Greg Doudna

Another point: if the Tippit killer was Oswald, then there would be no motive or reason for anyone to intimidate Tippit crime scene witnesses. Intimidation of witnesses related to the Tippit killing only makes sense if the killer was not Oswald, potentially identifiable as other than Oswald, and it was wished that the killer's identity remained unknown. 

Similarly this logic works in reverse with the case of Whaley the cab driver who drove Oswald from Dallas to Oak Cliff on Nov 22. That really was Oswald, that cab ride is Whaley's only connection to the case, and Whaley correctly identified his passenger as Oswald. There was nothing to be covered up or that was covered up in Whaley's story. Later Whaley was killed in a head-on collision, and somehow that death in that traffic accident got written into the lists of suspicious deaths! When that is not a suspicious death at all. 

It was only by freak accident that Warren Reynolds lived instead of being killed on the spot when shot at close range in the head, in Jan 1964 immediately following his public profile in news reports as a witness potentially capable of identifying the Tippit crime scene killer (combined with no other known motive for an attempt on his life). It didn't matter that that expected killing turned out differently with Reynolds living--it sent a message to all witnesses.

That is a prima facie interpretation of the Warren Reynolds shooting, even if it is not proven.   

On 3/8/2024 at 6:00 AM, Steve Thomas said:

Greg,

I think I got one of my questions answered.

There was a First Lieutenant Green posted to Dallas.

It looks like he was transferred to Fort Wolters in August, 1964.

Steve Thomas

Thanks Steve for finding that. It would be interesting to know how that information was communicated from Doughty to Lt. Green, whether Green of the 112th was in the Dallas Police station or whether it was via a phone call (if so who initiated the call?), etc.

Also I have been intrigued that the "112th Intelligence Corps Group"'s Dallas office was located in the Rio Grande Building and that, whether by coincidence or not, Oswald upon leaving the TSBD on Nov 22 walked directly to the location of the Rio Grande Building, before getting on a bus in the vicinity there. The timeline of Oswald's movements is so constrained there is hardly time for him to have gone into the building to try unsuccessfully to find someone known to him there, but still, it seems an odd coincidence that that is where he walked first thing before getting on the bus.

And there is the whole deal with Powell of the 112th, taking all those valuable photos, first of JFK's arrival at Love Field, then of the TSBD windows at the time of the shots in Dealey Plaza, supposedly on a day off not on work time (and so his superiors legitimately have no idea what he was up to on his own time) and Powell's full photo set was never disclosed nor known today.

Still, so many of these possible leads (such as Powell) just don't seem to go anywhere substantial, either because too much information is missing or because there was nothing actually there, whichever it is.  

1 hour ago, Mark Ulrik said:

What year Benavides' brother was killed is hardly trivial. When you're in the business of killing or intimidating witnesses, it usually makes the most sense to do it before they testify. Maybe it works differently in the US. Have you read Benavides' WC testimony? Did you find anything in there that might have irked the conspirators to the extent that hard measures needed to be taken? I didn't think so.

Well Benavides was so close that if he had seen the killer's face he would be a credible witness in making a positive identification of the killer, who if his physical description in his Warren Commission testimony is to be believed was not Oswald (block cut rear hairline; darker skin complexion). Benavides claimed he had not seen the killer's face (and apparently on Nov 22 told police he could not identify the killer) but would the ones who ordered Tippit's killing (if so) trust a witness who was a few feet away who claimed he had not seen well enough to identify anyone?

Any individual act of violence or threat affecting Tenth and Patton witnesses is difficult to know was related to the Nov 22, 1963 Tippit killing. Still:

• Warren Reynolds was on television saying he had seen the Tippit killer and for no other known reason was shot and nearly killed, never solved. He later was reported (I think this supposedly is from Mack Pate the auto garage owner) to have said he, Reynolds who had been shot, was positively identifying Oswald thereafter "because he wanted to live". 
• There is a report attributed to Callaway or Callaway's wife, I forget which and don't remember where I read it, that has them saying several days close to Nov 22 there was some threat to the Callaways at their business. (I do not doubt that Callaway's positive ID of the fleeing Tippit killer as Oswald was sincere, as opposed to correct, but Callaway did notably tell of Leavelle telling him of Oswald--by name--before the lineup--that the Dallas Police hoped to get Oswald, who was already in the news, "wrapped up real tight" on Tippit, and this witness's desire to help law enforcement may compromise confidence in his positive identification.)
• There is an FBI document saying that Guinyard appealed to the FBI for help complaining that strange unidentified men with guns had come to his house when he was not there asking for him; the FBI said they could do nothing for him because not their jurisdiction and referred him to local Dallas Police. Unclear what that was about or its outcome, but he was a witness of the Tippit killer.
• Acquilla Clemons claimed she was advised to be quiet for her safety by an officer, which possibly could even have been well meaning on the part of the officer, but no police officer is identified who talked to Acquilla and the FBI denied they had been in contact with her. Acquilla Clemons said she had seen the Tiopit gunman and her presence standing at the northwest corner of Tenth and Patton is supported independently from another witness, supporting that Acquilla saw what she said she saw.
• Tatum was a witness who did not come forward because he said he feared it had been a mob killing; then in the late 1970s Tatum was outed not of his doing and identified the gunman as Oswald; was that influenced by his admitted earlier silence for fear of the mob? There was a letter published in Playboy, Aug 1966, from an anonymous writer who claimed to be a witness to the Tippit killing and was keeping silent out of fear for his safety in language similar to Tatum's later language, sounding like it could have been authored by Tatum, except the anonymous letter writer claims he saw two gunmen and neither was Oswald. The later Tatum said he saw one gunman twice and it was Oswald. The anonymous Playboy letter author may have been Tatum--I suspect it was--and Tatum's fear of mob involvement in the Tippit killing may have been the variable that caused the change to Tatum's identification of Oswald. Tatum's acknowledged fear of mob involvement in the killing of Tippit may compromise the credibility of Tatum's identification of the killer as Oswald after Tatum was outed as a witness.
• According to family members of Helen Markham reported by Gavan McMahon in an article in the current Garrison, Helen Markham claimed to family members she saw an "Italian" gunman (darker skin complexion [compare Benavides on the complexion]), supposedly, as the family (mis-?)understood it, in addition (?) to Oswald, whom she recognized and said was mob related. Curtis Craford, of darker skin complexion than Oswald according to FBI description (Curtis Craford was described as "medium" not "light" skin complexion) ate at the Eatwell restaurant across from the Carousel Club where Helen Markham worked as a waitress. Helen may or may not have seen him there, then again as the killer of Tippit, which if so would have caused exactly the terror she experienced. Later on Nov 22 someone at the Eatwell restaurant reported that Ruby had come in, sat at a counter and ordered, asked to speak with Helen Markham, was told she wasn't there, whereupon Ruby left without eating. What was that about? No one knows. According to McMahon's interviews of a Helen Markham daughter-in-law, Helen Markham received a sum of money after her Warren Commission testimony that the family understood to be as someone rewarding her for her testimony. 
• According to an interview of Scoggins' grandson videotaped and made publicly available by McMahon, Scoggins said he had been asked by a Ruby associate to be parked where he was eating lunch in his cab, the day and time when Tippit was shot (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/30211-pre-arranged-planted-witnesses-tippit-killing/). Rather than McMahon's interpretation of that as a planting of a witness, I read that as a planting of a getaway car option. When the killing of Tippit happened, the killer did go directly around the corner to Scoggins' cab, but the streetwise Scoggins, hearing the shots, had immediately bolted out of and away from his cab due to the risk of being carjacked at gunpoint if he remained sitting in the car. It is possible the Tippit killer intended to have Scoggins drive him away at gunpoint and continued his flight on foot only because Scoggins had wisely left the cab so quickly first. This background from the Scoggins grandson's interview aired in the video could affect the assessment of Scoggins' Oswald identification. 

Any of these instances considered in isolation can have possible explanations on grounds unrelated to the Tippit killing. But cumulatively, I don't think so in all of these cases.

The Tippit killing has all the appearances of a premeditated professional execution; with Tippit lured to be there at a certain time and ambushed. Reiland of WFAA-TV showed news footage on Nov 22, less than thirty minutes after Tippit's death, of DPD Crime Lab officer Barnes dusting the top of the right front passenger door on the Tippit patrol car for fingerprints, and Reiland reported police were hoping to get usable prints to help identify the killer. They did lift prints but did not disclose what finally came forth three decades later, that those prints were sufficiently usable to easily exclude (according to examiner Lutz) that they had been left by Oswald. That 1990s-reported exclusion of Oswald contradicted the unsigned and unattributed hearsay told in 1964 to the Warren Commission (by Barnes in his testimony) that someone unknown in the Dallas Police crime lab had determined there was no useful information in those fingerprints, nothing to see there.

An argument against the testimonies as to violence or threats against Tippit witnesses is that none of the cases were solved in the form of evidence or confession that organized witness intimidation related to the Tippit killing was happening and by whom. If the gunman was (say) Curtis Craford, he left Dallas on Sat Nov 23, 1963 and could not have been involved in such intimidation himself. 

But there was a Dixie Mafia which was very brutal and ruthless, with members in Dallas, and there were Marcello-Civello-Ruby circles who sometimes cooperated with the Dixie Mafia on matters of mutual interest. Although it isn't proven, that is where some of this witness intimidation and violence, if and to the extent some if not all was related to the Tippit killing, might be situated.

