Steve Thomas

The thing that struck me was, how did Katzenbach know, two days after the assassination, what the FBI report was going to say, and how did he know that it was going to be inconsistent with what the DPD was saying? I guess it goes back to the motive part in Katzenbach's memo: "Speculation about Oswald’s motivation ought to be cut off..." At its heart, JFK's assassination boils down to a murder mystery, and in any given murder investigation, you have to satisfy the three basic requirements of means, motive, and opportunity. Supposedly Oswald had the means and the opportunity, it was the motive that was in question. I know that Bill Alexander wanted to indict Oswald for murder "in furtherance of an international conspiracy", and that Henry Wade freaked when he heard that (see his WC testimony here: http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/wade.htm).He said, "Well, on that score it doesn't make any sense at all to me because there is no such crime in Texas, being part of an international conspiracy, it is just murder with malice in Texas, and if you allege anything else in an indictment you have to prove it and it is all surplusage in an indictment to allege anything, whether a man is a John Bircher or a Communist or anything, if you allege it you have to prove it. So, when I heard it I went down to the police station and took the charge on him, just a case of simple murder." How did Katzenbach know on the 24th what the FBI report, which had not yet been written, was going to say? Steve Thomas

Katzenbach wrote this memo by hand on the evening of Sunday 24 November, a few hours after Lee Harvey Oswald had been shot dead by Jack Ruby. A typed version was prepared the following morning and sent to Bill Moyers, an assistant to President Johnson. http://22november1963.org.uk/katzenbach-memo-moyers-warren-commission "It is important that all of the facts surrounding President Kennedy’s Assassination be made public in a way which will satisfy people in the United States and abroad that all the facts have been told and that a statement to this effect be made now.... I think this objective may be satisfied by making public as soon as possible a complete and thorough FBI report on Oswald and the assassination. This may run into the difficulty of pointing to inconsistencies between this report and statements by Dallas police officials." Can anybody think off the top of their head what some of those inconsistencies might have been? Steve Thomas

I've always been puzzled by the idea that Oswald traveled the 10 or 12 blocks from N. Beckley to 10th and Patton in only a few minutes (if you believe he left N. Beckley shortly after 1:00 and Tippitt was shot at 1:10 at the earliest and 1:16 according to the official record), and yet it took him the better half of a half an hour to go the six blocks from 10th and Patton to the Texas Theater. Leaving aside for the moment whether Burroughs sold him popcorn at 1:15, or that Oswald sat next to Jack Davis at the theater earlier than that: http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/Unspeakable/TwoLHOs.html The police dispatch tapes reports him ducking into the Theater at 1:44 PM. http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/dpdtapes/tapes3.htm If it wasn't Oswald at the Theater, then who was running around Oak Cliff in that half an hour, and why would it take him so long? Steve Thomas

Robert, According to Day's WC testimony, both the empty shells and the live round were tested for fingerprints, and no prints at all were found. http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/day1.htm Mr. DAY. Were taken, I processed these three hulls (found at the TSBD) for fingerprints, using a powder. Mr. Sims picked them up by the ends and handed them to me. I processed each of the three; did not find fingerprints. Mr. BELIN. Could you tell us what exactly you did in testing those hulls for fingerprints? Mr. DAY. I used fingerprint powder, dusted them with the powder, a dark powder. No legible prints were found. Mr. DAY. Captain Fritz took possession of it. I retained possession of the rifle. Mr. BELIN. Did you process this live round at all for prints? Mr. DAY. Yes, sir; I did. I did not find any prints. Mr. DAY. There was one other article released with this, an envelope containing the three negatives I made of the prints on the side of the magazine housing of that 6.5 rifle, which I did not definitely identify as belonging to Oswald. While, in his testimony, Day refers once to the clip, he does not specifically say he dusted it for prints. He mentions testing the side of the magazine housing and all other metallic surfaces, but not specifically the clip. Mr. BELIN. Do you carry any equipment of any kind with you when you go there? Mr. DAY. Yes, sir. We have a station wagon equipped with fingerprint equipment, cameras, containers, various other articles that might be needed at the scene of the crime. Mr. STUDEBAKER. Lieutenant Day and I answered the call. Mr. BALL. What equipment did you take with you? Mr. STUDEBAKER. We took our camera and fingerprint kits and our truck. We have a truck that is equipped with all that stuff - a station wagon. W.E. Barnes first reported to the TSBD, but when the report came over that Tippitt was shot, he was dispatched there. He had the equipment for doing so, and said he tested Tippitt's car for prints, but does not say he tested the shells for prints. In Poe's WC testimony he says that he gave the hulls to Barnes of the Crime Search Section. Mr. BALL. What did you do with the hulls? Mr. POE. I turned the hulls into the crime lab, which was at the scene. Mr. BALL. Did you save the Winston cigarette package? Mr. POE. I turned it in with the two cartridges. Mr. BALL. To the crime lab? Mr. POE. Yes, sir. I wonder if the "crime lab" that Poe refers to was the station wagon that Day and Studebaker mention. I haven't seen any reference so far that the live shells found in Oswald's revolver, or the live shells that were supposedly found in his pocket were tested for prints. Just as an aside, I wonder who the guy in the brown jacket was, seen by "6 or 7 witnesses", fleeing the scene of Tippitt's shooting by running away east (in the opposite direction of the Texas Theater) up the alley between Tenth and Jefferson. http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/21/2195-001.gif Steve Thomas

