Re Paul Landis? 11/22/63 FBI Memo Confirms?

[Benjamin Cole]

Note to anybody:

I have an e-mail into Ben Wecht, who is Cyril Wecht's son, asking Ben to ask Cyril if bullet paths can usually be probed successfully. 

It may be be that it does happen that a bullet path through a body is blocked to probes, due to internal muscles or organs shifting. I have never been able to get a forensic pathologist to answer this question. 

It may be also that the Bethesda autopsists were not skilled at probing bullet paths. 

All that said, as of now I am leaning to the explanation that the wound in JFK's back was shallow, and the CE 399 slug popped out due to shock waves from subsequent strikes. Then Landis found the slug. The FBI memo, perhaps based on scuttlebutt, or an fff-the-record statement, reflects that. 

[Donald Willis]

12 hours ago, Alan Ford said:

Do we know who the suspicious person on the third floor was?

Edited December 10, 2023 by Donald Willis
left out word

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

7 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Note to anybody:

I have an e-mail into Ben Wecht, who is Cyril Wecht's son, asking Ben to ask Cyril if bullet paths can usually be probed successfully. 

It may be be that it does happen that a bullet path through a body is blocked to probes, due to internal muscles or organs shifting. I have never been able to get a forensic pathologist to answer this question. 

It may be also that the Bethesda autopsists were not skilled at probing bullet paths. 

All that said, as of now I am leaning to the explanation that the wound in JFK's back was shallow, and the CE 399 slug popped out due to shock waves from subsequent strikes. Then Landis found the slug. The FBI memo, perhaps based on scuttlebutt, or an fff-the-record statement, reflects that. 

The back to front path was probed from back to front.

The probe stuck say halfway, showing that the path was not straight, ie the path was bent.

But i don not know whether the path was probed from front to back.

The bent path helps the SBT too.

Edited December 10, 2023 by Marjan Rynkiewicz

[Alan Ford]

8 hours ago, Donald Willis said:

Do we know who the suspicious person on the third floor was?

No!

[Matt Allison]

On 12/9/2023 at 7:56 AM, Alan Ford said:

 

Edit: It turns out the officer's name was Denham, not Desham.

Edited December 11, 2023 by Matt Allison

[Donald Willis]

4 hours ago, Matt Allison said:

 

There is no mention of this Officer Desham anywhere on the forum, and basically none on the rest of the internet.

Any time I read a doc like this and there's a black hole of further info, I get really suspicious. This seems important.

"Seeing Inspector Sawyer at the front door [of the TSBD] he reported for instructions.  Sawyer advised they still were not certain where the gunfire came from, but the best guess at that time was the TSBD.

By this time they were joined by Jerry Hill and he and Hill went inside.  Hill continued upstairs and an officer W.H. Desham (#7140 DPD) approached him with a prisoner.  Advised this subject had been observed 'acting suspiciously' on the third floor without a reasonable explanation for being up there."

Very tantalizing.  Especially as Sawyer about 20 minutes later said on the DPD radio that they had found shells on the "3rd floor".  

Also note that Hill bumped into Sawyer at the front of the building.  In his testimony, he says that he went inside with him.  Trantham was with Sawyer, and Patrolman Valentine was with Hill, so it seems that all four went in at the same time.  (Valentine later reported that he was "assigned to the fifth floor", so we know that he went in & up.  And Sawyer testified that he'd gotten at least as high as the 4th floor.  So all four would have been there for the 3rd floor incident.)  

This grand entrance would have been about 12:50 or so, since Hill & Valentine radioed at 12:48 that they were on their way to "Elm & Houston".  And this pretty much proves that Sawyer--despite testifying that he went in earlier, about 12:34, actually went into the building about 12:50. And thus may have actually been there at the discovery of the shells... on the "3rd floor".  Dunno...

