Joe Bauer

Vince, your thoughts?

Has anyone ever heard or read anything about Craig's early childhood, anything about why he left home and hit the road at 12 years old?

And how he survived doing that and throughout the next 5 years?

Wonder what his daughter knows about it all?

5 hours ago, Allen Lowe said:

People have said Craig went a little crazy, and cite this as a way of discrediting him - but if you read his book, he was fired from one job after another, likely for his outspokenness on the assassination - and as a result he lost his home, his family - something that would push the most stable person over the line. Also, just to get a sense of his Craig's credibility about harassment, in Barry Earnest's book he tells of sitting in a car with Craig when two cops come over and start to give them a hard time, clearly because  of Craig's presence. So to me he has plenty of justification for losing it. I have had a mild version of this kind of personal harassment, and it makes you paranoid and hostile.

Agree.

The Roger Craig story has always been a nudgingly curious one to me.

There seems to be just enough corroborative documentation and testimony to back up most of his claims to debatable degrees that you just can't dismiss them out of hand.

I do believe Fritz lied when he denied Craig's claim that he ( Craig ) was called into his office while Oswald was being interrogated there.

Craig's account of what he saw, heard and did in that Fritz office and in Dealey Plaza on 11,22,1963 seemed too detailed to have been made up imo.

The more details, the easier it would be to find others on the scene to counter them and prove they weren't true or in the least extremely misinformed and/or exaggerated.

And Craig stuck with his account despite enormous pressure to change it.

I have read some accounts about Craig's mental and emotional make up that suggest at least a few related problems in his life.

Certainly depression in his last years. Earlier not sure.

Craig's own daughter adding to this. Stating her father was discharged from military active duty because he kept "injuring himself" ?

For those wanting to discredit Craig this would of course be the ultimate tactic to do so.

I have always been curious about the entire story of Craig's early life.

His runs away from home at 12?

12?

That begs so many heavy questions of childhood trauma such as serious child abuse, neglect, etc.

A 12 year old boy walks off on his own into the world? With what? A small suitcase? A few dollars in his pocket?

Did he hitchhike? Did he ever have to sleep outside at night? Was he ever molested? 

I can't imagine ( thinking back to myself at 12 ) what that must have been like. Sounds terrifying in many ways. Sounds almost like life and death desperation.

I don't see Craig's childhood run off as some romantic see the world adventure motivated action.

And Craig was always a deathly thin person. At that age he must have looked even more waifish, fragile and vulnerable than other kids.

Craig recounted that for several years he wandered by himself and found jobs on ranches and farms? In Northern Plains states and even Rocky Mountain states then Nebraska, Oklahoma and finally in Texas?

How Craig survived under those circumstances as a child is a story I want to know more about. On it's face it sounds like a fascinating tale.

Based on Craig's account of running away from home and then having to fend for himself as a child of 12 wandering from state to state and surviving on his own, I have to assume ( using my life experience common sense ) that Craig was very possibly seriously traumatized before he ran away from home and maybe after.

To a degree that he was likely a person afflicted with a serious case of post traumatic stress syndrome.

Maybe Craig's childhood was so neglectful and abusive, he couldn't even talk about it. To anyone , ever. The pain is too great to re-feel.

That frequently happens in the many of the worst cases.

What any of this could mean in the over-all story of Roger Craig in the JFKA case is a big and debatable question mark I admit.

Yet, still, I would love to have heard how Roger Dean Craig survived on his own from 12 years old out into the rugged terrain and lifestyle of the Dakota's, Wyoming. Colorado. etc, back in those poor economic times.

5 hours ago, David Josephs said:

 

Thanks boys.

Usually a guy that big stands out. Someone you'd remember.

To me, the guy to the right of the cigar holding fellow looks like Jack Webb.

The light blue rent a cop shirt looking fellow looks like a young Meat Head.

The good ole boy on the far right with the white hat might be Detective Clarence Woodrow ( C. W. ) Conway.  Department store shop lifting bureau.

56 minutes ago, David Josephs said:

Who is the big and tall intimidating fellow in the picture above. Right behind the man holding the cigar leaning on the top of the car?

He looks at least 6ft. 6in. tall.

It makes perfect sense why federal politicians since November, 1963 have not wanted to put themselves out there knocking the Warren Commission or worse, suggesting our own government may have been involved.

