David Lifton spots a piece of scalp in the Moorman photo.

[Tony Krome]

5 minutes ago, Steven Kossor said:

We’ll see how well it stands up to scrutiny.  Thanks for your encouragement!

Kilduff gave the game away at Parkland, so we have indications that a bullet struck the right temple. We also know from Parkland doctors that there was a large right rear occipital exit wound. The Tolson/Belmont report has a bullet lodged behind the right ear, so I would think that bullet would not be the bullet you believe "disintegrated". The Tolson/Belmont report also has the Secret Service, on Friday night, in possession of another bullet that struck JFK. A "lodged" bullet would imply it was pressed into interior bone behind the right ear. You have a frontal shot that entered where? right temple? but disintegrated with no exit (not lodged bullet) Then you have another bullet entering where? Do you have it exiting out the occipital wound?

[Steven Kossor]

I believe I've explained my understanding of the sequence of events in that "last second in Dallas" by now so I won't repeat myself; it's spelled out in previous posts on this thread and doesn't have anything to do with witnesses or reports. Witness accounts and reports can be wrong for nefarious or innocent reasons, but physics and fluid dynamics don't mislead. 

If there was a bullet lodged behind JFK's right ear, that part of his skull was pretty well mutilated before his official autopsy at Bethesda began at 8:00 pm on 11/22/63.  The exploded appearance of JFK's head in the leaked autopsy photos suggests that some pretty frantic "smashing and bashing" of his head (and tearing open his trachea/esophagus as well) occurred between 1:30 pm CST in Dallas and 8:00 pm EST at Bethesda, and that any bullet, or substantial fragments of a bullet, that might have been lodged behind his right ear (or anywhere else in his head, or at the apex of his bruised right lung) had been manually removed by the time the leaked autopsy photos were taken.  I'm not sure who deserves credit for taking and hiding the head or chest bullet evidence; it may be the same people who did the smashing and bashing, or the military doctors who "finished the job" of preparing JFK's body for autopsy between 6:30 pm and 8:00 pm, and then created the autopsy report and other necessary historical records and testimony about Kennedy's death.

[Andrej Stancak]

I understand the acoustic and acceleration arguments for two head shots occurring in rapid succession, however, what the Z-film and the MM picture both tell point to only one head shot with an entry probably on the right temple behind the eye and exit probably in the parietal region of the skull, as reconstructed in Mary Moorman's picture. This shot was tangential and caused a large flap of bone to detach from the rest of cranium and hang by the skin. The brain matter including blood and cerebrovascular fluid was discharged upward in various directions - directly upward, slightly to the front and also to the back, creating a wedge. The left-riding motorcycle officers were hit as they arrived at a spot to receive the brain matter and bone particles falling down. 

I just cannot see evidence in terms of the head wounds (on the autopsy pictures or in Z-film) proving another head shot while I admit there may be another shot around the time of the fatal head shot that missed.

The flap of bone hanging over the President's right ear in Z-film suggests a large gaping wound in the right parietal region of the head and this could be the wound that all Parkland medical staff had witnessed. 

I wonder if the bone loosened from the flap and remained in the limousine, was retrieved by the SS agents, brought to the Bethesda hospital, and was crudely mounted back in what was later seen as "apparent surgery to the head" by the FBI agents Sibert and O'Neil.

 

 

 

Edited May 24, 2021 by Andrej Stancak

[Steven Kossor]

With the well documented history of film and movie alteration, I don't think it's productive to base conclusions on those media.  Witness testimony is notoriously unreliable, whether intentional or otherwise, so it can't be used in place of the principles of physics, including fluid dynamics, to understand what happened.  The existing film/movie record is incomplete, so it makes more sense to me to use the physical evidence that has existed in the record as the basis for concluding what probably happened in DP.

