Steven Kossor

A broken clock is right twice a day, right?

At about the one minute point in his 11/22/63 press conference, Lee Oswald was addressed by a man in the audience (who appears to be standing well above Oswald's level, perhaps on a table, at the back of the room) who says "Nobody said what? Nobody said what?" and then says "Behave yourself!" Oswald looks up at this man, makes a disgusted facial expression, and soon after is escorted from the room. Who the hell was this guy, admonishing Oswald to "behave himself?" It doesn't sound like Jack Ruby's voice, but I believe that Ruby was reportedly in the room during this press conference, standing on a table near the back. Whomever this person was, he appears to have been known to Oswald, who dismissed him as an annoyance. Given Oswald's investment of time in observing the role of a spy (he was an avid fan of the TV show "I led three lives"), it's understandable that he would not "out" this person who was giving him pointed, public admonition about how he should "behave" -- but his disgust over being talked-to like that in a public forum is plainly obvious, and has never been explained or addressed before, to my knowledge. This is the URL for the relevant section from that press conference: https://youtu.be/uuMh1wVWKuw. Anybody have any idea who the speaker is? More food for thought.

As a psychologist and the operator of a relatively large practice that delivers mental health treatment services to children in their homes & communities, I actually have had more than a little training in forensic "critical incident analysis" in order to satisfy state standards for the investigation of incidents of alleged abuse and neglect. Applying that training to the JFKA has been something I've been doing for at least 10 years, adding new bits of information as it comes to light, and "slicing the bologna" of time as thinly as possible and examining each slice carefully as an entity unto itself, like I was taught to do, in order to create the most accurate reconstruction of events possible (and identifying missing information) by considering both eyewitness testimony and any available forensic evidence. That process has yielded some very stable understandings about what probably happened (it's not possible to say "exactly" what happened, but in the realm of probability, I'm pretty confident that I understand the sequence of events pretty clearly at this point). David Lifton and some others have gone beyond the realm of probability and entered the realm of speculation in the past, but in David's case, we've spoken about the "thin time slices" of events in microscopic detail over the past 10 years as I was trying (until about March of this year) to help him finish Final Charade. I think that he is closer to a scientific/forensic understanding of the events on 11/22/63 than others, because he has embraced the concept of reviewing "thin sequential time slices" and reconciling each of them with established facts to the extent possible, so I'm hopeful that his sequel to Best Evidence will be helpful in understanding "what happened" (which he documented scrupulously in Best Evidence along with his speculation trying to tie events together as best he could) but also "what was probably planned, but didn't happen in Dallas for several reasons, but set into motion the French farce between Love Field and the official Bethesda autopsy that was a desperate struggle by the plotters to get the plot back on the rails." I'll let David complete the story of the JFKA in Final Charade asap. In the mean-time I'll add whatever insights I've come up with to the narrative in the Education Forum, with appreciation from the group for identifying less-than-complete contributions, and will amend them to the best of my ability as necessary. The confirmation bias be damned!

It's really satisfying when the numbers come out so closely (great minds think alike!). Always a pleasure to receive your input, Chris! Best wishes always!!!

Just did a little math. If it took 19 seconds for me to record the cars on Elm Street at an average panning rate of 23 mph, then it should have taken Zapruder 27.31 seconds to record the events he filmed on Elm Street at an average rate of 16 mph. If you consult the beautiful graphic above though, the weighted average of the reported speeds is 14.89 mph so the Zapruder film should have been 29.35 seconds long. Three seconds missing. Chris Davidson's thread analyzing the Limo Stop some time ago should be a good place to pick this up.

The expertise in this group is so tremendous and the graphic Chris presented above is a good example of the level of scholarship that I aspire to! When I shot that video, I tried to pan at different speeds at different times to approximate the faster and slower portions of the limo's progress down Elm Street, so I accept the average of my "panning speed" being about 23 mph. If the limo's actual average speed was 16 mph as shown, there is still a time discrepancy, but it clearly isn't as enormous as the discrepancy that originally seemed to be the case (30 mph vs 11 mph is a gross oversimplification, for sure). I think that the most useful thing that my recreation of the Zapruder film brings to the forefront is that Zapruder's film should have taken more than 26 seconds to complete the record of the limousine's transit down Elm Street. How much more is open to question, of course, but any missing time had to have come from somewhere and my guess is that it's on the editing room floor. Here's the updated URL for my recreation of the Zapruder film: https://youtu.be/7-kzRXjuoYs

