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(Source)
One of the most frequently asked questions regarding witnesses to the Kennedy assassination concerns a mysterious young woman who became known as The Babushka Lady. She can be seen clearly on the Zapruder film and also on various other movie films and still photographs taken in Dealey Plaza on 22nd November 1963. She was one of the few witnesses who was not immediately identified - thus the rather odd nickname which she acquired due to the 'babushka' or triangular headscarf which she was wearing that day.
The question which The Babushka Lady provokes has become much more than just: "Who is she?" It has become much more positive: "Are The Babushka Lady and Beverly Oliver one and the same person?" Undoubtedly, the most important aspect of The Babushka Lady is the fact that she appears to be filming the motorcade. Her position on the south side of Elm Street close to eyewitnesses Charles Brehm, Jean Hill, Mary Moorman, etc. means that her film would almost certainly be a mirror image of the Z-Film. Perhaps more important than the presidential limousine itself would be what could be seen behind it. The background to The Babushka Lady's film would inevitably include the Texas School Book Depository (perhaps including the so-called sniper's nest window) and the grassy knoll.
The question of The Babushka Lady's identity remained a total mystery following the death of the President. Nobody came forward to claim that they were the mysterious eyewitness and furthermore, nobody could suggest who the lady may have been. There it remained, and perhaps would have continued to remain, were it not for a chance meeting between renowned assassination researcher J Gary Shaw and a young lady called Beverly McGann shortly after a church service at the First Baptist Church of Joshua (a small Texas town 20 miles south of Fort Worth) in November 1970.
The aftermath of this meeting is widely known and has been well-documented in many books. Beverly McGann (nee Oliver) related to Gary Shaw how she had filmed the motorcade and the assassination from a point on the south side of Elm Street. As anybody who knows Gary would be aware, he did not just accept this stranger's story without question. No - being aware that she had not had an opportunity to see the Zapruder film (and The Babushka Lady), he took her to Dealey Plaza and asked her to indicate exactly where she had been standing on the fateful day. To Gary's amazement, she did not hesitate but went straight to the point where The Babushka Lady can be seen on the Z-Film.
The controversy over Beverly Oliver's claim to be The Babushka Lady has raged unabated from that day to this - and remains one of the most vehemently debated aspects of the Kennedy assassination mystery. Whilst there are parts of Beverly's account which I find difficult to understand, I firmly believe that Beverly Oliver and The Babushka Lady are one and the same person. Like many researchers of my acquaintance, on both sides of the Atlantic, I have frequently become involved in heated discussions (arguments?) concerning this question. I am delighted to report that no matter how involved some of these discussions have become, I have not yet ended up exchanging blows with anybody.
I have something of an advantage over many researchers, particularly those outside the United States, in that I have had the pleasure and privilege to meet Beverly Oliver and her husband Charles Massegee on several occasions. I like to think that we trust and respect one another and I am proud to call Beverly Oliver my friend. Perhaps it may be thought that this tends to colour my opinion that Beverly was The Babushka Lady. I would refute that and stress that by speaking with Beverly regularly over the past couple of years I have come to know someone who is, in my opinion, one of the most open and honest people I have ever encountered.
(Source)
I was a 17-year-old girl that was at Dealey Plaza that day taking pictures of the President when he was assassinated. I never wanted to become a public figure over this. I never intended to. Until my name was accidentally leaked to the press in 1972, I was not a public figure. It has caused me great grief. It has caused me a lot of concern in my life.
I have been called a liar as recently as today. I have been called a hoax. I am neither a liar nor am I a hoax. I am who I say I am. I was down there that day standing between 20 and 30 feet from the President when he was shot. I was taking a movie film which on the 25th of November was confiscated by a man who identified himself as an FBI agent.
I have never until recently started trying to inquire about my film because I am extremely patriotic, did not see that there was any reason to because I had assumed all these years that it was locked up until the year 2029 as evidence, and I am still not sure that there is anything sinister about it, and that is why I am here. I would just like an explanation as to what happened to my film and where it is, and that is the only reason that I am here.
In an article published in Ramparts, David Welsh claims that Roberts was subjected to intensive police harassment. "They visited her at all hours of the day and night, contacted her employers and identified her as the Oswald rooming house lady. As a result she was dismissed from three housekeeping and nursing jobs in April, May and June of 1964 alone; no telling how many jobs she lost after that."
Earlene Roberts died of a heart attack in Parkland Hospital on 9th January, 1966.
(Source)
Mary Sherman became Associate Professor of Orthopedic Surgery, and practiced medicine at UC's Billings Hospital. Sherman's research was brought to the attention of Dr. Alton Ochsner and she was invited to become a partner in the Ochsner Clinic in New Orleans where he was carrying out research into the causes of cancer. She was also offered the post of Associate Professor at the Tulane Medical School. Sherman accepted Ochsner's proposal and started work for her new employer in 1952.
Sherman's career prospered and she was elected to the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons (AAOS). Soon afterwards she was appointed as chairman of the Pathology Committee of the AAOS.
Edward Haslam argues in "Dr. Mary's Monkey" that Sherman was involved in carrying out secret research into developing a vaccine to prevent an epidemic of soft-tissue cancers caused by polio vaccine contaminated with SV-40. This work included using a linear particle accelerator located in the Infectious Disease Laboratory at the Public Health Service Hospital in New Orleans. According to Haslam there was a second-lab working on this project. This was being run by David Ferrie on Louisiana Avenue Parkway.
Edward Haslam has done more than any other researcher to explain Sherman's death. In his recently published book he provides some very important evidence about the death:
(1) Homicide Report (29th October, 1964)
The undersigned entered Apt. J. from the patio, the only entrance to said apartment, into the living room area. Said apartment was composed of a living room, kitchen, bathroom, study, and a bedroom.... Located in the bedroom, was the body of a white female, apparently dead, later learned to be one Dr. Mary Stults Sherman, WF, 51 yrs., formerly residing 3101 St. Charles Ave., Apt. J., who lived alone....
The body was in a supine position, the head in the direction of the river, the feet in the direction of the lake, and both legs were outstretched and parallel to each other... The left arm was outstretched and parallel to the left side of the body. The right side of the body from the waist to where the right shoulder would be, including the whole right arm, was apparently disintegrated from the fire, yielding the inside organs of the body. There was what appeared to be a stab wound in the left arm and also in the inner side of the right leg near the knee.
The body was nude; however, there was clothing which had apparently been placed on top of the body, mostly covering the body from just above the pubic area to the neck. Some of the mentioned clothes had been burned completely, while others were still intact, but scorched... According to the Criminologist, the mentioned clothes were composed of synthetic material which would have to reach a temperature of about 500 F before it would ignite into a flame; however, prior to this, there would be a smoldering effect.
It appeared that no scuffle took place inside of said bedroom, and nothing appeared to be dis-arranged in the bedroom or throughout the apartment.
(2) New Orleans Times-Picayune (21st July, 1964)
An intruder forced his way into a fashionable St. Charles Ave. apartment early today, stabbed a prominent woman orthopedic surgeon to death and set fire to her body. Police apparently had virtually no clues to the identity of the slayer of Dr. Mary Stults Sherman...
Homicide detectives said the front door to her apartment had been forced open, her wallet was empty, and her 1961 automobile was missing ... Sam Moran, Special Investigator for the Orleans Parish Coroner's office, said the front door had been forced open and an unsuccessful attempt had been made to open a jewelry box.
Mrs. Levy (a neighbor who lived beneath Dr. Sherman for 12 years) ... usually heard Dr. Sherman when she came in at night, but last night she went to bed early and didn't hear anything.... "If there had been a loud commotion, I know I would have heard it," Mrs. Levy said. "The doctor was quiet, but I always heard her come in and take off her shoes, then padding around in her slippers. Sometimes I remarked to my husband, Doc's home again."
(3) Coroner's Report on the Death of Mary Sherman (July, 1964)
A preliminary examination by Dr. LoCascio on the scene determined that there were several possible stab wounds of the left arm of the body, which had not been deteriorated by the fire. There also appeared to be several stab wounds in the torso. There was also a large wound of the inside of the right thigh just above the knee. From further examination of the body, it was noted by the coroner that the right arm and a portion of the right side of the body extending from the right hip to the right shoulder was completely
burned away exposing various vital organs...
The cause of death was also given to Patn. Knight by Capt. Stevens as follows: 1. Stab wound of the chest, penetrating the heart, hemopericardium and left hemithorax [sic] 2. Multiple stab wounds of the abdomen, with incid wound of the liver. 3. Multiple stab wounds of the left upper extremity and the right leg. 4. Laceration of Labia Minora. 5. Extreme burns of right side of body with complete destruction of right upper extremity and right side of thorox and abdomen.
