I can be identified by name and location on alt.jfk, and s/he can't be identified here? That said, since neither of us know what, exactly, was going through Hill's mind at the time, and since he did not say, specifically, that he read what was on the bottom of the shells ("which was ...") to have identified them as "automatics," in truth, either interpretation has as much validity as the other. Mine can hardly be called "denial." I believe that my comment was with respect to his appearance in plain clothes as being a "detective," and that the reason he was in plain clothes was because he was doing office work. Well, all of this comes down to simple argument, doesn't it? And argument for the sake of being argumentative. I said "he didn't pick up the bullets," which is absolutely true; they were handed to him by Poe, so yes, he held them in his hand (sort of; see below), but he still didn't pick them up or see where they had been originally. It's likewise true that Hill didn't say that he'd deduced that they were automatic shells for any reason, but he likewise never said that he examined the shells closely; that is an inference by "Whomever." In actual point of fact, Poe handed Hill the shells "in a Winston cigarette pack," which was not clarified to have been anything other than a cigarette pack, and certainly not as just the cellophane that would have encased a pack of cigarettes (how do you tell a Winston cellophane from a Marlboro cellophane from a Kool cellophane?), and as such, there's no actual evidence, testimonial or otherwise, that Hill even had the opportunity to read what was on the shells. See 7H48-49. So, if Hill didn't examine them, how did he come to the conclusion that they were automatic shells? Sort of. "Anonymous" would have been fine, too.

Imagine that: he sees a rifle firing in a direction that was not downward, toward him, and he had to "get out of the way?" Of what? 180° ricochets? The larger problem, tho', is that he's not seen in any of the films or photos taken of the front of the TSBD. If he was really where he said he'd been when he supposedly was there, he'd have been captured somewhere. "Smoking habit made him short-winded?!?" Sure, he said that, but hey, folks, I'm 50 years old, have had a quadruple bypass, and have smoked since I was 18 years old - older than Worrell and smoking longer than Worrell even was old at the time - and I can sprint that distance - and have sprinted that very same distance - without having to stop for three minutes to "catch my breath!" When the shots were fired, Sam and his partner were on Stemmons Freeway awaiting the passing of the motorcade. They remained there until after the limousine and its immediate entourage had passed, and then drove through city streets - and through the torn up construction area - to get to TSBD. In normal traffic today, it takes more than three minutes to do; going over torn up roads presumably takes a little longer. In any case, how can a person who didn't hear the shots know how long afterward he'd arrived? It was purely an estimate on Sam's part because he didn't know when the shots were fired! "Confirmed" the time? Hardly. Really? He'd have seen what was taking place at the southwest corner of the building when he was at the northeast corner? In that case, it would've saved him quite some time if he'd just flown over to the TSBD from the highway instead of rushing through city streets and construction areas! Sam could only see what was visible down Houston Street toward Dealey Plaza, and nothing at all once the building blocked his view westward. Sam, incidentally, claims he saw someone running diagonally across Houston Street at about the time he got there, doing the same thing Worrell claims to have done, but three minutes or so later. There is likewise none to support it ... not even Worrell's own that he was even in or near Dealey Plaza! Sounds great, but isn't quite true, but Weston would have no way to know that. Worrell didn't want to make a statement, and didn't call the police. Truth is, his mother made him, and called the Farmers Branch police, who took him to Dallas. Worrell had no choice but to accede to his mother's wishes, otherwise he'd have had to tell her that he'd concocted the whole story and maybe even that he'd quit school more than a month before (at 20, the school would not have had to notify his parents), the latter being something that he actually never did! Same reason there are no pictures of Worrell standing in front of the TSBD: he wasn't there!

