David Von Pein

The original plan was, indeed, to transport JFK's casket to Bethesda via helicopter, as we can hear on the Air Force One tapes (below). But the plan was changed prior to AF1 landing at Andrews, due (no doubt) to the fact that somebody realized the difficulty there would be if they tried to jam JFK's very heavy and cumbersome casket onto a helicopter. So an ambulance/hearse was used instead. There's certainly nothing conspiratorial or sinister about that change in plans whatsoever. In fact, it was a very sensible and prudent change that almost certainly had to be made. And the answer to the #2 question above is quite simple --- President Kennedy's body got to Bethesda by way of the gray Navy ambulance. Millions of people watching television saw the casket being placed into that ambulance. (Why was that second question even asked?) ~shrug~ Below are excerpts from the AF1 radio transmissions concerning the "chopper" and the later realization by members of the Kennedy party aboard Air Force One that ground transportation would be needed to replace the chopper: Air Force One Radio Excerpts (November 22, 1963) More.... jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2011/12/aircraft-radio-transmissions-11-22-63.html

But the thing is, Ron -- the shots were not that "difficult". This four-hour program would tend to refute your statement (at least to some extent).... jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2011/05/cbs-news-inquiry-the-warren-report-(1967).html BTW, I liked Walter Cronkite (and his reporting) a great deal. And when he died in 2009, some of the more despicable CTers came out of the woodwork to piss on his grave. So I had to add my 2 cents.... jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/06/walter-cronkite.html

Absolute nonsense. I've never once said anything of the kind, and Drew knows it.

It's funny, isn't it Brian, that two people can look at the exact same facts and the exact same circumstances and yet come to totally opposite conclusions? The nature of "human" life, I suppose. But it is my firm belief that Jack Ruby's known actions and movements from November 22 to November 24 practically eliminate the idea that any pre-planned conspiracy (or "rub out") occurred in the basement of Dallas City Hall at 11:21 AM CST on 11/24/63.

And the evidence for that extraordinary assertion is.....?

MARK KNIGHT SAID: Midway. That would likely be the other airport in Chicago. DAVID VON PEIN SAID: Yes. That's a good alternate choice, Mark. But even Midway is a pretty good-sized airport. I'm thinking Ruby might have wanted to use DuPage Airport, which is a general aviation facility located 29 miles west of Chicago. If Jack wanted to keep a very low profile while visiting his sister for the last time before plugging Oswald, I think DuPage might have been his best bet. And on his drive into Chicago, he could (of course) stop by a deli in his old neighborhood where he used to live and pick up some sandwiches to take to Eileen too.

RON ECKER SAID: What about it? Maybe he knew that if he didn't go see his sister that night, he might never see her again, at least not as a free man. That's one possibility. But I know, you don't have to tell me, that's "just plain silly." DAVID VON PEIN SAID: Okaaaaay, Ron. So Ruby is hired to rub out the patsy. And he surely knows that he should probably carry out that "rubbing out" job as soon as he can, so the patsy won't spill any more beans than he already might have spilled to the cops since the plotters (including Ruby) were too stupid to just kill Oswald after he left the Book Depository Building immediately after the assassination. But Ruby decides to waste a bunch of time by phoning his two sisters (Eva and Eileen) on the afternoon and evening of November 22nd (and he wasted more time on the phone talking to several other people too). And on top of that foot-dragging that he did on the telephone that weekend, Ruby decides he just might want to fly out of Dallas and travel hundreds of miles away to Chicago, Illinois, so he can say goodbye for the last time to his sister Eileen. Which means he would have to very quickly hop on another plane at O'Hare International Airport (or whatever low-profile airport Chicago was using to accommodate hit men and other assorted criminals so they could slip in and out of town without attracting any undue attention) and fly almost immediately back to Dallas in order to complete his important assignment of murdering the patsy named Oswald. Good theory, Ron. Nothing wrong with that logic at all. (But at least I didn't use that "S" word you hate so much.) :-)

Jack Ruby liked to go where the action was happening. (I thought that fact was common knowledge by now amongst people interested in the JFK assassination.) So it doesn't surprise me in the least that he showed up numerous times at Dallas City Hall after Oswald was arrested. It's what I would EXPECT Jack Ruby to do. Plus, he knew a lot of cops. This made his presence in the police station more of a normal occurrence than anything out of the ordinary as far as many of the police officers stationed there were concerned. As far as Ruby's knowledge of the "Fair Play For Cuba Committee" during Henry Wade's late-night news conference, there is a very logical explanation for that --- right here. Also see the chapter called "Ruby And The Mob" on pages 1071—1144 of Vincent Bugliosi's "Reclaiming History". That chapter contains an excellent biography of Jack Ruby.

