Roy Wieselquist

Paul Trejo, I must add more rebuttal to your statement in #235 that there was no coup in 1963. On only the subject of the change in US foreign policy, you have probably read Jim DiEugenio's concise article, something like, "Reversal of U. S. Foreign Policy after 1963, EXCEPT Cuba and Vietnam." (because those two have been beaten to death) I'd link it here from my bookmarks, but I'm a techno-moron. Establishment historians do their darnedest to show that there has been nothing but continuity since WWII. And it can appear that way. What America did to Iran and Guatemala in the 1950s looks fascistic enough. Persia wouldn't play ball with the West over their oil and United Fruit wanted to make an extra dollar on bananas over and above the millions already made. So we had to destroy those two sovereign nations. And Patrice Lumumba was slaughtered as Kennedy took office, so what happened in the 60s and 70s was just more business as usual, right? But no. With JFK out of the way, American and world fascism got going in earnest. [A gross error was here RE Dominican Republic. The following is what it should have been] 4-28-65, LBJ sent 42,000 troops to restore the anti-Juan Bosch military junta; 9-65, LBJ sent Marines to end another revolt when Bosch tried to return. But Indonesia may take the cake for the nastiest genocide of all time. CIA, Dutch and Belgians already had the list of PKI supporters when we shot Jack's brains out in Dallas. So, when the coast was clear, we murdered Sukarno and then methodically murdered his ilk until they were all gone. Historians put it at 400K, 500K tops, but it was at least a million, maybe two. And that's two million of the best and bravest. Sukarno's successor, military strongman and Western henchman Suharto ruled for more than 30 years, until the late 1990s. Israel got the Bomb, despite everything JFK's admin had done to prevent Mid-East destabilization. Before Jack's body was cold, it was full speed ahead for Zionism's nuclear WMDs. And then in June 1967 at the start of the Six Days' War, a year to the day before RFK was gunned down in Los Angeles, LBJ and Mossad did their worst to send USS Liberty, a communications ship, to the bottom of the Mediterranean. Central America, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Congo again destabilizing nearly the entire African continent. A shortlist. Then there's Vietnam and Southeast Asia, LBJ's pride and joy. There's never been anything like it. This is when the Military-Industrial Complex took over for good, though we didn't notice, like the frogs boiled slowly. Just three quick facts: 1. We dropped eight million TONS of bombs on SE Asia, 2-3 times what was expended all over the world in WWII. 2. 61% of the American boys who were killed in action hadn't seen their 21st birthday, not old enough to buy a beer today. 3. 1968 saw 108 official fraggings. It was actually several times that. In fact the Boomer draftees mutinied and ended the Vietnam War. Nixon merely codified it. None of the above happened on Kennedy's watch. The characteristics of a fascist nation/society: -- marriage of big business and government -- bloated, monstrous, bellicose military. America, 4.5% of the world's population, spends as much on "national defense" as the rest of the world put together; so, per capita, Americans spend about 20 times more than the rest of the world. We are the slaves of the military. They think they are immensely superior to civilian "dirtbags," their pet name for us. That's why USA is the only developed nation on Earth without universal health care, another thing stopped with the end of Kennedy -- genocide (above), then along comes Dubya Bush who sees to the violent death of about two million Iraqis, in a blase fashion -- racism, both FOR whites and AGAINST non-whites -- vehement nationalism USA! USA! USA! -- anti-labor, anti-democracy -- a far-right oligarchy that gives special treatment to the wealthiest; i.e., the rich pay a smaller proportion of their income, due to a chaotic morass of tax codes, than working folk So the far-right was not victorious 11-22-63?! How could they have been more victorious? Another thing: KKK, Birchers, American Nazi Party, etc. are not the only far-right. They are only the most OPENLY far-right. CIA, DIA, MIC, Big Oil, Big Finance, they're all the same thing. They look down their nose at the workingman and fear nothing more than actually having to labor manually. This nation was founded upon slavery. The far-right's only concern is keeping it that way. Wage-slavery is still slavery. It's even better for the masters; they get the fruits of labor without any of the worries about labor's living conditions.

