Our recent newspaper articles

[Tim Gratz]

No Name Key Soldier of Fortune

Reveals JFK Assassination Secrets

by J. Timothy Gratz and Mark Howell

Only 13 percent of Americans believe President Kennedy was shot by a lone nut, says a 2001 Gallup poll.

What really happened on November 22, 1963 is known only to a handful of people still alive. One of those has recently started to share some of the secrets of the Kennedy assassination.

Gerald Patrick Hemming served as a consultant on the 1991 movie “JFK” and is listed in the credits. This week, Hemming spoke with Solares Hill of the days when he was the leader of Interpen, a group of American anti-Communists who trained Cuban exiles in the early 1960s at a camp on No Name Key, 25 miles north of Key West.

Hemming, who is 6 foot 7 inches tall, was in his early twenties at the time. With his wavy black hair and movie-star good looks, he was often compared to Errol Flynn but Flynn’s movie exploits paled in comparison with hemming’s real-life adventures.

Hemming, raised in Los Angeles, started a paramilitary group while he was still in high school. He served in the Marines, then went to Cuba to train Castro’s paratroopers. When Castro embraced Communism, Hemming returned to the United States and told the CIA what he had observed in Cuba. He then started his Interpen group on the same site on No Name Key once used for the same purpose by Rolando Masferrer, who in Dec. 1960 trained with 300 anti-Castro mercenaries on the key. (Readers will recall that Masferrer was arrested on January 2, 1967 for attempting to launch an invasion of Haiti from Coco Plum Island off Marathon.)

Hemming told Solares Hill that his sources were the first to verify the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba in 1962, and that they were able to provide precise locations for them. Hemming provided this information to Florida Governor Farris Bryant. Hemming states that that the photos of missile sites that Adlai Stevenson showed the United Nations were actually decoy sites set up by the Soviets. Hemming considers the work he did on the Soviet missile sites the most important accomplishment of his life.

In a deposition to the House Assassinations Committee, Hemming testified that in 1963 he was offered money by New Orleans private detective and former FBI agent Guy Banister to kill Kennedy, an offer he refused. (Banister was played in “JFK” by Solares Hill’s friend Ed Asner.) Banister reportedly knew Oswald, a fact confirmed by a New Orleans history professor who had observed the two together on two separate occasions. Hemming testified that George deMohrenschilt, the mysterious Russian from Dallas who became Oswald’s best friend, was present at the meeting when Banister made the offer.

Hemming himself encountered Oswald twice. The first time was in Monterey Park, California, shortly before Hemming first went to Cuba. Hemming was then acting as a guard at the home of the Cuban consul. He was approached by a skinny young man in civilian clothes who called himself Lee Oswald (Oswald was then in the Marines). Oswald said he wanted to fly to Cuba and join the revolution. Hemming says Oswald gave him an eerie feeling. “It was like he had read my file,” Hemming told us. Moreover, Oswald expressed knowledge of a secret cache of arms hidden in the consul’s house and destined for Cuba.

Fearing Oswald was an agent provocateur, Hemming sent him away. Hemming tried to follow him to get his license plate, but Oswald had disappeared too fast.

The second time Hemming saw Oswald was in 1962. On December 4 of that year, Hemming and 13 of his Interpen colleagues were arrested in Marathon by U.S. Customs for violations of the Neutrality Act. Hemming’s group had moved a boat, the “Sally,” from Miami to Marathon, and Customs had information they were going to use the boat for a raid into Cuba.

After being booked in Key West, they were released on bond with the help of a Miami attorney named Charles Ashman, then drove to Miami where they rented hotel rooms. In Miami, Hemming was shocked when he saw Oswald with one of his No Name Key men, apparently trying to infiltrate his group. Hemming stopped that right away. Get away from him, Hemming told his man, he’s trouble. Attorney Ashman witnessed the incident.

Hemming told Solares Hill of a third encounter with Oswald. Shortly after Hemming arrived in Havana, in January of 1959, while he was near the Presidential Palace, Hemming was told an American named Oswald was looking for him. Hemming avoided Oswald.

And there was a fourth attempted contact as well. A month or two before the assassination, Hemming and his No Name Key comrade Howard Davis were appearing on a Miami radio talk show hosted by Allen Courtney. A man called in asking to speak to Hemming, identifying himself as Lee Oswald. Hemming did not want to take the call and handed it to Davis.

