Orcarberro

[Steve Thomas]

I didn't realize until just the other day how short a period of time Manuel Rodriguez Orcarberro had been in Dallas before the assassination.

On April 24, 1964 SS Chief Rowley wrote a Memorandum to J. Lee Rankin of the Warren Commission. This memo is CD 853
http://www.maryferre...amp;relPageId=2

This memo was in response to a letter from Rankin to Rowley dated April 22, 1964. The topic was Manuel Rodriguez Orcarberro and the Cuban exile community. Some of the things in Rowley’s memo were:

1/16/64 Frank Ellsworth was interviewed about Orcarberro.
Ellsworth had been working undercover gathering evidence against John Thomas Masen.
Masen told Ellsworth that Orcarberro had been trying to buy guns and bazookas from Masen.
Masen told Ellsworth that Rodriguez and George F. Parrel were leaders of the local DRE and also members of Alpha-66
Masen told Ellsworth that George Parrel, an associate of Orcarberro, had also been trying to buy guns from him.
They had made purchases from him and that they presently have a large cache of arms located somewhere in Dallas, although he did not know the location.
Parrel was a student at Dallas City College.
Agent Ed Coyle was also contacted about Orcarberro.

On May 25, 1964, Manuel Rodriguez voluntarily appeared at the Dallas FBI offices and spoke to Wallace Heitman. He told Heitman that the members of SNFE met at bi-weekly meetings at 3126 Harlandale. (Although in his Report, Heitman spelled it Hollandale.)

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=222

In his 11/26/63 follow up Report, Deputy Sheriff, Buddy Walthers wrote that the Cubans who had been at the Harlandle house had moved out between seven days before the President was shot and one day after he was shot.

See: http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh19/html/WH_Vol19_0276b.htm

Warren CD# 1085 is a letter from the Director of the FBI to Jay Lee Rankin dated June 11, 1964 with attached memos and reports.
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=11481&relPageId=3

See here for a list of various reports from Wallace Heitman:

http://www.maryferrell.org/search.html?q=HEITMAN%20june%2025,%201964

One of the Reports included is a memo from Dallas SA Wallace Heitman dated April 29, 1964. This Report discusses the residents of an address in Garland, Texas and the sighting of a Rambler station wagon parked in front with a bumper sticker that says, “Kill the Kennedy Klan.”

While Heitman’s memo is heavily redacted, other research has revealed the two residents of 806 E. Monica in Garland, TX were Raul Castro and Juan Quintana.

CD 913 is a March 30, 1964 Report of Robert Gemberling. Included in this Report is information relative to the "Kill the Kennedy Klan" bumper sticker and persons receiving mail at an address in Garland.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/...p;relPageId=174

Gemberling's report INCLUDES the names of the people. The mail being reported on dates from late December and early January, 1964.

Heitman's Report of April 29th is a copy of Gemberling's March 30th.

Among the people receiving mail at 806 E. Monica Dr. were Raul Castro and Juan Quintana.
Manuel Rodriguez Orcarberro had revealed that Raul Castro and Juan Quintana were members of Alpha-66 and the SNFE.

On page 6 of his memo, Heitman says this his source told him that the two unnamed subjects of the memo had been employed by him (the source) for approximately one year. He said they were Cuban citizens and who were trained as duster pilots in Mexico for the Cuban Government and later defected from the Fidel Castro Government and came to the United States.
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=11481&relPageId=215

The two subjects were known to be violently anti-Castro and had attended the speech by Adlai Stevenson in Dallas when he got bonked on the head by a picket sign.

CD 1085

In June, 1963 Andrés Nazario Sargén wrote Orcarberro a letter and urged him to establish a chapter of Alpha 66 in Dallas. He moved to Dallas in September, 1963.

University of Miami finding aids

http://proust.library.miami.edu/findingaids/?p=creators/creator&id=430

General Secretary Andrés Nazario Sargén was a founder of Alpha 66 along with other prominent anti-communist fighters such as his older brother Aurelio Nazario, Eloy Gutiérrez Menoyo and Antonio Veciana.