(4) Precinct Report on the death of Mary Sherman (July, 1964)
The fire smoldered for sometime -long enough to denude an innerspring mattress and burn away the flesh from one of the doctor's arms...
From further examination of the body, it was noted by the coroner that the right arm and a portion of the right side of the body extending from the right hip to the right shoulder was completely burned away exposing various vital organs.
The cause of death was ... 5. Extreme burns of right side of body with complete destruction of right upper extremity and right side of thorax [chest] and abdomen.
The right side of the body from the waist to where the right shoulder would be, including the whole right arm, was apparently disintegrated from the fire, yielding the inside organs of the body.
(5) New Orleans States Item (15th August, 1964)
The murderer set fire to her bed and piled underclothing on her body, setting it afire. The fire smoldered for some time - long enough to denude an innerspring mattress and burn away the flesh from one of the doctor's arms.
Mr. Warren Reynolds, who was employed in a car lot one block from the scene of the shooting of police officer Tippit, told the FBI on January 21, 1964 that he had seen a man carrying a pistol fleeing from the scene of the killing. He also told them that he could not identify the man as Oswald, despite the fact that he had followed the man for a block and seen him at close range. Two days after this FBI interview he was shot through the head in the basement of his office. Since nothing was stolen there was no obvious motive.
(Source)
Reynolds was hospitalized and miraculously recovered from his head wound. He had been out of the hospital for about three weeks when, late in February of 1964, an attempt was allegedly made to kidnap his ten year old daughter. He and his family received telephone threats. Reynolds' growing fear brought about major changes in his everyday life including continuous worry, the end to night walks, and the presence of a friend at the car lot after dark. He owned a watchdog and surrounded his house with floodlights which could be instantly turned on...
But the story is not over. Darrell Wayne Garner, the "prime suspect" arrested after the shooting of Reynolds, was released on the strength of an alibi provided by his girlfriend, Nancy Jane Mooney, alias Betty McDonald. Ms. Mooney had worked as a stripper at Jack Ruby's Carousel Club. Eight days after providing an alibi for Garner, Ms. Mooney was herself arrested. The charge was "disturbing the peace." She had allegedly been fighting with her roommate on a street corner, although the roommate was not arrested. Two hours later she was dead, allegedly having hung herself in her jail cell.
Several years later Mr. Garner was located by independent investigators and denied shooting Reynolds but admitted knowing a number of the principal figures in the case and gave a good deal of information to independent investigators. He was buried in Dallas on January 24, 1970, allegedly the victim of a heroin overdose, his role in this whole affair still pretty unclear.
Gary Underhill was born in Brooklyn on 7th August, 1915. He graduated from Harvard in 1937 and during the Second World War he served with the Military Intelligence Service (6 July 1943 to May 1946). After leaving the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) he worked on specific projects for the Central Intelligence Agency. He was also military affairs editor for Life Magazine.
After the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Underhill told his friend, Charlene Fitsimmons, that he was convinced that he had been killed by members of the CIA. He also said: "Oswald is a patsy. They set him up. It's too much. The [SNIP] have done something outrageous. They've killed the President! I've been listening and hearing things. I couldn't believe they'd get away with it, but they did!"
Underhill believed there was a connection between Executive Action, Fidel Castro and the death of Kennedy: "They tried it in Cuba and they couldn't get away with it. Right after the Bay of Pigs. But Kennedy wouldn't let them do it. And now he'd gotten wind of this and he was really going to blow the whistle on them. And they killed him!"
Underhill told friends that he feared for his life: "I know who they are. That's the problem. They know I know. That's why I'm here. I can't stay in New York."
Gary Underhill was found dead on 8th May 1964. He had been shot in the head and it was officially ruled that he had committed suicide. However, in his book, Destiny Betrayed, James DiEugenio claimed that the bullet entered the right-handed Underhill's head behind the left ear.
Banister was suspended by the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) for an incident with a gun in a bar. His suspension ended in June 1954, but when he refused to be transferred to the NOPD's Planning Department, he was dismissed from the force. After leaving the police he established his own private detective agency, Guy Banister Associates.
In 1963 Banister and David Ferrie began working for the lawyer G. Wray Gill and his client, Carlos Marcello. This involved attempts to block Marcello's deportation to Guatemala.
Later Banister was linked to the plot to assassinate John F. Kennedy. On 9th August, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald distributed leaflets that supported Fidel Castro and his government in Cuba. On these leaflets was the address 544 Camp Street, New Orleans. This was also the office of Carlos Bringuier, an anti-Castro exile. Around the corner from 544 Camp Street, located in the same building, was 531 Lafayette Street, which housed the detective agency run by Banister. This raised suspicions that Oswald had been involved in a right-wing conspiracy to kill Kennedy.
On the afternoon of 22nd November, 1963, Banister and Jack Martin went drinking together. On their return to Banister's office the two men got involved in a dispute about a missing file. Banister became so angry that he he drew his Magnum revolver and hit Martin with it several times. Martin was so badly injured that he had to be detained in the local Charity Hospital.
Over the next few days Martin told friends that Banister and David Ferrie had been involved in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. According to Martin, Ferrie was the getaway man whose job it was to fly the assassin out of Texas. He also claimed that Ferrie knew Lee Harvey Oswald from their days in the New Orleans Civil Air Patrol and had given him lessons on how to use a rifle with a telescopic sight.
On 25th November, Martin was contacted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He told them that he thought Ferrie had hypnotized Oswald into assassinating Kennedy. The FBI considered Martin's evidence unreliable and decided not to investigate Banister and Ferrie.
This information eventually reached Jim Garrison, the district attorney of New Orleans. He interviewed Martin about these accusations. Martin claimed that during the summer of 1963 Banister and David Ferrie were involved in something very sinister with a group of Cuban exiles.
Jim Garrison now became convinced that a group of right-wing activists, including Banister, David Ferrie, Carlos Bringuier and Clay Shaw, were involved in a conspiracy with the CIA to kill John F. Kennedy. Garrison claimed this was in retaliation for his attempts to obtain a peace settlement in both Cuba and Vietnam.
(Source)
In 1953 C. D. Jackson served on the Presidents' Committee on International Information Activities. The following year he was appointed as Special Assistant to President for International Affairs.
Jackson urged President Dwight D. Eisenhower to speak-out against Senator Joe McCarthy. He was probably influenced by McCarthy's attacks on CIA officials such as Frank Wisner and Cord Meyer. In Jackson's opinion McCarthy was damaging the anti-Communist cause with self serving and unstable behavior.
According to Carl Bernstein, Jackson was "Henry Luce's personal emissary to the CIA". He also claimed that in the 1950s Jackson had arranged for CIA employees to travel with Time-Life credentials as cover.
After the election of John F. Kennedy in 1960 Jackson left the White House and became publisher of Life Magazine. When Kennedy was assassinated, Jackson purchased the Zapruder Film on behalf of Life. David Lifton points out in The Great Zapruder Film Hoax (2004) that: "Abraham Zapruder in fact sold the film to Time-Life for the sum of $150,000 - about $900,000 dollars in today's money... Moreover, although Life had a copy of the film, it did little to maximize the return on its extraordinary investment. Specifically, it did not sell this unique property - as a film - to any broadcast media or permit it to be seen in motion, the logical way to maximize the financial return on its investment... A closer look revealed something else. The film wasn't just sold to Life - the person whose name was on the agreement was C. D. Jackson." Jackson published individual frames of Zapruder's film but did not allow the film to be screened in its entirety.
Soon after the assassination Jackson also successfully negotiated with Marina Oswald the exclusive rights to her story. Peter Dale Scott argues in his book Deep Politics and the Death of JFK (1996) that Jackson, on the urging of Allen Dulles, employed Isaac Don Levine, a veteran CIA publicist, to ghost-write Marina's story. This story never appeared in print.
Charles Douglas Jackson died on 18th September, 1964. On December 15, 1971, Jackson's widow gave his papers to the Eisenhower Presidential Library. These documents revealed that he had been working as a CIA agent since 1948.
(Source)
He had a pigmented skin area for many years, and in Spring 1964 there was a malignant transformation. The treatment was excision, including a nodule. You all left for London in July 1964. I saw your father approximately once a month from September 1964 through July 1965 (lunch in London, at your house in Highgate). Paul was engaged by his work at the London Observer and tremendously enjoyed sharing the experiences of living in England with your Mom and the Mandel kids. There were signs that he was not as physically robust, but life was good. In Summer 1965, it was apparent that the cancer had progressed. You returned Stateside in August? September? 1965. I think your Dad’s hospitalization was in October (I would telephone him at the hospital) [email to John McAdams dated Sept. 24, 2003]
(Source)
The following affidavit was executed by David Goldstein on August 13, 1964.