By November 1963, law enforcement had picked up rumors of potential danger to the President from both anti-Castro and pro-Castro Cubans. When President Kennedy visited Miami on Monday, November 18, 1963, Hemming and several of his No Name crew were asked to help with security by scanning the crowds for potentially dangerous Cubans. They were asked to come armed, but Hemming told the authorities they would be there but unarmed; he was concerned it might be a set-up with his men possessing firearms too close to the President.

After Kennedy was assassinated, the FBI interviewed Hemming to find out what he knew about the assassination. Hemming says the interview was perfunctory and it was clear to him the FBI was not conducting a serious investigation. Hemming once told an assassination conference in Dallas, “After the assassination, when the FBI did not immediately detain me and Mitch WerBell [a right-wing arms merchant from Powder Springs, Ga.] for questioning, I knew there was going to be a cover-up.” Not everyone laughed.

In fact, when New Orleans District Attorney James Garrison started his investigation, he first believed the assassination was planned on No Name Key. To disabuse him, Hemming walked into the office of the “giant” DA (Hemming even had a few inches on Garrison) and offered to help his investigation.

In late March of 1968, Hemming was in Los Angeles and was offered money to kill Martin Luther King, Jr., an offer he reported to the FBI. Within two weeks, King was murdered in Atlanta.

In 1972, Hemming may have foiled a plot to kill President Richard Nixon. One of his colleagues was approached by a Cuban exile group who wanted to use a boat disguised as Cuban military to shoot bazookas at the presidential compound on Key Biscayne. The idea was to blame the attack on Cuba to prompt a U.S. invasion of Cuba. Hemming and his associate reported the plan to the FBI.

Perhaps not coincidentally, there is a body of assassination researchers who believe the Kennedy assassination was conducted by Cuban exiles (some think with the assistance of “renegade” CIA agents) with a similar motive: Set up the left-wing Oswald as the patsy assassin, kill Oswald while he was trying to escape, pin it on Castro and prompt a U.S. invasion of Cuba. If that was indeed the motive, it backfired. Recently released recordings between LBJ and Chief Justice Earl Warren indicate LBJ initiated the cover-up precisely because he feared an investigation might demonstrate foreign involvement in the assassination and lead inexorably to a war.

On the night of the assassination, LBJ’s closest aide called the Dallas prosecutor and ordered him to delete any references to a foreign conspiracy in the indictment against Oswald.

Many people think that although Hemming was not involved in the assassination, over several years he learned the details through his associates. A few weeks ago Hemming identified to us for the first time the name of a man he states participated in the assassination.

Recall the “JFK” movie’s scenario that there were three teams involved, each team consisting of a “shooter” and a “spotter.” Hemming helped Stone set up the “triangulation of cross-fire” scenario.

“JFK” shows a white shooter and a black spotter in the Dal-Tex Building, across the street from the Texas School Book Depository. Hemming told Solares Hill that the spotter was a black Cuban exile named Nestor Izquierdo, a veteran of the Bay of Pigs and considered a hero among the members of Brigade 2506

Hemming tells a revealing story about this. Originally, Oliver Stone wanted Hemming’s No Name Key colleague Howard Davis to play the role of the Dal-Tex spotter, but Hemming insisted the spotter should be black for reasons of historical accuracy. (Hemming did not tell Stone he knew the name of the spotter.)

Izquierdo was killed in 1979 fighting with the Somoza forces against the Communist Sandinistas in Nicaragua. Our sources say that Izquierdo was close to a CIA officer named Rip Robertson, who was involved with a CIA front company, Mineral Traders, that ran arms into Cuba from a warehouse on Stock Island. One of the boats in the Bay of Pigs invasion was captained by him. Some believe Robertson may have been one of the CIA officers involved in the assassination. In a photo of onlookers in Dealey Plaza there is a man wearing a hat who bears a striking resemblance to Robertson.

He died in the Congo in the mid-1970s, still fighting communists for the CIA. Solares Hill has a source who was involved in an intelligence operation that included several mercenaries who served with Robertson in the Congo. Those mercenaries told our source that Robertson admitted to them that he was in Dealey Plaza when Kennedy was shot.

And Robertson had one association that raises disquieting questions. After the failure of the Bay of Pigs, Robertson worked with JM/WAVE, the CIA’s anti-Castro operation located in Miami that conducted Operation Mongoose against Cuba. In that program he worked closely, and reportedly became drinking buddies with, Johnny Rosselli, the flashy Los Angeles Mafioso whom the CIA had engaged to kill Castro. Rosselli and Robertson often met at the Mariners Restaurant on US 1 in Florida City. Rosselli’s operation was based in Point Mary on Key Largo, where he trained snipers to kill Castro but whose guns may have been turned on Kennedy.

