Steve Roe: Please Reveal Your Mystery Witness!

[Benjamin Cole]

https://steveroeconsulting.wixsite.com/website/post/still-stuck-on-steel?postId=b2659060-8a6a-46fc-9a37-1fc70005cb9b&utm_campaign=e6afa95a-4c42-43c8-847f-357257ecab15&utm_source=so&utm_medium=mail&utm_content=d5d64047-e2db-434e-8697-3d91d880697f&cid=be0b5a8a-2ba5-4c80-82a6-22670f80f869

In an article pertaining to the April 10, 1963 failed shot at General Walker in Dallas, Steve Roe concludes with the explosive report:

"In conclusion

Let me preface my remaining remarks with this. I know there will be a few naysayers claiming I made the following story up out of thin air and that's to be expected. For the record, I do not make up false fantastical stories.

A few weeks ago, I was in contact with a person who was very close to this April 10, 1963, shooting event. His family asked me to keep his identity confidential at this moment to protect his privacy. I agreed to do that out of privacy concerns. There are plans to meet him in person in the near future, as one family member said he was open to that.

In phone conversation with him about what happened that night, he gave me a good rundown. We talked about many things and some I will not reveal in this article. But I did check out things he told me, and it was never embellished, and he was most credible with a good memory of this 60-year-old event.

Without coaching or leading on, I simply asked this question, what was the color of that bullet that was found? His exact words were "it was a copper coated bullet".

---30---

To put it mildly, this is shocking news. There can, of course, only be a few surviving witnesses to the slug as seen in the Walker home on April 10, 1963. 

Yet, the mystery witness description, based on a 60-year-old memory, raises a question: 

What is a "copper-coated bullet"? 

Steel-jacketed bullets are, of course, "copper-coated," also called "copper washing" or "copper gilding." The purpose of the microscopically thin copper-coating is to limit rust, and save wear-and-tear on inner gun barrels---copper being a softer metal than steel. 

It sounds very much like the mystery witness has described a steel-jacketed bullet with copper coating. That would confirm the official reports of the four Dallas Police Department officers who witnessed the bullet. 

No one has ever disputed that the slug found in the Walker home was copper-colored. Steel-jacketed bullets, especially in the 1960s, almost always were.

In any event, I ask Steve Roe exhaust every available means to bring this mystery witness to the larger JFKA community, so that he/she can be  questioned under the light of day.  

I have many questions, such as---

Is the mystery witness familiar with ammo? How long did they see the Walker slug? Did they handle the slug? How old were they at the time? 

Does the mystery witness understand that the term "copper-coated" refers to copper washing or copper gilding of steel-jacketed bullets, and does not denote the steel-jacket itself? 

Did the mystery witness see any officer using a magnet on the slug? 

Did the mystery witness see anyone mark the slug? 

Did the mystery witness examine the exposed edges of the steel or copper jacketing, revealed when the bullet was mangled. This would be a bit much for a child to have noticed in 1963, but it is not the color of the gilding that matters, but rather the color of the jacketing itself. 

After 60 years, I hope the Steve Roe mystery witness can be persuaded that there would be almost no personal ramifications upon coming out of the closet. The number of people interested in the Walker shooting must be in the dozens nationwide (and in Denmark). 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by Benjamin Cole

[James DiEugenio]

This is almost funny.

This mystery witness surfaces 60 years later after Tom and Ben's article?

[Benjamin Cole]

29 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

This is almost funny.

This mystery witness surfaces 60 years later after Tom and Ben's article?

Even more odd, the mystery witness, at least as related by Steve Roe, has described a "copper-coated" bullet---that is the exact definition of a steel-jacketed bullet: they are almost invariably (in the 1960s) coated, or "gilded" or "washed," in a microscopically thin layer of copper. 

 

 

 

 

[David Von Pein]

Reality Break (Re: The CE573 Walker Bullet)....

The fact that CE573 cannot be linked to any specific rifle is virtual proof, right there, that it was not "planted" into the evidence pile. Because only a total idiot would want to do something so stupid. Although, yes, CE573 looks exactly like CE399 in many respects. No doubt about it. But if you're going to go to the trouble of PLANTING a bullet to frame a particular person, you're surely going to make sure that that bullet can be tied exclusively to the patsy's gun.