3 spent cartridges on the floor of the Texas School Book Depository. 1 live round in the rifle - that makes 4 4 cartridges recovered at the scene of Tippit's shooting - that makes 8 5 rounds found in Oswald's pocket - that makes 13 a fully loaded revolver with 6 rounds - that makes 19 On 19 bullets or cartridges, Oswald's fingerprints were not found on a single one of them? Was anyone's prints found on any of them? Doesn't that seem odd? Steve Thomas

What strikes me too about the whole pistol evidence is that the pistol, the bullets allegedly found in Oswald's pocket, and the bullets recovered from Tippitt's body were all held by different policemen, some kept in their desk drawers for an extended period of time and not immediately turned over to the evidence room. Seems odd. Steve Thomas

I've been wondering; if the Walker shooting in April, 1963 was "staged", as many have suggested, was there something going on in Walker's life at that time that would have required or benefited from a staged attempt on his life? Right now, I'm not even convinced that Walker was even in the room at the time. Steve Thomas

Was the revolver taken from Lee Harvey Oswald in the Texas Theater ever tested to determine that it was THE gun used to kill J.D. Tippitt? Is such a test possible? I apologize if this has been discussed before, if it has, I just don't remember it. Steve Thomas

Chuck, Thank you. You have given me lots to think about. You wrote: "On March 5, 1964, INS searched its files on Souetre and said they came up with nothing on him or his aliases Roux and Mertz. However, as of that time the CIA had both a file on and a photograph of him... The query of the FBI in Paris and New York was part of the attempt to get a line on his whereabouts." To me, this is no big thing. The French had also approached both the Italians and the West Germans back in 1962 requesting the same thing. You also wrote: "It is also known that in the late winter, presumably because of de Gaulle's upcoming visit to Mexico, the French had put out a world-wide, all-points alert for Souetre." According to Jean Claude Perez, (in his talk with Fensterwald) there actually had been a three-man hit team dispatched to Mexico City to assassinate DeGaulle there, but the plan was scrubbed because they couldn't get their logistics together. Do you think Souetre was involved in the attack on DeGaulle at Petit-Clamart in August, 1962? I know that for weeks afterward the police and media speculated that he was. Steve Thomas

I had read once that the source for the media reports came out of the Sheriff's office, but I'm sorry, I can't confirm this. Steve Thomas