Paul Trejo #235. Thanks for that detailed reply. Wow. My re-reply: 1. "The problem was the timing of the TEC agent..." LHO was applying at TSBD when the airport offer came to Ruth's phone and another call came the NEXT DAY when he worked his first day at the book warehouse. Lee was not beholden to Roy Truly (hence to Ochus V. Campbell hence to David Harold Byrd) even that second day when they bestowed upon him that crappy "job". You surely don't think they OWNED Lee because he broke the plane of the doorway seeking employment. The fact is that Ruth committed a horrible lie of omission by not even telling Lee about the much better job offer. And he owed nothing to that crappy job the first day, second day, or ever. 1.3 "Ruth's too liberal for Rightist plots." Very true. Ruth was led by the nose, there can be no doubt. It's almost laughable that the plot would apprise her of any part of the massive scheme to murder the POTUS in her backyard. I say "almost" because she could have had some hatred of the man, if only for his womanizing and Hollywood buddies. The hatred for Kennedy in so many circles cannot be overestimated. Oilmen, military, segregationists, old money, Cuban exiles, the list is a long one. Include the Miss Prisses who tsk-tsked anything that appeared jet-set, hence "immoral." Heck, the old impotent white Southern baldies hated him for having a full head of hair! And how dare he not shave it crew-cut style in solidarity with the jarheads who're "fottin fer are fraydumb"! ("Fighting for our freedom" if you are not familiar with the solipsistic idiocy of our fine fascist military who think they are a superior species to us civilian "dirtbags" because they flap their arms and prance around with a gun in their hands. Actually they're allergic to honest, productive labor, so they have to tell themselves that.) 1.5 "It was Marina who pressed Ruth Paine to call TSBD." You must know how that can work. E.g., a housewife doesn't feel like cooking dinner one night, and when hubby comes home, she moans about what a tough day SHE's had, and lets drop that the fish-house is having a buy-one-get-one-free-dinner. And voila, next day she's talking to one of the kids and says, "Your father took me out to eat seafood last night. IT WAS HIS IDEA." As if she did him a favor. Ruth let drop that there was a job working with books (Lee's first love), which was a TOTAL LIE. There was no opening. And sure enough, Marina gets all enthusiastic about how perfect that would be for hubby. Ruth says, "Well, okay, if you want me to, I'll call them. For you and Lee." Right. 2.3 "White Russian hatred of Hitler's legacy." Yes and no. The WRs of 50 years previous, circa Russian Revolution, were fascists supreme. Thirty years after that, a female White Russian painter poisoned FDR to death for allying with the commies who "stole their birthright." (Webster Tarpley) It didn't have to be a WR who put a bug in RP's ear that the TSBD would be a good employer for the bookish Oswald. BTW, the Russians have an amazing capacity for change and genuine sympathy, to wit George de M. He ended up teaching at an all-black college after he'd fallen on hard times. But in WWII he did some nasty "jobs" for the Nazis. 2,5 "Lib Easterners vs. Con Easterners." For their own interests, they can change on a dime. They are not two monolithic camps. Witness Cord Meyer, who was a bigshot in the World Federation movement, then joined CIA, and ten years later he's helping shoot our president's brains out in the middle of the day in the middle of the street. 2.7 "RP and racial integration." So very true and it was genuine. Something that has always amazed me about the Paines and the Russian community in Dallas is how much they yearned for improvement in the lives of the common man, especially the downtrodden. This is a Russian characteristic and the Paines were attracted to them largely due to that. Though really, they all kept the black folk at more than arm's length; they loved them from a safe, great distance. Again, Ruth didn't have to bear ill will toward JFK to be used as a pawn in his demise. 2.8 "She didn't need anyone's pin money." (for vacations or whatever) How true. But ENTREE (where's the acute accent on this typy thing?), that's another thing. That's what she adored, being invited to the parties and the enclaves and the islands of The Great People. C'mon now, admit she was a bit of a butt-kisser when it came to the rich, famous, and powerful. Way more than the average American, which is pretty bad. 3.3,4 approx. "Whether she is/was a lesbian is irrelevant." First, a disclaimer: if I were a woman, I would be 100% lesbian, and maybe a violent one. Any man who came within spitting distance of me would be blinded by loogies in both eyes. I know how rotten we are. Plus we cause pregnancy, no walk in the park. I don't know or care if Ruth was/is sexually attracted to her gender. BUT she definitely was a man-hater. Today, even that would not be relevant. But THEN, there can be no doubt it twisted people. Do I have to list the VIPs who were driven to psychopathy by the terror? To borrow a phrase from the great Willy Whitten over at JFK Facts, BLACKMAIL LEVERAGE. In those days, most of the powerful were either extorting or being extorted, some both like J Edgar Hoover, for money or goods or actions or inactions. How hard would it have been for someone "to get something" on goodwoman RP, and make her fear losing her children or her alimony or just her reputation? I think she's about 90% pure (not 100% as you seem to think), which is pretty good for a human. But doggone it, she stomped on a better man's neck, LHO's, when he was down. Marina Oswald Porter knows what RP is made of, and pretty soon after the events. 4.0 "no coup d'etat in 1963" and 4.1 approx. "...for the coup to be truly victorious, US would have believed LHO a commie following Uncle Fidel's orders." NO. LBJ and the gang knew no moron, not even an American moron, could/would swallow that whopper. They knew not to push their "luck" More soon: the problem of seeing The Far Right as too discrete an entity.

James R. Gordon - #222 - vis a vis shots from SOUTH Knoll (left of "Triple Overpass"): "Jackie is now directly in front of JFK." Not true. The line to JFK from where i'm talking about is at least 60* away from Jackie. "...(the problem of this trajectory is) finding a route past SS as well as John and Nellie Connally." The only problems with shots from SGK are clearing the windshield and the roof support/roll bar. And that big flat support is well forward of JFK. All the other occupants' heads are well below that roof support. True, it is somewhat like threading a needle, but a big fat needle. All it would take is a 15-20* drop from the far right end of the postal parking lot/far right end of the RR tracks to be able to hit President Kennedy. The first shot from SGK, which hit JFK in his throat and exited his back, was much lower than the gunman intended. Maybe it nicked that roll bar, maybe the distance was more than he calculated. Most likely, it was that Greer slowed the car more than Sarti or Souetre was tracking, which would account for it being low, rather than high. The second shot from SGK entered the president's LEFT temple (seen by Dr. Jenkins and Father Huber at Parkland, and by the morticians at Gawler's, when, by that time, it had been plugged with wax), and blew out the right occiput, seen by 60-some at Parkland. This second shot from SGK was almost concurrent with two other shots to the president's head -- one from behind the NGK stockade fence (not "picket fence," for goodness sake!, dear researchers), a frangible that went in the right temple area (as proven by Bob Prudhomme some where, ey?), and exited nowhere, but left a galaxy of bits in the cranium, mostly around the entry wound and the opposite, left side. The third shot to the head was a glancing blow (if it struck him at all, if the Zapruder scalp-flap is not an animated addition to the film) that went along the right parietal, then went on to put a big ding in the chrome windshield frame, dent the back of the rear view mirror, and crack the windshield itself. That shot had a flat trajectory from straight behind, meaning it had to come from a low floor of Dal-Tex or from the hungover George Hickey, waving his AR-15 around like a maniac in the SS followup car. Has anyone noticed this: Nellie's window is the only one not all the way down, and man, is she hunkered down going through Dealey! Also, Greer is sitting low and really hugging that steering wheel most of the time going through the kill-zone.

This topic is a joke, right? Several medicos observed a 5-6 mm puncture (a little less than a quarter inch, like a .223 Remington bullet would make) in the lower right side of the president's larynx. Some observed a nick in the top of the tie knot. The tie is worn UNDER the Adam's Apple, despite how many cartoons you can manufacture showing it differently. The Parkland doctors performed a tracheotomy, using that hole as part of it. The missile that made that wound came from the SOUTH Knoll, probably from a team of French-Corsican assassins, probably led by Lucien Sarti and/or Jean Souetre. (See Sandy Larsen's topic, "Any prevailing theories on the back wound?") The slug was traveling down at a 15-20* angle through JFK's body rightward. It avulsed the top of the right lung and exited his back between spine and scapula (closer to shoulder blade) at the T3-4 level. That relatively early shot, as early as Z-200 and no later than Z-220 when he was obscured by the "moved" Stemmons sign, was the first of 6 to hit inside the presidential car. At least 3 others hit outside the limo, maybe 5. For a total of 9-11 shots.