Extremely remote (at best). And what about Jack Ruby (on Nov. 22) telephoning his sister Eileen in Chicago and telling her that he might fly to Chicago to see her that night? Was that just part of a scheme by Ruby to throw people off so they wouldn't suspect that Ruby was really on a mission to rub out Lee Harvey Oswald throughout the whole weekend of November 22 to 24, 1963? And how did Jack know that his sister Eileen would tell him NOT to come to Chicago that night? Was Eileen part of the scheme too?.... MRS. EILEEN KAMINSKY -- "Jack said, "What a black mark for Dallas." Then, he said--oh, he said, "Maybe I will fly up to be with you tonight." And I said, "Well, I don't think that is necessary"." [15 H 283] ------------------------------- Ruby Links: How Did Ruby Get Into The Police Basement? How Did Ruby Know The Name Of The FPCC?

Or.... Maybe Jack Ruby's movements were just exactly what they appeared to be --- the movements of a man who did not wake up on Sunday morning, November 24, 1963, with the thought in his mind of murdering Lee Harvey Oswald, but due to ordinary non-conspiratorial circumstances found himself downtown near the City Hall building (with a gun in his possession, which he was known to carry, even on days when accused Presidential assassins were NOT being housed at Dallas Police Headquarters) at precisely the right moment to encounter Lee Harvey Oswald in the police basement. Is the above scenario even remotely possible in a conspiracy theorist's world?

Okay. Thanks, Larry. For the record, here's what Howard Brennan told the Warren Commission on March 24, 1964 [at 3 H 148].... DAVID W. BELIN -- "Mr. Brennan, could you tell us now whether you can or cannot positively identify the man you saw on the sixth floor window as the same man that you saw in the police station?" HOWARD L. BRENNAN -- "I could at that time—I could, with all sincerity, identify him as being the same man."

Larry, But what about Brennan's FIRST-DAY (Nov. 22) affidavit? In that affidavit, Brennan clearly indicates he saw a "slender...white man in his early 30s ... taking aim with a high powered rifle" from an upper-story window on the east end of the TSBD Building. That's Brennan's FIRST-DAY account, within hours of the assassination---and that affidavit perfectly matches just about everything he told the Warren Commission a few months later. I see no discrepancies at all between the things Brennan laid out in his voluntary statement on Nov. 22 and his later testimony. And I find it nearly impossible to comprehend how anyone could even begin to believe (as some do) that NO SHOTS AT ALL came from the sixth floor of the Depository after reading the affidavit presented below by Howard L. Brennan. But, incredibly, there are some CTers who believe no shots at all came from the sixth floor. And among them was the late Harold Weisberg..... jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2011/10/harold-weisberg.html Harold Weisberg Audio Clip I guess Mr. Weisberg must have thought Brennan just made up this statement from whole cloth: ~shrug~

I can see why.

Then why wasn't Ruby already downtown prior to 10:00 AM, which is when Oswald was supposed to originally be transferred?

That's kind of a ridiculous thing to say, Jon. Holmes was a U.S. postal inspector, and the POST OFFICE played a part in the evidence connected to Lee Harvey Oswald (via the P.O. Boxes he rented in 1963 and the U.S. Postal Money Order that Oswald used to order the assassination weapon). So, Jon, I think Harry D. Holmes was a little bit more significant to the investigation than just any ol' John Doe pulled in off the street.

Ron, You just proved my point about Carlin's call. Thanks.

Ron, The "Harry Holmes Delayed The Transfer" thing is something I've used many times in the past too. And that's because it is TRUE. If Holmes had not decided to go downtown and interrogate Oswald, then Ruby could not possibly have shot Oswald, because Oswald's transfer would very likely have already taken place by the time Ruby got done with his Western Union business. That makes perfect sense to me. Just as it also makes perfect sense to say that if stripper Karen Carlin had not telephoned Ruby when she did on the morning of 11/24/63 (10:20 AM), then Oswald would very likely not have been shot. (And who in their right mind thinks Karen Carlin was a co-conspirator in a plot to rub out Oswald?) IOW---Oswald was killed not by a conspiracy, but instead as a result of good old garden-variety HAPPENSTANCE. To believe anything else requires twisting yourself into a pretzel in order to bring "conspiracy" into Jack Ruby's movements on November 24th in Dallas.

