Bill Brown

On 9/17/2023 at 7:55 AM, Michael Kalin said:

Extraordinary -- if I'm getting the drift -- even after agreeing with you, Jack Myers failed to modify his article to reflect this agreement.

At this point I'm bowing out. I'll leave it to Jack Myers to explain why he ignored your advice after agreeing with you, if that is what actually happened.

So the dark cloud lifts, and the silver linings to our discussion remain:

1. The discovery that Tatum told another interviewer that "he watched as the gunman turned up the street and up an alley." Bill Brown, this should dispel your blind faith in Callaway.

2. Dale Myers belated correction to his misquote of Tatum relative to the shot "in the head."

Note DM's dishonest interview reporting technique of presenting paraphrased content as if literal quotation. His many interviews are worthless as reported.

"At this point I'm bowing out."

Good idea.

9 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

Yes, that is astounding. How someone can pretend that this doesn't change "the fact that she identified Oswald as the killer" is hard to comprehend. In any normal case, nobody would take her "identification" seriously.

Anyway, yes, it seems rather obvious that Markham knew or strongly suspected that Oswald was not the man she had seen shoot Tippit. After all, she was at least 90 feet away. I believe the description of the killer that she gave in interviews was her genuine recollection: that the guy was a bit heavy and had dark bushy hair.

It is very simple: It is hopeless trying to reason with you or to get you to deal credibly with evidence. 

If I say, as Benavides did of the killer's hair, that John Doe's hair "went down and squared off," that would logically mean that I could see his hairline; otherwise, how would I know if his hair "squared off" when it "went down"? How? How? X-ray vision? If I could not see his hairline because it was covered by a coat collar, I would have no idea how his hair looked when it "went down."

If Benavides could not see the guy's hairline, one would logically think he would have said so and would have qualified his description of the guy's hair accordingly. This is just logic and common sense. Ah, but you can't go there because Oswald's hair was indisputably tapered in the back.

Again, this is real simple.  You said that Benavides said the hair squared off ABOVE the collar.  But, Benavides never said that.  This matters.  The argument could be made that the straight-edge collar caused the collar line (the hair) to give the appearance of being squared off.  That argument could not be made if Benavides had actually used the word ABOVE.

Just stop misquoting witnesses.

9 hours ago, Michael Kalin said:

 

The Jack Myers article appeared three weeks before your comment. This is not "long before" posting "here on the Ed Forum." Did you discuss the article with him before it was published?

If Jack Myers agreed with you, why didn't you say so?

Still waiting -- how long were you ignorant of the fallacy of Dale Myers' quote that Tatum said Tippit was shot "in the head?"

You don't get it.  Do you think I'm lying?

Jack Myers sent me the article for feedback long before it was ever posted.

3 hours ago, Greg Doudna said:

Bill, Michael Griffith is clearly correct on this point. It is clearly the natural reading. The fact that Benavides spoke of the killer's hair "went down and squared off" means it "went down" to where it "squared off", which implies it did not go down below where he saw it "squared off", i.e. he saw skin under where he saw the hair "squared off". 

You can say Benavides remembered it wrong in his testimony six months later, or misunderstood what he saw, or whatever. But you can't say that skin under a "squared off" hairline in back is not what Benavides was claiming he saw, thought he saw. 

This is real simple.  Michael Griffith misquoted Benavides.

11 minutes ago, Greg Doudna said:

Bill you hammer Michael Kalin pretty unmercifully for errors, including ones he made in the past not the topic of current discussion, and indeed you are strong on details. Just remember that when you hit someone too hard when they are down audiences start sympathizing with the one being hit, irrespective even of the issue. Here the tables may be turned. I think you missed it on this one, and perhaps may acknowledge a little humility and that no one, not even yourself, is immune from an occasional mistake.

Here is what Benavides said, and the issue is not what a man with a pony tail might have looked like, but whether this is a description of the back of the head of Oswald on Nov 22, 1963. That is the issue.

Mr. BENAVIDES - I remember the back of his head seemed like his hairline was sort of--looked like his hairline sort of went square instead of tapered off, and he looked like he needed a haircut for about 2 weeks, but his hair didn't taper off, it kind of went down and squared off and made his head look flat in back. 

Now here is a photo of Oswald from the same weekend, and I ask you to say with a straight face that a witness getting a good look at this back of Oswald's head at close range would say twice, with emphasis, that that man's hairline in the back did not taper off: "his hair didn't taper off". "it kind of went down and squared off".

