Duke Lane

No problem, feel free. A bit simplistically, but yes. Hill was in the Personnel office when the DP shooting took place, he was not "working the streets" except by his own volition afterward; he was given no assignment, per se, to do that. Unequivocally, no, he was assigned to no such job(s); equivocally, he did perform one or more. A transcript of a "press briefing" that he gave is among the WC Exhibits, as I recall. The reporters consistently referred to him as "Jerry." How he came to be at each location he was at is likewise a bit of a mystery since every person that he said he'd ridden with failed to mention him when asked who was in the various cars with them. This includes even Hill's (temporary) superior, Capt. Westbrook ... who held no particular liking for his subordinate. Westbrook seems to have ensured that certain aspects of Hill's actions were put on record, however, none complimentary and at least one potentially even incriminating. As obscured as they are, there are answers, even if not simple - or easy - ones. I've posted a few myself.

I think that the answer to this one is really quite simple: Hill was not in truth an "experienced police sergeant" at least not to the extent of having much with weapons and crimes. Consider that, as a sergeant, he walked a downtown beat. He was in plain clothes on November 22 not because he was a detective - as he undoubtedly appeared to be to several uniformed officers, including Poe - but because he was assigned to office duty in the Personnel office, not what you'd call hard police work. Earlier, he had been a journalist, and later, the spokesman for the Dallas County Sheriff's Office during the tenure of his good buddy, former DPD communications sergeant Jim Bowles. He was better known among the media than his fellow officers. As to how they might be identified as "automatic" shells - not having been done by Hill's keen observational skills - is simply that they had been nearby on the ground, as if ejected. Recall that he didn't actually pick them up or see them on the ground: fired shells outside of a gun at the scene might well be inferred to be from an automatic pistol, as opposed to those fired from a revolver, which might be inferred to either have still been in the gun, or located close together as they were dumped from the cylinder.

Write a book, Wim. Bring your client's guilt before a court of competent jurisdiction and get him extradited. Nobody said it would be an easy row to hoe. I don't expect people to sing my praises when I'm dead unless I deserve it. Dying doesn't make one more deserving. The lack of mutual admiration between Joe West, Bob Vernon and I was well documented back in the CompuServe JFKFORUM days. I can't imagine there's anything else to add; can you? Frankly, I'm too busy to bother at the moment, and my lack of response doesn't strengthen Files' position one itsy-bitsy, teeny-weeny, polka-dotted iota. No straw man here.

As tired as I am, all I can suggest is that what you've cited has to stand on its own merits without my additional input. If you have problems with what you've cited, then you refute it with your own facts. Ees not my yob, mon. I'm not your or anyone else's straw man. At least Ed's supporters admit that there's no way to prove his claims, that they're taking it on faith because he's really a decent guy after all (a sentiment with which I agree ... but this isn't a "sentimental" case, is it?). They've written two non-sellers about it; I'm sure you can do the same. Ed is supposedly only a witness, not a perpetrator. If Files' story were true, the only responsible path you could beat is to a court of competent jurisdiction to nail the sumbinch. I don't believe - on faith - that you can or will. So, to me, it's a non-story right from the git-go. Prove me wrong. Hanging the story out there for someone else to buy doesn't do it for me. Turn in the killer and make your money back on the lecture circuit after the conviction. I guarantee you WILL be famous for breaking the case at last; how could you disagree? Mark Lane reportedly did fairly well, didn't he? Unless, of course, you don't think it's do-able? According to the copyright notice on Perry's article, you've had ten years to do it. Why not? Incidentally, this is your can of worms; I didn't open it, you did. Besides, there's no blood in a turnip. FWIW.

Thanks for the kudos, Wim, but I'd no more presume to delve into that than I would, say, the Roscoe White story. It's already been done; what could I add?