Very interesting article and presentations of Gavan McMahon. 

On Scoggins being asked in advance by a Ruby associate to be parked there with his cab at the time Tippit was shot, as told by his grandson, the story is believable but the interpretation of that as a planted witness seems to be the wrong interpretation of the fact cited. 

As a later questioner in the video commented, Scoggins (parked around the corner) was not in a good position to witness directly. That is not what that would have been about. Instead, it would be to have the option of a cab at hand for a killer to have for a getaway. 

Scoggins surely had no knowledge there was going to be a killing. Scoggins told of after hearing the shots, of getting out of and away from his cab immediately as part of cabbie street sense, because of a high risk of being carjacked or forced to drive at gunpoint if the cabbie remains in the car. By getting out of his cab immediately, Scoggins removed the ability of the Tippit killer to utilize him as a driver in that way, if the killer had so wished.

If the grandson’s story is true of what his grandfather told his father, it supports what other grounds indicate, that the Tippit killing was a premeditated execution. 

The Helen Markham family story of Helen’s story, as told in the interviews of McMahon, is interesting but must be suspected to have some mistaken interpretations of family members mixed in not from Helen, or not from Helen's personal knowledge. I personally think the James Markham Oswald gang member and Tolliver story is completely bogus (James came up with that in prison and it sounds like total fabrication) and I doubt it stems from any firsthand knowledge of Helen even if the daughter-in-law today thinks so. 

Instead, what McMahon (in the Garrison article) tells from the family, of Helen’s “second gunman” with Oswald, the “Italian” or mob-related man that Helen recognized but not in her son's gang, sounds like a description by Helen of the real killer (just as was Helen’s physical description to Odum Nov 22, and to Croy at the crime scene), which has mistakenly been mixed up in the family telling into a doubled figure standing with Oswald as Oswald shot Tippit. I strongly doubt Oswald was there at all. There was only one gunman, Helen’s public and questionable identification of Oswald, and Helen's private description of the killer to family, the “Italian” of darker complexion even though a white man, and thicker and bushier and darker hair than Oswald. 

The story of the allegedly separate 10th and Marsalis stabbing and loading of a body into a station wagon reads to me as mistaken, as an early misunderstood hearsay report of the ambulance removing Tippit’s body itself, not some separate incident at the same time for which there is zero police report evidence and no credible witness testimony stronger than ancient misunderstanding of hearsay in the minutes following the Tippit killing as the news spread, "have you heard...?". 

But the family story that Helen Markham said she had been asked in advance to be there; her closer vantage point where she stood when the killing happened; and the implied if not actual threat concerning her witness identification, combined with the family claims that Helen received sums of money as apparent rewards related to her testimony, sound possible. 

The claim that Helen saw two police officers standing nearby at the time of the killing, who watched but did not intervene or chase the killer, sounds like the Doris Holan story, hard to know how to interpret that. Doris Holan’s story of seeing a patrol car which was not Tippit's and movements of two men across from her window is believable but Doris Holan was living on Patton not Tenth at the time (also in the Doris Holan story the two men are not identified necessarily as police officers). Perhaps Helen’s story of the two officers on Tenth as told by the family which sounds almost exactly like the Holan story, is a mixture of Helen describing her real memories of Croy the first officer at the Tippit crime scene, and the separate Doris Holan story, mistakenly conflated in the family telling. McMahon notes that Virginia Davis said when she and her sister went out of their house on Tenth there were police already there but was Virginia correct on that detail. Perhaps Croy was there earlier than he said, or Helen's time sense was distorted in those minutes of trauma, or she confused Callaway who went to the body of Tippit with the officer Helen said went to the body of Tippit before leaving and then returning again (which is what Callaway did, Callaway who was mistakenly thought to be an officer by Scoggins).

One thing McMahon brings out is that Myers was just wrong in saying the Doris Holan story told by Brownlow and Pulte was not credible on any level. 

According to McMahon, Lad Holan Jr's sister says today her mother’s story was told by her mother and was true, and that she (Lad’s sister) tried to tell that to Myers at the time Myers was writing his article to no avail. That sounds a bit different than Myers ringing conclusion of his article (after a correct repositioning of where the Holan family was living on Nov 22) that there was nothing to the Doris Holan story as told by Brownlow and Pulte “on any level”, even though the essential points of the Doris Holan story, told as Mrs. Holan knew she was dying, make better sense from the correct Patton Street address window’s vantage point as a witness, than from the incorrect mistaken address. 

It is interesting that three members of Helen’s son’s criminal gang, according to McMahon’s information, were Tenth and Patton vicinity witnesses (Smith, Smith, and Burt). Jimmy Burt’s car was seen by another witness parked in an unusual way next to Tippit’s patrol car only seconds after the shot although Jimmy Burt himself gave conflicting stories. I don’t believe James Markham’s street gang of petty crime carried out the professional execution of officer Tippit, an extremely serious thing, but the Helen Markham story (as refracted through the telling of the family now later) raises questions whether gang members were enlisted in some role not realizing it would be a murder. 

On 3/8/2024 at 6:52 AM, Jamey Flanagan said:

There are some very interesting details in this post, but for me the above was the most interesting! I had never heard that before. How explosive would those tapes be if they ever surfaced?

Thanks Jamey for your comment, but I am taking that out of my piece; here is why. For sure it would be explosive if it surfaced or (it must be said) if it existed. After a flurry of leaks and promised imminent disclosure of such Fritz tapes those decades ago so far as I can see everything went dark/silent about that story ever since. First question: can it be verified that a wife of a DPD friend of Fritz told any researcher what Gary Mack reported? Mack refers to researchers plural who heard what Mack reports, but to my knowledge neither the wife’s name, the name of the Fritz friend, or the name of any researcher who personally heard the wife say that, is known. (Mack does not seem to say explicitly that he did.) What became of that story? Why didn’t the researchers who allegedly heard the wife firsthand tell further or name the names? Or was it a plant of a rabbit hole that was nothing, a hoax story? Unless some verification comes forward that a wife of a friend of Fritz said any such thing, I don't think this is usable or citeable. 

4 hours ago, Steve Thomas said:

Greg,

I appreciate the hard work you put into this. Your citation of the 112th Spot Report raised several questions in my mind.

1. Why was this information about the "Subject" attributed to a Captain "Dowdy"? Obviously, the person at the 112th who was relaying this information was not familiar with the Dallas Police personnel. If it indeed come from Captain Doughty of the Crime Search Section, why him, and not somebody in Special Services?

2. Did you catch the date at the top of the Spot Report? Also, look closely at the date of the "sighting" of the two guys sighting a rifle. Does the 63 date look odd?

3. I need to look at my notes of the roster of 112th Region II. Was there a Lieutenant Green on that Roster?

4. The timing on this Spot Report is suspiciously close in time with the information supposedly provided by Detective Stringfellow of Special Services to the effect that 5'10", 165 lb. Harvey Lee Oswald had been arrested.

5. In his article on the 112th, Larry Hancock asked why, either a) the Dallas Police were deliberately feeding the 112th false information, or b) the 112th was deliberately garbling the information the were gett8ng from the DPD.

Steve Thomas

I had not noticed that Nov 22, 1961 date instead of 1963 as it should read. Did typists for the 112th not proofread their work after typing? Good question on why Captain Doughty, and your other comments.

6 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:

Greg - are you certain it was Ellsworth who arrested Masen?

Not sure, cannot find the answer to that question.

"On 2/11/64, Frank Ellsworth, ATTU, Dallas, Texas, advised SA Richard L. Wiehl that subsequent to the arrest of John Thomas Masen on 11/20/63 for violation of the Federal Firearms Act, Masen was taken to the ATTU offices for questioning. During this questioning it was determined that Masen was of strong 'right-wing' beliefs and inclinations. Masen stated that there was in the Dallas area a small 'elite group' of patriots who were arming for the defense of the country inasmuch as the Government was being infiltrated by Communists ..." (https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=136322#relPageId=21)

Here is an article with two high school pictures of Masen from 1958: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=16255#relPageId=28.

Maybe the witness who reported seeing someone who looked like Oswald in the Nov 20 “silhouettes” sighting was a witness of the Nov 20 arrest of Masen by ATTU Ellsworth and fellow ATTU agents? That would agree with the date (Nov 20); could account for the DPD unable to find records or patrol officers who remembered it if it was really ATTU agents not DPD (ATTU agents had legal authority to make arrests); and it involved someone who looked like Oswald (Masen).

Ellsworth and one other ATTU agent did an undercover sting on Masen, they pretending to be what Masen thought were corrupt Irving police officers, in the weeks running up to the Nov 20 arrest of Masen by ATTU.

Does the “Irving” connection of the ATTU undercover sting on Masen make more plausible that Masen (who did not live or work near Irving) could have been in Irving where Oswald on Nov 11 was driving with a freshly repaired and sighted Mannlicher-Carcano in the car prepped for a sale to somebody—such as, say, a gun dealer such as Masen?

3 minutes ago, Robert Burrows said:

"...a man fitting SUBJECT description in company of another man were observed by this witness on 20 Nov 63 in the immediate vicinity of the place where President Kennedy was killed. These men were observed sighting in a rifle at two silhouette targets. When the police arrived on the scene they realized they were in the direct line of sight so attempted to approach the car by circling around to their rear. When the two officers arrived at the spot where the men were last observed the men had disappeared."

