Steve Thomas

David, How does this (jibe?) (jive?) (what's the right word?) with what Ellis supposedly told a HSCA staff investigator - that he saw debris coming up from a nearby curb? See p. 23 of Vol XII of the HSCA Report here: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=84#relPageId=27&tab=page The footnotes those statements are based on, are on page 31 of Vol. XII here: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=84#relPageId=35&tab=page and refer back to JFK Doc 013841. I have never learned how to find an online version of HSCA documents. I frustrates the heck out me. Steve Thomas

Chris, Someone told me a long time ago that that patch signified a policeman who had received CPR training. I don't know if that's true or not. Steve Thomas

*smile* Steve Thomas

David, That's a possibility, but I think you would want to look for somebody with a more direct line to Fritz. Moody worked in the Criminal Investigation Division, where the Homicide and Robbery Bureau was. The Traffic Division was involved a lot the day of the shooting, but not so much in the investigation afterwards, or assembling the case file. Over and above that, the note that Bart provided implies a degree of familiarity, with the just the word, "Sorry" at the end - not Sorry, Sir or Captain or anything like that. Steve Thomas

Do you think Gloria Calvery could be the woman who shouted to Joe Marshall Smith that "they are shooting the President from the bushes"? Mr. SMITH. Yes, sir.; and this woman came up to me and she was just in hysterics. She told me, "They are shooting the President from the bushes". Was Calvery "in hysterics"? I don't know, I was just asking. Steve Thomas

David and Bart, I think M.M. is Marilyn Moody. She was a civilian employee stenographer in the Forgery Bureau. See Batchelor Exhibit 5002 Page 147 of the Exhibit (page 30 0f Batchelor's List) http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh19/pdf/WH19_Batchelor_Ex_5002.pdf Steve Thomas

I found another copy in Box 5 of the DPD Archives, so that makes 7 copies. Why would someone go into the DPD Archives and alter this Report in Boxes 5 and 15 after the Warren Report, and CE 2003 of the 26 volume Hearings had been published? CE 2003 pp 268+ https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=1140#relPageId=286&tab=page Warren Report Appendix XI pp 607+ https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=946#relPageId=631&tab=page DPD Archives Box 15, Folder# 1, Item# 111, pp 9+ http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/box15.htm The Federal Government documents were already a matter of public record. What good would it have accomplished? Steve Thomas

David, You asked where the final report is. I believe that the version in Box 15, Folder# 1, Item# 111 is the final version. You can see the same version in CD 81 AG Texas Letter with attachments dated 07 Jan 1964 beginning on page 452. CE 2003 (24H) p. 268 Appendix XI of the Warren Report. On page 607 The version in Box 1 is the original, you can see where Fritz went over this with a stenographer, and indicated where he wanted to break with new paragraphs. These changes are reflected in the version in Box 15. The anomaly here, is that someone, at some point, went back in and changed the Box 15 version. I think it was after the Warren Report came out in September, 1964, and Thomas Kelley's Report showed up in Appendix XI. I have run across six versions of this Interrogation. I explore this, but it's too long to be inserted here, so I put it up on a web site here: http://myjfksite.weebly.com/ look at the bottom of the page If, for some reason you can't pull it up, let me know and I'll post it here. In a later post on this thread, you said that Fritz probably *** a brick when he realized that the finding of the rifle photo did not match the 12:35 Interrogation. Somebody did, I just don't know if it was Fritz. I am finding differences between the DPD Case file in the DPD Archives, with what's in CD 81 - which is also supposed to be the DPD Case File. Things have been removed. I have come to suspect that Fritz and Kelley were the only ones there and that either: a) Oswald was being questioned about the pictures before they had officially been found; or, The 12:35 Interview had nothing to do with the pictures, but was about something else. An effort has been made to eliminate references to the 12:35 Interrogation. They succeeded in some places, but failed in others. The tipping point for me was the jail checkout card. Steve Thomas

Alistair, To my eye, on page 10 the note originally said 4th, and Fritz wrote 3rd over the top of it to reflect what he had written on the page before it, page 9. By changing the time from 12:35 to 6:00 PM and re-numbering the Interrogations, Fritz is making an attempt to hide the 12:35 Interrogation. Steve Thomas