A noble sentiment, to be sure, but not entirely accurate, Tim, since sometimes even a thorough debunking doesn't stem the flow of false information. While few people any longer believe that David Atlee Phillips was under arrest in Fort Worth on November 22, the rumor of Roscoe White's involvement in the killing persists. These are relatively benign examples inasmuch as nobody stands to profit in any way - financially or otherwise - by continuing to push those stories. The same is not true of those who insist that others were involved or were witnesses. Cases in point include James Files and Ed Hoffman, to name but two (should we include Lee Oswald here?). In the latter case, it seems like no sooner had I published my Freeway Man analysis of Hoffman's story than two new authors appeared at the 2007 November in Dallas conference to "add to" Ed's already "definitive" account of his experience in Eyewitness. (I, incidentally, was initially invited, then disinvited when the gist of Freeway Man became known, tho' ostensibly for different reasons.) Ed admits that his story cannot be proven, that people can only take it on faith ... and despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, even folks like the normally dispassionate Bill Miller won't let loose of the story. So, in my humble opinion, even debunking by careful researchers doesn't keep false information from spreading, keeps getting repeated, and appears to be "more believable" by its repetition ... as long as there's someone out there who wants to keep repeating it in the face of all odds.

Get ahold of Gordon Winslow, he'd know if anyone would.

While I agree with the conclusion for other reasons, failure to volunteer does not constitute "proof," only inference and, potentially, corroboration. Two other people saw the man walking westbound from Denver St, a block east of Patton. Markham and Scoggins' testimonies could have been used to refute the others', and the fact that this information was not elicited from either of them points toward the conclusion that their interrogators knew full well that they hadn't seen Oswald or anyone else cross Patton from the west. Markham and Scoggins' testimony, then, at least didn't contradict the prosecution's case, and that was sufficient for the WC's purposes. Competent defense counsel, had there been any, might well have asked if either had in fact seen anyone walking eastbound on 10th, but absent that, we cannot state with certainty what either of them did or didn't see. Absent their testimony that they did see someone walking eastbound, neither can we state with certainty that someone - Oswald or anyone else - was. That was simply something that Oswald would have had to have done to be at the crime scene, and since it was already determined - but not established - that he was at the scene, then he "had to" be walking east ... even if nobody saw him. This is along the same lines as establishing Tippit's TOD. The WC concluded that occurred at 1:16, when the "citizen" radio call came over the air (by TF Bowley). That, of course, assumes that Bowley watched it happen and got on the radio immediately, even before the killer had rounded the corner. Didn't happen that way at all, but it was necessary to have happened then because otherwise, as tight as the timing was for LHO to have gotten from the rooming house to the crime scene, if the murder happened any earlier, it was absolutely impossible. Let it be said that a young man could've walked the necessary distance in the 13 minutes alloted; the thing is, he really only had about five minutes to cover the distance because Tippit was dead before 1:10! If we recognize that as fact - and it is - then the entire discussion of LHO being the killer is moot. Who cares which direction the gunman was walking or if he was walking at all? He wasn't Lee Oswald, and there's no getting around that.

Someone posted a comment to the RawStory.com "new evidence" story, that read: "nice to see this in the news. The facts are so obvious and the solution is so simple but the first step is a doozy." The truth is that it's the second step that's the doozy, for once someone takes and completes the first step, then the next one is to admit for all these years what we've "known" is bullspit. What of the government and the media who for decades have been telling us one thing, for certain, has been the truth only to find out that now it's not, really? It's the prospect of that second step that keeps the first one from ever happening.

So maybe others would read it? Felt the need to mention it to someone when the occasion arose. It arose; it was you. Nothing personal. Honest. It's just one of my pet peeves, reading the same last, long post several-several times in succession, trying to find the replies in the midst of them. I find myself doing the same thing, too, and only just recently too ... so I'm as much an object as an exemplar of my own criticism, and much less the latter than the former oftentimes. Just blowing steam.

Is there a relation between the two? I haven't seen anything on such a person, nor has anyone to my knowledge ever to date suggested that J.E.D. (deceased 1991) had anything to do with anything that day other than eating lunch with Danny Arce, not in and of itself incriminating. Send me a PM if you have a moment so I follow your thinking better.

With all due respect, Kathy, I know what I'd said and don't need it repeated in full in the very next message. I only quote yours in full because there have been several between then and now. Learning the names of the people who worked in the TSBD and what they had to say is a very good first step. It beats the heck out of buying wholesale into a "two Oswalds" theory (which has merits, FWIW) and dripping silly sarcasm ("It just hit me: the invisible man, retarded -- David Ferrie! ... He was with Lee [of Lee and Harvey fame]") to "win a prize" like on a board game. But silly me, isn't that what this is? No, you didn't win a prize. Nor, I think, did you expect to.