From an Army 112th Intelligence Corps document: Prima facie evidence of a conspiracy.

I don't think so Robert. This sighting was a number of blocks away from Dealey Plaza on Continental Street to the north, and assuming the suspected Oswald identification was mistaken, as it probably was like so many others (why would he be on Continental Street?), there is nothing there to connect it to the assassination. Any real assassins of course would sight in rifles but there is no good reason to assume several blocks away to the north of Dealey Plaza is where that would be done.

In two studies I showed that Lee and Marina Oswald borrowed a car belonging to Michael Paine without Michael or Ruth's knowledge, parked in front of Ruth Paine's house, on the morning of Monday Nov 11, 1963, Veterans Day, when Ruth was gone much of that day. Marina was in the car giving directions to Lee driving, since Lee would not otherwise have known where to drive, to find a gunsmith to repair a damaged scope base mount on the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle. After removing the rifle from Ruth Paine's garage on the morning of Nov 11 and succeeding in getting the rifle repaired with apparent intent to prepare it for a sale or conveyance, there is a black hole of information on the whereabouts and custody of that rifle between Nov 11 and Nov 22--when it turned up on the 6th floor of the TSBD used in the assassination. There is no evidence the rifle was returned to the garage or was in the garage again after Nov 11. It could have been returned to the garage again but there is no evidence it was. 

The first of the two studies establishing this activity of Lee and Marina on Nov 11 involving Lee driving a car is "The Mystery of the Furniture Mart sighting of Lee and Marina Oswald and their children and its solution", https://www.scrollery.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/JFK-Furniture-Mart-mystery-105-pdf2.pdf.

The second is, "The Oswald rifle scope installation at the Irving Sport Shop of Monday, November 11, 1963", https://www.scrollery.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Irving-Sport-Shop-109-pdf.pdf.

The car Oswald drove, and was seen driving that day, was a blue-and-white 1955 Oldsmobile sedan. 

With that in mind, I believe there is a heretofore-overlooked reference on Nov 22, 1963, the evening of the day of the assassination, confirming that the Dallas Police had information from some witness who told of Lee driving that car on Nov 11. I believe this reference functions as corroboration of the correctness of the argument of my two studies on the existence of that driving excursion of Lee carrying Marina and their child and baby, on Nov 11.

From an Army 112th Intelligence Corps document citing information learned from Captain Doughty of the Dallas Police some time between 8 and 10 pm, Nov 22, 1963. 

"SUBJECT: Lee Harvey OSWALD ... SUBJECT's wife has signed a statement stating that subject owned the rifle which is believed to be the weapon that fired the shot that killed President Kennedy and wounded Gov Connally. (this info has not been released to the public) The rifle was manufactured in Italy in 1940 (6.5m). The police have interviewed a witness who has stated that a man fitting SUBJECT description in company of another man were observed by this witness on 20 Nov 63 in the immediate vicinity of the place where President Kennedy was killed. These men were observed sighting in a rifle at two silhouette targets. When the police arrived on the scene they realized they were in the direct line of sight so attempted to approach the car by circling around to their rear. When the two officers arrived at the spot where the men were last observed the men had disappeared. The witness further stated that he saw an old model car parked in the vicinity of where the two men were observed with the rifle. The description of the car fits the description of the car that SUBJECT was driving. Witness believes there was a man sitting in the car. (this info has not been released to the public) The slugs that killed President Kennedy and wounded Gov Connally have not been recovered ... SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Capt Dowdy ... TIME AND DATE INFORMATION RECEIVED BY REPORTING AGENCY: 2225 hrs, 22 Nov 63. COMMENT BY REPORTING AGENCY: Region II agents were cautioned that most of the above info was not public knowledge." (Kennedy Assassination Chronicles 7/4 [2001], 27, https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=4273#relPageId=28)

Comment: this information apparently derives from that early stage following the assassination before it was realized Oswald had no car and supposedly never drove on his own. The phrase "fits the description of the car that SUBJECT was driving" is to be interpreted as echoing what Capt. Doughty told them, an interpretation of the police (not of the unnamed witness of the silhouettes). This witness (unnamed) saw a certain "old model car" which Captain Doughty told these Army 112th Intelligence Corps persons "fits the description of the car that SUBJECT was driving", that is, Doughty was saying what this witness saw was a car which was in general agreement with what police had as a description of a car that Oswald had been seen or was known to drive.

Nothing further is heard of this car identification again. But there is little other way to read this than that a report had come in to the Dallas Police, some time after Oswald's arrest and identification by name around 2 pm, but no later than 8-10 pm that day, Nov 22--some time in those few hours time frame--the Dallas Police had information that Oswald drove a car, and they had a description of what that car was like. It was "an old model car". That's all that this report says. 

The 1955 Olds that Oswald drove on Mon Nov 11 was "an old model". That matches. There is no other date Oswald can be known to have driven a car on his own in the greater Dallas area than this one time on Nov 11 (apart from his driving lessons with Ruth Paine, and a report that he test-drove a new car at a car dealership with a salesman in the passenger's seat). 

Therefore I interpret this as the Dallas Police having learned on Nov 22 of Oswald driving the car he did on Nov 11, 1963. Someone--we don't know who--was a source of information to the Dallas Police on that point, on Nov 22. How would the Dallas Police have learned that on Nov 22?

Note also that the location of this sighting of the two men sighting-in a rifle did not take place, as one might think from reading the above, very near the TSBD; it did not, according to an allusion to this same incident in an FBI report of Nov 27, 1963, which says it occurred on Continental Street which is on the other side of a freeway to the north of the TSBD, not immediately adjacent or adjoining the TSBD: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=95672#relPageId=90. 

And both the persons and the car of the Wed eve Nov 20 sighting are not related to Oswald or to "the car that [Oswald] was driving" (on Nov 11). This was a sighting of something maybe a quarter of a mile away, in the midst of hunting season so not obviously sinister, and none of the persons were Oswald, the car was not the car Oswald had driven, and there is no reason to suppose that incident with the silhouettes had anything to do with anything with the assassination. (The FBI inability to get confirmation of the police check on it on Wed night Nov 20 as reported, could have been caused by a mistake in the date by one day in the witness's report.) But none of this is material to the point here, which is not the car of Nov 20, but rather DPD knowledge of the car Oswald drove on Nov 11--and how the DPD might have obtained that knowledge when they did.

And a possible second, independent allusion to Oswald and a car also at the Dallas Police station on Nov 22

I refer to the story of deputy sheriff Roger Craig who told of phoning Capt. Fritz, who had Oswald in his office questioning him, and then Craig went over and believed he identified Oswald as the man Craig had seen run to and get into a light-colored Rambler station wagon which Craig believed was Ruth Paine's station wagon (it was not). Craig was mistaken on both counts, on the identification of the man, and of the station wagon. But that is not the important point here, which is Roger Craig's account of a curious exchange, in which he says he heard Capt. Fritz ask Oswald (I am paraphrasing from memory), "What about this? This man saw you in that car/station wagon." And Oswald replies--very strangely and seemingly nonsensically--"that's Ruth Paine's car--keep her out of this!" And something about Oswald saying to Fritz, "I told you that!" Also something about Oswald looking dejected and saying "everyone will know who I am now", which Craig interpreted as if Oswald was regretting his cover (or something) would be blown or lost.

Everyone has read this as if Oswald believed he was answering a question concerning how he left the TSBD. 

But that makes no sense because there was no Ruth Paine car in front of the TSBD--there just wasn't--and there is no rational reason why Oswald would have thought so. Therefore, I don't think that is the question Oswald thought he was answering. And remember this is all hearsay from Roger Craig who could not figure what Oswald was meaning either, just reporting or paraphrasing what he remembered was said as best he could.

Before I saw the 112th Army Corps report explicitly referring to the Dallas Police having information and a description of a car driven by Oswald, I had already surmised that this Roger Craig exchange might actually reflect--even if neither Roger Craig nor later readers recognized it--Oswald referring to something to do with the car he drove on Nov 11. 

I surmised that that is what Fritz had been discussing with Oswald in the immediate seconds before Roger Craig poked his head in the door at Fritz's invitation and heard what he did. I believe Oswald interpreted the question or statement of Fritz to be as if Fritz was saying, "Mr. Oswald, this man saw you driving that car that another witness told us about". And Oswald, thinking the reference is Nov 11 when he was driving, does not want to have Ruth Paine involved in any trouble (Ruth Paine did not even know Oswald had driven the car that day--still does not know it to the present day--was not convinced by my papers explaining it 🙂 ). 

Technically the car Lee drove on Nov 11, the '55 Olds, was not Ruth's but registered to Michael Paine, but it was always parked at Ruth's place indefinitely so it would be easy for Oswald to refer to it to Fritz as "that's Ruth Paine's car".

Without the interpretation I have given--that Oswald thought he was answering something to do with Nov 11, not Nov 22, in his "that's Ruth Paine's car" answer--the answer of Oswald makes no sense. Ruth Paine, and her car (and Michael Paine's '55 Olds) were all in Irving all day, nothing to do with being in front of the TSBD nor would Oswald think so. But what makes this sensible is linking it backward to Nov 11 and also forward a few hours later to the Capt. Doughty reference to police knowledge of a car that Oswald drove--an "old" model car ... the car Oswald drove on Nov 11.

