Paul Brancato

David - this is an important question. If you have time could you write some background so I can follow this a little better, or direct me to some good research on the Hidell rifle order?

Perhaps alibi isn't the right word to use in my last post. If Tippit had lived and had been considered a suspect in the shooting of JFK, his report to dispatch of his location at 12:17 pm would have been his defense, and the much later corroboration by the store owner would have provided an alibi.

I guess it depends on whether Tippit lied about his location at 12:45 pm, or the 5 witnesses who reported seeing him at Gloco gas station at the same time were mistaken. If Tippit lied, one would have to wonder if he also lied about his location at 12:17 pm, and one would then have to ask why.

Witnesses can be honestly mistaken, but 5 witnesses all mistaken as to the identity of the cop at Gloco gas station, two of whom knew him personally, when weighed against Tippit's response to his dispatcher as to his whereabouts at 12:45, raise the strong likelihood that Tippit was lying. This naturally leads to looking more closely at his whereabouts at his previously reported location at 12:17 pm. Tippit has exactly one alibi at 12:17, and no official record of the story his alibi, the store owner who says he reported a shoplifter and that Tippit answered the call and took the shoplifter into custody, tells.

Duke, your timings are interesting. Assuming that Tippit's reported locations between noon and 12:45 on Bonnie View drive are untrue, surely Tippit had the time to leave home after lunch, drive to Dealey Plaza in time for the big event, and drive to the Glaco station in time for a 12:45 sighting.

I find the Gloco witnesses believable, and am more inclined to believe them than to believe Tippit's locations as reported by him to dispatch. If he lied about his whereabouts in the immediate aftermath of the assassination its suspicious behavior indeed. He was certainly a victim of a conspiracy, and perhaps part of one too.

David - uniformed cops shooting at the motorcade does make good theater. I'll refresh my memory on Gordon Arnold's testimony soon. But whether he is believable or not, there are scant eyewitness descriptions that day of any of the shooters. They were all well hidden. The evidence is overwhelming, at least to me, that there was a crossfire, and that shots came from the direction that Arnold and so many others said they did. I am not sold on the Badgeman story, but that doesn't mean there wasn't a uniformed shooter in that area. Should we dismiss the possibility that Tippit or some other as yet unnamed DP or someone dressed like one shot at JFK just because we don't find the Badgeman photo evidence believable or because Roscoe White's story doesn't hold up to scrutiny, or because we have little eyewitness testimony of such a shooter?

Good reading David.

If 5 witnesses are to be believed, Tippit was at the Gloco gas station at 12:45 pm on Nov. 22, and therefore lied about his whereabouts to police dispatch about 15 minutes after the assassination.

He left home after lunch at 11:50 AM. At 12:17 pm he radios in a location 4100 Bonnie View, where he apparently showed up despite not being dispatched there, and ends up taking a shoplifter into custody. In 1978 Tippit's presence there is verified by the then store owner, who claims he called the police to report the shoplifter. So that is his alibi for his location during the assassination. Pretty weak, especially if he lied about his location shortly afterwards. The shoplifter was never identified, and in the lengthy article linked in David's last post the store owner is not identified either.

Reports of Tippit's behavior after the event suggest he was in a panic, and up to something other than hunting for the killer or killers of the president. His subsequent violent death lends credence to the idea that he was afraid for his own life. McBride's groundbreaking interview with Tippit's father reveal that Tippit was a great shot.

To add further fuel to the theory that Tippit was up to his eyeballs in trouble, his gun is taken from under his dead body and presumably, but not provably, the very same gun is returned later.

Josh - you posted this before and then elaborated on a subsequent post without divulging the name of your source. I don't really want to know the name, and even if you revealed it I would feel free to disregard the alibi he provides for Flores, whether or not I find Flores a person of interest. An anonymous alibi is worthless, especially 50 years after the fact and with so little being said about Flores. Maybe he has legitimate personal reasons for his avoidance of scrutiny. But avoid it he has. Yet he was the very first suspect, and he was released before his anonymous coworker even had a chance to provide the alibi to the DPD.

Maybe this is just another well concealed rabbit hole and Josh and his source are trying to do us a favor by keeping us from falling in it.

Agree David Josephs that Badgeman evidence is weak, and agree David Andrews that non cops in uniform makes more sense.

The Ted Callaway story is mentioned briefly by a poster but dismissed as old news. Why? Someone picks up Tippit's gun and replaces it, presumably, some time later. That is completely weird.

I'd like to bring back this thread. Joseph McBride, in his book 'Into the Nightmare', presents an idea that appeared no where on this thread, that perhaps JD Tippit was Badgeman, or at least that he was a shooter at DP. His wife presented him with an alibi of course, saying that he came home for lunch that day, something unusual for him. McBride interviewed Tippit's father, who says that JD was an expert shooter. Whatever the truth of this, McBride and others are right when they say the Tippit shooting is a rosetta stone to the assassination of JfK. I find it interesting that several witnesses who buttressed the government conclusion that LHO killed Tippit were connected with Jack Ruby. I enjoyed the book, even though personal journey took up many pages.

Willie Nelson is a pop icon, Pete Seeger almost forgotten. How strange. I saw Seeger many times as a child, and am good friends with the children of Millard Lampell. And was named after Paul Robeson. I guess that pretty much defines what milieu I grew up in.

Pete Seeger was a great man and he fought the good fight. It would be wonderful if a bridge was named after him.

So long Pete, its been good to know ya.

By forward you mean forward of the bullet, not forward the direction the car was moving. Thanks for clarifying. The Z film I have seen pretty clearly shows that the head shot on the right side came from in front and to the right.

