The Killing Floor

[Ron Bulman]

33 minutes ago, Gene Kelly said:

Ron

The more that I read about the Book Depository, the more that I come to believe that it was full of "spooks" ...

Gene 
 

Ha.  I'm almost a spook.  My birthday is October 30th.  An early Happy Halloween to all.  A favorite holiday all my life.

  

[Pat Speer]

Some more thoughts about Shelley's affidavit claiming he'd left Dougherty in charge of the elevator. 

1. As neither Shelley nor Dougherty were asked about this on the record, even though the WC had written internal memos expressing their concerns about Dougherty and their desire to establish his activities on the day of the shooting, it seems likely Ball/Belin asked about this off the record, and didn't like the answers they received. Perhaps, then, Shelley or Dougherty or both indicated this happened shortly after the shots, before Dougherty went upstairs and heard a sound. 

2. Similarly, neither Truly nor Shelley were asked just when it was that Truly told Shelley to guard the elevators--before or after he went upstairs with Baker. As it makes far less sense for Truly to have told an unarmed Shelley to block a potential assassin from coming off an elevator AFTER Truly had come down from the roof--when armed policemen were filling the building--than it does for Truly to have told this to Shelley before the police invaded, it seems likely that this occurred before Truly climbed the stairs. In such case, it would once again appear to be no accident that this question was not asked on the record.  

3.  Shelley's affidavit said "I left Jack Dougherty in charge of the elevator."  This is fairly vague. I mean, did he actually speak to Dougherty? Or did he tell Lovelady or someone else to get Dougherty to do it? Or was Shelley just lying, knowing Dougherty's issues would lead people to believe him over Dougherty? At the time of Shelley's affidavit, it was not yet established how Oswald got out of the building. Supposedly, Oswald told his interviewers he spoke to Shelley who said it was okay to go home. Perhaps, then, Shelley was frightened he would be blamed for Oswald's "escape" and the subsequent killing of Tippit, and decided to blame the "retard"--kinda like the way people blame the dog when they cut a fart. At that time, Shelley may have thought Oswald had taken the passenger elevator down--or that people would come to believe as much. So, his saying he left Dougherty in charge may have been his way of saying "Hey, don't blame me! I took the cops upstairs to the fourth floor. If Oswald took the elevator down while we were upstairs, well, it's not my fault--I told Dougherty to watch the elevator. Blame him!" 

Addendum: It should be pointed out as well that Shelley worked for Truly and that Truly had given him an order to block anyone's coming off the elevator. Shelley may have been worried that Truly--who was understandably upset that he'd vouched for Oswald on the second floor--would come to blame him for letting Oswald leave the building entirely. So he dumped the blame on Dougherty, who had trouble communicating, and was kinda like Truly's pet. 

 

Edited October 25, 2022 by Pat Speer

[Michael Griffith]

On 10/15/2022 at 7:08 AM, David Von Pein said:

Only if a person wants to believe that Dorothy Garner had her eyes fixed on the TSBD staircase every single second just after the assassination.

From a 2014 discussion:

"Why in the world would anyone think Dorothy Garner had her eyes transfixed on the STAIRS every single second immediately following the President's assassination? How silly would that be, considering what had just happened outside those fourth-floor, SOUTH-SIDE windows just moments earlier? Why would she (or anyone) have kept a vigil on the staircase? Therefore, since it makes no logical sense to think that Garner (or ANYBODY ELSE) had their eyes peeled on those stairs every second, Oswald could have easily been on that 4th-floor landing for a matter of--what?--five seconds and not been seen by anyone who was on the same floor. Or do conspiracy theorists REALLY want to contend that Dorothy Garner never took her eyes off those stairs between 12:30 and 12:32 PM? That's incredibly silly to believe that's the case (even if she DID catch a glimpse of Truly and Baker)." -- DVP; Oct. 2014

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/Adams & Styles

This is just sad. Nobody who was on or near those stairs during the time under discussion saw or heard Oswald coming down the stairs. 

