Pat Speer Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 2 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said: I did the very same analysis one would do when calculating the odds of a coin flip landing on heads or tails 17 out of18 times. THERE IS NO NEED TO DO THIS ON EVERY COIN IN THE WORLD to get a valid calculation. Same thing is true with the witnesses. There is no need to include every witness to get a valid calculation. Wrong! Seventeen specifically said on the BACK of the head. Okay. Do you want me do the calculation for a different group of witnesses? How about the Dealey Plaza witnesses? Or the Bethesda witnesses? Oh I know... How about I do the calculation for ALL the witnesses? No matter what, you're going to lose. (As long as you're not allowed to cherry-pick the way you like to do.) Yeah, once made aware of their account being inconsistent with the official story. That's the reason you like to use the changed testimonies of those witnesses. But okay, no problem. I'll do the calculation using the statements of ALL the witnesses... including those who changed their minds! I'll even let you misinterpret McClelland's testimony the way you like to do. You'll still lose. There are just far too many back-of-head witnesses for you to win. It's not about "winning." Is your ego that fragile"? Really? It's about establishing a probability. And you have relied upon men who have cherry-picked their witnesses to create a consensus...who have then taken what most would agree is a reasonable summary of the recollections of the cherry-picked witnesses--that they believed the wound was farther back than shown in the autopsy photos--and used that to sell the idea that the low back of the head was blown out and that the body or films were altered. You yourself have agreed with me on this point--that the statements of the cherry-picked witnesses suggest the top of the back of the head was blown out, and not the bottom of the back of the head (the back of the head at the level of the ears.) So why have I been singled-out as someone holding back the research community, or whatever, when it was not me but Lifton, Groden, Livingstone, Fetzer, Mantik etc who perpetuated this myth that the low back of the head was blown out--which even you agree is nonsense? Do I have a near-cult following? Have I sold millions of books? Have I been held up as a leading critic of the Warren Report, so I could then be shot down for pushing crazy theories that the public as a whole, and future historians, will never come to accept? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sandy Larsen Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 1 minute ago, Pat Speer said: It's not about "winning." Is your ego that fragile"? Really? It's about the truth, Pat. The truth. You say I used witnesses that somebody cherry picked. This is a lie... I used all the Parkland witnesses and you know it. Almost every witness said early on that the gaping wound was on the back of the head. It's simply impossible for them all to be wrong. The math proves it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Speer Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 (edited) 1 hour ago, Sandy Larsen said: It's about the truth, Pat. The truth. You say I used witnesses that somebody cherry picked. This is a lie... I used all the Parkland witnesses and you know it. Almost every witness said early on that the gaping wound was on the back of the head. It's simply impossible for them all to be wrong. The math proves it. Did you use all the Parkland witnesses? McClelland said the wound was of the left temple, and then days later that it was of the right side of the head. Burkley told Kilduff it was of the right temple. Jackson said the top of the head was gone. Jacks said it was on the top of the head. Greer said it was on the upper right side of the head. Salyer said the wound was on the side of the head. Giesecke said the wound was on the left side of the head. All these men saw the wound at Parkland and commented on the wound's location in the hours days and months after the shooting, and all placed the wound in a location other than the far back of the head. So, no, it's not unanimous. But the bigger problem is that you keep pretending you can cherry-pick one batch of witnesses--the Parkland witnesses-- and get a valid outcome. That would be like asking the people watching a basketball game from courtside seats if a player stepped out of bounds or not. A group decision from one select group--a rich family with courtside seats, so to speak--even if unanimous, which in this case it is not--is not a reliable way to referee an event, and that is why we have professional referees (autopsists) and replay (autopsy photos and x-rays). And yes I think the analogy holds, because as all sport lovers know, sometimes the officials, even with replay, get it wrong. Edited January 30 by Pat Speer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sandy Larsen Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 7 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: Did you use all the Parkland witnesses? I used all the Parkland doctors and nurses with one exception. They are the best witnesses. The doctor I didn't use was Adolph Giesecke. I didn't use him because, even though he said the wound extended to the lower back of the head, he also has it on the left side. Which is wrong. He did say he was there but a short time. You can see the doctors and my methodology for categorizing them here: https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/30062-on-the-reliability-of-witness-recollections/?do=findComment&comment=526154 7 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: McClelland said the wound was of the left temple, and then days later that it was of the right side of the head. That's been soundly debunked. But even if you were right, the odds would still be greatly against your side of the argument. 7 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: Jackson said the top of the head was gone. Jacks said it was on the top of the head. Were Jackson and Jacks Parkland doctors? 7 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: Greer said it was on the upper right side of the head. I used only Parkland doctors and nurses. I'll add the Dealey Plaza witnesses if you want. 7 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: Salyer said the wound was on the side of the head. Yes, got him. 7 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: All these men saw the wound at Parkland and commented on the wound's location in the hours days and months after the shooting, and all placed the wound in a location other than the far back of the head. So, no, it's not unanimous. I never said it was unanimous. 7 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: But the bigger problem is that you keep pretending you can cherry-pick one batch of witnesses--the Parkland witnesses-- and get a valid outcome. That is called "sampling" in statistics and it is widely done. Making the sample size larger will give a more precise result. I'll add any other groups you want. I think we should include them all. But I can see right now that the odds with everybody counted will be astronomically against your side of the argument. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Von Pein Posted January 31 Share Posted January 31 (edited) ........... Edited January 31 by David Von Pein Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keven Hofeling Posted February 1 Author Share Posted February 1 2 hours ago, David Von Pein said: Links of "Head Wound" interest: https://drive.google.com / Excerpt From "Reclaiming History" Concerning JFK's Head Wound and http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2011/04/index.html#JFK-Head-Wounds And here is some back-of-the-head wound information for you of a substantially more credible nature.... Autopsy photograph authenticity apologists such as David Von Pein and Pat Speer cannot and will not even attempt to contend with evidence that the photographs have been altered. To demonstrate this I am offering the following from Dr. Gary Aguilar, Dr. Cyril Wecht and Rex Bradford. It is one of the better recitations of the existing evidence against authenticity that I am aware of (which I have supplemented with some supporting exhibits). It is an excerpt of a Letter to the Editor rebutting an article* giving the standard mainstream line of nonsense and government lies about the medical evidence in the Kennedy assassination. Both the article and the Letter to the Editor appeared in the medical journal "Neurosurgery" in 2004. *Levy, M. L., Sullivan, D., Faccio, R., Grossman, R. G., Goodrich, J. T., Kelly, P. J., Laws, E. R., & Sturdivan, L. (2004). A neuroforensic analysis of the wounds of President John F. Kennedy: Part 2 - A study of the available evidence, eyewitness correlations, analysis, and conclusions. Neurosurgery, 54(6), 1298-1312. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15157287/ The link to the Letter to the Editor I have excerpted from below: https://websites.umich.edu/~ahaq/correspondence.pdf What I'd be interested in seeing from Mr. Speer and Mr. Von Pein -- as well as any other autopsy photograph authenticity apologists who wish to apply -- is a response that provides answers to the following questions which Doctor Aguilar, Dr. Wecht and Mr. Bradford demonstrated in their Letter to the Editor are the fundamental questions that all apologists who wish to be regarded as intellectually honest must answer (accordingly, I predict that there will be no answers from any apologists that are on point, because the apologists are simply not intellectually honest in any way): What is the explanation as to why coauthor Robert Grossman, and the two FBI agents who were present during the autopsy, rejected the JFK autopsy photographs, if they are authentic? The failure of the photographs to pass a test designed to link them to the autopsy camera is deeply troubling, and just is troubling is that the HSCA lied about this in its Final Report, claiming instead that the Department of Defense could not locate the camera when HSCA documents declassified in the 1990's indicate that the HSCA had received the camera but could not verify that the camera had taken the photographs. Why should we not therefore conclude that the HSCA failed to authenticate the autopsy photographs, why did the HSCA publish such falsehoods about the autopsy camera, and why should all Americans therefore not regard this as calling into question the authenticity and integrity of the autopsy photographs? Given the testimony from the autopsy team regarding autopsy photographs having been taken that are no longer in the extant collection today, how are we to regard the autopsy photographs as authentic when the chain of custody of the photographs has been so fundamentally broken? The consistent misinterpretation of Kennedy's injuries by numerous witnesses at both Parkland and the Bethesda morgue, in claiming a rearward skull wound that is absent in the photographs, is a matter of grave concern. What is a plausible explanation for this glaring inconsistency, particularly considering that the purpose of autopsy photographs is to clarify the nature of the wounds rather than further obscure them? The absence of any witness describing what is visible in the photographs raises doubts about the veracity of the images. How do you account for this discrepancy, and what credible explanation do you have to offer for why no witness corroborates the details depicted in the photographs? What plausible explanation do you have to offer for the conflicts between the witness testimony and the autopsy photographs of the brain, and why should we not entertain the possibility that the brain that was photographed was a substitute brain? "...As we will show, Dr. Humes and several of Dr. Levy’s primary sources adjusted their memories to fit the government’s preferred “lone nut” conclusion. Unfortunately, Dr. Levy nowhere explores this, even in his discussion of the all-important autopsy photographs. Instead, the photos win his endorsement on grounds the HSCA had authenticated them. He sidesteps how incompatible they are with Dr. Gross-man’s description, as well as the fact that Dr. Grossman flatly told the ARRB they didn’t show what he saw. Nor does he explore new evidence uncovered by the ARRB that shows that both government investigators and the autopsy team mishandled this evidence. But before the ARRB knocked the struts out from under them, JFK’s autopsy photographs had offered solid support for the government’s position in the case. Besides the HSCA’s claim it had authenticated them, the autopsy pictures got an additional boost from four members of the autopsy team: Drs. Humes and Boswell, the attending radiologist, Dr. John H. Ebersole and John Stringer, the autopsy photographer. After being allowed to see the grisly stills for the first time in 1966, the four men signed an affidavit [prepared by the U.S. Justice Depart-ment (3, 6), 3. Aguilar G, Cunningham K: How Five Investigations into JFK’s Medical/Autopsy Evidence Got It Wrong (Part II). On-line at: http://history-matters.com/essays/jfkmed/How5Investigations/How5InvestigationsGotItWrong_2.htm. Accessed10/29/04. 6. Aguilar GL,Wecht C. The medical case for conspiracy, in Crenshaw C (ed): Trauma Room One. New York, Paraview Press, 2001, pp 216–217. under whose authority its Bureau, the FBI, had determined there had been no conspiracy] attesting to the fact that the file of JFK’s autopsy photos was complete: “The X-rays and photographs described and listed above include all the X-rays and photographs taken by us during the autopsy, and we have no reason to believe that any other photographs or X-rays were made during the autopsy” (3, 7, 91). 3. Aguilar G, Cunningham K: How Five Investigations into JFK’s Medical/Autopsy Evidence Got It Wrong (Part II). On-line at: http://history-matters.com/essays/ jfkmed/How5Investigations/How5InvestigationsGotItWrong_2.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. 