Daniel - why would massive forward splatter indicate a shot from the front?

Does Doug Horne think that agent Greer was one of the shooters? If so what evidence does he present?

Dinkin's story is either one about a paranoid American soldier, or its a key to the hiring of at least part of the shooter team by elements of the US military.

David - agree, and also other publications, such as National Zeitung un Soldaten Zeitung, 'the German Nazi 'soldiers newspaper'.

David - I didn't mean to post that question twice, and thanks for clarifying your position. It is really odd that when one tries to research Dinkin the story quickly becomes what he may have gleaned from reading Stars and Stripes and other publications, rather than what he may have learned from cable traffic on the OAS. It makes sense that he protected his own skin, and he even says as much in regard to the psychological testing he underwent at Walter Reed hospital. Assuming this to be true, the interesting question is why that cover story? What were the other publications that he read? He claimed that all his papers were confiscated during his hospitalization. He also claimed that he could not report his 'theory' to his superiors because some of the plotters were US military.

Was he perhaps leaving us a clue as to who in the military he thought was actually involved? It is curious that he previously published in the Overseas Weekly, a newspaper considered 'leftist' by military brass ( in sharp contrast to Stars and Stripes) his opposition to being forced to purchase savings bonds because over 50% of those profits were being used to finance the US military. This brought him to the attention of his military superiors. The Overseas Weekly is the very same paper who had helped being down General Edwin Walker a few years previously. Dinkin was well aware of the negative view the US military had of the Overseas Weekly, a newspaper deliberately denied to US troops stationed in Vietnam at least by 1965. No doubt Dinkin was telling the truth when he claimed that the Military publications were indoctrination devices.

So perhaps Dinkin saved his own skin and apparently disappeared shortly thereafter. Assuming his story is basically true one would have to see him as a brave and patriotic individual, and not the paranoid he was painted as in all the post assassination documents circulated to the Warren Commission et al. One article I read compared him to whistleblower Edward Snowden. So shouldn't we consider that his last act was a defiant one? In a nutshell, his message was that certain US military brass were involved in a conspiracy to kill the president, that they were drawn from the ranks of the far right, those that resented the treatment of General Walker, perhaps Walker himself.

Pat et al - what do you make of the Belmont memo? Apparently a bullet lodged behind JFK's ear was found at the Bethesda autopsy but never entered into evidence.

David - do you believe the story that Dinkins decoded secret messages in this publication? I can see where a certain political climate can be deduced, but not the detail he apparently provided.

I am going to dig through my books a little and see if I can answer my own question.

David - do you believe the story that Dinkins decoded secret messages in this publication?

I am going to dig through my books a little and see if I can answer my own question.

Does anyone know where Garrison got info that Dinkin was specifically working on cable traffic between OAS and CIA?

I find the idea that Dinkins picked up such detail in advance of the assassination from deciphering Stars and Stripes and other publications, using cryptographic code breaking techniques he learned in the CIA or US Army intelligence, rather untenable. I think this story may be a limited hangout, supported by Dinkins himself for fear of his own life. In any case, most people would find this explanation unbelievable, and thus dismiss his story too easily. Mission accomplished. On the other hand, if he was in fact privy to cable traffic between CIA and OAS, that would be very interesting.

Pat - a few posters including myself would like you to clarify something - from where exactly do you think the fatal head shot originated? Does your sleuthing on the wounds lead to a conclusion?

Thanks for that David. Fyi I am working my way through Armstrong's book. Its unwieldy but interesting. I wish I could find a detailed synopsis. As for who, I've posted on a few threads my feeling that the conspiracy was large and that the conspirators saw safety in numbers. I believe it was a coup, and that we are still living with the consequences. I don't dismiss anything as beyond them, including Z film alteration and faked autopsy photos. I only joined this now depleted forum last year, so perhaps I missed days in which posters examined the top of the pyramid. Its mostly conjecture of course, but it goes to the heart of the matter.

David - I always have a hard time seeing what others see in looking at short closeup sections of the Z film. What I am sure of is that the, or perhaps one of, the fatal head shots clearly come from in front, as did an earlier shot to the throat. So it does seem strange that the film would be doctored in other ways while leaving clear evidence of a frontal shot intact. Somebody argued that the people that altered the film did what they could in a short amount of time. Maybe that's true, and maybe the alterations you and others point out had the affect of hiding evidence of complicity on the part of Greer or someone else. It is suspicious indeed that no provably original film exists, if that is in fact true. Even though I have read a ton over 50 years, I am not nearly an expert.

If by some miracle a new Congressional or even privately funded investigation was begun, I would prefer that its initial energies were spent on the yet to be released files of intelligence agencies rather than on post assassination coverup. Sure its all important - call it who, how, and why. I want to know who. I feel I already know why, and of course I want to know how the conspirators pulled this off.

I'll concede that sometimes the devil is in the details. But when I talk to non-believers and relatively disinterested friends their eyes glaze over when I start talking about fake autopsy photos or altered Z film.

Andric and Pat - which shot came from in front, by your scenario? The fatal shot?

Pat - I am inclined to agree with you about those that argue the z film is altered. Assuming it was not, are you saying that you believe the evidence supports only shots from behind?

Man, following this important thread is difficult. I am working through Armstrong's book now, so the answers to questions about tax returns for Marguerite Oswald and the Smiths goes to the heart of Armstrong's arguments. Would someone here try to simply answer the question which tax returns are still classified? Robert, in particular it doesn't seem pertinent that there are real John and Minnie Smiths in the phone books of the time. The question is are there several years of tax returns from someone named John and Minnie Smith that are still classified?