Leslie Sharp

104-10181-10113: MEMORANDUM FOR THE RECORD: POSSIBLE DRE ANIMUS TOWARDS PRESIDENT KENNEDY 04/03/67: Memo for the record from A. E. Dooley: Page 2: ..."5. It is abundantly clear that the DRE had no part in the Kennedy assassination. Oswald was never a member of the DRE, which in fact, rejected him. In developing information regarding CIA's relations with the DRE, I conferred with Howard Brubaker, of the Cuban Operations Group who recently returned from a tour with our Miami Station; Carl Trettin, Deputy Chief of the Counterintelligence Branch of the Cuban Operations Group who knew Bringuier and was stationed in New Orleans at the time of the above incidents [emphasis added]; and Margaret Forsythe also of the Cuban desk who is thoroughly familiar with the DRE operation." - - - Dooley also wrote a memo on November 11, 1964, about taking "Sam Halpern. Carl Trettin, Ray Monahan, and Nestor Sanchez of the Cuban desk (WH/SA) to the Warren Commission. Our mission was to examine some FBI reports, called to our attention by Dr. Goldberg, containing references to persons in Cuba..." https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=6412#relPageId=2

September 20, 1977, NYTimes reporter John Crewdson writes, ' . . . Most of the narcotics agents who worked under Mr. [George Hunter] White in New York and San Francisco while the drug‐testing programs were under way have said that they, too, were unaware of his dual affiliation, though some said they had suspected it. It appears from the White. diaries that one who may have known something was Jean Pierre Lafitte, a near‐legendary police informant and “special employee” of the narcotics bureau who once was dispatched by Mr. White to Washington to be interviewed by the C.I.A. Mr. Lafitte, who was instrumental in developing a number of noteworthy criminal cases for the Bureau of Narcotics, the F.B.I. and other Federal agencies, also appears to have played a role in helping Mr. White to establish the $215‐amonth apartment first used by the C.I.A. for the drug experiments in a six‐story red brick building at 81 Bedford Street in a quiet section of Greenwich village. Mr. Lafitte, a short, chunky man who speaks with a thick French accent, was known to the agents as “the pirate.” One man who knew Mr. Lafitte 20 years ago recalled that the informant had once described for him in detail the apartment at 81 Bedford Street, including its extensive collection of electronic listening devices, although he did not say whether he knew that it was being used by the C.I.A. for drug testing. Mr. Lafitte, now living under another name in a New England city that he does not want disclosed, said in an interview that although he had worked closely with Mr. White on a number of important narcotics cases, he had never knowingly spoken with or worked for anyone from the C.I.A. and had never known about the Greenwich Village apartment or the drug tests that were conducted there.' https://www.nytimes.com/1977/09/20/archives/abuses-in-testing-of-drugs-by-cia-to-be-panel-focus-senate-panel-to.html (The following is a second hand account: In 2022, Crewdson was contacted to ask if he might have retained his notes from his conversation with Pierre Lafitte. He indicated that he was fairly certain that file was long gone. He also mentioned (paraphrasing) this story was one of my few regrets. Apparently, for reasons he didn't expound upon, he had failed to follow through with the story.)