Jack Dougherty was working on the fifth floor near the stairway, and he heard no one coming down the stairs. Sandra Styles and Victoria Adams went down the stairs from the fourth floor at the same time Oswald would have been going down the stairs, but they did not see him. Dr. David Wrone:

           To make their scenario seem to work, officials had to render invisible the testimony of three witnesses. They omitted from the evidence the testimony of Jack Dougherty, who was working on the fifth floor near the stairway and heard no one come down the stairs. They also eliminated from their consideration the testimony of two secretaries, Sandra Styles and Victoria Adams, who had been on the fourth floor. After the last shot, they had fled to the stairway and were in fact on the stairs at the time Oswald had to have been there—and, according to Adams, he was not. (170)

And you know, deep down, that you cannot get Oswald through the second-floor foyer door without being seen by Truly when Truly reached the second-floor landing. No way. Just no way. Anyone who clears their mind and considers the evidence objectively will realize this, even if they can't bring themselves to publicly admit it. 

Finally, any reenactment that assumes that the sixth-floor gunman could have simply dropped the rifle into its hiding place is fiction on that basis alone. 

Edited October 25, 2022 by Michael Griffith

[Pat Speer]

7 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

This is just sad. Nobody who was on or near those stairs during the time under discussion saw or heard Oswald coming down the stairs. 

Jack Dougherty was working on the fifth floor near the stairway, and he heard no one coming down the stairs. Sandra Styles and Victoria Adams went down the stairs from the fourth floor at the same time Oswald would have been going down the stairs, but they did not see him. Dr. David Wrone:

           To make their scenario seem to work, officials had to render invisible the testimony of three witnesses. They omitted from the evidence the testimony of Jack Dougherty, who was working on the fifth floor near the stairway and heard no one come down the stairs. They also eliminated from their consideration the testimony of two secretaries, Sandra Styles and Victoria Adams, who had been on the fourth floor. After the last shot, they had fled to the stairway and were in fact on the stairs at the time Oswald had to have been there—and, according to Adams, he was not. (170)

And you know, deep down, that you cannot get Oswald through the second-floor foyer door without being seen by Truly when Truly reached the second-floor landing. No way. Just no way. Anyone who clears their mind and considers the evidence objectively will realize this, even if they can't bring themselves to publicly admit it. 

Finally, any reenactment that assumes that the sixth-floor gunman could have simply dropped the rifle into its hiding place is fiction on that basis alone. 

You understate the case. Dougherty was not only "near" the stairway, he was, according to the commission's scenario, just standing there, 20 feet or so away from the open floor Oswald would have to have crossed to go downstairs. They avoided all questions about this because they knew where this would ultimately lead--that Dougherty was not where he said he was when they needed him to be there. Yes, they were in a bit of a bind. They desperately needed Dougherty to be upstairs at the time of the shooting so they could say he was the one who took the elevator down as Baker and Truly ran up. But they couldn't have him descend for 2 minutes or so after the shooting. And, they believed the elevator was already on this floor, within a few feet of where Dougherty had been working. So they just left it at that--they let people think Dougherty was too stupid to notice anyone running past him. But we have reason to suspect they knew this wasn't true.

When I read up on Joe Ball's career I was surprised to find he was famous for destroying witnesses on the stand. Apparently, he was particularly famous for making problematic witnesses look stupid, so that his clients (many of whom we can suspect were guilty) would go free. One case I read about stands out, for that matter. A man was accused of raping an underage girl, and Ball found out she'd never learned to read a clock. So he asked her on the record to tell the time on a clock, and then used her failure to undermine her credibility in his final summation. Essentially, he told the jury she was so stupid we couldn't trust her to know if she'd been raped or not. Well, he and his mini-me Belin used this same tactic over and over. They smeared Rowland using his wife. They avoided asking key questions and smeared Piper and Dougherty in the WR. And they used Lovelady and Shelley's inconsistent testimony to smear Adams. And, at the same time, they propped up Givens--who had a huge sign around his neck saying "unreliable witness." It was all by design.

