Fried Chicken assassin

[megobari]

According to tv and radio news reports at the time Dallas police found the remains of fried chicken on the sixth floor from where Oswald allegedly shot President Kennedy. Had Oswald eaten any chicken while waiting for the motorcade?

Was there an autopsy performed on Oswald? Were there any traces of undigested fried chicken found in his stomach?

I heard this reference to fried chicken on a piece of BBC tv footage from the 22nd November 1963. The newsreader clearly states that remains of uneaten fried chicken were found in the sniper's lair on the sixth floor.

Has anyone else any information on this reference to fried chicken?

[Antti Hynonen]

I believe it was decided by the investigators that the chicken bones belonged to a colleague of Oswalds. Oswald had something else for lunch on Friday the 22nd (I believe it was a sandwich).

Oswald was killed two days later, on Sunday November 24th 1963.

[Paul Kerrigan]

I believe it was decided by the investigators that the chicken bones belonged to a colleague of Oswalds. Oswald had something else for lunch on Friday the 22nd (I believe it was a sandwich).

Oswald was killed two days later, on Sunday November 24th 1963.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Bonnie Ray Williams, an employee at the School Book Depository, had eaten his chicken lunch on the sixth floor until he left at about 12:20.

[Larry Peters]

Tom Alyea is said to have seen the lunch bag being found on the fifth floor and it was taken up to the 6th floor during the search. I also believe Williams said he had a chicken sandwhich which makes me think there were no chicken bones found at all. Sometimes newspaper reporters add their own slant to things and history gets distorted.

[Greg Parker]

I believe it was decided by the investigators that the chicken bones belonged to a colleague of Oswalds. Oswald had something else for lunch on Friday the 22nd (I believe it was a sandwich).

Oswald was killed two days later, on Sunday November 24th 1963.

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Bonnie Ray Williams, an employee at the School Book Depository, had eaten his chicken lunch on the sixth floor until he left at about 12:20.

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That's what Williams told the commission, but it is not what he originally said. This is from the statement he wrote on the afternoon of the asassination:

"We worked up until 10 minutes to 12. Then we went downstairs. We rode the elevator to the 1st floor and got our lunches. I went back up to the 5th floor with a fellow called Hank and Junior. I don't know his last name. Just after we got to the 5th floor we saw the President coming around the corner on Houston from Main St. I heard 2 shots sounded like they come from just above us..."(DPD collection: Box 1 folder 6 file 13)

Early reports indicated the chicken remains were found onthe 5th floor.

This is a quote from the Sydney Morning Herald's breaking news of the assassination: "One theory on which the police were earlier said to be working was that the assassin or assassins might be professional killers hired to do the job. The theory was based on the feeling that the assassination was too cold-blooded and precise for a paranoiac with a grudge against the President."

The picture DPD wanted to project was of a cold, calculating sniper (i.e. Oswald). Presenting the sniper coolly eating lunch waiting for the motorcade, helped bolster that notion.

I believe when it finally dawned on them the impossibility of "proving" Oswald was up there eating his lunch, they needed a "volunteer" to be the gourmet. Enter Williams.

That is not to say the lunch hadn't been Williams. But if it was, it was moved from the 5th floor to the 6th.

If it wasn't his, we are left with the real possibly, it was indeed, a sniper's lunch.

greg

[Larry Peters]

That is not to say the lunch hadn't been Williams.  But if it was, it was moved from the 5th floor to the 6th.

If it wasn't his, we are left with the real possibly, it was indeed, a sniper's lunch.

greg

Greg - It wouldn't seem to do much good to move the evidence to the sixth floor if you are letting witnesses like Tom Alyea see you doing it. From what I have gathered is this - The Police started searching the TSBD floor by floor. When they reached the 5th floor and while giving it the once over, they saw the chicken lunch and collected it as possible evidence. It was then taken up to the 6th floor as the Police continued their search upward. Someone who had come onto 6th floor after the search had begun must have seen the sack lunch that had been brought up from the 5th floor and they just assumed it had been found on 6th floor, thus the erroneous 'sack lunch being found on the 6th floor story' gets out into the media.

[Greg Parker]

Larry: Greg - It wouldn't seem to do much good to move the evidence to the sixth floor if you are letting witnesses like Tom Alyea see you doing it.

Greg: But isn't that exactly what you say happened?

Larry: From what I have gathered is this - The Police started searching the TSBD floor by floor. When they reached the 5th floor and while giving it the once over, they saw the chicken lunch and collected it as possible evidence. It was then taken up to the 6th floor as the Police continued their search upward. Someone who had come onto 6th floor after the search had begun must have seen the sack lunch that had been brought up from the 5th floor and they just assumed it had been found on 6th floor, thus the erroneous 'sack lunch being found on the 6th floor story' gets out into the media.