Aye, but 'tis none of the above. The story of the electrical blackout is a misconstruction. I'm thinking that it was Geneva Hine - don't have time to look it up at the moment - who had stayed behind the the TSBD to answer phones. She noted that, at about the time the motorcade came around, the phone stopped ringing "and all the lights went out." What she was referring to was not to the lights in the building, but the lights on the phone. If you remember the old multi-line phones, they had a row of clear lucite buttons with which to select the line. When in use or when ringing, the lights beneath the buttons lit up: steady when the line was in use, blinking when it was ringing or on hold. On the other hand, two people testified to the elevator not working as they rode from the first floor upward to the second. One of them was Luke Mooney, whose testimony following that incident is most interesting. The other was a woman who'd testified to the same thing; I can't think of her name offhand either. The "Invisible Man" was standing about 10 feet west of the west (freight) elevator at the time of the shooting, which likewise placed him about 10 feet from the stairwell, directly in the path of anyone who would have run down from the sixth floor to any floor below. He apparently had the elevator doors open, for about 60-75 seconds later, Roy Truly tried calling the elevator down, but it didn't move; he even rang the bell to get whoever might've been using it's attention to close the door, but to no avail. It and the passenger elevator to the east - which could only be operated when someone was in it and could not be called anywhere - were both at the fifth floor, exactly where the "Invisible Man" said that he was. Interestingly, when Truly and Baker got to the fifth floor (where Truly had last seen both elevator bottoms when he looked up the shaft), Truly took Baker right by where the freight (west) elevator should have been - but wasn't - and went to the passenger (east) elevator, which the two of them rode up to the seventh floor, past the sixth. Truly even testified that he saw the freight elevator was gone, but he did not call it to Baker's attention. Since it would seem that a moving elevator would've caught even Baker's attention - he wouldn't have necessarily known there was supposed to have been an elevator there - it would seem that the elevator had either ascended or descended while B&T were running up the stairs, making all sorts of noise. Going down might've caused whoever was operating the freight elevator - which faced the stairs - to have been noticed by Baker as they made their descent to (or past) the fifth floor if, for example, Baker had hesitated on the fifth floor like he did on the second floor, with Truly running ahead. On the other hand, if the freight elevator went up while B&T were coming up from below, they had but one floor to move and no chance of bumping into Baker on the way down. Once Truly got him on the enclosed passenger elevator, going down past B&T as they "hopscotched" the sixth floor would've provided the cover that was needed to get down to, say, the fourth floor. Both elevators moved at almost exactly the same speed (according to Billy Lovelady, who had previously timed the two elevators going down from the seventh to the first floors), thus the passenger elevator going up two flights was roughly equal to the freight elevator going down two floors, both stopping at about the same time. The elevator "stall" - which may have been the result of someone not closing the gate fully? - happened after that. Luke Mooney saw whoever it was that was coming down. He thought they were cops, but there were no other cops in the building other than Baker - who was on the seventh floor at the time - Mooney's partner going up the stairs, and Mooney himself who was momentarily stranded on the second floor, walked up, and was the first officer known to be on the sixth floor other than Baker on his way down from seven. Mooney did not run into Baker on the stairs because he testified that the "officers" (or officers) he met were "plainclothes, like me" (or words to that effect), which does not describe Baker. The "Invisible Man?" We've known about him for years. Just nobody's put together what he did and when, and what opportunities that befell him. The reason? He was "retarded" ... tho' today, we'd know better. You'll just have to (ahem!) "wait for the book."