Does Oswald look like that below to you? Yes, this Oswald, right here, the one with the tapered hair in the back.

And a second photo is clearer, showing the back of Oswald's head better, but I am unable to show that photo, only the link to the Dealey Plaza Echo page on the MFF site where you can see it if wished: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=146528#relPageId=8 . Same questions on the second photo.

Your suggestion that Benavides from a few feet away saw Oswald's tapered hair going down behind the collar of a jacket and decided to describe that as "his hair didn't taper off" sounds like a bit of a stretch. It is not what one would expect a reasonable witness to report with emphasis if it were Oswald. 

That same Dealey Plaza Echo article notes that Helen Markham "told two patrolmen (J.E. Poe and L.E. Jez), almost certainly within 20 minutes of Tippit's slaying, that the gunman had "bushy hair".

Sergeant Gerald Hill said that as soon as he drove up to the scene a man approached him and described the gunman as having "brown bushy hair" (7H47-48). 

Ted Callaway gave an immediate physical description (before influence from any other factors) to "Patrolman H.W. Summers (the second policeman at the scene of the Tippit killing), who passed on the description to his dispatcher. Included was a reference to the gunman as having 'black, wavy hair'."

Do those repeated descriptions of "busy", and "wavy" (and the later Benavides' "curly") hair look like Oswald's hair above?

Compare the photo below of the head of hair of Jack Ruby's experienced-contract-killer employee living at the Carousel Club at the time, recently employed by Ruby as a "handyman" paid in cash, Curtis Craford, two years younger than Oswald, about 1.5 inches shorter and about 10-15 pounds heavier than Oswald, not lean or almost skinny looking like Oswald (compare witness Acquilla Clemons' description of the gunman as "short and kind of chunky"). 

This photo of Craford was taken in Michigan a few days after the Tippit killing and may even have been after a haircut though that is unknown. In this photo Craford wears a light zippered jacket similar to, and of exactly the same off-white light tan color as CE 162, the Tippit killer's abandoned jacket, though the two are not the same jackets. They just are exactly the same color and zippered lightweight by an odd coincidence (as if someone liked similar jackets of that particular color, or perhaps wanted to establish that CE 162 wasn't a jacket someone might have seen him wearing at the Carousel Club). This jacket of identical color is worn by a man matching the earliest witness descriptions of the Tippit killer, a man who for no explicable reason quit his handyman job with Ruby with no notice and fled Dallas hitchhiking for Michigan less than 24 hours after Tippit was killed, on the morning of Saturday Nov 23, 1963. Tippit dead, an experienced contract killer bolts from Dallas hours later, a few hours after that the experienced contract killer's boss, Jack Ruby, kills Oswald dead witnessed on national television. Okaaaay.

But notice the full head of hair below. Does it look like Callaway's "black, wavy" hair of the Tippit killer? Sort of does, doesn't it? Can you imagine Craford's hair below, if windblown as the Tippit killer's was according to witnesses, looking "bushy" as witnesses said spontaneously within minutes, before having seen and come under the influence of having seen Oswald on television and in lineups?  

And although it is a little hard to tell from this photo, does it look like Craford's full head of dark brown or near-black wavy hair could have a block rather than tapered hairline appearance in the back, in a way that Oswald's hair did not?

Maybe notice the skin complexion too. Benavides, Latino, said the Tippit killer, although a white male, nevertheless had a skin complexion a little darker-toned than average for a white man, about the same skin tone as himself, Benavides. Of course we don't know the color scale used in this photo of Craford, so it could be illusory. But doesn't he at least look in this photo like he could be a slight bit "darker" in skin tone than average for white males, perhaps compatible with Benavides' description of the Tippit killer?

 

 

Greg, my post to Michael Griffith corrected Griffith's mistaken claim that Benavides said the killer's hairline squared off ABOVE the collar.  Benavides never said such a thing and your quote of Benavides supports my statement to Griffith that he (Griffith) was wrong.

Nothing in your above post changes any of that.

Now, we can argue back and forth over whether or not the killer's collar line squared off or tapered off 'til the cows come home, but that wasn't even remotely close to the point of my post to Griffith.  My post was about Griffith's misquote of Benavides and I thought I was pretty clear on that.

5 hours ago, Bill Fite said:

She says 6 times during her testimony that she can't identify the murderer then miraculously when she is given the suggestion  that it was 'Number 2' she makes the ID.    LOL

And how does any of that change the fact that she identified Oswald as the killer on the late afternoon of 11/22/63?