________________________________________________________________

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2012/12/edwin-walker-and-lee-harvey-oswald.html

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by David Von Pein

[Tom Gram]

2 hours ago, David Von Pein said:

Reality Break (Re: The CE573 Walker Bullet)....

The fact that CE573 cannot be linked to any specific rifle is virtual proof, right there, that it was not "planted" into the evidence pile. Because only a total idiot would want to do something so stupid. Although, yes, CE573 looks exactly like CE399 in many respects. No doubt about it. But if you're going to go to the trouble of PLANTING a bullet to frame a particular person, you're surely going to make sure that that bullet can be tied exclusively to the patsy's gun.

________________________________________________________________

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2012/12/edwin-walker-and-lee-harvey-oswald.html

 

That’s not necessarily true. The FBI’s analysis determined that the bullet couldn’t be matched to Oswald’s rifle, but they also implied in the lab report that the bullet quite possibly did not match Oswald’s rifle. The lab requested that the FBI be on the lookout for bullets fired closer to April ‘63 because the toolmarks didn’t match. With how little Oswald allegedly “practiced”, is it really reasonable to think that the barrel would have changed that much in just seven months? I’m not familiar with this work myself, but @Lawrence Schnapf has mentioned that the latest research suggests that the answer is no. 

So under what circumstances could a bullet have been swapped that did not match Oswald’s rifle? The Walker shooting was a DPD unsolved case, and Oswald was the perfect dead commie suspect to tie it all up. The FBI had the rifle, but H.L. Green store in Dallas sold literally the exact same rifles imported through Crescent Firearms from Italy… 

Pure speculation obviously, but I wouldn’t be surprised if someone decided to take a trip to the shooting range one day. It was a pretty safe bet that the FBI wouldn’t press the issue on the toolmarks, if they could even be identified in the first place. The FBI’s subsequent “investigation” of the bullet on behalf of the WC reflects that they went out of their way to avoid conflict and not ask questions about the bullet itself, despite clear orders to so by Rankin. Maybe they already knew the answer. 

Edited June 20, 2023 by Tom Gram

[Benjamin Cole]

2 hours ago, David Von Pein said:

Reality Break (Re: The CE573 Walker Bullet)....

The fact that CE573 cannot be linked to any specific rifle is virtual proof, right there, that it was not "planted" into the evidence pile. Because only a total idiot would want to do something so stupid. Although, yes, CE573 looks exactly like CE399 in many respects. No doubt about it. But if you're going to go to the trouble of PLANTING a bullet to frame a particular person, you're surely going to make sure that that bullet can be tied exclusively to the patsy's gun.

________________________________________________________________

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2012/12/edwin-walker-and-lee-harvey-oswald.html

 

DVP:

 

1. Under what circumstances would you describe CE573, picture above, as "steel jacketed"? If you were collecting evidence at the crime scene of an attempted murder, and you found CE573 at the scene, would you describe it as "steel -jacketed"?  If so, I do not advise a late-career move to detective work. 

2. No one planted CE573 in the Walker home. The slug found in the Walker home was a steel-jacketed bullet, as described by four different DPD officers, two of them detectives who passed civil service exams, in two separate official and signed reports. As an aside, CE573 may be the most obviously copper-jacketed slug ever photographed. 

3. The slug that ended up in the FBI lab, at least the one examined by Frazier, on or about Dec. 3 or 4, almost certainly is not the same slug that was extracted from the Walker home on April 10, 1963. Frazier immediately and correctly identified CE573  a copper-jacketed lead slug. 

 

[David Von Pein]

3 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Under what circumstances would you describe CE573, picture above, as "steel jacketed"? If you were collecting evidence at the crime scene of an attempted murder, and you found CE573 at the scene, would you describe it as "steel -jacketed"?

CE573 (just like CE399) is a Full METAL Jacketed (FMJ) bullet.

And....

Steel = Metal.

Copper = Metal.

And....

"Some individuals commonly refer to rifle bullets as steel-jacketed bullets, when they actually in fact just have a copper alloy jacket." -- Robert A. Frazier of the FBI (3 H 439)

Conspiracy theorists always make way way too much out of the "Steel" reference when it comes to CE573. They just can't fathom that Robert A. Frazier was right about what he said to the Warren Commission in the testimony I just quoted above.