Raconteur. Soldier-of-Fortune. Centurion. Son of a naval petty officer, he was raised in a military boarding school. Decorated military hero. Winner of five military citations, including two combat medals. Developed a fast-attack, lightning strike force called “Matou” (Tomcat”) inserting paratroopers directly into front-line combat situations. One of, if not the, youngest Captain in the French Air Force. Led a company of 100 men, he would be known as Captain Souetre for the rest of his life. Beloved by his men, frowned on by his superiors. Was called charismatic, but naive. Nicknamed “Robin Hood” by his friends, he named his first-born son “Little John”. Arrested and tried for desertion, he married his second wife two weeks after arriving in a prison camp. His best man (or in French fashion, “Witness”) at his wedding was a 70-year old hippie General who once wrote that he would rather put flowers in the barrels of soldiers' guns than drop bombs on people, and organized a rock concert headlined by Pink Floyd. The “arch of sabers” at his military-style wedding was not crossed swords, but strands of barbed wire. In The Great Escape fashion, led an 18-man prison escape by digging a tunnel 35 meters long under the prison walls. Married three times. Had three children, and possibly a fourth born out of wedlock. High ranking member of the French OAS, at one time he was one of the two most wanted men in France. Suspect in not just one, but at least two assassination plots against national Heads of State. Target of an assassination plot himself. Amnestied in 1968, would later go on to serve in local government politics as a member of the right-wing Front National party. He died on June 15, 2001, but his Death Certificate would not be signed until June 18th. Interesting fellow this Jean-Rene.

Michael, This web site has the picture you were looking for: http://jfkfacts.org/assassination/news/calling-all-witnesses-the-african-american-couple-on-the-grassy-knoll/ Steve Thomas

Michael, There are a couple of forum threads indicating that the black dog man shape was either a woman holding a baby or a black couple. The picture you refer to might be this one from this web site: http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/organ3.htm "Richard Trask's 1994 landmark book, Pictures of the Pain, publishes an image taken on the afternoon of the assassination by Dallas Morning News photographer Johnny Flynn showing: "two plainclothes men, one with a stenographer's note pad in hand, leaning over and examining a paper lunch bag, and a wrapper marked 'Tom Thumb 8 Buns 25 cents.' The lunch leavings are resting on an odd-looking metal frame slat bench positioned perpendicular to the concrete wall and next to the walkway leading to the stairs at the knoll." " *shrug* Steve Thomas

I don't know. Maybe this has been explored before. If it has, and this is redundant, I apologize. I have been mulling over the idea that the hatted figure seen in frame 413 and thereabouts of the Zapruder Film and the black dog man are the same person. The angle seems about right. and I'm also considering that the black dog man is also known as Shadow Man, photographed leaving Dealey Plaza by way of the Elm Street Extension. and I don't understand the photographic technique that would have blotted out this person and turned him all black, and to the best of my knowledge, I've never read an account of anyone seeing a figure dressed all in black walking around up there. I have also been mulling over the idea that this person is the Secret Service Agent that Officer Joe Marshall Smith and Deputy Constable Seymour Weitzman encountered behind the retaining wall at the Elm Street Extesnion immdediately following the shots. Steve Thomas

I don't know if this will work or not, but I think this is a composite of the black dog man leaving Dealey Plaza. In the picture on the left, you can see him right in the center of the picture just above the corner of the retaining wall. The picture on the right is from a Bothun picture that has been labeled Shadow man. Maybe some of you who are better at pictures than I am can look these and tell me what you think. In another forum I suggested that this might be the "Secret Service" man that Officer Smith ran into behind the Elm Street Extension. Steve Thomas

Larry, Thanks for responding. It's nice to hear from you again. With respect to the FBI interviewing Orcarberro the following year, yes. Heitzman's report is dated in April of 1964. I got to wondering about that in light of Escalante saying that Orcarberro had moved to Puerto Rico. In addition, I want to go back and log the addresses he lived at in Dallas. A CIA document stamped November 24, 1963 ("WAVE traces indicate that...") has him living on Columbia https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=40314&relPageId=2 In January, 1964 Roger Warner said that INS had him living at 5310 Columbia St. So did Agent Aragon of Miami. In March, the SS still had him living there. In an FBI report dated May 28, 1964 he was listed at 2311 Nicholson St. https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=28726#relPageId=4&tab=page (Just as an aside, that FBI lists a Jose Rodriguez as one of the officers of the Dallas SNFE. I wonder if it was his brother) On May 22, 1964 Heitman lists his address as 2311 Nicholson St. Appt. D So, it looks like some time between March and May, Orcarberro moved. I read through some of your blog posts on Harlandale. At one point you said, "One of the FBI’s primary subversive tasks in 1963 was cracking down on exile guy buys and we should have a large set of documents on that activity in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. What we do have from the FBI in regard to Walthers report is nothing more than a confirmation that the Cubans had been in the house and left almost immediately either before or after the assassination." I was sort of astounded the other day when I was reading some FBI surveillance reports of Apha 66 in New York City and saw that much of their information came Jack Caulfield (of Watergate fame). He worked for the Special Service Bureau in NYC - just the same as the Special Service Bureau in Dallas. It seems that these Special Service Bureaus were patterned after each other, and Bureaus from around the country met periodically and shared information and techniques. (Both Revill and Curry reference this). Their emphasis was on criminal activity of an organized nature, like Communist and the Fair play For Cuba Committee, but not Mafia type activity. If you look at the 9 organizations that Jack Revill had under surveillance before Kennedy's visit, they included the John Birch Society and the White Citizens Council, but not any of the cuban exile organizations. I still have to square the idea of Orcarberro living in Dallas as of May, 1964 and Escalante saying Orcarberro, "arrives in Dallas two months before the Kennedy assassination "and he leaves afterwards at full speed." I'll go back and spend time with SWHT. Steve Thomas