7. ARRB Medical Document # 13. On-line at: http://historymatters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md13/html/Image10.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. 91. Weisberg H: Postmortem: JFK Assassination Cover-up Smashed. Frederick, Harold Weisberg, 1975, p 573 But, in another example of oscillation, members of the team also testified, both before and after signing the dubious document, that photographs they had taken during the autopsy are missing. For example, three years before signing off that the file of autopsy photographs was complete, Dr. Humes had sworn to the Warren Commission that he had taken at least three images that aren’t in the file: two or more images of JFK’s skull and one or more of the interior of his chest. “This [skull]wound then had the characteristics of [a] wound of entrance from this direction through the two tables of the skull, ”Humes testified, “and, incidentally, photographs illustrating this [‘coning’ or ‘beveling’] phenomenon [that show the bullet’s direction] from both the external surface of the skull and from the internal surface were prepared” (86). 86. Warren Commission testimony of Dr. James H. Humes. Warren Commission Hearings, 2H352. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh2/html/WC_Vol2_0180b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. The complete inventory of autopsy photographs housed at the National Archives and examined by authors Wecht and Aguilar through special permission has no such images, nor have any such images ever been described in any official tally of the inventory. A simple oversight? One might be tempted to accept that explanation for the missing photos if the necessity of taking such photos were not so obvious and if Dr. Humes’ recollection had not been independently corroborated by his teammates. One of them was Dr. Pierre Finck, a forensics expert from the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, someone who would not have been insensitive to the forensic and legal importance of documenting the fatal wound for the expected trial of the then-living Oswald. He was firm that the photos in the inventory do not include the cranial images he shot. During his formerly suppressed HSCA testimony (unearthed by the ARRB), Dr. Finck read from notes he had apparently written sometime closer to the time of the autopsy. “I help[ed] the Navy photographer to take photographs of the occipital wound (external and internal aspects) [sic]” (48). 48. HSCA interview with Dr. Pierre Finck. HSCA record # 180-10081–10347; agency file # 006165, p 6. On-line at: http://historymatters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md28/html/Image05.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. As with Dr. Humes, his obvious intent was to capture the tell tale inward beveling at the point of in-shoot on JFK’s cranium, a feature familiar to anyone who has ever shot a BB or a pellet through a pane of glass. Dr. Finck expanded on these notes under oath before the HSCA in 1977. HSCA Counsel: “We have here a black-and-white blowup of that same spot [on the rear of JFK’s scalp]. You previously mentioned that your attempt here was to photograph the . . . crater, I think was the word that you used.” Dr. Finck: “In the bone, not in the scalp, because to determine the direction of the projectile the bone is a very good source of information so I emphasize the photographs of the crater seen from the inside the skull. What you are showing me is soft tissue wound [sic] in the scalp.” A few moments later, the following exchange occurred: Dallas Chief Medical Examiner Charles S. Petty, MD: “If I understand you correctly, Dr. Finck, you wanted particularly to have a photograph made of the external aspect of the skull from the back to show that there was no cratering to the outside of the skull.” Dr. Finck: “Absolutely.” Dr. Petty: “Did you ever see such a photograph?” Dr. Finck: “I don’t think so and I brought with me memorandum referring to the examination of photographs in 1967. . .and as I can recall I never saw pictures of the outer aspect of the wound of entry in the back of the head and inner aspect in the skull in order to show a crater, although I was there asking [the photographer to take] these photographs. I don’t remember seeing those photographs.” Dr. Petty: “All right. Let me ask you one other question. In order to expose that area where the wound was present in the bone, did you have to or did someone have to dissect the scalp off of the bone in order to show this?” Dr. Finck: “Yes. . . the scalp had to be separated from it in order to show in the back of the head the wound in the bone.” (49) 49. HSCA interview with Dr. Pierre Finck, pp 89–90. Agency File 013617. On-line at: http://historymatters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md30/html/Image21.htm to http://historymatters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md30/html/Image22.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. There are no photographs of JFK’s skull with the scalp reflected. But both JFK autopsy photographers backed up Drs. Finck and Humes. In 1997, Bethesda’s chief autopsy photographer, John Stringer was asked, “Did you take any photographs of the head after scalp had been pulled down or reflected?” Mr. Stringer answered, “Yes” (12). 12. ARRB deposition of John T. Stringer, July 17, 1996, p 71. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Stringer_7-16-96/html/Stringer_0008b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Assistant medical photographer, Floyd Riebe, was asked, “Do you recall whether any pictures were taken from angles very close to the inside of the cranium?” “Yes,” Mr. Riebe replied, “I think Mr. Stringer did that when the body was on its side” (13). 13. ARRB deposition of Mr. Floyd Albert Riebe, May 12, 1997, p 39. On-line at: http://historymatters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Riebe_5-7-97/html/Riebe_0005a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. In 1964, Dr. Humes had also testified that, besides the cranial images, “Kodachrome photographs were made of this area in [the apical portion of] the interior of the president’s chest” (81). 81. Warren Commission testimony of Dr. James H. Humes, in Warren Commission Hearings, 2H363. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh2/html/WC_Vol2_0186a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Despite signing off on the completeness of the photo file in 1966, Dr. Humes told the HSCA the same thing in 1978 that he had told the Warren Commission in 1964. In a suppressed memo regarding a private interview, the HSCA reported that Dr. Humes, “specifically recall[ed] that Kodachrome photographs were taken of the president’s chest” (50). 50. HSCA interview with James H. Humes. HSCA record #180-10081–10347; agency file #006165, p 6. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md19/html/Image06.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. In open testimony Dr. Humes told the HSCA, “I distinctly recall going to great lengths trying to get the interior upper portion of the right thorax illuminated. . .and what happened to that film I don’t know” (46). 46. HSCA testimony of James H. Humes, HSCA, vol 7:253. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0132a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Eighteen years later, Dr. Humes told the ARRB much the same thing: “We took one [picture] of the interior of the right side of the thorax. . .and I never saw it. It never—whether it was underexposed or over-exposed or what happened to it, I don’t know” (14). 14. ARRB testimony of James H. Humes, February 13, 1999, p 97. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Humes_2-13-96/html/Humes_0050a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Dr. Humes’s fellow signatories independently recalled things the same way. The HSCA reported that Dr. Boswell had said that, “he thought they had photographed ‘the exposed thoracic cavity and lung,’ but doesn’t remember ever seeing those photographs” (59). 59. HSCA interview with Dr. J. Thornton Boswell, p 6, A. Purdy memo. HSCA rec.#180-10093–10430. Agency file # 002071, p 6. ARRB Medical Document # 26. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md26/html/Image05.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. In 1996, Dr. Boswell was asked, “Are there any other photographs that you remember having been taken during the time of the autopsy that you don’t see here?” “The only one that I have a faint memory of was the anterior of the right thorax,” Dr. Boswell replied. “I don’t see it, and haven’t [sic] when we tried to find it on previous occasions, because that was very important because it did show the extra pleural blood clot and was very important to our positioning that wound” (15). 15. ARRB testimony of J. Thornton Boswell, MD, February 26, 1996, p 178. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Boswell_2-26-96/html/Boswell_0089b.htm to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Boswell_2-26-96/html/Boswell_0090a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Similarly, John Stringer told both the HSCA and the ARRB that chest photographs were missing. The HSCA reported that, “Stringer remembers taking at least two exposures of the body cavity” (51). 51. HSCA interview with autopsy photographer, Mr. John Stringer. A. Purdy memo. HSCA rec. # 180-10093–10429. Agency file # 002070, p 12. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md19/html/Image11.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. He testified to the ARRB that “There were some views that we—that were taken that were missing . . . I remember [photographing] some things inside the body that weren’t there [in the file]” (16). 16. ARRB deposition of John T. Stringer, July 16, 1996, p 133. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Stringer_7-16-96/html/Stringer_0014a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. As with the photos of JFK’s cranial wound, the importance of photographs of the apex of his chest should be emphasized. Besides the clinical value of such images, the autopsy team would not have been blind to the legal importance of documenting the bruise at the apex of JFK’s evacuated chest cavity for both the medical record and expected upcoming trial. Whereas the significance of an incomplete photographic record of JFK’s autopsy should not be understated, two related points bear emphasis. First, the contradictions between their attestation to the completeness of the file of photos in 1966 and their repeated testimonies before and after that date that images are missing does not speak well for the reliability of Dr. Levy’s primary sources. Second, it shows, yet again, that Dr. Levy has overlooked important new evidence. Dr. Levy, however, does not ignore JFK’s autopsy photographs entirely. He endorses them, using “evidence” that suggests he may be unfamiliar with yet another, recent official discovery. Dr. Levy wrote, “The HSCA verified that the postmortem photographs and x-rays in the custody of the National Archives [which show the backside of JFK’s head was undamaged] were authentic. Authentication of the autopsy photographs was essential because of the discrepant descriptions given of the wounds by eyewitnesses at Parkland Memorial Hospital, the doctors present at the autopsy, the Warren Report, and the Clark Panel” (65). 65. Levy ML, Sullivan D, Faccio R, Grossman RG: A neuroforensic analysis of the wounds of President John F. Kennedy: Part 2—A study of the available evidence, eyewitness correlations, analysis, and conclusions. Neurosurgery 54:1298–1312,2004. Indeed, the HSCA said it had authenticated the photographs (43). 43. HSCA vol 7:87. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0049a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. The images support Dr. Levy’s view the discrepant Dallas doctors were wrong about the gaping hole in the back of JFK’s skull thought by some to be an exit wound. But by the same token, the crystal clear photos also apparently prove that Dr. Grossman was wrong when he described a one inch-wide entrance wound in the middle of JFK’s occipital bone. Dr. Levy seems not to appreciate his and his coauthor’s predicament. He also seems to be unaware of what the ARRB discovered about the HSCA’s process of authentication. The story begins in an inconspicuous footnote that qualified the HSCA’s public claim that from “microscopic” and “stereoscopic” examinations of the photos its experts had confidently concluded that the images were authentic (52, 53). 52. HSCA vol 6:225–226. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol6/html/HSCA_Vol6_0116a.htm to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol6/html/HSCA_Vol6_0116b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. 53. HSCA report by Frank Scott entitled, “Report on Autopsy Color Photographs Authenticity.” HSCA vol 7:69–71. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0040a.htm to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0041a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. The footnote only offered the minor caution that the HSCA had encountered a negligible glitch during authentication. It wrote: Because the Department of Defense was unable to locate the camera and lens that were used to take these [autopsy] photographs, the [photographic] panel was unable to engage in an analysis similar to the one undertaken with the Oswald backyard pictures that was designed to determine whether a particular camera in issue had been used to take the photographs that were the subject of inquiry. (54) 54. HSCA vol 6:226, footnote # 1. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol6/html/HSCA_Vol6_0116b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Regarding that very sentence, ARRB investigator, Mr. Douglas Horne, wrote, “By late 1997, enough related documents had been located and assembled by the authors to bring into serious doubt the accuracy of the HSCA’s conclusion that ‘the Department of Defense was unable to locate the camera and lens’. . .” (22). 