Not really. The major difficulty is that it's neither very critically thought through nor very accurate, which is unfortunately a hallmark. I'll explain: This fails to note, first, that Worrell was a 20 years old and that he was not a "high school senior," but someone who in his testimony admitted that he'd dropped out of school in October. He was BS-ing his mother and sister about being in school, and tried unsuccessfully to BS the Warren Commission, too. Once again, not so. He was in the wrong place to get a good view. IF he was even at the airport. IF Worrell was at Love Field, and IF he took a bus downtown, and IF he was anywhere near the TSBD, he could only have gotten there by the hair of his chinny-chin-chin. While I've left dangling the possibility (in "Imaginary Witness," an article published in Walt Brown's DPQ second quarter of 2007, which may also be posted here on the forum) that he might've made it there, that's only true if everything worked absolutely in his favor. Weston's "plenty of time" would only have been true if there was a bus leaving Love Field immediately after JFK's arrival. There wasn't; the next one wasn't scheduled to leave until after 12:00, and would not have arrived in normal traffic conditions downtown until after the assassination had taken place, and with no time for Worrell to have walked there. The only bus that would've taken Worrell downtown close enough to the TSBD to have walked there with any time to spare was the one scheduled to depart Love before AF1 landed ... or if the bus driver decided to wait around to see the landing (if not the President himself) and blame his tardiness on traffic or security when leaving Love. There's no evidence or even suggestion that such a thing happened other than Worrell's claiming to have done it. Well, if that were so, it would've been his own fault because he chose to stand right up against the building rather than on the street. Danny Arce, who worked in the TSBD, was a short guy who had a problem seeing as well, but he managed to walk across the Elm Street extension to the main curb and watched from there. What would Worrell's problem have been? [continued next post]

If one reads closely the testimonies of Williams, Norman and Jarman, one finds that it's not only impossible for anyone to have seen these guys on the fifth floor very long before the shooting, but also highly improbable for whoever was on the sixth floor to have been Lee Oswald. The latter is due to the apparent fact that Bonnie Ray Williams was upstairs much later than he ever testified, and his failure to have identified Oswald as having been there fairly well exonerates him. After all, what was Oswald going to do to him for ratting him out? Is that necessarily so? Consider that, when Williams got down to the fifth floor, Junior Jarman had noticed that he'd had a white dusty or powdery substance in his hair. There is no actual representation of how much of that substance was in his hair. Was it a small spot, say 2 by 2 inches, and only lightly dusted, or did it heavily cover his head? If the latter, could someone have mistaken Williams for being "elderly?" Jarman only said that he'd noticed the substance in Williams' hair after the shooting, but he does not state that it was not there prior. Now, if we're to believe that a couple of tiny shells kicked loose enough dust to fall from the ceiling of the fifth floor (the floor of the sixth) some (ten?) feet above Williams' head while he kneeled with his head out the window in sufficient quantity after falling that distance - and presumably dissipating at least somewhat - then and only then can that substance have come from the fifth story ceiling cum sixth story floor. The fact of the matter is that Williams was probably on the sixth floor as late as 12:27-12:28. This is based on Jarman or Norman's testimony that they did not leave the front of the building (where they were seen and noticed by Roy Truly) until after they had heard that the motorcade was on Main Street. That could not have been before 12:22, when the pilot car first indicated that it was on Main Street, and could have been as late as 12:27 when the motorcade was again announced as being on Main. Word could not have filtered all the way down Main Street and into Dealey Plaza for the two to have gleaned that information from "the buzz of the crowd," although it is possible that someone nearby to the TSBD heard it over a police radio and word then filtered through the crowd there, or that there was a police radio near enough to the front of the TSBD for the two to hear, but in either case, that information could only have come from a radio broadcast. Jarman and Norman left the front of the TSBD at about the same time as Danny Arce went to meet his friend at the parking lot at Record Street, a short block away, and then walk to Main Street to watch the parade go by. That walk only takes about 1½ minutes. This is evidenced by Roy Truly's testimony that he'd thought he'd seen Hank and Junior crossing Houston with Danny. Either time would have been sufficient for all three of them to get to their respective locations. Anyway, they went around the back of the TSBD and rode the freight elevator upstairs to the 6th floor. Jarman estimated that this was at 12:26 or 12:28 if memory serves. Jarman also testified that Williams met them after they had arrived, although Norman said that he wasn't certain whether Williams was already there when they'd arrived, or if he'd come afterward (but he certainly did join up with them at some point!). We also know from Roy Truly's testimony that, when he and Officer Baker had gotten to the elevator shaft, both elevators were at the fifth floor. This jibes with the fact that Hank and Junior said that they'd taken the freight elevator to the fifth floor, and that Williams testified that he had ridden the passenger elevator first to the sixth floor, and then back down to the fifth floor when he decided to go downstairs. There is, as you might guess, much more to this story, which I'll get around to telling. Immediately, however, it goes to show that it is possible if not likely that the "elderly Negro" on the sixth floor was Bonnie Ray Williams with some "white stuff" in his hair, both because at some point later he did have the "white stuff" there, and because he was on the sixth floor almost right until the shooting. If that's true - if Williams was upstairs, near a window, with others not matching or even coming close to his description being seen in that and other windows - then Williams saw and very possibly was being "held hostage" by the shooter(s). The fact that he didn't say he'd seen Oswald up there is strong evidence that Oswald wasn't up there, for what did he have to lose - what could he possibly be afraid that a dead man was going to do to him or his family - by saying he'd seen him? Rowland, incidentally, estimated the time he'd seen the man who "seemed to me an elderly Negro" was at about 12:15, just before he noticed the other man with a rifle in the west window, which he estimated by hearing a police radio nearby (!see above about the motorcade on Main!) announcing that the parade was on or around Turtle Creek or somewhere in that vicinity. Even Bonnie Ray admitted to being upstairs at that time, "perhaps" even as late as 12:20 or so, which certainly encompasses 12:15.

