JFK Grand Jury

[John Dolva]

THE JFK ASSASSINATION – BASIS FOR LEGAL ACTION. – By William Kelly – bkjfk3@yahoo.com

It is a myth that the assassination of President Kennedy will always remain an enduring mystery. Though justice may never be served, the murder of John F. Kenney is not an unsolvable crime, but rather a homicide that can be solved to a moral and legal certainty.

To keep people questioning, to allow multiple theories to abound, to let time slip away and drag on before applying the basic and routine legal procedures for investigating and solving such a crime is only a reflection of the institutional unwillingness, resistance and refusal to challenge the powers that took over the government on November 22, 1963.

The feeling of citizen helplessness is reflected in the subtitle of the book by one of the living victims of the same criminals – James Tague, whose book is called The Truth Withheld – A Survivor's Story – Why We Will Never Know the Truth About the Assassination. But those responsible for JFK's murder win and go free only if they die before being exposed, and escape justice.

The reason for the Congressional law that established the "50 year rule" on the classification of all Congressional documents is that is the amount of time it is estimated for the people mentioned in the documents to be dead. Since it is not yet 50 years after the assassination of President Kennedy, some of those suspects are therefore still alive.

It is simply not true that the murder of JFK will forever remain a mystery, and we'll never know the truth, since thanks to the JFK Act, we have most of the evidence, the documentary records and witness testimony in the public domain.

Despite the institutional unwillingness to make the effort to solve the crime, a strong regiment of independent researchers, determined investigators, honest witnesses and ordinary citizens have taken upon themselves to determine the truth, solve the crime, but justice has yet to take its course.

"We need not accept (the) view that mankind…..is doomed," JFK said in his landmark June 10, 1963 'Peace Speech' at American University. We need not accept, "that we are gripped by forces we cannot control…Our problems are manmade – therefore, they can be solved by man….No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings. Man's reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly unsolvable – and we believe man can do it again."

American political assassinations and murders were committed by men, and therefore can be solved by men, if only the effort to do so is taken to do so. However belatedly, there has been a new trend to at least attempt to resolve the civil rights and political murders of the 1960s, with the assassination of Medgar Evers, the murders of the Philadelphia, Mississippi Freedom Riders, the York, Pennsylvania race riot killings, and the MLK assassination civil trial have all utilized the judicial system to solve crimes that were thought to be untouchable a decade ago.

The assassination of President Kennedy was not an accident of history or an act of God, but the act of man, and men can solve the crime if only the effort is made to do so.

Whether the accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone gunman as the official report alleges or a patsy as he claimed, he was a former U.S. Marine who worked with the U2 program in Japan, was trained in the Russian language, defected to the USSR, returned with a Russian wife, reportedly took a pot shot at General Walker, participated in covert Cuban operations in New Orleans and Mexico City, and fits the covert operative profile that makes the assassination a covert intelligence operation. As former Senator Richard Schweikder (R. Pa.) put it, the case has "the fingerprints of intelligence."

Just because covert operations are designed to conceal the actual perpetuators doesn't mean that they can't be exposed, identified and brought to justice, just as other, similar covert crimes have been exposed – Watergate, Iran-Contra and the assassination of the former Chilean ambassador to the U.S. in Washington.

How can ordinary citizens force the hand of an entrenched judicial system? An examination of how the assassination of Medgar Evers and the other civil rights murders of the 1960s were resolved presents a legal road map to follow, and one of the first stops on the way to justice is the grand jury.

"As a general policy," former Justice Department official Ben Civiletti testified before the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) in its last session, "the Department of Justice seldom turns down at least exploring, or reviewing a petition or reasonable request,…(and)…to some extent it becomes a matter of public will…but also a matter of judgment that falls within the duties of any particular department or agency of government…as to how far questions…can be explored to a useful or fruitful purpose."

Well, besides determining the truth and seeking justice, it would be useful and fruitful to determine who killed President Kennedy, why they did it, and how they accomplished it, so such a thing can never happen again. If the assassination of Medgar Evers was immediately pursued and justice resolved, President Kennedy would not have been killed in the same way, and if JFK's assassination was properly resolved immediately, RFK and MLK probably would never have died the way the did.