I'll soon be publishing - possibly here on the forum, initially - a three-part analysis of the events in TSBD from about 11:30 to about 12:40. Through that analysis, you'll find that the entire Baker-Oswald encounter - which I believe took place, but Officer Baker being deceased, I can only take that on faith - is a red herring that really means nothing at all. Why? Because not only did Oswald not run down the stairs to eventually meet up with Baker, nobody ran down the stairs, then or later. They simply rode the freight elevator - which was not noisy as some like to posit - down past Baker as Baker made his noisy way up with Roy Truly. The only questions about that are whether they - and there were two or more persons - first took the freight elevator up to six, descending when Truly & Baker took the closed passenger elevator up to the seventh floor, or whether they timed it such that the noise of the two men running up from five to six covered the noise of the elevator going down. They only had to - and possibly did - only descend to the fourth floor. They were seen descending by stair somewhere between two and six, tho', and it is on record. One man, also now deceased, actually spent several (probably very nervous) minutes with them, and was probably saved from having been "Lee Oswald's" second victim by the arrival of the men on the fifth floor. Yet another, also unfortunately deceased, also witnessed it close at hand and most likely participated in the events taking place. These were "The Three Blind Mice." He has been overlooked by every author and research to my knowledge, but his culpability is virtually undeniable, his alibis - such as they were - suspect at best. I've dubbed him "The Invisible Man," even though he has a name. If any of these things are true - and they are all documentable and documented, tho' overlooked - then the encounter with Oswald on the second floor is absolutely meaningless in terms of Oswald's escape from the sixth floor ... because they mean that Oswald wasn't on the sixth floor, and thus did not "escape" from it. Oswald's not being on the sixth floor is evidenced by the fact that neither of two people who were on the sixth floor during the minutes leading up to the shooting, and none of the four people who would have been able to see who was coming downstairs (if they actually came down the stairs), and the one who absolutely, positively could not have not seen someone coming downstairs if they did, ever testified to having seen Oswald there. With Oswald dead by the time of their testimonies, what would they have had to fear by so identifying him? The only reason they didn't testify to having seen him is because they didn't see him, even tho' they were in a position to have done so. If, perhaps, they hadn't been so desperate to "see no evil," perhaps their testimony might've been better suborned, and they'd have "admitted" to having seen Oswald running downstairs. Their testimonies are glaring by their omissions. But the question does still remain, since we know that Geraldean Reed saw Oswald after the encounter with Baker would have taken place, where he went from there, how he went, and possibly with whom he went. Unfortunately, from that point onward, there is nothing on the record, and the one person who might've told us was dead less than 48 hours later.

THE Rosetta Stone had the same thing on it in Greek, Egyptian heiroglyphics and demotic characters; only the Greek was known. Knowing that, however, led to the translation of the others. The common definition is "a clue, breakthrough, or discovery that provides crucial knowledge for the solving of a puzzle or problem." And that the Tippit murder certainly is. Wars are not won by generals at headquarters, but by footsoldiers on the front lines. If one wants to know what general gave what order, the determination is won by asking the soldier what sergeant sent him, the sergeant what lieutenant's orders he relayed, the lieutenant to the captain to the colonel ... and only then do we find the general who actually ordered the massacre. That may be so, but it doesn't make it any less "convincing" ... at least to the unitiated! The President got no legal autopsy within the competent jurisdiction; for all legal intents and purposes, he "didn't die" in Texas. If JFK had a massive heart attack as he passed the Stemmons sign, no murder would've taken place. There's just no legal basis to prosecute. Even if we suddenly learn beyond any doubt who pulled the trigger(s), it's unlikely they'll ever see a single day in court ... at least not on the charge of murder. The same is not true in the Tippit case, although there may be questions about the validity of some of the evidence. Many of the people who may have something to do with it are dead (none, apparently, mysteriously!), and there are many other gaps that may likewise preclude a conviction, possibly even call for a directed acquittal. But a trial may nevertheless bring closure to the case, if it ever came to pass.

It's also a FACT that the question we're addressing is but a micro-microcosm of what Alaric posted points about, and which I've yet to read in its entirety. If we want to pursue the issue I'd raised separately, let's do on another thread. I really only wanted to hear Alaric's response to that one challenge ....

By whom? Thomas, read the testimonies, then YOU tell ME. It's pretty self-evident if you do. Who was where and when? Follow the trail, all pre-coneptions aside. This is NOT new information. I remember discussing this on CompuServe in the early '90s. It's only a question if anyone READ what was recorded by all the sources who knew about it. A little help: Bonnie Ray Williams, Hank Norman, Junior Jarman, Bill Shelley, Danny Arce, Billy Lovelady, Jack Dougherty, Buell Wesley Frazier, Roy Truly, Troy West, Eddie Piper, and everyone else they mentioned who was recorded. I will post an analysis of all of this in the next few months, I'm just terribly busy right now with other priorities. If you ask nicely and promise non-disclosure, I can maybe send you Parts I and II, "The Great Elevator Shuffle" and "The Three Blind Mice." Part III, "The Invisible Man," is fairly concensual in nature: let's see what YOU think before I begin writing that. Someone here recently quoted Bugliosi as having called this case a "bottomless pit" with more questions than answers ... some 1000+ pages into a 1500-page tome. There are twice as many details you can forget as there are that you might remember. One of those is that there were four - not just three - men on the fifth floor when the shots were fired. Two of them knew with absolute certainty who was firing those shots. It's independently on record. Does that make it a fact?

