The Zfilm, The copies and The Geraldo

[Jeremy Bojczuk]

John Butler claims that Mary Moorman's famous Polaroid might be a fake, because it ought to have the book depository in the background rather than the grassy knoll.

As we have seen, he is mistaken, because there was no time for any such alterations to have been made.

The source of his mistake seems to be a statement by Jean Hill that Mary Moorman took a photo with the book depository in the background. Moorman did in fact take a photo with the book depository in the background, but it was not the photo John is referring to.

If he turns to page 233 of Richard Trask's Pictures of the Pain, he will see a reproduction of Moorman's third Polaroid, which shows a police motorcyclist, who was an old school friend of Moorman's, on Elm Street with the book depository in the background.

I presume John accepts that there was no time to make any sort of complex alterations to Moorman's fifth Polaroid, the famous one with the grassy knoll in the background, and that it is genuine. Will he admit publicly that the photo is genuine?

If he still thinks the photo is a fake, will he tell us exactly what's wrong with it, and explain how any alterations could have been made in the very limited time available?

[John Butler]

7 hours ago, Jeremy Bojczuk said:

f he still thinks the photo is a fake, will he tell us exactly what's wrong with it, and explain how any alterations could have been made in the very limited time available?

WC Exhibit Hill No. 5:

and,

and,

TSBD is the background for her Grassy Knoll Polaroid.  Which by the way isn't the Grassy Knoll, but should the TSBD.  I don't know when this was changed, but according to Jean Hill's testimony it was.  The interview with Arlen Specter was a hostile one.  Jean fought to get this information in her testimony.

It is a shame she later changed her testimony and that testimony in later years said much the same as Mary Morman.  If I remember correctly, Mary Moorman never changed her testimony.  She was always down by the Grassy Knoll.

There is a film out there somewhere in which Mary is very nervous describing where she was at.    It may be the same film where she said she wasn't wearing white slacks that day.  I keep mentioning this in hopes of jogging someone else's memory and iding that film.

Edited February 22, 2022 by John Butler

[Sandy Larsen]

15 hours ago, John Butler said:

 

Does anybody know who was laughing at Jean Hill in Washington and why? In her testimony she said it bothered her greatly.

 

[Jamey Flanagan]

Yeah Sandy, those damned Warren Omission attorneys NEVER followed up on their questions! Lol! It's just pure speculation on my part, but I would bet that maybe is a reference to folks not taking her testimony seriously because she had said something about there being a little dog in the limo between the President and his wife. Some folks ridiculed her for saying that and tried to discount everything she said. But in all actuality, there was a small lambchop doll between them that a child had given Jackie at Love Field. On another thread in this forum I had posted a picture of this little doll. Despite some wild accounts Jean Hill told later on in her life, I feel her early testimony, especially her first day testimony to be very reliable! 

[Pat Speer]

Yikes, Jean Hill said they were across from the TSBD. OMG! That means the Moorman photo is a fake!

Only, not...

Here is an overhead view of the plaza in 1963. The depository included a loading dock and storage room to the west that would subsequently be destroyed. Look from the west edge of this on a straight line out into the plaza, and voila! you come within a few yards of Hill's location in the z-film, and the location from which the Moorman photo was shot. OK, now we know someone's gonna insist that she meant the 7 story building part of the TSBD. But even if she meant that, her placement of herself at the far west end of the 7 story building still puts her a good 20 yards or so to the west of where John thinks he sees her in the Dorman film. 

 

Edited October 5, 2023 by Pat Speer

[Jeremy Bojczuk]

Jean Hill was not a reliable witness. She was confused about several things, and changed her mind several times.

It means nothing that she jotted down a diagram that places the book depository behind the presidential car. Of course, there was an instant when Mary Moorman, the car and the book depository were in that particular alignment. But Hill couldn't have known that the photo in question was taken at that instant, because she wasn't taking the pictures; Mary Moorman was. The diagram was simply the product of a mistaken recollection.