PRESIDENT'S COMMISSION
ON THE ASSASSINATION OF AFFIDAVIT
PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY
STATE OF TEXAS,
County of Dallas, ss:
I, David Goldstein, 6111 Averill Way, Apartment D, Dallas, Tex., being duly sworn say:
1. I am and have been for several years owner of Dave's House of Guns, 2544 Elm Street, Dallas, Texas.
2. Dave's House of Guns has handled Smith and Wesson .38/200 British Service Revolvers. Within ten days after the assassination of President Kennedy, F.B.I. agents called on me to determine if Dave's House of Guns had any record of handling a Smith and Wesson .38/200 British Service Revolver, serial number V 510210 and assembly number 65248. We had no such record.
3. After being shown a photograph of the above gun, I showed the F.B.I. agents a catalog which listed such guns and indicated that they were handled by George Rose and Company, Inc., 1225 South Grand Avenue, Los Angeles, California.
Signed this 13th day of August 1964.
(S) David Goldstein,
DAVID GOLDSTEIN.
(Source)
"Cheramie died of injuries received from an automobile accident on a strip of highway near Big Sandy, Tex., in the early morning of September 4, 1965. The driver stated Cheramie had been lying in the roadway and although he attempted to avoid hitting her, he ran over the top of her skull, causing fatal injuries. An investigation into the accident and the possibility of a relationship between the victim and the driver produced no evidence of foul play. The case was closed" - Louisiana State Police Memo
(Source)
Kilgallen began to tell friends that she was close to discovering who assassinated Kennedy. According to David Welsh of Ramparts Magazine Kilgallen "vowed she would 'crack this case.' And another New York show biz friend said Dorothy told him in the last days of her life: "In five more days I'm going to bust this case wide open." Aware of what had happened to Bill Hunter and Jim Koethe, Kilgallen handed a draft copy of her chapter on the assassination to her friend, Florence Smith.
On 8th November, 1965, Kilgallen, was found dead in her New York apartment. She was fully dressed and sitting upright in her bed. The police reported that she had died from taking a cocktail of alcohol and barbiturates. The notes for the chapter she was writing on the case had disappeared. Her friend, Florence Smith, died two days later. The copy of Kilgallen's article were never found.
Some of her friends believed Kilgallen had been murdered. Marc Sinclaire was Kilgallen's personal hairdresser. He often woke Kilgallen in the morning. Kilgallen was usually out to the early hours of the morning and like her husband always slept late. When he found her body he immediately concluded she had been murdered.
(1) Kilgallen was not sleeping in her normal bedroom. Instead she was in the master bedroom, a room she had not occupied for several years.
(2) Kilgallen was wearing false eyelashes. According to Sinclaire she always took her eyelashes off before she went to bed.
(3) She was found sitting up with the book, The Honey Badger, by Robert Ruark, on her lap. Sinclaire claims that she had finished reading the book several weeks earlier (she had discussed the book with Sinclaire at the time).
(4) Kilgallen had poor eyesight and could only read with the aid of glasses. Her glasses were not found in the bedroom where she died.
(5) Kilgallen was found wearing a bolero-type blouse over a nightgown. Sinclaire claimed that this was the kind of thing "she would never wear to go to bed".
Mark Lane also believed that Kilgallen had been murdered. He said that "I would bet you a thousand-to-one that the CIA surrounded her (Kilgallen) as soon as she started writing those stories." The only new person who became close to Kilgallen during the last few months was her new secret lover. In her book, Kilgallen, Lee Israel calls him the "Out-of-Towner".
(Source)
"JFK would elude the Secret Service on occasion in order to have trysts with women. He did this in Palm Beach when he hopped a fence to swim with Flo Smith. The Secret Service agents couldn't find him and called in the FBI. They finally turned to Palm Beach Police Chief Homer Large, a trusted Kennedy family associate. The Police Chief knew exactly where to find Jack - next door in Earl E. T. Smith's swimming pool. Jack and Flo were alone, and as Homer put it, "They weren't doing the Australian crawl."
(Source)
The News broke the story of Oswald's getaway ride in the cab on Nov. 28, 1963. After becoming impatient with a city bus he had hopped near the assassination scene, Oswald ran to Whaley's cab at the Greyhound
Bus Station and asked, "Can I take this cab?"
Whaley, commenting on the crowds milling near the Texas Schoolbook Depository Building, drew no conversation from Oswald, he said. Oswald sat tight-lipped until reached the address he'd given Whaley, a few blocks beyond the rooming house where the assassin had been staying in Oak Cliff. The fare was 95 cents. Whaley later said, "If you can call a nickel a tip, I guess he tipped me."
(Source)
On 12th October, 1964, Mary Pinchot Meyer was shot dead as she walked along the Chesapeake and Ohio towpath in Georgetown. Henry Wiggins, a car mechanic, was working on a vehicle on Canal Road, when he heard a woman shout out: "Someone help me, someone help me". He then heard two gunshots. Wiggins ran to the edge of the wall overlooking the tow path. He later told police he saw "a black man in a light jacket, dark slacks, and a dark cap standing over the body of a white woman."
Mary appeared to be killed by a professional hit man. The first bullet was fired at the back of the head. She did not die straight away. A second shot was fired into the heart. The evidence suggests that in both cases, the gun was virtually touching Mary’s body when it was fired. As the FBI expert testified, the “dark holes on the skin around both entry wounds suggested they had been fired at close-range, possibly point-blank”.
Soon afterwards Raymond Crump, a black man, was found not far from the murder scene. He was arrested and charged with Mary's murder. Police tests were unable to show that Crump had fired the .38 caliber Smith and Wesson gun. There were no trace of nitrates on his hands or clothes. Despite an extensive search of the area no gun could be found. This included a two day search of the tow path by 40 police officers. The police also drained the canal near to the murder scene. Police scuba divers searched the waters away from where Mary was killed. However, no gun could be found. Nor could the prosecution find any link between Crump and any Smith and Wesson gun.
Crump’s lawyer, Dovey Roundtree, was convinced of his innocence. A civil rights lawyer who defended him for free, she argued that Crump was so timid and feeble-minded that if he had been guilty he would have confessed everything while being interrogated by the police.
(Source)
In March, 1976, James Truitt, a former senior member of staff at the Washington Post, gave an interview to the National Enquirer. Truitt told the newspaper that Meyer was having an affair with John F. Kennedy when he was assassinated. He also claimed that Meyer had told his wife, Ann Truitt, that she was keeping an account of this relationship in her diary. Meyer asked Truitt to take possession of a private diary "if anything ever happened to me".
Ann Truitt was living in Tokyo at the time that Meyer was murdered on 12th October, 1964. She phoned Bradlee at his home and asked him if he had found the diary. Bradlee, who claimed he was unaware of his sister-in-law's affair with Kennedy, knew nothing about the diary. He later recalled what he did after Truitt's phone-call: "We didn't start looking until the next morning, when Tony and I walked around the corner a few blocks to Mary's house. It was locked, as we had expected, but when we got inside, we found Jim Angleton, and to our complete surprise he told us he, too, was looking for Mary's diary."
James Angleton, CIA counterintelligence chief, admitted that he knew of Mary's relationship with John F. Kennedy and was searching her home looking for her diary and any letters that would reveal details of the affair. According to Ben Bradlee, it was Mary's sister, Antoinette Bradlee, who found the diary and letters a few days later. It was claimed that the diary was in a metal box in Mary's studio. The contents of the box were given to Angleton who claimed he burnt the diary. Angleton later admitted that Mary recorded in her diary that she had taken '___' with Kennedy before "they made love".
Leo Damore claimed in an article that appeared in the New York Post that the reason Angleton and Bradlee were looking for the diary was that: "She (Meyer) had access to the highest levels. She was involved in illegal drug activity. What do you think it would do to the beatification of Kennedy if this woman said, 'It wasn't Camelot, it was Caligula's court'?" Damore also said that a figure close to the CIA had told him that Mary's death had been a professional "hit".
(Source)
Dr. L'Herisson said Bogard's parents, Mr. and Mrs. A.T. Bogard, said their son had been ill with flu some few days days before and had been despondent. On Monday night he had come to his parents home to ask them if he could borrow a piece of garden hose. Bogard lived in Shreveport. Funeral arrangements were incomplete Tuesday afternoon pending the arrival of a sister from South Carolina. Rose-Neath Funeral service is in charge.
Jimmy Harper, who is the husband of Bogard's first cousin, actually discovered Bogard dead in the car (although Bogard's uncle had seen the car at the cemetery, but didn't want to approach it, so he went to get Harper).
There was no sign of a struggle or any violence at the scene.
In the trunk of the car were Bogard's shoes and a stack of newspapers all having headlines about the JFK assassination. The car itself was an overdue rental unit. The gas tank was empty.