Paul Trejo, Many times you say Ruth Paine didn't lie to the WARren COmmissioN. There are two huge sets of whoppers so obvious, so taken for granted in the research, one of omission and one of commission. The first is about the baggage handling job at the airport. First she said there was no such offer, then the man who had called her pointed out that he had talked to her on the phone at least twice, lengthily. So she said she had merely forgotten. This woman who ran Lee Oswald down and hounded him constantly about not working at least full-time to support his princess in the manner she deserved -- she FORGOT about this way better job offer?! It took a lot of FBI's time and trouble questioning the airport and employment agency to straighten out this simple matter. It stinks from beginning to end. RP didn't want Lee working there for anything. Incomparably worse is how RP steered LHO into Dry Hole Byrd's TSBD. Her explanation is a total canard. She said she heard about an opening from neighbor Linnie Mae Randle: there was no job opening. For sure she heard that Buell Frazier worked there. Who was the Prime Mover for manipulating Ozzie into that building little more than a month before the parade through Dealey Plaza? We will probably never know. But we know for sure that he WAS manipulated into that joke of a job. It wouldn't take any great shakes to do it. Byrd himself, one of the Hunts, Murchison, Richardson, one of the KKK-Birchers (like the closet homosexual EA Walker), someone in the White Russian community -- all that one of them had to do was pass the word to someone Ruth knew well and trusted, "Get Oswald in that building ASAP." They all hated that smart-aleck (maybe that's where he got the name Alek Hidell) if only for busting up the Chicago plot. The person above Ruth could've been paid in cash, drugs, whatever: something outright tangible. To sweeten the pot for Ruth, all it would take was a paid vacation (she loved those vacations -- from doing nothing except bossing Marina around) or an especially good-looking lesbian to go down on her. Paul -- I love your hard work finding the genuine, salient facts about important aspects of the coup de 1963. I refined my idea about the Edwin A. Walker "shooting", when no one was shot, from your topic about that. Greg Parker has the basic idea: it was a big publicity stunt to get sympathy for EAW and his live-in boyfriend, not-see Nazi publisher Robert A. Surrey. And also to bring in the moolah; Hunt and most of the deep-pocketed right-wingers had Walker's number: he had become an embarrassing loon. BUT you, like most JFK researchers, develop the problem of tunnel vision. You lose sight of the big picture. Your reply #203 in this topic is a case in point. "No bona fide CIA would ever be a Patsy in an assassination." You surely have heard of intell's Richard Case Nagell, who was certain he was being set up for scapegoat. He HAD to take the drastic measure, after all else failed, of shooting up a federal bank in El Paso to make sure his status and whereabouts were dead certain -- in JAIL. CIA invented "double cut-out" and "frame-up." Regarding Ruth Paine, you're missing several important characteristics. One, she lived to manipulate. She was a small fry in her milieu of world-class manipulators, the Hydes, Forbeses, et al, the slacker clowns who think they OWN this land and everyone in it. Just because they were the first Euros to step off the boat. And she was very plain-looking, didn't have the slave-driving power of, say, a Mary Bancroft, Allen Dulles's hoity-toity mistress. So she ached to push people around all the more. Lee and Marina came along, and oh boy...she sure knew what was best for them. She worked Marina like a rented mule. Sure, her Quaker charity didn't allow her to assassinate Lee's character in an OVERT, profane way, but man did she stick it to that smarty-pants from the wrong side of the tracks. She never worked a day in her life. Michael's house and car and who knows how much financial support were good enough for her. But not Michael himself, no, he schepped off every weekend to live in his crummy apartment. And alack, alas, to hear Ruth tell it, it was all Michael's idea and fault, something like, "He had become disillusioned with The Marriage." You betcha. Ruth knew how to give the cold shoulder to the rare anyone who was counting on her for the least thing. And turn his insides to cold jelly. Paul, you're right that Ruth and the White Russians went beyond the call of duty helping the young Oswalds. Just fixing Marina's teeth, nowadays it would cost a mint. But it was seldom total charity; they looked down on Lee and felt he was in their debt. This country, we, are much to blame for how we treated same-sex folks until just recently. The J Edgar Hoovers, the E A Walkers, the Roy Cohns, the Ruth Paines. We twisted them with fear and cruelty and drove them underground. Keep fighting the good fight, Paul, really. I at least get a lot of relevant info from your research. Oh, and has ANYone ever been as CIA-connected as M and R Paine?!

Bare facts of the crash of United Air Lines flight 553 near Chicago's Midway Airport, 2:29 PM, 12-8-1972: -- massive, obvious, sophisticated, satanically devious sabotage -- 18 survivors -- 45 homicides: -- 2 on the ground, Veronica and Theresa Kuculich -- 43 on the plane, inc. 12 Watergate witnesses: -- Dorothy Hunt, Watergate hush-money distributor, with over $10K in cash, $40K in (Bernard) "Barker bills", $2 Million in various negotiables -- all but the cash disappeared -- U. S. Representative George Collins (7th District), a Watergate investigator -- CBS reporter Michele Clark, investigating Watergate (her body was quickly cremated over her family's objections, probably to hide cyanide poisoning or gunshots) -- several lawyers and lobbyists involved in the nasty, dragged out legal fight between Northern Natural Gas and El Paso Gas, with ties to John Mitchell -- one atty, James W. Krueger, brought a briefcase stuffed with the El Paso/Mitchell documents onto the plane, which UAL refused to return to his widow The pilot, about as experienced as can be, was named Whitehouse. How's that for coincidence? In his system, he had four times the level of cyanide ever seen in a crash and burn. On the plane was a DALE/DEA/CIA/DIA (it's all the same) hitman named "Harold Metcalf", who walked out of the back of the plane in a jumpsuit. Strange traveling attire, ey? 50 FBI/DIA were on the scene immediately. Before long there were 150. Fire, police, and EMS were kept blocks away. There can be no doubt that many who were supposed to die, but didn't, were murdered. The Joseph Scarelli mob was on the scene with the feds. They reportedly found the Hunt money and the Mitchell documents and sold them for $5 Million. In 1973, the Rockefellers were majority owners of UAL and outright owners of all three major media networks, CBS, NBC and ABC. They were in this up to their eyeballs. In America, there was a media blackout of the investigations into Flight 553. News of it was all over Europe. Swedish TV made a very popular documentary starring our very own Sherman Skolnick, for free. Transportation lobbyist Lawrence O'Connor was steered away from 553. Many suspicious types tried to steer activist Dick Gregory ONTO it, but he smelled a big Cuban-sized, John Mitchell-sized Rat and declined. Though John DEAN may be the biggest prevaricator who ever lived, or tied with LBJ. They make E. Howard Hunt look like an amateur. Watergate was lousy with the Miami Cubans, just like the JFK assassination. Why did Watergate have to happen? Anyone who cares to know knows that D. C. prostitution and getting an edge in the election (that they were set to win in a landslide) is a bunch of hooey. IMHIgnorantO there are two main (sets of) reasons. One, the ex-Cubans and the right-wing were scared witless that the Dems had solid info about JFK, and were prepared to use it. Ha! As if any group of lazy American cowards would take a chance of losing their cozy racket, er, excuse me, job. American right-wing criminals had nothing to fear regarding that. But they did fear it. As our dear Jack liked to quote this Bible verse, "The wicked flee [and fear] when no one pursueth." The MIC, anti-Castro Cubans, Americans in general fear their own shadow. And such cowards are scary. They are on a hair-trigger and they have plenty of chicken-crap guns with triggers to pull. The second motive for Watergate was the first motive for the coup of 1963: revenge, pure diabolical hatred. There's a great line in SJH's "Dorothy." He asked his dad what was the real reason for assassinating Kennedy. "Pure uncut revenge for the Bay of Pigs." Those ex-Cubans are still NOW insanely enraged that JFK didn't send in the Marines to change their dirty diaper. And take back Cuba for murderous, work-allergic gangsters. Nixon had let his admin be infiltrated with such human garbage. He wasn't anywhere near as bad as them, but he deserved what he got for not having the courage to stand up to them. And ironically, it was RMN who most pushed the Bay of Pigs, and then the holdover bureaucrats pushed it down JFK's throat. Nixon reaped what he sowed. I don't feel sorry for him, though I don't think he was involved in the American coup on the Kennedys and King. But if Nixon HAD stood up to the right-wing criminal element in the early 70s any more than he did, he most likely would have gone the way of the Kennedys, shot in the head. By 1973, RMN had most ground troops out of Nam. He did the grunt work of ending LBJ's war, maybe the filthiest in history. Nixon gave 18-year olds the vote, started the EPA, OSHA, and other liberal programs. That's why the military and the right-wing hated him. They couldn't control him. A Nixon impeachment was no great loss to them. E Howard Hunt went to Miami for the 10th anniversary of the Bay of Pigs, 4-15-71. That's when the ball started rolling for Watergate, a year and two months later. The lazy cowards compared notes and groused about how Nixon wasn't much better than "that ************ Kennedy." The fuse was lit.