David, Thank you. I believe you're right. Steve Thomas

To anyone, In Box 15 of the DPD Archives Box 15, Folder# 1, Item# 111. Interrogation, by J. W. Fritz. Draft of the interrogation of Lee Harvey Oswald, (Photocopy) Poor Quality), date unknown DPD Archives, Box 15, Folder# 1, Item# 111. This consists of 13 pages. http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/box15.htm On page 9 of this Report, the 12:35 time has been crossed out, and 6:00 PM has been written in. There is an additional note written in that I can't make out. (Brd Int?/Bnd Intv?) Is Intv an abbreviation for Interview? Can anyone hazard a guess what this writing stands for? Steve Thomas

I'm sorry, I forgot to include the bibliographic citation for this. I was referring to his Interrogation notes Here: http://www.jfklancer.com/Fritzdocs.html Steve Thomas

David, Thanks for discussing this with me. I've learned a lot. I'm not ready to knowledgeably (is that a real word?) discuss this yet, because I'm still researching it, but for what it's worth, I've come to believe that the Fritz Interrogation notes are a fraud. Not so much a fraud, as fraudulent; because I believe that a page has been removed between pp. 4 and 5 of those notes in an effort to hide the Interview at 12:35. I can't say positively what was discussed, but from what I surmise, only Fritz and Thomas Kelley were there. For example, the two DPD Detectives who were supposed to be there, Senkel and Turner, make no mention of attending an Interrogation on the 23rd in their after-action Reports. Neither does James Bookhout of the FBI. I'll be writing more about this later. You mentioned Nat Pinkston of the FBI getting information about Kleins. Turner's after-action Report makes interesting reading. Look at the bottom of page 4 and the top of page 5 about him receiving an anonymous phone call about Kleins. DPD Archives Box 15, Folder# 2, Item# 55 http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/box15.htm Somebody was pushing Kleins pretty hard that day. I don't know what was going on between 11:30 and 12:35. Maybe Fritz was out in the hall giving interviews? What do you make of the bottom on page 5 of Fritz's Interrogation notes where he says that Oswald was complaining on Saturday night about wanting a jacket for a lineup? There was no lineup on Saturday night. in the DPD Archives Box 6, Folder# 1, Item# 73, there is a list of the lineups and when they took place. The only line-up on Saturday took place at 2:15 in the afternoon. If Oswald was complaining about wanting a jacket, he couldn't have been doing that at 6:30 in the evening. http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/box6.htm PS. BTW, this list of the lineups that you find in Box 6 is the only place you will find Howard Brennan listed. Steve Thomas

Maybe to many, but not to Sims and Boyd of the DPD. Following the assassination, Detectives Richard M. Sims and Elmer L. Boyd of the Homicide and Robbery Bureau filed a joint after-action report with Police Chief Jesse Curry. In their undated report, Sims and Boyd wrote, “Detective Studebaker and Lieutenant Day took pictures of the rifle. Mr. Pinkston of the F.B.I. and a Secret Service Agent were there at the time the pictures were being made. We don’t know the Secret Service agent’s name. Mr. Ellsworth and another officer from Alcohol Tax Department were also there. They knew enough to distinguish between the FBI, Secret Service and ATTU. "Report on Officer's Duty in Regard to the President's Murder, R. M. Sims. No. 629, and E. L. Boyd, No, 840. Dallas Police archives Box 3 Folder # 4, as cited in the City of Dallas Archives – JFK Collection, http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/box3.htm

David, You can find one copy in Volume XI of the Warren Report itself here: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=946#relPageId=623&tab=page and another copy in the Papers of Will Fritz here: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=29104 I have not sat down and compared these line by line to what you find in Box 15 Folder@ 1, Item#111 of the DPD Archives. Steve Thomas

