Greg Doudna

3 hours ago, Tom Gram said:

Do you see the note that says “(Above bears pencil notation “300” - bill torn)” ?

It does seem like we should be able to compare the DPD bill photo with these serial numbers. Either way it looks like Oswald did have one torn bill on him. 

OK, got it. But no photos to tell how much torn or what the tear looked like? Doesn’t advance information much. 

5 hours ago, Tom Gram said:

Well said. I’m guessing that Bill’s only “logic” in rating a low probability on this is that the prints are not Oswald’s. 

Don’t tell Bill I said so Tom, but I suspect you’re right! 😊

4 hours ago, Bill Fite said:

As Micah Millet pointed out in another thread there is evidence of a torn $ bill.

https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/24479-lee-harvey-oswalds-possessions/

 

Bill am I missing something, how is this evidence of a torn dollar bill? It’s evidence of dollar bills on Oswald that I can see, not a torn one. Also, didn’t the torn dollar bill DPD photo give serial numbers? I bet those serial numbers differ from the ones on this document. 

5 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

There is no evidence whatsoever that Oswald had a torn half of a dollar bill.  This is nothing more than a factoid, foolishly invented by John Armstrong.  Upon arrest, an inventory of Oswald's possessions mentions nothing about half of a dollar bill.  Armstrong found a notation on a piece of paper inside the Dallas Police archives that mentioned a torn half of a dollar bill, but even this particular piece of paper has nothing on it which even hints to it being anything assassination-related.

Bill I agree with you on this which is why I worded it the way I did. I challenged that a while ago in some thread on this forum on exactly these grounds but someone did come back at me and showed somehow the unidentified provenance torn dollar bill DPD photo of some evidence item was physically among evidence items which were Oswald’s, at the DPD filing or storage end of things. How did that happen? But I agree it’s not confirmed Oswald’s. 

4 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

"That’s possible Bill. I wondered that too. But against, is he kept moving to different persons, three or four times."

Jack Davis, who you agree is credible, has Oswald sitting beside (or almost sitting beside) only TWO people.

There was Davis himself and Gibson to his right at the corner of the theater, that’s two, and was there something about a man to Davis’s left on the other side of the aisle from Davis? I don’t remember for sure. Maybe it was just those two from Davis. 

Then there is one more from Burroughs, Oswald sitting next to a pregnant woman after Oswald reentered the theater on the other side from Davis after being in the concession area where Burroughs had the popcorn. That makes three, 2 from Davis, 1 from Burroughs. 

The stories of Burroughs and Davis agree on the behavior of Oswald sitting next to strangers, Oswald in the concession area where Burroughs was selling popcorn, and at the time of the opening credits. Did Burroughs remember Oswald in the concession area and embellished that saying he sold him popcorn? Who knows. But that’s what Burroughs said, and Davis has Oswald walking out the rear of the theater into the concession area during the opening credits time the same time Burroughs says. 

2 hours ago, Leslie Sharp said:

@Greg Doudna please acknowledge that you have seen the photo I've parked momentarily on my FB page; and retract your defamatory accusation that Hank Albarelli lied about his source.

Renee Chagnot

b. Nov 24, 1904  -- Selancour FR

d. June 21, 2000 -- US

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=2126475874356938&id=100009836370242&mibextid=Nif5oz

I get a broken link and “page not available” from your link so saw no photo on your Facebook. But I see the photo of ca 85-yr old June Cobb and one of her brothers you posted here; thanks for posting that photo.

I never accused Albarelli of lying about his source, at least I don’t remember doing so. I thought Albarelli may have been deceived, different thing. 

From your photo however, I retract the idea that Albarelli’s June Cobb, the godmother of his grandson, was not the real June Cobb from Ponca City OK.

I still don’t know how someone as famous as June Cobb could die with no known newspaper notice or obituary, but maybe that is less unusual than I supposed, probably happens all the time (a lot) dependent on the accident of whether a family member proactively makes an announcement happen. But what a story June Cobb—the CIA femme fatale in her heyday—would have to tell!! I hope her story via Albarelli may see the light of day. 

2 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

 

Davis seems credible?  Okay.

When does Davis say he saw popcorn in Oswald's hands?

Davis never said he saw popcorn in Oswald’s hands. The sitting next to Davis was before Oswald moved to sit next to Gibson and then went out the rear to the concession area. The popcorn purchase would happen after Oswald left sitting next to Davis. 

Who would have seen popcorn in his hands would be the pregnant lady that Burroughs says Oswald next sat next to in the theater (she got up and didn’t return to that seat). Then Oswald at some point moved again to where he was when arrested.

1 hour ago, Bill Brown said:

Re: Jack Davis and Oswald sitting beside himself and another guy, consider the possibility that Oswald wanted to appear to be part of a small group of patrons versus a man sitting by himself.  Just sayin'.