22. ARRB memorandum for file by Mr. Doug Horne entitled, “Unanswered Questions Raised by the HSCA’s Analysis and Conclusions Regarding the Camera Identified by the Navy and the department of Defense as the Camera Used at President Kennedy’s Autopsy,” pp 2–24. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0001b.htm. to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0012b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Mr. Horne reported that the Navy had sent the HSCA a fact sheet that “strongly reiterates the Navy’s position that the camera provided to the HSCA was indeed the camera used at the autopsy on President Kennedy.” The proof was a suppressed letter to the HSCA from the Assistant Secretary of Defense indicating that the Department of Defense had indeed located, and had in fact already sent to the HSCA, “the only [camera] in use at the National Naval Medical Center in 1963” (22). 22. ARRB memorandum for file by Mr. Doug Horne entitled, “Unanswered Questions Raised by the HSCA’s Analysis and Conclusions Regarding the Camera Identified by the Navy and the department of Defense as the Camera Used at President Kennedy’s Autopsy,” pp 2–24. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0001b.htm. to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0012b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. However the HSCA wasn’t satisfied with the camera the Defense Department had fetched. In a letter asking the Secretary of Defense to look around for another one, HSCA chief counsel, Robert Blakey, explained the problem: [O]ur photographic experts have determined that this camera, or at least the particular lens and shutter attached to it, could not have been used to take [JFK’s]autopsy pictures. (22) 22. ARRB memorandum for file by Mr. Doug Horne entitled, “Unanswered Questions Raised by the HSCA’s Analysis and Conclusions Regarding the Camera Identified by the Navy and the department of Defense as the Camera Used at President Kennedy’s Autopsy,” pp 2–24. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0001b.htm. to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0012b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Whereas the HSCA reported it could not completely close the loop because the camera was missing, the suppressed record suggests that 1) the loop was closed, 2) the camera was located, and 3) that the HSCA’s own experts determined the camera “could not have been used to take [JFK’s] autopsy pictures.” The HSCA staff elected to withhold this inconvenient information from the public. They also kept it from their own experts on the FPP, including the chairman, Dr. Micheal Baden (personal communication), and one of the authors of this essay [CHW]. And so, as Dr. Levy makes clear, the FPP experts were left to labor under the illusion that the images had passed authentication with flying colors. THE ARRB ON THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE JFK AUTOPSY CAMERA DURING THE HOUSE SELECT COMMITTEE ON ASSASSINATIONS INVESTIGATION: "...4. By late 1997, enough related documents had been located and assembled by the author to bring into serious doubt the accuracy of the HSCA's conclusion (see paragraph 2 above) that "...the Department of Defense was unable to locate the camera and lens...used to take...[the autopsy] photographs." If the HSCA was incorrect in its conclusion that the camera it examined was not the autopsy camera, the implications for what may have happened on November 22-23, 1963 are considerable. In paragraph 5 below, a timeline has been constructed of HSCA activities in the autopsy camera area, referencing appropriate documents assembled by the author, that will explain why a reasonable student of the assassination might conclude that the HSCA reached the wrong conclusion regarding the autopsy camera. [Appropriate documents are attached to this memo as enclosures.] Implications of the HSCA's possibly incorrect analysis of the situation are explored in paragraph 6 below...." "...7. Looking at this problem from another viewpoint, the HSCA report writers (presumably Blakey, Cornwell and Billings) might just as well have said, after receiving John Kester's letter of April 20, 1978, "Because the Navy did provide the camera used at the autopsy, through DOD, for our examination--and our experts have concluded it could not have been used to take the autopsy pictures--the Committee therefore concludes that the official autopsy photographs in the collection at the National Archives were taken by someone other than John Stringer, and that John Stringer's photographs were removed from the collection prior to April 26, 1965." But instead of openly pointing out, in its written report, the possibility of either conclusion being correct, the HSCA apparently assumed the photographs were Stringer's without question, and therefore concluded that the Navy and DOD must have provided the wrong camera to the Committee, in spite of the strong assurances of the Department of Defense that the Graphic View Camera provided for examination in 1978 was the only one used at Bethesda in November, 1963. Perhaps worst of all, the document that would have cast doubt on the seeming certainty of the HSCA's conclusion regarding the camera, the John Kester letter of April 20, I978, was apparently sealed for 50 years by someone on the HSCA staff. In light of the HSCA's deposition of Robert L. Knudsen in August. 1978, in which he indicated with great certainty that he had developed color negatives (vice color positive transparencies) from the autopsy, and a film pack of black-and-white negatives (vice black-and-white negatives from a duplex film holder), and the Committee staff's subsequent decision not to publish or even mention his testimony in its final report, and to seal it for 50 years, one cannot wonder whether some important, high-ranking members of the HSCA staff had a strong disposition against accepting, at face value, indications that there may have been chain-of-custody or authenticity problems with key photographic evidence in the Kennedy assassination, and a predilection in favor of benign explanations for apparent discrepancies in the photographic evidence...." https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=43609#relPageId=1 Dr. Levy thus offers readers outdated and misleading government assurances while ignoring recent government discoveries that undermine those assurances. In doing so, he both boosts the government’s case for a single gunman at the same time he impugns Dallas doctors who described a rearward cranial wound, including, ironically, his co-author Dr. Grossman. The pristine backside of JFK’s scalp is crystal clear in the images except for a tiny wound or spot of blood at the top of JFK’s cranium overlying the right posterior parietal bone. Dr. Grossman has consistently maintained that the higher wound in the photos is not the larger occipital wound he saw. So the images seem to prove that all the Dallas doctors who described rearward cranial damage were wrong. But also proven wrong, as we will show, are many of the autopsy witnesses who agreed with them. The images thus put Dr. Grossman in much the same position as his Dallas associates, and in the same position as the FBI agents who witnessed JFK’s autopsy, Francis O’Neill and James Sibert. For, like Dr. Grossman, Special Agents O’Neill and Sibert told the ARRB there was a rearward cranial wound where none appears in the images: ARRB Counsel Gunn: “I’d like to ask you whether that photograph resembles what you saw from the back of the head at the time of the autopsy?” (Fig. C4) Special Agent Francis O’Neill: “This looks like it’s been doctored in some way (25) 25. ARRB testimony of FBI agent Francis X. O’Neill, 9/12/97, p 158. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Oneill_9-12-97/html/ONeill_0015a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. . . .I specifically do not recall those—I mean, being that clean or that fixed up. To me, it looks like these pictures have been. . . It would appear to me that there was a—more of a massive wound. . .” (26) 26. ARRB testimony of FBI agent Francis X. O’Neill, 9/12/97, pp 161–162. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Oneill_9-12-97/html/ONeill_0015a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Mr. Gunn also asked the other FBI witness who was present, Special Agent James Sibert, a similar question: Counsel Gunn: “Mr. Sibert, does that photograph correspond to your recollection of the back of President Kennedy’s head?" Special Agent James Sibert: “Well, I don’t have a recollection of it being that intact. . . I don’t remember seeing anything that was like this photo. . . I don’t recall anything like this at all during the autopsy. There was much—well, the wound was more pronounced. And it looks like it could have been reconstructed or something, as compared with what my recollection was. . .” ( 28) 28. ARRB testimony of FBI agent James W. Sibert, 9/11/97, p 128. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Sibert_9-11-97/html/Sibert_12b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Ironically, in an ARRB interview not mentioned by Dr. Levy, his coauthor Dr. Grossman reacted in almost exactly the same way. The ARRB reported: When shown the Ida Dox drawing of the back of the head autopsy image [Fig. C4], Dr. Grossman immediately opined, “that’s completely incorrect” . . .The entry wound he saw was larger than the small entry wound depicted in the Ida Dox drawing, and lower on the head, well down in the occipital region, near the external occipital protruberance. In fact, Dr. Grossman’s opinion was that the entrance wound he observed on the rear of the skull had passed through the tentorium and the right cerebellum, and he remembered seeing what he believed to be cerebellar tissue through this punched out wound which he interpreted to be one of entrance. (17) 17. ARRB memorandum, February 11, 1998. Directed to: Jeremy Gunn and Tom Samoluk. From: Doug Horne. Subject: Wrapping Up ARRB Efforts to “Clarify the Record” Re: The Medical Evidence in the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, p 11. As Dr. Levy points out, Dr. Grossman now bows to the photographs and concedes that he must have been wrong about cerebellum; that, in other words, evidence from the photographic record of the autopsy, which has problems he was unaware of, trumps his own memory and those of his Dallas colleagues. Thus, perhaps Dr. Levy regards dissecting the conflicts between Dallas and the autopsy photos as less helpful in understanding the true nature of JFK’s injuries than in determining whom to trust—the Dallas witnesses or the witnesses in the morgue. Given the clear advantages of those who witnessed the prolonged post mortem, it is not unreasonable to credit the Bethesda accounts over the discrepant doctors of Dallas. Moreover, the HSCA reported that the autopsy witnesses had uniformly endorsed Kennedy’s autopsy photos, and so all the more reason to reject Parkland. Or so it was once believed. But, as with the “complete” file of autopsy photographs and the HSCA’s authentication claims, records to which Dr. Levy makes no allusion have proven the converse. In referring to the compilation of witness statements that one of the authors prepared (Aguilar), Dr. Levy seems to believe that the autopsy photographs rebut Dallas witnesses regarding JFK’s head wounds and prove those at Bethesda. That is not the case. Nor is that really even the controversy. Infact, both Dallas and Bethesda were in virtually complete agreement that Kennedy had a gaping rearward wound that involved his occiput. Thus, the real controversy is that the images apparently disprove both Bethesda and the Dallas doctors while also disproving Dr. Grossman’s claims. But Dr. Levy’s confusion may be the result of his greater familiarity with the “old” official evidence rather than the “new” official evidence. In 1979 the HSCA did not mince words in resolving the apparent Bethesda/Dallas conflict. It wrote: “Critics of the Warren Commission’s medical evidence findings have found [sic] on the observations recorded by the Parkland Hospital doctors. They believe it is unlikely that trained medical personnel could be so consistently in error regarding the nature of [JFK’s cranial] wound, even though their recollections were not based on careful examinations of the wounds. . .” (55). 55. HSCA vol 7:37. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0024a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. However, it continued, “In disagreement with the observations of the Parkland doctors are the 26 people present at the autopsy. All of those interviewed who attended the autopsy corroborated the general location of the wounds as depicted in the photographs; none had differing accounts . . . it appears more probable that the observations of the Parkland doctors are incorrect” (56). 56. HSCA vol 7:37–39. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0025a.htm to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0025a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. This was a devastating rebuke to skeptics who had cited the Dallas doctors in arguing for a different wound, a different bullet trajectory, and perhaps even a different assassin than Oswald. But the proof—the autopsy witnesses’ interviews—was entirely and unjustifiably suppressed. Had it not been for the ARRB’s interest in this area, these interviews might have remained state secrets until 2028, the mandatory declassification date. A surprise lay in wait when they were prematurely unsealed in the mid-1990s. While more than twenty Parkland witnesses said that at least part of JFK’s cranial defect was rearward, it turns out that, despite the HSCA’s claim to the contrary, just as many autopsy witnesses reported the same thing, whether in the suppressed HSCA interviews or in public Warren Commission documents and interviews (4). 