Fabian Escalante

CUBAN INFORMATION ARCHIVES

http://cuban-exile.com/doc_026-050/doc0027-3.html

A third information comes from Mr. Manuel Rodriguez. Manuel Rodriguez truly, we didn't know who
he was. We heard about Manuel Rodriguez when we started to do research on Oscar Berot (ORCARBERRO?) on
account of what information was received from the __________ hotel. Oscar Berot is the second
surname of Manuel Rodriguez

(the Comodoro hotel?)

and in our organization the index is always made by the first surname not by the second one. But when
we found out that Oscar Berot was Manuel Rodriguez, then we found another interesting information.
Manuel Rodriguez, Oscar Berot told one of our agents, first of all that he was in Dallas because he
was the officer 66 [Alpha-66] delegate in Dallas. And he was the delegate for office 66 in Dallas and if anyone came to know that he and Bercian took part in the plot to kill Kennedy. They were going to be killed. He was already living in Puerto Rico or a little after that he went to live in Puerto Rico. And
another information comes from a very close person of Bercian, I think... some of you have already
interviewed. This person told us that Phillips threatened Bercian in order for him to not reveal his true identity. I'm not going to reveal his name, but I will only tell you that some of you have had interviews
with this person (don't talk about it) ?__________________ I cannot reveal this on account of an
ethics principle for the same cause, because some of you will not make such revelations.

(Is Bercian Antonio Veciana?)

FABIÁN ESCALANTE ON POSADA AND OPERATION 40

By Jean-Guy Allard interviewing Fabian Escalante in Havana. Axis of Logic

Axis of Logic

Tuesday, Jan 11, 2011

http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_62001.shtml

Escalante underlines how a Cuban, Manuel "Manolito" Rodriguez Orcarberro, arrives in Dallas two months before the Kennedy assassination "and he leaves afterwards at full speed."

(Remember what Buddy Walthers saying about the Cubans who left Harlendale shortly afterwards)

There he opens an office of Alpha 66, where Oswald will enter at one time, according to the testimony of the assistant police chief of Dallas.

"This Cuban sought asylum in 1960 in the Brazilian embassy together with two known CIA agents. Who were they? Ricardo 'El Mono' Morales Navarrete and Isidro Borgas, a figure of Mexican origin who looks a lot like one of the figures who is with Oswald handing out proclamations supposedly in favor of Cuba in New Orleans -- all of that which was a show put on where Carlos Bringuier goes to challenge them, a fight erupts, and the police arrest all of them..."

Orcarberro was a busy little guy in the short time he was in Dallas.

Steve Thomas

[Larry Hancock]

Steve, I don't think the time was quite that short....I cover the points you mentioned above in SWHT and as I recall he had been in the house longer than that and did not exit that quickly...in fact there is good evidence that he was interviewed during the following year by the FBI and had been a source for them previously....indeed he seems to have been the source who helped them write off the report of Oswald at the Harlandale house. You might want to search my blog for posts on Harlandale and on Heitman.... there is some new information there on both subjects.

[Steve Thomas]

Steve, I don't think the time was quite that short....I cover the points you mentioned above in SWHT and as I recall he had been in the house longer than that and did not exit that quickly...in fact there is good evidence that he was interviewed during the following year by the FBI and had been a source for them previously....indeed he seems to have been the source who helped them write off the report of Oswald at the Harlandale house. You might want to search my blog for posts on Harlandale and on Heitman.... there is some new information there on both subjects.

Larry,

Thanks for responding. It's nice to hear from you again.

With respect to the FBI interviewing Orcarberro the following year, yes. Heitzman's report is dated in April of 1964. I got to wondering about that in light of Escalante saying that Orcarberro had moved to Puerto Rico.

In addition, I want to go back and log the addresses he lived at in Dallas.

A CIA document stamped November 24, 1963 ("WAVE traces indicate that...") has him living on Columbia

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=40314&relPageId=2

In January, 1964 Roger Warner said that INS had him living at 5310 Columbia St.

So did Agent Aragon of Miami.

In March, the SS still had him living there.

In an FBI report dated May 28, 1964 he was listed at 2311 Nicholson St.

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=28726#relPageId=4&tab=page

(Just as an aside, that FBI lists a Jose Rodriguez as one of the officers of the Dallas SNFE. I wonder if it was his brother)

On May 22, 1964 Heitman lists his address as 2311 Nicholson St. Appt. D

So, it looks like some time between March and May, Orcarberro moved.

I read through some of your blog posts on Harlandale. At one point you said, "One of the FBI’s primary subversive tasks in 1963 was cracking down on exile guy buys and we should have a large set of documents on that activity in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. What we do have from the FBI in regard to Walthers report is nothing more than a confirmation that the Cubans had been in the house and left almost immediately either before or after the assassination."

