A problem concerning guns

[Mark Stapleton]

Apologies if this has already been covered (I looked through the Tippit threads and it wasn't mentioned).

Aside from the anomolies concerning the bullets removed from Tippits body not completely matching the make and manufacture of the shells handed in to the DPD, and the fact there was no unbroken 'chain of evidence', as required by the law, concerning these shells, the biggest obstacle to be overcome in concluding that Oswald killed Tippit is this: Why would a murderer who has just pumped four bullets into a policeman then pause to remove spent shells from his revolver---on the spot?

Wouldn't he run away and remove the shells later, where he might be safer? Isn't it much more likely a semi-automatic weapon was used to kill Tippit, not a revolver. Of course, this would make Oswald innocent, as he was arrested in possession of a revolver.

Any help here is greatly appreciated as I'm no expert on guns.

[Jack White]

Apologies if this has already been covered (I looked through the Tippit threads and it wasn't mentioned).

Aside from the anomolies concerning the bullets removed from Tippits body not completely matching the make and manufacture of the shells handed in to the DPD, and the fact there was no unbroken 'chain of evidence', as required by the law, concerning these shells, the biggest obstacle to be overcome in concluding that Oswald killed Tippit is this: Why would a murderer who has just pumped four bullets into a policeman then pause to remove spent shells from his revolver---on the spot?

Wouldn't he run away and remove the shells later, where he might be safer? Isn't it much more likely a semi-automatic weapon was used to kill Tippit, not a revolver. Of course, this would make Oswald innocent, as he was arrested in possession of a revolver.

Any help here is greatly appreciated as I'm no expert on guns.

It is a muddled mess. The shells found were AUTOMATIC.

The shells in evidence were REVOLVER.

But automatic shell casings would have all been EJECTED IN

THE STREET. The casings which Poe put in an empty cigaret

pack were found in the YARD of the Davis sisters on the corner,

at least 50 feet from the shooting scene.

It remains an important question 40+ years later. But there

is no answer.

Jack

[John Dolva]

Lots of evidence is of that nature. It's as if the diverse early reports statements allow for a set-up.

How can one 'dissect' such a thing?

some of my suggestions(born of ignorance of many matters in this case)::

it is simply human faults, mistakes. It doesn't mean anything. It's just the nature of the beast.

it means there is a small number of conspirators, who cannot control everything. However, the final 'product' must not contradict 'Oswald did it'. This means the conspirators had elements in the DPD who were in a position to plant evidence. IE it must be high up in the power structure in order to be able to manage invrestigations about such plants. There must have been foreknowledge.(who bought what when) etc a complicated scenario (IMO) over which control would be just about non existent. Unless the conspiracy was 'huge', which in turn the likelihood of it leaking (like a sieve) would be a matter for the dice. Likely? Fertile ground for a

'roll up, roll up, all conspiracy theories catered for'.

it means the above but evidence was not planted, while report of suspect running with automatic, before any ordinance was found.

Either a suspect was seen with an automatic or it was wrong, and it was indeed a revolver.

If the gun was an automatic then who came up with the shells/casings. Track back from the bullets recovered in Tppit. Where does that trail end up?

[Mark Stapleton]

Apologies if this has already been covered (I looked through the Tippit threads and it wasn't mentioned).

Aside from the anomolies concerning the bullets removed from Tippits body not completely matching the make and manufacture of the shells handed in to the DPD, and the fact there was no unbroken 'chain of evidence', as required by the law, concerning these shells, the biggest obstacle to be overcome in concluding that Oswald killed Tippit is this: Why would a murderer who has just pumped four bullets into a policeman then pause to remove spent shells from his revolver---on the spot?

Wouldn't he run away and remove the shells later, where he might be safer? Isn't it much more likely a semi-automatic weapon was used to kill Tippit, not a revolver. Of course, this would make Oswald innocent, as he was arrested in possession of a revolver.

Any help here is greatly appreciated as I'm no expert on guns.

It is a muddled mess. The shells found were AUTOMATIC.

The shells in evidence were REVOLVER.

But automatic shell casings would have all been EJECTED IN

THE STREET. The casings which Poe put in an empty cigaret

pack were found in the YARD of the Davis sisters on the corner,

at least 50 feet from the shooting scene.

It remains an important question 40+ years later. But there

is no answer.

Jack

Thanks Jack. It's a mess all right, one that would have surely been laughed out of court had Oswald ever stood trial for the Tippit murder.

* Benavides picks up two shells, apparently from the shrubbery at 10th and Patton, and puts them in an empty Winston cigarette packet and hands them to Officer Poe. Seargent Hill testifies that Poe shows him the packet containing three shells, and orders him to mark them for identification.

*The other two shells are found by Barbara and Virginia Davis and are handed in to an officer who was later questioned by a Commission attorney. Does anyone know who this was?