4. Aguilar G, Cunningham K: How Five Investigations into JFK’s Medical/Autopsy Evidence Got It Wrong (Part V). On-line at: http://history-matters.com/essays/ jfkmed/How5Investigations/How5InvestigationsGotItWrong_5.htm. Accessed10/29/04. For example, after interviewing the commanding officer of the military district of Washington, D.C., Philip C. Wehle, the HSCA’s suppressed record says that, “[Wehle] noted that the wound was in the back of the head so he would not see it because the President was lying face up . . . ” (57). 57. HSCA record #10010042, agency file #002086, p 2. (Autopsy images show a gaping wound on the right side of Kennedy’s head in front of his right ear, where it should have been easy to see with JFK lying face up.) A Ph.D. candidate in pathology in 1963, James C. Jenkins, worked as a lab technologist in JFK’s morgue. The HSCA said that Mr. Jenkins reported, “he saw a head wound in the ‘. . . middle temporal region back to the occipital’” (58). 58. HSCA interview with Mr. James Curtis Jenkins, 8-29-77. JFK Collection, RG 233, Document #002193, p 4. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md65/html/md65_0004a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. The HSCA also said that another lab technologist, Jan Gail Rudnicki, had reported that the “back-right quadrant of the head was missing” (60). 60. HSCA record #180-10105–10397, agency file number #014461, p 2. Several of the autopsy witnesses, including two FBI agents, prepared diagrams for the HSCA that depicted a cranial defect involving JFK’s occiput (4) (Figs. C5 and C6). These inconvenient diagrams, their accompanying interviews and similar statements by other autopsy witnesses were all suppressed. And the discrepancy with Dallas? Compare these morgue accounts with that of Parkland’s Robert McClelland, M.D. “The right posterior portion of the skull had been extremely blasted,” he told the Warren Commission, “the occipital bone being fractured in its lateral half” (84). 84. Warren Commission testimony of Dr. Robert McClelland, in: Hearings, 6H33.On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh6/html/WC_Vol6_0022a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Or Charles J. Carrico, M.D., who told the Warren Commission that JFK’s cranial defect was “in the posterior skull, the occipital region” (85). 85. Warren Commission testimony of Dr. Charles Carrico, in: Hearings, 3H361. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0185a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Virtually all the Dallas doctors and nurses offered similar descriptions. In Dr. Levy’s article, his coauthor dealt with this by dismissing his Parkland colleagues on grounds of imprecision. “Many doctors,” Dr. Grossman explained, “loosely use the term [occipital] to refer to the ‘back fifth of the head’” (65). 65. Levy ML, Sullivan D, Faccio R, Grossman RG: A neuroforensic analysis of the wounds of President John F. Kennedy: Part 2—A study of the available evidence,eyewitness correlations, analysis, and conclusions. Neurosurgery 54:1298–1312,2004. It is difficult to understand how even non-neurosurgeons would have referred to the gaping wound the photos show in front of JFK’s ear as “occipital,” as in, the “back fifth of the head.” But what of perhaps the best witness in Dallas—Parkland’s chairman of neurosurgery, Kemp Clark, M.D., the senior treating physician at Parkland, the man who signed JFK’s death certificate, and Dr. Grossman’s superior on the day of the assassination? The ARRB asked Dr. Grossman about Dr. Clark in 1997. “Repeatedly during the interview,” the ARRB reported, “Dr. Grossman suggested that we interview Dr. Kemp Clark, and said that he felt Dr. Clark’s observations would be more accurate than his, since Dr. Clark had much more experience at that time than he with gunshot wounds to the head and neurosurgery in general” (18). 18. ARRB interview of Dr. Robert Grossman, 3/21/97. ARRB Medical Document #185, p 2. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md185/html/md185_0002a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Unacknowledged in Dr. Levy’s report, which accurately reflects Dr. Clark’s descriptions of JFK’s cranial injuries in official documents, is the fact that Dr. Grossman’s superior was just as “loose” with the term “occiput” as were the discrepant Dallas doctors he dismissed. For example, on the day of the assassination, Dr. Clark wrote, “There was a large wound beginning in the right occiput extending into the parietal region” (87). 87. Warren Commission Exhibit #392, hand-written notes of Kemp Clark dated 11/22/63, in: 17H9–10. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh17/html/WH_Vol17_0018a.htm to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh17/html/WH_Vol17_0018b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Under oath before the Warren Commission, Dr. Clark further explained that, “This was a large, gaping wound in the right posterior part, with cerebral and cerebellar tissue being damaged and exposed” (88). 88. Warren Commission testimony of Kemp Clark, MD, in: Hearings, 6H20. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh6/html/WC_Vol6_0015b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Whose description are we to accept? There is abundant scientific support for the common sense notion that descriptions given immediately after an event are more likely to be accurate than accounts given years later (37, 67–70). 37. Buckhout R: Eyewitness testimony. Sci Am Dec 1974, pp 23–31.There is even evidence that the human mind is capable of creating false memories (67). 67. Loftus EF: Creating false memories. Sci Am Sept 1997, pp 71–75. 68. Loftus EF: Eyewitness Testimony. Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1996. 69. Loftus EF, Doyle JM: Factors determining retention and retrieval of events, in: Eyewitness Testimony: Civil and Criminal. Charlottesville, The Michie Co., 1992, pp 53–83. 70. Marshall J, Marquis KH, Oskamp S: Effects of kind of question and atmosphere of interrogation on accuracy and completeness of testimony. Harvard Law Rev 84:1620–1643, 1971. Given that Dr. Clark recorded his impressions immediately and testified under oath close to the time of the events, whereas Dr. Grossman waited 18 years to give his account to a newspaper reporter, and given that even Dr. Grossman has said that Dr. Clark’s then-greater experience with such wounds confers greater authority to his account, one would have hoped Dr. Levy would have offered better reasons than he has to accept Dr. Grossman’s description and reject the near identical descriptions of Dr. Clark and his Parkland colleagues (Fig. C7). And if Dr. Levy is going to continue to regard JFK’s autopsy photographs as unassailable, he might usefully offer a sensible explanation for 1) why his coauthor and two FBI agents apparently rejected them, 2) why the photos failed a test designed to link them to the autopsy camera, 3) why the autopsy team testified that some images have vanished, 4) why myriad witnesses at both Parkland and the morgue made the same mistake in claiming that Kennedy had a gaping rearward skull wound that is remarkable by its absence in the pictures, and 5) why not a single witness described what is visible in the photographs. Unfortunately, the contradictions in the autopsy evidence do not end here. For while the photographs of Kennedy’s brain seem to be a reasonable match for its measured weight and autopsy description, the images are contradicted by several witness reports from both Parkland and Bethesda, as well as by evidence from the scene of the shooting. Dr. Levy used Dr. John Lattimer’s claim that 70% of JFK’s right cerebral hemisphere was missing as a springboard to succinctly dispatch another important, photography-related controversy: “We should note that some authors have used the term ‘missing’ when referring to the brain which has led to extreme theories of the nature of the injuries,” he wrote. However, he added, the “drawing by Ida Dox (sic) demonstrates a bullet track in the right hemisphere extending from the occipital lobe forward, but the brain was not missing.” There the discussion ended with the reader left to assume that the Dox sketch was accurate and that Dr. Lattimer was not. Unfortunately, Dr. Levy shortchanged his readers by printing the wrong diagram—the HSCA’s depiction of a blasted human skull, not the Ida Dox drawing of an autopsy photograph of JFK’s brain—and by not mentioning the ARRB’s contributions to the controversies involving JFK’s brain, controversies that again pit the autopsy findings and photographs against credible witnesses. But Dr. Lattimer’s estimate was probably based on more than just this HSCA diagram, which faithfully renders photos that show a disruption of JFK’s right cerebrum with little actual loss of mass (Fig. C8). He may have based it on the reports of several key witnesses. In the Journal of the American Medical Association, for example, Dr. Humes reported that, “two thirds of the right cerebrum had been blown away” (35). 35. Breo 😧 JFK’s death: The plain truth from the MDs who did the autopsy. JAMA267:2797-2798, 1992. ARRB Medical Document #22. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md22/html/Image06.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Dr. Boswell testified that one-half of the right cerebrum was missing (19). 19. ARRB testimony J. Thornton Boswell, College Park, Maryland, 2/26/96. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/md241/html/md241_0001a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. When shown the photographs of JFK’s brain at autopsy, FBI Agent O’Neill told the ARRB in 1997, “The only section of the brain which is missing is this small section over here. To me, that’s not consistent with the way I recall seeing it.” Mr. O’Neill amplified, saying that when JFK’s brain was removed, “more than half of the brain was missing” (24). 24. ARRB testimony of FBI Special Agent Francis O’Neill, pp 116–117. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Oneill_9-12-97/html/ONeill_0011b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. (See also: Washington Post, 11/10/98, p. A-3.) The assistant autopsy photographer, Mr. Floyd Riebe, recalled things much the same way. When asked by ARRB counsel, “Did you see the brain removed from President Kennedy?” Riebe answered, “What little bit there was left, yes. . . Well, it was less than half of a brain there” (29). 29. ARRB deposition of autopsy photographer, Mr. Floyd Albert Riebe, 5/7/97, pp 43–44. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Riebe_5-7-97/html/Riebe_0005a.htm to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Riebe_5-7-97/html/Riebe_0005b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Finally, the chief of anesthesia at Parkland Hospital, Marion Thomas Jenkins, M.D., reported that Jackie Kennedy had handed him “a large chunk of her husband’s brain tissues” (36) during the resus-citation effort. The Zapruder film shows such a massive jettisoning of tissue from Kennedy’s head that something like what these witnesses reported seems likely to be true. Hence, the brain photographs contradict the prosectors, other credible witnesses, and the Zapruder film. FBI Special Agent Francis O’Neill, who observed the autopsy, rejected the images commenting, quite rightly: “This looks almost like a complete brain” (27). 27. ARRB testimony of FBI Special Agent Francis O’Neill, 9/12/97, p 165. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Oneill_9-12-97/html/ONeill_0015b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. (See also: Washington Post, 11/10/98, p. A-3.) In rejecting the images, O’Neill was joined by the photographer of record, John Stringer. Stringer claimed that he took images of sections of the brain, which are missing, and that the images in the current file were not taken with the type of camera or type of film he used at that time (20). 20. ARRB testimony of John Stringer, July 16, 1996, pp 216–222. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/medical_testimony/Stringer_7-16-96/html/Stringer_0021a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. If Dr. Levy is right to accept the pictures and the brain weight, then what is exploding from JFK’s skull when his head erupts in the Zapruder film? What ejecta caused the “jet effect” that Dr. Levy proposes may have propelled JFK’s head rearward? Officially, virtually nothing, it seems. As intractable as this conflict might seem, an intriguing possible solution was first publicized in a Washington Post article. The November 10, 1998, news headline read: “Archive photos not of JFK’s brain, concludes aide to review board; staff member contends two different specimens were examined” (23). 23. ARRB memorandum for file by Mr. Doug Horne entitled “Questions Regarding Supplementary Brain Examination(s) (sic) Following the Autopsy on President John F. Kennedy,” 8/28/96. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_BrainExams/html/d130_0002a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. (See also: Washington Post, 11/10/98, p A-3.) The Washington Post report was the first public acknowledgment of an ARRB memo advancing the so-called “two brain” hypothesis of former naval officer and review board staffer, Douglas Horne. After carefully comparing accounts of the appearance of JFK’s brain on the night of the autopsy against photographs disavowed by the photographer which contradicted these accounts, and after comparing incompatible accounts of the timing of the brain examination given by the prosectors and lab personnel, Mr. Horne concluded that two different brains were examined on two different days (22). 22. ARRB memorandum for file by Mr. Doug Horne entitled, “Unanswered Questions Raised by the HSCA’s Analysis and Conclusions Regarding the Camera Identified by the Navy and the department of Defense as the Camera Used at President Kennedy’s Autopsy,” pp 2–24. