Excellent review by author Jim DiEugenio

[Vince Palamara]

Excellent review by author Jim DiEugenio:

http://www.ctka.net/2014_reviews/survivors_guilt.html

[Ron Ecker]

Vince,

I recall reading somewhere that a Secret Service agent named Grant showed up in Dallas and that it was Grant, not Lawson, who reduced the number of motorcycles around the limo, in a meeting with Dallas police a day or so before the motorcade. Is this incorrect?

[Vince Palamara]

Agent David Grant, Clint Hill's brother in law (no joke), came from the Florida trip (where he assisted in the advance in Florida) and did indeed help Lawson and Sorrels with the Dallas advance and is definitely a suspect in the reduction of the motorcycle formation, perhaps taking the "heat" off Lawson

[Pat Speer]

Excellent review by author Jim DiEugenio:

http://www.ctka.net/2014_reviews/survivors_guilt.html

You should look through Howard Willens' journal, Vince. The SS' poor performance was on the minds of the commission, and they seriously considered recommending the SS lose its presidential protection responsibilities. Dulles was a big supporter of this, if I recall. There is also a discussion of a Rowley report, which was apparently quite damaging to the SS, that the WC considered a hot potato. I'm pretty sure this is the report in which the late night drinking of Hill, Landis, Bennett etc was detailed. Good stuff.

[Vince Palamara]

Wow---Pat, is this in his book?

[Pat Speer]

Willens has published his journal on his website, Vince. It goes into far more detail than the book. I was wrong...the "Rowley Report" was not on the drinking incident, but was a recommendation for a major overhaul of the SS.

From March 9, 1964

Shortly after this the Chief Justice received a telephone call

and left the room and Mr. McCloy addressed a question to me regarding

the Commission’s function in this area. I made a strong statement to

Mr. McCloy expressing my personal views, which I suggested were generally

those of the staff on this subject. I emphasized the amount of time that

had already passed without any work being done in this area, the need

to gain access to detailed information before any recommendations could

be made, and the fact that the Commission is missing a great and unique

opportunity to make a substantial contribution in the field of security

precautions. Either in the course of this conversation or later when

the Chief Justice returned to the room, I made reference to the Rowley

report to the Secretary of the Treasury. I may well have overstated

the extent to which this document referred to the events of the

assassination, but I did indicate that Rowley had set forth detailed

criticism of Secret Service operations and proposed certain

recommendations for improvements in the areas of interest to the Com-

mission. This was the first time the Chief Justice had ever heard of

this report and he was obviously disconcerted that it had not been

submitted to the Commission. When he returned to the room the Chief

Justice and Mr. McCloy engaged in a heated discussion of the report and

all the rest of us sat quietly. The two men disagreed rather sharply.

Mr. McCloy expressed his view that the Commission should get access

to all the relevant materials from Secret Service and then agree to

consult with them regarding publishing of these prior to the final

report. According to Mr. McCloy, any debate on this matter could be

resolved by the President at the appropriate time. The Chief Justice

responded that this would put the President on the spot and that if

he decided not to release any of this material he would be accused

of covering up the investigation of the assassination. The other

major concern of the Chief Justice was the fear that if detailed

information was made known to the members of the Commission and

staff they would be primary suspects in the event of any leak which

resulted in another assassination attempt. This discussion ended at

approximately 5:30 or 6 p.m.

From March 11, 1964

The most important meeting in which I participated

Wednesday was a meeting Wednesday afternoon with Mr. Carswell,

Chief Rowley, the Chief Justice, Mr. Rankin, Mr. Stern and myself.

This meeting was called in response to the Chief Justice’s request

that he have an opportunity to discuss personally with Treasury

representatives the matters discussed the prior Friday and with

Mr. McCloy the previous day. It was a unique meeting in that I

remained quiet from beginning to end. This proved to be a wise course

of action. The Chief Justice opened the meeting with approximately

a 15-minute presentation in which he stated precisely where he stood

in the area of security precautions. He repeated the points that he

had made on prior occasions regarding his disinterest in detail and

his concern in putting the President on the spot. After he indicated

his position so clearly, Chief Rowley could do nothing but agree

enthusiastically. Chief Rowley made many digressions into operations

of his Service, most of them irrelevant to the functions of this

Commission, but seemingly designed to prove to the Chief Justice

the wisdom of his action. For example, Chief Rowley made reference

to the efforts made by foreign governments and others to inquire into

the actions of the Secret Service and his efforts to restrict these

efforts. It seemed clear that Chief Rowley, even more than I might

have expected, is reluctant to expose his present procedures to the

scrutiny of the President’s Commission. Competent as he may be, he

gives the impression of being a very average law enforcement official

who runs a second-rate agency and doesn’t want his deficiencies to be

exposed. During the course of the conversation he made reference, for example

to the infiltration of the “syndicates” into counterfeiting and suggested

that this was another reason why the Commission should not become informed

regarding his operations. As far as I was concerned this was just baloney.

