Lee Oswald - The Cop-Killer

[James DiEugenio]

Charles P is rather infrequent poster, but when he does, its good.

 

CP: Yet Brewer was more than willing to point out NOT the man in the vestibule, but his old customer instead. Some witness.

The mysterious "IMB men" really did prompt Brewer to walk down the sidewalk and speak with Julia Postal.

How do we know?

Because Johnny Brewer admitted to Ian Griggs that "he didn't really know why he was there . . ." Why not?

Because the universally told story that Johnny Brewer witnessed the unknown man duck into the theater without buying a ticket was a lie.

No one can stand on the sidewalk in front of Hardy's Shoes and see the ticket booth at the Texas Theater. The booth is recessed back from the sidewalk. The only way to see the booth is to walk to the front of the theater. Any transaction at the booth would have been invisible to Johnny Brewer unless he was standing almost in front of the theater. Yet the very reason he claimed he was suspicious was because he saw the man duck in without paying. Brewer could have seen no such thing from any location on the sidewalk anywhere near Hardy's.

Incidentally, as I pointed out years ago, all three early audio/video taped interviews with Johnny Brewer all contain the same bizarre interruption of his narrative, just as he about to describe how and why he went down to the Texas Theater.

For one example, here's Vincent Bugliosi himself, interrupting Brewer at the 3:42 mark ("and thereupon you")  just as Brewer was about tell us what happened as he stood in front of Hardy's Shoes. This interruption kept Brewer from mentioning any possible prompting from any "IBM men."

BTW, VInce B took a pasting from me on the JFK case.  

Word is out that Errol Morris will do the same on the Tate/LaBianca case.

Edited July 14, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

Joe McBride replies to Dale Myers, and cues us in on Mentzel. Kennedys and King, 2/2/14

III. The Other Police Officer

And who was the other police officer involved in that pursuit, the one who, according to Edgar Lee Tippit's account, briefed Marie Tippit? I point strong suspicion in Into the Nightmare at Sergeant William Duane Mentzel. A former patrol partner of J. D. Tippit, the thirty-two-year-old Mentzel was the officer actually assigned to the district in which Tippit was shot (Tippit was four miles out of his assigned patrol district). Mentzel gave conflicting stories about his whereabouts during the crucial time period (including whether or not he was eating lunch) and was reported to have gone to the scene of an auto accident at 817 West Davis in Oak Cliff, eleven and a half blocks from the location of the Tippit shooting. That accident was reported at 1:11, two minutes after Tippit was shot. I suggest that Mentzel, who was at the accident scene for only about five to ten minutes (accounts vary), actually may have had the accident he supposedly was investigating.

 

[Bill Brown]

1 hour ago, Gene Kelly said:

Bill

Not sure if you read the article by Jack Meyers in Kennedys and King, but he characterizes the eyewitness testimony as:

If the ballistics evidence in the Tippit case could rightly be characterized as messy, then the eyewitness testimony regarding the Tippit homicide would have to be labeled a toxic waste site by comparison.

A better storyline for your production company would be to get Joe Pesci to do a remake of "My Cousin Vinny" and have him interview the four questionable witnesses against Oswald in the Tippit murder: William Scoggins, Ted Calloway, Helen Markham, and the delinquent/incredible Jack Ray Tatum.  I can just see the late Fred Gwynne's facial expressions, as defense counsel Vinny deconstructs their stories. 

Gene 

Great movie, one of the best. 

 

By the way, I read the article by Jack Meyers. He emailed it to me before submitting it to get my thoughts. 

 

 

Edited July 15, 2022 by Bill Brown

[James DiEugenio]

More oddities about the messages.  See if you find this in the Warren Report. But its important.

 

We now come to the message at 1:08. Between 12:45 and that time there were four messages involving Tippit. Three went from the dispatcher to the patrolman and one allegedly came in from Tippit; this was at 1:08. In one version of the messages, Tippit called the dispatcher twice and got no answer. In the FBI version, Tippit’s call number at that time, 78, is missing: the message is assigned to No. 488. The FBI notes the sound is garbled and No. 488 is not identified by his name, and there is no other message that is assigned to whoever this person is. Tippit researcher Bill Drenas, who wrote an interesting essay, “Car #10 Where are You?”, did a thorough examination of the tape and transcripts. He concluded that the voice is not Tippit’s either. But he disagrees with who the real caller is. He says it is call number 388. Which would be from the Criminal Investigative Division.

 

 

Edited July 15, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[David Von Pein]

9 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

Oswald left the rooming house around 1:00 p.m. 1:01 p.m., maybe 1:02 p.m. Earlene Roberts said he was back in his room "just long enough to grab a jacket". Tippit was shot around 1:14 p.m. to 1:15 p.m.; plenty of time to get there on foot.