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0001b.htm. to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0012b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. If Horne is right, the HSCA diagram likely depicts the second brain that was examined, the one that weighed 1500 grams. But this is not the brain that we see exploding in the Zapruder film, not the one missing the “large chunk” Mrs. Kennedy handed Dr. Jenkins. Nor is it the one that Dr. Humes, Dr. Boswell, Agent O’Neill, or the photographer, Reibe, said was missing so much mass. In fact, no witness has ever described seeing a JFK brain that looks like the one in the autopsy photographs. Dr. Levy may have his reasons for rejecting Horne’s hypothesis. But because he sets such stock by official sources and analyses, one wishes he had at least acknowledged this intriguing government report, or the coverage of it in the Washington Post, if only for the purpose of refuting it...." ____________ ARRB STAFF MEMO | BY DOUG HORNE | 6/2/1998 'Questions Regarding Supplementary Brain Examination(s) Following the Autopsy on President John F. Kennedy' https://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_BrainExams/html/d130_0001a.htm DOUG HORNE, PRESS STATEMENT (15th May 2006) https://spartacus-educational.com/JFKhomeD.htm "...Two Brain Examinations My most remarkable finding while on the Review Board staff, and a totally unexpected one, was that instead of one supplemental brain examination being conducted following the conclusion of President Kennedy’s autopsy, as was expected, two different examinations were conducted, about a week apart from each other. A thorough timeline analysis of available documents, and of the testimony of autopsy witnesses taken by the ARRB, revealed that the remains of President Kennedy’s badly damaged brain were examined on Monday morning, November 25, 1963 prior to the state funeral, and that shortly thereafter the brain was turned over to RADM Burkley, Military Physician to the President; a second brain examination, of a fraudulent specimen, was conducted sometime between November 29th and December 2nd, 1963—and it is the photographs from this second examination that are in the National Archives today. Pertinent Facts Regarding the Two Examinations are as follows: First Brain Exam, Monday, November 25th, 1963 Attendees: Dr. Humes, Dr. Boswell, and Navy civilian photographer John Stringer. Events: John Stringer testified to the ARRB that he used both Ektachrome E3 color positive transparency film, and B & W Portrait Pan negative film; both were 4 by 5 inch format films exposed using duplex film holders; he only shot superior views of the intact specimen—no inferior views; the pathologists sectioned the brain, as is normal for death by gunshot wound, with transverse or “coronal” incisions—sometimes called “bread loaf” incisions—in order to trace the track of the bullet or bullets; and after each section of tissue was cut from the brain, Stringer photographed that section on a light box to show the damage. Second Brain Exam, Between November 29th and December 2nd, 1963 Attendees: Dr. Humes, Dr. Boswell, Dr. Finck, and an unknown Navy photographer. Events: Per the testimony of all 3 pathologists, the brain was not sectioned, as should have been normal procedure for any gunshot wound to the head—that is, transverse or coronal sections were not made. The brain looked different than it did at the autopsy on November 22nd, and Dr. Finck wrote about this in a report to his military superior on February 1, 1965. The color slides of the brain specimen in the National Archives were exposed on “Ansco” film, not Ektachrome E3 film; and the B & W negatives are also on “Ansco” film, and originated in a film pack (or magazine), not duplex holders. The brain photos in the Archives show both superior and inferior views, contrary to what John Stringer remembers shooting, and there are no photographs of sections among the Archives brain photographs, which is inconsistent with Stringer’s sworn testimony about what he photographed. Further indications that the brain photographs in the Archives are not President Kennedy’s brain are as follows: Two ARRB medical witnesses, former FBI agent Frank O’Neill and Gawler’s funeral home mortician Tom Robinson, both recalled vividly that the major area of tissue missing from President Kennedy’s brain was in the rear of the brain. The brain photos in the Archives do not show any tissue missing in the rear of the brain, only in the top. When former FBI agent Frank O’Neill viewed the Archives brain photographs during his deposition, he said that the photos he was viewing could not be President Kennedy’s brain because when he viewed the removed brain at the autopsy, the damage was so great that more than half of it was gone—missing. He described the brain photos in the Archives as depicting a ‘virtually intact’ brain. Finally, the weight of the brain recorded in the supplemental autopsy report was 1500 grams, which exceeds the average weight of a normal, undamaged male brain. This is entirely inconsistent with a brain which was over half missing when observed at autopsy. Conclusions The conduct of a second brain examination on a fraudulent specimen, and the introduction of photographs of that specimen into the official record, was designed to do two things: (1) eliminate evidence of a fatal shot from the front, which was evident on the brain removed at autopsy and examined on Monday, November 25th, 1963; and (2) place into the record photographs of a brain with damage generally consistent with having been shot from above and behind. Until I discovered that the photographs in the Archives could not be of President Kennedy’s brain, the brain photos had been used by 3 separate investigative bodies—the Clark Panel, the Rockefeller Commission, and the House Select Committee on Assassinations—to support the Warren Commission’s findings that President Kennedy was shot from above and behind, and to discount the expert observations from Parkland hospital in Dallas that President Kennedy had an exit wound in the back of his head. In my opinion, the brain photographs in the National Archives, along with Dr. Mantik’s Optical Densitometry analysis of the head x-rays, are two irrefutable examples of fraud in this case, and call into question the official conclusions of all prior investigations. [For those who wish detailed verification of this hypothesis, the 32-page research paper on this subject that I completed in 1998 will be made available at the end of this press conference.]..." https://spartacus-educational.com/JFKhomeD.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Bojczuk Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 Just for my own amusement, I copied and pasted Keven's last post into a text editor, to find out how many words there were. The figure I was given was 9,320. Handy hint: almost no-one will bother to read a forum comment that's 9,320 words long, or even a small fraction of that. You're weakening your case, not strengthening it, by posting such long comments. It's much more effective to provide links, with summaries if necessary. End of handy hint. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keven Hofeling Posted February 1 Author Share Posted February 1 32 minutes ago, Jeremy Bojczuk said: Just for my own amusement, I copied and pasted Keven's last post into a text editor, to find out how many words there were. The figure I was given was 9,320. Handy hint: almost no-one will bother to read a forum comment that's 9,320 words long, or even a small fraction of that. You're weakening your case, not strengthening it, by posting such long comments. It's much more effective to provide links, with summaries if necessary. End of handy hint. My posts are intended for people who have worked hard to acquire an understanding of the assassination. With your obsession with JFKA material that appeals to the lamestream, you are obviously not one of these people. Your "hints" are obviously what made you what you are, and are of absolutely no interest to me. I take the intellectual endeavor seriously, and you do not. Case closed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Von Pein Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 (edited) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BOg-l-zBXc-4UjAZuJI-eiZhc2iPbl-2/view http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2011/04/index.html#JFK-Head-Wounds Edited February 1 by David Von Pein Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micah Mileto Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 We already know from basic geometry that the HSCA's interpretation of the empty-cranium photographs cannot be true - the entry and exit in the bone could not only be 5 inches apart, because you cannot pull a brain out of a 5-inch skull cavity - the HSCA's interpretation could only be true if pieces of the rear parts of the skull were somehow replaced after having already been taken out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keven Hofeling Posted March 12 Author Share Posted March 12 On 1/6/2024 at 12:47 AM, Pat Speer said: Geez, Michael, I have been over this dozens of times. Don't swallow the vomit. Read the transcripts. Stringer said he took the back of the head photos and that they reflect what he saw on the night of the shooting. He had a problem with the brain photos, however, in that he felt they were taken with a different kind of film than he was using at the time. That's it. He was 78, and didn't remember using that kind of film. That's it. While people have pretended he said the photos were faked, and were of a different brain than Kennedy's, he never said that. It wasn't the condition of the brain that bothered him. It was the type of film. Stringer was, and is, a strong witness for there being NO blowout on the back of the head, and untrustworthy people have tried to twist him into being a strong witness for a blowout wound low on the back of the head. It's a con. He authenticated the back of the head photos numerous times. But no one on this side of the fence mentions that. @Michael Crane Don't be misled by Speer's deceptive representations about Bethesda autopsy photographer John Stringer. Although Speer is intimately aware of David Lifton's 1972 interview of Stringer (in which Stringer asserts that he photographed the occipital parietal wound AND that the top of JFK's head was INTACT), Speer instead refers to government interviews in which Stringer adhered to the government script of the fraudulent autopsy. Also note that David Lifton conducted his interview of John Stringer in 1972 when he was much younger and would have been in much better control of his mental faculties, and that Speer on his website dismisses Stringer's account on the absurd basis that the question about where the back of the head rests on the rear portion of a bathtub is so confusing that it invalidates everything Stringer said about the existence of the back of the head wound and the top of JFK's head being intact. This is of course a blatant example of Speer spinning the Lifton interview into something it is not because it demolishes Speer's mythological account of the integrity of the fraudulent autopsy photographs and X-rays, a significant number of which are missing from the extant inventory at the National Archives (Doug Horne estimates that up to eighteen autopsy photographs and a half dozen X-rays are no longer in the extant inventory today). Also relevant to the topic is Bethesda autopsy photographer Floyd Riebe's demonstration of JFK's back of the head wound, as follows: Furthermore, and absolutely fatal to the claim that the autopsy photographs have been authenticated is the fact that the HSCA's test to match the Bethesda autopsy camera to the autopsy photographs failed, and the HSCA then "lost" the camera and failed to disclose the failure to authenticate the photographs in the HSCA final conclusions. As Dr. Gary Aguilar explained: "...The HSCA also said it had validated compelling autopsy photographs that show no defect where myriad credible witnesses, both in Dallas and in the morgue, say they saw one. The images show a gaping wound in front of JFK’s right ear and toward the top of the front of his skull. The back of the skull is virtually pristine. The authenticated autopsy images gave the HSCA powerful ammunition to shoot down witnesses who said JFK’s skull gaping skull wound was in the rear. But the HSCA was apparently shooting blanks, a fact the HSCA apparently preferred to leave hidden until the required declassification date in 2028. For, whereas the HSCA boasted of the authenticity of JFK’s autopsy photographs, a new document reveals that in fact those images flunked a key HSCA authentication test: the pictures failed a test intended to link them to the camera in the Navy morgue that was supposed to have taken them. The images never were, therefore, authenticated. Nor, apparently, will they ever be. THE MORGUE CAMERA THAT THE NAVY SENT TO THE HSCA FOR THE TESTS DISAPPEARED SOMETIME AFTER THE EXAMINATION...." (emphasis not in original) https://www.history-matters.com/essays/jfkmed/How5Investigations/How5InvestigationsGotItWrong_5.htm NOTE that the second link below is to the transcript of David Lifton's 1972 recorded interview of John Stringer which is an ARRB exhibit designated as ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARD MD 84. The following is the relevant excerpt of the interview: ------------------------------------------------------ "...JOHN STRINGER: was the autopsy photographer. David Lifton interviewed Stringer, in part, as follows: LIFTON: "When you lifted him out, was the main damage to the skull on the top or in the back?" STRINGER: "In the back." LIFTON: "In the back?...High in the back or lower in the back?" STRINGER: "In the occipital part, in the back there, up above the neck." LIFTON: "In other words, the main part of his head that was blasted away was in the occipital part of the skull?" STRINGER: "Yes. In the back part." LIFTON: "The back portion. Okay. In other words, there was no five-inch hole in the top of the skull?" STRINGER: "Oh, some of it was blown off--yes, I mean, toward, out of the top in the back, yes." LIFTON: "Top in the back. But the top in the front was pretty intact?" STRINGER: "Yes, sure." LIFTON: "The top front was intact?" STRINGER: "Right." Lifton, unsatisfied with precisely what Stringer may have meant by the 'back of the head' asked, as he had asked McHugh, if by "back of the head" Stringer meant the portion of the head that rests on the rear portion of a bathtub during bathing. Stringer replied, "Yes."