How did Fritz and Doughty of the Dallas Police learn on Nov 22 of Oswald driving a car in Irving on Nov 11?

Once I established from the above items that the Dallas Police had some source of information regarding Oswald driving on Nov 11, I wondered how that could have happened. There is no certainty here but I will run down my thinking. It will not have been Marina because Marina wasn't telling anything that first day, there is no record she did, and she consistently denied it later when asked if she was where Oswald drove her on Nov 11. So Marina is out. So are Ruth or Michael Paine, who did not know Lee and Marina had borrowed the car without permission. At the Furniture Mart where two women had seen Oswald arrive and leave driving Michael Paine's blue-and-white 1955 Olds, it will not have been Gertrude Hunter because she said she did not see a picture of Oswald for several days at which point she recognized him. And it will not have been store owner Edith Whitworth because she said she did recognize Oswald quickly from the news as having been in her store but did not phone it in to the police or FBI, told no one except her husband. And it will not have been Dial Ryder at the Irving Sport Shop who worked on Oswald's rifle making the repair, because Ryder hardly remembered anything and was inside the shop and specifically denied when asked if he had seen a car or how Oswald had arrived, he did not know. 

Was it volunteered by Oswald himself? (That could possibly relate to what Roger Craig heard Oswald say to Fritz, "I told you I did".) If he did, the point would not be because the car was important, but it would have to be some unreported part of the 90% of Oswald's 12 hours of interrogation time which is unknown because the reported questions and answers only account for about 10% of the total time of Oswald's interrogation according to one published estimate. Oswald's reported interrogation questions and answers are woefully inadequate and incomplete, leaving basic things unasked and not followed up on, probably not because Fritz (or whoever) never asked, but more likely because not everything was reported. 

And consider this fascinating article, "Oswald: Why I think he talked to Will Fritz", by Alaric Rosman (Dealey Plaza Echo, 2012), https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=146599#relPageId=22 . 

Or maybe Oswald talked to Hosty after Hosty was officially ordered not to be part of the DPD interrogation any further with Fritz or to tell the DPD anything--but Hosty still was around in the offices there for several more hours... lots of opportunity for Hosty and Oswald to have some off-the-record private talk if there was a need for it ... Fritz claimed he was there all the time except for the times he stepped out ...  

Or maybe Oswald talked to ATTU (Alcohol Tobacco Tax Unit; ATF today) agent Ellsworth who is not known in any Oswald interrogation accounts but who by his account a few years later to Dick Russell told of having gone over there at Fritz's request to talk to Oswald about the rifle, or something. That occurred Friday afternoon or evening too, Nov 22. For all we know Ellsworth could have just been there and left just before Roger Craig showed up. What was said between Oswald and Ellsworth? No one knows.

Or maybe he talked to Fritz, as Alaric Rosman supposed. But Rosman gives some argument that Oswald did talk to someone about what was really going on, along with the rest of what Oswald is reported to have said and answered, including some things which were not only untrue but had to have been known by Oswald could be found quickly to be untrue. Rosman argues for the possibility that Oswald was assured he would be released shortly, but asked to maintain his cover just a little longer until he was released. Rosman focuses on the press conference late Friday night and Oswald's look of utter desolation upon being informed by reporters that he was being charged with the President's death. Rosman interprets that as Oswald in despair because he did not think that was going to happen, because he had been told, or anticipated, a promised intervention which would get him released.  

It seems the source of information that Oswald drove a car on Nov 11 in Irving would have to come from either Oswald himself, or from someone who had met or knew of Oswald's driving on Nov 11, such as a recipient of the rifle which Oswald was spending money to have repaired so he could convey it.

The existence and identity of a recipient of the rifle on Nov 11 is pure speculation, but the rifle had to go somewhere after Oswald paid $6.00 at the Irving Sport Shop and got it back, scope base and scope repaired and installed, rifle sighted-in by bore sighting. Oswald was not seen taking it with him in Buell Frazier's car the next morning, Nov 12, riding in to work. Either Oswald on Nov 11 returned it to the garage, put it in a storage locker at a bus station, or met someone that same day for a sale or conveyance of the rifle. 

Speculation on how the rifle got from Point A to Point B

I'm going to suggest just as a conjecture that what happened next with the rifle, after Oswald had it repaired on the morning of Nov 11, was the last of the three possibilities just named, and in thinking over who that person, if so, might possibly have been, I'm going to take a wild guess and consider John Thomas Masen.

Masen was a gun dealer, a dealer in Mannlicher-Carcano rifles. So he was someone knowledgeable about Mannlicher-Carcanos, one of the few people in Dallas in the business of buying and selling such, I believe one of the only two dealers in ammo for Mannlicher-Carcanos in Dallas. And according to Ellsworth, it was Masen, not Oswald, who the people at the Sports Drome rifle range thought was Oswald--that Sports Drome shooter who was a crack shot and looked like Oswald, easy to mistake for Oswald by looking at him (said Ellsworth, and supported from the only known photo of him, his high school photo). Ellsworth told Dick Russell that Masen had confirmed that it was he at the Sports Drome, to Ellsworth. Oswald never practiced with that rifle after Nov 11 that he spent money to have repaired on Nov 11. He repaired it on Nov 11 in order to sell it. 

Masen was under surveillance by Ellsworth working undercover, and Ellsworth said he was in Fritz's office talking to Oswald somewhere in there late Friday afternoon or early evening, perhaps just before the Roger Craig Fritz/Oswald exchange that Craig heard. 

Masen, although there is no reason to suppose he was involved in the assassination himself, claimed he was in touch with and doing gun-running and weapons acquisition on request, to order, for anti-Castro Cubans who were dead set on invading Cuba and also killing Kennedy, i.e. Masen could have been in contact with the assassins of Kennedy, and he certainly was obtaining weapons on order on request from killer types with motivation and wish to kill Kennedy.

Masen could have been the means by which Oswald's rifle, removed from Ruth Paine's garage on the morning of Nov 11 (fact), ended up eleven days later in the TSBD used in the assassination on Nov 22 (fact). 

And according to disputed reports, Masen was in the custody of the Dallas Police on Fri Nov 22. He was certainly in custody on Wed Nov 20 because Ellsworth arrested him then; released Thu by a lawyer; but there is documentation referring to an arrest of Masen on Fri Nov 22. Either that is a second arrest or some mistaken reference to a one and only first arrest of Nov 20, I don't know which. If Elrod's "Oswald" of La Fontaines' fame was actually Masen who looked like Oswald, then Masen was in jail at the Dallas Police station on Nov 22.

So Masen could possibly be another conceivable source, other than Oswald, for the Dallas Police's information concerning a car driven by Oswald on Nov 11, since he may have been at the police station and questioned on Nov 22, if Masen was the mysterious Y party conjectured to be the recipient of a rifle Oswald had repaired on Nov 11 in order to convey in what may have been a solicited sale of his rifle (or something along that line).

Whatever the mechanism, Doughty and Fritz of the Dallas Police knew, on Nov 22, that Oswald had driven a car, which was on Nov 11. The only mystery is how they knew that, what was the source of that information on Nov 22. 

1 hour ago, Cory Santos said:

And when Ruth called for Lee (the violent abusive husband) how did she get the number to call Truly at the Book Depository?   From the phone book?

I believe Ruth testified she knew of no allegation that Lee beat Marina. She certainly testified she knew nothing of any violence of Oswald toward Marina or otherwise herself. 

Yes, why not the phone book, I assume so. How else? What do you think? What is your point?

9 minutes ago, Tony Krome said:

Was the WC aware that during the week of Oct 7-11, that enquires were made at the TSBD, prompted by the knowledge that Oswald was looking for work?

Not that I know of.

I don't believe Buell Wesley Frazier told of the role he played in asking at work about a job for Lee, or whether they were hiring, as he does on pp. 34-35 of Steering Truth, before that book, which was published 2021. (If he did before 2021 I missed it.) Though there may be allusions in early newspaper reports from the days following the assassination that reflect it.

Buell acknowledges in Steering Truth that what he describes differs from what Linnie had said in her Warren Commission testimony, but he says Linnie really did make inquiry of him re a job for Lee because she was a caring person about others around.

"During her testimony, Linnie stated that she couldn't remember saying anything to me about inquiring about work for anyone, but I can tell you she did mention it to me in passing. Linnie had a way of looking out for people. She really cared about others and hated to see them go through difficult times. She never directly told me to talk to anyone about a job. I made the decision to ask on my own.

"I went to work the next day and spoke to Mr. Shelley about whether they were hiring, and he talked to Mr. Truly. Later that afternoon, Mr. Shelley informed me that anyone wanting a job could come in and fill out an application.

"I came home and told Linnie what Mr. Shelley had said. A few days later, Linnie told me that the husband of the lady living down the street with Mrs. Paine had gotten a job at the Texas School Book Depository."

