Pat Speer- I am confused (so what else is new?)...re: JFK head wound

[Pat Speer]

"In this case, MOST of the witnesses claiming they saw a wound on the far back of the head deferred to the autopsy photos when shown them. It is offensive, in my opinion, to assume these people were lying, or scared or intimidated, whatever. There was a conflict in the evidence. They stepped up and said, "My bad, I probably made a mistake." No one standing on the outside could possibly know how certain they'd been to begin with, and how easy or hard it was for them to admit they made a mistake."

Just one minor problem with your thinking here, Pat. If the witnesses at Parkland and Bethesda had, in equal numbers, randomly put the large head wound all over JFK's head (ie. face, back, high, low, top, forward, back, etc.), your logic might have some credence to it.

HOWEVER, the Parkland and Bethesda witnesses, WITHOUT any communication between them, miraculously all placed the large gaping head wound at the BACK of JFK's head. What a frickin' coincidence, eh, Pat?

Think it might have been a conspiracy??

The line I've highlighted is not remotely true.

[Pat Speer]

Because the death of a sitting U.S. president was never honestly investigated, all we can do is speculate about all the maddening inconsistencies left in the extant record. I respect Pat Speer's work, even though I think he's wrong about some key aspects of the assassination. Like Cliff Varnell, I prefer to concentrate on the holes in JFK's clothing, and the other supporting evidence clearly demonstrating that the entrance in the back was far too low to have exited from the throat.

JFK's head wound(s) are impossible to decipher at this point. As I've noted, the autopsy photos appear to contradict what the medical personnel saw at Dallas. And when considering a blowout in the right rear, we have to reconcile that with a shot from knoll area, which would seemingly blow out the left part of the back of the head. And when we combine McClelland's statement about a gunshot wound to the left temple, and Father Huber's remark about seeing a wound over the left eye, we become lost in confusion.

Considering the kind of pathetic autopsy JFK was given, and the fact we know that participants were told not to talk about what went on there, and that evidence was seen being destroyed there, why would we trust in the legitimacy of the photos and x-rays which have been made public? We know now that two of Malcom Perry's colleagues, Dr. Donald Miller and Dr. Robert Artwohl, claimed that Perry had informed them privately that the throat wound was indeed an entry wound, regardless of what he eventually told the Warren Commission. And we know that Secret Service agent Elmer Moore was tasked with getting Perry to change his story, something he later told his friend Jim Gochenaur that he felt remorse about.

JFK's brain was not placed in formalin, and the bullet path was never traced. Then, as we know, the brain was lost. Somehow, it's accepted that the brain of a United States president was just misplaced. The ARRB would later reveal that Secret Service agent James Mastrovito supposedly disposed of JFK's brain matter in....a food processor. How can we trust any "official" part of the medical evidence? Lifton's body alteration theory is so attractive because of all these enduring questions.

No evidence for a shot from the front? Come on, Pat! The best evidence regarding the throat wound, which was later mutilated via the tracheotomy incision, is that it was an entrance wound. Both Dr. Kemp Clark and Dr. Robert Shaw made early, and therefore more credible, statements that the bullet had entered JFK's neck from the front. And the motion of JFK's head backwards has always been one of the key pieces of evidence pointing towards conspiracy.

As I said, I respect Pat's work-and he has done a lot of good work-but I think the only way you can reject all the suggestions of a frontal shot or shots is to trust exclusively in the official medical evidence, which is a mess and contradicts the overwhelming number of eyewitnesses, as well as the film record.

It's important that we realize the difference between emergency room doctors and forensic pathologists. An emergency room doctor forms an impression as to entrance and exit wounds, while a pathologist comes to a conclusion. Perry most certainly never concluded the throat wound was an entrance. It APPEARED to be one. He didn't waver on this in his testimony, or ever. He always insisted that it appeared to be an entrance. That doesn't mean he'd concluded it was an entrance, and LIED later when he said it could have been an exit wound.

Most emergency room physicians, we can only hope, have some humility about these matters. Their impressions are frequently at odds with the conclusions of pathologists--which is why we have pathologists.

Pat, I wonder what you have to say about Dr Miller's recent article.

Dr Donald W Miller

Dr. Perry publicly changed his view of the neck wound for the Warren Commission after a Secret Service Agent came to Dallas, threatened him, and coerced him to testify that it was an exit wound. In 1970, that Agent, Elmer Moore, confessed to a friend that he had acted “on orders from Washington.” He regretted that he had “badgered Dr. Perry into making a flat statement that there was no entry wound in the neck.” As ordered, he said, “I did everything I was told, we all did everything we were told, or we’d get our heads cut off.” The friend he admitted this to was (appropriately enough) a University of Washington graduate student named Jim Gochenaur.