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by David Von Pein

[Benjamin Cole]

9 minutes ago, David Von Pein said:

CE573 (just like CE399) is a Full METAL Jacketed bullet.

And....

Steel = Metal.

Copper = Metal.

And....

"Some individuals commonly refer to rifle bullets as steel-jacketed bullets, when they actually in fact just have a copper alloy jacket" -- Robert A. Frazier of the FBI (3 H 439)

Conspiracy theorists always make way way too much out of the "Steel" reference when it comes to CE573. They just can't fathom that Robert A. Frazier was right about what he said to the Warren Commission in the testimony I just quoted above.

 

DVP-

 

You are an excellent researcher. 

Please find any reference, anywhere, that police detectives (or game wardens or target-range operators) ever referred to "all rifle bullets as steel jacketed." 

Frazier's comment stands unique in the literature.  

"Some individuals" is a very broad category, as in everyone on the planet.

Yes, the statement of Frazier's is likely true, especially of people who do not know anything about ammo.

People who are not police detectives investigating the attempted murder of a very high profile national public figure, and collecting evidence. 

Yes, steel and copper are both metals. 

BTW, I have a pound of silver, and I wish to trade it with you for a pound of gold. Silver and gold are both metals. 

 

[David Von Pein]

48 minutes ago, Benjamin Cole said:

DVP-

You are an excellent researcher. 

Please find any reference, anywhere, that police detectives (or game wardens or target-range operators) ever referred to "all rifle bullets as steel jacketed." 

Frazier's comment stands unique in the literature.  

"Some individuals" is a very broad category, as in everyone on the planet.

Yes, the statement of Frazier's is likely true, especially of people who do not know anything about ammo.

People who are not police detectives investigating the attempted murder of a very high profile national public figure, and collecting evidence. 

Yes, steel and copper are both metals. 

BTW, I have a pound of silver, and I wish to trade it with you for a pound of gold. Silver and gold are both metals.

Ben,

Bob Frazier was a firearms expert for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I would think that his word just might mean a little something when it comes to the subject of bullets. But most CTers (naturally) just want to toss aside everything he said.

But even with the "Steel/Copper" controversy staring us in the face every day, Lee Harvey Oswald's guilt in the Walker shooting has been proven beyond all reasonable doubt in multiple other non-ballistic ways, such as in Commission Exhibit No. 1.

Am I really supposed to believe that one of the following two things is true regarding Commission Exhibit No. 1?....

1. The cops (or Feds) faked Lee Oswald's handwriting in CE1.

Or:

2. Oswald was really referring to something totally unrelated to the Walker shooting in the note he wrote to Marina (which became CE1).

And then there's Marina's own testimony about Lee himself confessing to having shot at Walker:

"He [Lee] told me that he had shot at General Walker." -- Marina Oswald (1 H 16)

More lies, Ben?

Question:

At what point does the evidence connected to the JFK and Tippit murder cases and the Walker shooting become something that can be utilized to actually try to solve those three crimes, versus the evidence being something that conspiracy theorists try their best to explain away, in their constant efforts to exonerate a certain Mr. Oswald?

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by David Von Pein

[Mark Ulrik]

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Frazier's comment stands unique in the literature.

Bridges, Burtis C. Firearms Identification: The Science of Examining Guns and Ammunition Used in Crimes. Chicago Institute of Applied Science, 1938, p. 16

[Benjamin Cole]

14 minutes ago, Mark Ulrik said:

Bridges, Burtis C. Firearms Identification: The Science of Examining Guns and Ammunition Used in Crimes. Chicago Institute of Applied Science, 1938, p. 16

MU--

I saw that. Note the date of the book--1938. That is before WWII, and the production of steel-jacketed bullets due to wartime copper shortages. 

It may be some Americans, unfamiliar with ammo, referred to "steel jacketed" bullets in the 1930s, although why baffles me, since back then nearly all bullets were copper jacketed. 

But after WWII there were, in fact ,steel jacketed bullets, military surplus, including 30.06's, on US markets. 

Your book was out of date even in 1963. 

That some people, unfamiliar with ammo, speak out of ken when discussing bullets does not mean police detectives, collecting evidence at the scene of an attempted murder, also are clueless to the differences between steel and copper jacketed bullets, or in their description of evidence in official reports. 

I probably commit misnomers when discussing, say, doctor's tools, such as forceps or scalpels. That does not mean surgeons use misnomers, especially in official documents or during surgery. 