I take you back to the film JFK and the scene where Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner ) asked Beverly Oliver ( Lolita Davidovich ) to come to New Orleans to testify in the Clay Shaw trial.

She sighs and says fearfully " If they can kill the President of the United States, you think they couldn't get to little ole me?"

I think that exact thought truly existed in the minds of most people in elected office.

And in the least a fear that "they" were powerful enough to ruin their political careers if they created some real problems for the true perpetrators.

Most career politicians will do and say ( or not do and say ) whatever they need to to stay in office.  Just like today.

48 minutes ago, Steve Thomas said:

WC testimony of Sheriff Bill Decker

https://www.jfk-assassination.net/russ/testimony/decker.htm

 

 

Mr. DECKER - Most prisoners taken in custody by the city police are arrested within the corporate limits of the city of Dallas and they in turn are moved to the city jail, which is located at the corner of Main and Harwood, or better still, in the 2000 block of Main Street, and there confined until their period of investigation is completed.
Mr. HUBERT - How long is that?
Mr. DECKER - Well, now, that's a problem I couldn't--there would be no way to answer that--how long does it take to make some investigation?
Mr. HUBERT - What I had in mind was whether there was any rule, regulation, or law?
Mr. DECKER - No; someone said once you couldn't hold them over 24 or 36 hours, but where it is, I don't know. The city ordinance under which most municipalities work is--they have a right to arrest and hold for investigation until they could determine if a crime has been committed. That leaves it pretty blank.

 

Mr. HUBERT - All right. Now, let's assume that a man has been formally charged and that there has been a capias or warrant
Mr. DECKER - It's a warrant in this case.
Mr. HUBERT - Of arrest, which authorizes you to arrest the particular prisoner?
Mr. DECKER - I or one of the constables.
Mr. HUBERT - What is your custom--are there any rules or regulations or laws?
Mr. DECKER - No; there's no rules or regulations---

 

Steve Thomas

Suspects rights in Dallas at that time were ... well, shall we say ...outrageously abused?

17 hours ago, Douglas Caddy said:

I have always thought what Mellen wrote here undercuts her defense of Mac Wallace in her book. 

Billie Sol Estes told me Mac Wallace was a stone killer and had killed people on Johnson's orders. 

If there is anyone who would be capable of committing cold blooded murder it would be someone who had already done so.

Wallace was an alcoholic and emotionally unbalanced basket case as early in his adult life as Oct. 22nd 1951 when he drove to the Austin Texas Pitch And Putt golf course and in broad daylight and in front of witnesses blasted John Kinzer to death. And then simply drove away.

It was easy for a Texas jury to come to their "Murder With Malice" verdict in the subsequent trial. 

But then a Texas Good Ole Boy political "miracle" happened when after a short recess right after the verdict was read, judge Charles O. Betts sentenced Wallace to only a 5 year suspended sentence!

Holy Toledo!

Wallace ( represented by LBJ's own attorney John Cofer ) walked!

If that trial and sentence was depicted in a movie the audience would erupt with a bellowing Guffaw!

The depths of political corruption in the state of Texas at that time was epic!

With LBJ ( and Ed Clark ) as one of their top King Pins. No debate at all with this reality.

And what would anyone expect that Mac Wallace would owe LBJ for getting him off a jury verdict reached murder rap?

A third party run by RFK Jr. could guarantee a Republican win in 2024.

Now THAT would be a tragedy.

7 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Yes, fingerprints can be faked. It is done in the art world to "authenticate" bogus art. 

You find a real fingerprint, and there are methods to copy and make a latex mold, fits over your own finger like a thimble. 

Real "Mission Impossible" type stuff.

Of course fingerprints can be planted. With today's technology anything's possible.

9 hours ago, Robert Montenegro said:

 

Luckily, this lunacy never came to pass, because United States Marine Corps Major General Smedley Darlington Butler exposed the plot:

 

 

Who was our Smedley Butler of January 6th, 2021?

General John Kelley?

General Mark Milley?

4 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

But here is the capper.  On the day Kennedy was killed, Oppenheimer's son came into his office while he was working on his acceptance speech. He told him the news. His secretary then affirmed it.  Oppenheimer offered his son a drink.  But when he went over to the liquor cabinet, he stopped.  His hand started to tremble, and he could not pour the drink. As they walked outside to watch TV Oppenheimer said the following: 

"Now things are going to come apart very fast."  

