Duke Lane

You're right. I noticed it probably just as I was posting it, sort of like seeing your keys in the ignition just as you slam the door.

... Which we will accept at face value, uncritically. Let's see: it's 8/10 of a mile from 1026 N. Beckley to the corner of 10th & Patton. That's roughly 4225 feet in 345 seconds, or 12.25 feet per second, or 8.3 mph. The average adult walking speed is 4.3 fps, or 2.9 mph. This would certainly make it a "fast walk" at nearly three times a "normal" walk, and in half the time as "people" have been cited as having been able to walk the same distance repeatedly over many years and time trials (i.e., 11 minutes). But if walking they call it, then walking it is. And if "anyone" can do it in 11 minutes, certainly Belin & Co. can do it in 5.75 at the same general speed.l Gosh. I should write a book about this. I think I'll call it "Murder Logic." I mean, it is logical, isn't it? Makes perfect sense to me ....

But it could be very important, because the WC's estimated times were being based on Earlene Roberts being RIGHT when she said that LHO was in his room for "3 to 4 minutes". But just look at what ELSE Earlene Roberts said: JOE BALL -- "How long did he [Oswald] stay in the room?" EARLENE ROBERTS -- "Oh, maybe not over 3 or 4 minutes. Just long enough, I guess, to go in there and get a jacket and put it on and he went out zipping it." (Emphasis added by DVP.) ------------- So, from Mrs. Roberts' OWN MOUTH, we have her saying that LHO likely wasn't in his room any longer than it would take "to go in there and get a jacket and put it on". Also take note of the words "maybe" and "I guess" in Roberts' WC testimony there. IOW--She was GUESSING. That's all. She wasn't timing Oswald with a stopwatch. And I kinda doubt that it would take 3-4 minutes to just get a jacket. In fact, via the re-enactment done in THIS 1978 MOVIE (see Part 4), it took the actor playing Oswald a mere 22 seconds to do all the things that we're fairly certain Oswald did while he was in his room on 11/22--e.g., grab his gun and put his jacket on. I'd be interested in learning how this one, brief statement in a witness's oral testimony differs from the (in)famous "surgery of the head" statement in the written record of a professional tasked with strict observance of a procedure by his superiors. This is the same "hanging on a thread" that CTers are so often accused of doing, focusing on one statement out of many to "prove" a point. What is "wishful thinking" on the part of the goose is "solid testimony" to the gander, enough to bolster a point of view that's already so "solid" that it "needs no embellishment" to be actually and absolutely correct. I guess we'd also have to ask the question, since we're using "common sense" here, exactly how long it took for a crowd to gather, and – while we're at it – exactly how many people constitutes a "crowd." If, when Tom Bowley arrived at 10th & Denver, there were only two people gathered at the crime scene, would that be a "crowd?" Would it be if there were six people gathered there? Ten? If it were only the Davis girls, the boys from Ted Calloway's place (who questioned Ted's memory, if not his verisimilitude), and Bill Scoggins, would that constitute a "crowd?" Or was Bowley simply either imagining things, exaggerating things, or just being loose with the language? What we do have in terms of Benavides' actions, speaking strictly offhand, is that (1) he "waited a few minutes" before even sitting up in his car because he feared the shooter might still be there and didn't want to get shot himself; (2) he spent some time looking for shells along with the Davis girls; and (3) he left the area and went home - only a few houses away - before returning. The exact sequence of these events wasn't nailed down, so who's to say in what order or how long each of them took? How long were each of these times? Well, I suppose they can be as short as you'd want them to be to fit a theory, but certainly not as long as someone else would want them to be to fit their theory. How do we "know" they're shorter and not longer times? Because it "wouldn't make sense" for anybody to do anything other than what makes the theory work. Why couldn't Benevides have taken 10 minutes to make the radio call? We don't seem to have a difficulty believing that it took Bowley six. What makes Donnie Benavides so much more decisive and bold, necessarily, than Bowley? We can all imagine what actually took place and when on that corner on that day, but that's all that we can do. None of us having been there, the only evidence we have (outside of that which can certainly be eliminated, such as estimates that the shooting took place 15 or 20 minutes after it was called in) is that which is given us by people who were there. Tom Bowley sticks by his estimate (I've spoken and met with him several times), and I've never heard anyone say that Helen Markham recanted her time estimates. Other than the radio call, those are the only bits of hard evidence we've got as to the actual time of the shooting. (In terms of things that "make sense," wasn't it the case that Markham left just after 1:00 as a matter of course in order to reach her usual bus (one of Dale Myers' arguments, maybe?)? With only two blocks to walk and one wide, not-too-busy boulevard to cross, why would she allow herself 20 minutes to get there and thus make the 1:22 bus her "usual" bus? It is only absolutely clear that the 1:02 bus wasn't it!) So, is it "reasonable to believe" that Benavides took nine minutes to attempt to make the radio call? I think it is ... simply because the evidence tells us that he did. Conjecture and supposition might argue, but the evidence doesn't. "Evidence" is not determined by what one considers "goofy" or not. Of course, this in turn leads us to the question of what any of us might consider "good" evidence vs. "no" evidence, what any of us will consider "acceptable" and what we won't.

No, I'd have to say that his mistake is that he believes that only his point-of-view can be correct, and he interprets evidence only in a manner that will support it. He cannot tolerate anyone interpreting evidence in any other way that reaches a conclusion other than that which he's reached because he's right and people who disagree with him are simply wrong. In his world, witnesses are absolutely right when what they said supports his view in toto. Where the witness might be wrong, it can only be in a manner that provides greater latitude to reach the same conclusion. Earlene Roberts, for example, could be "wrong" because she only thought Oswald was at the rooming house for three or four minutes when it really could have been as little as only one minute, which possibility he can explore in depth and reach the same conclusion. But she can only be "wrong" in the way he wants/needs her to be: she could not, for example, be wrong three or four minutes in the other direction, which we know with certainty because it would hamper if not eliminate reaching the same conclusion. Helen Markham's time estimates can only be wrong in one direction because we must start at an acceptible conclusion (i.e., "Oswald shot Tippit between 1:15 and 1:16") and work around it, even if there's no direct evidence that the conclusion is correct. It is "wrong" to believe her time estimates are correct because they don't lead to the "obvious" truth. We "know" Oswald received the pistol because he had it on him in the theater and he'd shot Tippit with it. It does not require strict proof to know this to be true, but it does require strict proof to even suggest otherwise. His "proof" is absolute because he believes it is, and finds anything contrary to his beliefs to be "silly" and "stupid." For as perfect as he was, I don't think that even Jesus wasn't quite so arrogant. (Part of this may be "cultural," in that the only word that goes with "conspiracy" is "theorist" ... which implies that anything that doesn't involve a conspiracy must be "factual." Sort of like Iran-Contra, right? It wasn't an illiegal conspiracy despite the wrong and improper convictions, while Clinton's deal - whose only "convicts" were Susan McDougal and her dead husband - very clearly was.)

