Greg Doudna

2 hours ago, Michael Kalin said:

There's also Guinyard's WC testimony that he saw Benavides arrive in his truck at the murder scene, not easily dismissed because it wasn't his idea. Ball led him into the affirmation.

Michael I think it can be dismissed as a mistake, because the error is not that hard to understand. Ball was leading Guinyard into that because that was probably language Guinyard had used in preinterview, and an alert Ball had noticed that and picked up on it. Ideally Guinyard would have said it again on his own; when he didn't Ball gently helped him out, nudged him to say it for the record. Ball may have been interested in bringing that out if it could cast doubt on or impeach Benavides' testimony which (also from preinterview) could have been considered problematic or a wild card due to the physical description Benavides was giving of the killer, which differed in certain respects from Oswald, combined with Benavides was the closest of any witness to the killer so would carry credibility. The WC counsels were like prosecutors seeking a stronger not weaker case against Oswald, and Ball as an experienced trial attorney knew how to question witnesses for that purpose. 

Guinyard comes across as a little confused but he's trying to tell the truth. Imagine Guinyard arrives to the scene with Callaway, Benavides isn't around. Guinyard assists in loading Tippit's body on to the ambulance when it arrives. Then Guinyard looks up and there he sees Benavides walking toward him looking like he just got out of his pickup truck. Some people--Guinyard in this case--seeing that could think the driver had just arrived and gotten out of the vehicle. That's what it could look like. Easy assumption to make. I think that's what happened. Guinyard did not realize Benavides waited inside the cabin of his pickup truck for some small amount of time after the shots before getting out of the cabin. Guinyard had no idea when Benavides' pickup truck actually arrived, but saw him arriving on foot from his vehicle and assumed that is when Benavides had arrived in his vehicle.

Mr. BALL. Was he dead or alive at that time? 
Mr. GUINYARD. He looked like he was dead to me. 
Mr. BALL. What did you do? 
Mr. GUINYARD. Helped put him in the ambulance. 
Mr. BALL. You stayed there until the ambulance came? 
Mr. GUINYARD. Yes, sir. 
Mr. BALL. Were you there when the truck came up that was driven by Benavides? 
Mr. GUINYARD. Yes, sir. 
Mr. BALL. He came up right after this? 
Mr. GUINYARD. Yes; he came up from the east side---going west. 
Mr. BALL. And then what did you do after that? 
Mr. GUINYARD. Well, we stood there a while and talked and I called him Donnie, he picked up all them empty hulls that come out of the gun. 
Mr. BALL. Who did--Benavides? 
Mr. GUINYARD. Yes. 
Mr. BALL. Did you pick them up---any of them? 
Mr. GUINYARD. He picked them up--I didn't pick them up---I was there with him. 

Thank you Andrej. Is it possible what I have been seeing and calling “Large-Framed Figure” in Darnell to Frazier’s left, who looks very broad-shouldered and big, is some misunderstanding of two persons not one (not counting another, a man, in front of her/him/them)? That is what you have been suggesting. Maybe so. In any case you have Sarah Stanton there in that location, in agreement with Frazier who said she was to his left.

I do see now one other thing you are saying. If that middle perpendicular vertical line in the background of Altgens6 is the NE corner of the TSBD doorway entrance, the traces of a person beyond and mostly blocked by Lovelady cannot (for line of sight reasons) be the Pauline Sanders figure you identified (convincingly and correctly to me) standing at the east end at the top level in Darnell in agreement with where Pauline Sanders said she was. Therefore it is extremely sensible in terms of expected position that the traces of a person behind/beyond Lovelady in Altgens6 would be Sarah Stanton, as you argue. 

13 hours ago, Jonathan Cohen said:

On what planet do any of these things have ANYTHING to do with one another? Why are you connecting the fact that William F. Buckley's family did business with Jack Crichton 70 years ago to the fact that a magazine founded by Buckley just as long ago is now, in 2023, supporting a specific presidential candidate? The leaps in logic are extraordinary and reveal absolutely nothing.

 

You mean the unverified, un-authenticated "datebook" ?

There you go being logical again Jonathan. 

In the snowstorm of details and names and mystification being thrown up around Crichton, there are only two things in the whole blizzard which purport to connect Crichton to the JFK assassination at all: 

One is the Lafitte datebook which a sophisticated, professional publicity operation is continuing to try to sell the JFK research community as being authentic, legitimate, and sensational. 

The other is a repeated quote, mediated through the same sources promoting the Lafitte datebook, of the late Albert Haney of Sarasota, Florida, former CIA station chief of Seoul, South Korea, and CIA point man who carried out the CIA operation to overthrow the Arbenz government in Guatemala (see in the lengthy Wikipedia article “1954 Guatemala Coup d’etat”, section “PBSuccess” for references).

Haney, career CIA up to his ears in deep propaganda operations for his agency, advises the JFK research community that it is essential that such researchers go after Crichton. No actionable evidence provided, no statement in writing offered to a court or law enforcement investigative body or to the Congress of the American people, just a tip and a sayso mediated through the channels promoting the Lafitte datebook, from one “who knows” (supposedly).

So there you have it. A “look THERE and consume tons of energy and endless bandwidth of discussion looking THERE” direction to the JFK research community, direct from a veteran CIA professional propaganda and disinformation specialist as his job description, what he was paid to do in his career as his job. 

Michael K., thank you and (also to Donald Willis) I stand corrected. I found the Bowley HSCA interview to which you refer on the MFF site (https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=149247#relPageId=6), and there is a second reference to "church". Bowley in 1977 to HSCA:

"While awaiting the arrival of the police Bowley began to ask what had happened. He was told by someone on the scene that a man shot the officer and had run West on 10th Street toward the Church. When the police arrived on the scene Bowley gave a uniformed officer his name and where he could be reached..."

I do not believe Benavides saw the killer ejecting shells at the Abundant Life Temple, because of the witnesses telling of that happening at Tenth and Patton. But I accept that the word "church" is confirmed to have been heard by Poe and/or Jez and written up in their report, and my error. 

The Abundant Life Temple seems to have been something of a landmark in that neighborhood. Note the header of this document in a Dallas Police file using the Abundant Life Temple as a landmark for the neighborhood of the Tippit killing (page 75 of here, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-Gig-Pi9TEQZWh8obarl2tM8s8mOuLjc/view ).

"Re: Residents, Tenth Street, Oak Cliff, Dallas, Area of Tippitt [sic] Murder andmthe [sic] Abundant Life Temple . . .

Donald W., with one exception I'll let your responses stand as the last word and not pursue this further other than to say I stand by mine. The one point that does call for correction is this, where you say:

AND YOU YOURSELF HAVE OFFICER POE LYING ABOUT BENAVIDES TELLING HIM THAT HE SAW THE PERP RELOADING THE GUN AS HE RAN ACROSS THE CHURCH LAWN, A STATEMENT MADE ON THE DAY OF THE EVENT, NOT SEVERAL MONTHS LATER.

No I do not have officer Poe lying at all. I said, "The expected word modifying the lawn where Benavides found the hulls is “corner” lawn, not “church” lawn. This is well explained as an error from handwritten notes improperly transcribed."

There is a big difference between a mistake on the level of a miscopying, and "lying". Lying involves two elements: it is not simply saying something untruthful, but willfully doing so, consciously knowing it is untruthful. There must be intent, for any given untruth to be an act of "lying" as opposed to misspeaking by mistake not intentionally.

From the little I have read of Poe, such as the interview of Poe in Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt, Poe seems to have been a decent and honest officer. He did not backtrack dishonestly in his later accounts telling of the hulls abandoned in the yard of the Davis sisters-in-law corner house. I believe he spoke truthfully of the events of that day to the best of his ability. The reason he never spoke again of a "church" lawn is because that was a mistake from handwritten "corner" lawn. 

Mr. BELIN - You heard the shot and pulled in and then what? 
Mr. BENAVIDES - Then I ducked down. 
Mr. BELIN - Then what happened? 
Mr. BENAVIDES - Then I heard the other two shots and I looked up and the Policeman was in, he seemed like he kind of stumbled and fell. 
Mr. BELIN - Did you see the Policeman as he fell? 
Mr. BENAVIDES - Yes, sir. 
Mr. BELIN - What else did you see? 
Mr. BENAVIDES - Then I seen the man turn and walk back to the sidewalk and go on the sidewalk and he walked maybe 5 foot and then kind of stalled. He didn't exactly stop. And he threw one shell and must have took five or six more steps and threw the other shell up, and then he kind of stepped up to a pretty good trot going around the corner. 
Mr. BELIN - You saw the man going around the corner headed in what direction on what street? 
Mr. BENAVIDES - On Patton Street. He was going south. 

Mr. BALL. And what happened after that? 
Mr. POE. I talked to a Spanish man, but I don't remember his name. Dominique, I believe. 
Mr. BALL. Domingo Benavides? 
Mr. POE. I believe that is correct; yes, sir. 
Mr. BALL. What did he tell you? 
Mr. POE. He told me, give me the same, or similar description of the man, and told me he was running out across this lawn. He was unloading his pistol as he ran, and he picked the shells up. 
Mr. BALL. Domingo told you who was running across the lawn? 
Mr. POE. A man, white man. 
Mr. BALL. What was he doing? 
Mr. POE. He was unloading his pistol as he run. 
Mr. BALL. And what did he say? 
Mr. POE. He said he picked the two hulls up. 
Mr. BALL. Did he hand you the hulls? 
Mr. POE. Yes, sir.  

A last point: Acquilla Clemons spoke of the gunman and a second person shouting and gesturing to each other going in opposite directions, true, but she never had that second person with a second gun, i.e. a second gunman. And the story sounds suspiciously to me like Acquilla Clemons witnessing the known exchange between Callaway and the gunman on Patton--the shouting at each other, the gesturing, the physical descriptions of the two, Acquilla's hearing of one shouting to the other "go on!" compared to the last two words of Callaway shouting "what the hell's going on?", the two going in opposite directions, and Acquilla Clemons' vantage point standing at the NW corner of Tenth and Patton having line of sight south on Patton (that detail of where Acquilla Clemons was standing from witness Mary Little, newly reported by Myers in 2020 (https://jfkfiles.blogspot.com/2020/11/emory-austin-his-daughter-mary-and.html), although Bill Brown has objected to me that the Callaway/gunman exchange occurred too far south on Patton for Acquilla Clemons to have heard it. 

/EDIT 10/12/23. The last sentence has been edited to correctly read “heard” it, replacing incorrect “seen” it./

Probings in an attempt to crack why the Tippit notebook and clipboard went missing

What an interesting question Steve T. Joseph McBride, Into the Nightmare, pp. 258-59, says,

"Surely it [the clipboard] would have been an important piece of evidence to study for possible leads. Some (including Belin, who took Barnes' testimony) have said there is a photo of a man's head visible on the board in the police photo, and that Tippit could have been searching for that man, but close inspection of the photo shows that the shape is the clip itself, holding what appears to be an open notebook."

So there become two missing items, not one: the clipboard, and the notebook. McBride, 259, interviewed Leavelle, who was at the crime scene, who told him, "I didn't look at that [clipboard], and I didn't trace it".

According to McBride, Leavelle told him that "inspecting the car was Sergeant Barnes's job. Barnes told the commission that 'we never read his clipboard ... I couldn't tell you what was on the clipboard.' The clipboard, which was never brought forward as evidence, would have been considered part of the equipment of the car, Leavelle said, like the shotgun Tippit carried in it."

Say what?? Tippit's notebook would not have been considered "part of the equipment of the car". And even if the physical clipboard itself was, the papers on the clipboard would not have been. 

Yet those papers disappeared. 

After no Dallas Police investigating officer even was curious enough to take a look at the top page, just to, you know, see if there might be anything there that might be a lead on the murder. All those police, and nobody looked at that clipboard, which disappeared. 