Everyone: (Part 1) St. John Hunt's new book, "Dorothy: The Murder of E. Howard Hunt's Wife -- Watergate's Darkest Secret" is a worthwhile read. An indispensable book about Watergate. Another title for this moving work could be, "UAL 553 -- A Study in How the American Crime Lords Can Get Away with Anything." It's not much DIRECTLY about the assassination of JFK, but it is all about how America is a nation MADE for political, criminal conspiracy. It's an unusual book in the oeuvre; no notes, no bibliography, a skeletal index. There's no need for notes because sources are cited within the text, and it's pretty much a memoir anyway. A bibliography would have been nice because Saint refers to many works, but oh well. Actually it's a refreshing and very powerful read after the mass of American conspiracy literature that, more and more, is becoming like a slog through a Dickensian legal case. Above, Scott Kaiser #20 and Gene Kelly #23 ask the all-important, essential question: Why did Watergate have to happen? (I have my ideas about that for part 2 of this lengthy reply) "Dorothy" has more clues to answer that than anything else I have seen. BUT I think St. John has one big critical part wrong, as does the great Sherman Skolnick. (Thank you, Dawn Meredith #24 for pointing out that "Skolnick did the best in depth study of this case." How very, heroically true.) SJH and SS seem convinced that Nixon was running the show in Watergate, or at least he knew what was going on. Not true; he was BEING run. SS especially seems sure that RM Nixon was a principal in the assassination of John Kennedy, and SJH relies on SS's judgment and follows suit. RMN, evidenced by his "the Bay of Pigs thing" as code for the JFK murder, had put the basic pieces together of the conspiracy, sure. And he was probably threatening the political criminal element (the American right-wing, let's be honest) with exposing the coup. BUT NO, RMN had no part in it. Sure, he was at Clint Murchison's late-night party that cinched the details of Dallas after he'd been paid an inordinate amount to appear at the Pepsi convention. But no way was Nixon privy to the planning, the carrying out and the cover-up of the assassination. First, there's a name in the index of "Dorothy" that has as many entries as John F. Kennedy. That name is Douglas Caddy. He was E. Howard Hunt's lawyer before, and as, Watergate was breaking. DC handed the ball off to one Bill Bittman, who does not appear to have the integrity of DC. I believe he is the same Mr. Caddy who is one of the hearts and souls and minds on The Ed Forum, and he who started this topic. Trails lead here and there. In brief, check out the long interview of Doug Caddy on Dark Journalist titled, "JFK Killed over the Alien Presence." If only to see how one man could have been present at so many critical moments in history. Like an ingenious, intrepid Forrest Gump. I've never seen/heard of anything like it. And to think he's on this forum. Next: Part 2 -- United Air Lines Flight 553, 12-8-1972

Best big fact - LHO being shot in police custody on the Sunday.(Darren Hastings #66) AMEN. Dead scapegoats tell no tales. And the looks on the mugs of DPD -- priceless. They're looking off into space, planned ignorance. Slower reaction time than a turtle. Jim Leavelle especially. He had been cuffed to Oswald for almost an hour (Marrs, new Crossfire, p 402). They were waiting to get word that JR finished his "errand" at Western Union. All of Europe knew "the fix was in" when Ruby gunned down Lee Oswald. Vince Salandria said he told his brother and friends on 11-23 that if LHO was assassinated like JFK, then it was an obvious conspiracy, a coup d'etat. So 11-24 started his life-long research into the Military Fascist Takeover that still rules us.