--as had McHugh (BE, p.516)..." http://www.assassinationweb.com/ag6.htm ----------------------------------------------- ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARD MD 84: Transcript (Copyright David S. Lifton 1972 All Rights Reserved) Excerpts of Telephone Interview of John T. Stringer Conducted by David S. Lifton on August 25, 1972 https://historymatters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/pdf/md84.pdf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Speer Posted March 12 Share Posted March 12 2 hours ago, Keven Hofeling said: @Michael Crane Don't be misled by Speer's deceptive representations about Bethesda autopsy photographer John Stringer. Although Speer is intimately aware of David Lifton's 1972 interview of Stringer (in which Stringer asserts that he photographed the occipital parietal wound AND that the top of JFK's head was INTACT), Speer instead refers to government interviews in which Stringer adhered to the government script of the fraudulent autopsy. Also note that David Lifton conducted his interview of John Stringer in 1972 when he was much younger and would have been in much better control of his mental faculties, and that Speer on his website dismisses Stringer's account on the absurd basis that the question about where the back of the head rests on the rear portion of a bathtub is so confusing that it invalidates everything Stringer said about the existence of the back of the head wound and the top of JFK's head being intact. This is of course a blatant example of Speer spinning the Lifton interview into something it is not because it demolishes Speer's mythological account of the integrity of the fraudulent autopsy photographs and X-rays, a significant number of which are missing from the extant inventory at the National Archives (Doug Horne estimates that up to eighteen autopsy photographs and a half dozen X-rays are no longer in the extant inventory today). Also relevant to the topic is Bethesda autopsy photographer Floyd Riebe's demonstration of JFK's back of the head wound, as follows: Furthermore, and absolutely fatal to the claim that the autopsy photographs have been authenticated is the fact that the HSCA's test to match the Bethesda autopsy camera to the autopsy photographs failed, and the HSCA then "lost" the camera and failed to disclose the failure to authenticate the photographs in the HSCA final conclusions. As Dr. Gary Aguilar explained: "...The HSCA also said it had validated compelling autopsy photographs that show no defect where myriad credible witnesses, both in Dallas and in the morgue, say they saw one. The images show a gaping wound in front of JFK’s right ear and toward the top of the front of his skull. The back of the skull is virtually pristine. The authenticated autopsy images gave the HSCA powerful ammunition to shoot down witnesses who said JFK’s skull gaping skull wound was in the rear. But the HSCA was apparently shooting blanks, a fact the HSCA apparently preferred to leave hidden until the required declassification date in 2028. For, whereas the HSCA boasted of the authenticity of JFK’s autopsy photographs, a new document reveals that in fact those images flunked a key HSCA authentication test: the pictures failed a test intended to link them to the camera in the Navy morgue that was supposed to have taken them. The images never were, therefore, authenticated. Nor, apparently, will they ever be. THE MORGUE CAMERA THAT THE NAVY SENT TO THE HSCA FOR THE TESTS DISAPPEARED SOMETIME AFTER THE EXAMINATION...." (emphasis not in original) https://www.history-matters.com/essays/jfkmed/How5Investigations/How5InvestigationsGotItWrong_5.htm NOTE that the second link below is to the transcript of David Lifton's 1972 recorded interview of John Stringer which is an ARRB exhibit designated as ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARD MD 84. The following is the relevant excerpt of the interview: ------------------------------------------------------ "...JOHN STRINGER: was the autopsy photographer. David Lifton interviewed Stringer, in part, as follows: LIFTON: "When you lifted him out, was the main damage to the skull on the top or in the back?" STRINGER: "In the back." LIFTON: "In the back?...High in the back or lower in the back?" STRINGER: "In the occipital part, in the back there, up above the neck." LIFTON: "In other words, the main part of his head that was blasted away was in the occipital part of the skull?" STRINGER: "Yes. In the back part." LIFTON: "The back portion. Okay. In other words, there was no five-inch hole in the top of the skull?" STRINGER: "Oh, some of it was blown off--yes, I mean, toward, out of the top in the back, yes." LIFTON: "Top in the back. But the top in the front was pretty intact?" STRINGER: "Yes, sure." LIFTON: "The top front was intact?" STRINGER: "Right." Lifton, unsatisfied with precisely what Stringer may have meant by the 'back of the head' asked, as he had asked McHugh, if by "back of the head" Stringer meant the portion of the head that rests on the rear portion of a bathtub during bathing. Stringer replied, "Yes."--as had McHugh (BE, p.516)..." http://www.assassinationweb.com/ag6.htm ----------------------------------------------- ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARD MD 84: Transcript (Copyright David S. Lifton 1972 All Rights Reserved) Excerpts of Telephone Interview of John T. Stringer Conducted by David S. Lifton on August 25, 1972 https://historymatters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/pdf/md84.pdf From Chapter 18c; Autopsy photographer John Stringer's statements and testimony have been similarly mislabeled. Stringer, we should recall, signed the November 1, 1966 inventory of the autopsy materials--along with Dr.s Boswell, Ebersole, and Humes. This inventory was purported to list "all the x-rays and photographs taken by us during the autopsy." Now this is important. Although Stringer and the others would later admit that they actually believed some x-rays and photos were missing, they would never once waiver from their claim the x-rays and photos of Kennedy's body they'd observed at the archives were authentic, and were ones they'd had created. Now, to be clear, Stringer contributed to the confusion surrounding his statements. In 1996, while testifying before the ARRB, Stringer failed to recognize the photos of Kennedy's brain as photos he'd taken at the supplementary examination. He thought he would have done a better job identifying the photos themselves when taken; he thought he'd have used a different kind of film; and he didn't remember taking one of the views. Well, this, of course, is interesting. But conspiracy theorists of all stripes have taken from this that the photos were switched out to hide a hole on the back of the brain, a hole proving once and for all that the shot killing Kennedy came from the front and blew out the back of his head. Many assert that this makes Stringer--yep, you guessed it--a "back of the head" witness... And that's just nonsense. I mean, if in 1996 the 78 year-old Stringer could tell just by looking at the photos that they were not his creation, wouldn't he have been much better able to tell this in 1966, just a few years after they were taken, when he was but 48? Well, then why didn't he say so, or remember his thinking so? The thought occurs that by 1996 Stringer's memory had slipped a bit. (Note: this is more than a passing thought. Stringer's obituary, found online, notes that he died on 8-17-11, at the age of 93, and that his wife of 51 years had died in 1993. Well, sadly, men widowed at such an age often start to slip. Only making this possibility more likely, moreover, is that Stringer's obituary further stated that memorial contributions could be made to the Alzheimer's Association of Vero Beach, Florida. So, yeah, the accuracy of the man's memories in 1996 are open to question.) Now, to be clear, it's hard to say just when Stringer's memories started fading. In 1977, the HSCA asked the then 59 year-old Stringer to go to the archives and look at the autopsy photos. The report on his doing so reflects that, while he was uncertain he'd taken the black and white photos of the brain, the brain itself gave the appearance of the brain he'd photographed, and that the brain, as Kennedy's brain, was not sectioned (cut into quarters). So, hmmm, Stringer was uncertain about the photos...but felt the brain in the photos was quite possibly Kennedy's brain. It's hard to see, then, how one can stretch his statements to include that the back of the head was blown out. While some, including Doug Horne and writer Jim DiEugenio, are fond of pointing out that Stringer told the ARRB that autopsy photographers who objected to things, such as rushing through the autopsy, didn't "last long," this by no means suggests that, in 1966, he would have readily gone along with someone switching out his photos to hide the true nature of Kennedy's wounds. That just goes too far. By 1996, when Stringer was first contacted by the ARRB, his memory had faded so badly that he couldn't even remember being contacted by the HSCA in 1977, let alone visiting the archives on their behalf. It follows then that the confusing aspects of his ARRB testimony may simply have been a reflection of his age, and the passing of time. It makes little sense, after all, to assume Stringer would readily admit what all too many now perceive as as an important truth--that he did not take the brain photographs--but then lie about the nature of Kennedy's head wounds in order to "get along." What, are we to believe Stringer was so stupid he didn't realize his disowning the brain photos was bound to raise some questions? And yes, you read that right. Those holding that Stringer was a bold and fearless truth-teller when discussing the brain photos inevitably hold he was a cowardly liar when discussing Kennedy's head wounds. Consider... When first contacted by Doug Horne on behalf the ARRB, and asked to describe the large head wound, Stringer told Horne "there was a fist-sized hole in the right side of his head above his ear...It was the size of your fist and it was entirely within the hair area. There was a sort of flap of skin there, and some of the underlying bone was gone." When under oath in his ARRB testimony, moreover, Stringer further confirmed that, no matter who took the brain photos, there was NO large blow-out wound on the back of Kennedy's head. When asked to describe Kennedy's head wounds, he at first described a small wound on the occipital bone near the EOP, "about the size of a bullet, from what you could see."He then described the large head wound: "Well, the side of the head, the bone was gone. But there was a flap, where you could lay it back. But the back - I mean, if you held it in, there was no vision. It was a complete head of hair. And on the front, there was nothing - the scalp. There was nothing in the eyes. You could have - Well, when they did the body, you wouldn't have known there was anything wrong." He was thereby describing the wound depicted in the autopsy photos and not the wound on the far back of the head proposed in books such as Horne's. Which only makes sense... Stringer had, after all, signed the aforementioned inventory in 1966 in which it was claimed the autopsy photos were those he'd taken, and had, upon studying these photos a second time in 1977, confirmed this by explaining to the HSCA's investigators what he was trying to portray as he took each shot. He had, moreover, told an interviewer from the Vero Beach Press-Journal in 1974 that the fatal bullet "had entered the right lower rear" of Kennedy's head and had come "out in the hair in the upper right side, taking with it a large chunk of his skull." While Mr. Stringer had also intimated (in a 1972 phone call with David Lifton) that the "main damage" was on the "back part" of Kennedy's skull, it's not entirely clear that Stringer was describing the damage to the skull apparent before the reflection of the scalp, or after. It's fortunate then that Stringer got a chance to clarify this issue in his ARRB testimony. He explained that when he first saw the skull, the scalp at the back of the head "was all intact. But then they peeled it back, and then you could see this part of the bone gone." Now, should one believe I'm cherry-picking here, and wrongly accepting Stringer's latter-day recollections over his much earlier statements to Lifton, one should go back and read the transcript of Stringer's conversation with Lifton, as released by the ARRB. It's confusing to say the least. After Stringer told Lifton the wound was on the "back part" of the skull, Lifton sought further clarification. He asked "In other words, there was no five-inch hole in the top of his head?" To which Stringer replied "Oh, it was...ahh some of it was blown off--yeah. I mean, ahh...towards out of the top, in the back, yeah." Apparently unsatisfied with that answer, Lifton later returned to this question, and re-framed it in one of the most confusing series of questions I've ever read. He asked "If you lie back in a bath tub, just in a totally prone position and your head rests against the bath tub, is that the part of the head, you know, is that the part of the head that was damaged?" To which Stringer replied "Yeah." (Now, I'm already lost. If you're laying back in a bath tub, you're not really prone, are you? Does Stringer's response then indicate that the top of the head was damaged? Or the back of the head?) Lifton then sought further clarification--with an equally confusing question. He asked "the part that would be against the tile of the bathtub?" To which Stringer replied "Mm-hmmm." (I'm still lost. Isn't the "tile of the bathtub" normally the tile on the back wall of a bathtub? And, if so, doesn't Stringer's response suggest the crown of the head was damaged, and not the back?) Lifton then tried again: "Whereas the part that would be straight up ahead, vertically in