Hargis said he was struck with such force that he thought he himself had been wounded; it would not have appeared this way to him if the material had been falling from overhead under its own weight.  The spray of brain tissue "out of the back seat" of the limo was described as a "wave" as it sparkled in the mid-day sun.  The tiny pieces of Mercury (the means for the "exploding" round to disintegrate inside the skull) inside the wave undoubtedly enhanced its reflective features as it went backward.  The gold bezel on JFK's missing watch would have Mercury particles on it, which is the explanation given for its disappearance from the evidence collection.  Dino Brugioni describes a "halo" of reflective white mist rising above and around JFK's head in the version of the Zfilm he used to create CIA briefing boards on 11/22/63, but he doesn't report seeing the "wave" coming out from the back of the head that others described, so I suspect he viewed a film that had already been altered (probably at the Jamison plant in Dallas).  The "Harper fragment" was purportedly found far in front of the limo's position at the time of the head shot, but it didn't fit in well with the other pieces of skull that were brought to Bethesda (including some reportedly recovered from the limo itself), and it accordingly vanished from the "historical" record as it was being constructed. 

There is a news camera footage of someone covering the driver's side taillight of the limo with a jacket as it sits in the ambulance bay at Parkland.  That evidence supports the existence of "something that needed to be hidden" on that part of the limo and, given Hargis' proximity to that area when he reports being struck by material, it's most probably brain tissue from JFK's head that was localized in that area, since the jacket is placed squarely over the driver's side taillight area.

My approach to understanding what happened in DP involves slicing time into thin slices, observing each slice separately and seeing how the picture evolves through the course of examining the slices.  There should be a continuous, noncontradictory flow of information from beginning to end of the time period under study, so it becomes relatively easy to spot "missing slices" and/or misreported events through this process.  It was called "Critical Incident Debriefing" when I was taught how to do it a few decades ago as part of a 3 day training program I participated in to learn how to approach the forensic analysis of child abuse incidents.  I've found the process to be really helpful in lots of ways over the years.

[Micah Mileto]

24 minutes ago, Steven Kossor said:

 

Dr. Robert McClelland's family members still have his bloody white coat saved. I wonder if anybody would want to try testing their luck and having it submitted to a lab.

[Steven Kossor]

Interesting thought but any testing would necessarily require altering the garment so I'm guessing it wouldn't be of interest to the family.  Maybe someone on the Forum will have a way to approach the family that would not seem perverse.

[Micah Mileto]

12 minutes ago, Steven Kossor said:

Interesting thought but any testing would necessarily require altering the garment so I'm guessing it wouldn't be of interest to the family.  Maybe someone on the Forum will have a way to approach the family that would not seem perverse.

McClelland's claim to fame was handling blood and guts, his family members would be used to hearing about that stuff. But yes, it's likely that more than one square of fabric would have to be cut away in order to test it for mercury.

[Tony Krome]

Reading below, one is left with the impression that the expelled matter from the fatal head shot landed in multiple directions:

Hargis;

“When Kennedy was shot in the head, brain matter and blood and stuff had all come over and hit me as I rode through it."

"Bud Brewer says, ‘Bob, you got something on your lip.’ And he flicked at it, and it was a piece of Kennedy’s brain and a piece of skull bone."

Kellerman;

Mr. KELLERMAN. Senator, between all the matter that was--between all the matter that was blown off from an injured person, this stuff all came over. 
Senator COOPER. What was that? 
Mr. KELLERMAN. Body matter; flesh.

Connally;

"Immediately I could see on my clothes, my clothing, I could see on the interior of the car which, as I recall, was a pale blue, brain tissue, which I immediately recognized, and I recall very well, on my trousers there was one chunk of brain tissue as big as almost my thumb, thumbnail"

 

[Steven Kossor]