Political assassination remain an effective tool for controlling policy only because the true perpetuators of these crimes are permitted to remain hidden in the background, pulling the strings of the puppets and moving the pawns as they have for centuries. The assassination of President Kennedy has maintained its watershed mark as the single most significant political event of the past century because it remains unresolved. Despite the tremendous amount of information that is now available, it remains an unresolved enigma and unsolved cold case homicide because there is no institutional willingness, motive or desire to simply solve it.

Unsolved cold cases, especially homicides, are reviewed every few years, sometimes by a new detective who looks over old evidence to see if there is anything that has been overlooked, or if there is any previously unknown evidence or witnesses, or recently developed scientific tools that could be used to help solve the crime. There is no statute of limitations on murder, under the rules of criminal procedure homicide is given precedence over all other crimes, and once accumulated, the evidence in a homicide is presented to a grand jury

Independent researchers, journalists and ordinary citizens can identify evidence, uncover conspiracies and witness crimes, but if there is no case, no grand jury, no place to present the evidence, then there is no justice. As Mr. Civiletti explained to the HSCA, the DOJ "seldom turns down exploring at least, or reviewing a petition or reasonable request…"

Towards the development of a legal case, the grand jury Petition-Request is a citizen's petition to a District Attorney responsible for prosecuting offenders to request a grand jury be convened to review the facts of a case and determine if there is enough evidence to indict someone for a crime.

A grand jury is asked to decide, not guilt or innocence, but whether there is enough evidence to have a person brought to trial for a crime. The grand jury only hears evidence of guilt, but does not render a verdict. Its decision is whether to indict, which is merely an accusation, or not to indict. Guilt or innocence is determined in a court of law; where the rules of evidence preclude hearsay evidence and allows the defense attorney the opportunity to cross-examine witnesses. Hearsay is allowed, and witnesses must testify before a grand jury without counsel, as all attorneys other than the prosecutor are not permitted in the grand jury room.

If the grand jury determines there is enough evidence, they vote a "True Bill" and indict someone for a crime.

The DA can simply ignore such a citizen's petition and request and not present the evidence to a grand jury, or even if a grand jury votes to indict, it is still up to the DA to issue the indictment and proceed to take the matter to court.

The Grand Jury process, which stems from English Cannon law, has been refined by the United States Constitutional system as an extension of the prosecutor's will, though historically the grand jury can investigate official corruption, review and develop evidence, attempt to answer questions, subpoena records and witnesses, order forensic autopsies and specialized tests and follow the evidence where ever it leads.

While grand juries composed of ordinary American citizens do not have the knowledge of the history and powers of a grand jury, and are often merely tools of the prosecutors, sometimes a prosecutor will lose control of a grand jury that begins to ask questions and make requests of its own. Such a grand jury is called a "Runaway Grand Jury," and often goes beyond the original intent of the prosecutors, such as the Rocky Mountain Flats Runaway Grand Jury. When the Colorado prosecutors refused to issued the indictments against major defense contractors for environmental contamination, the grand jury leaked its report to the press [see: Westword Rocky Mountain Flats ]

The previous reluctance of district attorneys to prosecute political assassinations, especially decades old crimes, is being overcome by new, young and diversified blood in official positions of authority. Although those District Attorneys at the top of their profession know that investigating political assassinations is detrimental to furthering their careers, and witnessed what happened to New Orleans DA Jim Garrison, there is a younger generation of assistant prosecutors who look upon solving such major crimes as an achievement that will advance their future careers.

Former HSCA attorney, Dean Browning Webb, Esq., who specializes in RICO litigation, said that such indictments are possible and that, "I am especially interested in developing an approach to seek indictments of those who conspired to murder the President."

