This piece is dedicated to Mr. Jack White who gave the world "Badgeman"
Above: RDM* 1999 Photocomposite "Badgcomp12.jpg"
Prologue
As we approach the end of the millenium, it should be clear to all JFK assassination researchers that regardless of our personal differences of opinions on the case, we have really achieved something positive as a team, as a "movement" of sorts, and that we shall not enter the 21st Century in ignorance. The light at the end of the tunnel can now be seen, the darkness is past...a better future awaits us for we have redeemed our history and have provided the nation with the course correction which it needed to avoid moral disaster and the decline of civilization that inevitably follows. The I Ch'ing, the oldest book in the world, states:
"Here the climax of the darkening is reached. The dark power at first, held so high a place that it could wound all who were on the side of good and of the light. But, in the end, it perishes of its own darkness for evil must itself fall at the very moment when it has wholly overcome the good and thus consumed the energy to which it owed its duration."
A Sign of the Times
Even as I wrote this introduction, synchronistically, David Lifton, author of "Best Evidence", appeared on Fox News with David Asman discussing (of all things!) the alteration of the Z-Film and why the U.S. should NOT pay the Zapruder foundation (LMH) 30 million dollars until AUTHENTICITY TESTS have been conducted to validated it. With what we now know, it has no hope of passing such a test.
DAVID LIFTON'S "BEST EVIDENCE"
Everyone must know how much I admire David Lifton's work in "Best Evidence". As far as my research and medical studies in the case of the JFK autopsy are concerned, I ask, my fellow Americans, "Where would I be without my 'parasagittal laceration' and 'severed cerebral peduncles' which Mr. Lifton first pointed out."
Mr. Lifton's appearance on Fox News was great. Slightly steamed up and a bit irate, but not blowing a gasket, Lifton even quoted Peter Finch in the movie "Network": "I'm mad (as hell) and I'm not going to take it anymore". Actually, Lifton, looking like Harry Truman and just a little too polite didn't quite say "hell" but David Asman repeating it did:
"I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore".
It shows how far we've come but...I'm not mad anymore. I'm almost satisfied that justice is about to be done. It's just a matter of time, we have laid the ground work of justice for JFK. We're getting the country back in step with history.
"Z"YNCHRONICITY
David Lifton's appearance on Fox News on July 13th, 1999 with David Asman comes just one year less one day after this writer gave Fox reporter Asman a copy of "The Z-Thesis". I call this "cross pollination of information" and it redounds to the benefit of all. Reporter David Asman, who also owned a Bell & Howell camera like Zapruder's, clearly understands the problems with the Zapruder film.
Last year, I was asked to appear on Fox In-Depth on "Bastille Day" 1998 to debate Howard Motyl, video producer of the new, improved and better altered version of the Zapruder Film(Flam).
All sarcasm aside, the digitized version is truly a much better alteration and really worth $20 (but only to an expert). Unlike the "original" original Z-Film, this new alteration is in sharp focus with many nearly complete frames. One can still see the splice marks (though slightly touched up and toned down) as well as many temporal anomalies. The condensation line or "vapor trail" at Z-295 is absolutely exquisite, vindicating my eyesight and position, as well as those of my colleague, Roy Shaeffer of Dayton, Ohio who shares the 1992 discovery with me. Finally, and best of all, one of the "frozen people" in the background of the "original" original Z-Film has actually thawed out and moves with thrashing legs whereas he had lain still, fallen and frozen like an icicle for 35 years in the "original" original Z-Film(Flam) which we all saw first on CBS.
We are making progress...
"BADGEMAN": A Brief History
Sometime in the mid-70's, Ruth Carter, President Jimmy Carter's sister, was shown a print of the Moorman polaroid taken at the moment JFK received his mortal head wound.
When seeing it, Ms. Carter remarked that she felt the impression of seeing someone firing from the Grassy Knoll at the President, pointing out the area in question. Ruth Carter was a gifted seer.