* The shells are absent from a police list of evidence compiled on the day of the assassination, and a ballistics catalogue turned over to the FBI the next day. They are not included in a police property clerk's list compiled on November 26. On November 28, the four shells used in evidence are handed over to the FBI as a seperate package.

* At the Tippit murder scene, Seargent Hill radioed in that the shells at the scene indicate the suspect is armed with an automatic .38 rather than a pistol, reinforcing a description of the killer's weapon from an eyewitness, broadcast minutes earlier.

There's no real mystery. Tippit was shot with a semi-automatic pistol. The DPD produced the bogus shells, well after the event, to frame Oswald. They also lied about the bullets recovered from Tippit, claiming initially that only one badly damaged bullet was retrieved. The other three showed up in March.

The issue of the shell casings being found in the yard, or shrubbery, can still be explained, IMO. Don't have an answer yet, but there must be one.

[Donald Diabo]

Back to the case...(this got lost in the big debate)

I wish to pose questions concerning the rifle that was found on the third floor.

Thus, my question; Why would a sniper, manipulate the bolt action to load the fourth bullet, if the goal was met by the "third" bullet?

Did the sniper believe he had sufficient time to make his escape?

Or, did the sniper expect to be caught? (time is of the essence)is it not?

Where is the fourth bullet, that was ejected from the rifle shortly after it was found?

I have not seen nor read any evidence as to its whereabouts.

true, perhaps i have not stumbled upon it, yet!

So help me out.

thanks.

[Steve Thomas]

Mark,

The issue of the shell casings being found in the yard, or shrubbery, can still be explained, IMO. Don't have an answer yet, but there must be one.

I always liked this one:

Representative FORD. You saw him take the shells out of the gun?

Mrs. DAVIS. No, sir; he was shaking them.

Representative FORD. He was shaking them?

Mrs. DAVIS. He was shaking them. I didn't see him actually use his hand to take them out. I mean he was sort of shaking them out.

Representative FORD. Did you find this one bullet at the point where you saw him shake the gun?

Mrs. DAVIS. No, sir; it was around the side of the house.

Steve Thomas

[Chuck Robbins]

Apologies if this has already been covered (I looked through the Tippit threads and it wasn't mentioned).

Aside from the anomolies concerning the bullets removed from Tippits body not completely matching the make and manufacture of the shells handed in to the DPD, and the fact there was no unbroken 'chain of evidence', as required by the law, concerning these shells, the biggest obstacle to be overcome in concluding that Oswald killed Tippit is this: Why would a murderer who has just pumped four bullets into a policeman then pause to remove spent shells from his revolver---on the spot?

Wouldn't he run away and remove the shells later, where he might be safer? Isn't it much more likely a semi-automatic weapon was used to kill Tippit, not a revolver. Of course, this would make Oswald innocent, as he was arrested in possession of a revolver.

Any help here is greatly appreciated as I'm no expert on guns.

It is a muddled mess. The shells found were AUTOMATIC.

The shells in evidence were REVOLVER.

But automatic shell casings would have all been EJECTED IN

THE STREET. The casings which Poe put in an empty cigaret

pack were found in the YARD of the Davis sisters on the corner,

at least 50 feet from the shooting scene.

It remains an important question 40+ years later. But there

is no answer.

Jack

I was under the impression that domingo benevides provided the first shells to the police. He said, and this is paraphrasing "these are the bullets that killed the officer".

Then, later, the Davis sisters found shells, one was found while the police were there and then one was found after the police had left.

At least that was my understanding of the events.

I was reading through some documents and found a strange situation regarding the gunshot residue tests done on Oswald.

Are we to believe that the original casts were just thrown away and then sketches were made to offer as evidence of the pattern shown on the casts? This sounds like one of the episodes of the twilight zone. A very badly made episode at that......jeez.

[Mark Stapleton]

Mark,

The issue of the shell casings being found in the yard, or shrubbery, can still be explained, IMO. Don't have an answer yet, but there must be one.

I always liked this one:

Representative FORD. You saw him take the shells out of the gun?

Mrs. DAVIS. No, sir; he was shaking them.

Representative FORD. He was shaking them?

Mrs. DAVIS. He was shaking them. I didn't see him actually use his hand to take them out. I mean he was sort of shaking them out.

Representative FORD. Did you find this one bullet at the point where you saw him shake the gun?

Mrs. DAVIS. No, sir; it was around the side of the house.

Steve,

I think you've cracked it--they were special shells which, once discarded from the firearm, crawl to the nearest shrubbery and hide.

Is it possible the shells from the murder weapon could be found fifty feet from Tippit's body?

It seems the DPD was also very reluctant to hand over the bullets extracted from Tippit's body, save for one very mutilated specimen. A cynic would suggest this was because the DPD (and whoever was directing them) knew that they could not be matched with Oswald's weapon.

Hale Boggs expressed concern at the three month delay in the DPD in handing over the (remaining three) bullets to the FBI and asked counsel why the delay and what certainty was there that these were the same three bullets that had been extracted from Tippit. The hapless Congressman obviously thought the WC was conducting an investigation---not a coverup.