Thirteen years later, Dr. Perry and I performed surgery on a patient with a thoracoabdominal aneurysm. I removed the thoracic, or chest part of the aneurysm, and Dr. Perry, the abdominal part. When the residents were closing the incisions Malcolm and I sat together alone in the surgeons’ lounge drinking coffee. Dr. Perry had always refused to discuss the Kennedy assassination, but that night, after we had been operating together for many hours on a complex case, I once again asked him about it. This time,

Perry told me that the bullet wound in Kennedy’s neck was, in fact, unquestionably a wound of entrance.

A year later, when called to testify to the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) Dr. Perry once again publicly supported the government’s single-bullet-theory official truth and agreed with the committee that the bullet wound in the neck must be an exit wound, explaining that the wound was so small that he had initially mistaken it for an entrance wound. But in 1986, Dr. Perry told another physician, Dr. Robert Artwohl, that it was in fact an entrance wound.

I have read this. I suspect he's exaggerating. It would be incredibly unprofessional for Perry to tell a near stranger that a wound he thought was an entrance absolutely positively was an entrance, particularly when there are conditions under which an exit can look like an entrance. Studies have shown that emergency room doctors mix up entrance and exit all the time. It's not their yob.

Dr. Jones, for one, pointed this out in his own testimony, when he said the wound could have been an exit for a slowly moving projectile.

[Robert Prudhomme]

From Pat Speer:

"The line I've highlighted is not remotely true."

Care to elaborate?

[John Crites]

If the Dallas Doctors and nurses saw a hole in the back of the head, there was a hole in the back of the head - period....

They were trying to save the man's life and explored every avenue at their disposal to do so. They saw the cause of death close up and they reported the cause of death untainted by government influence, until the cover up - "the Public must be satisfied that Oswald was the assassin" became the sole objective of the government.

[Pat Speer]

If the Dallas Doctors and nurses saw a hole in the back of the head, there was a hole in the back of the head - period....

They were trying to save the man's life and explored every avenue at their disposal to do so. They saw the cause of death close up and they reported the cause of death untainted by government influence, until the cover up - "the Public must be satisfied that Oswald was the assassin" became the sole objective of the government.

That sounds good on paper, John, and 9 times out of 10 you'd probably be right.

But in this instance we have

1) Witnesses to the shooting itself that pointed to a location in front of the ear.

2) Witnesses who saw the body itself, including Mrs. Kennedy, who said the wound was on the top of the head, and whose words are consistent with the Dealey witnesses.

3) Autopsy photos consistent with the statements of the Dealey witnesses.

4) X-rays consistent with the statements of the Dealey witnesses.

5) Films of the shooting consistent with the statements of the Dealey witnesses.

6) Most of the key Parkland personnel saying their previous statements indicating the wound was on the back of the head were in error.

Believe what you like, but Bill and Gayle Newman are 100 times as credible as the likes of Charles Crenshaw and Audrey Bell.

[Pat Speer]

From Pat Speer:

"The line I've highlighted is not remotely true."

Care to elaborate?

Here's the line:

HOWEVER, the Parkland and Bethesda witnesses, WITHOUT any communication between them, miraculously all placed the large gaping head wound at the BACK of JFK's head. What a frickin' coincidence, eh, Pat?

All? If you've been following the thread on Groden's new book, you'll see that he's been caught trying to pass off a still shot from Stone's JFK as a previously unseen autopsy photo. His work with the "back of the head" witnesses was almost as misleading.

[Ray Mitcham]

Because the death of a sitting U.S. president was never honestly investigated, all we can do is speculate about all the maddening inconsistencies left in the extant record. I respect Pat Speer's work, even though I think he's wrong about some key aspects of the assassination. Like Cliff Varnell, I prefer to concentrate on the holes in JFK's clothing, and the other supporting evidence clearly demonstrating that the entrance in the back was far too low to have exited from the throat.

JFK's head wound(s) are impossible to decipher at this point. As I've noted, the autopsy photos appear to contradict what the medical personnel saw at Dallas. And when considering a blowout in the right rear, we have to reconcile that with a shot from knoll area, which would seemingly blow out the left part of the back of the head. And when we combine McClelland's statement about a gunshot wound to the left temple, and Father Huber's remark about seeing a wound over the left eye, we become lost in confusion.