That is the"legend' that has grown around this story but the truth is more interesting. According to Jack White, who made the discovery, it went like this:
"THIS IS AN ANCECDOTE TOLD BY ROBERT GRODEN AND HE FIRST TOLD IT ABOUT 1985, SEVERAL YEARS AFTER THE DISCOVERY OF BADGEMAN. AT THE TIME OF THE BADGEMAN DISCOVERY, THIS ANECDOTE WAS TOTALLY UNKNOWN AND IS NOT VERIFIED. NO. THAT IS NOT WHAT HAPPENED. IN 1981, GARY MACK WAS LOOKING AT SOME SLIDES LOANED TO HIM BY ROBERT GRODEN, WHEN HE PROJECTED THE SLIDE OF AN ENLARGED PORTION OF THE MOORMAN PHOTO, HE SAW WHAT HE THOUGHT WAS A FACE. GARY ASKED ME TO MAKE
A PHOTO ENLARGEMENT TO BRING OUT DETAIL. THAT LED TO THE DISCOVERY WE CALLED BADGEMAN. RUTH CARTER OR GRODEN HAD ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS ABSOLUTELY UNTRUE!!!!!!!"
A short time later, Jack White, a professional photographer, film developer and expert in photo enlargement procured a UPI photograph made shortly after the assassination of the Moorman polaroid, which by the mid-70's had begun to fade.
Jack White continues the official history of "Badgeman":
"AT THAT POINT, WE HAD NEVER HEARD OF ANY OBSERVATIONS BY CARTER. I WORKED ENTIRELY FROM THE OBSERVATION BY GARY MACK! BUT IF YOU ARE PUTTING THIS OUT FOR PUBLIC CONSUMPTION, PLEASE CORRECT THE REFERENCES TO RUTH CARTER (UNTRUE) AND REPLACE THEM WITH THE CORRECT STORY."
Thus, as a result of his collaboration with Gary Mack, Jack White was able to produce a print of the clearly recognizable image of a man, standing behind the picket fence, dressed in a Dallas Police uniform.
This is how this writer describes the appearance of "Badgeman":
The man, possessing a nearly horeshoe-shaped receding hairline and with police shield and Dallas P.D. patch reflecting the sunlight is, quite obviously, caught by the camera in the act of firing a rifle at President Kennedy. The photo and the figure revealed by Jack White and Gary Mack have come to be known as "Badgeman", one of the great mysteries of the JFK Assassination.
BADGEMAN REVEALED ON T.V I first saw "Badgeman" in 1991-92. When "The Men Who Killed Kennedy" documentary series cablecast the photo in the fall of 1993, I used a then Hi-Tech Sony professional video capture printer to produce a hardcopy of "Badgeman". This (3" x 5") polaroid photo was then scanned and digitized at 600 dpi for computer enhancement.
BADGEMAN'S ID
Five years ago, after this work, I felt I had identified "Badgeman" (to my satisfaction) but I couldn't tell very many people about it.
One of the few who could hear and understand my findings was Professor James Fetzer, McKnight Professor of Philosophy at the University of Minnesotta, co-author and editor of "Assassination Science". I had made a correlation between the hair line, facial features, and uniform characteristics of "Badgeman" with similar features I saw in photos of a Dallas policeman appearing in other assassination photos, specifically, an arresting officer in some of the Tramp photos.
I shared some of my composite studies with Professor Fetzer which showed a nearly identical match in the hairline study. When he saw the head photo which I was using for the comparison, Fetzer advised me that, having seen the original print of the head photo, he could assure me that the photo I was using had been reversed from right to left as the head in the original print was cocked or tilted the other way. Visualizing the reversal, it seemed to me that if it were truly that way, the match would be even better...but I couldn't tell very many people about that in 1994.
CALLING DALLAS
This year (1999), I celebrated the 4th of July in a special way: I called Dallas, Texas to talk to Jack White for half an hour and to ask his o.k. to release my analysis and enhancements of his original "Badgeman" photo.
JFK CONSPIRACY THEORY VALIDATED
I really appreciate Mr. White's approach to JFK research and I respect his work very much. Jack is one of the few open-minded and "original thinkers" in the history of assassination research. Where would we be without the mystery of "Badgeman"? Where would public interest in the case be if Jack White had not extracted "Badgeman" from the Mooreman polaroid and given credibilty to the JFK conspiracy theory?
What could be more "conspiratorial" than a picture of a Dallas Policeman taking a "pot shot" at the President of the United States on November 22nd, 1963?
Recently, I've been inclined to publish my enhancements and analysis of his original "Badgeman" photo enlargements which I first saw on television in 1992.
On the 4th of July, 1999, Jack White gave me his permission to use the "Badgeman" image I had captured in 1992 to post this (even though he may not agree with my interpretations). Here is a scan of the first comparison I made between "Badgeman" and the "Tramp Cop" in 1994.