I was sort of astounded the other day when I was reading some FBI surveillance reports of Apha 66 in New York City and saw that much of their information came Jack Caulfield (of Watergate fame). He worked for the Special Service Bureau in NYC - just the same as the Special Service Bureau in Dallas. It seems that these Special Service Bureaus were patterned after each other, and Bureaus from around the country met periodically and shared information and techniques. (Both Revill and Curry reference this). Their emphasis was on criminal activity of an organized nature, like Communist and the Fair play For Cuba Committee, but not Mafia type activity. If you look at the 9 organizations that Jack Revill had under surveillance before Kennedy's visit, they included the John Birch Society and the White Citizens Council, but not any of the cuban exile organizations.

I still have to square the idea of Orcarberro living in Dallas as of May, 1964 and Escalante saying Orcarberro,

"arrives in Dallas two months before the Kennedy assassination "and he leaves afterwards at full speed."

I'll go back and spend time with SWHT.

Steve Thomas

[Larry Hancock]

Steve, a couple of things. First off my impression is that Orcabaro had been in Dallas for some time and did not leave immediately, he stayed for a few months at least, maybe more. Somebody interviewed him later in Puerto Rico, I forget who. What had changed that fall was that Alpha 66 had begun aggressively fund raising and recruiting in Dallas and traffic at the house had really picked up, with out of towners staying there. During Oct/Nov it clearly became a contact point with people coming and going every night. Both Alpha 66 types and DRE types visited and people like Amelio Diaz (DRE) lived there. The house itself was rented by Jorge Salazar, Vice Sec. of Alpha 66. The burst of traffic in early Nov is what brought it to the attention of Walther's mother. At least one source document that Stu located stated that Veciana had been to the house multiple times on trips to and through Dallas...but we have not been able to corroborate that.

Several of the folks who either lived there or frequented the place - like Oswaldo Aurelio Pino - were either being investigated by the FBI or were FBI sources. There is some reason to believe that the FBI even put the place under at least part time surveillance in November.

The FBI certainly had a mission to investigate exile organizations in order to interdict any actual military activities and certainly weapons purchases. Yet we only have bits and pieces of records on that sort of thing, especially from Heitman. Actually we have lots of post assassination documents and interviews showing the FBI was very well aware of many of the activist exiles and groups...we just don't have the pre-assassination equivalent. Heitman would seem to have been the guy looking into that - there is plenty of indication the FBI knew these people but finding the pre-assassination data is the open challenge.

Edited March 6, 2016 by Larry Hancock

[Steve Thomas]

Larry,

"Actually we have lots of post assassination documents and interviews showing the FBI was very well aware of many of the activist exiles and groups...we just don't have the pre-assassination equivalent. Heitman would seem to have been the guy looking into that - there is plenty of indication the FBI knew these people but finding the pre-assassination data is the open challenge."

The other day I ran across the name of another Spanish speaking guy who seems to have worked with Heitman, but I neglected to write his name down. If I run across it again, I'll let you know.

Steve

[Steve Thomas]

On April 24, 1964 SS Chief Rowley wrote a Memorandum to J. Lee Rankin of the Warren Commission. The subject of Rowley's letter was, “Manuel Rodriguez”. This memo is CD 853
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=11250#relPageId=2&tab=page

This memo was in response to a letter from Rankin to Rowley dated April 22, 1964. In describing the overall investigation of Rodriguez, Rowley wrote,

“The basic document in this investigation is a Memorandum from the CIA to the “Federal Bureau of Investigation – Special Agent in Charge” (Miami Office), dated November 25, 1963, a copy (of) which was furnished to this Service at Miami. The FBI file number is 105-112098.

With his letter, Rowley includes a January 14-17, 1964 Protective Research Report from Dallas Secret Service Field Agent, Roger Warner. The topic of Warner's memo was: “Reaction by Cuban Exile Community to President Kennedy's Death”

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=11250#relPageId=3&tab=page

In the Synopsis to Warner's Report, it says that he description of Manuel Rodriguez as being “violently anti-President Kennedy” was contained in this original November 25, 1963 CIA memo.

 

Here is a copy of the CIA's memo to the FBI of November 25, 1963.

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=30106&search=%22Manuel_Rodriguez%22#relPageId=4&tab=page

This copy is not signed, nor is the memo written up on CIA letterhead. The name “Heitman” is handwritten on the first page. Wallace Heitman was an FBI Dallas Field Office Agent. Is this a copy done up by Heitman on his own typewriter of the information he got from the CIA?

It is cc'd to the Secret Service.

 

Steve Thomas