[CATHERINE TAAFFE AND JESSE VICKERS] ' . . . For more than a decade, Miami based arms dealer Jesse Vickers had been active in the West Indies, a volatile region that consumed US military and intelligence resources. Vickers was arrested in 1953 for gun running, along with Efron Pichardo who is named earlier in this book as having been imprisoned in 1959 with Capt. Paul Hughes, John Wilson-Hudson, and R. Emmett Johnson in Trescornia while Santo Trafficante held court. Meanwhile, Jesse Vickers had hooked up with Catherine (Mrs. W. Randall) Taaffe, self-described as “the only woman arms dealer registered in Washington, D.C.” [the names Hughes, Wilson-Hudson, Johnson, and Vickers appear in the 1963 record maintained by Pierre Lafitte.] Records suggest that Mrs. Taaffe had been an active participant in rather spectacular operations since the early ’50s. She is named in progress reports related to PBSUCCESS, which culminated in assassination of President Arbenz of Guatemala, as having written a letter to her husband in NY, “instructing him to purchase aircraft from Sweden for a dissident group of Guatemalan Army leaders” who were planning to overthrow the government and eliminate the Communists. Described by author Joan Mellen in The Great Game in Cuba, Catherine was a “pint-size, brown-haired, brown eyed woman, five feet in height, and a self-styled Mata Hari” who acted as an informant for both the FBI and CIA as well as the Cuban National Revolutionary Police and the anti-Castro Acción Democrática Cristiana. There are indications that she was a friend of June Cobb as well. By 1959, her business efforts were intermingled with not only Batista, but Generalissimo Trujillo of the Dominican Republic. We have learned previously that figures who were of primary interest to the project manager were also active in the DR, including DC attorney Herbert Itkin and skilled sniper R. Emmett Johnson. According to a 1959 FBI document, “JESSE VICKERS... became associated with CATHERINE TAAFFE to utilize her contacts as wife of Colonel W. RANDALL TAAFFE. Since the departure of VICKERS and CATHERINE TAAFFE for Washington D.C. Colonel TAAFFE has been advising the Miami Office of their activities and reported that they were working on a large arms order, for which they had already secured State Department export licenses and complied with other Government requirements.” Another bureau document reads, “Taaffe is said to have been an American citizen interested in Cuban political and revolutionary activities and claims to have numerous connections among Cuban exiles in the United States and Cuban government officials in Cuba.” The next entry, a report of another informant relying on a representative within another US government agency advised that a case involving a C-74 airplane which was confiscated on May 22, 1959 by US Customs agents in Miami resulted in the arrest of the Dominican Consul. Any mention of C-74s captures our attention. In an undated document found in the ledger maintained by Pierre Lafitte, he writes, “C-74 Globemaster. Walker yes on spray guns. Willoughby?” followed with an odd ‘note to self,’ "I have no idea where we will put these." No doubt there were dozens of C-74s flying around the region during the early 1960s, but mention of that particular equipment by a man who was writing about Vickers in context of Willoughby and Walker, one is persuaded to contemplate the implications.' — Coup in Dallas