Considering the kind of pathetic autopsy JFK was given, and the fact we know that participants were told not to talk about what went on there, and that evidence was seen being destroyed there, why would we trust in the legitimacy of the photos and x-rays which have been made public? We know now that two of Malcom Perry's colleagues, Dr. Donald Miller and Dr. Robert Artwohl, claimed that Perry had informed them privately that the throat wound was indeed an entry wound, regardless of what he eventually told the Warren Commission. And we know that Secret Service agent Elmer Moore was tasked with getting Perry to change his story, something he later told his friend Jim Gochenaur that he felt remorse about.

JFK's brain was not placed in formalin, and the bullet path was never traced. Then, as we know, the brain was lost. Somehow, it's accepted that the brain of a United States president was just misplaced. The ARRB would later reveal that Secret Service agent James Mastrovito supposedly disposed of JFK's brain matter in....a food processor. How can we trust any "official" part of the medical evidence? Lifton's body alteration theory is so attractive because of all these enduring questions.

No evidence for a shot from the front? Come on, Pat! The best evidence regarding the throat wound, which was later mutilated via the tracheotomy incision, is that it was an entrance wound. Both Dr. Kemp Clark and Dr. Robert Shaw made early, and therefore more credible, statements that the bullet had entered JFK's neck from the front. And the motion of JFK's head backwards has always been one of the key pieces of evidence pointing towards conspiracy.

As I said, I respect Pat's work-and he has done a lot of good work-but I think the only way you can reject all the suggestions of a frontal shot or shots is to trust exclusively in the official medical evidence, which is a mess and contradicts the overwhelming number of eyewitnesses, as well as the film record.

It's important that we realize the difference between emergency room doctors and forensic pathologists. An emergency room doctor forms an impression as to entrance and exit wounds, while a pathologist comes to a conclusion. Perry most certainly never concluded the throat wound was an entrance. It APPEARED to be one. He didn't waver on this in his testimony, or ever. He always insisted that it appeared to be an entrance. That doesn't mean he'd concluded it was an entrance, and LIED later when he said it could have been an exit wound.

Most emergency room physicians, we can only hope, have some humility about these matters. Their impressions are frequently at odds with the conclusions of pathologists--which is why we have pathologists.

Pat, I wonder what you have to say about Dr Miller's recent article.

Dr Donald W Miller

Dr. Perry publicly changed his view of the neck wound for the Warren Commission after a Secret Service Agent came to Dallas, threatened him, and coerced him to testify that it was an exit wound. In 1970, that Agent, Elmer Moore, confessed to a friend that he had acted “on orders from Washington.” He regretted that he had “badgered Dr. Perry into making a flat statement that there was no entry wound in the neck.” As ordered, he said, “I did everything I was told, we all did everything we were told, or we’d get our heads cut off.” The friend he admitted this to was (appropriately enough) a University of Washington graduate student named Jim Gochenaur.

Thirteen years later, Dr. Perry and I performed surgery on a patient with a thoracoabdominal aneurysm. I removed the thoracic, or chest part of the aneurysm, and Dr. Perry, the abdominal part. When the residents were closing the incisions Malcolm and I sat together alone in the surgeons’ lounge drinking coffee. Dr. Perry had always refused to discuss the Kennedy assassination, but that night, after we had been operating together for many hours on a complex case, I once again asked him about it. This time,

Perry told me that the bullet wound in Kennedy’s neck was, in fact, unquestionably a wound of entrance.

A year later, when called to testify to the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) Dr. Perry once again publicly supported the government’s single-bullet-theory official truth and agreed with the committee that the bullet wound in the neck must be an exit wound, explaining that the wound was so small that he had initially mistaken it for an entrance wound. But in 1986, Dr. Perry told another physician, Dr. Robert Artwohl, that it was in fact an entrance wound.

I have read this. I suspect he's exaggerating. It would be incredibly unprofessional for Perry to tell a near stranger that a wound he thought was an entrance absolutely positively was an entrance, particularly when there are conditions under which an exit can look like an entrance. Studies have shown that emergency room doctors mix up entrance and exit all the time. It's not their yob.

Dr. Jones, for one, pointed this out in his own testimony, when he said the wound could have been an exit for a slowly moving projectile.

Sorry that you "suspect" he is exaggerating, Pat, but that's a cop out. What you mean is that he is lying. Why would Dr Miller lie about what Dr Perry told him?

The Warren Testimonies cannot be trusted.

Edited December 19, 2013 by Ray Mitcham

[John Dolva]

While I agree that Pat is wrong on a number of issues his research is a template, of sorts, and does generate discussions that allows a general education around various matters.