That’s possible Bill. I wondered that too. But against, is he kept moving to different persons, three or four times. And he was sitting directly next to lone strangers in a nearly empty theater, not two or three seats away, and directly next in a nearly empty theater is definite invasion of personal space.

(But suppose he feared someone might find him and shoot at him right there in the theater. Sitting immediately next to someone might deter someone from shooting from a distance, gaining time for Oswald (who was armed) to react?)

John Martino whom Larry Hancock argues had knowledge of the assassination plot in Dallas said Oswald was meeting someone in the theater who unknown to Oswald was going to kill Oswald but the Tippit killing messed things up. The seating directly next to each person, then quick leaving, then repeating the same with another patron several times, in a theater of only 14 tickets in all sold by Julia Postal that day, do seem to weigh in favor that Oswald was looking for a contact. Plus some think a torn dollar bill in DPD inventory with other Oswald materials suggests that was on Oswald in the theater in keeping with a known practice in theaters for meeting contacts. 

6 minutes ago, Bill Brown said:

 

"The partial prints lifted from the patrol car REASONABLY APPEAR LIKELY..."

No.  This is not true at all.  A possibility?  Of course.  Likely?  Nope.  There is no reason at all to claim that it is likely that the killer ever touched the patrol car, much less the front hood/fender/quarter panel.

The first fact is that some one person put those prints there in both places, one of which is decidedly unusual (right palm print on the right front bumper low to the ground). .

The second fact is that however unlikely you suppose it would be for the Tippit killer, known to have been at both locations with hands inches away, or in the case of the right front passenger door witnessed leaning onto the car with arms or hands directly touching, to have left those prints …

… it is some magnitude still less likely that any other person would, for the same reasons you think it unlikely from the man known at those two locations of the car in live and dramatic action involving hands and motion. 

Just be real. At one of the two print locations, the top of the right front passenger door, one witness, Helen Markham, said she saw the killer leaning right on the car there with his arms crossed, hands right there at the top of that car door exactly where prints were lifted twenty minutes later.

And another witness, Jimmy Burt, claimed he saw the killer’s hands directly on the car, in physical contact with the car, at exactly that location (where prints were lifted twenty minutes later).

You can handwave however you like about this, it speaks for itself.

It is short of certainty yes. But I’d say realistically and conservatively it is in the maybe ca 70-95% range of Bayesian prior odds (odds based on known experience and information prior to discovery of the actual solution, a quantification of expectations prior to learning the truth of a matter). 

You agree it is possible a man seen standing at a car in two specific places with his hands witnessed near the car at both and witnessed touching the car at one might conceivably be the mystery person who left those prints.

I am puzzled at why you judge a very low Bayesian prior probability, as if there are higher-prior-odds possibilities elsewhere (remember, single individual only, both places). Are you supposing, say, one of the Tenth Street onlookers, or one of the ambulance attendants or a police officer, or a gas station attendant or whatever, is more likely to be that individual than the Tippit killer? 

Why not be consistent and argue no human is likely to have left those prints, for the same reasons you claim the Tippit killer is unlikely to have done so? (Just being consistent in carrying out what seems to be your logic.)

I think some human at those two locations did leave those prints, I suspect the killer of Tippit. 

I believe the claim. That it didn’t come out in his Warren Commission testimony I don’t think is too significant, given the WC staff counsels’ “prosecutors’ case” with skill in questioning witnesses for the record (after pre-interviews off the record to help know what questions to ask on the record and how they will be answered, to move the case forward).

Julia Postal’s WC testimony has one little glitch I noticed where she starts to say Butch Burroughs had claimed to Julia that he had seen Oswald— which Julia cuts off in mid-thought and says she told Butch, “Now, Butch…” as if Butch was confused (without it being very clear what that was about).

Also, Jack Davis is a credible witness. Just see and listen to his Sixth Floor oral history interview. His account of Oswald’s moving around in the main seating area, sitting down for brief moments next to people, next to himself, then I think next to Gibson in the corner, then (Davis telling) Oswald went OUT the back of the far aisle into the popcorn concession area (according to DAVIS) before coming BACK IN a different aisle… although little-remarked I regard that as somewhat striking corroboration, independent corroboration, of Burroughs’s account of Oswald’s movement. The only thing missing is Davis doesn’t have Oswald buying popcorn when he is back there, but that would be because Davis had no way of seeing or noticing that from where Davis was sitting. But the credible Davis places Oswald back where he could buy popcorn from Burroughs there, in the same “opening credits” time frame as Burroughs had Oswald buying popcorn, and I interpret Davis as supporting the credibility of Burroughs on that.

Which definitely is a different timing and version of Oswald in the Theatre from the Tippit killer running past Brewer’s store and Julia Postal into the theater balcony well after the movie had started, raising the question of whether Brewer was correct or mistaken in his identification of the man he saw through the glass doors of his store as Oswald. 

11 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

You need to get permission from the authors (regardless of forum rules) because they are the copyright holders.