Buell does not explicitly say the inquiring of Linnie and his own checking with Shelley at work about whether they were hiring, occurred prior to Monday Oct 14 the morning of the coffee klatch (i.e. back into the week of Oct 7-11). That relative time-sequencing is reconstructed by me because I do not see the timeline working starting from Oct 14 for what Buell describes. I am locating the first sentence of the final two above as having occurred prior to Oct 14; Buell's inquiry in person with Shelley about a job for Lee and/or hiring situation at TSBD as having also occurred prior to Oct 14; then the coffee klatch Oct 14 where Linnie passes on what she has learned from Buell, Ruth calls that day; Oswald goes first thing Tue morning Oct 15 to apply with Truly, Truly hires him; Oswald starts work day one on the job Oct 16.

I think what was otherwise a neighborhood in which the women were in continual contact and knowledge of goings-on would have meant it likely Linnie knew through the grapevine the week of Oct 7-11 that Marina's husband was having difficulty finding work, Linnie checked with Buell about it, then Buell checked with Shelley at work, got back to Linnie with the green light he received, Linnie made a point on Monday morning Oct 14 of finding Ruth and Marina and telling them. Then after the assassination Linnie not surprisingly clammed up about wanting to tell of any role she had in having helped Lee find that job due to the horrifying way that had turned out.

2 hours ago, Tony Krome said:

Mr. TRULY. She said, "Mr. Truly,"---words to this effect---you understand---" Mr. Truly, you don't know who I am but I have a neighbor whose brother works for you. I don't know what his name is. But he tells his sister that you are very busy. And I am just wondering if you can use another man,"

Why would you be "wondering if you can use another man" if you knew definitely they were looking for someone.

Your words, "definitely...looking for someone". Not Ruth's, not Buell's, not anyone's directly quoted words.

Buell says after Linnie asked him if there could be a job possibility at TSBD for Lee (this before the Oct 14 coffee klatch), that Buell asked Shelley at work, who checked with Truly and then Shelley got back to Buell and told Buell the unknown Lee would be welcome to apply, understood by Buell as a green light. (In other words, the answer did not come back to Buell, as it could have, "No, we don't need anyone right now.") Buell told Linnie, and on Monday morning Oct 14 Linnie walked over and told the women including Ruth and Marina that. 

If I heard a rumor that a company might be hiring, and I contacted the owner doing the hiring, I wouldn't start first words in the door blasting away on selling myself. I might ask an opening question like that before wasting time if I had heard wrong. That's how Ruth's opening question of a cold-call phone call reads to me. 

But let me turn the question around on you: why do you suppose Ruth would make such a call at Marina's urging, and why would Marina be excited about it, if something had not been said about a job possibility at TSBD? 

Again, Buell Frazier, Steering Truth, 34-35. All I can say is, Buell supports Ruth's testimony. Of course, you are free to consider Buell a l iar too, people will believe what they want. Also, I do not want to be in the position of having to defend or explain every syllable Ruth Paine said as if that is my obligation. I pointed you to Buell Frazier as corroborating testimony and you can judge for yourself. 

3 hours ago, Tony Krome said:

Take your pick;

Mrs. RANDLE. Well, we didn't say that he might get a job, because I didn't know there was a job open.

Mrs. PAINE. Through my neighbor, we heard there was an opening at the Texas School Book Depository.

This one can be answered. It is Linnie Randle who dissembled there, Ruth Paine was the truthful one. According to Buell Wesley Frazier, who, against interest (he loved his sister), backed up Ruth Paine on this one. Buell Wesley Frazier, Steering Truth (2021), 34-35.

There is more to it than even this in print from Buell Frazier. Early news accounts credited Oswald getting a job in the TSBD to learning from a neighbor employed there (Buell Frazier) that there was a job opening. 

It was known in the neighborhood that Marina's husband lacked a job, with Marina about to have a child. Sometime in the week of Oct 7-11 Linnie, in touch with the neighborhood, knew this information. Being helpful, Linnie asked Buell if there might be a job where he worked (TSBD). Buell then checked and told Linnie that yes, there was (or could be, whatever exactly). 

On Mon Oct 14 there was the outdoor informal women's coffee klatch next door to Ruth Paine's house attended by Ruth and Marina. Linnie walked over and in the discussion over Lee's unemployment predicament Linnie volunteered there could be a job opening at TSBD where her brother worked--this from Linnie told by Ruth in her testimony, denied by Linnie, Ruth's testimony corroborated by Buell in Steering Truth. 

Ruth jumped on this, asked Linnie if she would call and see if Lee could be gotten a job there. Linnie declined. Marina begged Ruth to call. Ruth called and inquired of Truly, who said send him in to apply. The rest is history.

There was post-assassination motive for Linnie to distance herself from what otherwise would have been a perfectly generous and well-meaning small act of assistance to someone in the neighborhood: helping Oswald find a job.

Ruth has been unjustly and unmercifully pilloried for six decades for that small act of generosity intended to help a poor man without a job who wanted to work. As Judge Griffin put it, "No good deed goes unpunished". 

2 hours ago, Pete Mellor said:

Elementary my dear Mr Doudna!  So is there any record of a Rowe moving into Ruby's apartment in '64?

I couldn't find anything about that. I wish someone could. One detail I noticed is that the Boxley/Garrison lead item has the apartment at issue as #206 at 227 S. Ewing in Oak Cliff, mistakenly identified as Ruby's apartment. In fact Ruby's apartment was #207. Apt #206 was George Senator's before Senator moved from #206 in with Ruby at #207. There is also some story, I don't remember where I read it, that some Dallas Police officers, unidentified, are supposed to have lived in an apartment next to or near Ruby's, I wonder if that is a different version of the Boxley/Garrison lead item. 

The Penn Jones allusion to "Tommy" Rowe (undercover officer Rowe) telling store manager Brewer that Oswald had gone into the theater is puzzling, but the simplest explanation might be that it was some version of Rowe's story that he, like Brewer, was at that alley side door of the Theatre behind the stage. Brewer came out that door and then went back in on the stage behind the curtain, with other officers, and from there peeking through the curtain saw Oswald sitting in the back of the theater and pointed Oswald out to the officers. Rowe in his 2009 video says identically that he too was on that stage at the same moments, as if he was with those other officers on the stage with Brewer, and Rowe says, just like Brewer, that he too saw Oswald sitting in the rear, standing up and sitting down again, seeing the same thing Brewer said he saw, from the same location on the stage Brewer was. Rowe in 2009 does not claim he pointed out Oswald to other officers or to Brewer while they were on that stage--Rowe 2009 does not mention Brewer at all--but it sounds so close that it seems the Penn Jones allusion must be some version of that. As Brewer told it he started to go out the side door into the alley and the officers outside (Rowe says he was with those uniformed officers) at first thought Brewer was the suspect until both officers and Brewer agreed the suspect was not Brewer but inside the theater. Brewer is alive and in Austin today at age 83? Its a long time ago, but I wonder if Brewer would remember anything related to Rowe, a long-haired plain-clothes officer with a ponytail there also on that stage with Brewer when Brewer spotted Oswald sitting in the back of the theater.

8 hours ago, Tom Gram said:

Is it possible Robert was using the name Tommy in his undercover operation? 

Tom I think you might be on to something there.

I've tried to identify these characters--Robert A. Rowe the officer working undercover; "Tommy Rowe" whose actions Nov 22 sound so much like Robert Rowe's; "Freddie Woodall" who supposedly shared Ruby's former apartment with "Tommy Rowe" according to the Boxley-Garrison document, through the 1963 and 1964 Polk's city directories for Dallas, and come up with nothing connecting anything to Ruby's address, and nothing for a Freddie Woodall in Dallas.

And I found no Robert A. Rowe who is not otherwise accounted for by different occupations named than police officer, so could not find him in Dallas, even though we know he existed and that is his correct name because of Dallas Police officer records.

What I did find in the 1963 directory however, not present in 1964, is a "Tom Rowe, student, 2435 W. Jefferson Blvd". Remember how in his 2009 video Robert Rowe said he and 2-3 other undercover officers were watching the news on TV and listening to the radio news regarding the assassination on Nov 22 for about an hour before hearing of Tippit, and then driving two miles to the Texas Theatre?

Well, 2435 Jefferson Blvd, where resides one "Tom Rowe", same name as the otherwise-unidentified "Tommy Rowe" whose presence and activity related to the Texas Theatre and Oswald that day sounds so closely similar to being the same person as Robert Rowe ... is almost exactly two miles from the Texas Theatre at 231 W. Jefferson according an online map.

Robert Rowe is undercover, is listed as a "student" going by "Tom" or "Tommy" plus same last name ... and Robert A. Rowe cannot be found under his correct name ... two miles away and two miles away ... its a match!

"Tommy Rowe" is one and the same with Dallas Police undercover officer Robert A. Rowe.

Brilliant Tom! I love puzzle solutions! 

4 hours ago, Donald Willis said:

Such as Mrs M & Virginia Davis, who apparently did not even see the shooter, just a vigilante chasing him.

At least in the case of Barbara Davis I think that is probably right. Barbara Davis insisted that the man of whom she saw a brief glimpse in profile of his face whom she believed had been the killer running by her house, and from that brief glimpse told police was Oswald out of a lineup, was wearing a black coat.

"except he [Oswald, at the lineup, concerning her identification of Oswald as the man she saw] didn't have a black coat on when I saw him in the lineup ... a dark coat ... a dark coat"

"No, sir [on whether she saw CE 162 worn by her "Oswald" who ran by her house] ... it was dark and to me looked like it was maybe a wool fabric, it looked sort of rough. Like more of a sporting jacket."