So, you read out loud, loudly? Must be very distracting around the office!

... And another is to optimize the JPEG or PDF images for web display, makes them much smaller.

All well and good as far as it goes ... but you end up with an "all-knowing conspiracy" in which every possible angle has been considered and executed with exactitude. Is such a thing even possible outside of fiction? Let's go along with the possibility of RP manipulating the conversation, limiting the possible answers, even suggesting the desired outcome. How did it come to pass that the conversation came up at all? We can have Ruth getting Marina to stick her head out into the yard at a good moment - good enough for her to remark, for example, about (big sigh) "poor Marina's husband" needing a job, and hoping the other women would pick it up and run with it. How, though, do we get Linnie Mae Randle to drop by the neighbor's house at an opportune time, more than a month before Lee supposedly "had" to be working there? By what chance does it turn out that Ruth's neighbor happened to be friendly with Linnie Mae? Who planned for Ruth's neighbor's friend's brother to just happen to get a job at TSBD so that Linnie Mae could even suggest it? Who kept Buell from getting any of the other jobs he'd applied for, and how did the folks at TSBD know that young Frazier lived with his sister, who was friends with the neighbor of the woman who was boarding the soon-to-be patsy's wife, and thus "needed" to be hired so that his sister could mention it and Ruth would have an excuse to bring it up in a conversation that nobody could have known at the time would take place? Or did they? As if all of that's not difficult enough to predict or pre-ordain, we must also account for Buell's decision to move from Huntsville to Dallas, or for his father to become so ill that he needed to be treated in Dallas (and not Houston, which is closer to Huntsville) and his mother to likewise move to be with Dad, and all of them move into the little bungalow - mother, son, daughter, husband and two kids in under 1500 square feet and two bedrooms - so that this seemingly chance encounter could take place. Of course, we haven't yet accounted for why Ruth and Michael Paine decided to pick that particular house, next to that particular neighbor, in that particular neighborhood in the first place, well in advance of Ruth's ever knowing of the Oswalds' existence, while Lee was still cavorting in Minsk, and may not even have met the Russian-speaking girl who would be his wife ... and Ruth Paine's excuse for bringing them into her household. What if Ruth and Michael had chosen a house across the street such that she and Linnie Mae's friend would never gossip across the back fence? What if Lee had found a different job (and all of his other potential employers hadn't been forewarned not to hire him)? What if Linnie Mae's family had decided only weeks before that the really did need a bigger house what with all those people living there? Robert Ludlum is a master at describing the plots that take years to unfold so perfectly. While some in the real world may well be as perfect, it truly stretches the imagination that one including all of the particular people we've mentioned - not to even consider the anomaly of Michael and Ruth being pacifists, his being part of the ACLU, and neither of those qualities probably being endearing to Roy Truly whose cooperation was without question needed - being a part of so grand and successful a scheme as this. ... And of course, someone conveniently decided not to depose the neighbor-lady! How perfect can it get?

Without delving into the question about whether statements were fabricated or for what purpose, the larger question is: what did they miss that made timing the lunchroom encounter even vaguely important? It's been staring us in the face for 44+ years, and only once - and then only just very recently - have I ever seen this addressed, even obliquely.

And, of course, too bad the bus was going in the wrong direction for Worrell ... not to mention that Worrell!probably wasn't even downtown.