Roselli recruited Florida mob boss Santo Trafficante, Jr. to assist in the attempts against Castro. In his biography, Trafficante’s long-time lawyer states that Trafficante admitted to his attorney his involvement in the assassination. Trafficante also, apparently, had connections to Jack Ruby. Within days after the assassination, a British journalist approached the FBI in London and stated he had been in a Castro prison with an American gangster named “Santos” and that Santos was visited by a man the journalist believed to be Ruby. The journalist asked to view Ruby’s photograph to verify the match. But FBI HQ in Washington wired London FBI and said it did not want the matter pursued.

Hemming’s revelation of Izquierdo as a participant opens new lines of inquiry among those who believe it is not yet too late to resolve what is without question the greatest unsolved crime in American history.

[Tim Gratz]

The ‘Kill Castro’ Business:

From No Name Key to Death in Dallas

by J. Timothy Gratz

and Mark Howell

Gerry Hemming was the leader of a group of anti-Communist soldiers of fortune who trained anti-Castro Cubans in the early 1960s at a camp on No Name Key, an island 25 miles north of Key West.

Many assassination researchers believe Hemming knows at least some of the secrets of the Kennedy assassination (some believe he participated in or even planned it). Recently he has been sharing some of these secrets with Solares Hill and his revelations may bring us closer to what has been called the crime of the 20th century.

Hemming tells us the assassination was accomplished by several autonomous, separately funded, “teams,” consisting of a shooter and a spotter. (He has yet to identify the “master planner” and has suggested he does not know who the master planner was.)

This week Hemming revealed who he believed were two of the “sponsors” of the assassination. Two men met in Haiti in February of 1963 and contributed funds for the Kennedy assassination. Both were from the Dominican Republic. One, Ramfis Trujillo, and international playboy who dated Hollywood starlets, was the son of long-term Dominican Republican dictator Rafael Trujillo, who was assassinated in May of 1961. The second man was Johnny Abbes Garcia, former intelligence director for General Rafael Trujillo. It was not the first time Garcia had financed an assassination. In 1959, Garcia hired American adventurer Alexander Rorke to smuggle eight men into Cuba on one of the first missions to kill Castro. (See Rorke story.) The motives of Trujillo and Garcia were apparent: To revenge the assassination of Rafael Trujillo, widely believed to have been organized by the CIA.

A ranking member of Rafael Trujillo’s military wrote a book in which he stated that the assassination was organized with the support of CIA agent (and future Watergate burglar) E. Howard Hunt and flashy Mafioso Johnny Rosselli, although this report is uncorroborated.

Hunt, interestingly, returned from a fact-finding trip to Cuba in July of 1960 and reported to his CIA superiors that Castro was “popular” and the only way to eliminate him would be by his assassination. The next month, acting apparently on Hunt’s recommendation, the CIA initiated its alliance with the Mafia to kill Castro. The first Mafioso the CIA recruited was Johnny Rosselli. Some believe that Hunt and/or Rosselli were involved in the Kennedy assassination.

This week Hemming revealed to Solares Hill that the assassins had a back-up plan to ensure Kennedy never left Dallas alive. According to Hemming, there was a huge remote-controlled bomb planted in one of the cars parked beyond the triple overpass at the south end of Dealey Plaza. If the assassins were not sure Kennedy had been killed by the ambush in Dealey Plaza, they would detonate the car bomb as the motorcade sped toward the hospital, ensuring the death of all the occupants of the Presidential limousine.

Hemming told us this week that, through a source in a Central American intelligence organization, he learned that a shooter in the Texas School Book Depository, spoke German and used a shoulder-mounted, carbine-firing Mauser equipped with a scope and a silencer.

This man fired not from the sniper’s nest on the southeast corner of the sixth floor of the book depository, but from the window on the west end of the sixth floor.

Hemming cannot identify this German-speaking shooter by name.

There is some evidentiary support for Hemming’s report. Photos show that the window on the west end of the sixth floor was open, and there is also a photo of witnesses, after the shooting, pointing to the west end of the building. In addition, one witness reported seeing a man with a “strange-looking weapon” on the sixth floor, but she assumed before the assassination that it must have been a secret service agent.