"I believe that a prosecution is feasible," says Webb, "especially when invoking the Pinkerton Doctrine," which holds that "a person associated with a conspiracy culpable for any criminal act committed by a co-conspirator if the act is within the scope of the conspiracy and is a foreseeable result of the criminal scheme." Agency theory holds that "all conspirators act as the agent or represent the other conspirators involved in the criminal scheme, and are liable for all criminal acts committed by the other conspirators."

Another reason that District Attorneys are reluctant to investigate and prosecute political assassination, besides opposing the criminal effort behind the murder, is the effort and manpower it takes to solve it, which takes away from the normal, day-to-day prosecutions that the District Attorney is also responsible for.

This can be compensated by including the most significant evidence, lists of documents and witnesses, and outstanding questions with the Petition-Request, laying out the case for crimes and conspiracy and reducing the work of the prosecutors. Such a convincing attachment would also help persuade a prosecutor to accept the case and take it to a grand jury.

It will only take one such JFK grand jury, and there are dozens of potential jurisdictions. There are Federal, State and County grand juries, each with many assistant district attorneys who work under the District Attorney, providing dozens of individuals in which to present the Petition Request.

Establishing jurisdiction in any particular district will not be difficult. Although some will argue that it was not a federal crime to kill the president in 1963, it was a federal crime to conspire to kill a federal employee, whether it is a postman or a president.

Besides the local Dallas district, there are Texas State grand juries, as well as the North Texas Federal District court, which is located in Dallas. The reluctance of any Dallas or Texas official to investigate the assassination will probably make other jurisdictions more inviting, New Orleans in particular, where a new District Attorney recently took over from former DA Harry Connick.

Of the dozens of the potential jurisdictions, it will be easiest to convene a Special Federal Grand Jury in Washington D.C., where most of the original evidence is located at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), and the body of the victim can be exhumed for a proper forensic autopsy.

Although conspiracy and homicide are the crimes being investigated, once the grand jury begins to subpoena records and require the sworn testimony of witnesses, other crimes, such as perjury, destruction of evidence, obstruction of justice come into play, and help persuade witnesses to tell the truth.

One aspect of the grand jury proceedings is their secrecy, which prevents the testimony from being made public before a trial. If there are no indictments, and there isn't a trial, the grand jury could issue a report explaining what it learned and the reasons behind its action or inaction.

Historically, traditionally and legally according to the Constitution of the United States, the evidence in a homicide is presented to a grand jury, which is where the evidence in the murder of John F. Kennedy must go before there can be justice.

"That we live as a nation of laws, and are not a 'Banana Republic,'" said Warren Commissioner John McCloy, "requires us as individuals and as a society, to purse truth and justice, 'even if the heaven's may fall.'"

It is not too late now, but soon, this case will slip slowly from an unsolved homicide to an historical mystery, unless we act now, and present the best evidence in a Petition-Request to convene a special JFK Grand Jury, and let the legal action take its course, wherever it may go.

William E. Kelly, Jr.

Bkjfk3@yahoo.com

Most informative summary, thank you, William.

(Bump for those who may have missed it.)

[William Kelly]

Since the Justice Department conveined a Special Federal Grand Jury to investigate the breach in security that allowed a well dressed couple to crash a White House party, I thought that they might now consider doing the same thing to investigate the breach in security that allowed the President to be assassinated.

[John Dolva]

sounds pretty reasonable to me

edit:typo

Edited January 23, 2010 by John Dolva

[Peter McGuire]

Since the Justice Department conveined a Special Federal Grand Jury to investigate the breach in security that allowed a well dressed couple to crash a White House party, I thought that they might now consider doing the same thing to investigate the breach in security that allowed the President to be assassinated.

I really appreciate your work on this Bill! We can all talk until we are blue in the face on this forum, but until a Grand Jury is convened on this matter, it is all for naught.

[William Kelly]

Since the Justice Department conveined a Special Federal Grand Jury to investigate the breach in security that allowed a well dressed couple to crash a White House party, I thought that they might now consider doing the same thing to investigate the breach in security that allowed the President to be assassinated.

I really appreciate your work on this Bill! We can all talk until we are blue in the face on this forum, but until a Grand Jury is convened on this matter, it is all for naught.