I updated the video that I shot, recreating the Zapruder film for research purposes and adding some content that summarizes the problem with the 26 second running time of the finished version of the Zapruder film. Here is the new URL: https://youtu.be/7-kzRXjuoYs It's clear that there is a great deal of consistency in the photo, X-ray and autopsy records that were recorded at Bethesda -- it might be considered as "set 1" of the body evidence collection), and a great deal of consistency in the reports of the doctors at Parkland hospital (especially the early ones, before they were visited in person by SS agent Elmer Moore and cajoled over the telephone and otherwise by others who successfully influenced them to change their testimony), which might be considered as "set 2" of the body evidence collection. Some of the people at Bethesda (Saundra Spencer, for example) seem to have corroborated the "set 2" evidence, but they're definitely in the minority and conscientiously swept under the carpet. The sometimes very strident objections to existence of disparities between the President's appearance in Dallas and his appearance at Bethesda that some researchers have voiced over the years notwithstanding, those disparities are real and need to be accounted for in the time line of events between 12:00 noon and 11:30 pm on 11/22/63.

Looking forward to participating in the conversation about the authenticity of the Zapruder film, now that there actually is a video shot from the same position with which to compare it. Except in the realm of Quantum Mechanics, time runs at the same speed, no matter how it is recorded, so it makes absolutely no difference how the passage of time is recorded - an event that should take 52 seconds based on the speed of the action being recorded, which only takes 26 seconds, can't be a legitimate, authentic record of that passage of time. Sad that this debate is still being had.

Zapruder's on-air WFAA-TV interview with Watson happened before his film was developed. He brought the film to the TV studio, allegedly believing that they could develop it and they referred him to the local Kodak plant, which developed the film later that afternoon. Then, he took the developed "master" film to the Jamison film studio in Dallas (which was known at the time as "the Hollywood of the MIdwest" because of its great array of film editing technology and expertise) where three (four?) copies of the film were made. It would have been possible for all of the special effects edits to the Zapruder film to be done right at the Jamison plant in Dallas (optical printers, aerial mats, etc), if someone had wanted to do that, so the necessity and purpose for the film's detour to NPIC and Hawkeye works is diminished a little, I think. Jacob Hornberger provides a step-by-step report of the process that he believes led to the existence of the "Zapruder film" that is kept in the National Archives today in his recent book An Encounter with Evil: The Abraham Zapruder Story which includes an incisive critique of the book 26 Seconds written by Abe Zapruder's granddaughter and summarizes Doug Horne's and other researchers' attempts to to explain what happened to the Zapruder film on 11/22/63 and in the weeks thereafter. Thanks, Pat, for weighing in on all of this; there has been a great deal of myth-making in the so-called "JFKA research" community, and most unfortunately, the mythmakers tend to stand by their creations long after they should have been modifying them when new facts came to light, but such is the lure of the confirmation bias.

It looks like there is a strong consensus that the autopsy photos and X-rays are at least compatible in that they both depict a large area of damage to the skull, including the top and right sides, which is also compatible with Zapruder's demonstration at WFAA-TV on Friday afternoon of what his film would later depict. The important thing to recognize is that all of the photo, X-ray and existing Zapruder film depictions of JFK's head injuries are incompatible with the observation at Parkland hospital that JFK had a hole at the back of his head, through which cerebellar tissue was falling onto the gurney. Cerebellar tissue is at the back/bottom of the skull so the hole they were viewing it through must have been much farther to the rear and toward the underside of the skull than any autopsy photo or X-ray currently in evidence depicts. Zapruder was either prescient in predicting what the autopsy photos, X-rays and his finished film would look like, or there is some other explanation for the remarkable consistency of his depiction of JFK's head wound on the afternoon of the assassination, and the official evidence collection that was eventually assembled much later.

I just uploaded my attempt to re-create the Zapruder film with a video recorder while standing on the same pedestal he occupied in 1963, with some interesting results. Looking forward to future conversations about the Zapruder film.