(Source)
Bowers also observed two unfamiliar men standing on top of the Knoll at the edge of the parking lot, within 10 or 15 feet of each other - "one man, middle-aged or slightly older, fairly heavy-set, in a white shirt, fairly dark trousers. Another younger man, about mid-twenties, in either a plaid shirt or a plaid coat or jacket." Both were facing toward Elm and Houston, where the motorcade would be coming from. They were the only strangers he remembered seeing. His description shows a remarkable similarity to Julia Ann Mercer's description of two unidentified men climbing the knoll.
When the shots rang out, Bowers' attention was drawn to the area where he had seen the two men; he could still make out the one in the white shirt - "the darker dressed man was too hard to distinguish from the trees." He observed "some commotion" at that spot, "...something out of the ordinary, a sort of milling around...which attracted my eye for some reason, which I could not identify." At that moment, he testified, a motorcycle policeman left the Presidential motorcade and roared up the Grassy Knoll straight to where the two mysterious gentlemen were standing behind the fence. The policeman dismounted, Bowers recalled, then after a moment climbed on his motorcycle and drove off. Later, in a film interview with attorney Mark Lane, he explained that the "commotion" that caught his eye may have been "a flash of light or smoke." His information dovetails with what other witnesses observed from different vantage points.
(Source)
On the morning of August 9, 1966, Lee Bowers, now the vice-president of a construction firm, was driving south from Dallas on business. He was two miles from Midlothian when his brand new company car veered from the road and hit a bridge abutment. A farmer who saw it said the car was going 50 miles an hour, a slow speed for that road. There were no skidmarks to indicate braking.
Bowers died of his wounds at 1 p.m. in a Dallas hospital. He was 41. There was no autopsy, and he was cremated soon afterward. Doctors saw no evidence that he had suffered a heart attack. A doctor from Midlothian, who rode in the ambulance with Bowers, noticed something peculiar about the victim. "He was in a strange state of shock," the old doctor said, "a different kind of shock than an accident victim experiences. I can't explain it. I've never seen anything like it."
Bowers widow at first insisted to Penn Jones that there was nothing suspicious about her husband's death. Then she became flustered and said: "They told him not to talk."
Google Video Link |
The Killing of Patrolman J. D. Tippit: ... Jefferson Boulevard he was moving in the direction of a used-car lot located on the southeast corner of this intersection. Four men, Warren Reynolds, Harold Russell Pat Patterson and L. J. Lewis were on the lot at the time, and they saw a white male with a revolver in his hands running south on Patton. When the man reached Jefferson, he turned right and headed west. Reynolds and Patterson decided to follow him. When he reached a gasoline service station one block away he turned north and walked toward a parking area in the rear of the station. Neither Reynolds nor Patterson saw the man after ...
(Source)
In 1963 Ferrie and Guy Bannister began working for the lawyer G. Wray Gill and his client, Carlos Marcello. This involved attempts to block Marcello's deportation to Guatemala.
On the afternoon of 22nd November, 1963, Guy Bannister and Jack Martin went drinking together. On their return to Banister's office the two men got involved in a dispute about a missing file. Banister became so angry that he he drew his Magnum revolver and hit Martin with it several times. Martin was so badly injured that he had to be detained in the local Charily Hospital.
Over the next few days Martin told friends that Ferrie and Guy Bannister had been involved in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. According to Martin, Ferrie was the getaway man whose job it was to fly the assassin out of Texas. He also claimed that Ferrie knew Lee Harvey Oswald from their days in the New Orleans Civil Air Patrol and had given him lessons on how to use a rifle with a telescopic sight.
On 25th November, Martin was contacted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He told them that he thought Ferrie had hypnotized Oswald into assassinating Kennedy. The FBI considered Martin's evidence unreliable and decided not to investigate Banister and Ferrie.
This information eventually reached Jim Garrison, the district attorney of New Orleans. He interviewed Martin about these accusations. Martin claimed that during the summer of 1963 Ferrie and Guy Bannister were involved in something very sinister with a group of Cuban exiles.
Jim Garrison now became convinced that a group of right-wing activists, including Ferrie, Guy Bannister, Carlos Bringuier and Clay Shaw, were involved in a conspiracy with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to kill John F. Kennedy. Garrison claimed this was in retaliation for his attempts to obtain a peace settlement in both Cuba and Vietnam.
David Ferrie died of a cerebral hemorrhage on 22nd February, 1967. However, some researchers, including Jim Garrison, believe he was murdered.
In 2007 Edward Haslam published Dr. Mary's Monkey. Haslam argues that Alton Ochsner organized "one of the 159 covert research centers which the CIA had admitted to setting up." Haslam believes that Ochsner recruited Mary Sherman to run the research operation The basic project was set up March 23, 1962, using conventional facilities, which then expanded out of the loop for its final phases. Haslam believes that Sherman was involved in carrying out secret research into developing a vaccine to prevent an epidemic of soft-tissue cancers caused by polio vaccine contaminated with SV-40. This work included using a linear particle accelerator located in the Infectious Disease Laboratory at the Public Health Service Hospital in New Orleans. According to Haslam there was a second-lab working on this project. This was being run by David Ferrie on Louisiana Avenue Parkway. Dr. Sherman was murdered on 21st July, 1964.
(Source)
Eladio del Valle was born in Cuba. He was a supporter of Fulgencio Batista and served as a congressman in Havana. He went into exile just before Fidel Castro gained power in January, 1959.
Del Valle moved to Florida where he was active in the Free Cuba Committee, an organization formed by Sergio Arcacha Smith. He also worked for Santo Trafficante and with his friend, David Ferrie he was involved in fire-bombing sugar fields in Cuba.
During his investigation into the assassination of John F. Kennedy case, Jim Garrison wanted to interview Eladio del Valle to obtain information against Clay Shaw. However, he was unable to find him.
Eladio del Valle was murdered on 22nd February, 1967. He had been shot in the heart. He died only hours after his friend, David Ferrie. Diego Gonzales Tendera, a close friend, later claimed de Valle was murdered because of his involvement in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
In 1975 Harry Dean claimed he had been an undercover agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. In 1962 he infiltrated the John Birch Society. He later reported that General Edwin Walker and John Rousselot had hired two gunman, Eladio del Valle and Loran Hall, to kill President John F. Kennedy. However, Dean was unable to provide any evidence to back up his claim.
Three years later further evidence emerged linking Del Valle with the assassination. Tony Cuesta had been captured during a mission at Monte Barreto in the Miramar district of Cuba on 29th May, 1966. A member of his team, Herminio Diaz Garcia, was killed during the raid. Cuesta, who always vowed that Castro would never take him alive, attempted suicide by setting off a grenade, which blinded him and blew off his right hand. Cuesta spent a long time in hospital as a result of his serious injuries.
In 1978 President Jimmy Carter arranged for a group of imprisoned exiles to be released. This included Tony Cuesta. Just before leaving Cuba Cuesta asked to see General Fabian Escalante, the head of Cuba's G-2 Spy Agency. Cuesta told Escalante that he had been involved in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. He also named De Valle and Herminio Diaz Garcia as being involved in the conspiracy.
(Source)
Nicholas J. Chetta, M.D., Orleans Parish Coroner since 1950, died at Mercy Hospital at 10:20 P.M., Saturday, May 25, 1968. ...
In our opinion, this is one of the key murders of the continuing Kennedy assassination conspiracy and coverup.
Dr. Chetta was the coroner who served at the death of David Ferrie. Dr. Chetta was the key witness regarding Perry Russo against Clay Shaw. Shaw's attorneys went into federal court only after Dr. Chetta was dead.
(Forgive my Grief, v. III, p. 28)
Date of Death: May 25, 1968
The testimony of Philip Geraci III, accompanied by his mother, was taken on April 7-8, 1964, at the Old Civil Courts Building, Royal and Conti Streets, New Orleans, La., by Mr. Wesley J. Liebeler, assistant counsel of the President's Commission.
(Reporter's Note: The witness, Philip Geraci, was accompanied into the hearing room by his mother.)
Philip Geraci, having been first duly sworn, was examined and testified as follows:
Mr. Liebeler.
My name is Wesley J. Liebeler. I am a member of the legal staff of the President's Commission investigating the assassination of President Kennedy. Staff members have been authorized to take the testimony of witnesses by the Commission pursuant to authority granted to the Commission by Executive Order No. 11130, dated November 29, 1963, and joint resolution of Congress No. 137.
I understand that Mr. Lee Rankin wrote you a letter last week in which he told you that I would contact you, did he not?
Mr. Geraci.
A letter? No.
Mr. Liebeler.
You did not receive a letter from Mr. Rankin?