off the top o me head, a few "smoking guns" (what a lovely American expression) in no special order: 1. blowout right rear of JFK's head, seen by 68 at Parkland. 2. hole in JFK's shirt and jacket at T4 level between spine and scapula, moved to shoulder by G Ford, A Specter and WARren COmmissioN. 3. hole in JFK's LEFT temple, seen at Parkland by Father Huber, Dr. Jenkins, and at Gawler's by the morticians; ignored of course by War Con. 4. evidence that disappeared or was messed with-- 1.Harper fragment; 2. bullet that fell from JBC's left thigh; 3. bullet that rolled out of JFK's clothing at Bethesda, seen by Adm. Osborne, FBI Sibert and O'Neill (thanks again, Ron Ecker, for helping me remember that), and many others; 4. original Darrell Tomlinson bullet (planted by our old pal Jack Ruby, there can be no doubt), which was pointy and about .30-30 caliber, AND was found on the stretcher of a two year old boy (Thanks, Josiah Thompson); 5. curb beside James Tague (well actually that was patched as soon as FBI saw they could ignore it no longer); 6. Stemmons Freeway sign (long story). 5. films that disappeared -- 1. Beverly Oliver's; 2. Gordon Arnold's; 3-8. time and space prevent... 6. films and photos, both at the crime scene and at the autopsy, that were messed with -- just about every stinking one of them that was not shown to a wide audience post haste. 7. limo damage ignored, suppressed, or downplayed -- 1. BIG dent in chrome windscreen trim, the hardest material known to man at the time; 2. damage to back of rear-view mirror*** 3. windshield glass hole or mark (?) not documented as which. Why not?/ 4. dent in chrome ashtray on back of front seat, caused by fragment of the SECOND shot to JBC that went through wrist. This ashtray dent is maybe the most suppressed piece of evidence in the assass. 8. bullet marks outside the limo --1 N Elm sidewalk; 2. S lane of Elm at Jean Hill's feet; 3. Stemmons sign; 4. S curb of Main beside James Tague; 5. manhole cover beyond Jean Hill, though that could have been the same bullet that ricocheted in front of her. Probably came from Braden/Brading in Dal-Tex or Harry Weatherstone atop Dallas County Records Bldg with his fancy new customized hunting iron w/suppressor. 9. Jack Ruby, who "had no significant connections to organized crime" y'know, according to War Con. Problem is he had nothing but significant connections to organized crime, practically from the Mother's Milk. 10. LHO lookalikes/impersonators Larry Crafard and William Seymour and probably others. I lost track of how many times Lee Oswald was impersonated. 11 through 1,000,000,000,000 take your pick. Here's a question for the Nutters: Which of these Top Ten Conspiracy Proofs do you think is NOT evidence of an obvious plot? PLEASE do not start a new topic with that question. Just put your answers down in this thread, O Thersiteses. The whole rest of the world knows it was a massive, obvious plot. Only certain Americans...nuff said. ***Was it Phil Dragoo who recently reminded us of that Kierkegaard observation, something like, "You had to have lived it, but it only becomes clear in the rear view."?

I heard the St. John Hunt interview on Coast to Coast, 6 Dec. 2015. Thank goodness the host was Richard Syrett, not the worthless George Snorey. When they took calls they put me on first, 4:16 to approx. 4:25 am, "Roy in Summerfield, NC." I picked up his new book "Dorothy" two days ago at my local independent bookstore; had to order it of course. I've read a good chunk of it; won't take long to read it all -- less than 200 pages, big type with many photos mixed throughout the text. The book is Trine Day, so if typos bother you, you will be bothered. I understand and relate to St. John. Maybe it's because we were born the same year, 1954, maybe because I lived in the D.C. area five years, which he did most of his formative life. A few tidbits I gleaned from the show: -- Everette Howard and Dorothy Hunt worked for Averell Harriman in Paris, and they first met right before Dorothy left for France. -- EH Hunt wrote screenplays and much else for AH: ol' E Howard also wrote 41 novels (!) and 3 non-fiction books. A genuine intellectual. -- A CIA pilot flew EHH into Dallas. St. John contends that his father was: 1. "just a benchwarmer at The Big Event," echoing EHH on this matter; 2. the oldest, last in line of The Three Tramps, who I believe was Mafia credential forger Chauncey Holt. Sidenote: the last set of Three Tramps (NOT Doyle, Gedney, Abrams -- genuine tramps) was rousted from a gondola-grain car, not a boxcar, and marched through DP no earlier than 2:15, quite a while after the gunfire. -- who St. John believes was behind The Big Event, from his father's evidence: Richard Helms, James Jesus Angleton (The Stork), William King Harvey (who was in charge of the false defector program, hence probably LHO), Cord Meyer, David Atlee Phillips (who ran the Corsican assassins). St. John noted that all these men were extreme drunks and psychopaths. -- David Morales was definitely there in DP with so many (nameless, or I missed it) others. Sounds like a spook reunion corner of Main and Houston. -- Dorothy Hunt was revealing secrets to reporter Michele Clark on the flight just before it went down as the result of obvious sabotage. DH was carrying a lot of hush money, which she had been distributing for a while. FBI was crawling all over the crash scene impossibly fast, and they made all the real evidence disappear. Sound familiar? My big question, after a stemwinder of an introductory comment, "Was GHW Bush there at 12:30? Is that him in 3/4 back profile?" All St. John would say is he's not sure. "There are problems with Poppy being there when the shooting occurred." He sounded like that question was the one that made him the most uncomfortable. I protested with my evidence a little bit, and they had to go to the next caller. Which was just as well because the next caller, "Wayne," had a lot of dish RE the psychopathy in US history and many of our leaders. To this, St. John stated that, despite his father's air of intellectual superiority, E Howard Hunt was definitely a clinical psychopath. I think St. John's judgment on this matter is because his mother was murdered and his sisters never wanted him to be so public with the mess. But I think E Howard was not nearly as bad as those other guys.

Scott, I believe you mean Silvia Duran who worked in Mexico City at the consulate where a fake LHO applied for a visa to Cuba. She was arrested twice and beaten. Her apartment was tossed. All because she refused to identify the Oswald impersonator (much shorter, maybe Larry Crafard) as the real LHO. Sylvia ODIO was the far-right Cuban, daughter of a man jailed in a Castro assassination attempt, who lived in a DALLAS apartment in late 1963. She was visited that fall by a motley trio which included one "Leon Oswald" who gave his nom de guerre as "Leopoldo Oswaldo" or some such tripe. Could've been Larry Crafard, the Carousel's live-in handyman, again. He was as busy as his boss Jack Ruby before, during, and after 11-22. I think JR was giving LC some of his Prellies and other speed pills. Even the WARren COmmisioN wouldn't use Odio as a witness because she was hysterical even on her good days. Silvia Duran's testimony was no good to the War Con because it didn't fit their narrative. I get the Si(y)lvias mixed up too sometimes. Easy mnemonic device: ODio was the odious one in D for Dallas; Duran was the other, good one in Mexico City.