In 2013, I stood on the same pedestal that Abraham Zapruder occupied when he filmed the assassination of JFK in Dealey Plaza. Zapruder's film took just 26 seconds to capture the action of the limo moving at about 11 mph down the same patch of street that I recorded. In my video, the cars were traveling at an average of about 35 miles per hour, and I recorded two passes down Elm Street in a total of 42 seconds -- about 20 seconds per pass. This means that, if the cars I recorded had been traveling at just 11 mph down Elm Street, it should have taken much, much longer for me to record their passage (about three times longer, in fact). This indicates that Zapruder's film should have taken 52 seconds, or longer, to capture the action on Elm Street between Houston Street and the triple overpass with the limo traveling at just 11 mph for most of the trip. Allowing for a much greater speed in the last few seconds would still require more than 26 seconds overall to film the JFK assassination. Unless the film was edited. Food for thought.... Here's the URL of my video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/bvsf6bZrzKk

I shot a bunch of video walking in and around DP back in 2013, so I'll upload more asap. Thanks for your appreciation of the video. The graffiti on the back of the picket fence is poignant. I climbed up onto the "Zapruder pedestal" and videotaped some cars coming down Elm Street so I saw first-hand what Zappy would have had to have done in order to keep the car in the middle of the frame (like any novice film maker would do, and which he certainly knew was necessary, given his expertise with a camera). You have to pan *down* while following the car to the right, since the street slopes downward at a pretty steep angle in order to go under the train track overpass. It looks like the Zfilm just pans to the right, as if the camera was mounted on a tripod, and the limo almost drops off the screen as a result. Best wishes!

LBJ's leadership in the coverup of JFK's killing was a key part of the plot, I think. Without his support, the triggers would not have been pulled because the threat of the plot's exposure would be too high. Getting him on board applied grease to the wheels of power, IMO.

My point was that Zapruder's depiction of JFK's head wounds in Dealey Plaza during his interview with Watson of WFAA-TV was much more like the condition of JFK's skull at Bethesda than like the condition described by doctors at Parkland. I'm sure there is some innocent explanation for this discrepancy. Perhaps it is the foundation for the rigid family taboo against discussing the Zapruder film (revealed by Abraham Zapruder's granddaughter in her book 26 Seconds) that Abe, his wife, and his son all took to their graves. Hornberger's recent book about the Zapruder film includes a wealth of information that summarizes the history of the Zapruder film with extensive references to the AARB and other efforts to uncover the truth.

The Bethesda autopsy photo collection shows extensive damage to the parietal and temporal areas of the head, and there are no pictures of the hole at the back of the head that was documented by the Parkland doctors. The right side of the head, extending into the frontal area of the skull, is damaged or missing in the X-rays. Overall, the size of the head wound is about five times larger in the Bethesda photos than anything documented before Bethesda. The description of the head wound by Humes, Boswell and Finck in the official autopsy report suggested that the head was struck by an axe, not a bullet, according to a medical doctor who reviewed the written description of the wounds sent to him by David Lifton in 1966, as reported in 1985 edition of Best Evidence, which I believe was the first public distribution of the autopsy photos.

Abraham Zapruder demonstrated a massive blow-out of the front/right side of JFK's head in his filmed interview with Jay Watson on WFAA-TV in Dallas shortly after filming the assassination (before the film had been developed). Zapruder's description disagreed with the observations of the Parkland doctors (who reported a hole at the back of the head, not a massive blow-out of the front and right sides of JFK's head). Interestingly, the autopsy photos and X-rays taken at Bethesda later that night precisely match Zapruder's description. Food for thought: https://youtu.be/4BZiqsk99qI

For anyone who hasn't been able to visit Dealey Plaza personally, here is a video of my drive down Elm Street in 2013. It's high definition, so it can be paused and frames can be printed to show points of interest. I hope this helps to give some perspective to the discussion we've been having. Here is the URL for the video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/xuICZj7eJd8 Best wishes always! Steve

Thanks always to Pat for bringing thoughtful and helpful information to the conversation. Tink's latest book Last Second in Dallas has a diagram showing how blood and gore went forward (as far as the hood of the limo and onto the occupants), and also backward (onto the hood of the Queen Mary), and also onto the driver's side taillight area and officer Hargis, so there seems to be evidence of bullet strikes from three different directions based on the separate "debris fields" that were created. What amazes me most is how any physician could possibly have mistaken a body with such awful head wounds as being alive and a legitimate candidate for endotracheal intubation. He didn't need respiratory assistance upon arrival at Parkland because he was DOA (as Kemp Clark admitted years later), and Carrico's inept placement of an endotracheal tube (the inflatable cuff was above the throat wound so it could not seal the trachea) seems to have misled Perry and other doctors to think that JFK was still alive. It seems that they realized their error in the midst of performing a surgical tracheotomy, and then focused only on Carrico's endotracheal tracheotomy in the 2:15 press conference. It does look like Hargis is reporting two different experiences in his report of what happened on Elm Street -- that he "drove through" a cloud, and that he was "hit by" blood and gore -- his seemingly different accounts are compatible with the physical evidence of at least two, if not three, head impacts during that "last second in Dallas" -- one producing a "cloud" that he drove through and one producing a "splash" that hit him more forcefully.