that position--was undamaged?" To which Stringer replied "Oh, I wouldn't say--undamaged--no. There was---some of it was gone--I mean--out of some of the bone." (Now, I'm not exactly sure what this means. But it seems clear, nevertheless, that Stringer thought he'd observed a hole on the top of Kennedy's head, where so many assume no hole was found. And that's not all that seems clear. In his book Best Evidence, Lifton re-writes this last question, and changes the context of Stringer's reply. He claims he asked Stringer "about the part of the head which in that position would be straight up and down, the vertical part, the 'top.' Was that undamaged?" His actual words, of course, were not so clear. According to his transcript, he not only failed to specify that he was talking about the top of the head, but said "straight up ahead"instead of "straight up and down." And that's confusing as heck. There is reason to believe then, that Stringer was confused by Lifton's questions, and just played along to get him off his back, not realizing his answers would be quoted in a best-selling book some 9 years later, and cited as evidence for a massive conspiracy.) And should one still have doubts Stringer failed to see a large hole on the back of Kennedy's head where conspiracy theorists believe it to have been, Stringer explained under further questioning by the ARRB that the occipital bone was "intact" but fractured, and that he could not recall any of it missing upon reflection of the scalp. So, yes, it's clear. Those believing Stringer to be honest and credible when telling the ARRB he didn't take the brain photos, and then using this to suggest there was a blow-out wound to the back of Kennedy's head, are behaving like the Warren Commission in reverse: taking snippets of someone's testimony, propping these snippets up as proof of something, and then finding ways to hide or ignore that the bulk of the witness' statements suggest something other than what they are trying to prove. Now, this is fairly common behavior, on all sides of the discussion. But what is unusual in this circumstance is the strength with which those pushing this view hold onto two mutually exclusive ideas: 1) Stringer is a brave truth teller, and PROOF the brain photos are not of Kennedy's brain, and 2) Stringer is a gutless liar, out to protect the status quo by pretending there was no hole on the back of Kennedy's head. I trust I'm not alone in finding this a problem. As far as Doug Horne, not only does he push in his book that Stringer lied about Kennedy's head wounds to the ARRB, he asserts that Stringer first publicly reversed himself from the descriptions he'd provided Lifton (in the 1972 phone call) in 1993. This avoids that in the 1993 article cited by Horne, Stringer's 1974 comments, in which he'd accurately described the wounds depicted in the autopsy photos, were discussed, as well as the fact that a TV crew inspired by Lifton's book interviewed Stringer in 1988, only to shelve the footage when Stringer told them the autopsy photos were accurate depictions of Kennedy's wounds. This, then, raises as many questions about Horne's integrity as Stringer's. That Stringer was describing the wounds shown in the autopsy photos as early as 1974, after all, cuts into Horne's position that Stringer reversed himself on the nature of these wounds as a response to Lifton's book, published seven years later, in 1981. 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Keven Hofeling Posted March 12 Author Share Posted March 12 4 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: From Chapter 18c; Autopsy photographer John Stringer's statements and testimony have been similarly mislabeled. Stringer, we should recall, signed the November 1, 1966 inventory of the autopsy materials--along with Dr.s Boswell, Ebersole, and Humes. This inventory was purported to list "all the x-rays and photographs taken by us during the autopsy." Now this is important. Although Stringer and the others would later admit that they actually believed some x-rays and photos were missing, they would never once waiver from their claim the x-rays and photos of Kennedy's body they'd observed at the archives were authentic, and were ones they'd had created. Now, to be clear, Stringer contributed to the confusion surrounding his statements. In 1996, while testifying before the ARRB, Stringer failed to recognize the photos of Kennedy's brain as photos he'd taken at the supplementary examination. He thought he would have done a better job identifying the photos themselves when taken; he thought he'd have used a different kind of film; and he didn't remember taking one of the views. Well, this, of course, is interesting. But conspiracy theorists of all stripes have taken from this that the photos were switched out to hide a hole on the back of the brain, a hole proving once and for all that the shot killing Kennedy came from the front and blew out the back of his head. Many assert that this makes Stringer--yep, you guessed it--a "back of the head" witness... And that's just nonsense. I mean, if in 1996 the 78 year-old Stringer could tell just by looking at the photos that they were not his creation, wouldn't he have been much better able to tell this in 1966, just a few years after they were taken, when he was but 48? Well, then why didn't he say so, or remember his thinking so? The thought occurs that by 1996 Stringer's memory had slipped a bit. (Note: this is more than a passing thought. Stringer's obituary, found online, notes that he died on 8-17-11, at the age of 93, and that his wife of 51 years had died in 1993. Well, sadly, men widowed at such an age often start to slip. Only making this possibility more likely, moreover, is that Stringer's obituary further stated that memorial contributions could be made to the Alzheimer's Association of Vero Beach, Florida. So, yeah, the accuracy of the man's memories in 1996 are open to question.) Now, to be clear, it's hard to say just when Stringer's memories started fading. In 1977, the HSCA asked the then 59 year-old Stringer to go to the archives and look at the autopsy photos. The report on his doing so reflects that, while he was uncertain he'd taken the black and white photos of the brain, the brain itself gave the appearance of the brain he'd photographed, and that the brain, as Kennedy's brain, was not sectioned (cut into quarters). So, hmmm, Stringer was uncertain about the photos...but felt the brain in the photos was quite possibly Kennedy's brain. It's hard to see, then, how one can stretch his statements to include that the back of the head was blown out. While some, including Doug Horne and writer Jim DiEugenio, are fond of pointing out that Stringer told the ARRB that autopsy photographers who objected to things, such as rushing through the autopsy, didn't "last long," this by no means suggests that, in 1966, he would have readily gone along with someone switching out his photos to hide the true nature of Kennedy's wounds. That just goes too far. By 1996, when Stringer was first contacted by the ARRB, his memory had faded so badly that he couldn't even remember being contacted by the HSCA in 1977, let alone visiting the archives on their behalf. It follows then that the confusing aspects of his ARRB testimony may simply have been a reflection of his age, and the passing of time. It makes little sense, after all, to assume Stringer would readily admit what all too many now perceive as as an important truth--that he did not take the brain photographs--but then lie about the nature of Kennedy's head wounds in order to "get along." What, are we to believe Stringer was so stupid he didn't realize his disowning the brain photos was bound to raise some questions? And yes, you read that right. Those holding that Stringer was a bold and fearless truth-teller when discussing the brain photos inevitably hold he was a cowardly liar when discussing Kennedy's head wounds. Consider... When first contacted by Doug Horne on behalf the ARRB, and asked to describe the large head wound, Stringer told Horne "there was a fist-sized hole in the right side of his head above his ear...It was the size of your fist and it was entirely within the hair area. There was a sort of flap of skin there, and some of the underlying bone was gone." When under oath in his ARRB testimony, moreover, Stringer further confirmed that, no matter who took the brain photos, there was NO large blow-out wound on the back of Kennedy's head. When asked to describe Kennedy's head wounds, he at first described a small wound on the occipital bone near the EOP, "about the size of a bullet, from what you could see."He then described the large head wound: "Well, the side of the head, the bone was gone. But there was a flap, where you could lay it back. But the back - I mean, if you held it in, there was no vision. It was a complete head of hair. And on the front, there was nothing - the scalp. There was nothing in the eyes. You could have - Well, when they did the body, you wouldn't have known there was anything wrong." He was thereby describing the wound depicted in the autopsy photos and not the wound on the far back of the head proposed in books such as Horne's. Which only makes sense... Stringer had, after all, signed the aforementioned inventory in 1966 in which it was claimed the autopsy photos were those he'd taken, and had, upon studying these photos a second time in 1977, confirmed this by explaining to the HSCA's investigators what he was trying to portray as he took each shot. He had, moreover, told an interviewer from the Vero Beach Press-Journal in 1974 that the fatal bullet "had entered the right lower rear" of Kennedy's head and had come "out in the hair in the upper right side, taking with it a large chunk of his skull." While Mr. Stringer had also intimated (in a 1972 phone call with David Lifton) that the "main damage" was on the "back part" of Kennedy's skull, it's not entirely clear that Stringer was describing the damage to the skull apparent before the reflection of the scalp, or after. It's fortunate then that Stringer got a chance to clarify this issue in his ARRB testimony. He explained that when he first saw the skull, the scalp at the back of the head "was all intact. But then they peeled it back, and then you could see this part of the bone gone." Now, should one believe I'm cherry-picking here, and wrongly accepting Stringer's latter-day recollections over his much earlier statements to Lifton, one should go back and read the transcript of Stringer's conversation with Lifton, as released by the ARRB. It's confusing to say the least. After Stringer told Lifton the wound was on the "back part" of the skull, Lifton sought further clarification. He asked "In other words, there was no five-inch hole in the top of his head?" To which Stringer replied "Oh, it was...ahh some of it was blown off--yeah. I mean, ahh...towards out of the top, in the back, yeah." Apparently unsatisfied with that answer, Lifton later returned to this question, and re-framed it in one of the most confusing series of questions I've ever read. He asked "If you lie back in a bath tub, just in a totally prone position and your head rests against the bath tub, is that the part of the head, you know, is that the part of the head that was damaged?" To which Stringer replied "Yeah." (Now, I'm already lost. If you're laying back in a bath tub, you're not really prone, are you? Does Stringer's response then indicate that the top of the head was damaged? Or the back of the head?) Lifton then sought further clarification--with an equally confusing question. He asked "the part that would be against the tile of the bathtub?" To which Stringer replied "Mm-hmmm." (I'm still lost. Isn't the "tile of the bathtub" normally the tile on the back wall of a bathtub? And, if so, doesn't Stringer's response suggest the crown of the head was damaged, and not the back?) Lifton then tried again: "Whereas the part that would be straight up ahead, vertically in that position--was undamaged?" To which Stringer replied "Oh, I wouldn't say--undamaged--no. There was---some of it was gone--I mean--out of some of the bone." (Now, I'm not exactly sure what this means. But it seems clear, nevertheless, that Stringer thought he'd observed a hole on the top of Kennedy's head, where so many assume no hole was found. And that's not all that seems clear. In his book Best Evidence, Lifton re-writes this last question, and changes the context of Stringer's reply. He claims he asked Stringer "about the part of the head which in that position would be straight up and down, the vertical part, the 'top.' Was that undamaged?" His actual words, of course, were not so clear. According to his transcript, he not only failed to specify that he was talking about the top of the head, but said "straight up ahead"instead of "straight up and down." And that's confusing as heck. There is reason to believe then, that Stringer was confused by Lifton's questions, and just played along to get him off his back, not realizing his answers would be quoted in a best-selling book some 9 years later, and cited as evidence for a massive conspiracy.) And should one still have doubts Stringer failed to see a large hole on the back of Kennedy's head where conspiracy theorists believe it to have been, Stringer explained under further questioning by the ARRB that the occipital bone was "intact" but fractured, and that he could not recall any of it missing upon reflection of the scalp. So, yes, it's clear. Those believing Stringer to be honest and credible when telling the ARRB he didn't take the brain photos, and then using this to suggest there was a blow-out wound to the back of Kennedy's head, are behaving like the Warren Commission in reverse: taking snippets of someone's testimony, propping these snippets up as proof of something, and then finding ways to hide or ignore that the bulk of the witness' statements suggest something other than what they are trying to prove. Now, this is fairly common behavior, on all sides of the discussion. But what is unusual in this circumstance is the