Shots from inside the presidential limo

[Paul Rigby]

1. Since Jackie was attending JFK at the time of the headshot, she could not possibly have seen it happen.

2. There is no muzzle flash from Greer's "gun", unless you have that, he can't be a shooter....the film is much too grainy and out of focus to conclude he shot JFK.

3. JFK's head is shot from the opposite side of the driver, and moves back and to the left...I do not think this would be consistent with a shot from the driver.

Mark,

Montaigne commented "Never argue with those who deny first principles" - but this is such an important point it's worth revisiting. Your analysis of who did what and when, temperate and conventional though it is, has no meaning for me because it is entirely shaped by the film record. To restate my position: I don't believe the films and don't cite them. Why? Because they are irreconcilable with the eyewitness testimony. One must make a choice.

4. Many experts believe the headshot was from a high powered rifle, not a revolver. I should list some references with this but its late and im tired.

I sympathise with the tiredness, and by all means adduce as many experts as you choose. But be aware of those experts who reached very different conclusions.

[Tim Gratz]

Peter wrote:

Lastly, it seems counter-intuitive to place a weapon in the center of everyone's visual focus. FWIW

Gee, I really thought I might finally get to agree with my new friend, Peter.

Peter puts it so well: "counter-intuitive" to place a weapon "in the center of everyone's visual focus."

I would not call it counter-intuitive, however.

A better word would be:

Well, let's start with "b words: batty or bananas, perhaps.

"c" words that come to mind: crackbrained, crazed, cuckoo.

or "d" words: daft or deranged.

Far better to disguise a sharpshooter as a copy and have him shoot from behind a picket fence.

Peter wrote:

Maybe MM did it and her camera was a gun

Frankly, Peter, that makes more sense than Paul's theory re Greer! And he still did not tell us how he sleeps at night!

Edited August 27, 2007 by Tim Gratz

[Paul Rigby]

Let's assume there were Secret Service agents guarding the Kennedy children. So you suggest that EACH of them (assuming there were two of them) were prepared to KILL Caroline and Jack Jr (three years old at the time)to further the conspiracy? Heck, I even think hardened Mafia killers would hesitate before killing defenseless children!

Really?

From our own correspondent (New York, 31 March), “Security Guard for Caroline Kennedy,” The Times, 1 April 1961, p.8:

It was reported today that United States Secret Service men at Palm Beach were investigating reports that a group of pro-Castro Cubans have been plotting to kidnap Caroline Kennedy, the President’s three-year-old daughter. The Kennedys are at present on holiday in Palm Beach.

The White House press secretary, Mr. Salinger, when questioned, said: “The Secret Service gets information from time to time on the President and his family which requires a routine investigation. There is such a routine investigation under way.” He refused to say whether it dealt with the reported kidnapping plot.

Palm Beach – March 31 – Security precautions around Caroline have been noticeably tightened in the past week. A Secret Service man accompanied the child when a cousin took her around the shopping centre of Palm Beach – Reuter.

One wonders who the real threat came from – Castro’s thoroughly penetrated networks, or Section D of the CIA’s Counterintelligence section.

[Tim Gratz]

To Paul:

Re accepting what the "eyewitnesses" said or saw over the photos and film:

You are so naive, Paul! Everyone knows that when witneeses gave statements to the FBI, the FBI changed them as they saw fit.

Haven't you ever seen "JFK"?

Hoover and the FBI hated both the CIA and the Secret Service. Everyone (and his brother) knows that.

It is not obvious the FBI altered the eyewitness' statements to frame Greer?

[Paul Rigby]

Maybe JC did it. Maybe Jackie did it.....this is [to me] a surreal attempt to explain the events. Maybe MM did it and her camera was a gun......

Uncharacteristically childish, from a man whose contributions on every other subject are shrewd and worth-having. You're better than this.

Had someone fired at JFK at point blank range in the car there would have been powder burns on his face...

Distance from front-seated Greer to (an elevated) President in the opposite rear corner? Point-blank? Not quite. But a damn sight easier shot than from distance with a rifle.

And as to traces of powder etc on Kennedy's clothing, remind me how carefully that particular piece of evidence was preserved?

...wound not in the locations they were or were even faked to be

Assuming Greer did shoot Kennedy, and Kennedy was facing forwards immediately prior to the head shot, we would expect to find a left front entrance and a right rear exit. This is exactly what we do find:

1. Elm St eyewitness:

Norman Similas: “I could see a hole in the President's left temple...” [Jack Bell, “10 Feet from the President,” NYT, 23 November 1963, p.5, citing Toronto Star.]