That simply is not automatically correct, Sandy, and not obviously correct in the quotations of David, accurate with citation and attribution.

Do you not know the legal meaning and provision for “fair use” quotations from copyrighted works—brief quotations for purposes of research and discussion—which do not legally require permission of the copyright holder (creator)? 

I believe Pat Speer quoted from the law on that above. It is in the Copyright Act of 1965. Did you not read it?

That is the law, that “fair use” quotations from published books, articles, any publication, any copyrighted published work, do not, repeat do not, legally require the copyright holder’s permission. 

(If such were required, think about it: no ability to cite a footnote to anything without prior obtaining of written permission? Have you ever quoted someone on this forum at the top of a post to which to reply without privately obtaining advance written permission from the one quoted? Substantive discussion worldwide would be extremely chilled if not stopped altogether if that were the law, which fortunately it is not.)

Of course “fair use” is not clearly defined but the Copyright Act gave principles to be applied on the standard of a reasonable person’s interpretation concerning application of those principles.

I agree with the policy of this forum that members shall not quote from this forum outside this forum. However that is not a copyright issue but a forum rules issue.

Bill in the spirit of trying to be helpful I have expanded and improved some wording on my suggested fillins for you above. Regards, Greg

47 minutes ago, Stu Wexler said:

Sherry Fiester made the same point Pat made in her book. The DPD made all of the mistakes Gil highlighted and more. But those just weren't standard norms and expectations many law enforcement agencies in 63.

It means trust that police did not cook evidence, or as they say in the UK, "stitch someone up", was on the honor system, which usually worked except in the cases it didn't.

Why I believe Oswald went to Mexico City

I believe the following reasons in aggregate, and in some but not all cases individually, establish beyond reasonable question that Oswald went to Mexico City, and that the bedrock certainty expressed by some that such was not the case is not justified. 

Against the positive reasons listed below, Oswald has never been shown not to have been in Mexico City in the days in question. That could be done, if it were so, by verifiably showing that Oswald was somewhere else. But that has never been done.

This does not say how he got to Mexico City, where he stayed, company he kept, what he did there, or whether there was also impersonation or not--only that he went there. 

• Marina said Oswald's main dream was to go to Cuba, the most efficient entrance point being via Mexico City.
• Lee got a visa in New Orleans for a visit to Mexico.
• Marina said Oswald went to Mexico City, swore it under oath in her Warren Commission testimony
• Marina told further of Lee going to Mexico City in Marina and Lee (1977.
• Lee wrote of going to Mexico City in a handwritten letter, then typed that letter, signed and mailed it to the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C. The handwritten draft of the letter was authenticated unequivocally as Oswald's handwriting by expert testimony.
• Marina told of witnessing Lee writing and typing that Soviet embassy letter. 
• Ruth Paine told of witnessing Lee writing and typing that Soviet embassy letter.
• Lee was overheard on Sun Nov 24 telling Secret Service Special Agent Kelley of his trip to Mexico City by two witnesses following interrogation, at a time when Fritz and Leavelle had left the room and interrogation for the record had ended. The two witnesses, who each independently testified to this under oath, were US Postal Inspector Harry Holmes, and Dallas Police Detective L.C. Graves. Their independent sworn testimony impeaches Kelley’s denial that he discussed Mexico City with Oswald. 
• Silvia Duran's name, office address and phone number at the Cuban consulate in Mexico City are in Oswald’s address book found at his rooming house, in agreement with Silvia Duran's testimony in Mexico City that she wrote her name, office address and phone number for Oswald when he was in Mexico City..  
• Oswald was seen in Dallas at the door of Silvia Odio on the evening of Wed Sept 25, 1963, being driven by two men in a car, said by the driver to have come from New Orleans and on their way to another destination, in exact time agreement, and explanation of mechanism of transportation, for Oswald leaving New Orleans that morning, en route to going to Mexico City
• On the evening of the assassination, Fri Nov 22, anti-Castro Cubans who knew Oswald in New Orleans called Mrs. Luce and told her they had information on Oswald including trips to Mexico. Hancock and Boylan have argued that was from personal knowledge of Oswald acquired pre-Nov 22 (Redbird leads paper).
• Paper relics of a bullfight in Mexico City and other miscellaneous items from Mexico City were found left by Oswald in Ruth Paine's house
• At any time after Nov 22, 1963, it would be against interest of the FBI, the Warren Commission, or any US agency to have physical evidence forged, fabricated, or witnesses suborned to perjury in order to have Oswald in Mexico City, because Oswald in Mexico City contributes nothing to, and goes against, the desired Lone Nut narrative. There is no evidence any of this physical evidence was forged, or that any of the witnesses named were suborned to perjure, and it would have been against interest or motive for any federal agency to have done so.
• There is no evidence Oswald was anywhere else during the days he was reported to have been in Mexico City.

Conclusion: Oswald claimed he went to and had been in Mexico City. Marina believed he did. It is not credible that the physical evidence and testimony named above was all fake. This evidence says Oswald went to Mexico City.   