However, the opinions expressed hereafter are those of this writer and NOT those of Jack White, Gary Mack or anyone else. They are simply the observations and comments of this researcher and no one else.
RDM* 1994 Photocomposite "Badtrp1.jpg":
It is important to note in this study, that, to our advantage, the heads of the two subjects are nearly at the same angle and perspective. This lucky break makes it possible to see the similarity of the "elf ear" in both photos which tapers up sharply peaking with a spear-like point at the apex.
Secondly, the position of the chest to the viewer makes it possible to see a unique geometric configuration among the shield, the brass button vertically below the shield, and the tip of the ball point pen clipped in the chest pocket of both uniforms in nearly identical position. The slight differences can easily be attribute to the fact that Badgeman's left arm is lifting the shield area slightly, wrinkling it, as he holds the weapon in firing at JFK. However, the top of the silver clip of the ball point is still visible as a small point of light just to the inside of the shield toward the midline in the "Badgeman" picture.
RDM* Photocomposite "Shields2.jpg":
SHIELD STUDY
In the 4 panel study below, the upper panels show the two shield areas. The lower ones are lettered a,b,c,d, etc. showing our correlation of similarities adjusted for the warping of the uniform by Badgeman's posture.
Code:
a=Elf-like ear;
b=Strong jaw, similar in structure, angle and proportion;
c=silver clip of ball point pen ("bpp") on uniform in relation to shield. Note only the very tip of the "bpp" is visible in Badgeman photo due to his arm posture in a firing rifle;
d=point of reflected light from the fold of a crease in the uniform.
There is yet one more detail (not lettered) of significant importance on the left sleeve of "Badgeman" which will be revealed below.
Tramp Photo "P6" :
TRACKING THE TRAMP COP
The above mentioned observations came after several years of studying the photo evidence and so it was not a discovery that was found out suddenly. It has been a slow recollection of facts. The conviction of certainty grew slowly as I acquired more and better pictures of the Tramp Cop, one of the "arresting" officers (though no arrest is apparent) in the Tramp photos. Below is the Tramp photo from which the above study was made. It is designated "P6" using Webberman/Canfield nomenclature which we will continue to use in our analysis.
We come now to two of the most interesting photos in the entire Tramp photo series, designated "P4" and "P7":
A DRUID INTEREST
My personal interest in this picture was piqued by the unique and nefariously associated patch on the forearm sleeve of the policeman at left. This patch is known to me as one of the symbols of ancient Druids but, perverted in modern times like the "swaztika", it designated to many others in the '50-'60's one of the primary insignias and logos of the Ku Klux Klan's Southern Jurisdiction. One can see it today commonly at white supremacist and skinhead rallies.
Tramp Photo "P4":
GUN RUNNING "MINUTEMEN"
In Texas, in 1963 in particular, this symbol was used by General Edwin Walker's renegade army of "Minutemen", a rabidly anti-Kennedy, right-wing militarist, gun running army of John Birchers, hate mongers and klansmen with networks thoughout the South. This group was intimately related to the Joseph Milteer and was involved with Jack Ruby in arms thefts at Ft. Hood (See John Elrod's testimony) and gun running (see FBI Lake Ponchatrain raid and Oxford incident involving General Walker's arrest in James Hosty's book on Oswald).
To continue our investigation, we must study the next photo in the Tramp series, "P7".Now let us study details of "P4" and "P7". I have designated the photo as "Patch 47" with an inset at the lower right center showing an enlargement of the symbol [(+)] and using the upper right corner of said inset to point to the position of the same symbol also seen on the left sleeve of the arresting officer whom I suspect of being "Badgeman".
Returning to our enhancement of Jack White's "Badgeman" photo, I can now demonstrate a definitive correlation which confirms that this suspect may indeed be one of the shooters of President John F. Kennedy. To do this, I must enlarge and invert a small section of the symbol shown in "Patch47" to compare with the presumed forearm position of "Badgeman" as he would have had to position himself to hold a rifle.
This posture would, in fact, have to rotate the left forearm outward thus presenting the patch or part of it to the camera. The reader can clearly see this by looking at the motion of his own left forearm while pretending to hold a rifle. In cradling and supporting the rifle from below in the palm of the left hand, the left forearm is forced to turn outward showing the inner surface of the forearm or sleeve (if one is wearing a long sleeve shirt). Below is an enlargement of this section of "Badgeman's" presumed forearm previously shown in the "4 Panel Shield Study."