Although not a new revelation, we also want to note Hemming’s explanation for how the assassins escaped from the sixth floor. Immediately after the assassination, a Dallas police officer called Baker rushed into the book depository accompanied by its manager, Roy Truly. They first attempted to take the elevator, but it was not functioning, so they dashed up the stairs. They encountered Lee Harvey Oswald calmly drinking a Coke in the second-floor lunch room, no more than 90 seconds after the shooting stopped.

Many people find it doubtful that Oswald could have hidden the rifle and run down four flights of stairs and purchased a Coke in that time period.

Hemming states that the assassins had disabled the elevator before the assassination, and that they escaped by ropes down the elevator shaft.

Last week we reported Hemming’s identification of Nestor Izquierdo, a black Cuban member of Brigade 2506, as the spotter in the Dal-Tex Building. We also reported Izquierdo’s close relationship with Rip Robertson, a CIA operative who ran a CIA front company on Stock Island hauling packs of arms into Cuba before the Bay of Pigs. Robertson captained one of the two boats delivering members of Brigade 2506 into the ill-fated Bay of Pigs. Some believe Robertson may have been involved in the assassination, a belief fueled by a photograph of a man watching the motorcade in Dealey Plaza who bears a striking resemblance to Robertson, as well as by Robertson’s close association with flashy Mafioso Johnny Rosselli who was involved in the CIA’s plots to kill Castro. FBI reports indicate Rosselli met twice in Miami with Jack Ruby in the months preceding the assassination.

Since our story on Izquierdo last week, our intelligence source has advised us that Izquierdo also had a close relationship with a CIA officer named David Sanchez Morales, which raises even more troubling questions than his association with Robertson.

Morales joined the CIA in 1951 and was involved in many of the CIA’s most secret and dangerous covert operations. He helped the CIA overthrow the Guatemalan government in 1954. In the early 1960s, he was in South Florida working on the CIA’s secret war against Castro. He was instrumental in the U.S. invasion of the Dominican Republic in 1965. He helped capture guerilla leader Che Guevara in Bolivia in 1967. In the late 1960s, according to an unpublished story by Bryan Abas, Morales was in Vietnam, assisting in the CIA’s notorious Phoenix program that killed thousands of Vietnamese civilians as suspected Communists.

His CIA colleague Thomas Clines said that Morales was one of the most feared undercover agents to the governments of Central and South America. “A lot of leaders figured that if Morales was there,” he said, “their government was going to cave in.” If the U.S. government needed someone or something neutralized, said Cline, “Dave would do it, including things that were repugnant to a lot of people.”

Gaeton Fonzi, a well-respected investigator who worked for both the Church Committee and the House Select Committee on Assassinations, is convinced Morales participated in the assassination. In the course of his congressional service, Fonzi interviewed a long-time friend of Morales, and Morales’ Harvard trained attorney, both of whom were with Morales when he boasted, referring to the slain president, “We sure took care of that son-of-a-bitch!”

One of our sources tells us that Morales had assembled a group of approximately twelve Cuban exiles trained as assassins, to be used in anti-Castro operations, and that Izquierdo was a member of that elite hit squad. Our source has identified all the members of this operation but because several are still alive, we do not deem it appropriate to name them yet. But we can state that several researchers believe that Izquierdo was not the only member of Morales’ team who was involved in the Kennedy assassination.

It is possible Morales’ statement was nothing more than drunken braggadocio and that he had nothing to do with the assassination. However, Hemming’s identification of Izquierdo as a participant in the assassination adds strength to the conviction of those who believe that Morales was involved. This is particularly so because Hemming had no knowledge of the Morales’ “hit squad” or Izquierdo’s involvement in it. Like fellow CIA agent Rip Robertson, Morales was close to the Mafia leader Johnny Rosselli. Kennedy scholar Dennis Mahoney writes in “Sons and Brothers” that Rosselli was the only person who could make the ill-temprered Morales laugh, and that Morales and Rosselli engaged in all-night drinking binges, often joined by Robertson.

It was perhaps in one of those drinking sessions that Morales or Rosselli first raised the idea of turning the Cubans they were training to kill Castro against Kennedy instead. Morales and/or Robertson would supply the Cuban exiles, many of whom felt Kennedy had betrayed them and caused the death of many of their comrades at the Bay of Pigs, and Rosselli would supply Mafia funding and expertise (and, in the event, Jack Ruby to forever silence the patsy).