16 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

@Greg Doudna

Finish this sentence please:

The partial prints lifted from the patrol car MUST be the killer's prints and no other person's prints because...

*** The partial prints lifted from the patrol car REASONABLY APPEAR LIKELY, though not CERTAINLY, to have been the killer’s prints and no other person’s prints, prior to taking into consideration any other information on the identity of the killer, because of the expert finding that those prints from both locations came from a single individual, and because of how unusual it would be that a random single person other than the killer would leave prints in both of those two particular locations, contrasted to perfect means and opportunity for the killer to have done so, witnessed at both locations.***

Fillins for Bill

“Those fingerprints on the Tippit patrol car in the exact two locations of the car where the killer was, and his hands witnessed either touching or inches away, which look very much like they could be from the killer (and which are not Oswald’s), I believe were more likely from an unidentified person than from the killer, because …”

“I know that Curtis Craford did not toss a revolver of the kind used to kill Tippit, out a back window of a car driven by Ruby close to the Carousel Club on Ruby's way to the Stemmons Freeway, in a paper bag of fruit, at about 6 am in the morning, onto a downtown street, hours after Tippit was killed and hours before Craford, of hitman experience and expertise, then precipitously fled Dallas in interstate flight, and I know the reason that weapon was disposed of in that way was not because it was a recent murder weapon, and I know the DPD and FBI concealment of knowledge of the existence and find circumstances of that particular weapon was unrelated to the Tippit murder, because…"

“I know there is no reasonable doubt over whether there could have been substitutions in the shell hulls sent to the FBI lab for matching to Oswald’s revolver, after judicious consideration of the information brought out here, https://www.scrollery.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/T-BALLISTICS-108-1.pdf, because…” 

“I know the man in the balcony of the Texas Theatre interviewed and released by Dallas Police, seen coming from the exact location where the killer of Tippit had ran only several minutes before, was not the killer of Tippit, and was never recontacted to ask if he had seen any other suspect for the killer who was where he was, because…”

"I know that the identifications of Oswald as the gunman from the Tenth and Patton eyewitnesses, and as the man in front of Brewer's store on Jefferson who ran into the balcony of the Texas Theatre, fleeting glimpses all, cannot reasonably have been cases of mistaken identifications because..."  

"I believe that the description of the killer by the Tenth and Patton witness who got the closest and best look at the killer's head of any witness from only a few feet away, of a block cut hairline on the back of the killer's neck claimed by that witness to have been seen very distinctly, was actually a mistake for the tapered cut hairline at the back of Oswald's head, because..."

“I know the three Texas Theatre alibi witnesses to Oswald placed somewhere else at the time of the killing of Tippit, on the ground level main seating area of the Texas Theatre consistent with being a paid-ticket customer, an alibi not contradicted by any other Texas Theatre staff or patron, cannot be correct, because..."

"I believe theater patron witness Jack Davis's account of Oswald's unusual movements in sitting next to different persons as if he was looking to meet someone was not because he was looking to meet someone, because..." 

"I know Oswald did not buy a ticket to the theater that day from Julia Postal at the cashier's window, and give his ticket to general manager Callahan who was taking tickets from persons going in to the seating area, because..."

"I believe Oswald, whom I say did not go by bus or on foot from his rooming house to the Texas Theatre, chose instead to walk from the rooming house in the very different direction of Tenth and Patton where he had no known reason to go there, for this reason:..." 

"I believe the reason the color and description of the killer's abandoned jacket at the Ballew's Texaco station differs so dramatically in color and description from the description of Oswald's gray jacket of Buell Wesley Frazier who saw him wear it many times at work at the TSBD and driving him to and from Irving, but is identical in color and similar in description to a jacket photographed a week later worn by Curtis Craford, is because..."

"I am confident confessed professional hitman Curtis Craford's precipitous decision to take flight from Dallas with no notice to his employer Jack Ruby who had recently hired him, hours after the Tippit killing, was not because Curtis Craford was the true killer of Tippit, and I am confident the Tenth and Patton witnesses and Brewer did not misidentify Craford as Oswald even though it is a matter of record that numerous witnesses unrelated to the Tippit case did misidentify Craford as Oswald in other circumstances, making exactly that mistake, because..."

"I believe officer Tippit randomly flagged down his killer on a sidewalk, and got out of his patrol car to check him as a suspicious person, without radioing that stop in, rather than the reverse in which the killer flagged down Tippit (hence the back-and-forth movements of the killer as the patrol car slowed to a stop), and calmly and accurately shot Tippit dead as a professional execution, and calmly reloaded prepared to kill again as he walked not ran away, because...

"I believe it can be excluded that the Tippit killer going to the Texas Theatre after shooting Tippit was a thwarted attempt on the part of that killer to kill Oswald next there, the failure of that intent making necessary the belated extrajudicial pretrial execution of Oswald two days later by Curtis Craford's employer, Jack Ruby, because..." 