Also see:

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/06/in-lee-harvey-oswalds-room.html

[James DiEugenio]

I don't read DVP any more especially since that ridiculous post on my videos, as if the numeral 12 on the envelope being a machine stamp was a fact.  I mean please. Armstrong showed the envelope to a retired letter carrier who worked for 35 years in the post office.  The guy said that is a zone number.  So what DVP presents as fact is not. 

But anyway, what I am trying to get across here is that there is some kind of subterfuge around these messages. And Bill Drenas did a thorough exam of the tapes and came to the conclusion the message at 1:08 was likely not Tippit's.

This is part of the issue that McBride's book really began to explore systematically, I think, for the first time.  And this is why I have said that Into the Nightmare brought the Tippit case to a new plateau. 

Edited July 15, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

Another reason to suspect the message about moving into Oak Cliff was bogus is that, not just Nelson disregarded it, but it appears that Tippit initially did also.

At that 12:45 moment, Tippit was sitting at a Gloco gas station "in his squad car at 1502 North Zang, at the northernmost point of Oak Cliff, watching the Houston Street Viaduct, connecting Oak Cliff with downtown Dallas."  (McBride, p. 441)

In other words, he was not moving into Central Oak Cliff or anywhere else.  And he was not where he said he was, at Kiest and Bonnie View.  That was five miles from where he was.  Murray Jackson commented on this in a rather generous manner: "If somebody is out of pocket off their district and you ask them their location, they are either not going to answer or they are going to give you somewhere else anyway." (ibid)

Five witnesses said that Tippit seemed to be staring ahead looking for someone to cross the viaduct.  At the other end of the viaduct, a few blocks down, was Dealey Plaza. As another researcher commented, "From the south end of the Houston Street Viaduct, it connects directly to Dealey Plaza within ninety seconds" (ibid)

But, remember, Bill Brown says, as Leslie Nielson does, "Nothing to see here."

 

 

Edited July 15, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

From William Turner in the November 1966 issue of the late great Ramparts magazine:

 

Photographer Al Volkland and his wife, both of whom knew Tippit, said that 15 or 20 minutes after the assassination they saw him at a gas station and waved to him.  They observed TIppit sitting in his police car at a Gloco gas station in Oak Cliiff, watching the cars coming out over the Houston Street Viaduct from downtown Dallas. 

Three employees of the Gloco station, Tom Mullins, Emmet Hollingshead and J. B. "Shorty" Lewis, all of whom knew TIppit, confirmed Volklands' story.  They said Tippit stayed at the station for "about ten minutes, somewhere between 12:45 and 1:00, then he went tearing off down Lancaster at high speed"....

Was Tippit waiting for someone, and that person did not arrive? 

But remember, Bill Brown says, "Nothing to see here! We have wrong way Callaway."

Edited July 15, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Sandy Larsen]

21 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

Tippit was shot around 1:14 p.m. to 1:15 p.m.

 

That's not possible unless he was shot at the hospital.

Tippit's ambulance arrived at the hospital at 1:15, where he was pronounced dead on arrival. He was shot several minutes before that.

The time is according to hospital records, and corroborated by DPD records.

 

Edited July 15, 2022 by Sandy Larsen

[James DiEugenio]

Nice one Sandy.

The WC pulled a fast one with that time of death since they knew Oswald could not have been there at 1:08.  Roger Banister had just run the first 4 minute mile about four years prior.  

So they just moved it back to what they thought would be a reasonable time. And this is why Bowley was not called before the WC.  BTW, Bugliosi makes one of the most bizarre statements in the literature on this point.  He writes, "Of course, even if Bowley is correct and Tippit was killed at 1:10 or earlier, it would be irrelevant, since we know Oswald killed him."  (DiEugenio, The JFK Assassination: The Evidence Today, p. 127)

😗

Edited July 15, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

More on Westbrook and Croy from my essay, "The Tippit Case in the New Millenium"

But, in retrospect, there were still some notable things to be garnered from the Commission testimony of both William Westbrook and Kenneth Croy.

V

The first is that neither man was a detective or a patrolman. Yet both were at the scene of the Tippit murder quite quickly. In fact, Croy was reportedly the first man there. Westbrook was the chief of the personnel department. (WC 7, p. 110) That is, he handled background inquiries for applications and investigated complaints. He did not even wear a uniform. On the day of the assassination, Westbrook sent his men to the Texas School Book Depository. After the office was empty and he was the only one there, Westbrook told the Commission he got antsy, so—and he fittingly prefaced the following with “believe it or not”—he decided to walk to the Depository alone. He also added that, even though he had a radio, he would stop occasionally to get an update on a transistor radio from groups of people standing on the sidewalk. The distance between the police station and the depository is about one mile. If one adds in the stopping to listen to civilians with radios, one could say that Westbrook’s unaccounted time here could amount to as much as 20 minutes or more.

