The Vanishing Low Fragment Trail and WC Apologists

[Gerry Down]

7 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

I ask again: Are any WC defenders going to try to explain why the low fragment trail described in the autopsy report is nowhere to be seen on the autopsy skull x-rays, and why the high fragment trail is not mentioned in the autopsy report?

Just try to imagine how two professors of anatomic pathology (Humes and Boswell) and a forensic pathologist (Finck) could have mistaken the high fragment trail, which is near the very top of the skull, for a fragment trail that was at least 5 cm/2 inches lower and that started 10 cm/4 inches lower than the alleged entry point for the high fragment trail. Remember, too, that the high fragment trail is above the alleged high entry point. Try to fathom how even a first-year medical student could make such an unbelievable error.

Either (1) the pathologists somehow "missed" the high fragment trail (impossible), or (2) they somehow mislocated it by at least 2 inches and mislocated its starting point by 4 inches (equally impossible), or (3) they purposely ignored the high fragment trail because they knew it indicated a second bullet to the head, since there was no connection between the two fragment trails. A fourth possibility, one that does not rule out the third option, is that the skull x-rays have been altered--not faked, but altered. 

Related to the issue of the fragment trails is the issue of the cavitation wounds. As Dr. Joseph Riley has noted, the two cavitation wounds in the skull indicate two bullets, since there is nothing that connects the two wounds. 

This can probably be explained by the fact the secret service took control of the x-rays and photos and burned alot of them. If we had all those, the problems you talk about would likely become alot clearer.

Btw, you talk about cavitation wounds? What "cavitation wounds" are you talking about?

[Michael Griffith]

1 hour ago, Gerry Down said:

This can probably be explained by the fact the secret service took control of the x-rays and photos and burned alot of them. If we had all those, the problems you talk about would likely become alot clearer.

This makes no sense. This does not even directly address the problems. The pathologists and the radiologist had the skull x-rays on view boards for much of the autopsy and had ample time to examine them, not to mention that they had the skull in front of them and could compare what they saw on the x-rays with what they saw in the skull. Humes took extensive notes and wrote the autopsy report based on those notes and on his fresh recollection of what he had seen, so any autopsy materials destroyed by the Secret Service later on have no bearing on the issue at hand: Not one of the extant skull x-rays shows the low fragment trail, yet the autopsy report describes it in some detail and Humes described it in his WC testimony. 

Also, what do the x-rays that the Secret Service destroyed have to do with the fact that the autopsy report says nothing about the high fragment trail that is brazenly obvious on the extant skull x-rays? How does the destruction of some x-rays explain the autopsy report's failure to say anything about the high fragment trail, given that this trail is readily apparent on the extant skull x-rays, and given that the pathologists reviewed the autopsy materials in 1967 and stated that those materials confirmed the conclusions stated in the autopsy report?

As for the two separate cavitation wounds, see Dr. Joseph Riley's articles on the subject. Dr. Mantik has also talked about these two wounds. 

[Pat Speer]

5 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

This makes no sense. This does not even directly address the problems. The pathologists and the radiologist had the skull x-rays on view boards for much of the autopsy and had ample time to examine them, not to mention that they had the skull in front of them and could compare what they saw on the x-rays with what they saw in the skull. Humes took extensive notes and wrote the autopsy report based on those notes and on his fresh recollection of what he had seen, so any autopsy materials destroyed by the Secret Service later on have no bearing on the issue at hand: Not one of the extant skull x-rays shows the low fragment trail, yet the autopsy report describes it in some detail and Humes described it in his WC testimony. 

Also, what do the x-rays that the Secret Service destroyed have to do with the fact that the autopsy report says nothing about the high fragment trail that is brazenly obvious on the extant skull x-rays? How does the destruction of some x-rays explain the autopsy report's failure to say anything about the high fragment trail, given that this trail is readily apparent on the extant skull x-rays, and given that the pathologists reviewed the autopsy materials in 1967 and stated that those materials confirmed the conclusions stated in the autopsy report?

As for the two separate cavitation wounds, see Dr. Joseph Riley's articles on the subject. Dr. Mantik has also talked about these two wounds. 

A couple of points.

1. I'm not aware of any evidence the Secret Service destroyed x-rays. Where does this come from?

2. The autopsy report was written 2 days after Humes last saw the x-rays. It seems apparent that his initial thoughts were that the back wound was a dead end. There is also some evidence he believed there were two head wounds, and only matched up the EOP entrance and large head wound after it became clear he needed to limit the number of shots. If so, he may very well have claimed the x-rays showed a low to high trail of frags, even though he had been denied the chance to double-check this. 