"I believe Jack Ruby and his recent hire, confessed hitman Curtis Craford, would not have had any interest or reason to kill Oswald on Fri Nov 22, and that Ruby's apartment only several blocks from the Tippit killing from which the car-less Craford could easily have walked (after being last witnessed driven away by Ruby from a restaurant the night before), and Ruby's giving from memory on Sun Nov 24 a mistaken street address residence of one of his dancers matching to the exact street address of the location of the Tippit patrol car where Tippit was killed, are coincidental without bearing on the Tippit murder, because..."

"I continue to hold that my previous statement of opposition to, and absolute refusal to endorse or express support for, a check being done of the unidentified fingerprints on the Tippit patrol car in an attempt to identify, including but not limited to a possible match or exclusion of match to Curtis Craford specifically, which would involve no financial cost and minutes of time by an expert analyst but which has never yet been known to have been done, is a correct and disinterestedly objective investigative decision to take in the Tippit murder case because..." 

On 12/10/2023 at 2:02 AM, Alan Ford said:

Mr. Doudna, I have come to share the widely held belief amongst researchers that Mr. Oswald was a sheep-dipped asset. All evidence one might adduce for his being a genuine pro-Castro Leftist can equally cut the other way: right-wing anti-Castroite engaged in an extended pro-Castro cosplay-----------the perfect profile for someone involved in an off-books false-flag operation of the sort I am proposing.

OK, I realize there are different possible interpretations on some of these things. I think his political writings are the real Oswald--I've read them, they're all consistent, all in his handwriting over different times of writing--and that means he was no right-winger but also was anti-authoritarian, almost libertarian socialist. However the anti-authoritarian views in his political writings as they stand could be consistent with anti-Castro along JURE lines, opposition to Castro from the left, in whose company Oswald was seen at Silvia Odio's door (Silvia Odio herself being closely and her father important JURE). And JURE leader Ray was I think friendly with RFK personally. In his Alabama Jesuit address summer 1963 Oswald spoke of building a best of both systems on "an American foundation", and from all who knew him he was pro-JFK start to finish. So the notion of him being a Cold War liberal or Cold War left working (if he thought so) for JFK and against Castro is not unthinkable, from that point of view. But the real Oswald as a closeted right-winger, closeted believer in segregation etc? No way. Was his one-man FPCC show in New Orleans an anti-FPCC operation? Larry Hancock suggests it could be Oswald creating a credential to enable him to get into Cuba, somebody told him if he did that that would work. So even though CIA and FBI were targeting FPCC at the very time Oswald does his FPCC thing in New Orleans, its not quite obvious what that means in terms of Oswald's view toward Castro (and FPCC). But enough of that, hard to solve that here.

If the idea is that Oswald was personally and wittingly complicit in falsely setting himself up as involved in an attempt to assassinate JFK (fake attempt actually), Oswald wittingly participating in himself being used as a means to implicate Castro in a false flag failed-assassination attempt scenario, I suppose one thing that could be said is, if that was Oswald's game, then his answers under interrogation (including talking at all instead of going silent until he got a lawyer), in terms of making denials easily shown false, could be consistent with making himself look guilty. But his claims he had not shot anyone, was a patsy, was being denied counsel, sure sound impassioned and real. 

There is a whole literature in criminal justice studies on the phenomenon of "false confession". I suppose in principle an idea of an innocent Oswald intentionally falsely incriminating himself in an assassination attempt on JFK, if so, could fall in the wide tent of that phenomenon (even though he never confessed in words). 

I'm struggling to find a way to see it as plausible (let alone whether there is evidence in support). How about this?--he is told or promised he would be blamed for being part of a Castro conspiracy to attempt to kill JFK, but that would be the end of his identity as Lee Harvey Oswald. Relocation, new name, new identity, new life somewhere else. But that would mean Oswald giving up Marina and even more importantly his children permanently. It’s hard to see that one either. 

2 hours ago, Alan Ford said:

Mr. Oswald was perfect for the role. A man who had worked very hard to build up a 'pro-Castro' profile. He was (by his lights) a patriot. Anti-Communist to the core. He detested Pres. Castro as much as the Kennedy brothers did.

So he willingly signs up for involvement in a plan to generate anti-Castro outrage by a non-lethal shots-fired incident in Dealey Plaza. He knows that there will be evidence pointing to his involvement (though NOT as a shooter). That's the whole point.

In all likelihood the planned official story was to be that he was flown out of Dallas from Red Bird Airport, bound for Cuba. As for his actual planned destination, we can only speculate.

His primary motivation? Ideology. It makes people do things that no calculus of narrow self-interest can account for.

If he indeed left his wedding ring with his wife that morning, then he was taking his leave from her and the children.