You can't make this stuff up.  It's on p. 576.  I hope it's in the film.

I do too.

1 hour ago, Steve Thomas said:

The shells were found at 1'00 PM. The rifle was found at 1:22 PM.

The shells had already been bagged and tagged and entered into evidence by the time the rifle had been found.

I'll always believe in my heart, with absolutely no evidence whatsoever to back it up, that somebody screwed up and planted the wrong kind of shells.

You can't really have a 7.65 rifle with 6.5mm shells.

Steve Thomas

Ditto Steve.

4 hours ago, Denny Zartman said:

Police ballistics experts couldn't find the "Made Italy" and "Cal 6.5" printed on the rifle, yet somehow non-rifle expert Mark Lane was able to find it. Strange!

They didn't immediately know that with that kind of stamping..."right on the barrel" that there was no way it was a Mauser?

For 24 hours?!

Beyond strange.

Can you imagine if Oswald hadn't been in the Texas Theater?

Maybe hitched a ride on a highway out of town?

The DPD would have had a collective breakdown.

When was the TXSCB found rifle identified as a Carcano?

Constable Seymour Weitzman's initial ID of it as a Mauser made it all the way to the national media. 

How long before the DPD got word out that it was not a Mauser?

Did it take hours or many hours to change the national media reported story of the rifle being a Mauser?

Lt. Day took possession of the rifle from Fritz just minutes after Weitzman's Mauser ID.

It seems as if Weitzman himself wasn't made aware of his famous ID screwup until later.

He had to be told of his mistake, no?

You'd think Lt. Day would have spotted Weitzman's incorrect ID right there minutes after Weitzman gave the rifle it's first provenance.

8 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

I said this elsewhere.

ANd it was in my review of Assume Nothing.

Specter said that once he examined the Z film and got the FBI results on the firing tests back, he told the COmmission  that we either go with the magic bullet or we start looking for a second assassin

Obviously this did the trick as Redlich said, denying the magic bullet is the equivalent of admitting a conspriacy. 

Connolly's dem damn bones just happened to get in the way of the "Magic Bullet" theory accepted by the Warren/Dulles Commission.

Broken rib bone, shattered wrist bone.

The collision of Specter's magic bullet with Connally's wrist bone was so violent, it changed the trajectory of it almost 90 degrees into his left thigh?

Upon seeing the Magic Bullet for the first time weeks after he operated on Connally, his treating surgeon Robert Shaw said he didn't believe Ce399 could have been the bullet that caused the bone damage he saw in Connolly and showing only a loss of 2.4 grams versus the fragment amount and weight they found in Connelly's body.

Connolly's other treating surgeon Charles Gregory also stated his belief that Ce399 was not the Connally wound missile.

He stated the entrance wound in Connally's left thigh was too small to have been made by the CE399 bullet.

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• Delta Rhythm Boys - Dry Bones - YouTube

   
  

   

  3:03

   

   

Off and on through these last 20 years of my interest in the JFKA and RFKA I have to stop and consider how much time and effort some people have invested in the entire case and story.

It's hard to imagine giving up that much of one's time in that effort.

And except for maybe some fairly small income from a book deal, how they did this without monetary compensation.

Now THAT's a sacrifice.  

9 minutes ago, Gil Jesus said:

It seems that Fritz had a history of not releasing evidence, not only to other divisions within his own department, but to outside agencies as well.

There's a reason for that: you can't tamper with evidence if someone else has it.

And Fritz's interrogation methods were some of the worst suspect rights violating one could imagine.

And the DUMMY did not have a recorder taping Oswald's every word during his interrogations of him, or even a stenographer?

Will Fritz.

The legendary policeman who shouted out to the world press, "This case is cinched!"

Just "48 hours" after JFK was killed in his city?

A murder case that "60 years later" is still full of incredible contradictions in evidence, eye-witness testimony, motive, etc.?

Some "Sherlock Holmes" brilliance in deduction reasoning with that case solved proclamation eh?

“It is a capital mistake to theorize before you have all the information. It biases the judgement.”

Sherlock Holmes "A Study In Scarlet."