You cannot be serious with the bullet evidence. I mean that stuff is so compromised it literally smells of garbage. But the point is you know all the problems with it, yet you still bring it up. Why? In any other case it would be a liability. But yet you do not even detail it before accepting it. For the prurient reader the sorry details are in Henry Hurt's book (pgs. 152-56) and Jim Garrison's (pgs. 197-201). ... Therefore both the provenance of the revolver is in question as is the ballistics evidence. Prurient (adjective): 1. having, inclined to have, or characterized by lascivious or lustful thoughts, desires, etc.; 2. causing lasciviousness or lust; 3. having a restless desire or longing. That aside, I think you can get a bit more technical that the bullet evidence is "so compromised it literally smells of garbage," especially when you consider that two LEOs testified to the fact (or more exactly, their expert opinions) that the bullets from the Tippit scene could not be matched to the revolver with any degree of certainty, despite the WCR's claim that they stated the contrary. Even everyone's favorite critic Dave Perry points these things out in his online article, "Conflicting Evidence of Bullets and Shells In The Shooting of J.D. Tippit." Ultimately, what was offered as proof in this aspect of the case, can only be taken as proof if one is willing to accept it as such. It does not stand up to the legal burden of proof. Some people don't think that that's important, even if a judge said it couldn't even be considered by a jury. They are probably of a similar mind that they should be welcomed onto a jury if they state, truthfully, that they've already made up their minds about the case they be asked to decide. Or maybe they're just willing to accept what "sounds good" and "seems right" to them in any venue other than empanelled on a jury, or are just more willing to believe what they're told if they don't have to actually deliberate it. In other words, "as long as I think you did it - nobody has to actually prove it to me - I'll string you up in a heartbeat." It amazes me that some of these folks actually live in America.

This is another great difficulty in terms of actually proving beyond a reasonable doubt since there is no certain chain of custody in the handling of whatever gun might've been taken from Oswald in the theater, to wit: McDonald never saw - and never claimed to have seen - the gun that Oswald supposedly pulled from his trousers; Det. Bob Carroll also did not see the gun he took from McDonald in the theater, having put it immediately in the small of his back and then, after getting to the squad car parked in front, having pulled it out and handed it to Sgt. Gerald Hill immediately and without examination; Hill played with it (and even removed and replaced all the shells from it) when he took it from Carroll, before putting the gun in his pocket; It apparently remained in Hill's possession after arriving at DPDHQ, but Hill absented himself from all the other officers and took it to the personnel office (where he was on TDY), then called the other officers and caused them to absent themselves from him again to go find McDonald. All of this occurred before any of them initialled the weapon and ammunition that eventually found its way into evidence. It was handled - and manhandled - improperly from start to finish to the extent that Captain Westbrook, Hill's nominal supervisor, refused to have anything to do with it when he arrived in the Personnel office and he had to call Robbery & Homicide to come up to retrieve the now-"identified" weapon from Hill. None of these men could have stated with absolute certainty that it was the weapon that they handled (and did not actually see) in the theater. The only thing that suggests that it is the same weapon is faith in the supposition that none of these men - or Hill in particular - would have done anything to "queer" or "plant" incriminating evidence. What further clouds the identity of this weapon is the statement by Officer Hutson that he accompanied Oswald into one of the interrogation rooms upon arrival at DPDHQ "and I had his gun" when they entered that room. This oral statement under oath was not either questioned or clarified and must, by definition, be as trustworthy as any other statement made under oath about this incident. More to the point, Hutson was the only one of the officers present in the theater who was able to state with certainty how many people were in the theater when the cops went inside because he alone had actually counted them (among other of his detailed observations), so his recollection that "I had his gun" cannot be brushed aside so very quickly. If someone can do a better job of showing that a proper and certain chain of custody was maintained, have at it.

So what? Who cares? Oswald's V510210 gun was obviously in perfect working order at approx. 1:14-1:15 PM when he plugged Officer Tippit four times with it. But, as always, hard-nosed conspiracists always prefer to concentrate on meaningless chaff, instead of focusing on the wheat field that is Oswald's guilt. Even if – and it is a HUGE "if" – any shells and/or bullets can be conclusively tied to that revolver, which they cannot, the ONLY reason to suppose that the gun "was obviously in perfect working order at approx. 1:14-1:15 PM" is because Oswald can't have gotten to 10th & Patton much sooner than that. The fact of the matter is that the shooting took place several minutes earlier than that, at approximately 1:08. If you work your way backwards from the 1:16 citizen radio call (unquestionably – and now officially – by Temple F. "Tom" Bowley), including that by the time Bowley got there, a "crowd" had already formed after the shooting, it cannot have happened as late as some would like to believe it did. To reach a 1:14-1:15 shooting time, one can only completely discount the "few minutes" that Bowley has told me more than once that he was there before he got on the radio, and discount his time estimate of 1:10 (according to his watch) that he got there and Helen Markham's estimate of "1:06 or 1:07" when she arrived at the corner and the fact that she had to get onto the 1:12 bus in order to get to work on time (she would have been late for that even before she'd even left her house if the 1:14-1:15 estimate is correct), or you've got to either eliminate Oswald's having been at his room or you've got to put him in a vehicle to get him to the Tippit murder scene by the time he quite clearly must have gotten there if he shot Tippit as late as this claim. There is NO EVIDENCE to support a time that late other than the radio call and the presumption that Oswald was actually the shooter. If you're honest about the first instead of trying to get facts to fit the conclusion, then you can't accomplish the latter. That might be a "wheat field of Oswald's guilt," but it was apparently being rotated that year.