Edited September 5, 2006 by Mark Stapleton

[Mark Stapleton]

Apologies if this has already been covered (I looked through the Tippit threads and it wasn't mentioned).

Aside from the anomolies concerning the bullets removed from Tippits body not completely matching the make and manufacture of the shells handed in to the DPD, and the fact there was no unbroken 'chain of evidence', as required by the law, concerning these shells, the biggest obstacle to be overcome in concluding that Oswald killed Tippit is this: Why would a murderer who has just pumped four bullets into a policeman then pause to remove spent shells from his revolver---on the spot?

Wouldn't he run away and remove the shells later, where he might be safer? Isn't it much more likely a semi-automatic weapon was used to kill Tippit, not a revolver. Of course, this would make Oswald innocent, as he was arrested in possession of a revolver.

Any help here is greatly appreciated as I'm no expert on guns.

It is a muddled mess. The shells found were AUTOMATIC.

The shells in evidence were REVOLVER.

But automatic shell casings would have all been EJECTED IN

THE STREET. The casings which Poe put in an empty cigaret

pack were found in the YARD of the Davis sisters on the corner,

at least 50 feet from the shooting scene.

It remains an important question 40+ years later. But there

is no answer.

Jack

I was under the impression that domingo benevides provided the first shells to the police. He said, and this is paraphrasing "these are the bullets that killed the officer".

Then, later, the Davis sisters found shells, one was found while the police were there and then one was found after the police had left.

At least that was my understanding of the events.

Yes, Chuck--that's my understanding of events too. It's all academic of course because the shells found at the scene were not the ones presented to the WC and Officer Poe couldn't identify his markings on the four cartridges shown to him in June, 1964.

I was reading through some documents and found a strange situation regarding the gunshot residue tests done on Oswald.

Are we to believe that the original casts were just thrown away and then sketches were made to offer as evidence of the pattern shown on the casts? This sounds like one of the episodes of the twilight zone. A very badly made episode at that......jeez.

What fun it would have been had Oswald survived and the whole mess went to trial. All the mistrials, appeals and retrials due to the DPD's wilful negligence would probably still be going on today.

[Duke Lane]

Apologies if this has already been covered (I looked through the Tippit threads and it wasn't mentioned).

Aside from the anomolies concerning the bullets removed from Tippits body not completely matching the make and manufacture of the shells handed in to the DPD, and the fact there was no unbroken 'chain of evidence', as required by the law, concerning these shells, the biggest obstacle to be overcome in concluding that Oswald killed Tippit is this: Why would a murderer who has just pumped four bullets into a policeman then pause to remove spent shells from his revolver---on the spot?

Wouldn't he run away and remove the shells later, where he might be safer? Isn't it much more likely a semi-automatic weapon was used to kill Tippit, not a revolver. Of course, this would make Oswald innocent, as he was arrested in possession of a revolver.

Any help here is greatly appreciated as I'm no expert on guns.

Responding also to some other posts in this thread ....

First, regarding the "automatic" shells: Sgt Gerald Hill was by no means a ballistics expert, having spent most of his time-to-date with DPD in the Traffic Division, and then working screening new police applicants with Capt "Pinky" Westbrook. Despite the fact that he dressed in plain clothes that day and looked like a detective, he was not ... and had nowhere near the experience. Quite simply: automatics eject their shells. The shells were not in the gun so they must have been "ejected." Ergo, it was an automatic rather than a pistol. (Aren't revolvers pistols, too? Goes to experience, your honor!)

Second, nobody who didn't want to leave evidence behind would have at least tried not to. Fingerprints were not an unknown in 1963 and hadn't been for several decades. Further, someone who didn't want to be identified probably would have gone to greater lengths to at least hide his features a little bit as he ran past the Davises' house, grinning at the girls as he fled. At the very least, he might have paused a moment to either shake the shells into his hand and then put them in his pocket, or try to catch them as he shook them loose, picking up any that fell.

These things together add up to someone who was secure in the knowledge that he wouldn't be fingered personally, and that any of the evidence he left behind wouldn't be tied back to him. Hence, he not only didn't care if evidence was found, he wanted it to be found.

Look at the neat job of eradicating fingerprints on the "Oswald revolver" that was done in the patrol car, and the farce of McDonald's "identifying" it in the personnel office as examples of what the shooter might reasonably have expected to have happened with the evidence he left behind at 10&P. In any case, by the time "the" shells were booked into evidence, Poe's initials were already gone, too, as was the primer "ding" from the "misfired" bullet that was supposed to have killed McD, resulting in a hail of gunfire eliminating the "guilty suspect."

Make no mistake: that "snap" put Jack Ruby behind bars just as surely as the bullet from his own gun did!

For more on the shells, see Dave Perry's "Tippit Evidence?".