2. Parkland medical staff:

i) Dr. Robert McClelland: "The cause of death was due to a massive head and brain injury from a gunshot wound of the left temple," Commission Exhibit 392. [‘Admission Note,’ written 22 Nov 1963 at 4.45 pm, reproduced in WCR572, & 17WCH11-12: cited in Lifton’s Best Evidence, p.55; and Meagher’s Accessories After the Fact, pp.159-160.]

ii) Dr. Marion Jenkins: "I don't know whether this is right or not, but I thought there was a wound on the left temporal area, right in the hairline and right above the zygomatic process," 6WH48. [Cited by Sylvia Meagher, Accessories After The Fact: The Warren Commission, The Authorities, & The Report (New York: Vintage Books, 1992 reprint), p. 40.]

iv) Dr. Robert Shaw: "The third bullet struck the President on the left side of the head in the region of the left temporal region and made a large wound of exit on the right side of the head" [Letter from Dr. Shaw to Larry Ross, "Did Two Gunmen Cut Down Kennedy?", Today (British magazine), 15 February 1964, p.4]

iii) Dr. David Stewart: “This was the finding of all the physicians who were in attendance. There was a small wound in the left front of the President’s head and there was a quite massive wound of exit at the right back side of the head, and it was felt by all the physicians at the time to be a wound of entry which went in the front,” The Joe Dolan (Radio) Show, KNEW (Oakland, California), at 08:15hrs on 10 April 1967. [Harold Weisberg. Selections from Whitewash (NY: Carroll & Graf/Richard Gallen, 1994), pp.331-2.]

3. Parkland non-medical staff:

Father Oscar Huber: “terrible wound” over Kennedy's left eye [AP despatch, Philadelphia Sunday Bulletin, 24 November 1963]

4. Sylvia Meagher. Accessories After the Fact: The Warren Commission, The Authorities and the Report (NY: Random House, 1992 reprint), p.161:

“The autopsy documents also provide some cryptic indications of damage to the left side of the head. The notorious face-sheet on which Dr. J. Thornton Boswell committed his unfortunate ‘diagram error’ consists of front and back outlines of a male figure. On the front figure, the autopsy surgeons entered the tracheotomy incision (6.5 cm.), the four cut-downs made in the Parkland emergency room for administration of infusions (2 cms. each), and a small circle at the right eye, with the marginal notation ‘0.8 cm.,’ apparently representing damage produced by the two bullet fragments that lodged there. Dr. Humes testified that the fragments measured 7 by 2 mm. and 3 by 1 mm. respectively (2H354). Although he said nothing about damage at the left eye, the diagram shows a small dot at the site, labelled ‘0.4 cm.’ (CE397, Vol XVII, p.45). Neither Arlen Specter, who conducted the questioning of the autopsy surgeons, nor the Commission members and lawyers present asked any questions about this indication on the diagram of damage to the left eye.

The sound:

...and heard and seen by many more witnesses [including Jackie who would have both heard and seen it].

A.J. Millican: “It sounded like a .45 automatic, or a high-powered rifle,” 19WCH486.

S.M. Holland: “It would be like you’re firing a .38 pistol right beside a shotgun, or a .45 right beside a shotgun,” Josiah Thompson. Six Seconds in Dallas, p.84.

Lastly, it seems counter-intuitive to place a weapon in the center of everyone's visual focus. FWIW

Remember the topography of Elm, Peter - it dips and slants: the assassination scene was not "in the center of everyone's visual focus." It was a sparsely populated stretch at the motorcade's fag-end; and the occupants of the vehicle, not to mention the following vehicles, further hindered clear line of sight for potential eyewitnesses.

[Paul Rigby]

Far better to disguise a sharpshooter as a copy and have him shoot from behind a picket fence.

Armed with a flintlock that belched smoke!

[Tim Gratz]

Sorry for the typo, I obviously meant "cop".

The weapon may or may not have smoked, but it was not a flintlock! It did its job.

Actually the smoke was just a diversion to draw peopls attention away from where the shots really came from!

[Tim Gratz]

Back to the seriousness (which this looney theory does not deserve) since Kellerman had to have seen Greer shoot JFK, he must have been part of it too!

But, after careful reflection and research it is apparent to me that in fact you got it right!

Kellerman did not really tell Greer, "Get us out of here!" His actual words were "Good shot, Bill!"

I watched Kellerman's lips in the Zapruder film 100 times last night and that is what Kellerman said to Greer all right!

Ironically when they got to Parkland Greer got rid of the smoking gun by handing it to Jack Ruby. He of course used it two days later to silence Oswald.

Thus, Paul, you have made the greatest discovery in almost forty-four years of assassination research:

JFK and LHO were both killed by the same gun!

[Bill Miller]

A challenge, then, to all the many adept film & picture afficionados, Bill Miller included - let's see the best enlargement obtainable of the SS hand in question. If my belief is erroneous, show it for all to see.

This topic has been played to death on various forums. I can only advise anyone interested in wasting their time on something as ridiculous as what is being purposed here, then do a search on Lancer under the name "Greer" and read what was posted on the subject.