We can be absolutely certain that the book depository was not in the background of Moorman's famous photo, simply because of the alignment of Moorman and the car. Look at the photo. Look at the angle of JFK and Jackie in the back seat. The picture was obviously taken from just behind the car. Look at the police motorcyclist who is between the camera and the car. He is behind the rear wheel of the car.

Mary Moorman's famous Polaroid was taken a fraction of a second after the car had passed Moorman and Hill. Not only do the details of the photo prove this, but all of the other photos and home movies which show Moorman at around the time of the head shot are perfectly consistent with this. 

Now, if the photo was taken immediately after the car had passed Moorman and Hill, what would we expect to see in the background? Would we expect to see the three spectators standing on the steps that lead to the fence on the grassy knoll? We would, wouldn't we? And what do we in fact see? Why, we see the three spectators standing on the steps that lead to the fence on the grassy knoll.

We know that Mary Moorman did take a photo with the book depository in the background; as I mentioned earlier, you can find it on page 233 of Trask's Pictures of the Pain. Jean Hill's testimony makes it clear that she was aware of the existence of this photo:

Quote

Well, as they came toward us, we had been taking pictures with this Polaroid camera and since it was a Polaroid we knew we had only one chance to get a picture, and at the time she had taken a picture just a few minutes before and I had grabbed it out of the camera and wrapped it and put it in my pocket. Just about that time he drew even with us.
(WC Hearings and Exhibits, vol.6, p.206: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=35#relPageId=216)

She merely confused one photo, which did indeed show part of the book depository (though not the sixth floor, unfortunately), with the one which shows JFK getting shot.

There is no mystery here. As with many other cases of inconsistencies between witness recollections and the photographic evidence, it's simply one more example of the fallibility of human memory.

Edited February 23, 2022 by Jeremy Bojczuk
changed 'statements' to 'recollections'

[Sandy Larsen]

1 hour ago, Jamey Flanagan said:

Yeah Sandy, those damned Warren Omission attorneys NEVER followed up on their questions! Lol! It's just pure speculation on my part, but I would bet that maybe is a reference to folks not taking her testimony seriously because she had said something about there being a little dog in the limo between the President and his wife. Some folks ridiculed her for saying that and tried to discount everything she said. But in all actuality, there was a small lambchop doll between them that a child had given Jackie at Love Field. On another thread in this forum I had posted a picture of this little doll. Despite some wild accounts Jean Hill told later on in her life, I feel her early testimony, especially her first day testimony to be very reliable! 

 

Thanks Jamey. I hope Jean Hill heard about the lamb chop doll before she died so she could have the last laugh. Well, at least there are some of us now laughing at her detractors.

 

[Jamey Flanagan]

I found that pic I had uploaded to another thread some time ago.

[John Butler]

5 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

Yikes, Jean Hill said they were across from the TSBD. OMG! That means the Moorman photo is a fake!

Only, not...

Like it or not, it is a fact.  Classified as Top Secret and hidden until the ARRB.  These 3 facts are meaningful.  Believe it or not!

Recall that Mary said when she took that "Grassy Knoll" Polaroid she heard the first shot and then 3 or 4 later.  Definitely not the official story.  She never changed that.  That account matches what the witnesses who said shooting occurred in front of the TSBD.

Edited February 23, 2022 by John Butler

[John Butler]

5 hours ago, Jeremy Bojczuk said:

Jean Hill was not a reliable witness. She was confused about several things, and changed her mind several times.

JB,

That's true.  But, it comes afterwards with years of harassment.  Jean was made to appear a fool.  That was done with intent.  That is what she is talking about in her testimony.  The Larsen/Flanagan exchange above is one example of that harassment.  I think Flanagan had the better of that. 

[ Sorry, Sandy I miss read what you said.  Sorry.]  Added later.