Note:  He said "3rd floor" on the police radio, but, for reporters, he said "5th floor".  Did he mix up events on the two floors?  Or three, if you think Sawyer confused "fifth" with "sixth".  Either 3rd or 5th would have been bad news for the official 6th-floor version.  No True Flags, on alt.conspiracy.jfk, says the suspect might have been Florer.

[Mart Hall]

4 hours ago, Matt Allison said:

 

There is no mention of this Officer Desham anywhere on the forum, and basically none on the rest of the internet.

Any time I read a doc like this and there's a black hole of further info, I get really suspicious. This seems important.

There was an officer W H Denham. 

He attended to the person who had a seizure at 12:15.

W H Denham made a written statement included as CE 1358 and made no reference to being inside the TSBD or detaining anyone. In his statement he said he didn't know where the shots came from. If he didn't know where the shots came from what would the timeline be for meeting Hill with a prisoner as Hill came up the stairs?

CE 1358.https://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh22/pdf/WH22_CE_1358.pdf 

[Tony Krome]

The prisoner that Denham mentioned was reported on the radio by Harkness at 12:40pm

"Send me a squad for a prisoner at Elm and Houston"

[Mart Hall]

11 minutes ago, Tony Krome said:

The prisoner that Denham mentioned was reported on the radio by Harkness at 12:40pm

"Send me a squad for a prisoner at Elm and Houston"

It could be fair to say that Denham did very well to apprehend a "prisoner" (not just a suspicious individual) on the third floor so quickly after the shots (which Denham didn't know where they had come from) and amid all the chaos. 

Has this "prisoner" ever been identified? This prisoner had to be either a worker based at the TSBD, probably one who decided not to go outside to watch the parade or a suspect.

 

[Matt Allison]

1 hour ago, Donald Willis said:

No True Flags, on alt.conspiracy.jfk, says the suspect might have been Florer.

Florer was in Dal-Tex, and that doc seems pretty specific that this suspicious person with no good alibi was in the TSBD.

Also the timing for the encounter with Denham would mean this mystery person was found a bit before Hill and Sawyer went into the building.

And thank you @Mart Hall for the correction!

[Tony Krome]

9 hours ago, Mart Hall said:

It could be fair to say that Denham did very well to apprehend a "prisoner" (not just a suspicious individual) on the third floor so quickly after the shots (which Denham didn't know where they had come from) and amid all the chaos. 

Has this "prisoner" ever been identified? This prisoner had to be either a worker based at the TSBD, probably one who decided not to go outside to watch the parade or a suspect.

 

Edit: it actually could be Florer that was Denham’s prisoner. So maybe Dal Tex 3rd Floor. So Harkness calls for a squad. Not sure how Hill runs into Denham.

Edited December 11, 2023 by Tony Krome

[Donald Willis]

21 hours ago, Tony Krome said:

Edit: it actually could be Florer that was Denham’s prisoner. So maybe Dal Tex 3rd Floor. So Harkness calls for a squad. Not sure how Hill runs into Denham.

I thought Dal-Tex and County Records were two different buildings.  Florer sez "County Records".  At any rate, Florer or Braden was stopped on the 3rd floor of the TSBD--the presence, at the same time, of Sgt. Hill and Sawyer (in Trantham) means TSBD, circa 12:50.  

[Donald Willis]

Did Trantham mix up the County Rec bldg with the TSBD?  Hill & Sawyer means TSBD.  Still, that was 15 years later, & memories fade.  BUT:  (and here things get complicated, as usual)  In "Pictures of the Pain, Trask quotes a Dallas Times Herald 11/22/63 story:  "Patrolman W.E. Barker ["Barnett", Trask corrects, and those are his initials & Barnett was around there at that time.  But I'm informed that they are also Barker's initials, so... But I'm also informed that Barker denied the story, so maybe it was Barnett ???]... Barker/Barnett "saw workers in the TSBD pecking on a window from the 3rd floor and pointing to a man wearing horn-rimmed glasses, a plaid coat, and raincoat.  The officer immediately arrested the man for questioning" & took him to the sheriff's.  In his 11/23/63 report, Chief Deputy Sweatt speaks of the incident, too:  "A DPD officer brought a boy in a sport coat up & said, 'Here is the man that had done the shooting'."  Rush to judgment, eh?  Sweatt does not say where the officer & the arrestee came from, but he, Sweatt, was mainly taking in the TSBD in his report.  