Whoah Alan. On Oswald being anti-Castro. Defend that. What evidence? Did Marina know? She said he loved Castro, it was all about getting to castro’s cuba for Oswald. De Mohrenschildt also said Lee was pro-Castro.

If you are saying he was anti-Castro and ideological, do you mean right-wing anti-Castro (DRE, Artime) or left anti-Castro (JURE, Ray), or something else?

Do you think his left ideology in his writings was fake and he was really a super-patriot on the US side (which is not found at all in his writings)?

1 hour ago, Alan Ford said:

Someone working on behalf of the JFK administration.

I am not suggesting that Mr. Oswald was self-incriminating as a shooter, but as someone involved in an upcoming 'pro-Castro' 'missed shots' incident (actually a false-flag stunt ahead of C-Day). He would have had zero idea that an actual assassination was in the works.

If you don’t mind pressing you on this, with reference to the Yates’ hitchhiker, if that was Oswald (as you suggested) that means he has created a random witness which could positively ID him talking about assassination of JFK and maybe carrying a rifle going to his workplace where his rifle and shot was fired etc. He would be in national news as involved in attempting to kill JFK, proof of premeditation and not framed etc.

How do you get someone to agree to go down in history looking like that? Enough money? Or what? 

Is there any mechanism in the scenario when his name would be publicly cleared? Would that be before or after invasion of Cuba and maybe nuclear war done because of it? If before, defeats the point of it, but if after, that is a major scandal too, so logically never. Would anyone rational go along with agreeing to that? How would he explain it to Marina and his kids? Would it occur to him with that kind of stakes maybe he might be helped not to be a living witness too long with that knowledge capable of blabbing? 

1 hour ago, Alan Ford said:

Actually I suspect it really was Mr. Oswald in both cases---------------and his little performance for Yates' benefit was part of his self-incrimination ahead of the planned false-flag event on the Friday.

Can you describe any believable scenario in which someone of sound mind who was pro-jfk would agree to falsely self-incriminate to appear to be an attempted killer of jfk? I can’t. 

I could conceivably imagine an ideologically committed anti-jfk person and good team player might falsely self-incriminate as decoy to help real assassin confederates in a real assassination, or attempt, escape. But not someone pro-jfk. 

17 hours ago, Stu Wexler said:

I will say this. Harold Weisberg did a lot of shoeleather investigations in this case. He did not just read the WC volumes. He also eschewed speculation as much as anyone. I would love to know where he might be getting this story re an affair.

It would be a plausible fishing question by police in a questioning or polygraph on other matters, though if so the expected and accurate answer from Buell would have been no, not yes. 

I listened to Weisberg’s answer several times to make sure Weisberg said “he said he had” not “hadn’t” but it seems Weisberg said as reported. 

Weisberg’s source may have been one of the officers who knew of the polygraph either directly or indirectly. But could police gossip get that mistaken that badly.

Maybe this wasn’t a case of a police source got it that wrong by mistake? Suppose Weisberg learned there was a polygraph of Frazier, which concerned something DPD preferred not to disclose. Weisberg asks his police source and is given back a bullshit answer which he believed, as to what the polygraph was about. In this scenario either Frazier was not asked that question or if he was Weisberg’s DPD source misled Weisberg as to the answer and the claim that that was the purpose of the polygraph.

It already is clear there was some kind of concealment or deflection going on re that Frazier polygraph. An intentionally misleading answer to Weisberg would be consistent with that? 

Gene, I did not know all of these allegations of Bethell though I knew he was at odds with Garrison and later some kind of right-winger. The fact that he was hostile to Garrison, was against him etc. is not so important to me in itself. What matters is whether this specific account of Salandria's presentation is true (even if from a hostile point of view), or invented. 

The point that matters: did Salandria urge in that public, witnessed setting that Garrison indict Ruth and Michael for assassinating Kennedy (charge Ruth and Michael with having met and conspired and plotted with others to murder Kennedy)? 

May I ask if you will at least agree for the record that if that did happen, no matter how good a man Salandria may have been in Philadelphia or at other times in his life, that action in that moment would fairly be characterized as "nuts"?

Do you know whether the specific claim--that Salandria urged in his presentation that Garrison indict Ruth and Michael for murdering Kennedy--was denied by any of the other attendees? Did Salandria ever deny he said that? 

Surely there were living members of that meeting present when Bethell's diary was published. If Salandria never said that, surely he or someone would have said so ("I never said that")?

Granted there is bias but there is pro-Garrison bias too, who in Garrison's circle didn't have bias or opinion for or against. Here you cite two pro-Garrison writers, whom some might unkindly call apologists, Mellen and DiEugenio, at least one of whom I don't think ever knew Bethell personally so how would he know, stating that "Bethell was an inveterate l**r".

The diary of Bethell sounds gossipy and negative toward Garrison but did Bethell fabricate what Salandria said?

(It sure sounds like Salandria, wouldn't you say?)  