Fred Sr., a co-founder of the John Birch Society was born in Quannah, Southeast of Amarillo. He was descended from Dutch immigrants who invested in the Forth Worth and Denver Railway. The acorns didn't fall far from the tree: Dutch investors were heavily involved in several railroad lines in the North Texas area, including the Fort Worth and Denver Railway Company, which had spawned Quanah in 1887 and owned just about all the land in town. County records show Harry provided advertising services and worked directly for the Fort Worth and Denver for nearly 20 years, sometimes receiving payment in the form of land transferred directly from the legendary railroad builder Grenville M. Dodge, who helped lay the Union Pacific and more than a dozen other lines across the country. . . . . . . The implication of his editorializing was simple enough: railroads are good to their workers; it’s the strikers who are greedy, thankless ingrates. It was a total inversion of reality, and a textbook example of a public relations technique that proved to work wonders—and still does. There is even a good chance Harry Koch participated in a bit of old-fashioned astroturfing in the 1930s, when a suspicious publication called “QA&P Employee’s Magazine” suddenly sprang into existence. Supposedly created and published independently of management by employees in order to “create a closer relationship among the employees, to make them feel more like one big family and to arouse an enthusiasm for more earnestness and sincerity in our work for the road,” the magazine was a big hit with QA&P brass, who “enthusiastically supported the venture.” One of the magazine’s special Christmas issues was so flattering that it made the QA&P’s president “nearly burst with pride.” The publication was also a big hit with the general business community, generating fan mail from top executives from around the country. There is even a good chance Harry Koch participated in a bit of old-fashioned astroturfing in the 1930s, when a suspicious publication called “QA&P Employee’s Magazine” suddenly sprang into existence. Supposedly created and published independently of management by employees in order to “create a closer relationship among the employees, to make them feel more like one big family and to arouse an enthusiasm for more earnestness and sincerity in our work for the road,” the magazine was a big hit with QA&P brass, who “enthusiastically supported the venture.” One of the magazine’s special Christmas issues was so flattering that it made the QA&P’s president “nearly burst with pride.” The publication was also a big hit with the general business community, generating fan mail from top executives from around the country. . . . In 1935, Koch published a bizarre editorial about a rumor that spread “among Quanah’s colored population that the Tribune-Chiefcontained a request from the government that every man past sixty should report as an applicant for an old age pension” that soon had “every elderly negro in town” cramming into Tribune-Chief‘s offices. It was proof positive that African-Americans, who had been depicted in the paper as “partly civilized” and unable to observe “laws made by and for white people,” were clearly already scheming to tap into the programs. . . . But the constant fear mongering and red baiting was just another calculated public relations technique, used selectively against political enemies. What few of his readers knew was that at the same time Harry screamed about the Red Menace, his youngest son, Fredrick C. Koch, was in the Soviet Union working for the Bolsheviks, building refineries, training Communist engineers and laying down the foundation of Soviet oil infrastructure. Fred even hosted a delegation of Soviet planners in his company headquarters in Wichita, Kansas. Fred’s Soviet contract to build 15 refineries personally netted him $500,000, a huge sum of money in the 1930s, but he continued his father’s cynical red menace attack strategy, and took it to a whole new level after he became one of the founders of the far-rightwing John Birch Society, which tried to convince the American people that unions, colored people, Jews, homosexuals, President Kennedy and even Dwight D. Eisenhower were all Soviet agents plotting to overthrow the U.S. through higher taxes and safety net programs. http://exiledonline.com/the-birth-of-the-koch-clan-it-all-started-in-a-little-texas-town-called-quanah/

From A.J. Weberman BERNARD FENSTERWALD IN CONGRESS SENATOR THOMAS C. HENNINGS In 1957 Bernard Fensterwald left the State Department and was hired by Senator Thomas C. Hennings (Dem.-MO) as an investigator for the Senate Committee on Constitutional Rights. In 1957, with his mother, Fensterwald visited the Soviet Union. In 1957 the FBI stated, "Fensterwald has gone out of his way to be helpful." On May 14, 1957, Fensterwald contacted Louis B. Nichols of the FBI. Senator Henning had been asked to introduce legislation to block the deportation of Pierre LaFitte. (LaFitte was mentioned in Ovid Demaris' Green Felt Junge, a book about Las Vegas gambling interests). "I told Fensterwald that this, of course, was a matter for the Immigration Service and on a purely personal and confidential basis the Senator should be exceedingly cautious before he got out on a limb; that if he inquired into LaFittes background he would find an extensive record; and that under no circumstances would the Bureau support LaFitte. I told him officially, of course, we could not take a position but that, personally, we would hate to see some friend embarrassed and he should be very cautious. Fensterwald stated that was enough for him. (Paragraph deleted)" [FBI 66-18621-269] In 1959 Fensterwald was the Subject of an applicant-type inquiry conducted by the FBI.