Alaric, I haven't a lot of time at the moment to respond to your lengthy post, however I did want to make comment on the above. Oswald didn't descend to the 2nd floor from the 6th unobserved because if he had descended from the 6th floor, he would've been observed, no question about it. Moreover, there was at least one witness on the 6th floor who would've seen Oswald there if Oswald had been there. That the witness didn't testify to having seen Oswald - given that the witness was on that floor until about 12:28, likely standing just west of the "sniper's nest" - further underscores the fact that Oswald wasn't there. I'm going to state these two things as fact based on a close study I've recently done - but have not yet completed - that's in three parts: "The Great Elevator Shuffle, the Three Blind Mice, and the Invisible Man." The results will surprise you ... just as they surprised me! I didn't set out to support a position, but merely to document events based on the testimonies of those who were on the premises. Only the last part - "The Invisible Man" - is speculation, and that only because there's nothing to document it with ... but given the prior documentation, they are reasonable conclusions. Parts I and II are finished; Part III is not even started. I have to agree with you that Dale's book will leave anyone convinced of LHO's guilt ... in much the same manner that Posner's did. It's all in the telling, after all.

I appreciate your several kind comments, and I might understand your consternation except that you keep going back to that same, tired old theme about a connection between LHO and JDT, or that JDT had any reason or instructions to search for someone resembling anyone "spookily similar" to LHO, without ever establishing a shred of evidence to support it. What "growing suspicion" are you talking about? Do you have anything that suggests that JD had any suspicions about anybody? Since he never communicated anything to the effect that he was "looking for" anyone, and nobody told him to look for anyone, and since nobody who was associated with him has ever suggested such a thing, how you can reach a conclusionary question like "What other reason could Tippit have cruised and then stopped right by the very person who'd been assigned to eliminate him, if it wasn't that person that Tippit was assigned to look for?" If you can't think of one, it doesn't mean there isn't one. The first thing you've got not to do is start with a conclusion, find the suppositions that support the conclusion, and turn them into "facts" because they seem to "make sense." There is a saying: "Assassination 'buffs' are those who raise questions; 'researchers' are the ones who answer them." I don't claim to know the answers, but I'm at least not simply raising questions, but dealing with facts. What those facts mean is another story. Add enough of them together, and a picture will start to emerge. My first recommendation is that, even though this is a long thread, read through it from the start. Then use a keyword search for mentions of Tippit (the results are here) and slog your way through them. Then read the testimonies, affidavits and reports of everyone who was in any way connected with Oak Cliff that afternoon, starting with William Scoggins' and the Davis girls' testimonies; they are all online. I can't really be an awful lot more help at this juncture. If you've got more questions after you've done that legwork, you know where to find me.