To make a statement regarding motivation, and not do as this type of topic does which is enable this discussion about the medical matters, which are not really of interest to me these days nevertheless a read of this and that gives a lot of answers without having to be involved, is skating close to forum rules. Bjorn, I think that you should restate your post. I'd call it lots of information and lots of wrong interpretations, but then I'd feel obliged to justify that. Fortunately I don't really have to answer much as it is and I hope that continues. I shall do my best to have it so.

Cheers.

[John Crites]

Dr. Crenshaw and Audrey Bell were dedicated professionals. As far as doctor Crenshaw goes, because he spoke the truth and reflected exactly what he and so

many of his peers said in testimony, and was not going to let the slandering of him by the government, JAMA and the MSM stop him - that is commendable. He spent his life in the field of medicine, not only as a surgeon, but also spent time as a professor .

I wish the Lawsuit against JAMA wouldn't have settled (Crenshaw was given a $220,000 + from JAMA in settlement to drop his case), because after Crenshall's lawyers destroyed the JAMA personnel in various depositions. It appeared that sooner or Later, Humes and Boswell were going to have to testify under oath in a

deposition as well if the case continued. They wouldn't have been able to fabricate and twist the truth as with the Warren Commission and HSCA. Obviously

Crenshaw's attorneys knew this, and they were loaded and ready to go the distance. Obviously, nobody from the Government wanted that to occur and JAMA knew that.

As far as the Newman's, this is no contest as to who is the most credible here - between them and Crenshaw and Bell. They are all credible. The Newman's were

never called to testify to the Warren Commission because they described the shot TO the front of the head and from behind - in the area of the knoll.

Please YouTube the Jay Watson interview from the day of the assassination with Bill and Gayle. Granted, the Newman's never said that there was a hole in the back of the head,

but its pretty obvious the way they described the blast to the head from the front.

The Newman's did testify in the Shaw Trial.

As far as Jackie goes, the poor soul testified ;

"But from the BACK you could

see, you know, you were trying to hold his hair on, and his skull on.

That poor woman, how terrible.

[John Crites]

While I agree that Pat is wrong on a number of issues his research is a template, of sorts, and does generate discussions that allows a general education around various matters.

To make a statement regarding motivation, and not do as this type of topic does which is enable this discussion about the medical matters, which are not really of interest to me these days nevertheless a read of this and that gives a lot of answers without having to be involved, is skating close to forum rules. Bjorn, I think that you should restate your post. I'd call it lots of information and lots of wrong interpretations, but then I'd feel obliged to justify that. Fortunately I don't really have to answer much as it is and I hope that continues. I shall do my best to have it so.

Cheers.

I feel that Speer's website is a valuable place for information on this case. I love his #35 series. Very is well produced. I

think it's appropriate to the times we live in, but feel the homeless woman quote header, is not totally tied to the subject of the assassination. But still good. A lot of us are going to disagree with the back of the head issue, and we all are steadfast in

our opinions on this.

[Robert Prudhomme]

It may get me in trouble concerning forum rules but, I agree with everything Bjorn Gjerde has said. Disinformation is a cancer that has invaded America.

[John Crites]

Disinformation is a cancer that has invaded America.

That is a fact Robert.

[Ken Davies]

I agree Robert. It has also invaded Canada.

[Robert Prudhomme]

Ohhhh yes, indeed.

[Pat Speer]

Because the death of a sitting U.S. president was never honestly investigated, all we can do is speculate about all the maddening inconsistencies left in the extant record. I respect Pat Speer's work, even though I think he's wrong about some key aspects of the assassination. Like Cliff Varnell, I prefer to concentrate on the holes in JFK's clothing, and the other supporting evidence clearly demonstrating that the entrance in the back was far too low to have exited from the throat.

JFK's head wound(s) are impossible to decipher at this point. As I've noted, the autopsy photos appear to contradict what the medical personnel saw at Dallas. And when considering a blowout in the right rear, we have to reconcile that with a shot from knoll area, which would seemingly blow out the left part of the back of the head. And when we combine McClelland's statement about a gunshot wound to the left temple, and Father Huber's remark about seeing a wound over the left eye, we become lost in confusion.