The House Select Committee on Assassinations put Morales on its witness list but was never able to interview or depose him. In May of 1978, Morales, then retired from the CIA, returned to his Arizona home from a business trip, complaining of chest pains. That night he collapsed at his home and was rushed to a Tucson hospital where he died several days later, at the age of 53.

Morales was not the only CIA officer involved with Rosselli to die during the investigation of the House Assassinations Committee. William Harvey was Rosselli’s case officer in the post-Bay of Pigs efforts to assassinate Castro. In fact it was Harvey who summoned Morales to work on the Cuban operations from the CIA base in South Florida. Harvey, like Morales, hated the Kennedys. Harvey died of complications following heart surgery in June of 1976, at age 61.

There is no evidence, and we do not suggest, that either Morales or Harvey died other than from natural causes. Several suspects in the assassination did, however, meet violent deaths while the Kennedy assassination was being reinvestigated, first by the Senate Church Committee and then by the House Assassinations Committee: Chicago Mafia don Sam Giancana was murdered in his Illinois home in June of 1975, only five days before he was to testify to the Church Committee; Jimmy Hoffa was murdered in Detroit in July of 1975; Johnny Rosselli was murdered in Miami in July of 1976; and George DeMohrenschildt, the mysterious Russian baron who had befriended the Oswalds in Dallas, apparently committed suicide in March 1977, on the same day that House Assassinations investigator Fonzi had scheduled a meeting with him.

Like Hemming’s identification to Solares Hill of Izquierdo as the Dal Tex spotter, his new revelations add additional avenues of inquiry to those who believe it is not yet too late to solve the murder that continues to haunt the American psyche.

The investigation continues.

[Tim Gratz]

Most of the above material has been posted here in various threads but we thought you might like to see the articles. As you might expect they generated quite a bit of interest in the greater Key West area.

[John Simkin]

Thank you for posting these articles. Some questions:

(1) Could you tell us the name of the newspaper and the dates of these articles (for reference purposes)

(2) What is the circulation of the newspaper?

(3) Has other newspapers picked up the story? I believe Gerry Hemming is talking to other journalists. Have these articles appeared? Is he telling everyone the same story?

(4) Did Gerry Hemming ever meet David Morales?

(5) Are you still interviewing Gerry Hemming? Will there be other articles?

(6) I am not sure it was a good idea to add the piece on the attempt to recruit Gerry Hemming to assassinate Martin Luther King. I felt that undermined his credibility.

Question to other researchers. Is there anything in these articles that Gerry Hemming has not revealed before?

[Tim Gratz]

John, re your questions:

(1) and (2) The articles were in Solares Hill, a free weekly supplement to the Key West Citizen. Mark is the senior writer for Solares. Not a great circulation, mostly in the Keys, but Solares is read by many writers and artists who live in Key West. The artucles have generated quite a bit of interest here and the papers can no longer be found since people seem to be grabbing them. The first article was on March 4th and the second on March 11th.

(3) No belief that other papers have picked them up. Gerry did mention to me he is talking to other reporters. I'll try to find out if other papers have printed articles about him.

(4) Re GPH and Morales--I did ask him that once but I want to reconfirm before I answer.

(5) We took a week off, but we are planning an article for next week re Hemming's identification of the Mexico City mystery man. Obviously are articles are intended for the general populace, although the readership of Solares Hill is quite literate. But we'll post it here after it is published. Mark and I will be interviewing Gerry more re his identification of the "mystery man". We recently received the Gerry Hemming CD from Debra Conway and there is a document in there that states that Mario Tauler Sague was also known as Frank Shay. More on this later.

(6) It is my understanding from weberman's nodules that in fact GPH and/or Hargraves did approach the FBI re the alleged solicitation to kill King.

There are things Hemming told us that, for several reasons, we did not put in the articles but did post here, e.g. that the shooter in the west window of the TSBD was specifically targetting Connally.

I am sure how many of GPH's "revelations" to us were "new". Gordon Winslow told us he had mentioned Izquierdo before but had not specifically placed him as a Dal Tex Spotter. I know he had previously identified Mario Tauler Sague as the Mexico City mystery man. I am not sure if he had previously identified by description the sixth floor shooter.