That does not pass the smell test. I do not believe it--that no one looked at what was written on the top page of that clipboard, and that by a wholly unrelated coincidence those papers disappeared.

Some provisional and tentative analyses:

• the lack of curiosity to look at the top visible sheet, let alone all the sheets, of that clipboard, combined with the disappearance of all of those sheets, and Tippit's officer's notebook, from being preserved, does not sound like accident or incompetence but purposeful.
• Leavelle himself is the prime suspect for (a) looking at the top page--or the page of the notebook held open under the clip on top of the clipboard if that is the way Tippit had it in the moments before his death; (b) saw something deemed inappropriate to become part of the public record in the investigation of the murder of a fellow officer; and (c) withheld or diverted it from any other officer seeing it.

What might have been written there that would account for that response?

A name of a woman?

Or just a street address, such as the street address of a house in front of which Tippit may have pulled over to meet someone who was waiting for him on the sidewalk?

Sometimes one loose thread can clear up another loose thread, such that in the calculus of loose threads of cases, 1 + 1 can sometimes = 0, instead of 2.

In the present case, there are two other loose threads: one is a known coverup (or else sophisticated attempt to feign one), reported by Myers of high-level knowledge that there was another officer witness, name not disclosed, present at the Tippit crime scene, as a witness to the Tippit killer, who was there supposedly having an affair with a married woman. At high levels (internal to Dallas law enforcement) that was covered up so as to protect the married woman's good name, supposedly (the alleged reason told to Myers for covering up this incendiary information and highly improper failure to report if true). This coverup is not speculated, it is reported by Myers attributed to a high-level anonymous witness the identity of which Myers has never revealed.

The second loose end is the anonymous waitress at Austin's Bar B Q, where Johnnie Witherspoon, with whom Tippit had had an affair, also worked, in the anonymous waitress's filmed interview in Shattered Friday. She said Witherspoon lived on 10th Street near where Tippit was killed. That apparently was not actually true, however that waitress who worked in the same circles and knew the gossip thought it was true. Officer Tilson, one of the officers of Tippit's station, in later years told Myers he heard that from other officers and believed it, but was not speaking from personal knowledge. There are more interviews and information on the Tippit-Witherspoon saga in McBride's book than Myers'. Austin's owner, Austin Cook, told McBride, "I've heard that she lived over close to where he was [when] Oswald killed him, but I don't know". Johnnie Witherspoon told McBride that in November 1963 that "she was indeed living in Oak Cliff, but she was evasive about the address: 'It wasn't twenty miles away. Probably three to five miles. I never lived on Tenth Street or even close ... I never lived on Tenth and not within three miles, four miles, or five miles ... people have vivid imaginations" (Into the Nightmare, 292). 

Let's assume (as I do assume as most likely) that the truth is as Johnnie said, and the gossip that she lived on Tenth was not correct (certainly neither city directory information nor direct witness has ever confirmed that gossip), and that the gossip that she did live on Tenth stemmed from some urban-legend genre of story that went viral.

Leavelle himself, not as speculation but confessed fact in his own words, covered up the Tippit-Witherspoon affair, even though it came out later. The fact of the affair is completely established, such that Myers, friend of and sympathetic to the family, in his book does not dispute that there was an affair, but tells it in the most sympathetic and sensitive way possible to Mrs. Tippit, even to the point of denying unconvincingly what is pretty likely a second fact, that the Tippit-Witherspoon affair produced a child.

But back to Leavelle. McBride asked Leavelle "if he had heard the rumors about Tippit and his mistress in 1963". Leavelle's answer to McBride: "We knew about it but didn't put it out ... it was known by some of his close friends, but it wasn't known department-wise. I talked to the girl. She didn't deny it. Who gives a sh-it? It's his business, it's her business" (p. 290).

That coverup on Leavelle's part is acknowledged fact, but it also may have had nothing to do with the Tippit murder case. But the second coverup, the one reported by Myers of an officer present at the Tippit crime scene and a witness, in an affair with a different married woman, definitely has to do with the Tippit murder case, and also was covered up. By who? Myers isn't saying to the present day, even though he knows who told him. To that extent Myers, although he did not create the coverup, is now accessory to that coverup, perhaps valuing keeping his word to someone who may now be dead, over disclosing that particular information in the interests of history.

Who was Myers' secret source? Well, absent disclosure from Myers it may never be known, but I will say who I think is the most likely suspect: it sounds to me a lot like Leavelle (who is now dead). It all fits very well with Leavelle, as someone who would be in a position to know; he was interviewed by Myers as a named source on other things; Leavelle has a track record of covering up exactly this genre of secret; and even the language reported by Myers of his source sounds to me a little like the way Leavelle would talk and explain things (Myers, With Malice, 2013 edn, 374). Perhaps anticipating this very focus of suspicion as to the identity of the source, Myers adds in his footnote (note 1125) this denial that it was Leavelle, from Leavelle: "Jim Leavelle, the former homicide detective who led the investigation into Tippit's death, reported in 1996 that he was unaware of the story." I do not see Myers taking a personal position in his book on whether he believes that denial. There it stands. I don't think Leavelle's denial bears significant weight, given that that is what would be expected of him if Leavelle was the source (and I don't think Leavelle was above prevarication).  

But to conjecture how these threads might be drawn together--

I suspect what was on that Tippit clipboard and/or notebook was a street address at or near the location where Tippit was killed, with or without accompanying written information. It may not have been clear to whoever saw that clipboard why Tippit would have the address where he was killed written down on a clipboard or in his notebook prior to his being killed there. If Leavelle saw that--and perhaps it is plausible he indeed may have been the first, and in this case also the last, to look at and take possession of that notebook?--Leavelle might not himself know for sure why that address was there, but he might have suspected or figured that it might have to do with a woman even if it was unclear from what Tippit wrote, if Tippit's womanizing was otherwise known to Leavelle unrelated to the Tippit killing. If Leavelle suspected that was in the background of Tippit's stop that day it would be very much in keeping with officers' loyalty, and consideration to Tippit's bereaved family, et al, to just mercifully (as Leavelle might self-interpret it) not "go there".

Leavelle, responsible for at least one, and I think very possibly both, of the two coverups related above, then, for the good of the family, the late officer Tippit's own reputation, and that of the Dallas Police Department in the national spotlight over the JFK assassination, simply saw to it that the clipboard and notebook never were turned in as evidence and not seen again.

And although I suspect what was on the Tippit clipboard was a 10th Street address where he was killed, I do not assume that necessarily involved womanizing in this instance (even if someone seeing Tippit's notebook and clipboard might not know one way or the other).

On other grounds, I believe the circumstances of Tippit's killing are well argued to be Tippit was lured into an ambush there at Tenth and Patton where he was killed in a professional killing, by a killer there waiting for Tippit's arrival at a particular time, accounting for the back and forth on the sidewalk when the killer saw Tippit's car arriving and flagged Tippit down, not vice versa as commonly supposed. 

That's my attempt to make sense of the missing clipboard and notebook of Tippit, on the basis of highly incomplete information. 

Donald Willis, I looked up the Nov 22, 1963 report of Poe and Jez to Curry. Where it reads that the person corresponding to Benavides at the scene of the crime handed two shell hulls to Poe telling him those were the bullets that had killed Tippit (known because Benavides witnessed the killing?), and that the killer “reloaded as he ran across the church lawn”, I believe that is a mistake for “corner” lawn.

Rather than an elaborate reconstruction of suborned perjury from at least four civilian witnesses plus an officer too, plus a doppelgänger killer lookalike with same kind of jacket running for the purpose of drawing witnesses’ attention on a different escape path. You have both Davis sisters at the corner house and Benavides and officer Poe conspiring to lie about the killer ejecting the hulls at the Davis’s corner lot.

And that is not counting witness Acquila Clemons who said she saw the gunman “unloading and reloading” as he left the scene, just as all the other witnesses said whom you reconstruct were all lying about it. 

You have Benavides chasing the killer on foot to Crawford to the church there, losing the killer but finding the hulls there, then returning to the scene with them, against the testimony of himself in his WC testimony, Virginia and Barbara Davis, officer Poe, and Acquila Clemons, and no other corroboration for the church location than that sole “church” word in the Nov 22 Poe and Jez report. 

The expected word modifying the lawn where Benavides found the hulls is “corner” lawn, not “church” lawn. 

This is well explained as an error from handwritten notes improperly transcribed.

In that same document the name of Helen Markham is mistakenly reported as “Helen Marsalle”. That is well explained in terms of handwritten notes improperly transcribed. As in the one case, so the other.

Furthermore two more shell hulls were later found by others at the Davis house yard, the same place Benavides found the first two.

When Croy reported that a distraught Helen Markham said the killer had gone off with Tippit’s gun in a cab, you interpret that as Scoggins running down the alley after the killer. But the taking of the Tippit gun and driving away in Scoggins’ cab by Scoggins and Callaway is known, and therefore that is the reference of Helen Markham, not a separate running of Scoggins with Tippit’s revolver down the alley.

It is possible that some of the earliest claims that the killer ran down the alley, which must be mistaken due to the witnesses establishing the gunman’s path on Jefferson, could be mistaking a witness or someone else going into that alley (your original insight I think), but that would not be Scoggins who never told of doing that.

I have come to a working litmus test for ruling out nonstarter theories: any theory that requires subornation of perjury of civilian witnesses, as opposed to witnesses mistaken or lying or fabricating for their own reasons, is by definition probably wrong, though theoretically possible in any given individual instance if a threshold of evidence were met. But any theory which requires multiple and coordinated proliferation of civilian witnesses suborned to perjury becomes improbable to the vanishing point, and would require truly extraordinary evidence to merit pursuit (such as a credible whistleblower coming forward with evidence telling of the specific supposed organized subornation to perjury of civilians).

Andrej, may I ask three questions?

(1) in Darnell there is a man standing between (viewer’s perspective) Prayer Man and Frazier, but lower. He appears balding but with hair around his ears, a little heavyset. Could you say who you think that man is? (And the match if any in Altgens6)

(2) I viewed your video again. I do not understand one thing. In the video you have the hair of Sarah Stanton behind Lovelady’s head but in front of the long necktie man, LNM (your Shelley). You say at one point that part of LNM’s head in back is interfered with or covered over a little by a part of Stanton behind Lovelady’s left ear but in front of LNM (your Shelley), indicating she is between Lovelady and LNM, in front of LNM, from the angle of the camera. But here in your post just now you speak of Stanton being behind LNM (your Shelley). I don’t understand— Is that a typo or is that a correction or change in your interpretation since the video was made?

7 hours ago, Andrej Stancak said:

It took me a while to figure out that Sanders's hair can be seen behind Bill Shelley (the man in dark suit in the centre of the doorway), until Sander's photograph and reports of her body height were made public. With her thick blonde hair, Sanders (5'6'' - 5'7''), was taller than Bill Shelley (5'6'') and therefore, the white blob above the dark strip of Shelley's hair can be seen both in Darnell and Shelley.

(3) In Darnell to the left of Frazier, viewer’s right, is a large-framed figure I call Large-Framed Figure, LFF (your Molina in your video). I agree if it were established that LFF is wearing a necktie that would rule out LFF being Sarah Stanton, a woman, but I am doubtful there is a necktie there (you refer to the necktie as speculative). Could you explain any other reasons, if so, why you regard LFF as ruled out (excluded) for being Sarah Stanton, who Frazier said was standing next to him to his left? Doesn’t the very size of LFF alone suggest Sarah Stanton? And LFF is where Frazier says she was, also where Pauline Sanders says she was (next to her to her right)?

Thanks, and thanks for all of your labor and work on these photos and analyses. 