And they weren't the designers. The record is clear that after Specter interviewed the first round of witnesses, and inconsistencies began to appear, that Warren told the staff he wanted a clean record, with minimal inconsistencies. It is also clear that Ball and Belin jumped on board and said they could cut down on the inconsistencies if they could pre-interview witnesses and screen out problematic answers, and that Redlich objected. And that Warren over-ruled Redlich. This is what happened. It's all in Willens' diary. 

The Warren Commission was a cover-up. Pure and simple. 

They may not have known what they were covering up, but that's a separate discussion. 

 

Edited October 25, 2022 by Pat Speer

[Paul Jolliffe]

4 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

You understate the case. Dougherty was not only "near" the stairway, he was, according to the commission's scenario, just standing there, 20 feet or so away from the open floor Oswald would have to have crossed to go downstairs. They avoided all questions about this because they knew where this would ultimately lead--that Dougherty was not where he said he was when they needed him to be there. Yes, they were in a bit of a bind. They desperately needed Dougherty to be upstairs at the time of the shooting so they could say he was the one who took the elevator down as Baker and Truly ran up. But they couldn't have him descend for 2 minutes or so after the shooting. And, they believed the elevator was already on this floor, within a few feet of where Dougherty had been working. So they just left it at that--they let people think Dougherty was too stupid to notice anyone running past him. But we have reason to suspect they knew this wasn't true.

When I read up on Joe Ball's career I was surprised to find he was famous for destroying witnesses on the stand. Apparently, he was particularly famous for making problematic witnesses look stupid, so that his clients (many of whom we can suspect were guilty) would go free. One case I read about stands out, for that matter. A man was accused of raping an underage girl, and Ball found out she'd never learned to read a clock. So he asked her on the record to tell the time on a clock, and then used her failure to undermine her credibility in his final summation. Essentially, he told the jury she was so stupid we couldn't trust her to know if she'd been raped or not. Well, he and his mini-me Belin used this same tactic over and over. They smeared Rowland using his wife. They avoided asking key questions and smeared Piper and Dougherty in the WR. And they used Lovelady and Shelley's inconsistent testimony to smear Adams. And, at the same time, they propped up Givens--who had a huge sign around his neck saying "unreliable witness." It was all by design.

And they weren't the designers. The record is clear that after Specter interviewed the first round of witnesses, and inconsistencies began to appear, that Warren told the staff he wanted a clean record, with minimal inconsistencies. It is also clear that Ball and Belin jumped on board and said they could cut down on the inconsistencies if they could pre-interview witnesses and screen out problematic answers, and that Redlich objected. And that Warren over-ruled Redlich. This is what happened. It's all in Willens' diary. 

The Warren Commission was a cover-up. Pure and simple. 

They may not have known what they were covering up, but that's a separate discussion. 

 

Well stated, Pat. 

Harold Weisberg put it simply over 57 years ago: the Warren Commission was a "Whitewash" (thus the title of his series of books.)

The crime never was investigated honestly by the proper authorities. Their "solution" was mere sophistry, nothing but political expediency. Blame the dead guy - the "evidence" will never be tested in court. 

Neither LBJ nor J. Edgar Hoover nor anyone else in Washington D.C. wanted a real investigation. Earl Warren couldn't stomach the idea that powerful forces, accountable to no one had killed JFK. He was, after all, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, but a finding of conspiracy meant that his whole career paled in comparison to the true (dark) powers in the country. 

A real investigation would determine that there was a conspiracy, and LBJ and J. Edgar Hoover knew that the fingers of suspicion would be forever pointed at them, regardless of their respective innocence. 

Same with the Secret Service. Any "solution" beyond a lone nut meant that they had failed in their most basic duty.

So, the three bodies most in charge of telling the nation what happened on November 22, 1963 had no incentive to tell the truth, and very powerful incentives to lie. 

And they did.

 

[Sandy Larsen]

23 hours ago, Gene Kelly said:

...someone helped Oswald leave the building.  I have come to believe that someone was Bill Shelley, who sent him out the back door,...

 

Gene,

Do you recall how you came to the idea that Shelley sent Oswald out the back door?