[Tim Gratz]

The articles make reference to a CIA front company called Mineral Traders which was located on Stock Island, the island immediately north of Key West. Robertson and Lynch were based here prior to the BOP. We were not sure what happened to Mineral Traders after the BOP. However, in the Hemming CD from JFK Lancer there is a very interesting memo about a meeting in 1962 supposedly with a representative of the White House and attended by Hemming and several Cuban exiles (one of which was Cuesta) to complain about the CIA. One of the things they complained about was that the CIA people at Mineral Traders were using food intended for operations into Cuba for parties. This clearly shows that Mineral Traders was still operating in 1962. They also complained about CIA parties at the "CIA PT boat HQ" on Big Pine Key (30 miles north of Key West). It is quite an interesting memo. I'll try to post it here in a day or two. Perhaps Larry or another researcher is aware of the memo. It's on my agenda for our next chat with Gerry.

Edited March 18, 2005 by Tim Gratz

[Antti Hynonen]

John Simkin Posted Today, 07:42 AM

  Thank you for posting these articles. Some questions:

(1) Could you tell us the name of the newspaper and the dates of these articles (for reference purposes)

(2) What is the circulation of the newspaper?

(3) Has other newspapers picked up the story? I believe Gerry Hemming is talking to other journalists. Have these articles appeared? Is he telling everyone the same story?

(4) Did Gerry Hemming ever meet David Morales?

(5) Are you still interviewing Gerry Hemming? Will there be other articles?

(6) I am not sure it was a good idea to add the piece on the attempt to recruit Gerry Hemming to assassinate Martin Luther King. I felt that undermined his credibility.

Question to other researchers. Is there anything in these articles that Gerry Hemming has not revealed before?

Tim, Thanks for posting the articles, very interesting stuff.

As a reply to John's question, re new detail revealed: The detail that struck me as having been odd was the detail concerning the escape of the TSBD shooters via the elevator shaft.

Hemming states that the assassins had disabled the elevator before the assassination, and that they escaped by ropes down the elevator shaft.

from post by Tim Gratz

Wouldn't there have been ropes left behind? Once the last of them was down, how do you detach the rope?

A more believable escape would have been an escape down the fire escape on the east? side of the building.

A few further comments regarding the articles: Evidence supporting Gerry Hemming's information:

Mario Tauler Sague (aka Saul Sage), was born in Germany, apparently he is the Mexico City "Oswald". He might be the candidate with German skills at the TSBD. As I recall, someone indicated in a thread on this forum, that Saul Sage was a sharpshooter.

[Tim Gratz]

I would be remiss in not acknowledging the help given us in preparing these articles by James Richards and Larry Hancock, both of whom were kind enough to look at drafts of the articles and chat by phone. So here is a public thanks to two fine gentlemen that it has been a great privilege to "meet" through this Forum.

[Tim Gratz]

To Antti:

An escape down an outside fire escape would allow someone to spot the fleeing villains.

The escape method Gerry suggests (he had posited it before elsewhere) is ingenious. And of course it is consistent with Officer Baker's discovery that the elevator was inoperable.

Edited March 18, 2005 by Tim Gratz

[Antti Hynonen]

Ok Tim, perhaps not the fire escape, I don't know what method or route they would use to escape, as I've never been in down-town Dallas, and much less the TSBD. The elevator shaft seemed a little unrealistic though.

At any rate, I say that according to witness testimony, men were seen fleeing the TSBD building from the side or the back of the building (doesn't rule out using ropes down the elevator well, though). I do find the ropes in the elevator shafts an odd solution (see below, Roy Truly).

From the Shaw trial. Mr. Dymond questioning Richard R. Carr.

Q: Right after that you saw the Presidential vehicle accelerate. Is that correct?

A: Yes.

Q: All right. Now, when you saw the Presidential vehicle accelerate, did that attract your attention?

A: No, sir, not so much as I turned and looked back, as I told you before, I saw these people come out from behind the School Book Depository and I am going to try to make this clear to you so where you can understand it, from where I was at I could not tell whether they came out this side entrance here, there is a side entrance to the School Book Depository, or whether they came from behind it, but they came either from the side entrance or they came from behind it, and got into this station wagon. Q: Now, how about the rest of the motorcade, did it accelerate along with the Presidential --

A: The crowd crowded in so fast until I could not tell anything about the rest of the motorcade or nothing else, there was a lot of commotion there from then on.

Q: Was there a great deal of traffic on Stemmons Freeway at that time?

A: Stemmons Freeway is on up here.

Q: I am talking about Elm Street going --

A: You said Stemmons Freeway, Elm Street is here, sir. No, sir, there was not much traffic on Elm Street.

Q: Not much traffic?