strength with which those pushing this view hold onto two mutually exclusive ideas: 1) Stringer is a brave truth teller, and PROOF the brain photos are not of Kennedy's brain, and 2) Stringer is a gutless liar, out to protect the status quo by pretending there was no hole on the back of Kennedy's head. I trust I'm not alone in finding this a problem. As far as Doug Horne, not only does he push in his book that Stringer lied about Kennedy's head wounds to the ARRB, he asserts that Stringer first publicly reversed himself from the descriptions he'd provided Lifton (in the 1972 phone call) in 1993. This avoids that in the 1993 article cited by Horne, Stringer's 1974 comments, in which he'd accurately described the wounds depicted in the autopsy photos, were discussed, as well as the fact that a TV crew inspired by Lifton's book interviewed Stringer in 1988, only to shelve the footage when Stringer told them the autopsy photos were accurate depictions of Kennedy's wounds. This, then, raises as many questions about Horne's integrity as Stringer's. That Stringer was describing the wounds shown in the autopsy photos as early as 1974, after all, cuts into Horne's position that Stringer reversed himself on the nature of these wounds as a response to Lifton's book, published seven years later, in 1981. I knew you were going to cut and paste this as a response, so I addressed it in advance. Regurgitating the same nonsense over and over doesn't lend it any credibility. This was my advance response to your cut and paste job: Don't be misled by Speer's deceptive representations about Bethesda autopsy photographer John Stringer. Although Speer is intimately aware of David Lifton's 1972 interview of Stringer (in which Stringer asserts that he photographed the occipital parietal wound AND that the top of JFK's head was INTACT), Speer instead refers to government interviews in which Stringer adhered to the government script of the fraudulent autopsy. Also note that David Lifton conducted his interview of John Stringer in 1972 when he was much younger and would have been in much better control of his mental faculties, and that Speer on his website dismisses Stringer's account on the absurd basis that the question about where the back of the head rests on the rear portion of a bathtub is so confusing that it invalidates everything Stringer said about the existence of the back of the head wound and the top of JFK's head being intact. This is of course a blatant example of Speer spinning the Lifton interview into something it is not because it demolishes Speer's mythological account of the integrity of the fraudulent autopsy photographs and X-rays, a significant number of which are missing from the extant inventory at the National Archives (Doug Horne estimates that up to eighteen autopsy photographs and a half dozen X-rays are no longer in the extant inventory today). NOTE that the second link below is to the transcript of David Lifton's 1972 recorded interview of John Stringer which is an ARRB exhibit designated as ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARD MD 84. The following is the relevant excerpt of the interview: ------------------------------------------------------ "...JOHN STRINGER: was the autopsy photographer. David Lifton interviewed Stringer, in part, as follows: LIFTON: "When you lifted him out, was the main damage to the skull on the top or in the back?" STRINGER: "In the back." LIFTON: "In the back?...High in the back or lower in the back?" STRINGER: "In the occipital part, in the back there, up above the neck." LIFTON: "In other words, the main part of his head that was blasted away was in the occipital part of the skull?" STRINGER: "Yes. In the back part." LIFTON: "The back portion. Okay. In other words, there was no five-inch hole in the top of the skull?" STRINGER: "Oh, some of it was blown off--yes, I mean, toward, out of the top in the back, yes." LIFTON: "Top in the back. But the top in the front was pretty intact?" STRINGER: "Yes, sure." LIFTON: "The top front was intact?" STRINGER: "Right." Lifton, unsatisfied with precisely what Stringer may have meant by the 'back of the head' asked, as he had asked McHugh, if by "back of the head" Stringer meant the portion of the head that rests on the rear portion of a bathtub during bathing. Stringer replied, "Yes."--as had McHugh (BE, p.516)..." http://www.assassinationweb.com/ag6.htm ----------------------------------------------- ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARD MD 84: Transcript (Copyright David S. Lifton 1972 All Rights Reserved) Excerpts of Telephone Interview of John T. Stringer Conducted by David S. Lifton on August 25, 1972 https://historymatters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/master_med_set/pdf/md84.pdf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Speer Posted March 12 Share Posted March 12 55 minutes ago, Keven Hofeling said: Keven: "Regurgitating the same nonsense over and over doesn't lend it any credibility." Perhaps the most ironic words ever written on this forum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keven Hofeling Posted March 12 Author Share Posted March 12 7 minutes ago, Pat Speer said: Keven: "Regurgitating the same nonsense over and over doesn't lend it any credibility." Perhaps the most ironic words ever written on this forum. Okay, let's try this: Let's see you address some facts about the failure of the HSCA to authenticate the autopsy photographs, a subject about which you cannot spam me again with a cut and paste because it is of course not addressed on your website. And while you are at it, why don't you explain to us WHY there is nothing on your website about the HSCA making the Bethesda autopsy camera disappear after failing to match the autopsy photographs to it. The following from Dr. Gary Aguilar, Dr. Cyril Wecht and Rex Bradford: https://websites.umich.edu/~ahaq/correspondence.pdf ______________ The story begins in an inconspicuous footnote that qualified the HSCA’s public claim that from “microscopic” and “stereoscopic” examinations of the photos its experts had confidently concluded that the images were authentic (52, 53). 52. HSCA vol 6:225–226. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol6/html/HSCA_Vol6_0116a.htm to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol6/html/HSCA_Vol6_0116b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. 53. HSCA report by Frank Scott entitled, “Report on Autopsy Color Photographs Authenticity.” HSCA vol 7:69–71. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0040a.htm to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0041a.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. The footnote only offered the minor caution that the HSCA had encountered a negligible glitch during authentication. It wrote: Because the Department of Defense was unable to locate the camera and lens that were used to take these [autopsy] photographs, the [photographic] panel was unable to engage in an analysis similar to the one undertaken with the Oswald backyard pictures that was designed to determine whether a particular camera in issue had been used to take the photographs that were the subject of inquiry. (54) 54. HSCA vol 6:226, footnote # 1. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol6/html/HSCA_Vol6_0116b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Regarding that very sentence, ARRB investigator, Mr. Douglas Horne, wrote, “By late 1997, enough related documents had been located and assembled by the authors to bring into serious doubt the accuracy of the HSCA’s conclusion that ‘the Department of Defense was unable to locate the camera and lens’. . .” (22). 22. ARRB memorandum for file by Mr. Doug Horne entitled, “Unanswered Questions Raised by the HSCA’s Analysis and Conclusions Regarding the Camera Identified by the Navy and the department of Defense as the Camera Used at President Kennedy’s Autopsy,” pp 2–24. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0001b.htm. to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0012b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Mr. Horne reported that the Navy had sent the HSCA a fact sheet that “strongly reiterates the Navy’s position that the camera provided to the HSCA was indeed the camera used at the autopsy on President Kennedy.” The proof was a suppressed letter to the HSCA from the Assistant Secretary of Defense indicating that the Department of Defense had indeed located, and had in fact already sent to the HSCA, “the only [camera] in use at the National Naval Medical Center in 1963” (22). 22. ARRB memorandum for file by Mr. Doug Horne entitled, “Unanswered Questions Raised by the HSCA’s Analysis and Conclusions Regarding the Camera Identified by the Navy and the department of Defense as the Camera Used at President Kennedy’s Autopsy,” pp 2–24. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0001b.htm. to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0012b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. However the HSCA wasn’t satisfied with the camera the Defense Department had fetched. In a letter asking the Secretary of Defense to look around for another one, HSCA chief counsel, Robert Blakey, explained the problem: [O]ur photographic experts have determined that this camera, or at least the particular lens and shutter attached to it, could not have been used to take [JFK’s]autopsy pictures. (22) 22. ARRB memorandum for file by Mr. Doug Horne entitled, “Unanswered Questions Raised by the HSCA’s Analysis and Conclusions Regarding the Camera Identified by the Navy and the department of Defense as the Camera Used at President Kennedy’s Autopsy,” pp 2–24. On-line at: http://history-matters.com/archive/ jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0001b.htm. to http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/arrb/staff_memos/DH_HscaCamera/html/dh_hscaCamera_0012b.htm. Accessed 10/29/04. Whereas the HSCA reported it could not completely close the loop because the camera was missing, the suppressed record suggests that 1) the loop was closed, 2) the camera was located, and 3) that the HSCA’s own experts determined the camera “could not have been used to take [JFK’s] autopsy pictures.” The HSCA staff elected to withhold this inconvenient information from the public. They also kept it from their own experts on the FPP, including the chairman, Dr. Micheal Baden (personal communication), and one of the authors of this essay [CHW]. And so, as Dr. Levy makes clear, the FPP experts were left to labor under the illusion that the images had passed authentication with flying colors. THE ARRB ON THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE JFK AUTOPSY CAMERA DURING THE HOUSE SELECT COMMITTEE ON ASSASSINATIONS INVESTIGATION: "...4. By late 1997, enough related documents had been located and assembled by the author to bring into serious doubt the accuracy of the HSCA's conclusion (see paragraph 2 above) that "...the Department of Defense was unable to locate the camera and lens...used to take...[the autopsy] photographs." If the HSCA was incorrect in its conclusion that the camera it examined was not the autopsy camera, the implications for what may have happened on November 22-23, 1963 are considerable. In paragraph 5 below, a timeline has been constructed of HSCA activities in the autopsy camera area, referencing appropriate documents assembled by the author, that will explain why a reasonable student of the assassination might conclude that the HSCA reached the wrong conclusion regarding the autopsy camera. [Appropriate documents are attached to this memo as enclosures.] Implications of the HSCA's possibly incorrect analysis of the situation are explored in paragraph 6 below...." "...7. Looking at this problem from another viewpoint, the HSCA report writers (presumably Blakey, Cornwell and Billings) might just as well have said, after receiving John Kester's letter of April 20, 1978, "Because the Navy did provide the camera used at the autopsy, through DOD, for our examination--and our experts have concluded it could not have been used to take the autopsy pictures--the Committee therefore concludes that the official autopsy photographs in the collection at the National Archives were taken by someone other than John Stringer, and that John Stringer's photographs were removed from the collection prior to April 26, 1965." But instead of openly pointing out, in its written report, the possibility of either conclusion being correct, the HSCA apparently assumed the photographs were Stringer's without question, and therefore concluded that the Navy and DOD must have provided the wrong camera to the Committee, in spite of the strong assurances of the Department of Defense that the Graphic View Camera provided for examination in 1978 was the only one used at Bethesda in November, 1963. Perhaps worst of all, the document that would have cast doubt on the seeming certainty of the HSCA's conclusion regarding the camera, the John Kester letter of April 20, I978, was apparently sealed for 50 years by someone on the HSCA staff. In light of the HSCA's deposition of Robert L. Knudsen in August. 1978, in which he indicated with great certainty that he had developed color negatives (vice color positive transparencies) from the autopsy, and a film pack of black-and-white negatives (vice black-and-white negatives from a duplex film holder), and the Committee staff's subsequent decision not to publish or even mention his testimony in its final report, and to seal it for 50 years, one cannot wonder whether some important, high-ranking members of the HSCA staff had a strong disposition against accepting, at face value, indications that there may have been chain-of-custody or authenticity problems with key photographic evidence in the Kennedy assassination, and a predilection in favor of benign explanations for apparent discrepancies in the photographic evidence...." https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=43609#relPageId=1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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