The reason I ask is because Buell Frazier in recent years changed his story and said that he saw Oswald walking out from Houston and turn onto Elm. Which, if true, fits in with what you said.

 

[Benjamin Cole]

13 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

You understate the case. Dougherty was not only "near" the stairway, he was, according to the commission's scenario, just standing there, 20 feet or so away from the open floor Oswald would have to have crossed to go downstairs. They avoided all questions about this because they knew where this would ultimately lead--that Dougherty was not where he said he was when they needed him to be there. Yes, they were in a bit of a bind. They desperately needed Dougherty to be upstairs at the time of the shooting so they could say he was the one who took the elevator down as Baker and Truly ran up. But they couldn't have him descend for 2 minutes or so after the shooting. And, they believed the elevator was already on this floor, within a few feet of where Dougherty had been working. So they just left it at that--they let people think Dougherty was too stupid to notice anyone running past him. But we have reason to suspect they knew this wasn't true.

When I read up on Joe Ball's career I was surprised to find he was famous for destroying witnesses on the stand. Apparently, he was particularly famous for making problematic witnesses look stupid, so that his clients (many of whom we can suspect were guilty) would go free. One case I read about stands out, for that matter. A man was accused of raping an underage girl, and Ball found out she'd never learned to read a clock. So he asked her on the record to tell the time on a clock, and then used her failure to undermine her credibility in his final summation. Essentially, he told the jury she was so stupid we couldn't trust her to know if she'd been raped or not. Well, he and his mini-me Belin used this same tactic over and over. They smeared Rowland using his wife. They avoided asking key questions and smeared Piper and Dougherty in the WR. And they used Lovelady and Shelley's inconsistent testimony to smear Adams. And, at the same time, they propped up Givens--who had a huge sign around his neck saying "unreliable witness." It was all by design.

And they weren't the designers. The record is clear that after Specter interviewed the first round of witnesses, and inconsistencies began to appear, that Warren told the staff he wanted a clean record, with minimal inconsistencies. It is also clear that Ball and Belin jumped on board and said they could cut down on the inconsistencies if they could pre-interview witnesses and screen out problematic answers, and that Redlich objected. And that Warren over-ruled Redlich. This is what happened. It's all in Willens' diary. 

The Warren Commission was a cover-up. Pure and simple. 

They may not have known what they were covering up, but that's a separate discussion. 

 

Well, OK, but then...

We know from multiple witnesses that somebody  pointed a rifle out of the sixth floor window, and likely fired shots. 

Dougherty was not only "near" the stairway, he was, according to the commission's scenario, just standing there, 20 feet or so away from the open floor Oswald would have to have crossed to go downstairs.--PS

Do I understand this correctly? 

Did the real perps take the elevator but unseen by Dougherty? 

Was the elevator moving, or not, when Victoria Adams descended the stairs? 

Is it impossible the LHO simply preceded Adams down the stairs? 

I agree the WC was a cover-up---it was a prosecution, a show trial ex post facto. 

However, the real story of the JFKA may involve LHO...and several others. 

 

[Pat Speer]

40 minutes ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Well, OK, but then...

We know from multiple witnesses that somebody  pointed a rifle out of the sixth floor window, and likely fired shots. 

Dougherty was not only "near" the stairway, he was, according to the commission's scenario, just standing there, 20 feet or so away from the open floor Oswald would have to have crossed to go downstairs.--PS

Do I understand this correctly? 

Did the real perps take the elevator but unseen by Dougherty? 

Was the elevator moving, or not, when Victoria Adams descended the stairs? 

Is it impossible the LHO simply preceded Adams down the stairs? 

I agree the WC was a cover-up---it was a prosecution, a show trial ex post facto. 

However, the real story of the JFKA may involve LHO...and several others. 