A: Elm Street had been blocked off for the motorcade.

Q: About how many automobiles were in the motorcade?

A: I don't know.

Q: Would you say plenty or just one or two?

A: Well, at the time this happened, I saw three.

Q: You only saw three vehicles, three automobiles in the Presidential motorcade. Is that correct?

A: At the time it happened I had only seen three, part of them were on back, had not got to that point yet.

Q: Did you ever see any more than these three?

A: Sir, I saw no more because I explained to you that the commotion was so great that everybody stopped there, there were a lot of people on the streets, on both sides, there were people up here, spectators, there were people lined everywhere along that route, all over there.

Q: Mr. Carr, weren't you interested in looking at this commotion and trying to see what was causing it?

A: Was I interested in knowing what was causing it?

Q: That is correct.

A: I would like to have known, but I could not have got through the crowd to find out it I had to.

Q: You had a pretty good spot from which to look, didn't you?

A: Yes.

Q: Were you looking to try to see what caused it?

A: I say were you looking to try to see what went on, what caused it?

A: To see what caused the commotion?

Q: That's right.

A: No, sir, not to see what caused it, I was looking to see what was going on.

Q: You were looking where, to see what was going on?

A: I was looking to see why all of the commotion down here and why these people were running.

Q: And at the same time you were looking up towards the Texas Book Depository seeing three men come out from behind it. Is that right? A: Do you see these dots on this --

Q: Would you answer my question and then explain, please, sir. I say would you answer the question and then explain.

A: Yes, I will answer your question, repeat it, please.

THE COURT: Mr. Carr, when a question is put to you, you can answer it yes or no, but you have a right to explain your answer so you cannot be cut off, so if you wish to explain the answer, you are permitted by law to do so.

(Whereupon, the question was read back by the Reporter.)

A: Yes, that's right.

BY MR. DYMOND:

Q: And also at the same time you were watching the man whom you say you had seen on the Fifth Floor of the Book Depository walk on Houston Street towards Main. Is that right?

A: Yes, and I have -- may I explain that?

Q: Yes.

THE COURT: You may explain.

A: The same man that I saw here in this window was with the three men that I told you a minute ago, they came out from behind the School Book Depository, got in the station wagon, one man crossed the street and then came down this side of Houston Street and turned onto Commerce Street.

BY MR. DYMOND:

Q: And you were watching that procedure at the same time that you were watching what was going on in the grassy knoll area?

A: No, sir.

Q: And what was going on around the Presidential vehicle and in the motorcade, right?

A: No, sir, I was watching that man at that time, and I watched him until I could see him no longer, but that man acted as if he was in a hurry and someone was following him, and I would know that man if I ever saw him again.

--------------------------------------------------------

WC testimony, Belin questioning Roy Truly:

Mr. BELIN. Let me ask you this, Mr. Truly. I note on Exhibit 362 right where you came in there appears to be some stairs there. Why didn't you go up those stairs, instead of running to the back?

Mr. TRULY. Those stairs only reached to the second floor, and they wouldn't have any way of getting up to the top without going to the back stairway.

Mr. BELIN. All right.

Mr. TRULY. So this is the logical stairway that goes all the way to the seventh floor.

Mr. BELIN. And you are pointing to the stairway in what would be the northwest corner?

Mr. TRULY. That is right.

Mr. BELIN. Now, you got to the elevator, and what did you do then?

Mr. TRULY. I looked up. This is two elevators in the same well. This elevator over hero

Mr. BELIN. You are pointing to the west one?

Mr. TRULY. I am pointing to the west one. This elevator was on the fifth floor. Also, the east elevator-- as far as I can tell--both of them were on the fifth floor at that time.This elevator will come down if the gates are down, and you push a button.

Representative FORD. Which elevator is that?

Mr. TRULY. The west one. But the east one will not come down unless you get on it and bring it down. You cannot call it if the gates are down.

Representative FORD. That is the east elevator?

Mr. TRULY. The east elevator?

There is a button and a little bell here. I pressed

Mr. BELIN. You might put a "B" on Exhibit 362 by the elevator for "button."

Mr. TRULY. That is right on this surface. There is a little button. I pressed the button and the elevator didn't move.

I called upstairs , "Turn loose the elevator."

Mr. BELIN. When you say call up, in what kind of a voice did you call?

Mr. TRULY. Real loud. I suppose in an excited voice. But loud enough that anyone could have heard me if they had not been over stacking or making a little noise. But I rang the bell and pushed this button.