20 hours ago, David Von Pein said:

Greg,

I think your made-up scenario of Oswald going back into the TSBD after the shooting is totally ludicrous. You've got him going up and down stairs and then out the back door for no really good reason (IMO).

Via your scenario, Oswald was ALREADY OUTSIDE THE BUILDING (on the steps, I assume? Or do you have him INSIDE the building, on the 1st floor, at 12:30? You seem to imply that it could have been either). But in either case, why would he possibly want to take a circuitous UP-AND-DOWN route via the two staircases just in order to get outside?! It's incredibly silly.

It's especially ridiculous from the standpoint of Oswald being INVOLVED (in at least SOME peripheral fashion) in a plot to kill JFK, because via such an involvement, Oswald would have no doubt wanted to get away from the scene of the crime as fast as he could....and since he was ALREADY OUTSIDE (if you think he is Prayer Man) or (alternatively) very near the FRONT DOOR on the 1st floor (if you think he took the SE stairs, which are practically right next to the FRONT entrance)....then why the heck wouldn't he just walk out the FRONT DOOR?

Plus, via your scenario, going back INTO the building itself (via the Prayer Man theory) would be mighty risky from LHO's POV too, because he would certainly have to think that the whole building was going to be sealed off very quickly after the shooting by the police (and it was, at about 12:37). So why would he have the slightest desire to go back into the building at all?

And I can't see why he would feel that leaving via the front entrance and being seen by somebody would look any worse (or be any more suspicious) than leaving by the back door. In fact, I can easily argue the opposite---that leaving by the BACK DOOR would look way more "suspicious" to anyone who might catch a glimpse of him than simply walking out the front door and exiting Dealey Plaza.

Sneaking out the back way is always a little more "fishy"-looking to most people, isn't it? In fact, aren't there many CTers who DO believe that one or more of the "real killers" of Kennedy did, indeed, sneak out the back door of the loading dock in order to make their getaway on 11/22?

I'd advise you to try again, Greg. Because your scenario of having Oswald going up and down the various stairs just in order to get out of the building is just laughable.

But, Greg, I do appreciate all the time and effort you have been putting into your very well-written posts in this thread over the last few days. I've enjoyed reading them. But this latest bit about Oswald's totally superfluous post-assassination escapade within the Book Depository is just not the slightest bit believable (IMO) and, frankly, reeks of CTer desperation.

You ask why would Oswald go back in the building to go up one floor, over, and back down at the NW to then exit by the rear. If he already was outside, why not just walk down the front steps and go, if exit was his objective? (under the scenario of if he was Prayer Man, understanding you are not endorsing that, nor for the record am I with certainty)

Nothing wrong with the question David, but before going into mockery mode, consider being a little slower to leap to closure. Per hypothesis (stay with me a moment on this), imagine a frightened, yet at the same time controlled, Oswald hearing the shooting, believing that something was terribly wrong, even suspecting his own life could be in immediate danger, deciding to make an evasive exit and not be tracked in the process. 

Why would such a person possibly want to go back in the building and to the rear of the building rather than leave by the front where he already was? (Those are the only two options for leaving.) 

Just can’t imagine any possible reason above mockery level why someone might go back in first before leaving?

I don’t know why, but I can imagine several non-laughable possibilities.

Maybe he wanted to get his jacket—the gray (that’s the g-r-a-y) jacket described by Buell Frazier as what Oswald wore that morning, which was never found at the TSBD?

Or how about something so mundane as he needed to take a leak or wanted a last pit stop in a restroom.

Or, I don’t know, was there something in a jacket pocket he did not want to leave behind? Or something to do with hiding curtain rods he had brought where they wouldn’t be discovered until he chose to do so in exercise of an alibi? 

Or, perhaps he wanted to step in a restroom just long enough to take off his light-colored, button-down collar maroon shirt, stuff it down the front of his pants, rebuckle his belt, and leave in only a white T-shirt under his jacket. Lest that be considered an outlandish conjecture as to intention, I see no better way to interpret Mrs. Reid’s testimony, which I regard as credible, than that Oswald in fact did exactly that after his encounter with Baker. (Trivia note here, not sure if it means anything, but the Warren Report reconstructed some half minute or so gap in time after Baker left Oswald to the time Oswald walked out past Mrs. Reid.) 

Or, suppose he knew or suspected he was being watched there in the front, perhaps in association with a prearranged getaway vehicle which Oswald’s instincts kicked in to now avoid and evade at all costs. And he wants to go out the back sight unseen to “them”, and chooses his strange means of getting there so as to be less easily tracked inside the building by one of “them” coming in after him specifically. And it is not even necessary that that fear actually have been true, only sufficient uncertainty in Oswald’s mind that he thought there was a risk of that being true.

Any of these factors could prompt Oswald to go back to the domino room where his gray jacket was, and restrooms, at the rear of the building on the first floor, before leaving the TSBD and making an evasive exit. 

And add to that this, going beyond conjecture to arguably probable fact: that Oswald probably did in fact leave by the rear even after he was at the inside front of the building, following the Baker encounter, as witnessed by Pierce Allman near the front doors. The argument for a rear exit in fact of Oswald seems to me strong: no evidence whatever for Oswald leaving at the front despite many cameras and TSBD witnesses out front at least one of which might be expected to have seen him if so. That in itself is a stand-alone argument of some weight in favor of the default only other possibility, exit out the rear. But in this case there is also a witness, Frazier, telling of seeing Oswald’s exit which came from the rear. Frazier did not tell of that originally, true, but I judge it more likely that Frazier was belatedly telling truthful testimony on that than that he later decided to fabricate that for no reason I can think of. 

The point is Oswald did, per good argument, go out the back, taking his gray—as in g-r-a-y—jacket with him, even when he could have gone out more quickly from the front. Therefore it is reasonable that he would intend to go to the domino room and then out the back from there originally in the moments following the shots.

In that light the only remaining question would be, if a domino room and rear exit was intended, why go up the one floor and back down again by the opposite stairwell, as means of getting to the back, instead of walking back on the ground floor. 

Perhaps it was a feint for deflection purposes if anyone was asked “where did he go?” “I saw him go up those SE stairs right there”. Again, Oswald actually did exactly that genre of feint some minutes later, when he purposely stood at a bus stop going north in front of his rooming house on Beckley, the opposite direction of his destination the Texas Theatre to the south—the northbound bus stop where he knew housekeeper Earlene would look and see him and if she were asked which way he left, would point questioners in the opposite direction from the way he really went. 

None of this proves the scenario true as such, but rather goes to the issue of your claim of implausibilities. 

4 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

Thanks. Can you show us LFF again? And from multiple angles? (Or is there only one angle?) 

Pat I have trouble posting images, and I am only going from the standard Darnell and Wiegman photos which are commonly posted, can be found on "Google Images" search "JFK Prayer Man", or on Bart Kamp's site under "Wiegman", "Darnell", etc. LFF does not appear in Altgens6 because Altgens6 from the angle of that camera shows only a straight shot through to the NE corner and east wall (with depth perception illusion issues to the viewer, e.g. Lovelady). LFF does appear in Wiegman and most clearly in Darnell. The angles of Wiegman and Darnell are a little different but not too much.

6 hours ago, Roger Odisio said:

Thanks for this more complete version of your story of the Baker-Oswald 2nd floor encounter, Greg, than the one in your earlier post. 

 

I said about your previous post that it would have been helpful for you to provide a context for your story to make clear you are *not* endorsing the WR version of Oswald coming *down* the steps after murdering JFK. But rather an entirely different story of Oswald going *up* the steps after the murder.

 

As I recall In your earlier post you merely asserted you were sure Oswald did encounter Baker on the second floor, without making that distinction 

 

Which supports the idea that Oswald did not shoot JFK from the 6th floor, regardless of whether or not he was Prayerman.  IOW, Bart's assertion that the *WR version* never happened is supported by your story.

 

I am left with the question as to why you think it is important to understand or accept your version of the encounter once it is clear Oswald did not shoot anybody from the 6th floor. You have poured a lot of energy into your story.  Do you think it useful because it is a detail that provides another nail in the WR coffin?

No, not motivated concerning regarding the Baker/Oswald encounter on the 2nd floor as a fact by any reason other than to me it is a fact that it happened as a starting point, because it is a fact.

How to interpret that fact--and how Oswald got there--and why Oswald would be going from inside to outside that door (and not vice versa as in the WR reconstruction) which I regard as a second fact--then needs to be interpreted, and of course interpretations of a fact can be wrong without changing that the fact being interpreted is right. 

The second-floor encounter with Baker is established as fact because of the testimony of three separate credible witnesses: Baker, Truly, and Mrs. Reid--and Mrs. Reid's testimony is highly credible from practically the first hour on that (she was a competent supervisor and professional woman and talked about it to coworkers that same afternoon, not simply the next morning on the phone), and her testimony is not impeached by Geneva Hine who is also credible--neither of those two women were lying and it is simply a matter of reconciling their testimonies which is done by Geneva Hine returning to her working area slightly after Oswald had walked by Mrs. Reid, who returned from the front steps slightly before the rest of her coworker women.

I believe it is a mistake to imagine complex scenarios in which two civilian witnesses and a low-level working police officer were all suborned to perjury in coordination with one another as some grand conspiracy-within-a-conspiracy by unseen never-identified handlers coordinating the thing including three sophisticated subornations to perjury.  All I can say is what I think, which is that isn't plausible to me, not how things worked. 

(I am not sure there is a single verified case of direct subornation to perjury in the classic sense of scripting a civilian witness to say a false story, in the entire WC record, which would be extremely serious with legal jeopardy if that ever were to come out in any proven form. I am not talking about tampering with documents or physical evidence, or indirect forms of manipulation, but classic overt direct subornation of perjury in the form of fabrication of a story to be told by a witness under oath, as must be supposed in not one but three cases in harmony with one another in the notion that the second-floor lunchroom encounter never happened--coordinated and accomplished within the space of hours, with not a word leaking out later from any of the suborned witnesses in the decades after, I don't buy it.)

As a distinct issue from whether the Baker/Oswald second-floor encounter is true, I do not think it is helpful to the argument that Prayer Man might have been Oswald to set up a perceived or claimed linkage of the two things. It is not necessary to the case for Prayer Man as Oswald. And it is counterproductive to the case for Prayer Man as Oswald to link it with something that virtually no professional investigator would find convincing.

It is a theory based on citing some discrepancies, I believe at the outset motivated by a perceived contradiction to the Prayer Man Oswald idea, and so a theory was built up of suborned witnesses and rapid development of a false and fabricated story in place by the second day. But it doesn't make sense on plausibility grounds and the requirement to assume unseen handlers micro-managing multiple created and elaborately scripted suborned perjuries, by three witnesses repeatedly under oath, with no evidence of such subornation coming to light then or since.

I see repeatedly claimed that the encounter does not appear in Baker's initial statement, when he clearly did tell of it--he just mistakenly had it happen on "the third or fourth floor" instead of the second. (There is an overstatement of weight compared to Oswald's by ca. 30 pounds which is a little off, but it is more likely that has some explanation (such as simple mistake) other than that Baker was describing some different person somewhere else in the building.) Based on that easy error of which floor, elaborate theories have been developed of a mysterious fourth-floor suspect other than Oswald, when there never was any fourth-floor Baker encounter at gunpoint with another suspect. That was nothing other than what soon became clear was the encounter with Oswald on the second floor. 

And it is commonly claimed Baker never said anything about seeing Oswald in the same room when he was writing out his statement, but he did according to witnesses (and that he did not write in his statement that Oswald was there in the room is best understood in terms of some mundane explanation). 

And the news reports of Ochus Campbell telling of TSBD people having seen Oswald in a storage room on the first floor, either is an inaccurate hearsay report Campbell passed on of the second-floor encounter, or it could be something else, but it does not mean there was no second-floor encounter told by Baker, Truly, and Mrs. Reid. 