Nobody male. The Top Ten pone call, had it been successful, may have been to ask "Where is he? I've lost him!" Coulda been ... but first, you've got to ask several questions to get there, and here's where the whole "Car 10 Where Are You?" scenario gets a little muddled (Bill Drenas and I have talked about this, and I won't say that he exactly agrees, but ...). First, this map, which will also answer the next question you asked: Duke is this witness testimony or Tippit's? Position "1" is where, according to Russ Shearer's DPD Channel I radio transcript (which most people who've compared it with the so-called "critics' tape" of the actual recording say is as close to accurate as can be ... and there are several reasons I can't get into here why I think it's authentic, not dummied up), is where Tippit reported being at 12:46, when he was contacted and asked his location; Kiest & Bonnieview. Position "3" is where he reported being at 12:54 when he was next contacted and asked "You are in the Oak Cliff area, are you not?" (which is sort of a strange way to ask an open-ended question, but that's neither here nor there). The red arrows mark the route that I believe he took since /a/ it's the most direct route to "3" and /b/ it takes almost exactly eight minutes to travel at about the speed limit ... which, if he was at each location as he'd said he was, when he says he was, the speed limit is about how fast he drove. Next map: The Top Ten Record Store is located at 338 W Jefferson, which is the SE corner of Jefferson & Bishop (actually, the second store in from the corner). The Gloco station was located where the Houston Street viaduct comes into Oak Cliff, in the sharp corner of the dark grey triangle. You can see where 8th & Lancaster is located as well, just six or seven blocks south of the Gloco, directly south on Lancaster (which no longer connects to the main drag there; you can see the gap on this recent map). If one believes that Tippit was at the Gloco when he said he was at Kiest & Bonnieview, then one then has to believe that he managed to stretch out that six- or seven-block trip into eight minutes, or that he'd gone somewhere else and managed to say, exactly eight minutes later, where he would have been exactly eight minutes after leaving Kiest & Bonnieview. That's too coincidental for me to swallow. As I've said, there are two candidates for being the cop at the Gloco; Tippit isn't one of them. If Tippit had only 15 minutes to live at that point (as I'm sure he didn't know), then in that time (assuming he was, in fact, at 8th & Lancaster where he said he was) he had to get to Top Ten at Jefferson & Bishop (about 1¼ miles or 4 minutes, according to Google Maps). This puts his arrival there at about 11:58. Then he had to jump out of his car, run into the store, dial the phone and let it ring a few times, then run back out and get in his car. It takes - and to my recollection, took - about 30 seconds for a phone to ring five times and time to dial it, etc., and let's give him 30 seconds in each direction from the car for an even two minutes, so it's now 12:00 noon sharp. (I'm "pushing" him here, not giving him time for anything other than rush-in, dial, 5 rings, hang up, rush-out and split.) He clearly didn't have time to get all the way back up to the Gloco almost two miles and approximately six minutes away. The most sensible route would have been Bishop north to Davis, east to Zang, north to the Gloco (1502 N Zang, according to Drenas). That's 12:06. Then down Marsalis to 9th, right on 9th past Patton and south on Crawford to 10th so he could approach 10th & Patton from the west, for another 1½ miles in 4 minutes, 12:10. Possible ... but then, our scenario above doesn't have him sitting in his car in the gas station lot, so it doesn't work. And 12:10 is already too late; he was dead by then. ... Or he could've done like I think he did, which is to have left Top Ten, crossed Jefferson, turned onto 10th and drove to Patton, about 8/10 of a mile in 3 minutes, 12:03 ... or more likely up to Davis (a wider thoroughfare than little sidestreet 10th. and with traffic lights to cross Zang and Beckley with), over to Crawford, down Crawford to 10th and a block east to his death. That's about 1.1 miles and about 5 minutes, 12:05-ish, a bit closer to the truth. If he tarried just a little bit, or if he got stuck at a long light at Zangs or Beckley in either direction to or from Top Ten, then it easily could have been a couple of minutes later. It is possible if not likely that the call at 1:03 that Tippit didn't answer occurred when he was in the record shop. Helen Markham was on the way to catch the 1:12 bus, and testified that it was about 1:08 when she reached the corner of 10th & Patton. Now I know there are lots of good reasons to consider her "an utter screwball" and totally unreliable, but the fact is that she took that bus every day to work, and knew what time to leave her house to get to the bus stop on time. A bus might be late, but one certainly doesn't plan on it being. Helen at least knew what time it was, how much time she had to get to the bus stop, and what time she'd get there ... which no seasoned bus rider would let be exactly the time the bus was supposed to arrive, because - even while it's not supposed to happen - busses can leave early, too. One does plan on that possiblity! We will also recall that T.F. Bowley arrived on the scene after the shooting - he didn't see it happen - looked at his watch and saw it was 1:10. I've elsewhere analyzed his movements from picking up his daughter at her school, and found the time to work. I've also visited with him several times, and he's quite confident of the time it was, even why he looked at his watch in the first place, and the fact that it was accurately set. So, there you have it: no Gloco station for Tippit. And very possibly an accurate accounting of how he went and got where, and when. Read the testimonies of William Scoggins and the Davis girls. Unless you posit that he was part of The Plot - Oswald's "contact" or some such nonsense - then what specifically would make anyone think he was looking for someone? The supposed incident involving James Andrews is unlikely to have occurred since Andrews claimed to have been driving west on West 10th St "a little after 1:00" - that is, in the opposite direction that Tippit ended up driving (east on East 10th) just a few minutes later. "Tippit" supposedly was also travelling west "about eight or nine blocks from where Tippit was shot minutes later," that is, two or three blocks west of Bishop, where Tippit was last seen after leaving the record shop. After supposedly stopping Andrews, Tippit again speeds off, still heading in a westerly direction. Then, inexplicably and unseen, he doubles back, crosses two busy streets (Zang and Beckley) and again starts cruising, not fast, furious and frantically like Andrews describes, but slowly down the street. Then he encounters a man (who may have resembed Oswald, but wasn't) and pulls up alongside him as the guy leans up against the side of Tippit's car as if in conversation through the closed window. The actions of a man who is trying to "escape" from Tippit and his cohorts? The actions of a man "frantically" in pursuit of none other than Lee Oswald? They don't sound that way to me. What caused Tippit's sudden change of demeanor, from "upset and agitated ... acting wild" to cool, calm and collected - and shy! Remember that he supposedly wouldn't look people in the eye, but down at the ground! - all within a matter of five minutes or less. I've explored this elsewhere here - maybe even in this thread? - and the answer to your last questions would seem to be that Tippit was predictable to those who knew him, and it was set up from the beginning. The question is, really: what had JD done to piss someone off so badly? Payback for his philandering? Just a "poor dumb cop" who wouldn't be missed? But then, we almost got to be asking that question about Nick McDonald, too. He was just a bit luckier than JD is all, but he was going to go down, too, moments before Oswald would've met his more timely demise in the theater.