Mr. BELIN. What did you call?

Mr. TRULY. I said, "Turn loose the elevator." Those boys understand that language.

Mr. BELIN. What does that mean?

Mr. TRULY. That means if they have the gates up, they go pull the gates down, and when you press the button, you can pull it down.

Mr. BELIN. And how many times did you yell that?

Mr. TRULY. Two times.

Mr. BELIN. After you had first pushed the button?

Mr. TRULY. That is right. I had pressed the button twice I believe, and called up for the elevator twice.

Mr. BELIN. Then what did you do? First of all, did the elevator come down?

Mr. TRULY. It did not.

Mr. BELIN. All right. Then what did you do?

Mr. TRULY. I went up on a run up the stairway.

Mr. BELIN. Could you again follow--from Point B, could you show which way you went? All right.

Mr. TRULY. What is this here?

Mr. BELIN. This is to show this is a stairway, and there is a stairway above it, too. But you went up the stairs right here?

Mr. TRULY. That is right.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Based on Carr's testimony several men were seen feeing the building (back or side, not front = main entrance).

Based on Truly, I gather than he stuck his head into the shaft and yelled for the elevators to be released, and could see by looking up that they were both on the 5th floor.

If the assassination teams had been in the process of climbing down a rope, I think Marrion Baker and Roy Truly would have a different story to tell. Just my view and analysis based on testimony.

Edited March 18, 2005 by Antti Hynonen

[Tim Gratz]

Excellent post, Antti!

If GPH is correct re the elevator shaft, the shooter and spotter were in good physical shape (goes without saying, but I said it anyway!).

[Antti Hynonen]

Tim Gratz Posted Today, 10:41 AM

  Excellent post, Antti!

If GPH is correct re the elevator shaft, the shooter and spotter were in good physical shape (goes without saying, but I said it anyway!).

Thanks Tim. "In shape" is an understatement; more like they all needed to be a combination of characters such as Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible) and Jason Bourne (Matt Damon in the Bourne identity).

Had the TSBD team of assassins decided to use the Elevator shaft to descend, they would have had 40-50 seconds at the most (my personal estimate) after the final shot to gather their equipment, for everyone to descend, get rid of the ropes and vanish from sight before Truly and Baker came hollering up the elevator shaft.... pretty slick action if you ask me.

On the other hand when it comes to the JFK assassination, nothing seems to be impossible.

Edited March 18, 2005 by Antti Hynonen

[Tim Gratz]

Antti:

A small but important correction:

Officer Baker and Truly took the stairs when gthey could not get the elevator, giving Hunt (Ethan, not E. Howard) and Bourne time to rope down the shaft out of view. So time was not a critical factor. Perhaps someone who has been to the TSBD can explain how they would exit the building at ground level.

[Antti Hynonen]

Tim Gratz Posted Today, 11:47 AM

  Antti:

A small but important correction:

Officer Baker and Truly took the stairs when gthey could not get the elevator, giving Hunt (Ethan, not E. Howard) and Bourne time to rope down the shaft out of view. So time was not a critical factor. Perhaps someone who has been to the TSBD can explain how they would exit the building at ground level.

Good point Tim, certainly a possibility. However, that raises additional questions/comments:

* How do you get your rope loose from the top of the elevator shaft, when you're the last man down? I gather a rope was never found hanging in the shaft, or was there?

* What if the elevators were indeed on the 5th floor (as per Truly). The three African Americans were on the 5th floor and were observing the motorcade driving by, and were apparently the last to use at least one of the elevators, and according to eye witnesses the shots were fired from the 6th floor and therefore the "team" was on the 6th floor, how do you get past the elevators that are on the 5th? Is the shaft wide enough to sneak by?

* I suspect that within a minute or two, more police officers were entering the TSBD, so even if the team descended after Baker and Truly looked up the shaft, but before other's stormed the building, they were playing with a very slim margin of time. In fact, I believe there was too little time to make a successful escape via this route.

Other than that, I have to say these articles were very interesting, and I'd encourage you and your friend to pursue Hemming in hopes of more information.

[Ron Ecker]

Hemming once told an assassination conference in Dallas, “After the assassination, when the FBI did not immediately detain me and Mitch WerBell [a right-wing arms merchant from Powder Springs, Ga.] for questioning, I knew there was going to be a cover-up.”

At the conference Hemming also named Conein and (William Charles) Godell.

Ron