Did Salandria give a talk in New Orleans on that date? Were the people present that Bethell names? Did Salandria speak negatively about the Paines? If he did, did Salandria go on to urge Garrison to indict Ruth and Michael, saying words to the effect of don't hold back, just do it, the evidence is there? And some prosecutors in the room pushed back on the issue of evidence?

Happened? Never happened? 

Here's what I think: assuming it has not been denied by Salandria or some other party who was there that day, it probably happened. Because every detail agrees with and is confirmed elsewhere from Salandria re the way he views Ruth and Michael's perfidy, save only the detail that he urged Garrison to indict.

But if he's talking at all about how guilty Ruth and Michael were, his basic spiel on their perfidy, and he's talking to Garrison and Garrison's team, sure, why wouldn't he urge Garrison to indict. That's what Salandria would do.

Its completely believable. Both that Salandria would say that and that some staff in the room might push back. 

Nothing at all unbelievable about that story that I can see. But if its confirmed or disconfirmed by someone else who was there that day, I'd like to know that. What do you think? 

3 hours ago, Gene Kelly said:

Greg

I am from Philadelphia, and have seen Vincent Salandria speak in person.  I can assure you that he was not "raving and nuts".  That's a rather cruel thing to insinuate.  

Gene

Gene that was not me but my paraphrase of what was reported by a witness in the room, quoted below. The Garrison staff consensus that Salandria “was something of a nut” is at the end. This was staff reaction to Salandria’s urging Garrison to charge Ruth and Michael Paine for having assassinated President Kennedy. I don’t think that reaction to Salandria in that context was inappropriate. From “Inside the Garrison Investigation: the Thomas Bethell Diary” (https://www.jfk-assassination.net/bethell4.htm )

“Sunday, January 28, 1968

“This afternoon there was a rather extraordinary meeting on the NOAC. It was attended by just about everybody from the DA's office who is working on the investigation -- Sciambra, Alcock, Burnes, myself, Ivon, Loisel and even Charlie Ward. We sat around a large table in a back room for some time, and then Garrison came in with Vince Salandria. Garrison said that Salandria had some remarks to address us, and introduced Salandria as an expert on the assassination etc.

"Salandria started off by telling us that we were in much better shape now than on the occasion of his earlier visit, in July. I had accompanied him around at that time, and I recall he was shown the Shaw file. He looked through it, and was rather rueful about it to me. He admitted to me that there wasn't much there. Now, however, it was a different story, or so he seemed to think. He could tell by the expressions on our faces. The case against Shaw was now looking much more solid, he told us, and we were beginning to work as a team.

“He then started to urge us that the only trouble was we weren't going far enough, and he then started to work himself up into a harangue about Michael and Ruth Paine. "They're agents," he said, "I know they're agents. I've got the proof." He went on at some length about how he had met the Paines, and he produced some quasi-evidence suggesting they were agents etc. Then he told us to go ahead and charge the Paines -- "You've got all the evidence you need." He exhorted us to charge some others too, Marina Oswald, and Allan Dulles. Don't worry about anything, just go ahead and charge them, "the evidence is THERE!"

“Garrison sat next to Salandria through all this, calmly smoking his pipe. Salandria was getting really worked up by this time, and was actually shouting at us. Someone asked him to tell us some of the evidence, and then he pulled out a few card indexes -- seemingly a little annoyed at being distracted by such trivia -- and then started off on his stuff about troop increases in Vietnam, the radio message to Airforce One, the same stuff he had shown me earlier on when he was working on the manuscript on WHY Kennedy was killed with his friend Tom Katen.

“When he finished he was fairly attacked by several members of the staff, notably Jim Alcock and Charlie Ward. He was told that he just didn't have sufficient evidence to warrant any of his conclusions, that he didn't seem to realize that we, as a DA's office must be concerned with the law and other such niceties, etc. Garrison began to get upset at these attacks, and came to Salandria's defense. Salandria even tried to tell us that Oswald was innocent, and I pointed out to him that if you believe Russo, you have just about got to believe that Oswald is guilty. I pointed out that the evidence adduced by our investigation made it more, and not less likely, that Oswald was involved. I remember Garrison gave me a look as though to say -- 'What on earth is he talking about, he still doesn't understand,' but I knew the whole office, apart from Garrison, was solidly behind me.

“Garrison was beginning to smart by this time, and he ended the meeting with an attempt to wrest back the initiative. He gave us a lecture about all having to pull together, that we couldn't afford to work against one another, etc. However, it was obvious that his major objective had not been accomplished. Evidently he had been trying to use Salandria to persuade us of a course of action which he wanted to take himself but knew that we would not endorse. Therefore he was hoping that we might accept it if it came from someone else, namely Salandria. But the ruse had not worked. It was evident that everyone there, with the possible exception of Sciambra -- who does not stick his neck out at all when he sees it means going against what Garrison wants -- thought that Salandria was something of a nut.”

2 hours ago, Max Good said:

I believe Ruth was offended that Lee was "lying on her typewriter" after reading his letter, and that he was actually using it with her permission.