This year's non-event was the Moment of Silence ... just talked right through it!

It is as you say: we discussed this several years ago. Or rather, I'd asked you about the process and you talked about the underlying thesis and the reproducible results ... but never described the process that is so "reproducible." You say it is, but don't tell us how to do it. That's what I asked you then, that's what I asked you this time. If you don't want to tell us how to reproduce the process and merely want to tout the results you've obtained and the concept it's based on, stop complaining about how nobody seems to be interested in the information you're trying to "relay" without relaying it. If it's reproducible, tell us exactly how to reproduce it. Otherwise, you're merely asking us to buy into a theory that's "so far beyond what is conventionally expected from optical enhancement" that all you can do is tell us why we should think it's valid without ever proving that it is. The proof is in the pudding known as "reproduction."

The MFF link notes, "In 1963, [Jack] lived with his parents, Redfern C. and Mary K. Dougherty. The older couple owned the home at 1827 S. Marsalis, and they were retired. In 1992, the phone is still in the Dallas phone directory listed to the older Dougherty with the same phone number but at a different address, 330 W. Pembroke Ave." We note from the gravesite information that his father died in 1978 at age 81, and his mother died in 1993 at age 94, so while the phone number was in the father's name, he clearly didn't answer it, tho' it was by no means unusual for married folks from that era to use the husband's name exclusively (witness, for example, Geraldean Reid's self-identification under oath before the WC as "Mrs. Robert A. Reid" @ 3H270), so between that and the 1992 information, we can safely presume that it was Mary Dougherty who was living at 330 W. Pembroke ... or, at approximately age 69, it could have been Jack, although I think it would have been more unusual for him to have used his father's name for a phone listing. That address happens to be to a Catholic assisted-living home, St. Joseph's Residence (www.stjr.org/contactus.html, which also lists Sister Adelaide Bocanegra as the administrator, phone 214-948-3597). It seems pretty clear that the gravesite is indeed that of Jack and his parents, particularly considering that he continued to live with his parents well into his adulthood and might well have been buried with them as a consequence. The question (for what little value it would have) would seem to be whether or how Jack stayed in contact with the outside world when his parents' phone was transferred to St. Joseph's, and what became of the property on Marsalis after Jack's demise (Robert, the Dallas Appraisal District or Dallas County real estate records would likely have information about this if you're inclined to search it out, if only out of curiosity).

Either would be helpful. I've read and re-read what you've written and haven't been able to make heads nor tails out of what you've been trying to explain. Despite what they show you on CSI and NCIS, you can't get more detail out of a pixel than was recorded in the first place ... any more than you can "see around corners" in photos. I work with photos and photography all day every day, so if there's a duplicatable process to follow, I'm very interested in learning exactly what the process is. Christian, do you need my email address? Or can you post the process here?

Could ... or couldn't? As written, it makes no "apparent" sense: "if I cannot see you, you can probably see me?" If you look at the photo taken from the view of the sniper's window posted above, you can clearly see the building under construction - so therefore the sniper, whoever he was, could have seen Carr going up the steps on the side of the building under construction. Whether or not Carr could have seen anyone in the windows of the TSBD is up to you. OK, if you insist. By this measure, someone who couldn't be seen behind Old Red from the window in the above photo might be able to see someone in the window ... it's "up to me" whether he could or not. Lines of sight work the same in both directions.

Could ... or couldn't? As written, it makes no "apparent" sense: "if I cannot see you, you can probably see me?"

OK. Ten-four. Gotcha. Hope no offense was taken earlier. But let me get this straight..... There are actually conspiracy theorists out there who think that "Tan Jacket Man" was the sixth-floor sniper? And then, after the shooting, this assassin in the tan jacket just hung around the Depository area in order to get himself photographed and filmed, instead of doing the wise and logical thing of high-tailing it out of Dodge asap? Yeah, right. I'm pretty sure that happened. .... 2009 Documentary -- "JFK: 3 Shots That Changed America" I'm certainly not going to endorse the view that there even could be a similarity between the guy in Hughes' film and any "enhanced" blur in a window, BUT ...! What I do find entertaining is that, based on the mere five seconds this guy appeared, that so many "conclusions" can be drawn: first, that he "hung around" the TSBD; second, that he did so "in order to get himself photographed and filmed;" third, that he wasn't "high-tailing it out of dodge asap;" and that, again based on five seconds of his "behavior," he can be either ruled in or out of anything. Precisely how long after the shooting did this segment take place? Since Oswald's presumed departure from the TSBD was inferred, not witnessed (and the inference based on his estimated and presumed arrivals at other locations), was not until approximately three minutes after the shooting, who is to say that, if someone else was involved, they didn't leave any sooner or later? Even if we know the precise time of this segment, we don't know how long the guy was standing there, nor do we know what he did after Hughes stopped shooting. Can we preclude that he hadn't just arrived there, stood around just long enough to "blend in," and then worked his way through the crowd (at any speed) and thence to points unknown (which is precisely where he did go unless he's in other footage or photos)? I think that, absent knowing all of the above (and more), anyone would be foolish to assert that "TJM" had anything at all to do with the shooting, but I think it's equally foolish to claim to be able to so cocksurely eliminate the possibility based on such flimsy "evidence" and speculation. After all, if anyone else was involved, we really don't know what he (or any of them) did afterward, do we. And then, too, we must wonder about Joe Marshall Smith's "Secret Service agent" while we're "eliminating" other participants, mustn't we? Or can all things unexplored and unexplained be cast off as "mistakes" ... not because those who saw these things were necessarily wrong, but merely because we have no further data? I'm all for separating the wheat from the chaff, but the chaff is generally so much more easily identified than the wheat. But if we can't identify something as either chaff or wheat, must it of necessity be chaff? A variation on cogito ergo sum? "I don't know what it means, so it means nothing?"