@Greg Doudna You had Hank's introduction in front of you when you issued your edict, questioning provenance and authenticity and insinuating that the datebook was "too good to be true." How do you think Hank might have responded? Before I completed my book on Frank Olson’s murder, I had the opportunity to meet the one person who was quite close to Lafitte, his wife. I had been informed by a highly respected journalist for the New York Times, John Crewdson, that Lafitte had been living in a small town in New England for at least twelve years. By chance, I had relatives in a nearby town, and I turned to them for help in locating Lafitte. As it turned out, he was living openly with his wife. Understandably, I traveled as quickly as possible to the place where they resided, which was quite easy because I was still living in Vermont where I’d gone to write the Olson book. Of course, I shared the location and address with the DA’s office in Manhattan, but ventured there on my own. I was too late to find Pierre. He had passed away before my arrival. But, as said, I had the opportunity to meet his wife Rene. Our meeting was a cautious one, but I felt that by being honest about my interests and objectives an initial bond of friendship was formed. That bond grew steadily stronger through the time that Rene relocated to the Miami, Florida area. As far as I know, nobody from the Manhattan District Attorney’s office ever made the same trip I did. Through additional meetings with Rene, I became aware that Pierre, like George White, had kept datebooks within which he would jot down certain things, often specific to matters he was working on at the time. It was a practice that was expressly forbidden by the CIA, but Pierre and George were notorious for bending and breaking the rules. Said Rene, “He would sometimes emulate George, mainly for financial reasons, not out of any admiration or the like.” As I’m sure you can imagine, I was especially interested in viewing and reading Lafitte’s personal writings. I respectfully made my interest known to Rene. She had agreed after thinking about it for what seemed a painfully long time. About two weeks later, she called again and said that she had become concerned about certain findings in Pierre’s materials and that she now wanted to talk with “her family’s attorney” about her concerns and liability issues. Oh, Lord, I thought, an attorney: that will surely mess everything up. But, perhaps thanks to the alignment of the stars, Rene called about a week later with good news.

The topic of the thread is the Haverstick book; I pointed out the incongruity in Greg Doudna indulging certain detail when he dismissed the datebook and CiD within nine days of publication. I've provided three bullet points as examples of the overlap in Haverstick's AWIK with facts presented in Coup and Hank's personal history with June Cobb. Not changing the subject. I'm drawing attention to the implications.

It actually has a great deal to do with AWIK, if you're paying attention, or if you know your material. I'll let you figure it out.

You're saying that with a straight face on a thread dedicated to a book that alleges Jerrie Cobb The Pilot, dressed as "Babushka Lady" shot President Kennedy with a pistol hidden inside a camera; and that said Jerrie ALSO piloted LIFE reporters to, or was it from, Dallas? Or was she scheduled to fly Oswald out of RedBird, having just killed the leader of the free world? WonderWoman indeed. I don't think anyone engaged on this forum can summarize AWIK with any clarity. As a simple exercise, can you @Greg Doudna @Jonathan Cohen @Michael Griffithaddress the following: June and Jerrie never closely resembled one another other than height. Hair color and style, as well as scars, can be manipulated but not skeletal features, or ears, mouth, eyes. June was not a licensed pilot. June was in the Amazon a decade before Jerrie. Did June's doctor not realize he was sleeping with a well-known pilot Jerrie Cobb who would soon pursue a role in the NASA programme, rather than a woman who returned from the Amazon with a serious condition and who eventually went to work for him? Did his staff know the difference between a woman they likely came across in the media vs. a virtual unknown? June, not Jerrie the Pilot, befriended Albarelli. Can you explain why Mary Haverstick would suggest to me that Hank didn't know who he had trusted his grandson with? Are you convinced June (or Jerrie) Cobb was THE QJ/WIN reporting directly to Harvey, overseeing hardened brutes like Harold Meltzer, Otto Skorzeny, or Pierre Lafitte in the patriarchal 1960s? Taaffe was an arms dealer, married to an AF captain and known to some very rough characters including gunrunner Jesse Vickers whose name appears in Lafitte records. Could she be effectively and persistently impersonated by the high-profile Jerrie Cobb, let alone the distinctly feline June Cobb? Was the AF captain on board this charade as well?

You're not serious? You lept to the conclusion the Lafitte datebook was a hoax but you don't think Jerrie Cobb would willfully fabricate? I'm not arguing whether she did or didn't; I'm questioning your own method of critical, objective analysis?

What do you not understand about the legal term, "private property"? Are you familiar with the phrase "terms and conditions apply"? Are you aware that journalists have a right to protect their sources and relevant material? I suspect you would not attempt this charade were Albarelli here.