I didn't realize until just the other day how short a period of time Manuel Rodriguez Orcarberro had been in Dallas before the assassination. On April 24, 1964 SS Chief Rowley wrote a Memorandum to J. Lee Rankin of the Warren Commission. This memo is CD 853 http://www.maryferre...amp;relPageId=2 This memo was in response to a letter from Rankin to Rowley dated April 22, 1964. The topic was Manuel Rodriguez Orcarberro and the Cuban exile community. Some of the things in Rowley’s memo were: 1/16/64 Frank Ellsworth was interviewed about Orcarberro. Ellsworth had been working undercover gathering evidence against John Thomas Masen. Masen told Ellsworth that Orcarberro had been trying to buy guns and bazookas from Masen. Masen told Ellsworth that Rodriguez and George F. Parrel were leaders of the local DRE and also members of Alpha-66 Masen told Ellsworth that George Parrel, an associate of Orcarberro, had also been trying to buy guns from him. They had made purchases from him and that they presently have a large cache of arms located somewhere in Dallas, although he did not know the location. Parrel was a student at Dallas City College. Agent Ed Coyle was also contacted about Orcarberro. On May 25, 1964, Manuel Rodriguez voluntarily appeared at the Dallas FBI offices and spoke to Wallace Heitman. He told Heitman that the members of SNFE met at bi-weekly meetings at 3126 Harlandale. (Although in his Report, Heitman spelled it Hollandale.) http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=222 In his 11/26/63 follow up Report, Deputy Sheriff, Buddy Walthers wrote that the Cubans who had been at the Harlandle house had moved out between seven days before the President was shot and one day after he was shot. See: http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh19/html/WH_Vol19_0276b.htm Warren CD# 1085 is a letter from the Director of the FBI to Jay Lee Rankin dated June 11, 1964 with attached memos and reports. http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=11481&relPageId=3 See here for a list of various reports from Wallace Heitman: http://www.maryferrell.org/search.html?q=HEITMAN%20june%2025,%201964 One of the Reports included is a memo from Dallas SA Wallace Heitman dated April 29, 1964. This Report discusses the residents of an address in Garland, Texas and the sighting of a Rambler station wagon parked in front with a bumper sticker that says, “Kill the Kennedy Klan.” While Heitman’s memo is heavily redacted, other research has revealed the two residents of 806 E. Monica in Garland, TX were Raul Castro and Juan Quintana. CD 913 is a March 30, 1964 Report of Robert Gemberling. Included in this Report is information relative to the "Kill the Kennedy Klan" bumper sticker and persons receiving mail at an address in Garland. http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=174 Gemberling's report INCLUDES the names of the people. The mail being reported on dates from late December and early January, 1964. Heitman's Report of April 29th is a copy of Gemberling's March 30th. Among the people receiving mail at 806 E. Monica Dr. were Raul Castro and Juan Quintana. Manuel Rodriguez Orcarberro had revealed that Raul Castro and Juan Quintana were members of Alpha-66 and the SNFE. On page 6 of his memo, Heitman says this his source told him that the two unnamed subjects of the memo had been employed by him (the source) for approximately one year. He said they were Cuban citizens and who were trained as duster pilots in Mexico for the Cuban Government and later defected from the Fidel Castro Government and came to the United States. http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=11481&relPageId=215 The two subjects were known to be violently anti-Castro and had attended the speech by Adlai Stevenson in Dallas when he got bonked on the head by a picket sign. CD 1085 In June, 1963 Andrés Nazario Sargén wrote Orcarberro a letter and urged him to establish a chapter of Alpha 66 in Dallas. He moved to Dallas in September, 1963. University of Miami finding aids http://proust.library.miami.edu/findingaids/?p=creators/creator&id=430 General Secretary Andrés Nazario Sargén was