RDM* Photo Composite "Patch47.jpg":
RDM*Photo Enhancement "PatchX.jpg":
We come now to a stunning demonstration of the possibilities of modern technology to unravel previously unseen and hidden information from the darkest regions of space. As most readers know, there is a computer graphics convention designating 256 shades of grey between white and black and that even in what appears to be wholly black or seemingly amorphous, there may yet be many shades of dark grey and near black containing valuable information.
Below, there follows an enlargement and inversion of the symbol (+) we have found on the sleeve of the "Tramp Cops" and "Badgeman". Juxtaposed in the upper left are two images of the patch. The inner one is that one worn by the arresting officer in "P4" (inverted) alongside the one we have found on "Badgeman's" sleeve (far left).
The discovery of this symbol on "Badgemen's" left sleeve provides yet another confirmation of our suspicion that the "Elf-eared" officer and "Badgeman" are one and the same person photographed just minutes apart.
In the following photo, we are using the lower right corner of the inset circled-cross, seen just left of center, [(+)] , to
point out the position of the same symbol on "Badgeman's" left forearm.
Photocomposite "Patchxinv.jpg":
As many readers may by now suspect, I have a definite idea of who this "Tramp Cop" may be and if the reader guessed "J. D. Tippit", the reader is correct.
RECOGNIZING TIPPIT IN 1994
As I stated above, coming to the realization that it was Officer Tippit in the Tramp Photos came slowly. This was due to the difficulty I had had in securing actual photos of the slain officer since I first proposed the possibility that photos of Tippit might have been substituted for those of JFK at the 3rd Decade Symposium Press Conference in June of 1992 in Chicago.
All pictures of Tippit seemed to be those of "too young" a man to be the 39 year-old slain in 1963. So it was very gratifying in 1994 when Professor David Porter of Empire State College in New York assisted me in procuring a picture of Tippit showing him closer to his actual age at the time of his demise. When I had collected enough pictures of Tippit between 1992 and 1994 to have memorized his features from different angles and aspects, I was shocked to recognize him as one of the arresting officers in the so-called "Tramp Photos".
The picture provided to me by Professor Porter was recently discussed in exchanges with Jack White regarding whether or not Tippit really looked like JFK. I answered with the following photo composite which I believe made the similarities self-evident.
RDM* Photcomposite "Essence2.jpg":
Curiously, it was this same photograph which provided me with the raw materials (facial feature components) to configure the "Badgeman Identified" photo composite shown at the beginning of this article.
As had been earlier pointed out by Professor James Fetzer, other pictures of Tippit had been reversed from right to left and drawings made of him were distorted. His true wounds had been hidden for 30 years until this writer uncovered them in 1992. Furthermore, false wounds ('legends" regarding the forehead and/or eye) where concocted to explain why Tippit's casket was sealed and buried unseen by his family. Ostensibly, because his face had been "disfigured". However, as we see in the Tippit autopsy photos which this writer released in last year in "The Ultimate Secret of the JFK Assassination", the bullet he received was so precisely place that none of his facial feature were harmed. Tippit's "disfigurement" came later as a result of the falsified "tracheotomy" which was performed on his corpse to fashion "a wound of exit" in anticipation of a single gunman scenario. Tippit was buried so quickly (the very next day in fact, Saturday November 23rd) ) that it has now come to be regularly misreported as Monday the 25th of November. No time was wasted in dispatching Tippit "to his heavenly rest." Though, ironically, in a strange twist of fate, this would be true if I am correct that it was Tippit's body that was buried in JFK's place.
OLD FRIENDS, NEW INSIGHTS
Recently, I chanced to meet with an old friend who had been one of the first friends to be interested in the case back in our Hunter College days in the mid-1970's. When I showed him enlarged copies of "Badgeman" and Tippit, he made a remark which reminded me of Jim Fetzer's discovery of right-left reversal of Tippit photos when he said: "It's too bad this picture of Tippit isn't the other way around 'cause then the hairline matches perfectly even this little wave (or curl) here, it goes right in..." pointing to a little triangular area on Tippit's pate which angles in at a very particular point making the hairline contour, though apparently "Horace shaped", slightly asymmetrical.
I realized that this detail could be tantamount to finding a finger print and if Jim Fetzer's observation made years ago applied here, then it could prove conclusively that Tippit was "Badgeman".