David, You can also find this interrogation report rough draft in Box 15, Folder# 1, Item# 111. This version is before the corrections and stenogropher's writing. http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/box15.htm It wasn't unusual for the police officers (and probably representatives of other other government agencies like the FBI and Secret Service) to review and correct their statements multiple times before submitting them. As Kenneth Croy told the Warren Commission in his testimony regarding his Report to Curry on his duties on the 24th: http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/croy.htm Mr. CROY. No; well, I will put it this way, that it took us 8 hours to get that up. That is how interested they were. Mr. GRIFFIN. You talked with them for 8 hours? Mr. CROY. On 2 different occasions. That day and the next day, for 4 hours each day. That is pretty interesting. Mr. CROY. No; we talked the entire thing over, and after we talked everything over and they brought the stenographer in and we went back over it again, then I left and she typed it up, and I came in the next day and we went back over it again and back over it and so on. I found three things in Fritz's Interrogation Report that were interesting to me: 1) On page 4 of the Notes, he wrote that Tippit was arraigned before Judge Johnston at 7:10 PM. What was interesting is that Fritz didn't catch that in the Report in Box 15 when he corrected and changed the Report that you find in Box 1. 2) On Page 2 of that Report, Fritz said he got a call from Shanklin that Shanklin wanted Hosty in on the interview, because Hosty "knew about these people and had had been investigating them before". What's that all about? 3) Also on Page 2, Fritz wrote that in addition to Sims and Boyd of the Homicide Bureau being present at Oswald's first interrogation, there were also "possibly some Secret Service men". This was corroborated by Sims, Boyd, M.W. Stevenson, and Chief Curry of the DPD. I have searched for this Secret Service agent, or agents and I don't know who this could be. I wrote a piece on this a while back called, Secret Service, On the Knoll and Beyond that you can find here if you're interested: Steve Thomas

Robin, Thanks for these. The gifs you provide in Part 3 definitely show that white car behind Johnson's car driving down Houston with its back door open. Is that Johnson's Secret Service follow-up car? I wonder why they did that? Steve Thomas

I know that this a response to a post that's over 10 years old, but in his WC testimony, Hosty said that he had the Elsbeth St. address as early as March, 1963. Mr. HOSTY. This was March 4, 1963, when I began my inquiry as to her present whereabouts. I determined on March 4, 1963, through the Immigration and Naturalization Service records that she had moved from Fort Worth to the Dallas area. She was living on a street called Elsbeth Street in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. On March 11, 1963, I made inquiry at this Elsbeth address Steve Thomas

Hosty says, " I requested that the case be reopened. I requested the supervisor in Dallas to reopen the case to me. " Mr. STERN. Was that in writing or verbally? Mr. HOSTY. Actually, it was, it would appear in writing. I did this by sending a letter to the Bureau, to the FBI headquarters in Washington I made a request that this case be reopened Belmont says, " In March 1963 Agent Hosty received information in Dallas to the effect that Oswald had been in communication with The Worker, the east coast Communist newspaper. He therefore re-instituted the case..." So that the case was revived in Dallas by Hosty. And he learned that Oswald had left Dallas, the residence was then picked up in New Orleans, and the case was revived. So that actually there was a joint revival of the case Hosty says he made a request. Belmont says he did it on his own. I don't know............... something doesn't feel right here. I don't think Hosty would have had that authority. From what I've been able to glean in reading through FBI reports on other things, Hoover didn't want his agents chasing their tails. Steve Thomas

I could have mis-read the Wikipedia entry I cited. That's not un-heard of. *grin* Glad I could take you for a stroll down memory lane. I've got a line on walkers if you need one. :-) Steve

This really isn't apropos to anything special. It's just an observation of an aspect of the JFK assassination that I don't think has been explored much. For example, I wonder how much info on Oswald might be found in the old Walnut files? You can see a reference to this system on page 6 in the document entitled: “DCI John McCone and the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy” http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB493/docs/intell_ebb_026.PDF that Douglas Caddy referred to in his thread, “CIA report concluded director led JFK assassination coverup According to Wikipedia, Walnut used an IBM 1360 data retrieval and name trace system employing IBM punch cards and microfilm. Paper documents were microfilmed and then the pages were scanned and input into IBM punch cards. The cards were keyword searchable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_1360 I had been doing some reading on the 507th Army Security Agency Group in Germany in the 1950's and 60's. The soldiers talked about using IBM punch cards in their work. Several said that there was a job waiting for them at IBM when their hitch was over. (Source: Email from John O'Neil) My next duty station (after Vint Hill Farms) was with the 507th USASA Group (Field Army) at Heilbronn am Neckar. We had 4 -2½ ton trucks with expandable sides that held all our IBM equipment that ran off portable diesel generators (one per truck). Jim Campbell in his email said “(When I was in, no 206 had ever re-enlisted - IBM had a job ready for them when they got out.)” When I got out I went to the IBM office in San Francisco, showed them my diploma with TJ Watson’s signature and asked for a job, they asked me what I knew about computers, so I told them I’d seen one in Germany. I got the hint when they said ‘Goodbye, thanks for stopping in”. "Late in 1962 was not the time to look for a job repairing the soon to be obsolete IBM punched card machines! It all turned out for the best. I worked as a tab operator while I taught myself computer programming and all that stuff and lived happily ever after. My wife, our three children and I moved to Australia 40 years ago." Hielbronn was where Dennis Ofstein of Jaggers-Chiles-Stovall fame and Thomas H. Crigler of the 507th were stationed. The CIA used IBM computers and so did Army intelligence. The CIA report cited above says, "In his appearance before the Warren Commission, McCone encouraged other federal agencies to computerize their records to facilitate investigations." I wonder if the FBI's databases were computerized. Steve Thomas