 

Well, I've been screaming from the rooftops for some time now that Dougherty was not on the fifth floor at the time of the shooting. Two of the relatively few things he was consistent on was that the sound he heard came from above him (and not through the open window right below the rifle) and that he went back upstairs after 12:30, the time of the shooting. I believe him on these points. When you believe him on these points, it strongly suggests the shooter (or shooters) took the elevator downstairs as Baker and Truly ran up. And that rules out Oswald. Truly saw him on the second floor, at a time when no elevator was on the second floor. So...unless Oswald raced down the stairs super super fast without being seen or heard, and some unknown person followed him down from the upper floors on an elevator, I think we can rule him out as a shooter. 

The question remains, of course, just what he was doing. His behavior strongly suggests he was watching the backstairs. Was he a lookout? Or did he infiltrate a plot, and hope someone he'd notified about said plot would arrive in time to stop the shooting? Or was he simply duped into being part of a different plot altogether? I don't remember where I read it (I think it was in the FBI's files on LBJ) but there was a plot around this time to embarrass the President by draping an anti-Castro banner from a building as the President drove by. Was that what Oswald thought was gonna happen in Dallas? And was the folded-up banner in his bag of "curtain rods"?  Who knows?

 

[Benjamin Cole]

1 minute ago, Pat Speer said:

Well, I've been screaming from the rooftops for some time now that Dougherty was not on the fifth floor at the time of the shooting. Two of the relatively few things he was consistent on was that the sound he heard came from above him (and not through the open window right below the rifle) and that he went back upstairs after 12:30, the time of the shooting. I believe him on these points. When you believe him on these points, it strongly suggests the shooter (or shooters) took the elevator downstairs as Baker and Truly ran up. And that rules out Oswald. Truly saw him on the second floor, at a time when no elevator was on the second floor. So...unless Oswald raced down the stairs super super fast without being seen or heard, and some unknown person followed him down from the upper floors on an elevator, I think we can rule him out as a shooter. 

The question remains, of course, just what he was doing. His behavior strongly suggests he was watching the backstairs. Was he a lookout? Or did he infiltrate a plot, and hope someone he'd notified about said plot would arrive in time to stop the shooting? Or was he simply duped into being part of a different plot altogether? I don't remember where I read it (I think it was in the FBI's files on LBJ) but there was a plot around this time to embarrass the President by draping an anti-Castro banner from a building as the President drove by. Was that what Oswald thought was gonna happen in Dallas? And was the folded-up banner in his bag of "curtain rods"?  Who knows?

 

https://groups.google.com/g/alt.assassination.jfk/c/3Dsk9bpdySI

Evidently, Sandra Styles said that Victoria Adams noticed the elevator cables were moving, as they descended the stairs. 

If true, that would be when the TSBD power was back on. 

Not to belabor a point, but if the elevator cables were moving, then LHO would have had enough time to have simply preceded the women down the stairs. 

As for Truly seeing LHO on the second floor, Truly was hustling. I think when anyone is running, then tend to look ahead--also, who knows? Maybe LHO heard people coming and ducked. LHO thought Truly had passed and stood up---to be seen by Baker.  

I don't know why it is so hard to conceive that LHO, a CIA asset, was involved in a CIA plot to murder JFK. Maybe witting, maybe unwitting. 

Sheesh, Jack Ruby was involved in a plot to murder LHO. What does that mean? 

 

 

[Pat Speer]

10 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

https://groups.google.com/g/alt.assassination.jfk/c/3Dsk9bpdySI

Evidently, Sandra Styles said that Victoria Adams noticed the elevator cables were moving, as they descended the stairs. 

If true, that would be when the TSBD power was back on. 

Not to belabor a point, but if the elevator cables were moving, then LHO would have had enough time to have simply preceded the women down the stairs. 

As for Truly seeing LHO on the second floor, Truly was hustling. I think when anyone is running, then tend to look ahead--also, who knows? Maybe LHO heard people coming and ducked. LHO thought Truly had passed and stood up---to be seen by Baker.  

I don't know why it is so hard to conceive that LHO, a CIA asset, was involved in a CIA plot to murder JFK. Maybe witting, maybe unwitting. 

Sheesh, Jack Ruby was involved in a plot to murder LHO. What does that mean? 

 

 

The power outage happened minutes later, not right after the shooting. 