Mrs. Geraci.
Would you please give us one. We would like to have it to keep.
Mr. Geraci.
Somebody said they sent one.
Mr. Liebeler.
You didn't receive it?
Mr. Geraci.
No.
Mrs. Geraci.
We did not receive it.
[SNIP]
Likewise, Jim Garrison, in On The Trail of the Assassins, claims that:
[In] another group of pictures taken at Dealey Plaza shortly after the assassination by Jim Murray of Blackstar Photo Service and William Allen of the Dallas Times-Herald . . . Deputy Sheriff Buddy Walthers is shown looking down at a bullet while a neatly dressed blond man is reaching down to pick it up. . . . The bullet was never seen again. The Warren Commission did not ask Walthers about the bullet or the blond man . . . and he did not volunteer anything about them. Walthers subsequently was murdered, so it is safe to conclude that this bullet will remain on the long list of missing or destroyed evidence. (p. 209)
Contrary to what Garrison said, the Warren Commission did ask Walthers about the "discovered bullet" story.
Mr. LIEBELER. There has also been a story, some sort of story that you were supposed to have found a spent bullet.
Mr. WALTHERS. Yes; that's what the story was in this book, and man, I've never made a statement about finding a spent bullet.
Mr. LIEBELER. And you never found any spent bullet?
Mr. WALTHERS. No; me and Allan Sweatt 2 or 3 days after the assassination did go back down there and make a pretty diligent search in there all up where that bullet might have hit, thinking that maybe the bullet hit the cement and laid down on some of them beams but we looked all up there and everywhere and I never did find one. I never did in all of my life tell anybody I found a bullet other than where it hit. (7H550)
(Source)
When Groden first showed his video at the 1995 COPA convention, Tony Marsh wrote him to correct this mistake:
Several of us in the audience were very troubled by your narration of some films. You are the leading photographic interpreter in the research community and many people will take your word as gospel. So, it is especially important that your video not perpetuate any myths. For example, in the Mentesana footage you state that the policeman is holding a second rifle, found in the TSBD. That is not a rifle; it is a shotgun. The barrel and the bore are too big in diameter for a rifle. Some shotguns have distinctive profiles and magazine caps by which we can identify them at a glance.
The shotgun the policeman was holding was his Remington 870. I have enclosed some examples of that model for you to compare to the Mentesana footage. I have reduced a diagram of the Remington 870 to about the same size as an overlay transparency of the Mentesana frame from your book so that you can see for yourself that they have the same profile at the same size. Also, one of the cops in the tramp photos carried a Remington 870. There were at least three different makes and models of shotguns used by the DPD and the Remington 870 is one of the most popular police shotguns.
Interestingly, still photos and films of Dallas cops holding shotguns that are apparently identical to the one in the Mentesana film are plentiful. But Groden neither prints any of them in his book, nor includes any in his video. Needless to say, Groden has not corrected his mistake.
(Source)
"Last Friday, November 22, 1963, I went downtown to see the President. I stood on Main Street just across the street from Titche's until the parade passed by. The I walked over to Elm Street and caught a bus to go home. The bus traveled West on Elm Street to about Murphy Street and made a stop and that is when I saw Lee Oswald get on the bus.
The traffic was heavy and it took quite sometime [sic] to travel two or three blocks. During that time someone made the statement that the President had been shot and while the bus was stopped due to the heavy traffic, Oswald got off the bus and I didn't see him again. I know this man was Lee Oswald because he lived in my home from October 7, 1963 to October 14, 1963."
" I just went to my desk and stopped there until the police came and then we were required to get a place to develop the films. I knew I had something, I figured it might be of some help - I didn't know what."
(Source)
Boggs had doubts that John F. Kennedy and J. D. Tippit had been killed by Lee Harvey Oswald and that Jack Ruby was not part of any conspiracy." According to Bernard Fensterwald: "Almost from the beginning, Congressman Boggs had been suspicious over the FBI and CIA's reluctance to provide hard information when the Commission's probe turned to certain areas, such as allegations that Oswald may have been an undercover operative of some sort. When the Commission sought to disprove the growing suspicion that Oswald had once worked for the FBI, Boggs was outraged that the only proof of denial that the FBI offered was a brief statement of disclaimer by J. Edgar Hoover. It was Hale Boggs who drew an admission from Allen Dulles that the CIA's record of employing someone like Oswald might be so heavily coded that the verification of his service would be almost impossible for outside investigators to establish."
It has been claimed by John Judge that when Alan Dulles was asked by Hale Boggs about releasing the evidence, he replied, "Go ahead and print it, nobody will read it anyway."
According to one of his friends: "Hale felt very, very torn during his work (on the Commission) ... he wished he had never been on it and wished he'd never signed it (the Warren Report)." Another former aide argued that, "Hale always returned to one thing: Hoover lied his eyes out to the Commission - on Oswald, on Ruby, on their friends, the bullets, the gun, you name it."
Thomas Hale Boggs disappeared while on a campaign flight from Anchorage to Juneau, Alaska, on 16th October, 1972. Also killed in the accident was Nick Begich, a member of the House of Representatives. No bodies were ever found and in 1973 his wife, Lindy Boggs, was elected in her husband's place.
The Los Angeles Star, on November 22, 1973, reported that before his death Boggs claimed he had "startling revelations" on Watergate and the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
The FBI had discovered that there were several women at the Quorum Club who had been involved in relationships with leading politicians. This included both John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy. It was particularly worrying that this included Mariella Novotny and Suzy Chang. This was a problem because they both had connections to communist countries and had been named as part of the spy ring that had trapped John Profumo, the British war minister, a few months earlier. President Kennedy told J. Edgar Hoover that he "personally interested in having this story killed".
Hoover refused and leaked the information to Clark Mollenhoff. On 26th October he wrote an article in The Des Moines Register claiming that the FBI had "established that the beautiful brunette had been attending parties with congressional leaders and some prominent New Frontiersmen from the executive branch of Government... The possibility that her activity might be connected with espionage was of some concern, because of the high rank of her male companions". Mollenhoff claimed that John Williams "had obtained an account" of Rometsch's activity and planned to pass this information to the Senate Rules Committee.
Shaw was brought into the trial originally by Garrison as one of the prime suspects in the case of the conspiracy to Kill JFK. Unable to prove it however he was acquitted in 1969 and then unfortunately died of Cancer in '74. Just a year after his death though, it was then fully confirmed by someone else that the previous claim that he had absolutely no connections to the CIA were found to be 100% completely false. The person making the claim was in fact a high-level CIA defector, Victor Marchetti.
It seems that he most certainly could've had interesting information but sadly and coincidentally passed away.
Clay Shaw was a businessman in New Orleans. He joined the U.S. Army and took part in the fighting in Europe. He served as an aide to General Charles Thrasher and by the time he retired in 1946 he had reached the rank of major general.
He played an important role in the restoration of historic New Orleans sites and in 1962 he established the city's International Trade Mart. He was a member of the World Trade Development Committee and a member of the board of directors of Permindex.
In 1961, Jim Garrison was elected as the city's district attorney. He developed a good reputation and in his first two years he never lost a case. Garrison took a keen interest in the case of Lee Harvey Oswald. After investigating the matter he became convinced that a group of right-wing activists, including Shaw, Guy Bannister, David Ferrie and Carlos Bringuier were involved in a conspiracy with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to kill John F. Kennedy. Garrison claimed this was in retaliation for his attempts to obtain a peace settlement in both Cuba and Vietnam.
Two of those being investigated died: Guy Bannister (June, 1964) and David Ferrie (February, 1967). On 2nd March, 1967, Jim Garrison announced the arrest of Clay Shaw on charges of conspiring to assassinate President John F. Kennedy. Attorney General Ramsay Clark, stated that the FBI had already investigated and cleared Shaw "in November and December of 1963" of "any part in the assassination". As Garrison has pointed out: "The statement that Shaw, whose name appears nowhere in the 26 volumes of the Warren Commission, had been investigated by the federal government was intriguing. If Shaw had no connection to the assassination, I wondered, why had he been investigated?" Within a few days of this statement Clark had to admit that he had published inaccurate information and that no investigation of Shaw had taken place.
As part of Garrison's attempt to prove the existence of a conspiracy, he subpoenaed the Zapruder Film from Time-Life Corporation. The company refused and they fought this subpoena all the way to the Supreme Court, which finally ruled that the corporation had to hand over the film. As Jim Marrs has pointed out: "Time-Life grudgingly turned over to Garrison a somewhat blurry copy of the film - but that was enough. Soon, thanks to the copying efforts of Garrison's staff, bootleg Zapruder films were in the hands of several assassination researchers."