From Hosty's WC testimony: On the 14th of March, I verified that Oswalds were residing at this address when I found the mailbox with the name of Lee and Marina Oswald at this address, 214 Neely Street. So I then checked Lee Oswald's file, at which time I determined that he had a contact with the New York Daily Worker. Mr. STERN. How did you learn that? Mr. HOSTY. From our New York office. Our New York office sent a letter through to the Dallas office. This was the first time I had seen this letter. Mr. STERN. This appeared in his file? Mr. HOSTY. In his file; yes, sir. Mr. STERN. Even if the case was closed, the file would continue to accumulate? Mr. HOSTY. That is correct, and they are periodically rechecked for things of this nature. I noticed it, and then because of the domestic difficulty and the fact that I knew I would be interviewing his wife in the near future, I requested that the case be reopened. I requested the supervisor in Dallas to reopen the case to me. Mr. STERN. Was that in writing or verbally? Mr. HOSTY. Actually, it was, it would appear in writing. I did this by sending a letter to the Bureau, to the FBI headquarters in Washington, setting forth the information I had developed, and then on our office copy I made a request that this case be reopened. This is a normal procedure that we go through when we open cases, or reopen cases. The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Hosty, did the letter from your New York office say what the nature of the con, tact with the Daily Worker was? Mr. HOSTY. It said he was on the mailing list, sir, of the Daily Worker. The CHAIRMAN. On the mailing list? Mr. HOSTY. Yes, sir. So, what you are saying I think, is that the FBI Headquarters allowed Hosty to re-open a closed case, just because he had subscribed to a newspaper, even though it was not their policy to do so. Just out of curiosity. have you ever seen this letter from the New York Office? Or the request Hosty made to Headquarters, and their response? Steve Thomas

This is the part that I've never understood, because in his WC testimony, Hosty said, " I noticed it, and then because of the domestic difficulty and the fact that I knew I would be interviewing his wife in the near future, (this was in March, 1963) I requested that the case be reopened. I requested the supervisor in Dallas to reopen the case to me. Mr. STERN. Was that in writing or verbally? Mr. HOSTY. Actually, it was, it would appear in writing. I did this by sending a letter to the Bureau, to the FBI headquarters in Washington, setting forth the information I had developed, and then on our office copy I made a request that this case be reopened. Hosty's emphasis was on the right wing, but it appears from this that he went out of his way to be given control of a case involving a Russian (de-facto, Communist) immigrant. This seemingly would not be his area of expertise. And yes, the impression I get from reading through the FBI's Subject Files on the Minutemen, etc. is that a lot of them were located in the Fort Worth area - even more so than in Dallas. Are you aware of any other communists Hosty was monitoring? Steve Thomas

November 1st:: Mr. STERN. You say the interview started at about 2:30? Mr. HOSTY. Approximately 2:30; yes, sir. Mr. STERN. About how long did it last? Mr. HOSTY. At the very most 20-25 minutes. Mr. HOSTY. Oh, yes, sir. This occurred on the 1st. This was a Friday. I returned to the Dallas office. I covered a couple of other leads on the way back. I got in shortly after 5 o'clock... What "leads" did he cover, and why did it take him two hours to go from Irving to Dallas?

I wonder why CE 103 is in English? Oswald knew how to write in Russian (see here for example: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth340234/m1/1/ Why write the Russian Embassy a letter that is not in Russian? Steve Thomas