Glad to see you've reached the same conclusion as I had, and largely for the same reasons. The original Carr report - and it appears that it was only a report and not a signed statement (that is what the "re-interview" and "clarification" was apparently for) - is contained in the same report as that of Mary Sue Brown's initial contact with the Feebs. It is on the MFF site at this link. It does not differ substantially from his later signed statement. In this January 9 report, Carr says that "it would have been impossible" for him to have seen the southeast corner windows of the TSBD from his perch at the 6th floor of the courts building then under construction, and he made no claim either (and consequently) about seeing a Rambler on Houston Street on the east side of the TSBD, which he could not by his own words have seen. This observation was confirmed by the "personal observation of Bureau agents" who went to the construction site. They couldn't even see the SE roof or 7th floor of TSBD until they had gotten as high as the 9th floor of the courts building, and at that point neither the 6th floor window nor the "lower portion" of the TSBD could be observed. This further eliminates the Rambler on Houston St., just as my reverse-perspective photo also showed. What we are left to wonder is why Carr happened to notice someone in a building two blocks away when that building hadn't gained any notoriety yet, and there were plenty of other things to draw his attention on his way to the construction site, and why, when he didn't realize that the sounds he'd heard were shots (and wouldn't for a couple of hours), did he not only notice that man out of the crowd, but also see fit to pay attention to where he went and what he did, including the type of car he got into and a description of the driver. This is not to say that he didn't notice and observe that one individual in that one building, even down to the details of what he wore, but only to wonder why he apparently did. Of course, the agents' observation that Carr "couldn't have" observed the assassination simply because he couldn't see the SE 6th floor window points to exactly the observation Tom Scully made.

Here's the thng, Lee, that you're missing from the prior thread: a holographic affidavit signed and initialed by Carr exists and was linked to that conversation. It may be discounted by true believers because we don't have a further affidavit by Carr that any of it was in his own handwriting, allowing the possibility that it was faked, just like the subsequent one could have been, along with every other typed and signed affidavit in this case where we don'thave independently verifiable handwriting samples, which likewise could be forged. Absent such a hypothesis, however, it's authentic. There were a lot more discrepancies than the two you mentioned, which I enumerated and discussed at length in the other thread, including photographic proof that Carr could not see Houston St north of Elm from anywhere but the very top of the courts building unless authorities moved the Records building to discredit Carr: not only unlikely but impossible. Scenario #1 is shot. Face it: the man perjured himself in New Orleans, and simply exaggerated his misrecollections the rest of the time. As much as some would hate to acknowledge it, the FBI report is a faithful representation of what Carr *could have seen* from where he said he was. Beyond that, it's not even provable that he was ever even downtown on the side of that building, and not at all that he was there that Friday lunch hour ... during which everyone seemed to be working at the construction site. Likely? I tend to think not.

No, Bill, it was Antti who discovered that his claimed military record was false, that the Ranger battalion that he claimed to be part of wasn't where he said it was, and that neither was Carr. I know enough about the VFW (quite a lot, actually) to know that what he told anyone there doesn't necessarily have any bearing on reality other than that he had something to show that he served during a relevent time frame in a war zone. His first statement said that he couldn't see anything other than the upper-most (7th floor) windows of the TSBD and the "grassy area" to the left. I do not recall that the Rambler was any part of his FIRST statement, but feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. His "identification" of a Rambler came much later, and included - under oath - events that he could not possibly have seen from his supposed vantage point, i.e., anything happening on Houston Street next to the TSBD. Cling to what you will, but that spaghetti won't stick on any wall that's not smeared thickly with glue.

Lee, We had a huge discussion about Carr a couple of years ago on this forum; don't recall what it was called, but there was a lot of "extra" stuff that you'll seldom find all together in one place. All of Carr's various statements and their evolutions were discussed and dissected. Bottom line is this: Carr didn't see anything other than what he told the FBI the first time, which was, in effect, "nothing." All the rest was just an elongation of his 15 minutes of fame. Most if not all of what he swore to in New Orleans was false (stipulating his name and each use of "the" and "a"), including his military record. But even tho' he was a de facto if not de jure deserter, and not the decorated WWII hero he claimed to have been, and despite the fact that it was and is physically impossible for him to see what he later claimed to have seen (his first description to the FBI was accurate), some people continue to believe his stories. Plural.

Parsing what he said: I scanned the area to the right of and below the overpass where the terrain sloped towards the road on which we were traveling. ... effectively, the Grassy Knoll, no? "To the right of and below the overpass where the terrain sloped towards the road." This does not describe an area nearer to the TSBD. Landis was obviously referring to a post-shooting time when he said, "My immediate thought was that the President could not possibly be alive after being hit like he was," and thus he could only be referring to an area beyond the TSBD area ... from which latter Piper is supposedly running. The area described by Landis is beyond where Greg postulates Piper is running. The only person I recall seeing clearly was a Negro male in light green slacks and a beige colored shirt running from my left to right, up the slope, across a grassy section, along a sidewalk, towards some steps and what appeared to be a low stone wall. As Landis was travelling west on Elm Street toward the Triple Underpass, and looking at "the area to the right of and below the overpass (etc.)," he was clearly looking toward the north, and not toward the south and the broad, flat plaza. Thus anyone who was "running from my left to right" would be running from the TU and generally toward the TSBD, not away from it; he was running up the slope, meaning he was running generally away from Elm Street and not toward it; and if Landis' sequence of "up the slope, across a grassy section, along a sidewalk toward some steps and what appeared to be a low stone wall," the man is apparently coming from the TU, up the hill, across the grass, toward the pergola and the sidewalk and steps on the west side of it. It does not appear that the man in the photo linked in Chris's post is wearing "light green slacks," or "light" slacks of any color, but that's only my opinion. That man was already on the steps, and not running "across a grassy section," tho' one can argue that he might've run "up the slope" and the rest. He was bent over while running and I started to point towards him, but I didn't notice anything in his hands and by this time we were going under the overpass at a very high rate of speed. I was looking back and saw a motorcycle policeman stopping along the curb approximately adjacent to where I saw the Negro running. The timing of when this observation occurred can be easily deduced from this, no? Unfortunately, the description of the motorcycle being "adjacent to where I saw the Negro running" doesn't tell us quite what we want to know: adjacent-east? adjacent-south? what? But at least we have an approximation - again - of where the black man was running. Could Piper - or anyone from TSBD - have gotten that far and then run back toward the TSBD in time before Landis passed under the TU, and if they could, why would they?!?