At the trial in February, 1969, Perry Russo claimed that in September, 1963, he overheard Shaw and Ferrie discussing the proposed assassination of John F. Kennedy. It was suggested that the crime could be blamed on Fidel Castro.
During Shaw's trial Russo's testimony was discredited by the revelation that he underwent hypnosis and had been administered sodium pentathol, or "truth serum," at the request of the prosecution. It claimed that Russo only came up with a link between Clay Shaw , David Ferrie and Lee Harvey Oswald after these treatments. The jury found Shaw not guilty of conspiring to assassinate John F. Kennedy.
In 1973 Jim Garrison lost the office to Harry Connick. After leaving his post as district attorney Garrison wrote a book about his investigations of the Kennedy assassination, On the Trail of the Assassins (1988).
Clay Shaw died in 1974.
(Source)
Clay Shaw was a businessman in New Orleans. He joined the U.S. Army and took part in the fighting in Europe. He served as an aide to General Charles Thrasher and by the time he retired in 1946 he had reached the rank of major general.
He played an important role in the restoration of historic New Orleans sites and in 1962 he established the city's International Trade Mart. He was a member of the World Trade Development Committee and a member of the board of directors of Permindex.
In 1961, Jim Garrison was elected as the city's district attorney. He developed a good reputation and in his first two years he never lost a case. Garrison took a keen interest in the case of Lee Harvey Oswald. After investigating the matter he became convinced that a group of right-wing activists, including Shaw, Guy Bannister, David Ferrie and Carlos Bringuier were involved in a conspiracy with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to kill John F. Kennedy. Garrison claimed this was in retaliation for his attempts to obtain a peace settlement in both Cuba and Vietnam.
Two of those being investigated died: Guy Bannister (June, 1964) and David Ferrie (February, 1967). On 2nd March, 1967, Jim Garrison announced the arrest of Clay Shaw on charges of conspiring to assassinate President John F. Kennedy. Attorney General Ramsay Clark, stated that the FBI had already investigated and cleared Shaw "in November and December of 1963" of "any part in the assassination". As Garrison has pointed out: "The statement that Shaw, whose name appears nowhere in the 26 volumes of the Warren Commission, had been investigated by the federal government was intriguing. If Shaw had no connection to the assassination, I wondered, why had he been investigated?" Within a few days of this statement Clark had to admit that he had published inaccurate information and that no investigation of Shaw had taken place.
As part of Garrison's attempt to prove the existence of a conspiracy, he subpoenaed the Zapruder Film from Time-Life Corporation. The company refused and they fought this subpoena all the way to the Supreme Court, which finally ruled that the corporation had to hand over the film. As Jim Marrs has pointed out: "Time-Life grudgingly turned over to Garrison a somewhat blurry copy of the film - but that was enough. Soon, thanks to the copying efforts of Garrison's staff, bootleg Zapruder films were in the hands of several assassination researchers."
At the trial in February, 1969, Perry Russo claimed that in September, 1963, he overheard Shaw and Ferrie discussing the proposed assassination of John F. Kennedy. It was suggested that the crime could be blamed on Fidel Castro.
During Shaw's trial Russo's testimony was discredited by the revelation that he underwent hypnosis and had been administered sodium pentathol, or "truth serum," at the request of the prosecution. It claimed that Russo only came up with a link between Clay Shaw , David Ferrie and Lee Harvey Oswald after these treatments. The jury found Shaw not guilty of conspiring to assassinate John F. Kennedy.
In 1973 Jim Garrison lost the office to Harry Connick. After leaving his post as district attorney Garrison wrote a book about his investigations of the Kennedy assassination, On the Trail of the Assassins (1988).
Clay Shaw died in 1974.
In 1926 Giancana was arrested for murder. However, charges were dropped after the key witness was murdered. He was later sent to prison for theft and burglary. On his release he went to work for leading gangster Paul Ricca. By the 1950s Giancana was one of the leading crime bosses in Chicago.
In 1960 Giancana was involved in talks with Allen W. Dulles, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), about the possibility of murdering Fidel Castro. It is claimed that during the 1960 presidential election Giancana used his influence in Illinois to help John F. Kennedy defeat Richard Nixon. The two men, at that time, shared the same girlfriend, Judith Campbell Exner. -(One f the mistresses of JFK as already mentioned)-
After becoming president John F. Kennedy appointed his brother, Robert Kennedy, as U.S. Attorney General. The two men worked closely together on a wide variety of issues including the attempt to tackle organized crime. One of their prime targets was to get Giancana arrested.
(Source)
On 22nd November, 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated. Rumours began to circulate that Giancana and other gang bosses such as Santos Trafficante, Carlos Marcello, and Johnny Roselli, were involved in the crime.
In 1975 Frank Church and his Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities discovered that Judith Campbell had been involved with both Giancana and John F. Kennedy. It emerged that during the 1960 presidential election Campbell took messages from Giancana to Kennedy. Campbell later claimed these messages concerned the plans to murder Fidel Castro. Kennedy also began an affair with Campbell and used her as a courier to carry sealed envelopes to Giancana. He told her they contained "intelligence material" concerning the plot to kill Castro.
Giancana was now ordered to appear before Church's committee. However, before he could appear, on 19th June, 1975, Sam Giancana was murdered in his own home. He had a massive wound in the back of the head. He had also been shot six times in a circle around the mouth.
On 14th January, 1992, the New York Post claimed that Hoffa, Santos Trafficante and Carlos Marcello had all been involved in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Frank Ragano was quoted as saying that at the beginning of 1963 Hoffa had told him to take a message to Trafficante and Marcello concerning a plan to kill Kennedy. When the meeting took place at the Royal Orleans Hotel, Ragano told the men: "You won't believe what Hoffa wants me to tell you. Jimmy wants you to kill the president." He reported that both men gave the impression that they intended to carry out this order.
In 1992 Giancana's nephew published Double Cross: The Story of the Man Who Controlled America. The book attempted to establish that Giancana had rigged the 1960 Presidential election vote in Cook County on John Kennedy's behalf, which effectively gave Kennedy the election. It is argued that Kennedy reneged on the deal and therefore Giancana had him killed.
In his autobiography, Mob Lawyer (1994) (co-written with journalist Selwyn Raab) Frank Ragano added that in July, 1963, he was once again sent to New Orleans by Hoffa to meet Santos Trafficante and Carlos Marcello concerning plans to kill President John F. Kennedy. When Kennedy was killed Hoffa apparently said to Ragano: "I told you could do it. I'll never forget what Carlos and Santos did for me." He added: "This means Bobby is out as Attorney General". Marcello later told Ragano: "When you see Jimmy (Hoffa), you tell him he owes me and he owes me big."
Roselli discovered in 1966 that the FBI had been collecting information on his activities. Attempts were made to deport him as an illegal alien. Roselli moved to Los Angeles where he went into early retirement. It was at this time he told attorney, Edward Morgan: "The last of the sniper teams dispatched by Robert Kennedy in 1963 to assassinate Fidel Castro were captured in Havana. Under torture they broke and confessed to being sponsored by the CIA and the US government. At that point, Castro remarked that, 'If that was the way President Kennedy wanted it, Cuba could engage in the same tactics'. The result was that Castro infiltrated teams of snipers into the US to kill Kennedy".
Morgan took the story to Jack Anderson and Drew Pearson. The story was then passed on to Earl Warren. He did not want anything to do with it and so the information was then passed to the FBI. When they failed to investigate the story Anderson wrote an article entitled "President Johnson is sitting on a political H-bomb" about Roselli's story. It has been suggested that Roselli started this story at the request of his friends in the Central Intelligence Agency in order to divert attention from the investigation being carried out by Jim Garrison.
(Source)
In 1975 Frank Church and his Select Committee on Intelligence Activities interviewed Roselli about his relationship with the secret services. It emerged from this interview that Roselli and fellow crime boss, Sam Giancana had taken part in talks with the CIA about the possibility of murdering Fidel Castro. Roselli also claimed that a CIA hit team that had been dispatched to Cuba had been "turned" and used to kill Kennedy.
The following year the Select Committee on Intelligence Activities decided to recall Roselli. Soon afterwards Fred Black called him and warned him that Santos Trafficante had taken out a contract on his life and that the "Cubans were after him".
In July 1976, Roselli left home in Florida to play golf. He never arrived at the golf course and ten days later his body was found floating in an oil drum in Miami's Dumfoundling Bay. He had been garroted. Roselli's legs had been sawed off and squashed into the drum with the rest of his body.
Jack Anderson, of the Washington Post, interviewed Roselli just before he was murdered. On 7th September, 1976, the newspaper reported Roselli as saying : "When Oswald was picked up, the underworld conspirators feared he would crack and disclose information that might lead to them. This almost certainly would have brought a massive US crackdown on the Mafia. So Jack Ruby was ordered to eliminate Oswald."