Not to belabor the point, but Truly said he looked and there was no elevator on the second floor. So, no, Oswald could not have taken the elevator down. As far as racing down...of course Adams and Styles could have been wrong. Everyone could be wrong. But in this case we have Garner backing them up in that they went down well before Baker and Truly came up. And this makes for a very narrow window in which Oswald could have preceded them down the stairs. And besides, any plot involving Oswald would not use him as a shooter. He was a mediocre marksman who hadn't practiced in months, if at all, with that rifle. It makes far more sense to suspect someone else was the shooter, and that Oswald played some other role. 

Edited October 26, 2022 by Pat Speer

[Paul Cummings]

18 hours ago, Paul Jolliffe said:

Well stated, Pat. 

Harold Weisberg put it simply over 57 years ago: the Warren Commission was a "Whitewash" (thus the title of his series of books.)

The crime never was investigated honestly by the proper authorities. Their "solution" was mere sophistry, nothing but political expediency. Blame the dead guy - the "evidence" will never be tested in court. 

Neither LBJ nor J. Edgar Hoover nor anyone else in Washington D.C. wanted a real investigation. Earl Warren couldn't stomach the idea that powerful forces, accountable to no one had killed JFK. He was, after all, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, but a finding of conspiracy meant that his whole career paled in comparison to the true (dark) powers in the country. 

A real investigation would determine that there was a conspiracy, and LBJ and J. Edgar Hoover knew that the fingers of suspicion would be forever pointed at them, regardless of their respective innocence. 

Same with the Secret Service. Any "solution" beyond a lone nut meant that they had failed in their most basic duty.

So, the three bodies most in charge of telling the nation what happened on November 22, 1963 had no incentive to tell the truth, and very powerful incentives to lie. 

And they did.

 

Well stated. Thanks 

[Ron Bulman]

On 10/25/2022 at 3:08 AM, Pat Speer said:

Some more thoughts about Shelley's affidavit claiming he'd left Dougherty in charge of the elevator. 

1. As neither Shelley nor Dougherty were asked about this on the record, even though the WC had written internal memos expressing their concerns about Dougherty and their desire to establish his activities on the day of the shooting, it seems likely Ball/Belin asked about this off the record, and didn't like the answers they received. Perhaps, then, Shelley or Dougherty or both indicated this happened shortly after the shots, before Dougherty went upstairs and heard a sound. 

2. Similarly, neither Truly nor Shelley were asked just when it was that Truly told Shelley to guard the elevators--before or after he went upstairs with Baker. As it makes far less sense for Truly to have told an unarmed Shelley to block a potential assassin from coming off an elevator AFTER Truly had come down from the roof--when armed policemen were filling the building--than it does for Truly to have told this to Shelley before the police invaded, it seems likely that this occurred before Truly climbed the stairs. In such case, it would once again appear to be no accident that this question was not asked on the record.  

3.  Shelley's affidavit said "I left Jack Dougherty in charge of the elevator."  This is fairly vague. I mean, did he actually speak to Dougherty? Or did he tell Lovelady or someone else to get Dougherty to do it? Or was Shelley just lying, knowing Dougherty's issues would lead people to believe him over Dougherty? At the time of Shelley's affidavit, it was not yet established how Oswald got out of the building. Supposedly, Oswald told his interviewers he spoke to Shelley who said it was okay to go home. Perhaps, then, Shelley was frightened he would be blamed for Oswald's "escape" and the subsequent killing of Tippit, and decided to blame the "retard"--kinda like the way people blame the dog when they cut a fart. At that time, Shelley may have thought Oswald had taken the passenger elevator down--or that people would come to believe as much. So, his saying he left Dougherty in charge may have been his way of saying "Hey, don't blame me! I took the cops upstairs to the fourth floor. If Oswald took the elevator down while we were upstairs, well, it's not my fault--I told Dougherty to watch the elevator. Blame him!" 

Addendum: It should be pointed out as well that Shelley worked for Truly and that Truly had given him an order to block anyone's coming off the elevator. Shelley may have been worried that Truly--who was understandably upset that he'd vouched for Oswald on the second floor--would come to blame him for letting Oswald leave the building entirely. So he dumped the blame on Dougherty, who had trouble communicating, and was kinda like Truly's pet. 