Bill and I in the past went around and around on this. Bill was positive Barbara saw the killer wearing CE 162 and somehow was massively mistaken in her memory of color and description of that jacket but was not mistaken on the facial identification from her profile view of the man. I argued that it was more likely a witness such as Barbara had a reliable memory of a basic color and coat description which differed so starkly from all other witness descriptions of the killer's jacket, and that an erroneous identification of Oswald in the lineup as the man wearing that black coat was an easier and therefore more likely error for a witness to make. I discussed this at pages 28-34 of https://www.scrollery.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/T-Jackets-112.pdf.

I have wondered if the man in the black coat Barbara saw go by her house might have been Jimmy Burt, who said he went around the corner of Tenth and Patton moments after the killer had passed there. 

Of course if Barbara was identifying someone other than the killer as Oswald (based on her glimpse of a profile of the man in the black coat seeing his face from the side), that could function to raise critical scrutiny of some witness Oswald identifications (influenced by other witnesses? by police? by wanting to help police convict the killer?), since it is logically impossible for two distinct men identified as Oswald out of lineups by Tenth and Patton witnesses to both be correct.

7 hours ago, Cory Santos said:

My opinion as to her veracity is based on taking her interviews and statements as a whole.  That is what lawyers do.   Your interpretation of my opinion is therefore your opinion of my opinion.  The difference is you are looking to defend her.  I came from a neutral position and made a conclusion.   I do not mean to defend or attack but merely state my opinion of how I see her veracity as a witness.  I could use your logic and ask why do you defend her so strongly?    I am sure you have your reasons.   But as for the phone call, your position is mere speculation.  
Consider, according to the WC, De Mohrenschildt knew about the rifle, Walker attempt and backyard photos, so did Marina.  Michael Paine knew about the weapons- and knew Oswald had his stuff in his garage near his kids.   Ruth “knew” Oswald was abusive to Marina - but let him around her kids-  which is odd for a pacifist especially since they had fights in her house.  All these facts but Ruth knew none of it?  Yet when they had this phone call, we should speculate it was innocent?   Right…..

The alternative that you are suggesting, that Ruth and Michael knew immediately (in a manner no one else "knew" from simply following the news) who killed President Kennedy, means foreknowledge--isn't that what you are suggesting? I am asking you to explain how that makes sense. You are seriously suggesting both Michael and Ruth Paine knew in advance who was going to kill Kennedy, and sat on that information (how evil can one get), and kept that secret for the next half century (and no one murdered them to eliminate the risk of them talking)? 

Please say that is not what you are meaning? And you know you are talking about a hearsay report to begin with where it is not even certain we have the exact syllables or words spoken as opposed to some human informant's (such as a telephone operator at the phone company) paraphrase: "we both know who..." Isn't it more likely that it is as Ruth has always said, they were thinking, "we know it is the radical right...", than this other alternative you are asserting which is a very extreme claim and has no other corroboration to it--all from that ambiguous hearsay few words? 

The argument on that point is actually independent of whether Michael did or did not tell Ruth about having seen the Backyard Photo. 

I am sure are also aware that by affirming as your premise that Oswald did show Michael a Backyard Photo you are opposing the many here who think the photos were faked, that Oswald had no rifle, etc.

I admit the Michael Paine 1993 claim is troubling. I have noticed that Michael has invented a few things in his later tellings that fit into his mental narrative of Oswald, such that I have wondered if it is possible the 1993 story of seeing the Backyard Photograph was one more (though I don't really know that that will work).

(For example: how many times has Michael Paine said over the years, quoted and requoted, that Oswald believed change could only come through violence? This is core to Michael Paine's interpretation of Oswald. Michael insisted that from the beginning, told the Warren Commission that was what Oswald believed. How surprised I was in studying Michael Paine's Warren Commission testimony to find Michael Paine explicitly told the Commission he never actually heard Oswald say that. He believed Oswald thought that, but said he never heard Oswald actually directly say anything about the necessity of violence to accomplish political change. That is Michael Paine's own explicit testimony to the Warren Commission. Michael Paine explained why he believed Oswald thought that even though he never heard Oswald say that. Michael explained: it was because Oswald never advocated for any progressive reform activity, never would answer to Michael any roadmap for political progressives to follow to get to a better world in any peaceful or programmatic political reform way. Oswald never would answer Michael when Michael asked him how exploitation was going to end. Since Oswald never gave Michael an answer to that question, Michael concluded it was because Oswald believed violence was the only way. Michael explained to the Warren Commission that was how he knew Oswald believed that. The problem is that is not correct, if the known political writings of Oswald are considered representative of Oswald's reasoning. Oswald in his writings never advocates political violence--the thing Michael Paine believed to the core of his bones was so basic to Oswald even though he never once heard Oswald say it. Oswald in his writings never says violence by politically aware people is necessary or advocated. Instead, Oswald's view was that both Soviet and American systems were fatally flawed and corrupted and would collapse by themselves--no political activists' violence involved or playing any role in those collapses. Oswald had an idea that the politically aware people should organized to be ready to build a better world and better systems after the collapse of the unjust systems which will happen on its own. The issue isn't whether Oswald was right or wrong on that. It is that Michael Paine fundamentally got Oswald wrong, and misrepresented Oswald on something Michael Paine explicitly said in his 1964 testimony he never heard Oswald say. But in Michael Paine's later years, at the same time he introduces the Backyard Photograph story, he starts speaking of having heard Oswald say emphatically that violence was the only way for change to happen. Michael Paine so firmly had his belief of what Oswald thought--his mind-reading of Oswald--that decades later he turned that into what he believed was an actual memory of having heard Oswald say that forcefully. Is it possible Michael Paine could have done the same thing with his belated introduction of the Backyard Photo business? I don't know.)

8 hours ago, Pete Mellor said:

No docs, just assume this Tommy Rowe was at one time interviewed by Penn Jones who then published his story in his Midlothian Mirror.  Never heard of the undercover cop 'Rowe'.  It was Tommy who moved into Ruby's apartment. 

Officer Robert A. Rowe. 

Ian Griggs writing in 2005 (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/13775-robert-rowe/page/2/) :

ROWE, Robert A. (Ptmn, NE Substation, 1st Platoon, Patrol Division)

As a member of the 1st Platoon, Ptmn. Rowe would have been on night shift duty during the assassination weekend. During a conversation with him in Dallas in November 2005, however, he claimed to have been working some sort of undercover assignment on 22nd November. He told me that at this time he was working out of uniform and had long hair tied in a ponytail. 

He also described having taken part in the arrest of Lee Harvey Oswald in the theatre. Despite discussing these claims with several DPD officers present during the Oswald arrest, I have been unable to corroborate his story. I have failed to identify any officer who saw him in the Texas Theater.

It was mentioned to me by a former DPD officer who knew Mr. Rowe that due to a longstanding medical condition (possibly a mental health problem), he (Rowe) seldom left the office and had responsibility only for the safe custody and necessary issue of keys in a key press.

During my meeting with Mr. Rowe it was noticeable that he was wearing on his jacket a DPD Patrolman badge across which was taped a piece of paper bearing the word RETIRED.

It is my opinion that this man was nowhere near the Oswald arrest site on 22nd November 1963 and I feel that his claim should be treated with extreme caution.

IAN GRIGGS

Here is verification that Robert A. Rowe was a Dallas Police officer in November 1963: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=1136#relPageId=140.

Here is an interview of retired Dallas Police officer Robert Rowe filmed in 2008 but to my knowledge only first posted saw the light of day in 2023, posted on YouTube in 2023, previously unknown, see starting at 41:05: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gw474eos24Y.

In this filmed interview from 2008, Rowe says he and his partner arrived in a pickup truck parked in the alley next to the Texas Theatre, on Nov 22, 1963.

Compare that to what has always been a mystery: a separate report of Dallas Police officer Stringer upon arrival to the alley entrance of the Texas Theatre on Nov 22, 1963, of seeing an unoccupied pickup truck with the engine running outside the back door of the Theatre: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=217804#relPageId=104. There is no information in the police reports of what became of that running pickup truck or who was the owner or driver of that pickup truck. According to Rowe's interview that may have been Rowe.

I also found this from Dallas Morning News reporter Jim Ewell in Sneed, No More Silence 1998), p. 10 referring to Oswald's arrest at the Texas Theatre: "Oswald then took my place in the backseat of the same [patrol] car that I arrived in. So when they left with him, I stood there stranded. I then hitchhiked a ride with a man in a pickup truck." Maybe that was Rowe or Rowe's partner.

Here is an interview of officer Rowe in 2009, starting at 14:09 of 5th down from the top, "Keep Seeking the Truth" video Part 2, https://projectjfk.com/videos. This is the fullest telling of Rowe's story.

In the 2009 video, Rowe says he was working undercover with 2 or 3 other officers, undercover, on a narcotics sting and a prostitution case. He says they were located about 2 miles from the Texas Theatre in Oak Cliff. He and the others were in an apartment and listened on a black-and-white television and on KRLD radio after the news Kennedy had been shot, for about an hour. When they heard on the news of the officer killed in Oak Cliff and that a suspect was at the Texas Theatre, on the commercial radio, he and another undercover officer (identified as T.O. Trotman in Rowe's 2008 video), decided to go over and see if they could help out. Rowe says he was not in uniform, had long hair and a ponytail, so he did not look like an officer. He says they pulled up near the door in the alley of the Texas Theatre, and he says he was there talking with the officers before that side door opened, and that he entered on to the stage area of the theater when officers opened the door. Rowe says from the stage he saw Oswald stand up and move over a few seats in the back of the theater. As the uniformed officers moved down the aisle toward Oswald, Rowe says he thought Oswald might make a run for the door out the alley. Rowe says he went near the location of the officers struggling to subdue Oswald, and when Gerald Hill called out for someone to give him  handcuffs, Rowe says that the officer who provided them handed them to Rowe who handed them to Hill (who put them on Oswald).