You alleged I have "monetized" information that shouldn't be. Does that mean Talbot, di Eugenio, Hancock, Doudna et al, shouldn't sell books, or Stone sell tickets? Do you actually believe they have provided the public with everything they have collected on the assassination? How long was JFK Revisited in the works? Couldn't they have easily jumped on the various forums and brought the public up to date? What about all of the promos and teasers and trailers? Were those intended as advance notice that when the full documentary was ready it would be made available at no cost? Philosophicallly, you seem to think that journalists should spend thousands (and tens of thousands) traveling, researching, interviewing so that your personal curiosity can be satiated with no attendant cost? We're having this discussion on this thread because I challenged you to explain why you take absurd claims presented in AWIK as possibly credible, and yet dismissed Coup out of hand when we have a physical document to substantiate our findings, not vague innuendos about Redbird from conversations that took place decades after Dallas and conclusions drawn from fundamentally flawed assumptions. The NDA is to prevent unauthorized dissemination of copyrighted material, standard publishing protocol. The NDA is in effect. If you're going to continue to allege the transcription is not aligned with the original entries, I insist you provide examples, or retract. (I'm aware of one instance of copy edit error.)

When you retract your accusation, I'll continue this discussion.

But that's not June Cobb.

@Greg Doudna Upon receipt of my advance copies of Coup and realization that the printer failed to get approval of our editor before hitting "print", I immediately set in motion that a PDF version of the entries found in the back of the book would be provided to all who purchased a copy. I've posted that offer on numerous social media sites as well as JFK forums including this one. (paraphrasing) Those who have purchased a copy of Coup in Dallas are entitled to a PDF version of the screenshots presented in the print edition as well as Kindle version. If you would like to receive the PDF, under either of those conditions, private email me at lesliemsharp17@gmail.com. Please explain why you think you're more qualified to transcribe the Lafitte entries? Have you spent hundreds (and hundreds) of hours over the past five years perusing the original instrument? If you think that your interpretation of certain entries might alter the overall conclusions drawn, let me know. I would particularly like to hear your assessment of the number of references to Otto and Ilse Skorzeny in the datebook. Or, your explanation of why "du Berrier" would appear on Lafitte's radar? You do know who Hal du Berrier is, right? I can assure you that Hank Albarelli would never turn over the datebook to the Mary Ferrell Foundation, nor will I.

You've made an unfounded public accusation. Please retract.

she has those for private distribution but requires people to sign a NDA (non-disclosure agreement)! Such that people cannot even discuss or comment in print upon the source text in those better photos, or publish corrections of errors in the published transcriptions from those better photos. @Greg Doudna Unless I'm misreading this, you've been advised of source text in 'better photos.' Have you seen 'better photos' to opine on whether the transcriptions are accurate? Would you care to elaborate here, or pursue this privately?

@Paul Brancato Out of curisuosity, why is that? In Hank's own words (and can you think of any reason he would make this up?), I had learned through my Olson research that Pierre and his family lived in New Orleans during the 1960s and that Pierre had been briefly employed by the William Reily Coffee Company where alleged JFK assassin Lee Harvey Oswald had also briefly worked in May and June 1963. Lafitte was known as a master of disguises. As Ron points out, Lafitte was under cover as bell captain at the Statler Hilton in 1953. Hank shared an incident where Lafitte served as a waiter whose customers one evening included James Angleton who failed to recognize his friend Pierre in disguise. His staff at Plimsoll Club in the late 1960s only knew him as Chef Jean Martin, an engaging boss who hosted Sunday afternoon soirees at his home in Gretna.