It happens that the first fact, of the second-floor Baker/Oswald encounter, is an argument with some weight toward Oswald's innocence for reasons which have long been noted: Oswald was not out of breath according to Baker and Truly; the timing issues (Barry Ernest's work and others); the lack of anyone seeing or hearing Oswald run down the noisy stairs, and so on. Whether that is or is not decisive, there is a second fact which may be: the pneumatic door and angles of vision of Baker meaning Oswald did not go in the door from the stairway as the WR said, but rather was about to go out but did not go out, seen by Baker who followed Oswald back in and accosted him at gunpoint because it looked suspicious. (For the argument establishing what I regard as the second fact that Oswald was coming out, not in, to the second floor area at that door to the NW stairwell, see pages 66-69 of here: https://www.scrollery.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/T-Jackets-112.pdf.) 

But that second fact--that Oswald cannot have gone in the door from the NW stairwell--destroys the stairway descent idea of Oswald from the 6th floor. I suppose it does not alone categorically prove Oswald's innocence in that, hypothetically, he might still have gotten down to the second floor from the sixth by one of the freight elevators, but no one has claimed that to my knowledge. Unless some scenario of a freight elevator down to the second floor is invoked and shown plausible in a way that the Warren Commission never considered, Oswald didn't come down from above to the second floor where Baker accosted him at all. He either was already there on the second floor or he came up from below from the first in agreement with his claims under interrogation, and either of those exculpates Oswald as the shooter.

(As also the NAA analysis of the paraffin casts and Oswald's mediocre skill in shooting combined with absolute lack of prior practice shooting, even if the rifle on the sixth floor was the rifle which had been in Oswald's possession until Nov 11.)

(I separately think I have established as another fact that Oswald removed that rifle from the Ruth Paine garage on Nov 11 for the apparent purpose of prepping the rifle for a conveyance, and there is no evidence the rifle was returned to that garage or in Oswald's possession after Nov 11 apart from the curtain rod/bag argument which is insubstantial on that point on other grounds. See my papers on the Furniture Mart and the Irving Sport Shop--the second in particular on the Irving Sport Shop--at https://www.scrollery.com/?page_id=1581.)

Barry Ernest brings out additional indications that the Baker/Oswald second-floor encounter was discussed immediately the afternoon of Nov 22, and not a creation of the next day, at: https://thegirlonthestairs.wordpress.com/2021/03/29/the-lunchroom-encounter/. 

How I look at it anyway, thanks for your comments all along Roger. 

1 minute ago, Pat Speer said:

So here's a third version, where Stanton is at the front of the top step. I naively thought there was a consensus on Stanton's location, and that I was missing something. That's fine, maybe it will get there. 

I envision, however, a "debate" or some such thing where CT A says "We know Prayer Person couldn't be any other TSBD employee because they have all been accounted for" and LN A counters with "Well, okay, where's Sarah Stanton?" CT A then points out where he/she thinks she was which then leads LN A to say "Interesting, because CT B says she was here and CT C says she was there. Why should we trust any of you?" 

Do you see what I'm getting at? It's a problem. To a skeptic, Prayer Person can only be Oswald once everyone else on the stairs has been eliminated, and not everyone else has been eliminated.

To be clear, I was looking through Bart's book and saw that he's eliminated Stanton by claiming she's down a couple of steps. Can we at least agree this was a mistake? 

Correct, there has been no consensus on Sarah Stanton's location, and to my knowledge my identification of Sarah Stanton as Large-Framed Figure to the left of Frazier in Darnell is (I find this hard to believe but it seems to be so) new. 

I believe Bart erred on his Sarah Stanton identification, yes.

And I believe Stancak is mistaken in supposing Sarah Stanton could be standing just behind Large-Framed Figure on the top level of the steps. That can be refuted now: First, the top landing was only 3'9" deep from the walls. I doubt that Saran Stanton of her size would be comfortable standing behind someone compressed into 3'9" total space, if it were not forced on her. Second, although Stancak sees some trace of something behind Large-Framed Figure I am not convinced it is anything. However I will defer to photo interpretation experts on that. If there is a human being behind LFF, I would be looking at someone like Roy Lewis behind Sarah Stanton, if anyone. And third, Large-Framed Figure herself as Sarah Stanton is right there, the elephant in the room (that is not meant as an unkind pun on Mrs. Stanton), the obvious identification of Sarah Stanton--looks like her, is one of the few if not only TSBD employee of a matching size to LFF, and is exactly where Buell Frazier said she was, immediately to his left.

Stancak has LFF as Shelley, but Shelley is established as having left the steps by Darnell, with Lovelady running west as verified in the Crouch film. 

The issue is not whether there is disagreement over where Sarah Stanton is, but which if any identification is actually correct. That goes to judgment of evidence, not anything else. 

Comments on photo identifications

The identifications of D as Madie Reese, F as Billy Lovelady, and G as Carl Jones are solid (correct and no question). 

C is clearly mistakenly labeled. C is clearly Ruth Dean, as can be seen from striking match to a photo of Ruth Dean in a crowd photo later the same day with her distinctive black hat and black coat, see at the "Ruth Dean" page at Bart Kamp's site. C is therefore not Sarah Stanton because C is Ruth Dean, no question C is Ruth Dean.

The identification of E in Altgens6, "long necktie man", and E in Wiegman, as Shelley, I believe is wrong. The analysis to follow of the men and arms shading their eyes from the sun is a little less certain than the four identifications above but here is what I see there.

E in Altgens6 (long necktie man) is Joe Molina, who appears in Darnell as a man standing in the middle of that photo who is bald with hair at the side of his ear, heavyset. That man in Darnell must be Molina--from the bald top combined with hair at the ears matching Molina photos, plus heavyset, plus I am aware of no other identification of that man standing in Darnell, and that man is compatible in position with long necktie man in Altgens6. Therefore that man in Darnell who appears to be Molina is the heavyset long-necktie man in Altgens6 who also appears to be Molina. Molina said he left the steps after the shots to go in the direction of the Grassy Knoll, but Darnell has him still on the steps meaning he has not yet left the steps at the time of Darnell. A slight delay on Molina's part before leaving the steps may be indicated from Molina himself who said after the shots he looked around before leaving the steps.  

I do not believe E in Wiegman, a rather large and wide figure, is the same as labeled E in Altgens6 (long-necktie man Molina). I believe that large and wide figure, E in Wiegman, is the same as what I call Large-Framed Figure (LFF) of Darnell, the very wide-girthed figure standing at the top of the steps to the left of Buell Frazier. I believe that is clearly and decisively Sarah Stanton based on both physical appearance (Stanton being highly, not just a little, obese at the time), and exact match to where Frazier said Stanton was (immediately to his left and he spoke with her back and forth to his left), and further corroborated by Pauline Sanders located at the far east end who said Sarah Stanton was next to her on her right.

I conclude that not just Frazier but both Frazier and Large-Framed Figure, Sarah Stanton, to Frazier's left, are missing in Altgens6, because of the camera angle. They were on the top steps and would be off to the viewer's left of the visible figures in Altgens6 but do not appear in Altgens6. Neither of them are missing in the blackness in Altgens6, they are not in Altgens6 at all.

In Darnell what can look illusorily like a trace of the top of a necktie on Large-Framed Figure (Sarah Stanton) is actually the top of the head--dark hair--above the arm of the man in front of Stanton. Stanton is wearing a dress all of the same color up to her neckline, and there is no necktie on her. One can see another part of Sarah Stanton's dress--and her wide girth--from her left side showing below the raised right arm of the man in front of her in Darnell.

In Altgens6 there is a face behind ("beyond") both Lovelady and Molina from the perspective of the camera, just to the viewer's right of Lovelady's left ear. That very well may be Pauline Sanders at the east end of the top level, or one step below the top whichever it was, but she was against the east wall. 

I believe B is mistakenly labeled, and is not Otis Williams. Instead I believe A is Otis Williams. In Altgens6 A is against the east wall, and that agrees with where Otis Williams said he was: "I was standing on the top step against the railing on the east side of the steps in front of the building. I do not recall who was standing at either side of me but I do know that Mrs. Pauline Sanders ... viewed the motorcade" [his FBI statement, 3/19/64]).

Otis Williams as A in Altgens6 I interpret as has his neck and face up to about his mouth in the light, but from the mouth up the rest of his face cannot be seen because in shadow.  

B I believe is William Shelley, with his right elbow from his right arm shielding his eyes facing the camera of Altgens6, in front of (from perspective of camera of Altgens6, i.e. west of) Otis Williams, A. 

In some photos I believe I see a sliver of the left side of the face of Shelley, sort of even recognizable as Shelley, to the viewer's right of his right arm held up to his forehead.

Shelley is visible as B in both Altgens6 and Wiegman, but is not in Darnell because he and Lovelady had taken off running west, and have been identified running together in the Crouch film (one of the running figures in Crouch I see as distinctively looking like Lovelady which confirms the correctness of that to me). Neither Lovelady nor Shelley would be expected to be in Darnell, therefore, and neither are.

A final detail: in Altgens6 I believe there may be a part of the right side of the head of another person to the viewer's left of B, Shelley's, right arm. That person is behind (from the perspective of the Altgens6 camera, that is east of) B, Shelley, but in front of (that is, west of) A, Otis Williams. That part of a head cannot be the right side of Shelley's face because it is too high and too wide to be part of Shelley's head. Though the photos are too faint for any certainty, that left part of some figure's head looks dark and I wonder if that might possibly be the otherwise-unlocated African-American Roy Williams, with possibly darker color of skin and Afro hair there. But that is just conjecture, it could be someone else too.   

1 minute ago, David Von Pein said:

Plus: Can anyone who believes that Oswald is the "Prayer Man" figure really and truly also believe that Oswald then decided he wanted to immediately go back into the TSBD Building and dash up to the second-floor lunchroom to buy a Coke within seconds of JFK being shot out on Elm Street in front of the building?

That scenario of Oswald being Prayer Man and then immediately having a burning desire to go get a Coca-Cola on the second floor is a very loony scenario, if you ask me. 

I agree that is a loony scenario, but that is not my scenario. You are setting up a straw man, then mocking the straw man. The scenario I am talking about is he did go up to the second floor and met Baker ca. 90 seconds after the shots; he did buy a coke there after that confrontation; but he did not go there for the purpose of buying a coke.

The scenario: he went from the ground floor up the SE stairs to the second floor, walked across the second floor with intent to go out the doors to the NW stairwell and back down the NW stairs again to exit by the rear. He did not succeed in that objective because as he got to the NW door and looked out, Baker coming up the NW stairs saw him. Oswald backed up immediately, but that looked suspicious to Baker who followed him in and drew a gun on him. 

Oswald's purpose in going to the second floor following the shots had nothing to do with wanting to buy a coke, even though that is what he did there after the Baker encounter.

Please don't set up straw men, then lampoon straw men. 

There is nothing unreasonable about Oswald going up to the second floor before the assassination to buy a coke to have with his lunch (as he said he he did)--since that was routine procedure he had done many times before. Other 1st floor domino room employees did the same thing, including at least one other that very day. 

Mr. BALL - What did you do after you went down and washed up; what did you do? 
Mr. LOVELADY - Well, I went over and got my lunch and went upstairs and got a coke and come on back down. 
Mr. BALL - Upstairs on what floor? 
Mr. LOVELADY - That's on the second floor; so, I started going to the domino room where I generally went in to set down and eat and nobody was there and I happened to look on the outside and Mr. Shelley was standing outside with Miss Sarah Stanton, I believe her name is, and I said, "Well, I'll go out there and talk with them, sit down and eat my lunch out there, set on the steps," so I went out there.  