Edited July 15, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

Continued from my essay:

In other words, it was all in a personnel officer’s workday. Thanks to being bored at his personnel desk, Westbrook became one of the few officers who showed up at the depository, the Tippit murder scene and the Texas Theater. But this does not actually do his busy day justice. As former British detective Ian Griggs has noted, Westbrook is also credited with finding the Tippit killer’s jacket and going to a nearby library to investigate a false alarm about the assailant being there. (Ian Griggs, No Case to Answer, p. 131-32) As Griggs points out, although he is credited with finding the jacket, Westbrook actually denied he did so. He said some other policeman gave it to him—but he cannot recall his name. Further, he did not place the discovery of the jacket on the report he gave to the Commission. Attorney Joseph Ball had to ask him, “Did you ever find something?” (WC Vol. 7, p. 115) Westbrook immediately said he did not find it; some other officer did.

[James DiEugenio]

So the obvious questions are: where did the jacket and the wallet come from?

These remain mysteries to this day.  

One--the jacket-- would be used as (dubious) evidence that Oswald was there at the scene of the murder.  The other would be discarded and not surface until decades later.

[Paul Cummings]

1 hour ago, James DiEugenio said:

Another reason to suspect the message about moving into Oak Cliff was bogus is that, not just Nelson disregarded it, but it appears that Tippit initially did also.

At that 12:45 moment, Tippit was sitting at a Gloco gas station "in his squad car at 1502 North Zang, at the northernmost point of Oak Cliff, watching the Houston Street Viaduct, connecting Oak Cliff with downtown Dallas."  (McBride, p. 441)

In other words, he was not moving into Central Oak Cliff or anywhere else.  And he was not where he said he was, at Kiest and Bonnie View.  That was five miles from where he was.  Murray Jackson commented on this in a rather generous manner: "If somebody is out of pocket off their district and you ask them their location, they are either not going to answer or they are going to give you somewhere else anyway." (ibid)

Five witnesses said that Tippit seemed to be staring ahead looking for someone to cross the viaduct.  At the other end of the viaduct, a few blocks down, was Dealey Plaza. As another researcher commented, "From the south end of the Houston Street Viaduct, it connects directly to Dealey Plaza within ninety seconds" (ibid)

But, remember, Bill Brown says, as Leslie Nielson does, "Nothing to see here."

 

 

If one believes Roger Craig that "Nash Rambler" (12:40PM) would be heading toward that area?

Edited July 15, 2022 by Paul Cummings

[Gene Kelly]

Vinny Gambini: Is it possible the two defendants entered the store, picked 22 specific items off of the shelves, had the clerk take money, make change, then leave. Then two different men drive up in a similar - Don't shake your head, I'm not done yet. Wait till you hear the whole thing, so you can understand this, now. Two different men drive up in a similar-looking car, go in, shoot the clerk, rob him, and then leave?

Mr. Tipton: No. They didn't have enough time.

Vinny Gambini: Well, how much time was they in the store? Mr. Tipton: Five minutes.

Vinny Gambini: Five minutes? Are you sure? Did you look at your watch?  Mr. Tipton: No.

Vinny Gambini: Oh, oh, oh, I'm sorry. You testified earlier that the boys went into the store, and you had just begun to make breakfast. You were just ready to eat, and you heard a gunshot. That's right, I'm sorry. So, obviously, it takes you five minutes to make breakfast. Mr. Tipton: That's right.

Vinny Gambini: Right, so you knew that. Uh, do you remember what you had?  Mr. Tipton: Eggs and grits.

Vinny Gambini: Eggs and grits. I like grits, too. How do you cook your grits? Do you like them regular, creamy or al dente? Mr. Tipton: Just regular, I guess. Vinny Gambini: Regular. Instant grits? Mr. Tipton: No self-respectin' Southerner uses instant grits. I take pride in my grits.

Vinny Gambini: So, Mr. Tipton, how could it take you five minutes to cook your grits, when it takes the entire grit-eating world twenty minutes?  Mr. Tipton: [a bit panicky] I don't know. I'm a fast cook, I guess.

Vinny Gambini: I'm sorry, I was all the way over here. I couldn't hear you. Did you say you were a fast cook? That's it?  Are we to believe that boiling water soaks into a grit faster in your kitchen than on any place on the face of the earth?

Mr. Tipton: I don't know.

Vinny Gambini: Well, perhaps the laws of physics cease to exist on your stove. Were these magic grits? I mean, did you buy them from the same guy who sold Jack his beanstalk beans?