Regarding Troy West, the "Reopen" article: One way to test [Piper's] alibi is to look for corroboration. When we do that, we find: He did not see anyone else who had remained inside on the first floor - even though, according to his testimony, he moved from his spot at the window to the same location as West. Likewise, West did not see anyone else. That statement is true, insofar as it goes. West's testimony on this subject reads in part as follows: Mr. BELIN. At any time while you were making coffee or eating your lunch, did you see anyone else on the first floor? Mr. WEST. No, sir; I didn't see. Mr. BELIN. Who was the first person you saw on the first floor after you--- while you were eating your lunch? Someone came in the building? Mr. WEST. Yes; before I got through. The officers and things were coming in the front door. According to this portion of the testimony, Troy West saw nobody on the first floor until "the officers and things" came in the door. How reliable is that testimony? Let's see what else he had to say: Mr. BELIN. Who was the first person or persons that you saw coming through there while you were eating your lunch? Mr. WEST. Well, that was police. Mr. BELIN. A police officer? Mr. WEST. Yes, sir. Mr. BELIN. Anyone else? Mr. WEST. I guess it was a bunch of them, I guess, FBI men, and just a crowd of them coming in there. Mr. BELIN. Did you see Roy Truly coming in at all that time? Do you know Mr. Truly? Mr. WEST. Yes, sir; that is the boss, the superintendent. Mr. BELIN. Did you ever see him, do you remember, while you were eating your lunch, come in the building? Mr. WEST. Yes, sir; I think he came in with the police. Mr. BELIN. Was he one of the first people in, or did other people come ahead of him, if you remember? Mr. WEST. Really, I just don't know .Mr. BELIN. That is okay if you don't remember. That is all I want you to say if you don't remember. Did you hear anyone yelling to let the elevator loose or anything like eat? Mr. WEST. I can't remember. Mr. BELIN. Were you working when you were eating your lunch? Were you facing the elevator or not when you were eating your lunch? Were you facing any of the elevators back there? Mr. WEST. No, sir; I was always--I mean I would always be with my back kind of, you know, towards the elevators and facing the front side over on the side. Mr. BELIN. The Elm Street side? Mr. WEST. Toward Elm Street side. Mr. BELIN. So you don't know whether anyone was using the elevators? Mr. WEST. No, sir; I don't. Mr. BELIN. Do you know whether anyone was going up and down the stairs? Mr. WEST. No, sir; I don't. Mr. BELIN. Do you know anything else about what happened on November 22, that might be helpful or relevant here? Mr. WEST. No, sir; I don't really. So here we have Troy West, mail wrapper extraordinaire who never left his wrapping desk all day long except to get water for coffee at 8:00 and 12:00 and, one presumes, to attend to the normal functions of the life of an habitual coffee drinker, who takes more than 30 minutes to eat his lunch while facing toward the front of the building. He becomes "spellbound" when police come in - "a bunch of them ... just a crowd of them coming in there," among whom, he thought, was the man responsible for West's weekly pay, Roy Truly. West couldn't remember, however, if Truly was "one of the first people in," or if "other people come ahead of him:" "really, I just don't know," he said. He didn't know if anyone went to the elevators. He didn't hear Truly yell upstairs to "let loose the elevator," or if anyone was actually using the elevators, or going up or down the stairs, or "anything else that might be helpful or relevent." Zip, zero, and zilch. And based on this testimony, we are to deduce that Eddie Piper wasn't where he said he was because Troy West didn't say he saw "anybody," much less single Piper out from among the crowd that he barely recalled his boss being in. Despite being "spellbound" and presumably watching the activities of the "officers" - a "bunch" of them, "just a crowd" of them - who came in the building, Troy West saw nothing or nobody, heard nothing or nobody, noticed nothing or nobody except a "bunch" or "crowd" of cops who weren't there. And that testimony is used to indict Eddie Piper's story?!? Also worth noting, from the "Reopen" article: Piper was seen moving towards West's mail desk by Bill Shelley at a time later than that which Piper had indicated - meaning he (Piper) could have been anywhere in the building beforehand. ... possibly the most damaging testimony to [Piper's] alibi came from Bill Shelley. Leaving aside his ludicrous timeline for WC consumption, he was back in the building as per his initial statement not long after Truly and Baker entered. His testimony on seeing Piper at that point is enlightening: Mr. BALL. When you came into the shipping room did you see anybody? Mr. SHELLEY. I saw Eddie Piper. Mr. BALL. What was he doing? Mr. SHELLEY. He was coming back from where he was watching the motorcade in the southwest corner of the shipping room. Mr. BALL. Of the first floor of the building? Mr. SHELLEY. Yes. So there it is. Piper did not watch the motorcade from a first floor window and move to West's mail desk at the sound of the second shot. He was seen "coming back" from that presumed viewing position after the last shot, and indeed, after the entry of Truly and Baker – leaving open the possibility he had not been at a first floor window at all. He could have been "coming back" from virtually any place in the building. As we've seen above, there is some conflict not only in testimony, but in this article as well, about when Shelley (actually entered the building after the shooting. In one case, we have him being one of two people (the other being Billy Lovelady) seen already on the first floor by Sandra Stiles when she arrived on the first floor "within a minute of the last shot ringing out," while in another he didn't come back inside until "well past the time of the last shot." Here, we have him coming inside "not long after Truly and Baker entered" the building. These are at least two and possibly three different times that Shelley entered the building. When it was "well past the time of the last shot," that time was used to show how Piper could have been anywhere and coming from anywhere; when Sandra Stiles didn't see him "within a minute of the last shot ringing out," it was used to show that Piper wasn't anywhere near where he said he was. Then, when Shelley's statement includes seeing Piper "not long after Truly and Baker entered" the building, with Piper "coming back from where he was watching the motorcade in the southwest corner of the shipping room," it "leaves open the possibility that he had not been at a first floor window at all," but "could have been 'coming back' from virtually any place in the building." The emphasis throughout is on the supposed inaccuracy of Piper's statement, without noting or apparently paying any attention to the inaccuracies and inconsistencies regarding Shelley's actions and timeline, or the inconsistencies and conflicts in these citations. What is important -- indeed, the only thing that needs to be resolved -- is how these inaccuracies and inconsistencies and conflicts can indict what Eddie Piper had to say. There is no question about whether any of them are incorrect, whether simply the result of bad recollections over a four- to five-month period, failure to accurately recall their exact movements, or if any of them may have simply been imagined or misstated by those making the observations. Shelley, within seconds after the shooting, saw Piper going from the front to the rear of the building, "from ... the southwest corner of the shipping room." There is no question about how Shelley knew where Piper was presumably coming from, or if he'd mis-stated "southwest" when he might have meant "southeast," or anything. And while, according to Shelley, Piper was going from south(west) to north on the first floor, there is no consideration that there were few places Piper could have been "coming from" from the southern (or particularly the southwestern) end of the first floor since there were no stairs, doors or elevators in that area, we learn that in (some version of) reality, Piper "could have been 'coming back' from virtually any place in the building" without limitation to any of those "virtually any" places that could have deposited him in the south(west) end of the building in order to be "coming from" there. The fact is that, prior to coming in the door, Shelley could not have seen where Piper was, but could only have formed an impression of where he was coming "from," so his statement isn't fully probative, but is certainly indicative: Piper was at least moving from near where he said he was, toward where he said he went. And he had "under a minute" to get to his supposed starting point ... and there's no indication that anyone saw him doing that either.