Digital and Physical Safety: Protecting Confidential Sources COMMITTEE TO PROTECT JOURNALISTS November 22, 2021 10:56 AM EST Protecting confidential sources is a cornerstone of ethical reporting. When journalists have agreed to protect someone’s identity, they should make every effort to do so, especially in circumstances where a source could be arrested or harmed. Maintaining confidentiality has become more challenging due to increasing levels of digital surveillance and monitoring by authorities and the public. Journalists should therefore consider the following safety advice to help protect the identity of confidential sources. https://cpj.org/2021/11/digital-physical-safety-protecting-confidential-sources/ UNESCO Source Protection and the Protection of Journalistic Materials (c) The right not to disclose the identity of sources and the protection of journalistic material requires that the privacy and security of the communications of anyone engaged in journalistic activity, including access to their communications data and metadata, must be protected. Circumventions, such as secret surveillance or analysis of communications data not authorised by judicial authorities according to clear and narrow legal rules, must not be used to undermine source confidentiality; https://www.mediadefence.org/ereader/publications/advanced-modules-on-digital-rights-and-freedom-of-expression-online/module-4-privacy-and-security-online/source-protection-and-the-protection-of-journalistic-materials/ DIGITAL MEDIA LAW If your source sues you for breaking your word and a court finds you had a legal obligation to keep your word, you may be ordered to pay your source compensatory damages. Generally, this means you must pay money to make up for anything your source has lost because you broke your word. Sometimes, this will not be much, but other times it could be a lot of money. In Cohen v. Cowles Media Co., 501 U.S. 663 (1991), the reporters had to pay $200,000 to their source. https://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/promising-confidentiality-your-sources#:~:text=By promising confidentiality to your,you if you do so.

Digital and Physical Safety: Protecting Confidential Sources COMMITTEE TO PROTECT JOURNALISTS November 22, 2021 10:56 AM EST Protecting confidential sources is a cornerstone of ethical reporting. When journalists have agreed to protect someone’s identity, they should make every effort to do so, especially in circumstances where a source could be arrested or harmed. Maintaining confidentiality has become more challenging due to increasing levels of digital surveillance and monitoring by authorities and the public. Journalists should therefore consider the following safety advice to help protect the identity of confidential sources. https://cpj.org/2021/11/digital-physical-safety-protecting-confidential-sources/ UNESCO Source Protection and the Protection of Journalistic Materials (c) The right not to disclose the identity of sources and the protection of journalistic material requires that the privacy and security of the communications of anyone engaged in journalistic activity, including access to their communications data and metadata, must be protected. Circumventions, such as secret surveillance or analysis of communications data not authorised by judicial authorities according to clear and narrow legal rules, must not be used to undermine source confidentiality; https://www.mediadefence.org/ereader/publications/advanced-modules-on-digital-rights-and-freedom-of-expression-online/module-4-privacy-and-security-online/source-protection-and-the-protection-of-journalistic-materials/ DIGITAL MEDIA LAW If your source sues you for breaking your word and a court finds you had a legal obligation to keep your word, you may be ordered to pay your source compensatory damages. Generally, this means you must pay money to make up for anything your source has lost because you broke your word. Sometimes, this will not be much, but other times it could be a lot of money. In Cohen v. Cowles Media Co., 501 U.S. 663 (1991), the reporters had to pay $200,000 to their source. https://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/promising-confidentiality-your-sources#:~:text=By promising confidentiality to your,you if you do so.

Thanks, Sandy. As indicated in a number of my comments on this thread, yes, I spoke with Mary Haverstick recently by phone. If this topic really interests you or anyone, I urge you/them to read carefully. 'The devil' is in the details' was never was more applicable than now.

Fortunately, the page is balanced by Albarelli's research; I venture that (were he alive) he would vigorously challenge those editors. I know several who will likely weigh in on the Talk Page.

Would that it were so simple. I respect Lisa Pease so I'm perplexed; what am I missing in this work that has other seasoned researchers, including Pease, persuaded? Had Haverstick stopped at her "doppelgänger" theory, limiting her analysis to instances that Jerrie The Pilot may have on occasion impersonated sometime informant and paid asset June Cobb, perhaps the remainder of her impressive document research would justify serious consideration of this work. However, venturing into wild suppositions, including that Kennedy was assassinated by a woman holding a pistol cloaked inside a camera, should be the "tell." Yet, here we are.