7 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

You can't be serious. Surely you know it is misleading--grossly misleading--to simply claim that Markham "identified" Oswald on the day of the shooting. Surely you know that such a claim would have been destroyed under cross examination in a trial.

For example, in her press interviews, Markham described the gunman as short, a little chunky/kind of heavy, and with bushy black hair. Oswald was 5’9”, downright skinny (if not almost anorexic), and had thinning brown hair.

She told the WC that she did NOT identify Oswald by his face but because he gave her the "chills."

Shall we mention that Markham was at least 90 feet away when the shooting occurred, and that she said that after the killer fled, she spoke with Tippit for several minutes? Tippit, of course, was quite dead when the killer fled.

Shall we mention that the one guy who was actually close to the shooting when it occurred, Domingo Benavides, said that the gunman had a squared-off (blocked) haircut that ended on the back of his neck above his "Eisenhower" jacket, and that photos taken on 11/22/63 clearly show that Oswald’s hair was tapered in the back and would have extended below the neckline on a similar jacket?

And on and on we could go.

"Shall we mention that the one guy who was actually close to the shooting when it occurred, Domingo Benavides, said that the gunman had a squared-off (blocked) haircut that ended on the back of his neck above his "Eisenhower" jacket..."

Now you're just making stuff up.  Why do you guys continually do things like this?

Benavides said the killer had a squared off haircut, yes.  But he did NOT say the hair was cut "above" the collar of the jacket.  You muddy the waters with this stuff.

Since Benavides did not say that the hair was cut above the collar, it is indeed possible that the jacket's collar itself gave the appearance of a squared off haircut.  The killer could have had a pony tail tucked inside the collar of the jacket and still have the appearance of a squared off haircut.

15 hours ago, Michael Kalin said:

Interesting, let's see how this affliction ran its course.

This was wrong. You made this mistake because you were ignorant of Jack Myers' source.

After being made aware of Jack Myers' source, you quoted it as follows:

It was probably not a sign of ignorance, but devious cherry picking to deflect attention from your previously revealed ignorance. In this case the distortion was also easily exposed.

Then you were asked how long you were ignorant of Dale Myers' misquote of Jack Tatum in With Malice, but you do not answer this question, presumably because you cannot reckon the number of years of your ignorance.

What is interesting is that DM slipstreamed the correction in an article at his JFK fiction weblog. It might have passed unnoticed were it not for a vigilant reader's question:

I'm ignorant of the identity of "Anonymous" but the bilious tone makes me think of you. Not likely, though, based on content. DM blamed his blunder on Jack Moriarty, which brings the Jack Tatum tall tale back to its creator, the primal source of all error relative to this subject.

There is an almost pathological dread among Tippit analysts & researchers of facing up to their errors.

Bill Brown, why is this so? Are we not all human, and therefore make mistakes? Who's exempt from occasionally lapsing into bilge?

"This was wrong. You made this mistake because you were ignorant of Jack Myers' source.

After being made aware of Jack Myers' source, you quoted it as follows..."

No Sir.  You have made a foolish statement (most likely because of your own ignorance, again).

I was fully aware of Jack Myers' source (since anyone who knows anything about the Tippit case is fully aware of the Tatum interview for the 1993 Frontline special).  Also, I discussed this specific point with Jack Myers long before I ever posted here on the Ed Forum.  Seriously, stop trolling.

By the way, Once I pointed it out to him, Jack Myers accepted that he was wrong and that Tatum is saying that he noticed the curling of Oswald's mouth as he passed within ten to fifteen feet of Oswald as Oswald and Tippit were talking through the window.  You wouldn't know this, though, because you're ignorant of the facts (just as you were, regarding your ludicrous claim about how T.F. Bowley drove past Tippit's body lying in the street before parking one block west of the scene, when the reality is that Bowley pulled over east of the scene and never drove past the body lying in the street).

You should be embarrassed but you don't know any better.

3 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

I think we are in alignment on this. He may very well have put it on a gurney in the hallway, thinking it was JFK's gurney. His current claim he put it on the gurney in Trauma Room One while JFK was surrounded by medical people doesn't pass muster, IMO. 

Except, I do not believe Landis would have found a bullet in or on the back seat.

Another location inside the limo, possibly (having already worked it's way out of Connally's thigh).

On 9/10/2023 at 4:38 AM, Michael Kalin said:

OK, thanks for the correction. DM did the research, and you misrepresented what Tatum said by ignoring the context. A shabby trick.