I only got it when Half Price Books did, and then only because I got a gift certificate for Christmas, but I haven't cracked it yet. One thing that's often true, however, is that even books that don't agree with one's own viewpoint can contain some interesting and sometimes useful information. What the author does with that information, how he uses it, may be a different story. Sometimes, they don't even realize what they'd written. Take With Malice, for example. I'm not going to go look it up, but at the beginning of one chapter, Dale Myers quotes a uniformed police officer who was in the interrogation room with Oswald after they got back to DPD HQ, said officer (C.T. Walker, if memory serves) saying that he was in the room with Oswald "and I had his gun." The quote is from Walker's WC testimony, so it's not a secret, but it's also not very well known. That Myers quoted it actually astounded me; that he ignored it was not particularly surprising; that he didn't realize what he'd said, however, simply floors me. How he could have acknowledged the existence of that quote without acknowledging its implications is ... well, either incredibly naive or stupid, or completely disingenuous. See, the fact is that Walker (or whomever; I'm not going to look that up either) couldn't have had Oswald's gun in the interrogation room because it was busy being initialed by Nick McDonald and others on a different floor, and never otherwise apparently came into Walker's possession. The actual chain of possession - as fatally flawed as it is - of the gun in the theater is documentable. It did not include Walker. Yet Myers effectively admitted, by his inclusion of this snippet of testimony in his book, that there actually were two handguns attributable (in effect) to Lee Oswald in DPD HQ that afternoon. And if there were two pistols, we have a serious problem. Myers chose to expose it and then ignore it. Assuming, that is, that he even realized what he'd said. Personally, I suspect that the reason it "tanked" is simply because it's so huge and expensive. Who but the most dedicated will spend fifty bucks on a topic that, at best, is only of passing interest to them? Those who subscribe to the single gunman theory already know "Oswald did it," so why would they need to spend that kind of money to learn what they already know? And those who don't subscribe to it ... well, why spend that kind of money just to raise their blood pressure? Maybe at $7.50, it stands a chance. It's quite a bargain at that price, cheaper even than the raw materials that went into it! The real "value" of Reclaiming History is that it's big, it's by a well-known (if not quite famous) person, and it endorses the conclusion that, really, most people would like to believe is the truth ... for to believe otherwise is to make for sleepless nights. Thus, if famous prosecutor Vince Bugliosi believes it and wrote so much about it (and charged so much for it!), then it must be true.