Greer doesn't reach across his body so to even have a chance at shooting anyone in the back seat. Connally and Nellie are between Greer and the leaning President. The kill shot to JFK came between exposures Z312 and Z313, thus when Z312 and Z314 are compared to one another - there is no sign of a recoil pertaining to Greer's hand upon having just been alleged to have fired a hand gun.

In fact, there are so many problems with even trying to consider such nonsense that it becomes embarrassing to think that someone would write a book making such claims for no other reason than to make a buck.

Bill Miller

Edited August 27, 2007 by Bill Miller

[Tim Gratz]

Bill, it is more than embarrassing, I submit.

BUT it does embarrass all of us!

[Paul Rigby]

Let's assume there were Secret Service agents guarding the Kennedy children. So you suggest that EACH of them (assuming there were two of them) were prepared to KILL Caroline and Jack Jr (three years old at the time)to further the conspiracy? Heck, I even think hardened Mafia killers would hesitate before killing defenseless children!

Really?

From our own correspondent (New York, 31 March), “Security Guard for Caroline Kennedy,” The Times, 1 April 1961, p.8:

It was reported today that United States Secret Service men at Palm Beach were investigating reports that a group of pro-Castro Cubans have been plotting to kidnap Caroline Kennedy, the President’s three-year-old daughter. The Kennedys are at present on holiday in Palm Beach.

The White House press secretary, Mr. Salinger, when questioned, said: “The Secret Service gets information from time to time on the President and his family which requires a routine investigation. There is such a routine investigation under way.” He refused to say whether it dealt with the reported kidnapping plot.

Palm Beach – March 31 – Security precautions around Caroline have been noticeably tightened in the past week. A Secret Service man accompanied the child when a cousin took her around the shopping centre of Palm Beach – Reuter.

One wonders who the real threat came from – Castro’s thoroughly penetrated networks, or Section D of the CIA’s Counterintelligence section.

CIA presumably had its own people within the Secret Service in November 1963. This is a vastly under-explored topic. Here's one view of the state of play a decade later, in 1974:

Combined Miami News Services, “Nixon is CIA prisoner, Colson quoted as saying,” Miami News, 25 June 1974, p.A2:

“Some Secret Service men are in the CIA, too, and Nixon is surrounded by these guys,” Colson said.

[Paul Rigby]

A challenge, then, to all the many adept film & picture afficionados, Bill Miller included - let's see the best enlargement obtainable of the SS hand in question. If my belief is erroneous, show it for all to see.

This topic has been played to death on various forums. I can only advise anyone interested in wasting their time on something as ridiculous as what is being purposed here, then do a search on Lancer under the name "Greer" and read what was posted on the subject.

Greer doesn't reach across his body so to even have a chance at shooting anyone in the back seat. Connally and Nellie are between Greer and the leaning President. The kill shot to JFK came between exposures Z312 and Z313, thus when Z312 and Z314 are compared to one another - there is no sign of a recoil pertaining to Greer's hand upon having just been alleged to have fired a hand gun.

Which is, of course, why Bill is once again taking an obsessive interest in a thread on the subject.

Great fake, by the way - any idea who was responsible for it?

In fact, there are so many problems with even trying to consider such nonsense that it becomes embarrassing to think that someone would write a book making such claims for no other reason than to make a buck.

Usual high quality of research and thought, Bill - Newcomb & Adams never formally published Murder From Within. They did, however, circulate copies of the manuscript among US congressmen and senators. So much for the "quick buck" allegation.

[Paul Rigby]

I don't understand Paul's mindset much of the time. I cannot tell if he really believes half of what he writes or if he is trying to make fools out of CT's in general by making ridiculous statements.Bill[/b]

Must be the influence of Greer's testimony. It has its moments, you know.

See if you, too, can spot the minor discrepancy with the official version of JFK’s time at Parkland:

“Then they took the president to another emergency room. I stayed with him through the examination and then through the autopsy, and was with him when they put the body in the coffin and took him back to Air Force One,”

Greer interview with Bob Tyrell, Asheville Citizen-Times, 6 November 1983, p.5D

Credit to Fred Newcomb for the spot.

[Bill Miller]

See if you, too, can spot the minor discrepancy with the official version of JFK’s time at Parkland:

“Then they took the president to another emergency room. I stayed with him through the examination and then through the autopsy, and was with him when they put the body in the coffin and took him back to Air Force One,”

Greer interview with Bob Tyrell, Asheville Citizen-Times, 6 November 1983, p.5D

Credit to Fred Newcomb for the spot.

Yes, Paul ... Greer is apparently recalling the events of that day some 20 years later ... is he getting things out of order or did the interviewer make the error? Either way - none if it has to do with him allegedly shooting JFK.

Bill Miller

[Bill Miller]

Greer's left hand position between Z312 and Z314. Any sign of him holding a gun or that there was any recoil in those 3/18s of a second - I don't see any.

Bill Miller