Greg, I wonder if you see the contradiction in these two statements you've made regarding "proof" of Piper's movements? Victoria Adams, who within a minute of the last shot ringing out, ran from a window on the south side of the fourth floor down the rear stairs to the first floor, saw no one there but Shelley and Lovelady. (ReopenKennedyCase website, "Was Eddie Piper on the Sixth Floor?") and He [Piper] also claimed that during the fusillade, he ran over to the packing table where a clock was located to see what time it was. In his first two statements, he said the time had been 12:25 - which just happened to be the AMENDED time the motorcade was supposed to pass. It was however, delayed a further 5 minutes. Was this clock just 5 minutes slow, or was Piper devising his alibi for what he thought was the time of the hit? I believe it was the latter, as Bill Shelley testified Piper was running to the wrapping table at the time he (Shelley) came back inside. This was well past the time of the last shot. (Post #1 to this thread; emphasis added) If the first is true, the second is false, and vice-versa.

Oh, puh-LEEZE, Greg! Eddie Piper was 55. You're 53. Are YOU anywhere close to describing yourself that way?!? Are YOU "elderly?" I didn't think so.

Greg, you're not following my point. Or maybe I'm not explaining it well. The story was about a "porter," which because of Meagher's reference to Givens as a "porter," you thought was the same as an "order-filler," which Piper clearly was not. Thus, in your interpretation, the story was about an "order-filler" who took Oswald up and then went to the first floor to watch the parade. Despite the fact that Piper was not an order-filler, you seem to have "made" him one because, as you say, he was the "only one" who "watched the parade" from the first floor. The point is that you thought an order-filler was a "porter," and drew initial conclusions based not on its definition as a "janitor," but on the assumption that the article referred to an order-filler such as Givens. Your erroneous understanding should have led you to eliminate Piper from consideration since he was not an order-filler. Pat pointed out a more "generic" use of the term "porter," essentially applied to any black man performing unskilled, menial, and often non-physical labor, such as operating elevators, parking cars and sweeping floors. The reporter might have used the term simply because he didn't know what his subject actually did, and made the assumption - easy enough in Dallas in 1963 - that whomever he spoke with fit that bill. If Meagher could've erroneously called Givens a "porter," why couldn't a reporter have done so as well? So along come people asking, perhaps erroneously, about a "porter," which various people respond to, saying that they know of no such person. And then Truly, who uses the term just like Eddie Piper did, uses a synonym to describe his only "janitor," you take this to be confirmation that the "porter" referred to in the first story is in fact the "janitor" that Truly was talking about. Thus, if Truly's "janitor" did a particular thing (or not) described in an article about a "porter" (or not), then the original story "must" have been about Piper, the only "janitor" in the building who once described himself as a "porter," which in your mind was an "order-filler" a la Meagher's description of Givens. If Meagher, who was intimately familiar with the case, could identify Givens as a "porter," what about a reporter doing the same thing is so impossible so shortly after the crime, when nobody was intimately familiar with it? Perhaps it's that our constant and belabored scrutiny of everything everyone said and did causes us to dissect and parse everything more closely than it needs be. Where it's reported that the "porter" went "down to the first floor to watch the parade," we presume that if he didn't also specify that "he went outside" that he therefore couldn't have and didn't. Consider this exchange that could've taken place with Charles Givens: Q: So then what did you do then? A: Went back downstairs to the first floor. Q: Did you watch the parade? A: Yeah. It is accurate insofar as the questions asked and answers given; it is obviously incomplete, but would the reporter, not having asked questions that he might not have thought entirely pertinent or germane at the time, be correct in saying that Givens "went down to the first floor to watch the parade?" My bet is that any editor would say he was. The trouble is that some of us expect reporters to have cross-examined witnesses and gotten every detail, and to have printed each and ever fact courtroom-accurately and in complete context, and if Givens in the exchange above didn't mention having gone to the parking lot and Main Street, then he couldn't have done that. Consider that the reporter got it wrong, inaccurate and incomplete at best, and remember that the reporting is not verbatim of a statement given under oath with all the right questions asked. It is at least as likely if not more so that this story is about Charles Givens as about the only actual porter TSBD had, Eddie Piper. You say "The confusion between Piper and Givens was deliberately created to hide one very salient fact: Piper was a close-up eye-witness," but the real "confusion" seems to be about what a "porter" is and does, and whether the reporter was talking to someone whom Oswald asked to "send the elevator back up for him," or someone who "went to the ground floor to watch the parade," who in your mind can only be "the only person to claim he watched the motorcade from the first floor," Eddie Piper. Troy West claimed not to have known that the President had been shot. He was "alone at the time" and "walking toward the front of the building" when he was told of the shooting by someone he couldn't recall. Could Troy West, by lack of specificity, not have been elsewhere, where he shouldn't have been? TFIC, consider that he made coffee every day when he came in at 8:00 and and "always" at 12:00 he made another pot, which he did on November 22 as well. Oddly, he stated in his testimony: Well, I had just, after I made coffee, I just had started to eat my lunch because I was a little hungry---I didn't eat anything that morning before I went to work---and I had started to eat my lunch. But before I got through, well, all of this was, I mean, the police and things was coming in, and I was just spellbound. I just didn't know what was the matter. So I didn't get through eating. I had to eat about half my lunch, and that is all. (6H361) You don't think it's a little odd that a man can "make coffee" at 12:00 and only got "about half" of his lunch eaten in the half-hour before the cops came swarming in? Yet you say he "couldn't" have been the "elderly Negro" on six because he didn't say that he'd watched the parade from the first floor? Well, Jeez Louise, talk about "alibis" that are "wafer thin:" Troy West didn't