Ron Ecker #476, 479 -- These are Great: 1.) December 2005 thread "South Knoll shooter in Cancellare?", 2.) magnified SK. General observations: The figure to the right of the tree in the blow-up (the second tree left of the overpass in the full photo) is a largish man in dark clothes. Like a dark uniform, like a police uniform. True, his back is to the sun, so his front is in shadow, but his clothes look a lot darker than his face and the shady side of everything around him. And don't snipers like to have the sun at their back, hence the sun in the face of their victims? Someone suggested he's like another Badge Man. I've lost count of how many phony and/or crooked lawmen were in DP that day. One more doesn't make much difference. My speculation: he's the rear guard, the last guy in the group to walk/drive away, making sure that his confederates are safe and cozy.. I don't see any definite rifle. John Dolva made a great observation in that late 2005 topic of Ron's: the pick-up truck nearest Badge Man #2 sure has some dark windows, way darker than the windows of any other vehicle nearby. As if it has some kind of blinds. You can see that phenom in the full photo. Chris Davidson #477 -- Great article in The Fifth Decade 6-28-2013, "The South Knoll: An Assassin's Paradise?" Great photos in that, though they're all recent, right? The last pic is from The Spot, "a good vantage point," he says in the next to last paragraph. And continues, "Could a shot have cleared the windshield?", the thorny problem. The author speculates about a shot through the windshield. That didn't happen, or some of the passengers would have been peppered with glass shards, probably in the face. He concedes that by Z313, sure, the angle is great enough to clear the windscreen (and also the roof support, let's remember). I think it's enough at Z200, especially if Greer's hitting the brakes, which would tip the car down from the horizontal AND throw JFK forward a little, making the angle greater for the trajectory through him. Is anyone here an expert on the possible French/Corsican assassins? Michel Mertz claims that he had gone straight by this time, but that, variously, Jean Souetre and Lucien Sarti were using his name. One checked into a Dallas hotel under his name, possibly as revenge for MM leaving the French Mafia/OAS, in the event that JS or LS were caught. A South Knoll set-up has all the Modus Operandi of this bunch. They figured they had learned from their mistakes against DeGaulle at the Day of the Jackal August 1962.

Guys, with your recent posts, I have cracked the case of the throat-entry and back-exit bullet. Somewhat. Ray Mitcham #466--Cancellare photo (originally #455 I believe). I never knew how high up that car park is; it's above the train tracks, 2 feet higher according to James Gordon #405. It would have been easy for a sniper to set up a position with blinds among those cars, with a couple spotter/lookouts around him keeping wanderers away. And the rifle of a man shooting from the shoulder is five feet above the ground. And JFK is less than 300 feet away, for a 1 in 12 pitch, with the tilt down, forward. I wish I could compute it exactly. I believe this is plenty of angle, close to 15*, for a telescopic sight to get a bead on the president's throat, clearing windshield and roll bar, which is above all the occupants. Chris Davidson #470--brother's position on left side of bridge, over the sidewalk/access tunnel beside Commerce, looking down on DP. Great photo-shot. It looks like plenty of angle to clear the limo's roll bar/roof support. And the car park is a good 50-60 feet farther to the left, from Jack's view that is. One very minor measurement. The road surface is at least 4 inches higher now than it was in 1963 due to re-paving. This was pointed out in re-enactments of a rifle (Johnny Roselli?) possibly firing from the drainage opening in the curb of the North side of Elm where DPD Hargis (?) dropped his cycle before charging up the NGK. The 2015 road surface could be six inches higher at the crown now than it was in 1963. Not much, but something. Ron Ecker #471, or should I say the super-perceptive Ron Ecker with the memory of ten elephants and the web-page distilled to pure salience--------- yes, James Tague is still in his spot and the Newmans are still laying in their spot. And you remembered an early Tague recounting of being accosted by an unidentified policeman who appeared out of nowhere. He didn't rappel down the face of the overpass, that's for sure. Where did he come from? Was he one of the phony lawmen that Dealey was lousy with that day? If we could magnify that Cancellare photo enough, we may be able to see Lucien Sarti lighting up a Gitane.

James Gordon #457--Thanks for that frame of Z190. I was citing Z190 by memory; for some reason, I thought that had been determined as the frame when JFK was first struck. But he is way back, and hasn't started to reach for his face or throat. He comes out from behind the sign about Z225, and has just got his hands up to his collar-bone. So he was hit around Z220. Is that a good approximation? 30 more frames down Elm is about 1 2/3 seconds. Travelling at 10 mph, about 15 ft / sec, so that would be about 25 feet farther down Elm from Z190? Thanks for helping me refine this. Thanks a lot for that great diagram. I'm still checking it out.

Sandy #444: "I'd like to see a diagram..." I can draw one on paper. As for getting it on here, well, I don't know how to get a link or photo on here. I'll probably be able to learn pretty soon. My son who runs IBM is supposed to come over this weekend. I may be the first guy kicked off Ed Forum for a sub-human lack of computer skills. But I'm a heck of a typist. Ray # 445: GREAT view of SGK. I've never seen a better one. It looks plenty high up enough to do what I'm suggesting---clear the windshield and roll-bar. Do you know how soon after the shooting the top photo was taken? I wish that exact same photo had been taken at Z190. Major muchos gracias. Chris #453:Great pics of the back seat. OK, in the Fox video (the beginning and end show it best) you see how those big buttons break up the back into quarters? In the quarter JFK was sitting against, there are three dimples/irregularities in the navy blue (almost black) top. Facing it as if that quarter section were a ruler, there's a lone one about 3" over, and then two together at about 8,9,10'. Those two look like a good candidate for this: The supersonic, small mass .223 went into his neck at a 10-15* angle, nicked a back rib between 3 and 4, so that the bullet yawed some, went out his back and clothes (much of the momentum gone by now) The messed-up bullet (I believe that's the technical term, right Bob P.?) then didn't have piercing power. And since K was pressed against the tough leather, pressing whatever cushion there was behind it, the slug bounced back and somehow got tangled in his clothes. OK, how it's possible that SS behind him saw the wound, the torn jacket (so that it was above the back seat), yet the bullet itself didn't strike above the back seat---They were looking down on JFK, and the bullet, after striking a rib and ripping the jacket, was on a much steeper downward path than when it started out. Quod esat demonstratum.