 

I've never looked into Doughtery in depth.  Thanks for your comments here and below it about him Pat.  You call him Truly's pet, dumped on for letting Oswald escape.  Truly called him mentally retarted in this article I found.  Yet he was competent enough to have served 2 years in the military during WWII, receiving rifle training.  A long-term trusted employee.  So much so that He Had A Set of Keys to the TSBD.

Some of this from the article linked below that I found.  Where one can view his affidavit to the DPD, both FBI interviews and their internal memo, and his Warren Commission testimony.  All riddled with contradiction.  I don't agree with it about him possibly being a shooter.  But do with your comment about him being a possible lookout.

Jack Dougherty · The Employees of the TSBD · JFK Witnesses (omeka.net)  

[Pat Speer]

2 hours ago, Ron Bulman said:

I've never looked into Doughtery in depth.  Thanks for your comments here and below it about him Pat.  You call him Truly's pet, dumped on for letting Oswald escape.  Truly called him mentally retarted in this article I found.  Yet he was competent enough to have served 2 years in the military during WWII, receiving rifle training.  A long-term trusted employee.  So much so that He Had A Set of Keys to the TSBD.

Some of this from the article linked below that I found.  Where one can view his affidavit to the DPD, both FBI interviews and their internal memo, and his Warren Commission testimony.  All riddled with contradiction.  I don't agree with it about him possibly being a shooter.  But do with your comment about him being a possible lookout.

Jack Dougherty · The Employees of the TSBD · JFK Witnesses (omeka.net)  

There was a telephone interview of Dougherty performed in 1970, if I recall. He was still working at the TSBD. He was just not the go-get-'em type. I think he was autistic or slow or both, and felt fortunate to have a job. It's always possible he had  relations in the Klan or the JBS or something, and that they sucked him into some sort of plot. But there's no evidence for it, none at all. 

[Benjamin Cole]

13 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

The power outage happened minutes later, not right after the shooting. 

Not to belabor the point, but Truly said he looked and there was no elevator on the second floor. So, no, Oswald could not have taken the elevator down. As far as racing down...of course Adams and Styles could have been wrong. Everyone could be wrong. But in this case we have Garner backing them up in that they went down well before Baker and Truly came up. And this makes for a very narrow window in which Oswald could have preceded them down the stairs. And besides, any plot involving Oswald would not use him as a shooter. He was a mediocre marksman who hadn't practiced in months, if at all, with that rifle. It makes far more sense to suspect someone else was the shooter, and that Oswald played some other role. 

Right. 

LHO still could have fired a weapon, and intended to miss. My guess is the Tague shot. A false flag op to be blamed on Castro--that is what LHO was told when he participated. 

Another guy with a snub-nose .38 on the Grassy Knoll provided diversion. 

The real perps...maybe the Dal-Tex building, maybe elsewhere in the TSBD. 

The thing is, LHO appeared to know he was in trouble nearly immediately. Ergo, going home (by taxi even) and getting a gun. 

And LHO was in trouble--he was soon murdered for what he knew. 

No need to murder LHO is he knew nothing. 

 

 

[Ron Bulman]

50 minutes ago, Pat Speer said:

There was a telephone interview of Dougherty performed in 1970, if I recall. He was still working at the TSBD. He was just not the go-get-'em type. I think he was autistic or slow or both, and felt fortunate to have a job. It's always possible he had  relations in the Klan or the JBS or something, and that they sucked him into some sort of plot. But there's no evidence for it, none at all. 

But his various statements are contradictory.  Was he coached/pressured over time?  If he was Truly's pet and told to would he have watched the stairs and held the elevator for others to run to and take down?  

Then dropping to the 5th or even 4th floor.  Where Baker encountered someone on the "3rd or 4th" that Truly dismissed as an employee.

Yet Doughtery was back on the first floor guarding the elevator as instructed by Shelly.  This does get deep.