Mr. Carswell made some effort to define the issue, but only

succeeded in getting Mr. McCloy and Mr. Carswell’s boss, Secretary Dillon,

into greater disfavor with the Chief Justice. Finally, Mr. Carswell

stated that Mr. McCloy had seen Secretary Dillon at the Secretary’s

request, when it became clear that the Chief Justice was somewhat

disturbed that this matter had been discussed in his absence by

another member of the Commission and the Secretary. The Chief Justice

reaffirmed his decision not to be exposed to the matters contained in

the Rowley report to the Secretary which looks toward the future.

Mr. Carswell made a strong statement to the effect that the procedures

and issues related to Dallas and the assassination could be isolated

from the procedures and issues looking to the improvements in the

operations of the Secret Service. The Chief Justice bought this

completely. (After the meeting, which took about one hour and

fifteen minutes, I expressed my views to Mr. Carswell and discussed that

this distinction probably would not hold up.) The end result of the

meeting was that Mr. Stern was instructed to work with Mr. Carswell and

prepare a series of questions and answers which would develop for the

Commission the information it needed to know in this area. The

memorandum of the conference in my chrono file dated March 13, 1964

sets forth the decision reached at the conference. So far as I am

concerned it makes the Commission a public relations adjunct to the

Treasury and makes it impossible for the Commission to do any

significant work in this field.

When I discussed the meeting subsequently with

Mr. Rankin he characteristically had somewhat more optimistic view.

He and I both think that any progress is all to the good and that

the question and answer routine may serve to (1) supply the

Commission with certain information of value and (2) highlight the

issues more sharply so that they may be discussed further. Mr. Rankin

still hasn’t given up in this area and for this I am grateful. If

this next step can be taken in a short period of time it is possible

that the full Commission may be able to discuss this matter and come

to a conclusion contrary to that of the Chief Justice.

From May 5, 1964

During this same meeting I asked Mr. Rankin what was

decided about Mr. Stern’s area. The Commission had decided at

its April 30 meeting that we could go further into the area of

Presidential protection than had been contemplated by the Chief

Justice. But the decision was apparently made, however, that

material such as the Rowley report and other studies under way

at Treasury should be made available only to Mr. Rankin and not

to members of the staff. After some discussion of this Mr. Rankin

authorized Mr. Stern to prepare a letter to Secretary Dillon

setting forth the arrangements upon which the Commission desired

to have access to these studies and related materials. Mr. Rankin

indicated that he hoped to persuade the Commission to let him

designate a member of the staff to assist him in this area.

From June 16, 1964

Area 6. I reported to Mr. Rankin and Mr. Redlich

Mr. Stern’s current position. Mr. Stern is currently in the process

of drafting his section on recommendation in the area of Presidential

Protection. After Chief Rowley testifies on June 18 he plans to

incorporate this material into his report and plans to have his

Final Report during the week of June 22. I mentioned to Mr. Rankin

and Mr. Redlich my belief that the Commission had to deal with the

question of transferring the responsibilities of the Secret Service

to the FBI in the field of Presidential Protection. Neither of them

seemed particularly enthused about discussing this issue in the

Report.

July 2, 1964

During the morning the Commission met to consider

those questions which it had not decided at its meeting on Monday.

According to Mr. Rankin’s later report of the meeting there were

no major problems except perhaps in the area of Presidential

protection. It was during this meeting, I believe, that there was

discussion of the transfer problem and Mr. Rankin told me that two

of the seven Commissioners were inclined to recommend the transfer

of the Presidential protection function to the Department of Justice.

I know that one of the two is Mr. Dulles and I think that the other is

Congressman Ford. Either at this meeting or later it was decided

by the Commission to attempt to reconcile these differences and

express no view on the question of transfer. It was decided by the

Chief Justice, at least, that the Commission should disavow its

competence to consider this proposal.

August 21, 1964

Late in the day I reviewed with Mr. Rankin the current

status of the work of the Commission and he reported to me the result

of the Commission meeting that day. He said that there was a split on the

Commission as to the question of giving to the FBI the responsibility

for the protection of the President. Apparently at least Congressman

Ford and Mr. Dulles felt that PRS is not adequate to do the job. The

two remaining members of the Commission, The Chief Justice and

Mr. McCloy disagreed on this issue. According to Mr. Rankin,

Mr. McCloy was drafting some language which he hoped would

bridge the gap and which he would bring to the next Commission

meeting, scheduled for Wednesday, the 26th.