Conspiracy Reporters, I'm not married to the idea that Greer tried to elevate JFK's seat to give a clearer sight-line to the French/Corsican sniper team on the South Grassy Knoll. I AM still married to the idea that the back wound is an EXIT, shot from his left-front, from that slope between the Postal Bldg car park and the RR tracks. I may delete that whole point "3." in post #414, where I "reach" for more ways that JFK's throat could have been more exposed, could have cleared the big, flat roof support of the limo in a line to SGK. Wild conjectures give us CRs a bad name. First, let me tell you what I did find from Jim Bishop's The Day Kennedy Was Shot regarding the back seat of the limo. Not much. Page 91--The PRESIDENT had the lever and "could lift the back seat 10 1/2 inches". In the lowest position the First Couple were "little more than 3 inches above their guests." I've seen 2 inches elsewhere, even on this thread I believe. What's a little suspicious: I have a note beside this passage iln my copy, "3rd time stated." As if JB doth protest too much about precisely this, the elevation of K in the limo. Anyway, the importance of this point is miniscule. It's like a hair on an elephant. At Z190, before the front bumper of the limo reached the Stemmons sign, someone on SGK could have fired (with a sound-suppressor of course) a shot that entered the president's throat, grazed his right lung, and exited his back. And he still could have said, as Kellerman reported, "My God, I'm hit."

Guys, you are scientific historians and historical scientists. This is who and what i've been looking for, lo these many years. Chris Davidson, your two posts, the video of the Kennedys getting into the limo at Love Field and the photo of the back seat raised up all the way, are pure gold for me, manna from heaven. My new favorite bookmarks. SO, the seat WAS down then. Mea culpa. Sidenote: notice John Con; that is one scared stiff Texan. He has an educated idea about what's about to happen. So far I have not been able to find a citation that JFK ever ordered the seat down on 11-22-63. It's not in Bishop at the airport because, simply, the seat was down at the start of the parade. I'm about to look at when they rode from the Ft. Worth hotel to Carswell AFB. But then they may not have used X-100. I don't remember at present. Solemn promise: from now on I will cite a good source for my analysis, no matter how small or tangential a point I'm trying to make. I beg you to suspend disbelief for a few more hours about this small point. I'm not asking for sympathy about my lack of computer skills, but a monkey who had been playing with this interweb thing as long as I have, about 4 years, would be ahead of me for facility with all the gadgets. No excuse, but somewhat of a reason. Picture a caveman Luddite. Different smal topic: the wild-goose chase I might've caused Sandy RE a possible hole in the backseat that JFK had his back pressed against. I believe that if a Sherlock Holmes, with magnifying glass and most sensitive fingers, were to get a hold of that exact piece of material, he would have trouble finding the damage caused by that missile that entered throat, exited back. Gotta go for now. The Donald's coming on SNL and I consider that an important part of my research into the Coup D'etat of 1963 and this New Dark Age we find ourselves in. Major thanks to all Ed Forum for science and forbearance.

Tom Neal #415: "source for this exchange" between Kennedy and Greer at Love Field before the parade --- I'm almost positive it's in the generally execrable Jim Bishop's The Day K Was Shot, pronounced "shat" in snotty Eastern Establishment-ese. I have my heavily annotated copy right in front of me, and since the book is strictly chrono, it would be relatively easy to find it. Ten minutes tops, 10 min. I don't have at the moment. Within a couple hours though, I promise I'll get that to you. I feel bad that I've been so slack on sources while you guys are like walking reference books. Bishop never missed an opportunity to give a detail to point out what he thought illustrated JFK's patrician hypersensitivity. My favorite of his that points out the opposite---when K arrived at the FT. Worth hotel around midnight, the air-conditioning was going full-blast. Mind you, this was a month before winter solstice and after midnight. I imagine it was about 55* in that room. So Jack "snapped" to turn the damn thing off and open a window. (p 30 "Get that damned air conditioning off") That man was Mother Nature's Son. James #416: "pictures of the procession from Love Field...back seat... was always in the down position." Yes. President Kennedy ordered the seat lowered as soon as he first sat in it. That Kennedy was sensitive to Connally's feelings--I doubt it. The man was a professiona satirist. As Jonathan Swift noted, "Satire is the refuge of a pure heart."

Fellas, sorry it took me so long to get back. Yesterday and today I've been looking at hundreds of photos of DP, maybe over a thousand. And that interactive thingy linked by Ollie #409 has kept me busy for a couple hours. First, I am really knocked out by the attention and consideration you very knowledgable experts have given this idea. Especially Sandy who started the topic, and Ron and Robert. You've really made me dig. I'm afraid I've caused a couple of wild-goose chases here, but we're all adults, so I don't feel too bad. When I have more time, I may opine on that. I've fine-tuned my theory about the throat entry-back exit shot that occurred around z190, the first shot to hit anyone or anything in the limo. From the South GK, not THE GK where everybody swarmed. The ANGLE of elevation to clear the roll bar/ car-roof support does not have to be15* for a few reasons. 15* was an educated WAG from my roofing days. And the angle of the wound from lower third of throat to T3-4 looks like about 15*. 1.Elm Street slopes down an average 1 in 20 pitch, 24' drop in 495'. I get that (and a whole lot more) from James Gordon #405. What is that -- 2 or 3 or 4*? So 15 becomes 12. 2.The tilt of the limo could be a few degrees. Deceleration (even only by coasting) and braking cause a car to pitch forward. We all know the expression, "Standing a car on its nose." So deceleration, another couple degrees, down to 10. 3,Greer, in it up to his ears, could even have put extra air in the back tires and taken air out of the front tires, for a little more tilt. And jacked up the rear shocks, esp. if they were air shocks. (At the start of the parade Kennedy told him to let his seat down all the way because he was sitting so much higher than JBC. The Catholic-hating Orangeman had it up about all the way. Ostensibly, Kennedy didn't want to appear to be high and mighty, looking down on the Gov of the Republic of Texas.) So tires and suspension fiddling could be another 2 or 3*, easily. We're down to 7 or 8 degrees of elevation that the sniper had to have from his perch above and to the left of Commerce St., right off the Postal parking lot. I don't see the angle as that much of a problem. True, the farther JFK was from Sarti and the Corsican boys (the closer JFK was to Houston Street), there is a problem of not enough angle. Looking from the bridge, SM Holland's viewpoint, the limo didn't have to be very far down Elm before it looks like you're looking down into the car. And the elevation just off the bridge to Holland's right is not much lower than that. I can't expound on the following points, so briefly: 1. LSarti used a .223 super high velocity round, not much mass, so back seat stopped it easily, didn't go through (I can explain why) 2. One of the signals to begin firing was limo front bumper reaching Stemmons sign, when Sarti barely had enough angle to clear the roof support 3. But because of foreshortening, he jumped the gun 4, His first shot was so low because the limo didn't maintain the tracked speed and air foil/drag from the support might've brought it down more 5. The assassins had all the time and recon in the world to set up positions and cover, control the ambush Some folks I have tried this theory on have been bugged because it subtracts one from their shot-count. BUT even if the throat and back wounds were caused by one bullet, there was a minimum of 9 shots. A minimum of 3 hit outside the limo. At least 6 hit in the limo. Gotta hit the rack.