Considering the kind of pathetic autopsy JFK was given, and the fact we know that participants were told not to talk about what went on there, and that evidence was seen being destroyed there, why would we trust in the legitimacy of the photos and x-rays which have been made public? We know now that two of Malcom Perry's colleagues, Dr. Donald Miller and Dr. Robert Artwohl, claimed that Perry had informed them privately that the throat wound was indeed an entry wound, regardless of what he eventually told the Warren Commission. And we know that Secret Service agent Elmer Moore was tasked with getting Perry to change his story, something he later told his friend Jim Gochenaur that he felt remorse about.

JFK's brain was not placed in formalin, and the bullet path was never traced. Then, as we know, the brain was lost. Somehow, it's accepted that the brain of a United States president was just misplaced. The ARRB would later reveal that Secret Service agent James Mastrovito supposedly disposed of JFK's brain matter in....a food processor. How can we trust any "official" part of the medical evidence? Lifton's body alteration theory is so attractive because of all these enduring questions.

No evidence for a shot from the front? Come on, Pat! The best evidence regarding the throat wound, which was later mutilated via the tracheotomy incision, is that it was an entrance wound. Both Dr. Kemp Clark and Dr. Robert Shaw made early, and therefore more credible, statements that the bullet had entered JFK's neck from the front. And the motion of JFK's head backwards has always been one of the key pieces of evidence pointing towards conspiracy.

As I said, I respect Pat's work-and he has done a lot of good work-but I think the only way you can reject all the suggestions of a frontal shot or shots is to trust exclusively in the official medical evidence, which is a mess and contradicts the overwhelming number of eyewitnesses, as well as the film record.

It's important that we realize the difference between emergency room doctors and forensic pathologists. An emergency room doctor forms an impression as to entrance and exit wounds, while a pathologist comes to a conclusion. Perry most certainly never concluded the throat wound was an entrance. It APPEARED to be one. He didn't waver on this in his testimony, or ever. He always insisted that it appeared to be an entrance. That doesn't mean he'd concluded it was an entrance, and LIED later when he said it could have been an exit wound.

Most emergency room physicians, we can only hope, have some humility about these matters. Their impressions are frequently at odds with the conclusions of pathologists--which is why we have pathologists.

Pat, I wonder what you have to say about Dr Miller's recent article.

Dr Donald W Miller

Dr. Perry publicly changed his view of the neck wound for the Warren Commission after a Secret Service Agent came to Dallas, threatened him, and coerced him to testify that it was an exit wound. In 1970, that Agent, Elmer Moore, confessed to a friend that he had acted “on orders from Washington.” He regretted that he had “badgered Dr. Perry into making a flat statement that there was no entry wound in the neck.” As ordered, he said, “I did everything I was told, we all did everything we were told, or we’d get our heads cut off.” The friend he admitted this to was (appropriately enough) a University of Washington graduate student named Jim Gochenaur.

Thirteen years later, Dr. Perry and I performed surgery on a patient with a thoracoabdominal aneurysm. I removed the thoracic, or chest part of the aneurysm, and Dr. Perry, the abdominal part. When the residents were closing the incisions Malcolm and I sat together alone in the surgeons’ lounge drinking coffee. Dr. Perry had always refused to discuss the Kennedy assassination, but that night, after we had been operating together for many hours on a complex case, I once again asked him about it. This time,

Perry told me that the bullet wound in Kennedy’s neck was, in fact, unquestionably a wound of entrance.

A year later, when called to testify to the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) Dr. Perry once again publicly supported the government’s single-bullet-theory official truth and agreed with the committee that the bullet wound in the neck must be an exit wound, explaining that the wound was so small that he had initially mistaken it for an entrance wound. But in 1986, Dr. Perry told another physician, Dr. Robert Artwohl, that it was in fact an entrance wound.

I have read this. I suspect he's exaggerating. It would be incredibly unprofessional for Perry to tell a near stranger that a wound he thought was an entrance absolutely positively was an entrance, particularly when there are conditions under which an exit can look like an entrance. Studies have shown that emergency room doctors mix up entrance and exit all the time. It's not their yob.

Dr. Jones, for one, pointed this out in his own testimony, when he said the wound could have been an exit for a slowly moving projectile.

Sorry that you "suspect" he is exaggerating, Pat, but that's a cop out. What you mean is that he is lying. Why would Dr Miller lie about what Dr Perry told him?

The Warren Testimonies cannot be trusted.

No, I don't mean that at all. I suspect Perry told a number of people over the years that "By Gosh, that sure looked like an entrance wound to me." I just think he was far too professional to tell mere acquaintances that "It WAS an entrance wound," and that therefore the single-assassin theory is nonsense. There is no evidence Perry was a CT.

And, by the way, I'm not going by the Warren Testimonies, but Perry's statements after.