Oswald's statements to Fritz and co. concerning going up to get a coke for his lunch during lunch time, before the assassination, are not much different than Lovelady's, and not unreasonable.

And we know Oswald was acting evasively following the shots, as a fact. There is the timing and manner of leaving TSBD itself; the cab (unusual for Oswald); the having the cab let him off blocks south on Beckley from where he lived concealing his address from the cabbie; the hurried complete change of clothing and colors of clothing--pants, shirt, and jacket--at the rooming house; the picking up of the firearm at the rooming house (not characteristic of Oswald to carry). Those are known signs of evasive action to which more specifics could be added.

Why he acted evasively following the assassination--with no money on him, no getaway car, no revolver--can be argued, but not that he acted evasively.

Therefore IF Oswald was on the first floor at the time of the shots (whether or not he was Prayer Man), THEN that method of intended exit from the TSBD I have described--in a manner designed to attract the least notice, less noticeable than walking out the front door or from the front door area through mobs of people and TSBD employees who would see him leaving, would be in keeping with his known behavior--of wanting to exit TSBD and to do so with the least attention drawn to himself.

And in the event, he arguably did exit from the rear--even after his original intent to do so by means of up one floor at SE, over on 2nd, down one floor at NW and out the back, was thwarted by the Baker encounter--the argument for that being there are zero witnesses or photographs having Oswald exit from the front, as opposed to one credible witness having him exit from the rear (Frazier).

Therefore all factors of why Oswald would have been where he was in that Baker encounter, with nothing to do with his actual purpose that time being to get a coke, are supported by known Oswald behavior, in terms of a scenario in which he was on the first floor at the time of the shots (his claimed alibi).

And his purchase of the second coke becomes an opportunistic act following the Baker encounter as his "innocent explanation" of why he was there when confronted by the officer, and becomes sensible (instead of telling the officer pointing a gun at him just after a president has been shot: "excuse me, I was just trying to leave the building in a hurry"). 

I have explained my reasons and argument on this scenario many times, not just earlier in the present thread, including in the paper that you publicly mocked and name-called without reading it or knowing its argument, my paper on the jackets (https://www.scrollery.com/?p=1553), where I set out the argument for this scenario in detail.  

It would help if you addressed others' positions as they are, not red herrings and straw men. Please try to be more careful in the future.

27 minutes ago, David Von Pein said:

Yes, I do. And that's because this chronology....

1. Coke/Lunchroom Encounter with Officer Baker.

2. Down to 1st floor to have lunch.

3. Then outside with Bill Shelley.

....is confirmed (or at least it is present and exists) in THREE different places within the reports or notes written by the various officials:

1. Captain Fritz' notes --- HERE.

2. James Bookhout's solo 11/22/63 FBI report --- HERE.

3. James Hosty's recently-discovered notes --- HERE. (Although in Hosty's notes, he doesn't say anything about "Shelley". He, instead, says Oswald went outside to watch the "P. Parade". But, IMO, Hosty is, in effect, conflating "Shelley" and "P. Parade".)

And as "absurd" as it might be to think that anyone would want to go and eat his lunch after having such an encounter with a police officer (at gunpoint) and after discovering that the President had just been shot right outside the front door of your workplace, we also have to realize that such a chronology was being provided by the person to whom all of the evidence in the assassination leads---Lee H. Oswald.

In other words, Oswald's absurd and crazy chronology was all just one big fat lie being told by the actual assassin of President Kennedy.

David, Oswald did not claim to start eating lunch after the assassination. That is ridiculous and counterindicated by Fritz's and Hosty's interrogation reports. It is as if you latch on to that confused report of Bookhout like a fundamentalist citing inerrant scripture, no matter that all other reports and common sense tell you that Oswald told of his lunch occurring during his lunchtime.  

You then cite Hosty's notes in support when they say the very opposite of what you claim. Hosty's notes of what Oswald was saying read: "at noon went to lunch". 

How does "at noon went to lunch" support your notion that Oswald did not claim to eat lunch at noon but claimed to have gone to lunch after 12:30 after the assassination? That's like asserting "Y" and citing a footnote which says "not-Y". 

Here is Hosty again:

"at noon went to lunch. He went to 2nd floor to get coca cola to eat with lunch and returned to 1st floor to eat lunch."

Those are three uses of "lunch" associated with "at noon" as the time of that lunch".

Then you cite Fritz's handwritten handwritten notes which I agree are ambiguous, but you are choosing or preferring an insensible reading of ambiguous words instead of a sensible reading. But this need not be forever ambiguous. Fritz's typed reporting shows Fritz did not interpret his notes the way you are. Fritz understood a sensible meaning not an insensible meaning, of the words. Here are both for comparison:

Fritz handwritten notes:

"claims 2nd floor Coke when/ off came in/ to 1st floor had lunch/ out with Bill Shelley in front/ left wk opinion nothing be/ done that day etc."

Fritz typed report:

"I asked him what part of the building he was in at the time the President was shot, and he said that he was having his lunch about that time on the first floor.

"Mr. Truly had told me that one of the police officers had stopped this man immediately after the shooting somewhere near the back stairway, so I asked Oswald where he was when the police officer stopped him. He said he was on the second floor drinking a coca cola when the officer came in."

(Note according to this report Oswald answered truthfully where the Baker incident occurred without being told. Note Oswald did not claim this coca cola was bought to have with his lunch.)

"I asked him why he left the building, and he said there was so much excitement he didn't think there would be any more work done that day...

"I asked him if he had told Buell Wesley Frazier why he had gone home a different night ... He denied... He said... When asked ... he said ... In talking with him further about his location at the time the President was killed, he said he ate lunch with some of the colored boys who worked with him..."

Note Oswald claimed--according to Fritz's typed report of what Oswald claimed--that he ate lunch with African-American employees, all of whom went to lunch at 12:00 before the assassination. Are you claiming Oswald claimed they all ate lunch together after the assassination?

All I can say is, you are stuck on only a single coke after the assassination followed by a lunch after that, and that premise (of only a single coke) leads you to believe that Oswald gave a totally bizarre time claim.

But all the other written reports other than Bookhout's do not support the outlandish meaning as what Oswald was saying or meaning, and common sense does not either. The sensible reading is there were two coke purchases in Oswald's story that day: one for his lunch during his normal lunch time (as Oswald routinely did on other days, according to second-floor women who would make change for him, etc., and as Oswald said in interrogation), and a second after the assassination when accosted by officer Baker (as Oswald also said when asked).   

On when Oswald was claiming he went out front "with Shelley"/"to see P. Parade", in the Fritz and Hosty handwritten notes, both of those appear only in handwritten notes, not in the typed reports. But the two expressions appear to be alternative language for the same thing, and "to see P. Parade" will not work for after the second-floor encounter with Baker. That cannot be disputed. The only way to explain that in keeping with your reconstruction is Pat Speer's idea that it was some kind of mistake on Hosty's part in that handwritten note (the argument for that being that Hosty never wrote that up in his typed reports or told of it later in testimony or in his book).  

But if Oswald did say he went out "to see P. Parade" (as Hosty's handwriting within ca. 24 hours of the fact suggests Oswald might have), and that followed his coke with his lunch ... well, q.e.d. there is when Oswald was situating his lunch and a coke with that lunch, before that, before the presidential parade, during the normal time for lunch.

Incidentally, in the typed reports of Fritz and FBI Hosty and Bookhout is anything even said about Oswald going out front of the building--at all? I don't think so. Even though that is in both Fritz's and Hosty's handwritten notes that no one was ever supposed to see.  

The sole mention in a typed report is Secret Service agent Kelley who says Oswald told him on Nov 24 he was out in front and a Secret Service agent asked him to direct him to a phone inside. According to Kelley's report, Oswald saw the man go to the phone inside. None of the others present in that final interrogation of Oswald's life reported or evidently heard that, but Oswald appears to have spoken semi-privately and directly to Kelley that morning, minutes before he was killed by Ruby. 

Two comments on that: first, Oswald was not making that up. Pierce Allman, a reporter, was that man Oswald directed to the phone, about 3 minutes after the assassination by Allman's estimate, which is just about exactly the time when Oswald would have come down the SE stairway to inside the front of the TSBD after the Baker encounter. (On the 3 minute estimate of Allman, https://jfkfacts.org/one-mans-encounter-with-oswald/. )

And second, I suspect Kelley had that slightly wrong that Oswald said he was actually outside the building, as opposed to inside near the front of the building, and here is why: it is because Oswald also said (according to Kelley) that he not only had directed the man to a phone, but actually saw the man go to the phone and use it. That only works if Oswald is inside the building. It does not work for an Oswald outside the building. And Pierce Allman said his encounter with Oswald occurred inside the doors as Allman rushed in, with nothing said of Oswald being outside the building.

There is no evidence Oswald was outside the front of the building after his encounter with Baker on the second floor. There is no evidence Oswald left the TSBD by the front entrance. I do not believe the Warren Report even claims Oswald left by the front, only that he left somehow. 

No photograph captures Oswald outside the building after Baker. No witness testified to seeing Oswald out front of the building after Baker.

I think the notion of Oswald outside the building after his Baker encounter at all, and leaving from the front, is mythical.

In contrast to no photo or witness having Oswald out front of the building after the Baker encounter or leaving from the front, Buell Frazier's account of witnessing Oswald walking away around from the rear I believe is credible and the best information on how Oswald left the TSBD that day. 

21 hours ago, David Von Pein said:

Greg,

You're severely overstating (i.e., misstating) Lee Harvey Oswald's alleged "alibi". Oswald never once said he was outside on the front steps of the Book Depository Building at the time when President Kennedy was being shot.

When Oswald told Captain Fritz that he was "out with Bill Shelley in front", Oswald was clearly indicating to Fritz that he had only gone "out" of the building AFTER he had already had his encounter with Police Officer Marrion Baker in the second-floor lunchroom, which was an encounter that occurred, of course, after the assassination had already taken place.

(See James W. Bookhout's 11/22/63 FBI report—HERE—for verification of the chronology of Captain Fritz' sketchy "out with Bill Shelley in front" note.)

The key words in Bookhout's report, chronology-wise, are these words:

"He thereafter went outside..."

And the more-recent discovery of James Hosty's "went outside to watch P. Parade" notes—discussed in detail HERE—have also been mischaracterized by conspiracists (IMO), because the basic chronology of those Hosty notes is identical to Bookhout's report, with Oswald (per the Hosty notes) only going outside after he had gone to the second floor to get a Coke....and we know the "Coke" excursion coincided with Oswald's encounter with Marrion Baker, which was AFTER the assassination, not DURING the assassination.

FWIW....

With regard to the identity of "Prayer Man", I'll re-post the following comments made two years ago by someone whose presence on the Depository front steps on November 22nd is not disputed by even the most hardened of conspiracy theorists:

"To answer the question about Prayer Man: I have been looking at this all day, and I can tell you this: I 100% have no idea who that person is. I can also tell you 100% that is not Lee Harvey Oswald. First, Lee was not out there. I know that to be true. Second, for anyone who thinks Prayer Man is Lee, the individual has a much larger frame than Lee."  --  Buell Wesley Frazier; March 28, 2021

Also See:
http://DVP's JFK Archives/"Prayer Man" Discussion
 

David, although I for one like much of your work and am glad for your voice in these discussions, I think you have this one wrong, about when Oswald claimed he went outside.  