And the great policeman legend Will Fritz's will always carry the ignoble mantle ( along with Curry ) of blame for the worst case of police department negligence in American history when Oswald was slain right in his own building due to his okaying ( along with Fritz and others ) the most illogical security plan one could imagine by transferring Oswald out of his building to the County jail in broad daylight and with a public announcement to thousands of crazies the time and place of such before hand.

Ignoring serious pleas from people in his own department who warned of just such a worst case scenario security breakdown disaster by not moving Oswald in the cover of night and with no public announcements.

Which stole the full JFKA investigative truth from the American people and triggered the most massive loss of trust with seeds of suspicion in the minds of over half our society regards our own government and which is still there after 60 years!

The majority of Americans "still" do not believe the finding of the Warren Commission regards Oswald and the JFK assassination!

Thanks in part to Fritz's leadership role in the greatest police department security breakdown negligence in American history.

That is some stellar police career legacy.

More Jacques Clouseau than Sherlock Holmes ... imo anyways.

When I think of the great Will Fritz my first recollection thoughts are his "this case is cinched" shout out to the world press, his doddering walk away from his Oswald escort team in the DPD building basement to clear away invisible others blocking access to the drive away car and his red faced, fist raised smack down confrontation with 19 year old Buell Wesley Frazier which resulted in a feisty Frazier warning Fritz..."you hit me and we's gonna have one hell of a fight!"

7 hours ago, Mark Knight said:

As far as Oswald's rights, Miranda v. Arizona wasn't decided until 1966. 

Yes, that is right. Thank you Mark.

8 hours ago, Robert Montenegro said:

Hell, Mr. Oswald had ten times more officers of the law physically surrounding him in the minutes leading up to his public execution than President Kennedy had in the damned motorcade!

Excellent absurd reality truth analogy RM.

Which makes the Oswald assassination so impossibly illogical and improbable even a child could see it was a set up.

I thought suspects were automatically provided legal assistance when they ask for such, and if they can't afford a private lawyer a public defender one is assigned to them?

Not the case in 1963?

How's this for Texas Style justice:

Oswald is a "suspect" in Dallas PD custody.

Oswald's personal physical safety is 100% the responsibility of the Dallas PD while in their custody.

Oswald is also one of the most ( if not the most ) threatened criminal suspects in American history. 

And he is also the most important criminal suspect in American history.

What he has to share could change the course of American history and reveal the truth about who killed a sitting president and why.

Oswald is whacked before he even gets out of the DPD building?

By a local sleazy strip joint owner who easily defeated the DPD security to do what he did?

The most negligent action failure in American police force history.

And ignoring warnings by even members of the DPD to move Oswald at night without broadcasting a daylight transfer just adds to the monstruous failure.

Technically, legally, Oswald's wife and children should have been compensated for the DPD's absolute worst case negligence in American history which caused the death of an untried suspect in their custody.

Joe Civello was the Dallas underboss, Carlos Marcello the overboss.

Marcello reigned over the entire area of Louisiana, Texas, etc.

Marcello was up there with Trafficante, Giancana, Luciano, Gambino.

Seth Kantor found Ruby's phone records the months before 11,22,1963.

In the last month, Ruby's calls to Chicago and Detroit increased 1000% from his normal pattern going back years.

He's calling the biggest most notorious mob hit men of that era and area.

Barney Baker. Lenny Patrick. Nofio Pecora in New Orleans.

All because he needed help with hot headed Jada, his feature stripper who was fighting Jack for more money?

5 hours ago, Ron Bulman said:

Look at the shadows in the first picture.  Pretty pronounced for say 1:00 in the afternoon.  30 minutes after the assassination.  The railroad yard was flooded with cops searching it immediately after it.  Even if not till 1:30, long shadows for that time of day.

Look at the shadows of the people lining the sidewalk on Elm street in the Zapruder film as JFK's limo was driving past.

This was approximately 12:30 PM, yes?

Not only are they not as long as the shadows in the 3 tramp perp walk photo above, they are actually going toward the opposite direction!

In the 3 tramp perp walk picture the grassy knoll is to the left of the tramps and accompanying officers.

Their shadows are showing to the right, and as Ron Buhlman pointed out, very long in length.

Could shadows move that much in one hour?