Bernie, It's my contention that whoever it was at the Gloco station, it was not JD Tippit. This is in part substantiated by the fact that the time between when Tippit said that he was at Kiest and Bonnieview, to the time he said he was at 8th and Lancaster - eight minutes - is exactly the amount of time it takes to drive the most direct route - north on Bonnieview to where it curves and becomes 8th, then from there to Lancaster. Remember that he wasn't told to go "code," meaning he went at a relatively normal speed, no lights or sirens. Conversely, it only takes about 2½ minutes to go from where the Gloco station was to 8th and Lancaster, so either: /a/ Tippit - who supposedly went racing out of the Gloco to points unknown - somehow managed to get to 8th & Lancaster in just the right amount of time as if he'd actually been at Kiest & Bonnieview, which in turn means either means he pre-planned lying about his original location and kept track of the time that had gone by since racing from the Gloco so he could report being where he "should" have been eight minutes later; or /b/ Tippit was never at 8th & Lancaster, but again kept track of the time so he could report being somewhere he wasn't then either, but could do so in the right timeframe; or /c/ it was someone else at the Gloco who resembled Tippit enough at a distance to be mistaken for him. There is evidence to suggest that that is exactly the case. If you search through well-known assassination-related photos, you will eventually see someone who fits that bill. Not exactly, but close enough to permit the mistake. There was also another cop in Oak Cliff at that time, but I don't know what he looked like. He was not - or at least didn't report being - on or near Houston Street, however. Tippit's supposed actions. You are adding too many "ifs" up to be able to reach a viable conclusion. The record reflects that Tippit was at Kiest & Bonnieview at 12:46 and at 8th & Lancaster at 12:54, and dead by no later than 1:10. We are thus missing only between 11-14 minutes of his time. Is it possible that he was able to get to all the places it's claimed he was? Maybe, but it's hardly certain. After reporting being at 8th & Lancaster at 12:54 and being told to "be at large for any emergency that comes in," he is next called sometime prior to 12:04, less than 10 minutes but does not respond. We can probably conclude at least that he was not in his car at that time, otherwise he would presumably have responded. If he was not in his car less than 10 minutes later, where was he? The trip from the Top 10 Records store takes just a few minutes, about enough for him to have gotten from there to 10th & Patton by about the time he was shot ... which was absolutely certainly before 1:11, and most likely before 1:10. If the call came asking for his location at, say, 1:03 and he had just gotten out of his car, give him a minute in the store and five to get to 10th & Patton; if it came just before he got back into his car, then he gets an additional minute. Since he was only "at large," there's no reason to think that he ran red lights, especially across the fairly busy Zangs and Beckley intersections, and also very possible that he was caught at red lights at either or both of them. Well, first of all, there is no real indication that Tippit knew Oswald, and likewise none that he was actually looking for Oswald either. Even if he did and was, why pick that particular part of Oak Cliff, and moreover, why stop into Top 10 to call him? It's not like Lee had a cell phone with him! The phone call alone - one he didn't connect to anyone on - should be enough to prove that JD was not "looking for" Lee or anyone else on the lam. There is likewise no indication that Tippit got "suspicious" in any way, and in fact the only witness to the shooting said that the conversation seemed to have been "real friendly like" from her point of view less than 100 feet away. Tippit did not draw his weapon, as a "suspicous" cop might well be expected to (I don't give a lot of credence to the "he always looked down, wouldn't meet your eyes" bull). Indeed, the only reason he'd have had to have been suspicious is if he was "part of the conspiracy," which is far from proven. Let's be clear: it was not "impossible" for Lee to have gotten from the rooming house on Beckley to 10th and Patton ... but just because it is possible to have done so does not mean that he did. It's possible for me to fly a plane, but that doesn't mean I was in Poughkeepsie last night! The "real outcome" of the rendezvous was exactly what it was and what it was always intended to be: the murder of a police officer to divert the attention of the rest of the force away from Dealey Plaza ... and to Oak Cliff where the patsy was left to fend for himself.

We shall see. Mostly, I think, we shall see where the "JFK Grand Jury" folks are (NOT) during Watkins' term.

Tsk, tsk, Jack. The word has an even more odorous background than merely being an "explosive device" inasmuch as it specifically dealt with the practice of exploding intestinal gasses as a means to breach the city gates. Colloquially, it means you've been spoiled by your own devices, undone by your own plot. Now what's that on your face? Edited by moderator due to inappropriate remarks.