The Bookhout report shows confusion and conflation. In fact Oswald claimed he went to the second floor to get a coke with his lunch, which preceded the assassination. Then, after the assassination, he went again to the second floor, not for the purpose of getting a coke but to exit by way of the rear stairwell to the first floor and out the back. He was spotted by officer Baker as he was about to come out of the pneumatic door to the NW 2nd floor stairwell, and Baker followed him in and there was the encounter at gunpoint. Oswald did not have a coke in his hand at the moment of that encounter, but after Baker left, Oswald then did buy a coke (second coke that day), and also took off his light-maroon shirt mistakenly seen by Baker as a "light brown" jacket (explicable if Baker was one of the ca. 10% of white men with genetically-inherited red-brown color blindness), to walk by Mrs. Reid in white T-shirt with a coke, as he went back down the SE stairwell to the first floor again before making his exit out the rear. (Exit out the rear based on Buell Frazier's later testimony of such which I find credible; and no contrary evidence of any witness seeing him leave out the front.)

The point being there were two, not one, incidents of Oswald at that second-floor lunchroom and cokes. Bookhout's report conflates the two.

The way you have it, you cite and apparently believe Bookhout as if that is evidence that Oswald literally (and absurdly) claimed he went to the second floor after the assassination to get a coke for his lunch, then claimed he came down (after the assassination) and ate his lunch after the assassination, then left. 

Do you seriously believe Oswald, whose lunch break started at 12:00, would claim in interrogation that he ate his lunch after the assassination which occurred at 12:30? Do you seriously believe Oswald claimed that?

If you seriously believe that, why then do neither Fritz nor Hosty's notes or reports reflect any other than Oswald saying he ate his lunch before the assassination?

Isn't it obvious that Hosty's notes, reflected in the typed Hosty-Bookhout report of the same interrogation, has correctly what Oswald claimed? 

Hosty handwritten notes: "O stated ... at noon went to lunch. He went to 2nd floor to get coca cola to eat with lunch and returned to 1st floor to eat lunch. Then went outside to watch P. Parade."

Hosty/Bookhout FBI report: "Oswald stated that he went to lunch at approximately noon and he claimed he ate his lunch on the first floor in the lunchroom; however he went to the second floor where the Coca-Cola machine was located and obtained a bottle of Coca-Cola for his lunch. Oswald claimed to be on the first floor when President John F. Kennedy passed this building."

Clearly, Oswald said his lunch was before the assassination, not after the assassination. (Contrary to the Bookhout report's misunderstanding, which you are citing as if it must be believed because Bookhout wrote it that way.)

Oswald's (first) coke, obviously was for his lunch, meaning he went up and bought a coke for his lunch before the assassination. That does not contradict that he had the Baker encounter after the assassination, which although Oswald may have bought a second coke after the gunpoint encounter with Baker as something of an alibi was not his actual purpose for going to the second floor after the assassination. 

That Oswald bought a coke for his lunch is what Hosty's notes, and the Hosty/Bookhout report, says Oswald said. It is logical, and it is what Oswald said, as to the timing and association with his lunch, and his claim of eating lunch was before the assassination, not after.

"Then" he said, following his lunch (before the assassination) he either said he "went outside to watch P. Parade" (Hosty notes), or "[was] on the first floor when President John F. Kennedy passed this building" (Hosty/Bookhout written report).

Bookhout screwed up his reporting of what Oswald said and meant, whereas Hosty got it basically right, is what happened there.

And here is a possible reconstruction, building on my above re Roy Lewis, who thought he was the last to go through the front doors to stand on the front steps, before the presidential limousine passed by.

Suppose Oswald did go outside on those steps but after Roy Lewis, coming in quietly behind Roy Lewis who did not notice (facing toward Elm Street). Suppose Oswald entered those steps to become Prayer Man in the shadow at one end there moments after the shots had been fired. That would account for why Roy Lewis did not notice him, and also why few others on the steps would be expected to have noticed him. It would account for Oswald expressing to Hosty an intention to see the presidential parade, while at the same time it could account for Oswald telling reporters he had been "inside the building" at the time of the shots.  

Roy E. Lewis, "last one out front", standing at the top of the front entrance

I mentioned that I went through the individual statements and information of every woman TSBD employee and found every one was excluded as being Prayer Man. But in turning to the men TSBD employees, I came to focus attention on one male TSBD employee, Roy Lewis. He was 18 years old at the time, TSBD's youngest male employee. He said he was on the top level of the steps, and he has not otherwise been satisfactorily identified in any photo. He said he was the last TSBD employee out the front doors to watch the parade. He was the same height as Oswald, a bit huskier, said he spoke to no one on the steps, said he did not see Oswald there, and from photos of him from the next hour or so his shirt and sweater could have a similar drooping neckline look as Prayer Man. 

I put quite a bit of study into whether Roy Lewis could possibly be Prayer Man. My conclusion is Prayer Man was probably not Roy Lewis, for reasons explained below. The "probably" rather than certainty reflects that on present information none of the four reasons seem individually quite airtight. (Digital prints from the original of Darnell could resolve that.) 

A first reason is Roy Lewis's skin color as African American. Prayer Man's arms and head look light, like Prayer Man was white, and that is what is generally understood. But is a light skin color of Prayer Man in fact an exclusively correct interpretation of the photos (which would exclude Roy Lewis)? Or could that be optical illusion, or an artifact of processing and filtering necessary to bring out the images in poor photos? I am not sufficiently expert to know; expert opinion on this point welcome and of interest. 

A second reason is the hair of Roy Lewis, a close-cut Afro, does not show the distinctive receding at the temples (early stage male pattern baldness) that Prayer Man seems to have (in agreement with Oswald). But again, given the poor quality of the photos, is that decisive? But it looks that way. 

Third, because of where on that top level Roy Lewis said he was in his statements and interviews: in the middle (never in a corner or at one end). He associated himself as standing with office women of the second floor also on the steps, and they were clustered predominantly toward the east end, or center such as Sarah Stanton, not west in the corner where Prayer Man was. In later years Roy Lewis said he could not remember specific persons next to him other than women from the second floor though at one point he said he thought he remembered Frazier on one side of him. 

And fourth, following the shots, Lewis says he followed "the women" in running toward the Grassy Knoll. From Lewis's statements and description I believe it likely he was not on the steps at all by the time of the Darnell photo, because by that point large numbers of people are running toward the Grassy Knoll as seen in the Crouch film, Lewis maybe among them in that Crouch film though I am not aware Lewis has yet been identified in the Crouch film.

Lewis is not visible in either Altgens6 or Wiegman even though he was on that top level somewhere along with Frazier and Sarah Stanton (Large-Framed Figure to the left of Frazier). Altgens6 is missing Frazier and Large-Framed Figure (Sarah Stanton) in the black in the back, and Lewis would be equally invisible in that same black in the back too. In Wiegman, Lewis either would be slightly too far east to be in line of sight of Wiegman's camera, or alternatively perhaps hidden standing behind and mostly blocked to the camera by Large-Framed Figure (Sarah Stanton). Lewis at about the same height as Oswald (according to Lewis) at 5'9" would be able to see over Large-Framed Figure/Sarah Stanton's height of 5'5 or 5'6" even if he were directly behind her.

Lewis in his FBI statement of CE 1381:

"On November 22, 1963 at approximately 12:25 PM I stood by myself on the inside of the front entrance of the Texas School Book Depository Building to watch President John F. Kennedy come by the building in a motorcade."

Lewis in Sneed, No More Silence (1998):

"I was one of the last ones out of the building before the motorcade arrived ... when I came out, I was standing with some ladies from up in the offices right in the middle of the steps in front of the building that led to the sidewalk beyond the glass door."

From a video interview of Lewis in 2016, at age 70, by Larry Rivera (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZOBn8wcIJU ). At 33:16f:

"I was standing on top of the steps where you go in, I was on the outside."

On the outside?

"Yeah I was on the outside." 

About in between first or second step?

"No, I was on the first step up there, the first step.

OK the first step--

"--before you get ready to step off--"

That's right--

"Yeah I was on the first step."

At 36:25 Lewis incorrectly identifies himself in a photo as Carl Edward Jones visible in Weigman against the west wall. (That could be cited as an argument that Lewis was compatible with having been at the west like Prayer Man?) 

And Bart Kamp's new book, Prayer Man: More than a Fuzzy Picture, publishes transcriptions of interviews of Ed Ledoux of Roy Lewis in 2018 never before publicly available (p. 49f). Here are some excerpts from that:

"I don't remember who was standing in front of me but I think Wes Frazier was standing on the side of me and I believe Billy Lovelace ... What was his name Lovelace?

Yeah, Billy Lovelady

"Yeah, Lovelady. I think he was standing on one side of me and Wes was on one side. One of them was standing beside or behind me. I can't remember which one."

(. . .)

So after the last one [shot], what happened? Did anybody say anything? Did you hear people talk? Did somebody say that sounds like shots?

"No, let me tell you what happened. We all ran towards the grassy knoll.

You and all the people on the steps?

"That's right. First of all, the women in front, from upstairs came up and started running that way too.

(. . .)

"[L]ike I said, I was one of the last ones out of the building ... I think I mean I knew I was the last one out but ...

You were outside ... now think about it, you were outside. Did you hear the shots? Did you step out when you heard something?

"Yeah, I stepped out, yeah right as I heard the first shot. I stepped out of the building. I was standing on the top step.

(. . .) 

"I stepped out the front door and I was standing out on the front steps up there.

Sure, I remember you said you were the last one out.

"Right. I was.

Do you remember who was in front of you?

"...No, because I was, eh... I don't remember. Because I wasn't paying much attention.

(. . .)

Do you remember when you got outside, how long it was before the limo came?

"No...oh. Only a minute or two or seconds, it wasn't long.

(. . .)

Do you remember who was out on the steps? Do you remember seeing Shelley, Buell Frazier or any of the ladies out there?

Well, some of the ladies; I don't remember their names.

(. . .)

When you were out on the steps you did not speak with anybody?

"No.

(. . .)

What did you exactly see when the limo went past. Did you get a view of the President? Were you able to see him?

"Yeah, I got a view of his back and the side of his head. And then after the shots I remember seeing his head snap and I thought Jackie was trying to get out of the limo, but they were saying that she was trying to get part of his head that had come off, I don't know.

Right, that's what they said that she was trying to get a piece or chunk of his head of[f] the trunk.

"All I saw was him, the last thing I saw do was brush his hair to the side. That's when the shots rang.

(. . .)

How long was it before you left the steps and ran down that way?

"A few seconds.

(. . .)

When was the first time you saw Roy Truly, was that when you came back to the buildlng?

"Right.

(. . .)'

Very interesting as you were the last one out that door.

"Right.

And standing at the back. Where, you know, you can see everything.

"Right.

And you knew who came in... so did anybody.. So, let me ask you this, did anyone run back in? While you were standing there outside?

"No.

No one ran back up the steps and ran back inside?

"No.

That's so--

"Not that I can remember.

Right. Right. and you stayed there for a little bit and then you went down the street and then went back inside?

"Right."

3 hours ago, Michael Kalin said:

Frank Cimino saw nobody except Mrs. M at the scene. Benavides was not quaking under the dashboard or having a strange interlude in the alley. He had not yet arrived.

That does not mean Benavides was not there. Benavides tells of a certain brief period of time that he stayed in his truck before getting out of it, out of caution that the killer with the gun might return. When he did get out, according to his own and Bowley’s testimony he went to the police car radio to try to call for help but did not know how to work it. There was a brief period following the killing, therefore (by his account, and supported by Cimino’s) when Helen Markham was there but Benavides was not visible outside his truck. Cimino meanwhile, in his living room a block away went out in his front yard immediately after hearing the shots and as you note, tells of seeing one or two women, I.e. Helen Markham, but nothing corresponding to Benavides. But that’s because Benavides was not out of his truck yet. It is not evidence Benavides fabricated under oath that he was there, still in his truck. 

Benavides’ account of being there, seeing Tippit fall from being shot, then seeing the killer from the back of the killer from ca. 15 feet away going away from him, is supported by the corroborated fact that he handed shell hulls to officer Poe. It is corroborated by Bowley telling of him at the police radio callin. It is corroborated by Callaway telling of first trying to get Banavides to drive to chase the killer and Benavides refusing, whereupon Callaway got Scoggins the cab driver. And last but not least, his own testimony, and there is nothing that comes across as a fabricator. 