So... ???  Same-day Barker/Barnett confirms '78 Trantham.  And Trantham said "prisoner", which would apply to B/B's "arrested" man.   And, yes, I know that Florer himself said "County Records building... 3rd floor", in his own 11/22/63 county affidavit.  But "Hill"/"Sawyer"/"TSBD" (Trantham & Times Herald)/"3rd floor" says TSBD to me.  My best educated guess is that the DPD did not want any ambiguity re the TSBD (hence nixing Sawyer's story of a man with a rifle out back of the building) and had Florer subtly transfer his story to the 3rd floor of another building.  Especially as Florer was the first man suspected of killing JFK.  (Bonnie Ray Williams, at the "second window from the end", was the second suspect, I believe.  Again--no TSBD ambiguity was wanted.)

And Sawyer's "3rd floor" shells, in his 1:12 transmission?  All the blinds seem to have been drawn on that floor at 12:30, except Stephen Wilson's...

[Mart Hall]

22 hours ago, Tony Krome said:

Edit: it actually could be Florer that was Denham’s prisoner. So maybe Dal Tex 3rd Floor. So Harkness calls for a squad. Not sure how Hill runs into Denham.

There is a video of Larry Florer being arrested in the street, a statement made by Florer that he left the County Records building after trying to use the phone and was pointed out to police whilst he was on the street. 
 

 

[Tony Krome]

1 hour ago, Donald Willis said:

Did Trantham mix up the County Rec bldg with the TSBD?  Hill & Sawyer means TSBD.  Still, that was 15 years later, & memories fade.  BUT:  (and here things get complicated, as usual)  In "Pictures of the Pain, Trask quotes a Dallas Times Herald 11/22/63 story:  "Patrolman W.E. Barker ["Barnett", Trask corrects, and those are his initials & Barnett was around there at that time.  But I'm informed that they are also Barker's initials, so... But I'm also informed that Barker denied the story, so maybe it was Barnett ???]... Barker/Barnett "saw workers in the TSBD pecking on a window from the 3rd floor and pointing to a man wearing horn-rimmed glasses, a plaid coat, and raincoat.  The officer immediately arrested the man for questioning" & took him to the sheriff's.  In his 11/23/63 report, Chief Deputy Sweatt speaks of the incident, too:  "A DPD officer brought a boy in a sport coat up & said, 'Here is the man that had done the shooting'."  Rush to judgment, eh?  Sweatt does not say where the officer & the arrestee came from, but he, Sweatt, was mainly taking in the TSBD in his report.  

So... ???  Same-day Barker/Barnett confirms '78 Trantham.  And Trantham said "prisoner", which would apply to B/B's "arrested" man.   And, yes, I know that Florer himself said "County Records building... 3rd floor", in his own 11/22/63 county affidavit.  But "Hill"/"Sawyer"/"TSBD" (Trantham & Times Herald)/"3rd floor" says TSBD to me.  My best educated guess is that the DPD did not want any ambiguity re the TSBD (hence nixing Sawyer's story of a man with a rifle out back of the building) and had Florer subtly transfer his story to the 3rd floor of another building.  Especially as Florer was the first man suspected of killing JFK.  (Bonnie Ray Williams, at the "second window from the end", was the second suspect, I believe.  Again--no TSBD ambiguity was wanted.)

And Sawyer's "3rd floor" shells, in his 1:12 transmission?  All the blinds seem to have been drawn on that floor at 12:30, except Stephen Wilson's...

hmmm, more research needed to get to the bottom of this. Here's all the players;