5 hours ago, Jeremy Bojczuk said:

It means nothing that she jotted down a diagram that places the book depository behind the presidential car. Of course, there was an instant when Mary Moorman, the car and the book depository were in that particular alignment. But Hill couldn't have known that the photo in question was taken at that instant, because she wasn't taking the pictures; Mary Moorman was. The diagram was simply the product of a mistaken recollection.

This kind of logic is what you are noted for on the Forum.  Nothing is true unless you OK it.  Lone Nutism has to survive regardless of what other folks say or the facts that they use.

She didn't jot down the diagram.  Arlen Specter did.  It launched his career.  Jean Hill didn't classify the map as Top Secret.  Arlen Specter did.  Jean Hill didn't hide a valuable piece of information away for decades.  Arlen Specter did.

As I have said earlier, these 3 facts are meaningful at the time they were made.  Jean's later behavior casts doubt on whatever she said.  But, that is later.  At the time there was an effort to discredit her. 

Edited February 23, 2022 by John Butler

[David Andrews]

In Altgens 6, even given the compactness of the plaza, the shadows labelled as Hill's and Moorman's look closer to the TSBD than you would guess from their location in Zapruder - far down and west along that long "sea of green" backdrop.

Edited February 23, 2022 by David Andrews

[Pat Speer]

23 hours ago, John Butler said:

WC Exhibit Hill No. 5:

and,

and,

TSBD is the background for her Grassy Knoll Polaroid.  Which by the way isn't the Grassy Knoll, but should the TSBD.  I don't know when this was changed, but according to Jean Hill's testimony it was.  The interview with Arlen Specter was a hostile one.  Jean fought to get this information in her testimony.

It is a shame she later changed her testimony and that testimony in later years said much the same as Mary Morman.  If I remember correctly, Mary Moorman never changed her testimony.  She was always down by the Grassy Knoll.

There is a film out there somewhere in which Mary is very nervous describing where she was at.    It may be the same film where she said she wasn't wearing white slacks that day.  I keep mentioning this in hopes of jogging someone else's memory and iding that film.

Not good, John. First, you claim this was classified top secret until the ARRB. Where do you get this stuff? This was published in the WC's volumes 20H158. Second, you make out this was a drawing made by Hill, and that she placed the building across from herself. She did not. The basic drawing was made by Specter. When one looks at the full drawing, it's clear he made the TSBD stretch halfway to the overpass. Hill merely marked her location in regards the plaza, about halfway down to the overpass. Now, she did indicate she was across from the building in her testimony. But 1) she said this while looking at Specter's placement of the building, and 2) she actually was across from the loading dock on the side of the building. Now, even if she thought the building was directly across from her in the distance, she most certainly didn't believe it was directly across the street from her. To demonstrate this point, the line she drew across from her position marked the path she took when she ran across the street and climbed the steps. There are no steps across the street from where you would like us to believe she was "really" standing. Jean Hill and Mary Moorman went back to Dealey Plaza on numerous occasions and gave interviews from where they'd been standing. They always stood right near where they are shown in the films and photos. They never once stood or suggested they'd been standing down where you claim they were standing. In fact there is not one piece of evidence suggesting they were standing where you claim they were beyond your gross misinterpretation of this drawing. 

In short, then, you have taken a crappy drawing by Specter published in 1964 and blown it up into being a long-suppressed key to where Jean Hill and Mary Moorman were "really" standing. The forum deserves better. 

[Sandy Larsen]

43 minutes ago, Pat Speer said:

Not good, John. First, you claim this was classified top secret until the ARRB. Where do you get this stuff? This was published in the WC's volumes 20H158

 

It's strange that the drawing was published by the Warren Commission given that it was (apparently) classified as Top Secret.

 

[Mark Knight]

[Jonathan Cohen]

4 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

In short, then, you have taken a crappy drawing by Specter published in 1964 and blown it up into being a long-suppressed key to where Jean Hill and Mary Moorman were "really" standing. The forum deserves better. 

Amen, Pat. Meanwhile, we are all still waiting for John Butler to actually explain how the Moorman Polaroid could have been falsified.