Greg: Okay, so you're saying it was all an innocent misunderstanding?

If so, how do you explain Williams testifying that he ate that lunch (a chicken ON-THE-BONE sandwich, btw) on the 6th floor - after originally making no mention of going back to that floor? Makes no sense to lie if it was all an innocent mistake.

[Larry Peters]

Larry: Greg - It wouldn't seem to do much good to move the evidence to the sixth floor if you are letting witnesses like Tom Alyea see you doing it.

Greg: But isn't that exactly what you say happened?

I should have stated it better than I did. What I was trying to say is that it made no sense to move the lunch from the 5th floor to the 6th floor with the intent of setting anyone up because it was done right in front of a non-police witness. At the time the Police were searching the building they would not have known who the shooter was. And what good would it do to plant a chicken lunch on the 6th floor when the person who claims to have eaten it is seen on the 5th floor in Dillard's photo of the TSBD just as the shooter has pulled his weapon back over the window sill.

Greg: Okay, so you're saying it was all an innocent misunderstanding?

If so, how do you explain Williams testifying that he ate that lunch (a chicken ON-THE-BONE sandwich, btw) on the 6th floor - after originally making no mention of going back to that floor? Makes no sense to lie if it was all an innocent mistake.

I am not sure what floor you are talking about when you say Williams made no mention of going back to it. What I gathered from reading what Williams said before the Commission was that he ate on the 6th floor. They asked about bones and he said he had placed them back into the sack, which means he must have removed the meat and placed it onto some bread to have eaten it as a sandwhich. Then Williams said he left for the 5th floor, leaving his lunch bag behind if I have understood him correctly.

Mr. BALL. Finish your lunch?

Mr. WILLIAMS. Yes, sir. No longer than it took me to finish the chicken sandwich.

Mr. BALL. Did you eat the chicken?

Mr. WILLIAMS. Yes, I did.

Mr. BALL. Where did you put the bones?

Mr. WILLIAMS. I don't remember exactly, but I think I put some of them back in the sack. Just as I was ready to go I threw the sack down.

Mr. BALL. What did you do with the sack?

Mr. WILLIAMS. I think I just dropped it there.

Mr. BALL. Your memory is that you left the Dr. Pepper bottle on top of some of the cartons?

Mr. WILLIAMS. As I remember. I am not sure.

Mr. BALL. It is shown there on the floor.

Mr. WILLIAMS. Yes, sir.

Mr. BALL. Where did you go when you left there?

Mr. WILLIAMS. I went down to the fifth floor.

Mr. BALL. How did you get down there?

Mr. WILLIAMS. I took an elevator down.

Mr. BALL. Well, you stopped on the fifth floor. Why?

Mr. WILLIAMS. Beg pardon?

Mr. BALL. Why did you stop on the fifth floor?

Mr. WILLIAMS. To see if there was anyone there.

Mr. BALL. Did you know there was anyone there before you started down?

Mr. WILLIAMS. Well, I thought I heard somebody walking, the windows moving or something. I said maybe someone is down there, I said to myself. And I just went on down.

Mr. BALL. Did you find anybody there?

Mr. WILLIAMS. As I remember, when I was walking up, I think Harold Norman and James Jarman as I remember, they was down facing the Elm Street on the fifth floor, as I remember.

Mr. BALL. Now, I want to call your attention to another report I have here. On the 23d of November 1963, the report of Mr. Odum and Mr. Griffin, FBI agents, is that you told them that you went from the sixth floor to the fifth floor using the stairs at the west end of the building. Did you tell them that?

Mr. WILLIAMS. I didn't tell them I was using the stairs. I came back down to the fifth floor in the same elevator I came up to the sixth floor on.

Mr. BALL. You did?

Mr. WILLIAMS. Yes, sir.

Mr. WILLIAMS. It was after I had left the sixth floor, after I had eaten the chicken sandwich.

Photographer Tom Alyea wrote:

Police officers who claim they were on the 6th floor when the assassin's window was found have reported that they saw chicken bones at or near the site. One officer reported that he saw chicken bones on the floor near the location. Another said he saw chicken bones on the barricade boxes, while another reported that he saw chicken bones on the box which was laying across the window sill. Some of these officers have given testimony as to the location of the shell casings. Their testimony differs and none of it is true. I have no idea why they are clinging to these statements. They must have a reason. Perhaps it is because they put it in a report and they must stick to it.

One officer stated that he found the assassin's location at the 6th floor window. He went on to say that as he and his fellow officers were leaving the building, he passed Captain Fritz coming in. He said he stopped briefly to tell Captain Fritz that he had found the assassin's lair at the 6th floor window. This seems highly unlikely because Captain Fritz joined us on the 5th floor and aided in the search. The chances are great that this, or these officers heard the report, that stemmed from WFAA-TV's incorrect announcement that the chicken bones were found on the 6th floor. This officer or officers perhaps used this information to formulate their presence at the scene. There were no chicken bones found on the 6th floor. We covered every inch of it and I filmed everything that could possibly be suspected as evidence. There definitely were no chicken bones on or near the barricade or boxes at the window. I shot close-up shots of the entire area.