Robert Prudhomme #372: That shot had to come from fairly high up to the front-LEFT. The elevation of the RR tracks south of the overpass or an elevation high up in the Postal Bldg. I used to think there was a lone boxcar on the closest spur to DP at the far left side of that RR bridge, which would fit the direction, but I haven't been able to find it in pictures since. I thought a complete Nix film where he pans the plaza from left to right showed this boxcar. The postal bldg is actually too much to the left of JFK for that shot unless he turned quickly that way, which I've never heard that he did. But then at Z190 he was behind the Stemmons sign, right?

Egg is on my face. Literally because I'm eating breakfast. And figuratively because my first post on this topic, #319, I said it was SS Win Lawson who was on the front-right running board of the follow-up car who said he saw a "spray of water come OUT the boss's back." Now, someone said this but it wasn't WL because he was riding shotgun beside Jesse Curry in the lead car. In the follow-up car: Sam Kinney driving, Emory Roberts beside him. On the right running-board: Jack Ready in front of Paul landis. The two DPD motorcycle police on the right of the limo: James M. Chaney inboard and Douglas L Jackson outboard. I am certain one of these lawmen said, and I think repeatedly, that he saw a spray OUt of JFK's back right above the seat-top. I'm having a heck of a time tracking this down. Ron Ecker, you remember it was a military man who told David Lifton about the bullet that rolled out of our dear Jack's clothes at the start of the Bethesda inquest; which bullet disappeared. RE, you helped me track that down. Any ideas who it was looking right at JFK's back and reported a spray out? Muchos gracias

Thank you, Ron Ecker #338. "...military man who told David Lifton..." When I read that, I knew it was at the back of Best Evidence, and my copy fell open to one of the many dog-eared pages. Chapter 29, The Assertion of Adm. David P. Osborne, p 645. 2nd P: "The HSC reported Osborne's assertion that he 'thought he recalled seeing an intact slug roll out from the clothing of President Kennedy and onto the autopsy table; at the outset of the autopsy.'" The next page Osborne stated, "I had that bullet in my hands." p590 is the first appearance of "The Osborne Allegation." I believe; haven't had time to go over it much. Robert Prudhomme #348 --- No, you misunderstand me. It's not the same problem. SBT predicates a HIGH back (actually shoulder) wound, which of course it would have had to hit some part of the cervical vertabrae. I'm talking about the ragged hole about five inches down on the back between spine and scapula, which lines up with the large ragged hole in the coat and shirt. IN throat, grazing rt side of trachea (so JFK COULD exclaim, "My God, I'm hit!"), down at a (relatively) steep angle, 15-20*, avulse top right lung, OUT back 5" down from shoulder, between spine (T4 or 5? hell I don't know) and shoulder blade. Doesn't get close to any vertebrae. Now, going between those back ribs without doing any damage, that's like threading a needle. More later.

Tom Neal post #329 -- "fibers pushed into wound" I don't know where you get that. From when JFK was stripped by the nurses as soon as he entered Trauma Room One until his body was spirited out of Parkland, none of the medicos even knew he had a back wound. I assume the clothing was put in a bag pretty soon. Did anyone examine the clothes then? According to Ron Ecker #328, Greer took possession and responsibility for that bag. I believe that's right. I don't know about the clothing never making it to the autopsy. Though I wouldn't put anything past Bill Greer, that Henry Cabot Lodge-loving sack of ****, for incompetence or villainy. The point is: 1. No one examined the clothing before it went into a bag. 2. The mere placing the clothing in a bag, or rolling it up, or anything will move ripped fibers. A fly could change the direction of ripped fibers.

Ron Ecker post #328 -- "Clothes never at autopsy" These are JFK's clothes I said in my first post in this thread, #319, that Sibert and/or O'Neill saw a nearly intact bullet roll out of. Which no one ever saw again. 1. Examination of a victim's clothing is one of the most essential parts of an autopsy, especially when there is blood, brains, and bullet holes present. Are you telling me the inquest couldn't even do that right? Though how they flubbed everything else, it's almost believable. 2. OK, how about the sheets JFK was wrapped in when he left Parkland? Maybe the bullet rolled out of that cloth. In at least one of their many testimonies, I'm pretty certain that the honest FBI agents S and/or O saw a bullet roll out of some cloth very early in the autopsy. This great, important topic --the back wound, which I've been crazy about for years, caught my eye a few days ago. It's all I (a techno-moron) could do to get signed up and make these messy posts the last couple days, with all else I have going on. But if no one else remembers when and where S and O stated this, I will find it in my notes in about a week.

Sandy Larsen #325, Wow, I cannot believe I never considered this possibility -- the throat wound being the entrance and back wound being the exit for the same bullet. A potential problem I can think of right away is that the slope of the back wound was reportedly downward from back to front. That's inconsistent with this new (to me) theory. Sandy, That is the problem: "reportedly" downward from back to front. I have never seen that any of the autopsists even tried probing in different directions. When the official autopsy began, after 8 pm, over six hours after JFK was dead, it seems that a gunman from behind and high up had already been tried and convicted in everyone's mind. And the rigor mortis in all those different soft tissues could have closed over any bullet path. As one example of Humes' utter incompetence, he was certain it was a shallow wound. Why? Because his LITTLE FINGER could only go in it to the first knuckle! How scientific is that? The joker probably messed up what evidence there was left. On another site, I fell in love with the simple common sense of a guy named Bob Prudhomme, who just like me notes that Humes was trying to jam something at least 5/8" wide into a 3/8" hole. The pleural cavity has some kind of tough cartilagenous lining (forget what it's called in Greek). So if the examiner didn't find the exact spot where there was a tear in it, sure, it would appear to be a shallow wound. Which, forcing his durn digit into, he could make go in any direction. Thanks, Sandy, for that concise re-stating, "...possibility -- the throat wound being the entrance and back wound being the exit for the same bullet." I wish I'd put it that way somewhere.