The House Select Committee on Assassinations managed to obtain the records of an FBI wire tap on Santos Trafficante. On the tape Trafficante was heard to say "now only two people know who killed Kennedy and they aren't talking."
In an interview in April, 1992, Tosh Plumlee claimed that Roselli had been killed because he knew too much about JM WAVE, Operation Mongoose, and the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
(Source)
"Bill Pawley had acquired a severe case of Shingles years earlier, which had progressed across his entire body (even the soles of his feet). He had been unable to lay down, stand or become comfortable in any position. The pain was excruciating, and there was no modern medicine(s) for a cure or even proper pain management at the time. Therefore, Mr. Pawley suffered day in and day out, until he just could not do it anymore. This was the reason for his suicide."
George de Mohrenschildt was recalled to America to testify before the Warren Commission. He was asked about the claim of Marina Oswald that he knew about Oswald's attempt to kill General Edwin Walker. After giving evidence he returned to Haiti.
On 5th September 1976 De Mohrenschildt sent a message to George H. W. Bush, who was at that time director of the CIA: "Maybe you will be able to bring a solution to the hopeless situation I find myself in. My wife and I find ourselves surrounded by some vigilantes; our phone bugged; and we are being followed everywhere. Either FBI is involved in this or they do not want to accept my complaints. We are driven to insanity by the situation. I have been behaving like a damn fool ever since my daughter Nadya died from (cystic fibrosis) over three years ago. I tried to write, stupidly and unsuccessfully, about Lee H Oswald and must have angered a lot of people I do not know. But to punish an elderly man like myself and my highly nervous and sick wife is really too much. Could you do something to remove the net around us? This will be my last request for help and I will not annoy you any more."
Two months later George de Mohrenschildt was committed to a mental institution. According to his wife, Jeanne de Mohrenschildt, he was suffering from depression. He was taken to Parkland Hospital and underwent electroshock therapy.
(Source)
In February 1977, Willem Oltmans, met George de Mohrenschildt at the library of Bishop College in Dallas, where he taught French. Oltmans later told the House Select Committee on Assassinations: "I couldn't believe my eyes. The man had changed drastically... he was nervous, trembling. It was a scared, a very, very scared person I saw. I was absolutely shocked, because I knew de Mohrenschildt as a man who wins tennis matches, who is always suntanned, who jogs every morning, who is as healthy as a bull."
According to Willem Oltmans, he confessed to being involved in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. "I am responsible. I feel responsible for the behaviour of Lee Harvey Oswald... because I guided him. I instructed him to set it up." Oltmans claimed that de Mohrenschildt had admitted serving as a middleman between Lee Harvey Oswald and H. L. Hunt in an assassination plot involving other Texas oilmen, anti-Castro Cubans, and elements of the FBI and CIA.
Oltmans told the HSCA: "He begged me to take him out of the country because they are after me." On 13th February 1977, Oltmans took de Mohrenschildt to his home in Amsterdam where they worked on his memoirs. Over the next few weeks de Mohrenschildt claimed he knew Jack Ruby and argued that Texas oilmen joined with intelligence operatives to arrange the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
Willem Oltmans arranged for George de Mohrenschildt to meet a Dutch publisher and the head of Dutch national television. The two men then travelled to Brussels. When they arrived, Oltmans mentioned that an old friend of his, a Soviet diplomat, would be joining them a bit later for lunch. De Mohrenschildt said he wanted to take a short walk before lunch. Instead, he fled to a friend's house and after a few days he flew back to the United States. He later accused Oltmans of betraying him. Russ Baker suggests in his book Family of Secrets: "Perhaps, and this would be strictly conjecture, de Mohrenschildt saw what it meant that he, like Oswald, was being placed in the company of Soviets. He was being made out to be a Soviet agent himself. And once that happened, his ultimate fate was clear."
The House Select Committee on Assassinations were informed of George de Mohrenschildt's return to the United States and sent its investigator, Gaeton Fonzi, to find him. Fonzi discovered he was living with his daughter in Palm Beach. However, Fonzi was not the only person looking for de Mohrenschildt. On 15th March 1977 he had a meeting with Edward Jay Epstein that had been arranged by the Reader's Digest magazine. Epstein offered him $4,000 for a four-day interview.
On 27th March, 1977, George de Mohrenschildt arrived at the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach and spent the day being interviewed by Epstein. According to Epstein, they spent the day talking about his life and career up until the late 1950s.
Two days later Edward Jay Epstein asked him about Lee Harvey Oswald. As he wrote in his diary: "Then, this morning, I asked him about why he, a socialite in Dallas, sought out Oswald, a defector. His explanation, if believed, put the assassination in a new and unnerving context. He said that although he had never been a paid employee of the CIA, he had "on occasion done favors" for CIA connected officials. In turn, they had helped in his business contacts overseas. By way of example, he pointed to the contract for a survey of the Yugoslavian coast awarded to him in 1957. He assumed his "CIA connections" had arranged it for him and he provided them with reports on the Yugoslav officials in whom they had expressed interest."
Epstein and de Mohrenschildt, broke for lunch and decided to meet again at 3 p.m. George De Mohrenschildt returned to his room where he found a card from Gaeton Fonzi, an investigator working for the House Select Committee on Assassinations. George De Mohrenschildt's body was found later that day. He had apparently committed suicide by shooting himself in the mouth.
On 11th May, 1978, Jeanne de Mohrenschildt gave an interview to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, where she said that she did not accept that her husband had committed suicide. She also said that she believed Lee Harvey Oswald was an agent of the United States, possibly of the CIA, and that she was convinced he did not kill John F. Kennedy. She then went onto say: "They may get me too, but I'm not afraid... It's about time somebody looked into this thing."
(Source)
Carlos Prio Socarrás was born in Bahía Honda, Cuba on 14th July 1903. Prio became involved in politics while a law student at the University of Havana. He spent two years in prison for his anti-government activities. After his release he took part in the coup that deposed Gerardo Machado's dictatorship in 1933 and helped organize the Partido Revolucionario Cubano Auténtico.
In 1944 President Ramón Grau appointed him as his Minister of Labour. He became a popular minister and in 1948 he replaced Grau as president. However, he never kept his promise of removing the Mafia from Cuba. He also appeared to acquire considerable wealth during his period in government.
In 1952 elections the Cuban People's Party was expected to form the new government. During the election campaign General Fulgencio Batista, with the support of the armed forces, ousted Prio and took control of the country. Prio fled to the United States.
In 1953, Fidel Castro, with an armed group of 123 men and women, attacked the Moncada army barracks. The plan to overthrow Batista ended in disaster and although only eight were killed in the fighting, another eighty were murdered by the army after they were captured. Castro was lucky that the lieutenant who arrested him ignored orders to have him executed and instead delivered him to the nearest civilian prison.
Following considerable pressure from the Cuban population, Fulgencio Batista decided to release Fidel Castro after he had served only two years of his sentence. Batista also promised elections but when it became clear that they would not take place, Castro left for Mexico where he began to plan another attempt to overthrow the Cuban government. Prio used some of the money to support the efforts of Castro against the Batista regime. However, he broke with Castro after he gained power in 1959.
Prio worked as a property developer and businessman in Miami. It was claimed that Prio was involved in the Bay of Pigs operation. It was also suggested that he had information on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. He was also linked in testimony with Jack Ruby and Frank Sturgis.
In 1977 Prio was wanted for questioning by the Select Committee on Assassinations. He was found dead from gunshot wounds on 5th April, 1977, outside the garage of his Miami Beach home. He died at the same time as George De Mohrenschildt and Charlie Nicoletti, two other men due to appear before the committee. Officially Carlos Prio committed suicide, however, in an article, Did the CIA kill Carlos Prio?, David Miller suggested in had been murdered.
(Please read this link again)
Still, Mr. Nichols concluded that even a pariah like Oswald deserved representation. And it was up to him as bar association president to see if the accused killer wanted a lawyer. So, Mr. Nichols cleaned up, got dressed on a Saturday afternoon and drove to the city jail.
After navigating his way through a horde of reporters and television cameramen, he went to Police Department offices and announced that he was there to speak to Oswald. Accompanied by Police Chief Jesse Curry, Mr. Nichols took the elevator to the sixth floor of the Police and Courts Building, where he found the prisoner by himself in a small cell between two empty cells. A police guard sat just outside the cell door.
“So, he sat on one bunk and I sat on the other. Maybe three or four feet apart,” Nichols told a lawyer for the Warren Commission, a prestigious group of government officials who investigated the assassination.
Nichols described Oswald, who was dressed in white T-shirt and slacks, as calm and rested. He had a bruise over one eye but appeared to be in good health. He said that police were holding him “incommunicado” and that he did not know what had happened to the president, Mr. Nichols told the Warren Commission.