I think I made that relatively clear (without actually coming right out and calling Gerald Ford the L-word) when I said this in my thread-opener.... "And it is quotes like that one, which is just blatantly false (unless I am severely misinformed as to the correct number of police lineups attended by Howard L. Brennan in November of 1963), that make it even more difficult to convince the public that the Warren Commission's investigation into the assassination of President Kennedy was a completely honest and forthright one." -- DVP Part of the reason I created this thread was to gauge CTer reaction to that quote of Ford's, and also to find out how many people here were even aware that Ford said such a thing in LIFE Magazine in late 1964. (I certainly had not been previously aware of the quote, and I have never once in the past heard anyone else mention it either.) It is disconcerting to me to think that a member of the Warren Commission would make such a false statement in an article that he knew would be seen by millions of people. I just don't know what to make of it. I really don't. But the existence of such a strange quote has certainly NOT suddenly erased or destroyed the large amount of evidence that supports Lee Harvey Oswald's lone guilt in JFK's murder. Yes, it's a quote that I do not think is accurate at all--and it is entirely misleading as well (giving the impression to LIFE's readers that a key witness to the assassination had, in fact, made a positive identification of Oswald during an official police lineup at the Dallas Police Department--which I'm nearly certain did not happen at any time in November 1963). But, based on that one foolish and inaccurate statement about Howard Brennan made by Gerald R. Ford, to then make a giant leap and to also start believing that the thousands of pages of documents and testimony and evidence that fully support and, in my opinion, confirm Lee Harvey Oswald's guilt in the JFK and J.D. Tippit murders are all now suddenly fraudulent and inaccurate is too much for any reasonable person to accept. (IMO.) In wrestling with the words contained in Ford's quote, in an attempt to find some kind of a fair and halfway reasonable explanation that could reconcile the statement in a manner that doesn't end up with Gerald Ford coming across as a bald-faced L-word, the only thing I could come up with is the following scenario (and it's not very satisfying to me, particularly since Ford made the statement at a time when the Warren Commission was undoubtedly still in existence in September 1964, which means his memory is not likely to have faded very much, if at all, when it comes to recalling the events and testimony surrounding the assassination).... Mr. Ford, somehow, in some inexplicable manner, had it in his mind and honestly believed (as of September 1964, just a few months after Howard Brennan testified to something completely different in front of the Commission) that Mr. Brennan had, indeed, identified Oswald at a second police lineup at the DPD on either November 22 or 23, 1963 (the only two days Brennan could have possibly seen Oswald in a lineup). In other words, via this wholly speculative scenario I'm painting here, Gerald Ford, who did know that Brennan did positively identify Lee Oswald at some point in time after the assassination, had it stuck in his mind that Brennan's positive IDing of Oswald while he was testifying in front of the Warren Commission was actually a positive identification provided by Brennan months earlier at a second police lineup at the Dallas Police Department. A pretty ridiculous explanation, isn't it? Yeah, as I said, I think it is too. But in an effort to give Mr. Gerald Rudolph Ford every benefit of every doubt I can muster, it's about the only explanation I can come up with that would explain Ford's quote in a manner which has Mr. Ford NOT telling a whopper of a lie to the American people in one of the USA's most popular magazines on October 2, 1964. David Von Pein August 11, 2015

Today I was reading Gerald Ford's article that originally appeared in the October 2, 1964, issue of LIFE Magazine, and I noted something odd on page 50 of that magazine when Ford said this.... "H.L. Brennan, who actually saw Oswald shoot the President and provided the first description, decided soon afterward that his own life was in critical danger. At the first police lineup, he later told us, he recognized Oswald immediately but feared to admit it. At the second lineup, he made the identification despite the feared consequences." But I am unaware of a SECOND police lineup attended by Howard Brennan. No second lineup is mentioned in Brennan's Warren Commission testimony. The above quote by Gerald Ford, in which he tells America in LIFE Magazine that Howard Brennan DID positively identify Lee Harvey Oswald at a police lineup, has no doubt raised the hackles (and the suspicions) of some conspiracy theorists who are aware of the quote. And it is quotes like that one, which is just blatantly false (unless I am severely misinformed as to the correct number of police lineups attended by Howard L. Brennan in November of 1963), that make it even more difficult to convince the public that the Warren Commission's investigation into the assassination of President Kennedy was a completely honest and forthright one. I can only shrug my shoulders and wonder why Mr. Ford would want to invent a "second lineup", when such a thing is directly contradicted by Ford's very own Warren Commission final report (on Page 143, where it's stated fairly clearly that Brennan only attended one single lineup at the Dallas Police Department), as well as being contradicted in the testimony of Howard Brennan himself in WC Volume 3 and in Brennan's May 7, 1964, affidavit which also appears in Warren Commission Volume 11. All of which can easily be verified by any conspiracy theorist who takes the time to check out the information. ~big shrug~