even offer one! And, while sitting "spellbound" eating his lunch, whatever became of his "walking toward the front of the building" as he'd told the FBI in March? You want to say that Eddie Piper "fit the description" of the "elderly Negro" seen by Arnold Rowland, yet you offer no proof that he wore a shirt similar to that described by Rowland beyond that "beige is on the red scale" so Piper can become yet someone else seen running outside later. "On the red scale" or not, do you know anyone who's ever mistaken a red shirt for beige or vice-versa? One who's not color-blind, that is? You cite no corroboration of this "description" of any sort by Amos Euins, who also saw a black man in the upper window. One might reasonably presume that it was the same black man. Nor do you relate Rowland's sighting to what Bonnie Ray Williams was wearing, or consider - for that matter - that Rowland didn't remember it quite the color it actually was: remember, he had no particular reason to pay close attention to it since he didn't think there was anything "pecuilar" about someone being there, that they were "Secret Service." And yes, I've read your articles. Bugliosi and Posner and Myers couldn't convince me that Oswald did it, and you haven't convinced me Piper even might have had anything to do with it. As for Bonnie Ray Williams, I've tackled that question in depth elsewhere, but succinctly, his being on the sixth floor near to the shooting is based on the statements of Norman, Jarman and Truly that had the two black men going upstairs after the motorcade was on Main Street and BRW joining them at the window after they'd walked from the front of the building, ridden upstairs and walked across the floor only a short while before JFK arrived. I didn't rely at all upon what time any of them thought or guessed it was. BRW was "clearly" there. It's all well and good to hypothesize that supposed "Secret Service" men or other outsiders co-opted Piper into performing a simple task for them - operating an elevator and getting them five stories up - but doing so flies in the face of anything plausible. We would have to imagine some chaotic enterprise whereby plotters had meticulously assembled a plethora of evidence against a patsy that nobody has pierced fully nearly 50 years later being so inept that they didn't know the layout of the building they'd be shooting POTUS from or how to operate the complicated machinery to get them to their lair. Instead of getting in quickly without - hopefully - being seen, they instead conscript someone and not only reveal themselves to him, but also allow him to hang around with them while they make whatever preparations were necessary prior to the motorcade's arrival ... and then, inexplicably, they let him go back downstairs, hoping all the while (I'm sure) that he doesn't say anything to anyone or worse, raise an alarm before they can execute their plan. Ultimately, that might not differ essentially from the scenario I've hypothesized with regard to the "three blind mice" on the fifth floor, except that in my scenario the shooter(s) didn't invite the men into witnessing their plan, but rather played with a hand they were unexpectedly dealt. Nor did they allow them to just "walk away" before or after their purposes were plain. Nor, for that matter, is mine dependent upon a flimsy description made months later with no corroboration that the "suspect" employee was anywhere near where I claim him to be. More to the point, I don't suggest that anyone else - several other people - altered or adapted their statements to "cover for" any of these men, which necessitates giving them a reason to want to change their stories to obfuscate yours. How could - and why would - anybody make such wholesale changes without knowing what really happened and what was at stake if anyone found out? One would think that Piper - if he'd been anywhere near "the action" - would've taken his secret to his grave and never taken the chance of anyone else being affected by what had happened to him by breathing even a hint about it. This alone undermines the whole hypothesis. (EDIT: What gives up your position is what you wrote on the "reopen" site: "To de-construct the newspaper account, we must first ask who claimed to watch the motorcade alone on the first floor? The answer to that is Eddie Piper." You start from a particular vantage point - conclusion, if you prefer - and proceed from there. Is that really the first question that needs to be asked? Only if you want to arrive at a certain place.)

This just gets stranger and stranger, so let's get to the nub of it: what was Piper's supposed motive for being involved in a conspiracy to kill the President of the United States? Why did the FBI, DPD and other LEAs along with the WC work so hard to cover up the obvious connection to the "Colored Conspiracy" in favor of "a Commie did it" solution when these highly organized black men would've made just as convenient a set of scapegoats as ol' "Maggie's Drawers" himself? Who do you propose "coerced, bribed, [or] threatened" Givens (and, clearly, Bonnie Ray Williams, Hank Norman, Junior Jarman and Jack Dougherty, to name only the most obvious) into "covering for Piper?" Other than Rowland's description of an "elderly Negro" in the window and your distrust of Piper's testimony, why on earth do you think Piper had anything at all to do with JFK's murder? He didn't have to operate an elevator for anyone. He didn't normally go to the sixth floor for anything, and had no special knowledge of it. There was no particular need for him to be there unless he was involved in the shooting. So why would he have been there? I don't know why you have such trouble imagining that Oswald would have "the same conversation" with someone twice in a matter of only a few minutes, especially when the first supposed instance was not an actual conversation, per se, but rather a general admonition to the half-dozen men who had taken both elevators - unnecessarily, since either one of them would have fit all the men easily - downstairs while Oswald was still up there. Why, within a few minutes and after apparently not checking to see if the men had closed the gate as he'd asked, would Oswald not say anything to someone whom he saw going downstairs again? Do you think it's odd that, not being sure that his request was complied with, someone would ask the next person he saw going into a down-elevator to double-check the gate for him? None of the men in the "elevator race" said that Oswald was right there, asking them all conversationally to "please be sure to close the gate," certain that each and all of them had heard him, or even knowing who-all, specifically, was a part of the "race." Why, given a chance to make sure that the gate was closed by asking Givens to check it, would Oswald not have done that? This has all the hallmarks of the evidence fitting the conclusion, rather than the other way around.