Rowe filed no written report. He does not show up in any of the accounts of the Texas Theatre arrest of Oswald, in any officer or witness report, his name does not appear in the index in Myers' book, etc and etc. Rowe explains in the 2009 video (my transcription): 

"I left, because I was not supposed to be there. I was undercover, and you're not supposed to go around police operations when you're undercover. I didn't get my name in any report."

In the 2008 video interview (the one that first come to light in 2023) Rowe makes what is really a sensational disclosure or claim--that he was a cop on the take from Jack Ruby whom he says he knew very well and whom he knew was mob-connected--and that there were other police on the take from Ruby too. By Rowe's description Ruby was a regular ATM machine for cash for some officers apparently. Rowe says all the cash that Ruby had on his person Nov 24 was only the cash still left after he had already passed some out in envelopes that weekend. Rowe does not name officers who received cash from Ruby other than himself.

Rowe straight-up says right into the camera that he received money from Jack Ruby handed to him personally by Ruby in cash in envelopes, in addition to his Dallas Police officer pay. Rowe just straight says that as if he's talking about the weather.    

Given that Ruby personally extrajudicially executed Oswald on Sunday morning Nov 24, and reasons for supposing there may have been a foiled intention to extrajudicially execute Oswald earlier in the Theatre on Nov 22, is the presence of an unreported undercover police officer in the pay of Ruby at the Texas Theatre at the time of Oswald's arrest significant, if he was there? It would have been nice if that could have been investigated.

Penn Jones that you cite and the Boxley Garrison witness lead document posted by Gil have a different Rowe named "Tommy Rowe" of whom hardly anything is known--supposedly a second unknown mystery person named Rowe there that day who also told people he played a role in the arrest of Oswald at the Texas Theatre and had an unusual connection to Ruby.

That seems like one too many mystery unreported Rowes who told of playing a role in Oswald's arrest who had a relationship with Ruby. Is it possible Boxley got his Tommy Rowe listing from Penn Jones' information and Penn Jones got his from some hearsay with a mistake in the first name? This is just speculating, I don't know. It just seems like too similar of a match to stories of an identical last name to be two of them.

Finally on officer Rowe, an unrelated story from 2013 in which Rowe tells of the day he reported to the scene of a 1973 Dallas Police shooting and killing of a 12-year old boy while in police custody (done by other officers, not Rowe): https://www.cbsnews.com/texas/news/retired-officer-remembers-the-night-santos-rodriguez-was-killed/ .

11 hours ago, Cory Santos said:

Ron you bring up good points that the cult of Ruth fails to acknowledge but I’ll add to your post by again stating that Michael knew before the assassination that Lee had a rifle and a pistol yet somehow he never told Ruth?   Oh please- in a DiEuginio voice. Additionally, Michael tells her they both know who did the shooting over the phone.  If Ruth did not know about the weapons or gee whiz even which book depository he worked at-even though she helped him get the job- well gosh, how did she know he did the shooting Michael?   You have to really ignore things to believe this stuff.  Like I said earlier, Jim is right on this one.   On Marilyn, we disagree but on this, Jim is flying high.  

Cory, if Michael did see a Backyard Photograph on April 2, 1963, he concealed that not only from the Warren Commission but from Ruth as well. Ruth's distaste for guns around children reads as real. Michael's 30-year-later disclosure that he had seen a BYP does not establish that Ruth knew or lied about not knowing. 

On "we both know" who shot Kennedy in that phone call, Ruth has said that was a reference to the radical right, widely believed at first by most of Dallas. Its very plausible that is what that kind of language meant in Dallas in the first hour after the assassination. On the other hand its not very plausible that Michael or Ruth actually knew who had just killed Kennedy. That they had foreknowledge of who killed Kennedy makes no sense. (Do you really believe so?) Why be so dead set on seeing something incriminating in "we both know who" instead of giving the benefit of the doubt to a person in the direction that is overwhelmingly the most plausible as to the meaning, is that person's own explanation, and is not contradicted by other evidence? (https://www.swtimes.com/story/news/2020/09/20/paine-interview-raises-more-jfk-assassination-questions-part-ii/42668757/). Why insist on construing something ambiguous someone says in a sinister way? Witchhunt logic. Where someone is publicly condemned based on suspicion regarded as its own evidence for itself.   

3 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

Greg, I respect your defense of Ruth but don't you do the same thing with Larry Crafard?

That's a fair question Bill and one I have asked myself. But I think I can answer it. It is the difference between making an accusation of someone in a village based on nothing more substantial than pure suspicion, and the equivalent of a grand jury indictment in which a threshold of evidence and probable grounds supports an indictment.

With Craford, I see significant grounds to consider him a suspect in Tippit if a prior conclusion is accepted that there are reasonable grounds for doubt that Oswald did it. Unlike Ruth Paine, who has no track record of any known crime, Craford confessed (even though it was later in life) to having engaged in hitman activity for a California mob figure in 1962. Craford's brother believed Craford's confession on that point. Ruth Paine never confessed to having done any of the fabrications of material evidence or wilful framings of Oswald that people accuse her of.

I believe Craford was heard by a witness discussing a contract murder on the night of Oct 4, 1963 in the Carousel Club. Ruth Paine was never overheard discussing forging or planting evidence or how to perjure someone innocent to implicate them in a crime.

Earlier in the summer of 1963 I believe Craford was the identity of Odell Estes' "Oswald" figure whom he saw at the Carousel Club in July-Aug 1963 (the figure certainly was not Oswald, yet I do not believe Odell Estes, knowing he was dying, was inventing his story to the FBI after a brief lifetime of fear and flight, before he died). Estes told of witnessing Craford (he did not realize he was Craford; that identity is from argument) present with mob-appearing types, and Estes told of driving Craford to the airport to take a flight somewhere for a couple of days for which he, Craford, received a huge sum of cash (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/29006-decipherment-of-the-james-odell-estes-story-carousel-club-july-aug-1963/). That and the Oct 4 witnessing of who I believe to have been Craford supports Craford's later self-confessed hitman expertise and experience had not ended in 1962 but continued in 1963 rendering plausible the time frame of Nov 22.

Craford matches the physical description of the Tippit killer; Craford was photographed a week later by the FBI wearing a similar though not identical jacket of exactly the same color and almost exactly same style as CE 162, the jacket abandoned by the Tippit killer; the Tippit killing took place very close to Ruby's apartment and Craford was seen at 3 a.m. the night before in the company of Ruby who was driving him home (Ruby could have driven him to his apartment from which Craford would have an easy walk to the location of the Tippit killing, which on independent grounds per argument was a luring of Tippit to a location where he was executed as a professional execution). Craford's alibi is weak for his whereabouts at the time of the Tippit killing, and Craford fled Dallas unexpectedly for Michigan within less than 24 hours.

Craford worked for the mobbed-up nightclub owner who I and many others are convinced carried out a premeditated mob hit on Oswald.

I believe the above makes Craford a suspect in Tippit. 

With Ruth Paine, no criminal record, no record of forgery or evidence-planting or perjury-framing training, no proof Ruth ever did any such thing in her life. The claims of proof of such, such as the Minox camera and so on, are controverted by the most basic evidence considerations to which some of Ruth Paine's critics seem impervious (in the case of the Minox camera, a DPD physical evidence photograph published by Savage in First Day Evidence which shows no Minox camera, only an empty Minox camera case and a Minox light meter, before those items were sent to the FBI lab mislabeled, and are mislabeled in the book First Day Evidence itself which, contrary to its own photograph, tells the reader, just as some continue to claim today, that there is a Minox camera in that photo when anyone can look for themselves and there is not--it is truly surreal). 

The point being, with Ruth there is nothing stronger than unsubstantiated suspicion for all sorts of horrible accusations made of her, yet which a huge body of people just believe as certainly true in their bones as if with bedrock certainty. 

So I do not regard the two cases as equivalent or comparable.

That said, your question remains a sober caution in any discussion of Craford or any other named person. The ancient common law jurors' oath was to convict the guilty and acquit the innocent, and that is what is to be striven for, to the best of our abilities, on the basis of critical thinking and evidence. May God forgive us for unintended convictions of innocent persons, if so, despite best efforts. Yet to go through the task of a human life one has to make judgments in the moment, every day, about persons on less that perfect information. And sometimes will get it wrong about innocent people. I don't know the full solution to this.  

I believe all those police showed up because they wanted to apprehend a suspected cop-killer at large (who also could be involved in the JFK assassination due to the timing). When Oswald resisted and had a gun on him and punched McDonald, that was regarded as pretty good reason to think they got the right guy (the cop-killer of Tippit), later (in their view) confirmed with identifying him as Oswald from TSBD. 

Dozens of officers already in Oak Cliff in hot pursuit of an armed cop-killer at large, converging on false leads until they thought they got him at the Theatre.