Also, this isn't really a blood "spatter" scenario. One of the bullets that struck JFK's head seems to have entered above his right eye and fragmented inside his skull, which would have produced an enormous over-pressurization scenario that could have resulted in the explosion of his head. I think the shot from the GK coming a split second later averted that gruesome outcome by creating a hole at the right rear of JFK's skull, through which the highly pressurized contents of his head was exhausted so that it struck Hargis with sufficient force for him to think that he might have been hit himself. A third shot or fourth shot may have struck the head and back from the rear but without accounting for the trail of "flecks" shown on Xrays inside JFK's head that tracked an entry in the right forehead, and the hole at the right rear of his head, any analysis of what happened on Elm Street is deficient.

I thought Hargis said originally that it seemed to him as though he, himself, had been hit because the gore struck him with such force. I didn't realize that he also said that the blood/gore "went up into the air" and that he "drove through it," which is a distinctly different account of what he experienced. Did he say both things and if so, which was his first account? As in the case of Malcolm Perry and every other witness to an event, it makes sense to give more weight to the earliest statement about what was experienced than any later statements. The blood/gore was also deposited in the vicinity of the driver's side taillight, so it seems pretty clear that the gore didn't just go up into the air, but that a goodly portion of it also projected backward and to the left. Maybe a 2nd or 3rd head shot produced that "cloud" of mist that Dino Brugioni of NPIC and others have described, but all of the reports taken together seem to indicate that a "cone" of gore was sprayed behind and to JFK's left, not just the mist erupting into the air.

Fluids, like bullets, travel in straight lines. In order for blood and brains to exhaust from a hole at the right rear of JFK's skull and land on the driver's side taillight and onto officer Hargis who was in that vicinity during the headshot(s) interval on Elm Street, the shot creating the hole must have originated in a straight line (with the two points defining it being the driver's side taillight/Hargis and the hole at the back of JFK's head). That line points toward the GK. In order for the hole at the back of JFK's head to "point" toward the driver's side taillight/Hargis at the time both were spattered with gore, his head had to have been turned toward the GK at the time the bullet struck. The integrity of the Zfilm is irretrievably lost because it does not capture the necessary orientation of JFK's head. These are facts that should be considered in any conversation about the direction from which bullets entered JFK's head on Elm Street. Like many in the Forum, I've been trying to make some sort of meaningful contribution to the understanding of "what happened" on Elm Street and until the facts I've described can be integrated into that understanding, it is incomplete and inadequate. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Destiny Betrayed is a marvelous effort, but it's not a sacred telling of truth because it leaves some things out entirely because they would be difficult to describe/defend/explain/integrate into the established narrative. Nice effort; worthy of an "A" but not an "A++" as it seems some would score it.

Perry used the word "endotracheal" in his press conference, and described only the procedure performed by Carrico. He did not describe a tracheal incision in that press conference. Only later, after Humes had inquired about whether or not he performed surgery of the neck, and was pressured by others including CIA figures, did he talk about cutting into the throat at all (he located his incision in several different places over time) and did his best to accommodate the forces pressing on him to fall in line with the established narrative. He was in a terrible fix. As are we all.

Given a climate so hospitable to disguise and deception in Dallas around 11/22/63, it would not be a shock to the senses if an effort to present a consistent, sanitized story was undertaken at the DPD, much like the effort to disguise the performance of a surgical tracheotomy by three Parkland doctors (after Carrico's botched endotracheal tracheotomy procedure). Malcolm Perry didn't mention the surgical intervention he and the other two doctors performed, and spoke only about Carrico's endotracheal tracheotomy activity (passing a tube down JFK's throat, not cutting into his windpipe), in the 2pm Parkland press conference announcing JFK's death. Most people still don't understand that there were two separate, sequential attempts by Parkland medical doctors to assist JFK's dead body with respiration on 11/22/63. In any case, I suppose it's possible that Westbrook's car is shown in the picture in front of the Texas theater, and that the other officers were describing a different (very similar) car parked nearby. Since the DPD officers seem to have been using each other's cars with startling ease (did the same key work multiple vehicles?), the confusion surrounding which car transported LHO to police headquarters is about the same magnitude as the confusion surrounding who was removed from the back of the Texas theater while LHO (?) was being removed on-camera from the front. I'm adding Harvey and Lee to my "library of information" about the JFK assassination. Damn the confirmation bias! The truth will out only if we don't stop seeking after it (reconciling seemingly contradictory observations), right?