Is this your indirect way of admitting you were fooled the entire 20 years?

You're just trolling.

"To be ignorant of one's ignorance is the malady of the ignorant." - Amos Bronson Alcott

Look, this is real simple... Landis is saying he placed the bullet on Kennedy's gurney right next to Kennedy's body. But we know this goes against the known facts. The Parkland doctors did not take Kennedy off of that gurney, it's the same gurney he was on as they were trying to save his life in Trauma Room One. None of the Parkland doctors ever mention a bullet lying on the gurney. It simply did not happen.

The idea that the bullet which hit Kennedy in the back was "undercharged" and traveling at a significantly lower rate of speed even though it had yet to strike anything is laughable.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Why so? 

Isn't one explanation (WC-HSCA) that is what CE399 did---penetrate JBC's leg, and then fall out? 

Is there a body of literature on this? 

 

 

 

Do you really believe the bullet which hit Kennedy in the back was traveling at the same low rate of speed as was the bullet when it hit Connally's thigh?  Really?

On 9/10/2023 at 3:10 PM, Vince Palamara said:

Landis' age (88) is the only thing working in his favor that he is not just a fraudster looking for cash. That said, I am skeptical. IF he is lying, it is a win-win for me: just goes to show you what XXXXX these agents are (Hill, Blaine, etc.).

It's entirely possible that Landis is not lying.  Perhaps he did find the bullet inside the car and placed it on A GURNEY, but not necessarily the President's gurney.  None of the Parkland doctors recall a bullet lying on Kennedy's gurney as they tried to save his life inside Trauma Room One.

On 9/9/2023 at 8:59 PM, Benjamin Cole said:

I posted a link to story, and you can use link to read story in Wayback Machine/Internet Archives.  I posted the story as well. 

Of course, whether you give credence to Landis' testimony depends on whether you are a CT'er or LN'er. 

1. Landis' explanation is that CE 399 is a projectile that made the shallow wound in JFK's back, and then fell out.

2. The WC version is that CE 399 is a projectile that passed through JFK's neck, did not tumble, then struck JBC cleanly, took out four inches of JBC's rib, exited JBC's chest tearing out of four-square-inch-hole (lots of bone exited), then smashed JBC's wrist, and then entered JBC's thigh, and then fell out onto a stretcher in Parkland. And after being struck by said projectile, JBC made a 180-degree turn in this seat to look for JFK. 

Maybe Landis' version stands up better....

 

Oh, and btw, CE 399 has marginal deformation after doing all that damage....

"1. Landis' explanation is that CE 399 is a projectile that made the shallow wound in JFK's back, and then fell out."

There is no chance that a bullet struck Kennedy in the back and penetrated only to such a shallow depth that it could later simply fall out of the entry wound.  Complete nonsense.  Whatever did occur, it wasn't this.

4 hours ago, Michael Kalin said:

Tatum's interviewer, Dale Myers, is the same guy whose book (both editions) falsely claimed that Tatum said Tippit was shot "in the head." Tatum never said this. DM fooled cerebral types for over 20 years.

First, you do realize that Tippit was indeed shot in the head.  Right?

Second, you do realize that Tatum has the killer going out into the street and fire off a final shot.  Right?

I'm just trying to find out what you do know and don't know, since you've shown in the past that you're pretty much clueless about the events in Oak Cliff.  No offense intended.

4 hours ago, Michael Kalin said:

I'd say same to you but it's not entirely necessary. You only need to use your ears, following the narrative sequence, just like Jack Myers.

"I put my car in gear and drove forward...watching through the rear view mirror...I saw him very clearly...and I was within 10-15 feet of that individual..." -- Jack Tatum

If and when you decide to use your head proceed with extreme caution. It may lead to a change of guru. Tatum's interviewer, Dale Myers, is the same guy whose book (both editions) falsely claimed that Tatum said Tippit was shot "in the head." Tatum never said this. DM fooled cerebral types for over 20 years.

How long did he fool you?

Myers didn't interview Tatum in the Frontline special.  You don't know what the hell you're talking about.  Just like when you argued for a week that Bowley squeezed past the body lying in the street before parking in the 300 block of East Tenth.

15 hours ago, Sean Coleman said:

mmmmm…..yeah……obvious confusion….

But, haha, she was as mad as a box of frogs

Why not simply answer my question?

What does any of the above (her testimony in 1964) have to do with the fact that she identified Oswald back on 11/22/63?