Having recent cause to be looking at this, a closer examination to the referenced documents shows the above to not be exactly so. The FBI's first interview in conjunction with this account was with Smith on 12/13/63. There is no indication in the report of the interview how it came to pass that they had learned of Smith having any knowledge of the Tippit shooting since Smith, who had been on probation at the time, did not give his name to any officials because he "thought he might get in trouble with the police" ... for giving them information about a cop-killer! [sarcasm off.] Smith lived at 328½ East 8th Street, about two blocks from where Tippit was killed. He said that he saw a white male, whom he didn't think resembled Oswald (but he was also "too far away" to positively identify anyone, he'd said), shoot a policeman, then walk toward Patton and turn on it toward Jefferson Boulevard. Smith said that he'd seen the shooter "walk up to the police car and as the officer started to emerge he heard four or five shots," whereupon the shooter "continued along 10th Street and turned left on Patton, heading towards Jefferson." There's a clear implication here that the shooter must've been already moving westward in order to "continue" in that direction and "turn left ... towards Jefferson." Smith said that he'd "immediately went up to talk to Mrs. MARKHAM, a neighbor of his that lives at 328½ East 9th Street," that is, one street over from, about even with his home, and on the same side of the street. (We learn from Smith's WC testimony that he also hung around with Markham's son, James.) Despite living just two blocks away from the murder scene, Smith told the agents that "his reason for being in the area was that he was visiting a friend of his, one JIMMY BURT, who was living with his father-in-law, DAVID SCHAFFER at 505 East 10th Street." Smith "thought JIMMY might have seen the shooting also but he was not certain" since Smith believed he had arrived at Burt's house before Burt did. (For some reason, the FBI agents also noted that Smith "advised that he did not have any relatives in New Mexico...." The New Mexico connection was not explained.) The next day, the FBI interviewed Ross Burt, Jimmy's father, at Jimmy's father-in-law's home at 505 East 10th Street, Apartment 8. Burt Senior advised that Jimmy had been living at the Schaffer residence there for the past three months, apparently with his wife (Schaffer's daughter) and their baby, but was by December 14 living in Belmont, Louisiana. Jimmy had apparently told his father that he'd been with Smith when the Tippit murder took place. Agents interviewed Jimmy Burt the next day in Belmont. He affirmed that he'd been living at the Schaffer residence on 10th Street on November 22, but told a different and more detailed story from his friend Smith. According to Burt, he and Smith had been "sitting in his brother, BILLY BURT's house at the corner of 9th and Denver," a block east and another block north from where Tippit had been shot, "when they heard two gunshots." They jumped up, ran outside and, as they ran toward Burt's car (parked facing south on Denver Street), heard four more gunshots. They got in the car, a 1952 two-toned Ford, and drove south on Denver to 10th, and then west on 10th toward the police car "parked at the curb in the middle of the block," facing east. Burt "later recognized him as being an officer who frequented that neighborhood" [emphasis added] and "was known by the name 'Friendly' to the residents of that area." Burt parked his car in front of Tippit's patrol car on the same side of the street, facing it, at about the same time as the shooter reached the intersection with Patton Street, about "50 or 60 yards" from where Burt was. The man was wearing "a light colored short jacket," but he could offer no further description because of the distance. Burt said he then ran to the corner and saw the man running into the alley way that runs between 10th and Jefferson, heading west. As he went toward the corner, he also noticed two women "going toward the officer who was lying on the street," possibly Helen Markam and one of the two Davis sisters-in-law (Virginia and Charlie), or the Davises. By the time he'd finished watching the gunman flee, a crowd had gathered, and he did not again "have a chance to view the slain officer." He "made no further observations" at the scene. Of the two, Burt and Smith, only the latter testified before the Warren Commission. Smith said that he'd spent "the whole day," from "in the morning" until "in the evening," at Burt's house at 505 East 10th, and at the time of the shooting, he was "in the front yard" at 505, with Jimmy Burt. He - or they - heard shots, which was what first attracted them to what had happened down the street. Smith also said in his testimony that he had not seen the man walking anywhere prior to the time he'd heard the shots, and specifically that he hadn't seen him walk in front of Burt's house. ---------------- What, then, to make of all this? Neither apparently man said that they had seen the shooter walking westward along 10th, and neither of them gave any indication of having seen him prior to the time they heard the first shot(s), much less having seen the shooter "approach the squad car," Tippit "roll down his window" or talk to the man. So where from was this story derived as it's been told for so long? It's what's in Rush to Judgment, but is an interview on Lane's film? If it came along well after the Report had been published and contradicts the reports made to the FBI and under oath (by Smith), can it be credited? As an aside, I think it was John Armstrong (but I could be mistaken) who conjectured that it was these boys whom Aquila Clemmons had seen, or possibly the shooter and one of them. Thoughts?