We cannot be sure of whatever else may have happened to JFK's head in that last second in Dallas, except that it was struck by at least two bullets, that the 2nd strike happened while he was facing toward the Knoll, and that it caused a blow-out of the right rear of his skull that exhausted material back and to the left of his position in the limo.  Brain tissue went elsewhere too, of course, but much more went out toward the left rear than went forward or toward the right rear.  Don't forget, Mr. Kellerman was referred to as "Mr. Killerman" by JFK's secretary, suggesting that some people close to JFK thought he was complicit in JFK's murder.  I wouldn't put much stock in anything he says.  Either Kellerman or another SS man testified that JFK exclaimed "I'm hit" (even though his throat wound made verbalization impossible), right?  Kellerman was described as "pushing buttons" in the front seat during the killing (the control panel to raise JFK's seat up as much as 10 inches to make him a better target was on the dashboard in front of him) and some witnesses said JFK "jumped up" during the killing.  Maybe the throat shot was intended to be a head shot before JFK's seat lurched upward. There is definitely more to the JFK killing than meets the eye, given the provenance of the visual images that have come down to us.

Edited May 25, 2021 by Steven Kossor

[Tony Krome]

19 minutes ago, Steven Kossor said:

Don't forget, Mr. Kellerman was referred to as "Mr. Killerman" by JFK's secretary, suggesting that some people close to JFK thought he was complicit in JFK's murder.  I wouldn't put much stock in anything he says. 

Do you have a source for that?

 

 

[Steven Kossor]

I'll check my sources asap.

[Jeremy Bojczuk]

Steven Kossor writes:

Quote

Some frames of the Zfilm have undoubtedly been removed because the film does not show the pivoting of JFK's head that is necessary for the hole in the right rear to exhaust brainmatter in the direction it traveled around the time Zfilm frame 313 was exposed. ... the removal of Zfilm frames (certainly those that captured the head pivot) can also be documented

It isn't only the Zapruder film that must have been altered. The Muchmore and Nix films record JFK at the same moment in time, and they too fail to show any pivoting of JFK's head. There's also the Moorman photo, which shows JFK's head in the same unpivoted position, a fraction of a second after the fatal shot.

Either all four were altered, or there was no "pivoting of JFK's head". Until someone comes up with a plausible, detailed account of how those three home movies and one photograph were altered, the only reasonable conclusion is that JFK's head didn't "pivot".

We saw something similar on another thread a couple of weeks ago. Paul Rigby claimed that the Zapruder film had been altered to eliminate the limo swerving into the left-hand lane and stopping. It was pointed out to Paul that the Muchmore, Nix and Bronson films, along with the Moorman and Altgens 7 photographs, corroborate what we see in the Zapruder film. It appears that Paul hadn't even bothered to check the rest of the photographic record. Understandably, we haven't heard much from Paul since then.

The moral of the story: before you claim that a particular element of the Zapruder film isn't genuine, you should check to see whether other films or photos show the same thing!

[Jeremy Bojczuk]

Steven Kossor continues:

Quote

There is no other way to reconcile the exhausting of material from the right rear of JFK's head toward the driver's side taillight with the existing movie/photographic record.

What we see in the various home movies and photographs is entirely consistent with a shot from the front causing brain matter to fly 'back and to the left', as the famous phrase has it (or, indeed, in any roughly horizontal direction; as Tony Krome points out, brain matter seems to have gone in all directions).

That's because, as I recently explained on another thread, there is no good reason to assume that any horizontal exit debris would have been caught on the Zapruder film. That applies also to the other home movies which show the same scene. If the debris wasn't recorded, there would have been no need to remove it from the films.

[Jeremy Bojczuk]

Steven Kossor goes on:

Quote

With the official call for citizens to turn in their photo and movie film immediately after the killing, and the limited number of cameras operating in DP that weren't confiscated on-site immediately (and film destroyed on-site),

There was only a half-hearted official request for people, if they would be so kind, and if it isn't too much trouble, to turn in their photos or films. A handful of photographers, such as Abraham Zapruder and Mary Moorman, came to the attention of the authorities immediately, but very little active effort was made to track down the rest of the photographers or to confiscate cameras or films.