I agree with this, seems accurate. I think Ruth had some qualms or twinge of guilt over looking at his letter he left out in her room, and was a little defensive about that, yet justified in her view in light of content which she thought the fbi should know. in other words I’m agreeing here. 
 

2 hours ago, Max Good said:

How interesting that the Paines, with all their communist/socialist parents, harboring a Russian emigre and a returned defector, never seemed to arouse the slightest suspicion on the part of the authorities.  If there was suspicion for a moment in the beginning, it was completely shut down by higher ups and the right people vouching for the Paines.

Wow Max. How can you say that? The Dallas Police upon first arrival to Ruth’s house were not friendly but suspicious that Ruth might be a communist, asked her directly in the car whether she was on the way downtown. By the next day LBJ had handed investigation over to the FBI so DPD became out of the picture.

Do you not know there was extensive FBI investigation of both Paines on the Communist angle? The MFF site has the FBI reports on that in great quantity. There is no sign that I can see that it was shut down from higherups. Instead what ended the communist question concerning both Paines was, to a man and to a woman, those who knew them attested to the FBI to their good personal character, being loyal Americans, not being communists or subversives, etc. 

It was thorough—I think running into some dozens of persons interviewed, and there just was nothing to tie either Ruth or Michael to being communists, even if they were liberal and Michael had a true blue Trotskyite father in California. 

There was not a single serious accuser charging that either Ruth or Michael were communist, no attending communist meetings of either, no memberships in communist groups or front groups of either, no communist associations other than Lee and Marina themselves and Michael’s long distance father. 

How could you miss that entire investigation of the Paines, the countless witnesses who were asked did they think the Paines were communist (no, no, no… went all the answers), coming up with nothing. The FBI concluded they weren’t communists. How can you say the question was not satisfactorily investigated or resolved.

I suspect Michael did check with someone security related at Bell, as to whether there was objection to his wife’s close association with Marina (and Lee) in light of their defector status, and was told it wasn’t a problem. One of the owners of Jaggars said Jaggars, when hiring Oswald, called to DC and asked if Oswald was OK and was told yes Oswald is OK, same answer I think Michael may have received. The reason I think Michael checked at Bell with whatever “intel” may have been there is it just sounds like a prudent thing he would have done. Though I don’t know that for sure. For all we know Michael could have kept them informed of anything important from time to time concerning his wife’s unusual housemate and returned defector husband.

Also I have something possibly new on Michael Paine and the BYP I plan to put up in the next couple of days or so. 

I would just like to point out Max Good, that none of the items you mention logically indicate Ruth perjured or framed Oswald, and your setup is unfair and prejudicial. 

Of course no one claims Ruth or anyone else cannot perjure because they are a member of any religion. Everybody knows that is a non sequitur, nobody claims that. The issue is not whether someone can perjure (anyone can), but whether she did.

And you don’t just call her identifying as Quaker but a “pious” Quaker. The adjective is disparaging and prejudicial. Ruth never claimed to be pious. Didn’t come across as any more pious than anyone else. You use the term as a disparaging or mocking term setting up a straw man. Even if the adjective was fair, which it isn’t, it would be irrelevant, personality is irrelevant to proving or suggesting perjury or forgery of physical evidence as Ruth is baselessly accused. 

Gene Kelly, Salandria wanted Garrison to indict Ruth right up there along with Clay Shaw for willful conspiracy to assassinate JFK. Garrison’s staff thought Salandria was raving and nuts, reminding him that prosecutors need evidence to file charges.

I cannot believe how a total lack of evidence is in people’s minds equated with certainty that Ruth was planting and forging physical evidence, perjuring, framing Oswald, conspiring to assassinate a president she loved, all over the map according to taste, in between caring for two toddlers as a single mom in a ranch house in Irving, and sharing a household with Marina.

She was caught up in proximity. “No good deed goes unpunished”—Burt Griffin of Ruth.

Her sister’s cia employment in DC has no more to do with Ruth assassinating JFK than my sister-in-law being a nurse in the US Air Force at a base in Germany makes me guilty of DOD war crimes done in Southeast Asia. 

Same logic. 

To me, this is like trying to talk to an Obama “birther” convinced Obama was secretly born in Kenya, not US born. There is nothing to it in terms of evidence but ones who believe it will never change. They know. People who think Ruth Paine was fabricating and forging evidence and maliciously knowingly giving false testimony to frame Oswald and conspiring to assassinate JFK as Salandria thought, will never change.

A film could be made, talking heads expressing suspicions of Oswald born in Kenya, not a real American. Obama denies the charges. Neutral moderator presents both sides, suspicions and the denials, leaves viewer to decide…  

Same thing. 

What could Ruth do differently which would prove her innocence to these people. Think about it. If you were in Ruth’s shoes and innocent, what would, what could, you do that would change anything to these people, prove your innocence? Think about it.