Benavides’ arrival in time to see Tippit fall from being shot and to see the killer leaving is supported by his testimony of the red car ahead of him who he named as would have been a witness, without knowing who or what that was. The identity of that red car and witness did not become known until years later, Tatum. 

And, Benavides knew where to find the gunman’s tossed shell hulls, which supports his account that he saw where the killer had tossed them as he was leaving and reloading.

There is no sound evidence Benavides was fabricating anything and all essential parts of his account ring true and most are corroborated. I believe his testimony likely from day one was considered “sensitive” simply because it was true and, when we do learn of his account a few months later for the first time in his WC testimony, it is not helpful to the identification of Oswald as that killer. 

The “block cut” hairline of the killer in the back of his head told by Benavides as what he saw from only ca. 15 feet away alone would be incendiary if it held up as true testimony, since if Benavides was right that killer could not have been Oswald. 

And so in addition to no positive evidence Benavides was making it all up, what would be the motive? Are you supposing Benavides was suborned to fabricate under oath? By whom? What motive, when his testimony (if Benavides is to be believed and was not mistaken) powerfully favors exoneration of Oswald in Tippit’s death, whom Leavelle and co. wanted so badly to have the evidence show he did it?

I read Ball’s questioning of Guinyard differently than you do. What I see is Ball asking leading questions based on preinterview of Guinyard with intent to impeach Benavides’ testimony. Guinyard already appears a little confused in his testimony of which side of the street the killer ran.

Note no followup to Benavides on that block cut rear hairline of the killer. That subject got changed real quick. 

Benavides’ testimony is like the fingerprints lifted from the top of the right front passenger door of the Tippit patrol car at the exact spot where the killer had leaned against that car talking to Tippit inside, about twenty minutes before those prints were lifted. In 1994, first published in 1998, those prints were found not to have come from Oswald. 

Signals in the air that the killer may not have been Oswald but someone else witnesses mistakenly identified as Oswald, who may have gone to the Texas Theatre next for the purpose of killing Oswald there.  But signals missed. And as in most specific items of cases, there are always possible alternative explanations (the fingerprints were left by someone else; Benavides was mistaken in what he said he saw from 15 feet away). And a third signal missed, the paper-bag revolver found on a downtown Dallas street the next morning which was covered up by Dallas Police and which may have been the true Tippit murder weapon for reasons discussed elsewhere. 

That is where I locate Benavides’ testimony in the larger scheme of things with the Tippit case. In a context of counter-signals, cognitive dissonance, to the easy closure of the case on Oswald in the matter of Tippit. Innocence Project genre considerations. 

Michael K., you’ve just quoted testimony from Guinyard, who worked with Benavides and knew him well, Benavides himself, and Poe, three witnesses, telling of Benavides giving shell hulls to Poe, and no contrary evidence. What are you on about acting like there is some deep mystery over the man’s identity who gave shell hulls to Poe?

What does covered up police and FBI early reporting of Benavides, the contents of which no one knows—if that happened and are not misstatements—have to do with it? Is it possible Benavides’ physical description of the Tippit killer could prompt downplaying of Benavides at the beginning? 

Isn’t Guinyard’s statement obviously a reference to telling of Benavides and his truck having driven up and parked his truck coming west, before Guinyard got there and saw Benavides there? Which is more likely: that Guinyard was a little confused (he seemed a little confusable anyway) or heard the question wrong, or that unseen forces suborned Benavides into, or he engaged on his own in wholesale conscious perjured testimony? Testimony that if correct on the physical description exculpates Oswald?

You have been on about this for a long time and I still do not know what your point is. Why be so dead set on discrediting one of the strongest witnesses in Oswald’s favor at the Tippit crime scene, on no substantial evidence? Benavides may have made minor nitpick-level mistakes in testimony months later as witnesses commonly do, but why the irrational desire to make him into a large-scale fabricator? To what end? I don’t think he was lying in his testimony.

47 minutes ago, Pat Speer said:

Look at the Altgens photo. Your large figure person is two people. Probably Shelley and Molina. 

I don’t think that’s right Pat. In Altgens6 those are two men, one of whom I agree is Shelley, in front of Frazier and Large-Framed Figure of Darnell. Neither Frazier nor Large-Framed Figure to his left at the top level in Darnell appear at all in Altgens6 (either because standing too far to the east to be in the photo or else hidden in the black).

Some more comments on Prayer Man and the seeming oddity of lack of witness identification of Prayer Man either as Oswald or not Oswald

Because of Prayer Man's holding his right arm up in a position similar to the way women's arms look in photos holding purses, I went through every woman employee of TSBD systematically, one by one (Bart's site is a great help in collecting documents relevant to each TSBD employee from a scroll-down menu at top), just to see if possibly some woman possibility had been missed. I found every one is accounted for other than in Prayer Man's position; every woman TSBD employee is ruled out as Prayer Man. Sarah Stanton I have shown why she is Large-Framed Figure to the left of Frazier in Darnell. Pauline Sanders said she was at the far east end with Stanton to her immediate right, which makes Pauline Sanders the short figure (therefore a woman not a man) at the far east end in Darnell, correctly so identified by Stancak.

Ruth Dean with distinctive dark or black hat and dark or black coat was on the steps but is visibly identifiable in both Wiegman and Darnell approximately second step up in the middle of each of those photos, so she was not Prayer Man. And Madelaine "Madie" Reese who accompanied Ruth Dean is identifiable in Altgens6 standing at about the lowest step level, top of her head over the parade car. 

Avery Davis said she was on the steps and has not otherwise been identified elsewhere on the steps, but she is ruled out as Prayer Man because of photos of her in the minutes and hour or so following the shots. Her ear does not show under her hair whereas Prayer Man's ear shows. Her neckline up around her neck does not look like Prayer Man's which is compatible with either a lower round neckline or the way Oswald and other working men wore shirts with the top button or two unbuttoned over a white T-shirt underneath. And Avery Davis told of seeing Clint Hill run to the limousine which would not be possible standing where Prayer Man is. 

As for where Avery Davis was on the steps, she said she started to run west after the shots along with other people, which would account for her not being in Darnell. She would have been on the steps when Altgens6 and Wiegman were taken.

Lacking a better identification, one possibility is that a trace of Avery Davis might be just behind Lovelady's left ear in Altgens6.

I spent a lot of time puzzling over what Fetzer used to always claim was evidence of tampering of Altgens6 due to Lovelady's left shoulder and I wondered at one point whether there was a white towel over Lovelady's left shoulder covering part of the shoulder in front. I finally realized that was no towel or tampering in that location. There indeed is a long necktie of a man with a white shirt and jacket on either side of the necktie. A particular print of Altgens6 shown on Bart Kamp's page for Lovelady clears up the optical illusion and shows nothing of the white in front of Lovelady's actual left shoulder. Instead there is blackness above Lovelady’s actual left shoulder that illusorily looks like part of his shirt in other prints (see here: http://www.prayer-man.com/tsbd/billy-nolan-lovelady/). 

And speaking of "long necktie man" next to Lovelady, I see that man commonly identified as Shelley, but I think that is Molina. The man is heavyset, and Shelley was lean or skinny whereas Molina was heavyset. That has to be Molina I conclude. 

But between Lovelady and Molina (necktie man), next to Lovelady's left ear, there is something there that I believe Stancak correctly identified as a trace of another person—is it a trace of a face looking toward the street and camera direction, the rest of that person covered up by Lovelady and necktie man (Molina) in front of that person? Sometimes I almost think I can see two eyes but that is probably artifacts from poor photo quality and/or imagination. Prayer Man is probably ruled out as that person due to how low the line of sight is.

Could that be the otherwise-unidentified Avery Davis? Avery Davis needs positioning somewhere on the steps, and that unexplained person behind Lovelady and Molina (necktie man) needs identification, q.e.d.?

Avery Davis said she was on the steps with Judy McCully who was to her (Avery's) left, but Judy McCully has never been identified, and is a very strange case in that she (Judy McCully) told the FBI first she was on the fourth floor not on the steps, then months later told the FBI that was wrong, she wanted to correct that, and she was on the front steps with Avery Davis (as Avery Davis said). That is truly bizarre and there has been no satisfactory explanation for that change in Judy McCully's statement of where she was.

The enigma of Judy McCully

That Judy McCully might have been Prayer Man herself I believe is ruled out because: photos of her show her with glasses but Prayer Man does not seem to have glasses; she said she started running immediately after the shots to see what was happening but hearing a woman screaming (Gloria Calvery?) returned back into the building, which is inconsistent with Prayer Man who has not moved in position in Darnell (ca. 20-30 seconds after the shots); and Avery Davis said Judy McCully was to Avery's left (east) on the steps, which is not possible as Prayer Man in the top west corner. 

And why would Judy McCully possibly want to lie about being in Prayer Man's position, if it was her? McCully's change in her story makes no sense on that hypothesis.

Bart Kamp discusses that puzzle and contacted and spoke with McCully's daughter about it in later years. McCully's original FBI statement, in which she told that she was on the 4th floor and also denied knowing who Oswald was and denied ever having seen Oswald in the building ever, was taken by two FBI agents one of whom by coincidence was her uncle. According to Kamp, McCully's daughter said her mother did not talk about it but had changed her story on advice of the FBI. That could go a couple of ways in interpretation, but here is one interpretation: 

• McCully was on the steps (testimony of Avery Davis; and later testimony of McCully herself)
• Her original prevarication/denial stating that she was not on the steps in her initial statement had to have some compelling reason; why would an everyday woman TSBD employee lie about something like that?
• A clue to that reason may be in another change in her two stories: the change in whether she had ever seen Oswald before. No, never, she said originally, not that day or ever (in the statement in which she said she was on the 4th floor not on the front steps). Yes, she later says, in her correction statement in which she says she was on the front steps, not on the 4th floor.
• Since there is no other good explanation for the very odd behavior of falsely denying where one was when the presidential parade passed by--to deny she was on the front steps--is it too much to suggest: could it have been because she saw Oswald on those front steps? (Scared her to death?)
• She later says she did recognize Oswald by sight and had seen him on a number of occasions in the preceding weeks (she still sticks to she did not see him on the day of the shots when she was on the steps). But her later statement that she did recognize and had seen Oswald numerous times in the past is undoubtedly truthful, and establishes that if she was on the front steps (which she was), and if she had seen Oswald standing in that corner (Prayer Man), she was capable of recognizing him. (Contrary to her original FBI statement in which she would not have recognized him.)
• My proposed interpretation of the strange change in stories, and the role of her uncle FBI agent who took her original FBI statement, is this, in the absence of a better explanation: she saw Oswald, and as the news came out about the assassination was scared to death by that. On her own, she lied saying she was not on the steps when she was. On her own, she lied saying she had no recognition of Oswald and had never seen Oswald in previous days either. Later, she has pangs of conscience, she tells someone, maybe her uncle the local FBI agent, who advises her to make the correction and how to do it, advises her once she has made the correction then just say no more to anyone about it. (Or, it could work the other way, in which her uncle cooperated with her telling the original false story, and she on her own had pangs of conscience when asked later by different FBI agents taking statements, and told most of the truth then--except for the detail about having seen Oswald on the steps, the original cause for her falsely stating she had never seen Oswald, and not having been on the steps where she was, when she saw him that morning.)

In other words, the highly odd saga of Judy McCully's untruthful denial that she was on the front steps, then doing the right thing and telling truthfully later that she was, calls for explanation. Her untruthful denial that she had ever recognized or remembered seeing Oswald ever before, later corrected, calls for explanation. What is the explanation? 