 

[Michael Griffith]

6 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

A couple of points.

1. I'm not aware of any evidence the Secret Service destroyed x-rays. Where does this come from?

2. The autopsy report was written 2 days after Humes last saw the x-rays. It seems apparent that his initial thoughts were that the back wound was a dead end. There is also some evidence he believed there were two head wounds, and only matched up the EOP entrance and large head wound after it became clear he needed to limit the number of shots. If so, he may very well have claimed the x-rays showed a low to high trail of frags, even though he had been denied the chance to double-check this. 

1. I was accepting his assumption for the sake of argument. However, the record is clear that someone destroyed or suppressed a number of x-rays, and the Secret Service is a plausible suspect. 

2. Oh, come on. Humes had his autopsy notes when he wrote the report, so he did not have to rely solely on his memory. Furthermore, in just two days, Humes could not have forgotten seeing the plainly obvious high fragment trail with its snowstorm of fragments concentrated in the upper right front. That trail is nowhere near the low EOP-to-right-orbit trail that he described in the autopsy report and in his WC testimony.

We now know that Humes correctly identified the rear head entry point. If Humes could do this, he surely could have remembered the high fragment trail and not have confused it for a trail that started 4 inches lower and that ended at a point 2 inches lower in relation to the reference points of the EOP and the right orbit. Come on.

 

 

Edited June 17, 2023 by Michael Griffith

[Pat Speer]

7 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

1. I was accepting his assumption for the sake of argument. However, the record is clear that someone destroyed or suppressed a number of x-rays, and the Secret Service is a plausible suspect. 

2. Oh, come on. Humes had his autopsy notes when he wrote the report, so he did not have to rely solely on his memory. Furthermore, in just two days, Humes could not have forgotten seeing the plainly obvious high fragment trail with its snowstorm of fragments concentrated in the upper right front. That trail is nowhere near the low EOP-to-right-orbit trail that he described in the autopsy report and in his WC testimony.

We now know that Humes correctly identified the rear head entry point. If Humes could do this, he surely could have remembered the high fragment trail and not have confused it for a trail that started 4 inches lower and that ended at a point 2 inches lower in relation to the reference points of the EOP and the right orbit. Come on.

 

 

I would agree that Humes most probably fudged his report to connect the EOP entrance to the large wound. (This may even be one of the reasons he destroyed his notes, along with the first draft.)

But am confused by one line: "not have confused it for a trail that started 4 inches lower and that ended at a point 2 inches lower in relation to the reference points of the EOP and the right orbit." 

Ended at a point two inches lower? Is this a reference to the large fragment found behind the eye? 

Edited June 17, 2023 by Pat Speer

[Michael Griffith]

To give you some idea of what we are talking about regarding the astounding blunder posited by WC apologists and one conspiracy theorist, here is an HSCA diagram on which I have placed the low and high fragment trails. As you can see, the two trails are nowhere near each other and can be readily distinguished in relation to reference points such as the EOP, the coronal suture, the sagittal suture, and the right orbit. Again, just try to fathom how even a first-year medical student could have mistaken either trail for the other. 

Edited June 18, 2023 by Michael Griffith

[Michael Griffith]

Pretending a problem does not exist will not make it go away. There are stark contradictions between the autopsy report and the autopsy skull x-rays. The autopsy report describes a low fragment trail that is nowhere to be seen on the skull x-rays. Equally problematic, the skull x-rays show an obvious high fragment trail that is not mentioned, much less described, in the autopsy report. 

The only innocent explanation for these contradictions is wildly implausible, namely, that Humes committed the incomprehensible blunder of mistaking the high fragment trail for a trail that was several inches lower and that ran between two fixed reference points that were clearly below the high fragment trail (the EOP and the right orbit). The graphic below illustrates just how mind-boggling an error this would have been.

Moreover, even if we assume that Humes committed this astonishing blunder, we must still explain how a bullet that entered slightly above the EOP could have left the high fragment trail, i.e., a fragment trail that starts several inches above the EOP and that has no tract that even remotely connects it with the entry site.

OTOH, if we reject the EOP entry site and accept the Clark Panel-HSCA higher entry point (the "inshoot" in the graphic), we must explain how three pathologists could have "mislocated" this wound by a whopping 10 cm/3.93 inches, and how they could have believed that a fragment trail ran from the EOP to the right orbit if the entry point was nearly 4 inches higher.

 

 

Edited June 22, 2023 by Michael Griffith