In fact, almost all of the photographers and home movie-makers, including Zapruder, left Dealey Plaza without having their cameras or films seized. Here's a partial list I compiled earlier:

• Oscar Bothun didn't have his camera or film seized: "Shortly after the shooting Mr Bothun apparently went back to work. He seems not to have been stopped or questioned as a witness at the scene" (Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain. p.157).
• Hugh Betzner didn't; he went out of his way to make himself and his photographs known to the police.
• Phil Willis didn't: "Remaining around the area for about an hour after witnessing the shooting, none of the family was questioned by law enforcement personnel" (Trask, p.179). Willis made his own way to the Kodak plant to get his film processed, and didn't have his camera seized there either.
• Orville Nix didn't; like Zapruder, he walked out of Dealey Plaza with his home movie camera. He returned later to take some more footage, and again left the scene without having his camera seized.
• Marie Muchmore didn't; she retained her camera and film until she sold the film to UPI three days after the assassination.
• Wilma Bond didn't; she wasn't even contacted by the authorities until February 1964.
• Jim and Tina Towner didn't; they stayed in Dealey Plaza for a while, then went home with their cameras.
• Robert Croft didn't; he left Dealey Plaza and went home to Denver with his camera.
• Mark Bell didn't; he walked across Dealey Plaza with his home movie camera and went back to work. There is no evidence that the authorities even knew of the existence of Bell's film until several years after the assassination.
• Robert Hughes didn't; he too left Dealey Plaza without having his home movie camera seized. The first thing the authorities knew about Hughes's film was when he voluntarily handed it to the FBI two days after the assassination.
• Charles Bronson didn't; he left Dealey Plaza with his still and home movie cameras, and returned the next day to take more footage and still photographs, and again left without having his cameras seized.
• James Altgens didn't; he waited for a short while in Dealey Plaza and then walked a few blocks to the local newspaper office to get his film developed.

As you can see, several of these people didn't come to the attention of the authorities until months or even years later. The authorities clearly weren't too bothered about what the photographs and home movies might show, apart from the obvious 'back and to the left' head snap that was presumably the main reason for keeping the Zapruder film largely away from public view for over a decade.

This implies that whoever was behind the assassination wasn't too bothered either. As long as the assassination happened and their gunmen got away undetected, why should they have cared about what the films and photos contained?

[Jeremy Bojczuk]

Steven Kossor also writes:

Quote

the amount of film tampering necessary to create the "official photographic/movie record" of the event was well within the capability of the Jamison company

I suspect he [Dino Brugioni] viewed a film that had already been altered (probably at the Jamison plant in Dallas).

I'd like to see Steven explain in detail how any organisation, let alone the Jamieson company, could have tampered with as many films and photos as it took to produce the internally consistent photographic record that we have today. How would this even have been possible? The more details Steven can provide, the less implausible his claim will be.

As with the imaginary 'pivot' of JFK's head, what we see throughout the Zapruder film is consistent with what we see in dozens of other films and photos. To achieve this consistency, the Bad Guys had to overcome two huge hurdles. Firstly, as we have seen, they didn't have physical access to all the films and photos. Secondly, all the films and photos that we know about became public at different times.

Some of these other films and photos came to light soon after the assassination, and were widely distributed very early on. Copies of the Moorman photo, for example, were distributed within hours of the assassination, at which point they would have been out of the reach of any photo-tamperers and would have provided conclusive evidence of any tampering carried out after that time.

Some of the films and photos only came to light weeks, months, and even years later. Some may still be sitting in a box in someone's attic, and may come to light in the future. Even today, we don't know how many films and photos actually exist.

Here are a few questions for Steven to ponder:

• How many of these films and photos were tampered with to produce such a consistent result?
• How did the Bad Guys work out which ones needed to be tampered with, and which elements needed to be altered?
• How, in each case, was that tampering actually done?
• How could the tamperers be sure that their tampering would not be exposed by the discovery of an un-tampered film or photo in the future?

The notion that many or all of the assassination films and photos were tampered with is preposterous. Fortunately, you don't need to claim that the Zapruder film has been tampered with, in order to question the lone-nut theory. Not everything is a conspiracy!