2 hours ago, Sean Coleman said:

Yeah guys, use your heads!! All witnesses are reliable omg am I surrounded by fools…

 

Obvious confusion during her testimony on exactly what Ball was trying to ask her.  But, I'm curious.  What does any of the above have to do with the fact that she identified Oswald back on 11/22/63?  What if she never testified to the Warren Commission?  Before Markham ever heard of Joseph Ball, she picked Oswald on the afternoon of the murder.

"Number two is the one I picked." -- Helen Markham

"Number two was the man I saw shoot the policeman." -- Helen Markham

You guys need to use your heads.

"I realized that there was one thing that made him stand out; and that was his mouth that curled up.  I couldn't mistake that.  Kind of a smile.  And I was within ten to fifteen feet of that individual." -- Jack Tatum

3 hours ago, Michael Kalin said:

The problem with "J.D. Tippit 101" is that the syllabus consists entirely of WR content plus HSCA add-ons supplied mainly by master sleuth Moriarty. His invention, Jack Tatum as driver of the red Ford observed by Benavides, was devised to overlay the contradictions between WR content and WC testimony. No surprise there's nothing on record to indicate what steps Moriarty took to verify Tatum's statements. Most obviously, he should have arranged a meeting with Benavides, the only witness who might have actually seen Tatum at the murder scene.

The author of the Esquire article on Vaganov (John Berendt) did exactly that, i.e. arrange a meeting between Benavides & Vaganov. Result was a lack of recognition but it was established that the car observed by Benavides had a "white top." This knocked Tatum's red Galaxie out of contention. Moriarty should have been aware of this. Berendt's article predated his involvement by ten years.

No point in discussing Tatum's observation of the "mouth curled up." He didn't see anything because he wasn't there.

J.D. Tippit 102 filters out the uncorroborated witness statements assumed to be valid that plague this case. Very few have taken this course.

 

Whether or not Jack Tatum was really there is another topic entirely.

As for my comments above, you didn't change anything.  Jack Myers misrepresented what Tatum said.

1 hour ago, Gil Jesus said:

Nobody ever said anything about the photos being forgeries. Part I of the the essay is about the Saturday search of the Paine residence.

That would require me to actually go read your work.  If what I've read from you here on this forum is any indication, then no thanks.

The HSCA Photographic Panel studied CE-133A, CE-133B, the negative of CE-133B and Oswald's camera (among many other items related to the photos, such as first generation prints of CE-133C).

The panel first performed a visual inspection of the photos, by use magnifiers and microscopes.  During this inspection, the panel made enlargements of the photos using various exposures and ranges of contrast.  These enlargements produced prints which ranged from very light to very dark.  In the darkest parts of the photos, the detail could be seen best in the lighter prints.  In the lightest parts of the photos, the detail could be seen best in the darker prints.  The panel felt this was the best opportunity of detecting any evidence of falsification anywhere in the pictures.

The panel also used digital image processing to determine if there were any unnatural edge lines or differences in grain structure or contrast.

Both photos (CE-133A and CE-133B) were also studied by the panel using stereoscopic techniques, which allowed the panel to see the photos in 3-D.  This method will detect forgeries in prints because it produces a photographic copy of a photograph.
 When viewed in stereo, these copies will not project a three-dimensional image unless made from different viewpoints along the same axis.  Retouching of the original photo can be detected when two photos depicting the same scene are viewed in stereo, the retouched print will not be on the same plane in which it should be lying; the items seen in the photo will be either in front of the plane or behind the plane.  Because of this, when viewed stereoscopically, fakery can easily be detected.

One final method the panel used to examine the photos was photogrammetrically.

Using all of these methods, the HSCA Photographic Panel detected no signs of forgery.

@Steve Roe @Gerry Down

Re: Oswald, leaflets and the USS Wasp...

Commission Exhibit 1412...

https://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh22/pdf/WH22_CE_1412.pdf

"In a letter to Mr. V.T. Lee, then National Director of the Fair Play For Cuba Committee, Oswald said that "we also managed to picket the fleet when it came in and I was surprised at the number of officers which were interested in our leaflets".

"So, she ran from the back to the living room and threw the curtain back and looked out the window and she could see this officer – Dallas police officer laying in the street; saw his squad car." -- Mike Brownlow (on what Doris Holan supposedly told him)

There is zero line of sight from Holan's apartment window on Patton to the location of Tippit's patrol car around the corner on Tenth.