In addition, the 1938 book makes no mention that "some people say all rifle bullets are steel-jacketed." 

Edited June 20, 2023 by Benjamin Cole

[Gil Jesus]

2 minutes ago, Benjamin Cole said:

MU--

I saw that. Note the date of the book--1938. That is before WWII, and the production of steel-jacketed bullets due to wartime copper shortages. 

It may be some Americans, unfamiliar with ammo, referred to "steel jacketed" bullets in the 1930s, although why baffles me, since back then nearly all bullets were copper jacketed. 

But after WWII there were, in fact ,steel jacketed bullets, military surplus, including 30.06's, on US markets. 

Your book was out of date even in 1963. 

That some people, unfamiliar with ammo, speak out of ken when discussing bullets does not mean police detectives, collecting evidence at the scene of an attempted murder, also are clueless to the differences between steel and copper jacketed bullets, or in their description of evidence in official reports. 

I probably commit misnomers when discussing, say, doctor's tools, such as forceps or scalpels. That does not mean surgeons use misnomers, especially in official documents or during surgery. 

In addition, the 1938 book makes no mention that "some people say all rifle bullets are steel-jacketed." 

CE 573 was substituted for the steel-jacketed bullet that was removed from Walker's house.

Even Walker knew that.

https://gil-jesus.com/the-walker-bullet/

 

[Benjamin Cole]

40 minutes ago, Gil Jesus said:

CE 573 was substituted for the steel-jacketed bullet that was removed from Walker's house.

Even Walker knew that.

https://gil-jesus.com/the-walker-bullet/

 

Excellent reporting GJ-

BTW, are you a retired police officer?

[Mark Ulrik]

Ben and Gil on the case. What can possibly go wrong?

[Benjamin Cole]

3 hours ago, David Von Pein said:

Ben,

Bob Frazier was a firearms expert for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I would think that his word just might mean a little something when it comes to the subject of bullets. But most CTers (naturally) just want to toss aside everything he said.

But even with the "Steel/Copper" controversy staring us in the face every day, Lee Harvey Oswald's guilt in the Walker shooting has been proven beyond all reasonable doubt in multiple other non-ballistic ways, such as in Commission Exhibit No. 1.

Am I really supposed to believe that one of the following two things is true regarding Commission Exhibit No. 1?....

1. The cops (or Feds) faked Lee Oswald's handwriting in CE1.

Or:

2. Oswald was really referring to something totally unrelated to the Walker shooting in the note he wrote to Marina (which became CE1).

And then there's Marina's own testimony about Lee himself confessing to having shot at Walker:

"He [Lee] told me that he had shot at General Walker." -- Marina Oswald (1 H 16)

More lies, Ben?

Question:

At what point does the evidence connected to the JFK and Tippit murder cases and the Walker shooting become something that can be utilized to actually try to solve those three crimes, versus the evidence being something that conspiracy theorists try their best to explain away, in their constant efforts to exonerate a certain Mr. Oswald?

 

IMHO, LHO likely fired into the Walker home on April 10, 1963, with a 30.06 rifle, using steel-jacketed bullets. Probably a weapon given to him for the night.

LHO also likely had confederates who gave him a ride.

I base my deduction on the photographs purportedly found in LHO's possession of Walker backyard (the always odd missing license plate photo) and approaches to the Walker home, and the reports of two automobiles rapidly leaving the Walker home in the immediate aftermath of the shot. 

Whoever was in the autos never showed up again, never reported the sound of a gunshot to the DPD. 

On the Walker letter, I am agnostic. My guess is the letter is authentic, as LHO anticipated an intentional shoot-to-miss outing at Walker, which even so had risks. 

The WC premise that LHO carried an MC rifle across town on a bus, earnestly shot at Walker from a short distance but missed, then buried the rifle and made an escape on foot and by bus, and then returned to the scene of the crime by bus to unbury the rifle and again return home on the bus...well, not sure about that. 

Marina's testimony was so erratic and evolving that even WC prosecutors despaired. 

Curious was that CIA asset Mohrenschildt showed up at the Oswalds the very next day after the shooting, and asked LHO if he had been involved. Almost like a handler checking up on his ward. 

The steel-jacketed bullet found in the Walker home on April 10 is obviously not CE573.