Sibert & O'Neill's "Next Largest Fragment" -- More Evidence of Autopsy Fraud

[Michael Griffith]

Researchers have long noted Sibert and O'Neill's intriguing reference to a bullet fragment "at the rear of the skull" in their 11/26/63 report on the autopsy (p. 4), since the autopsy report says nothing about a back-of-head bullet fragment. Sibert and O'Neill said it was the "next largest fragment" and that it appeared to be "at the rear of the skull at the juncture of the skull bone." The 6.3 x 2.5 mm fragment discovered within the 6.5 mm object is in the back of the skull; it is close to the lambda, and the lambda is the meeting point of the lambdoid suture and the sagittal suture at the top of the occiput, i.e., the spot where the three cranial plates (the two parietal bones and the occipital bone) meet in the back of the head.

However, the autopsy report says that the second-largest fragment was 3 x 1 mm in size, and Humes repeatedly and clearly said that the 3 x 1 mm fragment was the second-largest fragment. Moreover, that fragment was nowhere near the back of the skull but was close to the right orbit, as we can see on the skull x-rays. And let us keep in mind that Humes measured the fragment after he removed it from the skull.

Some researchers, myself included, rightly suspect that Sibert and O'Neill's entry about a rear-head fragment was based on a discussion that the autopsy doctors had about the 6.3 x 2.5 mm fragment that was later discovered within the image of the 6.5 mm object, and that the autopsy doctors chose to suppress the fragment's existence because of the severe problems it posed for their scenario of the shooting. Being near the rear "juncture of the skull bone," the fragment was far too high to be associated with the EOP entry site, and there was no other entry wound that could account for its presence near the lambda.

So, the autopsy doctors opted to suppress the fragment's existence, just as they did with the high fragment trail. They did not mention the back-of-head fragment and the high fragment trail in the autopsy report; however, they did not know that Sibert and O'Neill would mention the back-of-head fragment in their 11/26/23 report. This could be one of the reasons that Sibert and O'Neill's report was not included in the WC volumes and was suppressed for years.

The 6.3 x 2.5 mm fragment could be described as the second-largest fragment on the x-rays, second only to the 7 x 2 mm fragment near the right orbit. Indeed, without the benefit of high magnification, the 6.3 x 2.5 mm fragment may have appeared to the autopsy doctors to be somewhat smaller, especially given its appearance on the lateral skull x-rays.

It goes without saying that Sibert and O’Neill could not have been describing a conversation about the 6.5 mm object seen on the AP skull x-ray, since the object was not on the AP x-ray during the autopsy, and since the object would have been the largest and most obvious fragment on the skull x-rays.

Edited December 18, 2023 by Michael Griffith