Could the explanation be the same for both untruthful representations in her original statement--that she had seen Oswald on the front steps in the position of Prayer Man, and was terrified by that since that wasn't supposed to be true from all that she knew and heard on the news? And this was how she coped with that?

Some thoughts on how so many witnesses on the front steps could say they had not seen Oswald there, if he were Prayer Man

One factor could be because of the effect of the sun blinding the eyes or causing poor vision in the dark shaded area where Prayer Man was standing. 

Another factor could be sheer accident of not noticing. One TSBD woman witness (don't recall which one at the moment) testified that she was standing next to some fellow employees but did not pay any attention who they were and could not say. 

A third factor could be the kind of fear that in extremis led one witness, Judy McCully, to falsely deny she was even there on the steps.

For example, Molina (as long-tie man next to Lovelady in Altgens6) was standing right below Prayer Man. He says after the shots he looked around, and he says he did not see Oswald that day. Molina repeated that to HSCA in 1978 (that he did not see Oswald that day). While I assume that is probably a truthful statement on Molina's part, perhaps explicable from not noticing Prayer Man at all, Molina was given much grief that weekend over accusations aired in public that he was a communist at the height of the Cold War in the Deep South, and as such, suspected of involvement in the assassination itself. It is not far to imagine Molina deciding he did not need to pile on more grief to himself and his family.

Frazier, who pointedly does not identify Prayer Man as anyone else (but also does not remember Oswald being there), may have a factor not previously given much attention. Frazier tells somewhere that upon hearing the shots he moved to the west in direction from where he was standing at the top (or next-to-the-top) step (with Stanton and Pauline Sanders to his left/east). Also, Frazier refers to speaking back and forth to Stanton standing next to him to his left, meaning except for when he was facing the parade some of the time he was facing east--toward Stanton, away from Prayer Man--and also a little more physically distant from Prayer Man than in Darnell after he may have moved a little westward.

These are all factors, added to the poor vision looking into shade/darkness after eyes adjusted to bright direct sunlight, and not paying attention, which could go some way toward accounting for witnesses not noticing Prayer Man, or Oswald as Prayer Man if so, if Oswald was there on the steps (briefly, and in the shade and darkness, and behind most of the witnesses).

Every single other person on the front steps was a TSBD employee, yet all women and nearly all if not all other men TSBD employees are ruled out as Prayer Man. Who then was Prayer Man? The little that is apparent of Prayer Man's physical description agrees as far as it goes with and does not clearly falsify that it was Oswald, and Oswald spoke to his interrogators of being out front. Lacking a different solution to the identity of Prayer Man it is a live issue, and for reasons stated the objection that nobody noticed Oswald there is less substantial than it may at first seem.

It is just needless mystification to suppose Benavides wasn't where he said he was at the Tippit crime scene, for no good reason or evidence, dismissal of the most important Tippit crime scene witness in terms of physical description of the Tippit killer--credible because of how close Benavides was to the killer.

Benavides' physical description of the killer is exculpatory in favor of Oswald's innocence on three specific matters of description from a witness who was only ca. fifteen feet away from the killer, in excellent position to have gotten these three points right.

• Benavides testified the Tippit killer, though a white man, was darker than average complexion for a white man, about like his own Latino complexion. Oswald was light-skinned.
• Benavides testified the Tippit killer had a block cut hairline in the back of his head. Oswald had a tapered, not block cut, hairline in back, from all photos that weekend. 
• Benavides testified the Tippit killer had "curly" hair. Oswald's hair was in no way curly.

What is this business of implying or suggesting Benavides--an average working man with no record of criminal behavior--was suborned to wholesale perjury, suborned to fabricate his testimony out of whole cloth, by never-identified shadowy marionette-string-pulling conspirators wanting so badly to have Oswald exculpated by Benavides' physical description testimony?

Does that make sense as a plausible conspiracy theory? Invisible handlers intent on having Benavides give fabricated testimony showing Oswald was innocent?

On the radio transmission, Gil Jesus's experience with police radio as a police officer is good enough for me to settle that point, that the notion of 90 seconds of mashing of the radio heard on the police radio tapes is a myth. 

But Benavides was there at that police radio trying to figure out how to radio for help before Bowley took over and radioed in the call with Bowley's voice heard on the police tapes.

That is just fact.

Because it is not just that Benavides told of it. Bowley told of it too, and what reason would there be for Bowley to lie? Who else is the "Mexican man" spoken of by Bowley than Benavides? 

"Bowley advised that on the afternoon of November 22, 1963, the day President Kennedy was assassinated ... <tells of driving by and seeing the fallen officer near the patrol car, and stopping> ...

"[Bowley] noticed other people in the neighborhood beginning to gather near the car and body. Bowley stated that he and another man, who he described as a Mexican male, were the first ones to go to the assistance of the man on the ground. He also remembered seeing a white female wearing a white uniform and a nurse type name place ... The radio of the scout car was on and the Mexican man was attempting to use it to call for help. Bowley informed the man that he was familiar with two-way radio's and if he'd let him, he could get the call for help through. Using the police radio in the scout car, Bowley notified the police dispatcher that an officer had been shot and gave his location ..." (HSCA interview of Bowley, https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=149247#relPageId=4)  

37 minutes ago, Gil Jesus said:

As someone who has had years of experience using two-way communications, including police radios, I suggest it is YOU who has no idea what you're talking about.

Here's the dictabelt recording 31 seconds before Bowley called on the radio. There was no one keying the mic for 90 seconds before his call. The transmissions were loud and clear, which they would not have been had someone been keying the mic. 

https://gil-jesus.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/bowley-call.mp3

Interesting, thanks Gil. 

A “factoid” debunked? 

I don’t doubt Benavides was there, because he says he was and his account of picking up and handing over shell hulls where he saw the killer toss them is corroborated, but it is good to not have misinformation contaminating things. 

What about you Bill—willing to consider (and thank Gil) for this minor correction of fact in Myers?

4 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

While I am not an expert on photography I feel certain there is a zero chance of clarifying the Prayer man images to the point one can make a convincing positive identification. There just aren't enough pixels. The NASA images are of relatively close-up objects. By increasing the contrast and layering the images, details can be brought from the shadows. But the Prayer Man image is not buried in darkness. It is simply too small to be enlarged and clarified. 

On my website, I have dozens if not hundreds of evidence photos. One can zoom in and find new things on the hi-res large format Dallas Police photos. (Thank you, UNT!) But you cannot zoom in on the low res images published by the Warren Commission and find anything new besides blurry blobs. A 16 mm film taken from a moving car is not gonna have a clear image of someone a hundred feet away. But I guess people will just have to see this for themselves. (I know some already have.)

Wouldn't it be accurate to say the existing photo information of Prayer Man is already close to individual-recognition-match quality, just not close enough? For example there seems to be a hairline, it looks male pattern (receding hairline at the temples, early stage male baldness progression), but just hard to be certain. Just a slight sharpening of that hairline could do wonders, rule in or out large numbers of individual TSBD employee possibilities including the one of interest, no? There already is enough clarity to establish Prayer Man is not wearing a necktie like many of the TSBD male employees--that is something already (and since everyone else on those steps, without a single known exception, is a TSBD employee there is a good argument that Prayer Man probably was too).

And does Prayer Man have long-sleeved shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows similar to the way Buell Wesley Frazier has his sleeves rolled up in the same photos? Seems to maybe look that way but hard to be sure--just a slight increase in sharpness could do wonders there, in addition to distinguishing a shirt from a dress, and maybe clarifying the neckline and whether a T-shirt is visible under a partly open shirt at the neckline. And this is only anecdotal, but a person with photographic expertise told me privately that although he said it was uncertain due to the poor quality photo he thought Prayer Man looked heavyset to him. But a couple days later after running one of the online Prayer Man photos through some basic photo processing and sending me examples he said he now no longer thought Prayer Man was heavyset, that there was blackness around the hips area that may be making it look that way illusorily.

From an article titled "Scanning film -- What is different?"

"Simply put, scanning film often gives better results than scanning prints. One obvious reason is because the film is the original image instead of a second generation copy. This means that film contains much greater detail than is possible in prints. Film also has much greater dynamic range (contrast) than prints. Prints have already been manipulated, some tonal range lost, some color data has been modified, the total area has been cropped, etc, and we cannot get that data back from prints. These differences are very real, and critical commercial work normally scans film, usually slides." (https://scantips.com/basic13b.html)

Imagine on a scale of 1-10 in sharpness that one can get to recognition of some individual humans at a threshold of, say, 4.0, and Prayer Man right now is at say 3.5. The gap in increased sharpness needed may not be that much. But digital scans of the original Darnell and Wiegman films have never been done, at least to anyone's knowledge, or if they have been done are not accessible for professional analysis of experts like Andy Saunders the maestro of NASA photos fame. Your saying "some already have" seen this "for themselves" does not seem accurate, since no one has been able to work with, digital scans from the original Darnell film because none are known to exist. From an article from a Manhattan photo processing business: "Scanning your film negatives versus prints--What's better?":

"The negative film strips preserve the original information from when the image was first captured and are the best option to scan. Even though negatives may look odd to the naked eye because the colors are inverted, they contain the recorded image data needed for a quality print or digital copy. Go straight to the source material if you have it!" (article, , https://www.dijifi.com/blog/scanning-your-film-negatives-vs-prints-whats-better)

Another way to put it: there are ten thousand theories on the JFK assassination, and half of America has never been convinced the full truth is known on the JFK assassination. Given that, would it be worth doing a simple check from available photographs on the theory of Oswald as to Oswald's whereabouts at the time of the shots?

Is Oswald's theory of where Oswald was, worth a check of the photos? If for no other reason than out of an abundance of caution, or to humor quaint, old-fashioned notions that a suspect's claim of a verifiable exculpatory alibi merits checking?

It is not as if the theory of Oswald as to where he was, is conveniently unverifiable.

It is not that no photographs exist by which Oswald's theory can be checked.

It is not that Oswald's theory concerning his whereabouts at the time of the shots has already been checked and refuted long ago by the photographs that exist.

(By referring to checking photographs, of course what is meant is the kind of analytical professional work that could be done with digital scans of the Darnell original analogous to what was done with the NASA archives photographs, of the article Tom Gram cited above.)

It is of no relevance Oswald's brief answer in the hallway to a reporter's shouted question asking if he was in the building answered with "Naturally if I work in that building, yes sir". 

Because: what is relevant is that Oswald told his interrogators under interrogation that he was out front, and that is an absolute fact, and nobody is denying that or can deny that, because it is in handwriting of Fritz, and handwriting of Hosty. 

"to 1st floor had lunch/ out with Bill Shelley in/ front/ left work..." (Fritz notes)

"O stated he was present for work at TBD on the morning of 11/22 and at noon went to lunch. He went to 2nd floor to get Coca Cola to eat with lunch and returned to 1st floor to eat lunch. Then went outside to watch P. Parade" (Hosty notes)

Is Oswald's verifiable theory of what Oswald was doing at the time JFK was assassinated, this terrible crime in American history, worth checking? 

Is that an unreasonable request on the part of a suspect?

To ask for a check of a verifiable alibi in photographs that are known to exist?

But it requires a digital scan of the original of the relevant Darnell frames, not digital scans of prints or copies of the original, according to the experts on this.

In order to do a check of the JFK assassination suspect's verifiable claimed alibi for the first time from photographs which have existed since 1963.

From an original of Darnell which exists.

And this could be done, if the right one or two or three persons in positions of authority in America decided to do so, just like NASA let professional Andy Saunders work on its archived photographs with amazing results. To discover what is there, in the interests of history, in the interests of a public interest in knowing the truth of a high-profile crime in our nation's history, and in the interests of long-overdue delayed fairness to the suspect and the living family members of that suspect, who was denied a trial by being killed while in police custody.