Edited July 25, 2004 by Larry Peters

[Greg Parker]

Larry, I am genuinely as confused at where you stand on this as you seem to be with me, so I'll try and be as clear as I can.

Williams made a statement to DPD on 22nov63. I posted the relevant part of that statement earlier in this. Essentially it said he left for lunch from the 6th floor, went to the 1st floor, got his lunch and went back up the 5t floor. Shortly thereafter, he heard two shots fired.

As you showed, this version of events got replaced with an entirely different version before the WC. This version had him going to lunch from the 6th floor, getting his lunch from the 1st floor, and heading back up to eat it on the 6th floor - then going down to the 5th floor.

In my opinion, it doesn't matter if the chickens bones were found on the 6th floor, or the 5th. They ended up on the 6th, and it seems to me, the only reason Williams would change his story would be because - for whatever reason - the powers-that-be needed someone to say they had eaten that lunch there. If the remains of the lunch were moved to the 6th and a reporter mistakenly assumed that's where they were found, and filed a story indicating that's where they were found, why would the powers- that-be not simply correct that misunderstanding?

Williams either lied on 22nov63, or several months later under oath. The latter seens the most likely, and I don't believe he lied then just for the hell of it...

greg

[Larry Peters]

Williams either lied on 22nov63, or several months later under oath. The latter seens the most likely, and I don't believe he lied then just for the hell of it...

greg

Greg - You are leaving out one other possibility in my view ... the police of 11/22/63 report misstated what Williams told them. The very next day (11/23/63) Williams spoke to the FBI and said that he had been on the 6th floor only to go down to the 5th floor after eating his lunch. Williams addressed this to the Commission and even corrected the FBI report where they had him using the stairs and not the elevator.

[Greg Parker]

Impossible, Larry. He wrote the statement himself.

[Larry Peters]

Impossible, Larry. He wrote the statement himself.

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I see what you mean for the undated affidavit is attached below. I don't know what to think of Williams. I notice that he said he only heard two shots when he wrote the note. One reason for his omission of being on the 6th floor when he did the affidavit might possibly be that a Negro of the South in them days may not want to stir the waters by saying he had just been on a floor where Police are saying an assassin took shots at the President of the United States. By the following day the whole world was being told that it was Lee Harvey Oswald who committed the crime and that might be why Williams was now saying that he had been on the 6th floor at one point before joining his friends on the 5th floor. The Hughes film does show three people in the 5th floor windows, which supports what Williams said about where he was when the shooting took place.

Edited July 26, 2004 by Larry Peters

[Antti Hynonen]

Williams' hand-written deposition does not state where he ate his lunch, although one may assume that it was one the 5th floor (unless there is more to it). The deposition is also lacking in detail (which is to be expected).

What surprises me is that most TSBD workers do not admit seeing any "suspicious" or otherwise unfamiliar individuals in the TSBD just before/after the shooting. I recall that one of the administration ladies did recall seeing a worker or engineer, who was not familiar to her, right after the deed.

Does anyone recall who this was, or were there more unfamiliar individuals roaming around on 11/22/63?

In my view the photo evidence supports two people on the 6th floor and 3 on the 5th floor during the event.

Great posts Mr. Peters and Mr. Parker!

[Greg Parker]

One reason for his omission of being on the 6th floor when he did the affidavit might possibly be that a Negro of the South in them days may not want to stir the waters by saying he had just been on a floor where Police are saying an assassin took shots at the President of the United States.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Larry, I'd agree Negroes in the South were vulnerable in such situations. However, in Williams' case, he had nothing to fear by admitting he'd eaten his lunch on the 6th floor (if indeed, that had been true). Reason being, he had an alibi for the time of the shooting, and witnesses to support that alibi.

Under those circumstances, if his vulnerability as a Southern Negro meant anything, it meant he could be easily coerced into changing his story.

And a comparison of his affidavit and WC testimony shows that is exactly what he did. Ruling out fear of being linked to the murder (due to a rock solid alibi), I'm left with coersion as the only plausible explanation.

[Steve Thomas]

Antti,

Does anyone recall who this was, or were there more unfamiliar individuals roaming around on 11/22/63?

From the 11/22/63 affidavit of Danny Arce:

The only person I saw was a real old man, and he had on an old brown suit and a western type hat. I saw this man leave the building and drive off in an old black Buick. This man was not carrying anything in his hands when I saw him. This man was in the building after lunch. This man left in the car before the President was shot. I didn't see any other people in the building but this old man, other than the people that I named that worked there.

Steve Thomas