Duke Maybe the only problem is my confusion. I assumed that the term "porter" was reserved for those whose usual job was in the collecting of books for shipping. I based that assumption on this from Sylvia Meagher: "One witness who helped to incriminate Lee Harvey Oswald in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy was a Book Depository porter named Charles Givens. The Warren Commission gave prominence to his testimony that he had forgotten his cigarettes on the sixth floor and that when he went to retrieve them just before noon he had encountered Oswald near the southeast corner window." From Givens' testimony: Mr. GIVENS. Well, I work on the first floor most of the time, like we fill orders. In short, I assumed "porter" was an alternative name for "order filler" -- not "janitor". But even if you're right, and "porter" = "janitor" and no other position, then there can be no question about who the story is about, despite efforts to try and point to Givens. If your point is that it removes a little suspicion from Truly.... yes... but only if "porter" could only mean "janitor" and nothing else. If I am confused about those terms, it was because it never occurred to me that Meagher might have herself misused the terms. None of this touches the meat of the argument though, does it? ... Pat, thanks for the clarification on "porter", but again... it hardly touches the meat of the issue. The substantive point is that Givens' account of returning to the 6th floor and seeing Oswald, did not materialize until AFTER the February breaking of the Waldo story. If there was nothing to the Waldo story -- you would not have a change in Givens' story. The "article" you refer to, I assume is the one earlier from Nov 24? If so, sorry but I don't buy your interpretation. An elderly Black man was seen on the 6th floor by Arnold Rowland. That man's description matched Eddie Piper. Eddie Piper's alibi for that time is less than wafer thin. He admits having a brief chat with Oswald about lunch and claims that he watched the motorcade from the 1st floor. That element is in the article. It had nothing to do with the elevator race - and everything to do with Piper. But since Piper was highly unlikely in the motorcade viewing spot he claimed to be in - and since Piper, or his double, was seen on the 6th floor - and since the article claims the person rode the elevator to the 6th floor, then back down to the 1st to watch the motorcade - the fact that you are still clinging to a Givens and/or elevator race account, is a bit perplexing to me. I mean, really... the 6th floor was the ideal location to watch from. The 1st floor was absolutely the worst. The oddity in this whole thing is that, despite the fact that you didn't believe that Piper was a "porter," you pegged him as being the man being referred to by the original news report. Why? Because the "porter" referred to said he was on ("went to") the first floor during the parade? So did Troy West, who was also an "elderly Negro." What about his account of not watching the parade didn't you find "suspicious?" Charles Givens, on the other hand, did say that Oswald asked him to "send the car back up for him," or at least a variation on that theme ("make sure the gate is closed" so Oswald could call the elevator back up: Truly testified that it wasn't possible to "send" it anywhere because of the gratings). He was, as you'd interpreted "porter," one of the order-fillers, the person that Meagher (erroneously) referred to as a "porter." Yet from among all that, you've deduced that the article was really referring to Eddie Piper, and not Charles Givens. The article didn't even say that the "building porter" was a black man, so he could have been anyone whose job was the same or like Givens', an order-filler, including Buell Frazier, Billy Lovelady or Jack Dougherty. The one man whom you didn't believe to have been a "porter" even despite his describing himself as such, is the man you pegged as the subject of this article. Why? Your logic doesn't follow, since you had to know that Piper wasn't an order-filler, so if that was what "porter" meant, it eliminated Piper from consideration, not made him the sole suspect. All that "works" in that logic are the facts that Piper said he watched the parade from the first floor, and you don't believe him; that you believe that the "elderly Negro" described by Arnold Rowland was, for some reason, none other than Eddie Piper; and that Piper must have lied about being on the first floor, because you think it was "absolutely the worst" place to watch the parade from. The sixth floor, on the other hand, was "ideal" (really? Even better than, say, the fifth, which was closer to the ground?), so since nobody would really watch the parade from the first floor, Piper must've been on the sixth. QED? It's not Piper's "alibi" that's "less than wafer thin" here, it's the premise that Piper was on the sixth floor simply because he was "an elderly Negro" whose testimony you don't believe. Troy West filled that bill too, y'know: how do you know he's telling the truth? What color shirt did he wear to work that day? Did it match Rowland's description? Was he "bald or very nearly bald?" "Very thin?" What other than your distrust of his testimony puts him on the sixth floor? And what about Bonnie Ray Williams, who was clearly on the sixth floor immediately prior to the shooting? Other than that he wasn't "elderly," what is it that eliminates him from being the man Rowland saw? Amos Euins, we'll recall, described a black man on six who had a "white spot" on his head (early reports said he'd seen a "white man" there, which Euins protested in his testimony), just as Williams himself did, at least at a later point when his compadres noticed it. There's no "meat" in this argument as far as I can tell, nor does there seem to be any connection between "Piper's" being on the sixth floor at the time of the shooting and the "concoction" of Givens' story about seeing Oswald upstairs 30 minutes earlier that I can discern either. And there is no logic to support the contention that "if there was nothing to the Waldo story -- you would not have a change in Givens' story" since Waldo's story seems to be about a witness who had been "held in protected custody" for more than two months that nobody then or now knows anything about. Even Bonnie Ray Williams never claimed to be able to "identify Lee Oswald as slayer of President Kennedy," and we know he was there. The only connection between that story and Piper seems to be the use of the words "porter" (which you believed Piper wasn't, according to your perception of a porter as an order-filler) and "janitor" (which we all know Piper was), and the fact that the latter term was used by Roy Truly. Beyond pure conjecture, you can't put Eddie Piper in or near the sniper's nest or on the sixth floor. Stop trying: it's never going to work.