Oswald said he wanted a New York lawyer named John Abt or a lawyer associated with the American Civil Liberties Union to represent him. Oswald also wanted a lawyer “who believes as I believe, and believes in my innocence.”
“What I am interested in is knowing right now, do you want me or the Dallas Bar Association to try to get you a lawyer?” Mr. Nichols asked Oswald.
“No, not right now,” he replied.
Mr. Nichols, who was 47 at the time, left the jail cell confident that he had done his duty as bar association president. The next morning, Jack Ruby shot and killed Oswald on live national television.
(Source)
On 28th August, 1964, Belmont received a memo that suggested that the Warren Commission had doubts about the authenticity of the palm print found on the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle: "J. Lee Rankin advised because of the circumstances that now exist there was a serious question in the minds of the Commission as to whether or not the palm print impression that has been obtained from the Dallas Police Department is a legitimate latent print impression removed from the rifle barrel or whether it was obtained from some other source." However, Belmont was able to persuade members of the committee to accept the authenticity of the palm print.
Kenneth O'Donnell, who was sitting next to Powers, also supported this view of the assassination. O'Donnell commented: "I told the FBI what I had heard, but they said it couldn't have happened that way and that I must have been imagining things. So I testified the way they wanted me to. I just didn't want to stir up any more pain and trouble for the family."
(Source)
I was standing in front of the Sheriff's Office at 505 Main Street, Dallas, Texas, watching President Kennedy pass in the motorcade. I was watching the rest of the motorcade a few seconds after President Kennedy passed where I was standing when I heard a rifle shot and a few seconds later a second and then a third shot. At the retort [sic] of the first shot, I started running around the corner and Officer Buddy Walthers and I ran across Houston Street and on up the terrace on Elm Street and into the railroad yards. We made a [unintelligible -- search?] through the railroad yards and I returned to Elm Street by the Turnpike sign at which time Officer Walthers told me that a bullet had struck the curb on the south side of Elm Street. I crossed to Elm with Deputy C. L. Lummie Lewis [sic] to search for a spot where a shell might have hit.
About this time I heard a shrill whistle and I turned around and saw a white male running down the hill from the direction of the Texas School Book Depository building and I saw what I think was a light colored Rambler Station [sic] wagon with [a] luggage rack on top pull over to the curb and the subject who had come running down the hill got into the car. The man driving this station wagon was a dark complected white male. I tried to get across the street to stop the car and talk with subjects, but the traffic was so heavy, I could not make it. I reported this incident at once to a secret service [sic] officer whose name I do not know, then I left this area and went at once to the building and assisted in the search of the building.
Later that afternoon, I heard that the City had a suspect in custody and I called and reported the information about the suspect running down the hill and getting into a car to Captain Fritz and was requested to come at once to City Hall. I went to the City Hall and identified the suspect they had in custody as being the same person I saw running down this hill and get into the station wagon and leave the scene.
(Source)
Investigation of Other Activities: ... had more than a passing notice of the person they observed. Malcolm H. Price, Jr., adjusted the scope on the individual's rifle on one occasion; Garland G. Slack had an altercation with the individual on another occasion because he was shooting at Slack's target; and Sterling C. Wood, who on a third date was present at the range with his father, Dr. Homer Wood, spoke with his father and very briefly with the man himself about the individual's rifle. All three of these persons, as well as Dr. Wood, expressed confidence that the man they saw was Oswald. Two other persons believed they saw a...
(Source)
"I'm not saying that Lee is innocent, that he didn't know about the conspiracy or was not a part of it, but I am saying he's not necessarily guilty of murder. At first, I thought that Jack Ruby (who killed Oswald two days after the assassination) was swayed by passion; all of America was grieving. But later, we found that he had connections with the underworld. Now, I think Lee was killed to keep his mouth shut.''
(Source)
" I believe he worked for the American government... He was taught the Russian language when he was in the military. Do you think that is usual, that an ordinary soldier is taught Russian? Also, he got in and out of Russia quite easily, and he got me out quite easily."
(Source)
"the motorcade came to almost a halt at the time the shots rang out". James Chaney (one of the four Presidential motorcyclists) - stated that the limousine "after the shooting, from the time the first shot rang out, the car stopped completely, pulled to the left and stopped." Mary Woodward, a journalist with the Dallas Morning News wrote: "Instead of speeding up the car, the car came to a halt... after the first shot".
(Source)
"If the Secret Service men in the front had reacted quicker to the first two shots at the President's car, if the driver had stepped on the gas before instead of after the fatal third shot was fired, would President Kennedy be alive today? He added "Greer had been remorseful all day, feeling that he could have saved President Kennedy's life by swerving the car or speeding suddenly after the first shots."
"I heard this noise. And I thought that is what it was. And then I heard it again. And I glanced over my shoulder. And I saw Governor Connally like he was starting to fall. Then I realized there was something wrong. I tramped on the accelerator, and at the same time Mr. Kellerman said to me, "Get out of here fast." And I cannot remember even the other shots or noises that was. I cannot quite remember any more. I did not see anything happen behind me any more, because I was occupied with getting away."
Originally posted by NowanKenubi
I'll have the honor of the first reply, then!
I obviously haven't finished reading your thread, but I noticed that E. Roberts died in 1966 of a heart attack and it has been shown ( at least recently to me ) that in 1965, the CIA had a "Heart Attack" gun at their disposal...
www.somethingmustbreak.net...
You must already know that, tho... Do you know how many people died from a heart attack, in the list of victims you present? ( I know! I'll know when reading the whole thread! )
Great work! Thanks!
I'll get back to you with it as soon as possible.
A good fare of heart attacks, and a few are primarily listed under other reasons, like unknown, long illness and such... And there seems to be a good share of "suicide by gun shot" and probably statistically to high a ratio of people getting shot by police officers for a hundred and three deaths report...
but I think I read somewhere about a gun inducing cancer as part of the arsenal of the CIA, also, but it might be a dream on my part... will have to check that..
(Source)
It's not surprising this scene ended up on the cutting room floor. Even Oliver Stone's source for the yarn, author Jim Marrs, acknowledges that medical science deems this "murder" impossible.(2) It is true that Jack Ruby did make the claim that he had been injected with cancer cells, but one simply could not develop cancer from such injections. In fact, injections of cancer cells have been used experimentally in humans in attempts to boost the immune system.
Ruby also claimed that his prison cell was being poisoned with mustard gas, and that genocide against the Jews was being conducted in the very building in which he was incarcerated. Jews were being exterminated not far from his cell, he said, and he asserted that could hear their screams. Is Oliver Stone about to argue that Ruby is a credible source of information about such things?
Just as importantly, and despite popular mythology, Jack Ruby did not die of cancer. As Stone's source, Jim Marrs, also acknowledges, Ruby had been diagnosed with lung cancer, but the cause of his death was pulmonary embolism; a blood clot had formed in a leg, passed through his heart and lodged in his lung.(3)
At one point in JFK, investigator Lou Ivon (Jay O. Sanders) insists that Ruby's death is part of a coordinated campaign to silence conspiracy witnesses: "how many corpses you lawyers gotta see to figure out what's going on?" he says.(4) Oliver Stone claims to have done his homework. How does he explain nonsense like this?
Looks like I've got a bedtime story for the next week at least
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You should be working on a book so we can settle this once and for all.
Obviously our own gov't had a HUGE hand in it.
(Source)
As Johnson was now president, Life Magazine decided not to use the story concerning his corrupt activities. James Wagenvoord later recalled: "The LBJ/Baker piece was in the final editing stages and was scheduled to break in the issue of the magazine due out the week of November 24th (the magazine would have made it to the newsstands on November 26th or 27th). It had been prepared in relative secrecy by a small special editorial team. On Kennedy's death research files and all numbered copies of the nearly print-ready draft were gathered up by my boss (he had been the top editor on the team) and shredded. The issue that was to expose LBJ instead featured the Zapruder film."
On 17th January, 1964, the Senate Rules Committee voted to release to the public the secret testimony of Don B. Reynolds. Johnson responded by leaking information from Reynolds' FBI file to Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson. On 5th February, 1964, The Washington Post reported that Reynolds had lied about his academic success at West Point. The article also claimed that Reynolds had been a supporter of Joseph McCarthy and had accused business rivals of being secret members of the American Communist Party. It was also revealed that Reynolds had made anti-Semitic remarks while in Berlin in 1953.
A few weeks later the New York Times reported that Lyndon B. Johnson had used information from secret government documents to smear Don B. Reynolds. It also reported that Johnson's officials had been applying pressure on the editors of newspapers not to print information that had been disclosed by Reynolds in front of the Senate Rules Committee.