Nothing strange about the law enforcement response, including the independent confirmed self-disclosures of two of the arresting officers, McDonald and Bentley, that they each considered shooting Oswald then and there themselves during the arrest, but didn’t (each said) out of concern for the risk of injuring a fellow officer on the other side of Oswald from the bullet going through if they had. 

Or in the confession of an officer later to having gratuitously beaten Oswald and proud of it, after Oswald had been subdued, after all officers and FBI Barrett swore in same day statements that no police brutality had been witnessed. And as Capt. Westbrook in command overseeing the arrest later told in Sneed, yes there was undisclosed beating of Oswald but Oswald had it coming from shooting JFK, so the nerve of Oswald that he would complain of police brutality which he deserved. 

I don’t think there was any advance plot to frame Oswald on Tippit. It was pure arrest of the wrong guy by mistake in that theater, then stitch him up after the arrest. The right guy was in the balcony, not Oswald seated on the ground level who was already in the theater as a paid-ticket customer and never was in the balcony. The guy in the balcony had killed Tippit and would have killed Oswald next if police had not arrived and arrested Oswald. The police let the guy in the balcony go without preserving record of his name or contact information.

The officer in charge who had the written list of theater patron addresses including the guy in the balcony, and “lost” that written information without turning it in, said in Sneed he probably knew Ruby better than any other officer on the Dallas Police force. By coincidence, if Oswald was not the killer of Tippit which there is more than reasonable doubt he wasn’t, it would be someone connected to Ruby as on the shortest list of suspects. 

By a further coincidence, Ruby had a recently-arrived self-confessed mob-associated hitman in his employ on a cash off-the-books basis whose alibi is weak for Fri Nov 22 and who fit the general physical description of Oswald and is separately known to have been mistakenly identified as Oswald by some witnesses, who fled Dallas hitchhiking for Michigan less than 24 hours later for no sensibly explained reason. 

Once the narrative on Oswald had gotten traction in a big way nationwide later on Nov 22 and the next day, it was not going to be rolled back on Oswald re Tippit, even if there was some awareness by a few officers that he could have been innocent on Tippit. Also, police cooking of evidence, to the extent it happens, often involves cases where the police believe the guy did it and want to produce some evidence to show the judge to get the guy put away.

When you say Ruth Paine introduced fabricated evidence, could you clarify whether you mean wittingly (she knew it was fabricated when she reported it) or unwittingly when she reported it?

And before, most recently from my memory, you have said you were not certain the Soviet Embassy letter was forged, as opposed to having been written by Oswald (in agreement with 100% of expert testimony, one, who have rendered an opinion on the handwriting as Oswald’s in all of history these past sixty years). 

If you have changed your view from uncertainty to certainty on that point, could you explain what changed your mind?

Finally, when you refer to “fabrication”, do you exclude that Oswald could have a role, such as in the writing, of that alleged fabrication (writing of the contents of that letter)?

But the main question is not whether Ruth Paine, against the wishes of Michael, reported the letter to the FBI, but whether you are ALSO explicitly claiming she knew it was allegedly forged and/or fabricated when she did so, and if so your basis for confidence in that belief.

My question is motivated from objection to seeing Ruth Paine, whom I knew, being unjustly smeared. But never mind the personal history, the questions are valid. 

On 2/26/2024 at 4:22 PM, Pete Mellor said:

In 1964 Rowe told friends, relatives and JFKA researchers that it was he, NOT Brewer, who pointed out Oswald to the police in the dark of the Texas Theatre.  Rowe was so close to Jack Ruby that Rowe moved into Ruby's apartment when he went to jail for killing Oswald.  Rowe was never interviewed by the DPD or FBI.  Rowe's account was published by Penn Jones in his Midlothian Mirror.

Pete, this is slightly off topic but it is important. Do you have the documentation for the claim that Rowe “pointed out Oswald to the police in the dark of the Texas Theatre”? 

The reason for asking is there is another Rowe, an undercover officer of the DPD, who has long claimed he was present that day at the Texas Theatre and participated somehow in Oswald’s arrest although unverified in any written records. And that undercover officer Rowe by his own admission (I have seen the videotape) said he had been receiving envelopes of cash from Ruby, was on the take from Ruby—that is what this retired DPD officer Rowe SAID—which would be in agreement with the story of “Rowe” being friends with Ruby. 

Of course this officer Rowe had a different first name than “Tommy” Rowe of the Boxley Garrison document. So it is puzzling, but I just wonder if there could be some mistakes or confusion in identities? Thanks for your other comment re my piece. 

Appreciation to Gerry Down, Tom Gram, and Mark Ulrik on the possibility--likelihood--that the FBI information of de Mohrenschildt referred to by Hosty came from Haiti post-Nov 22. Hosty's reference in his book is non-specific (no date, no interviewer, no footnote), and based on the FBI interest in and relationship to the State Department officials' interviewing of de Mohrenschildt in Haiti, that seems to be what underlies the Hosty reference.

In other words, there is no proof from the Hosty reference for an April 1963 FBI interview or information from de Mohrenschildt re the Walker shot. The question of the topic title is answered satisfactorily to me in the negative, in the sense that there is no strong basis for supposing such. 

Natasha Voshinin's story remains unexplained, but its first appearance in 1992 does not seem sufficient to overcome the absence of other evidence, plus the FBI's denial, that Oswald was not on the FBI's radar re the Walker shot prior to post-assassination. Voshinin's claim is in the genre of it could be true but there is no way of knowing that it is. 

As Stu Wexler notes, Epstein was very strong in reporting that de Mohrenschildt, in his interview on the last day of his life, claimed both to have received a Backyard Photograph from Marina prior to the Walker shot and to have reported Oswald's involvement in the BYP and/or Walker shot to a CIA contact in the Dallas office of the Domestic Contacts Division (Edward Jay Epstein, The Assassination Chronicles [1992], 554-569), in a larger context in which de Mohrenschildt was doing unofficial surveillance of Oswald reporting to the CIA. According to de Mohrenschildt (according to Epstein), the CIA had been informed by de Mohrenschildt of those things in real time. Epstein cites Marina, who said on the record that the BYP with "to my friend George" and "hunter of fascists ha! ha!" inscribed on the back, had been given to de Mohrenschildt prior to April 10, and two unnamed friends of de Mohrenschildt (unfortunately not named and unable to verify) whom Epstein claims confirmed de Mohrenschildt's concern about his possession of that BYP prior to de Mohrenschildt's return from Haiti. In other words, de Mohrenschildt's claim that he never knew of that BYP until 1967, which he claimed he and Jeanne had only belatedly first noticed in their belongings after their return from Haiti, was not true on the timing of that, according to these reports. 

I was surprised to read in the biography of de Mohrenschildt by Nancy Wertz Weiford, The Faux Baron: George de Mohrenschildt (2013), Weiford's argument that de Mohrenshchildt knew at the time (in April 1963) that Oswald had taken the shot at Walker, because Oswald had told him--contrary to de Mohrenschildt's later claims that he suspected but did not know, which become interpreted as de Mohrenschildt understatement. In addition to other argument on that point, Weiford cites a new witness not previously come to attention:

"After the assassination, there were also several instances of George or Jeanne revealing their earlier knowledge of Oswald's complicity in the Walker shooting in April 1963. Alston Boyd, a UT Austin graduate student who later spent a year in Haiti with de Mohrenschildt in 1963-1964, also claimed he never heard George mention Lee Oswald until after the assassination in November, 1963. The next day, November 23, Boyd recalled George telling him that 'Oswald had bragged about taking a shot at General Walker, but that he had missed.'" (p. 361, citing "author interview with Alston Boyd in August, 2003)

Weiford adds this footnote to that:

"During our interviews and correspondence, I really probed this issue with Boyd to ensure he was remembering the incident correctly. Boyd said the conversation with de Mohrenschildt occurred on Saturday, November 23, the day after the assassination. De Mohrenschildt had never spoken of Oswald before the assassination, and it was because of his knowledge of Oswald's shooting at Walker that he immediately thought of Oswald when he heard that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas. This was the connection that fixed the conversation so strongly in Alston Boyd's mind." (Weiford, The Faux Baron, 748)

I am in an advanced stage of a rewrite of my earlier paper on the Walker shot, in which I believe there is incontrovertible evidence that Walker aide Robert Surrey had knowledge of and was involved in that shot, was physically present in the alley close by to Oswald at the moment of the shot. I believe strongly that Oswald's involvement in the shot must be accepted due to overwhelming evidence that he was. The question is whether the shot was intended to kill Walker or not. There are three theoretical possibilities: the shooter shot to kill Walker but missed; the shooter intentionally missed; or the shooter fired into an empty room and Walker faked it. All three possibilities are consistent with the physical evidence. The question of which of those three then turns on less-certain assessments of a wider spectrum of evidence and the direct and hearsay claims of persons of interest.   

I intend to argue that if this Alston Boyd witness claim is accurate (the argument that it is, being influenced by plausibility of its accuracy on other grounds), it would weigh against Oswald having shot with intent to kill. If it was really true that Oswald sought to kill Walker to eliminate a Hitler figure for America, then a miss of that shot would be a failure and not something Oswald would brag about. But if the shot was some form of political theater, then that is something that could be consistent with Oswald bragging about it privately to a friend.