a founder of Alpha 66 along with other prominent anti-communist fighters such as his older brother Aurelio Nazario, Eloy Gutiérrez Menoyo and Antonio Veciana. Fabian Escalante CUBAN INFORMATION ARCHIVES http://cuban-exile.com/doc_026-050/doc0027-3.html A third information comes from Mr. Manuel Rodriguez. Manuel Rodriguez truly, we didn't know who he was. We heard about Manuel Rodriguez when we started to do research on Oscar Berot (ORCARBERRO?) on account of what information was received from the __________ hotel. Oscar Berot is the second surname of Manuel Rodriguez (the Comodoro hotel?) and in our organization the index is always made by the first surname not by the second one. But when we found out that Oscar Berot was Manuel Rodriguez, then we found another interesting information. Manuel Rodriguez, Oscar Berot told one of our agents, first of all that he was in Dallas because he was the officer 66 [Alpha-66] delegate in Dallas. And he was the delegate for office 66 in Dallas and if anyone came to know that he and Bercian took part in the plot to kill Kennedy. They were going to be killed. He was already living in Puerto Rico or a little after that he went to live in Puerto Rico. And another information comes from a very close person of Bercian, I think... some of you have already interviewed. This person told us that Phillips threatened Bercian in order for him to not reveal his true identity. I'm not going to reveal his name, but I will only tell you that some of you have had interviews with this person (don't talk about it) ?__________________ I cannot reveal this on account of an ethics principle for the same cause, because some of you will not make such revelations. (Is Bercian Antonio Veciana?) FABIÁN ESCALANTE ON POSADA AND OPERATION 40 By Jean-Guy Allard interviewing Fabian Escalante in Havana. Axis of Logic Axis of Logic Tuesday, Jan 11, 2011 http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_62001.shtml Escalante underlines how a Cuban, Manuel "Manolito" Rodriguez Orcarberro, arrives in Dallas two months before the Kennedy assassination "and he leaves afterwards at full speed." (Remember what Buddy Walthers saying about the Cubans who left Harlendale shortly afterwards) There he opens an office of Alpha 66, where Oswald will enter at one time, according to the testimony of the assistant police chief of Dallas. "This Cuban sought asylum in 1960 in the Brazilian embassy together with two known CIA agents. Who were they? Ricardo 'El Mono' Morales Navarrete and Isidro Borgas, a figure of Mexican origin who looks a lot like one of the figures who is with Oswald handing out proclamations supposedly in favor of Cuba in New Orleans -- all of that which was a show put on where Carlos Bringuier goes to challenge them, a fight erupts, and the police arrest all of them..." Orcarberro was a busy little guy in the short time he was in Dallas. Steve Thomas

These are supposed to be two pictures of the same event - L.D. Montgomery bringing the bag out of the TSBD. Now, I'm no photographic expert, but, aside from the fact that the bag is bent in one picture, and not the other, it seems to me that these are two different events. The angles of the sun appear different. One picture has people in it that the other picture doesn't. Heck, are these even the same bags? Look at the creases in the two bags. Montgomery said that Studebaker dusted the bag for fingerprints. Mr. MONTGOMERY. "Wait just a minute no; I didn't pick it up. I believe Mr. Studebaker did. We left it laying right there so they could check it for prints". Mr. BALL. You say you dusted it? Mr. STUDEBAKER. With that magnetic powders. Looks like one bag has fingerprint powder on it and other doesn't. Steve Thomas

I think either: a) somebody got their signals crossed; or, the left hand didn't know what the right hand was doing I think the Dallas Police Department realized early on (as early as the 22nd) that they had a problem on their hands when the shells (that had already been filmed, and guarded, and entered into evidence) didn't match the rifle that was found. Look at these two images: I can imagine the panic that set in. Steve Thomas