Edited April 14, 2014 by Pat Speer

[Vince Palamara]

GREAT stuff, indeed-thanks a lot, Pat!!

[Peter McGuire]

Since this thread was started by Vince, I think it is fitting to continue my posting on Mark Lane's Secret Service chapters in his book, LAST WORD.

"Bolden was indicted for attempting to sell information to a suspect. My own ( Mark Lane's ) research into the matter, including interviews with Bolden while his appeal was pending, constrained me to believe that he was framed and that no crime was ever anticipated or committed. An examination of the court records, the criminal records of the accusers, the almost unprecedented actions of the judge and the appellate court ( what's new? This after all is the Kennedy case where nothing is surprising ) and the character of the judge ( again, the accusers have no (good) character in the case of Bolden or Oswald )and prosecutor, convinces me ( Attorney Mark Lane ) beyond any doubt that Bolden was denied a fair trial."

Edited June 12, 2014 by Peter McGuire

[David Von Pein]

This should be of interest to Mr. Palamara.....

I have now found several more Secret Service documents, available to view in Warren Commission Document No. 821, which indicate President Kennedy's desire to not have the SS agents riding on the rear steps of the Presidential limousine during motorcades.

More info at my website here.....

jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/11/secret-service.html#Commission-Document-821

Plus: Similar information from the 12/18/63 Secret Service Assassination Report.....

jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/11/secret-service.html#Excerpt-From-December-1963-Secret-Service-Report

Click to enlarge top photo below.....

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Edited July 3, 2014 by David Von Pein

[Peter McGuire]

You apparently don't understand that what the Warren Commission says means nothing.

[David Von Pein]

You apparently don't understand that what the Warren Commission says means nothing.

The documents I provided above come directly from SECRET SERVICE personnel, not the WARREN COMMISSION.

Those SS statements exist within a "Commission Document", yes. But the material in that document consists of FIVE different statements made by SECRET SERVICE agents, not "Warren Commission" people, for Pete sake.

Are you saying that all of those statements made by the Secret Service agents in April of 1964 are filled with nothing but lies?

Plus, the Commission, as far as I am aware, didn't even publish ANY of the statements found in that CD821 document. That's why it's buried at the Mary Ferrell website only---it's not a "Commission Exhibit". Therefore, it wasn't even published in the volumes.

And yet, why would a Commission that you, Peter McGuire, evidently think is totally useless and worthless (and obviously corrupt to its core) have NOT wanted to publish CD821 in its 26 volumes? They certainly wouldn't be hiding such information. That'd be silly to believe--even for CTers.

But, once again, when faced with overpowering proof that goes against what some conspiracists want to believe (and in this instance that "proof" comes in the form of multiple signed statements written by the various Secret Service agents themselves), we're treated to the normal response by a conspiracy theorist, such as Peter McGuire's brilliant retort -- "You apparently don't understand that what the Warren Commission says means nothing" -- which is a retort that is worthless unto itself, seeing as how those reports that comprise CD821 are Secret Service reports and really have nothing whatsoever to do with the "Warren Commission" directly at all. (Unless Peter now wants to say that James Rowley and his Secret Service agents were all in league and in cahoots with Earl Warren's boys, and therefore Rowley's men decided to start writing phony reports just to please the rotten crooks on the Warren Commission. Is that the idea, Peter?)

Edited July 4, 2014 by David Von Pein

[Peter McGuire]

Good job Pine Knob using my name multiple times.

Are you using your real name?

[Vince Palamara]

David,

Hi! This is ANCIENT, old news that I deal with in excruciating detail in my book: see chapter one. I read your blog links and, again, I am much aware of all of this/ that and, again, have addressed all the apparent "contradictory" information.

(I haven't been on the forum in eons because I thought it no longer existed. I had a researcher tell me "DVP must have never read chapter one of your book~ wanna respond?" LOL)

In addition to chapter one, please see (in entirety- all images/ docs up and down the page and the 7 corresponding blog entries):

http://jfkkennedy.blogspot.com/

Vince Palamara (I think you thought you "got me"... you didn't LOL. BTW, your blog is great otherwise, as are your other resources- you must have been going crazy with all the OJ stuff for the 20th anniversary)

[David Von Pein]

>>>"Are you using your real name?"<<<

Why wouldn't I be?

Edited July 9, 2014 by David Von Pein