Running neck and neck (well, sort of). As of 2:30 PM EDT on 8/10/15.... "Beyond Reasonable Doubt" (Mel Ayton & David Von Pein) --- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #140,315 in Books "JFK: From Parkland To Bethesda" (Vincent Palamara) --- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #261,299 in Books

But what for, Jon? Why would they even WANT to "fudge" anything relating to the five unfired bullets that Detective Elmer Boyd said he took out of Lee Oswald's pocket? The DPD already had the bullet shells at the Tippit murder scene and the six unfired bullets in the chamber of the gun they wrested out of Oswald's hand. Not to mention the revolver itself. So why would an additional five bullets be needed to convict Oswald? Makes no sense to me. And I completely disagree with this statement you made above, Jon: "The whole story of Oswald's having a revolver or clip-fed semi-automatic on November 22 is rife with question marks." The key to knowing that Officer Tippit's killer positively did not shoot Tippit with any kind of an automatic weapon is the location of where the bullet shells were found after the shooting. Those shells weren't found right next to Tippit's patrol car--which, of course, IS where Tippit's murderer was located when he shot Tippit--right there by the car. The shells, instead, were found by THREE separate civilian witnesses near the corner of Tenth Street and Patton Avenue. If Tippit's killer had used an automatic, the shells would have been automatically ejected right there by Tippit's police car. Therefore, how can conspiracy theorists who think Tippit was shot with an automatic gun possibly even begin to (logically) explain how those four expended bullet shells could have been found at the corner of 10th & Patton if J.D. Tippit was really shot many yards up the road on Tenth Street (which, of course, he was, according to every witness at the scene)? Plus, we can know that Tippit's killer did not have in his possession an automatic weapon by also examining the first-day (November 22) statements of witnesses Virginia Davis and Barbara Davis. Each of those Davis girls said in her 11/22/63 affidavit that the man they each saw cutting across their yard right after the shooting occurred was dumping shells from the gun he was holding. And that means the gunman was carrying a revolver, not an automatic. Both Davis girls, who each positively identified the gunman they saw as Lee Harvey Oswald, used the same word in their individual affidavits that they filled out and signed on November 22nd -- "unloading": Virginia Davis -- "I saw the boy cutting across our yard and he was unloading his gun." Barbara Davis -- "I saw this man walking across my front yard unloading a gun."

I guess Jim DiEugenio (and other CTers too) have added DPD detective Elmer L. Boyd to their Liars List with respect to the five unfired bullets that Boyd said he himself took out of Lee Harvey Oswald's pocket on 11/22/63 [at 7 H 126].... Mr. BALL. Before you went into the showup, did you search Oswald? Mr. BOYD. Yes; I did. Mr. BALL. And what did you find? Mr. BOYD. I found five .38 shells, I believe it was five. Mr. BALL. Live? Live shells? Mr. BOYD. Yes, sir. Mr. BALL. What did you do with them? Mr. BOYD. Well, I put them in an envelope and put them with the rest of the property up there to be turned in. Mr. BALL. Did you put any mark on them? Mr. BOYD. Let me see I can look and see. Mr. BALL. I will show you Commission Exhibit 592 in an envelope, will you take a look at that--at the cartridges? Mr. BOYD. Yes---I got my mark on them. Mr. BALL. You have your mark on all five of them? Mr. BOYD. I have my mark on the first three---yes, sir---I have my mark on all of them. Mr. BALL. On all five of them? Mr. BOYD. Yes, sir. Mr. BALL. You put those marks on there, did you? Mr. BOYD. Yes, I did. Mr. BALL. Now, looking those cartridges over, can you tell me whether these five cartridges, which constitute Commission Exhibit 592, are the cartridges which you took from Oswald? Mr. BOYD. Yes, they are. Mr. BALL. And where were you when you put the mark on them? Mr. BOYD. I was back up in my office. Mr. BALL. When you first took them from Oswald, where did you put them? Mr. BOYD. I put them in my pocket.

Greg, Do you think the Dallas Police planted five unfired bullets in Lee Oswald's pocket? Or, alternatively, do you think the DPD just MADE UP a story about LHO having 5 bullets in his pocket?