To my amazement, when I switched the picture from right to left, the later photo of Tippit (circa 1959, confirmed by the late Tippit expert, Larry Ray Harris) showed eyebrow, forehead contour and hairline features which are identical to those seen in Jack White's "Badgeman" photo enlargements.
TIPPIT=BADGEMAN
Below, I present the photos which I believe prove the identity of "Badgeman" to be Officer J. D. Tippit. The contours of the hairlines when adjusted for the difference in the angle of the heads in the photo show themselves to be IDENTICAL (it helps to study topology in this kind of work). The most salient feature is the unique triangular indentation of the hairline shown the right side of the hairline (from our viewing perspective, but actually being the left side of Badgeman's head).
In fact, if the reader will look closely, he will note that the angle shown within in the inset is almost exactly 60 degrees form a nearly perfect equilateral triangle (depicted by the red down arrows).
Descending to our right along both hairlines, we find a second and smaller wave of hair which forms a black triangular wave (red up arrows) immediately adjacent to the previously described 60 degree indentation, before the line curls downward in a semicircular pattern (blue left pointing arrows) toward the sideburns.
Other features, such as the long Elf-like pointed ear as well as the very dark left eye brow, cheek bone and the forehead size and contour appear to this researcher's eyes to be IDENTICAL. I encourage the reader to do his own geometric studies.
Here follow the photos which I have used to produce the "Badgeman Identified" photo composite. I knew this in 1994, but I couldn't tell many people.
RDM* Photocomposite "Badgcomp.jpg"
Three good reasons for Tippit's murder:
During our July 4th conversation, I reaffirmed for Jack White some of my ideas on the purposes of the pre-planned Tippit killing, i.e., that it was designed to be the lynchpin for a successful execution of JFK by providing a diabolically conceived "mind control" apparatus for preemptively whitewashing the entire event.
A. To frame Oswald as a cop-killer to make credible the presidential assassination charge;
B. To provide preconceived and rearranged medical evidence: Fake Stare-of-Death photographs, HoaX-Rays of Tippit's head wound were substituted in less than 2 weeks after the assassination to fool and to coerce Dr. Malcolm Perry and the Dallas medical team, thus tricking them and forcing these heroic doctors into doubting themselves in order to alter
their opinions most importantly, to provide, in this writer's words, "the get-away vehicle" for the masterminds' and assassins' successful escape by sacrificing one of there own to cover their tracks. By arranging and providing a body, really and truly slain by a "Single Gunman", with a prealigned head wound, the masterminds were sure to confuse Humes, Finck and Boswell, the Bethesda autopsy team (who wouldn't know the real JFK from a hole in the head). While under the direct control of General Wehle, U.S. Army, and Admiral Burkley, U.S. Navy, the Bethesda autopsy team was manipulated like a group of marionettes by the string-pullers, curtain closers, and grey men who stood in the shadows of the Bethesda autopsy room telling Humes, Boswell and Finck "what to find" and "where to find it" in those gruesome hours before the dawn of November 23rd, 1963. The control of Humes, Finck and Boswel continued as well in the days and years which followed the death of John F.
May John F. Kennedy rest in peace, may the truth be known and may the world receive Light out of the darkness of his untimely death.
C. Most importantly, to provide, in this writer's words, "the get-away vehicle" for the masterminds' and assassins' successful escape by sacrificing one of there own to cover their tracks. By arranging and providing a body, really and truly slain by a "Single Gunman", with a prealigned head wound, the masterminds were sure to confuse Humes, Finck and Boswell, the Bethesda autopsy team (who wouldn't know the real JFK from a hole in the head). While under the direct control of General Wehle, U.S. Army, and Admiral Burkley, U.S. Navy, the Bethesda autopsy team was manipulated like a group of marionettes by the string-pullers, curtain closers, and grey men who stood in the shadows of the Bethesda autopsy room telling Humes, Boswell and Finck "what to find" and "where to find it" in those gruesome hours before the dawn of November 23rd, 1963. The control of Humes, Finck and Boswel continued as well in the days and years which followed the death of John F. Kennedy.
Here is wisdom:
"Here the climax of the darkening is reached. The dark force at first held so high a place that it could wound all who were on the side of good and of the light. But, in the end, evil perishes of its own darkness for evil must itself fall at the very moment when it has overcome the good and thus consumed the energy to which it owed its duration."
Epilogue
In addition to the photo evidence and analysis heretofore presented, my research has also produced two eyewitnesses to Tippit's presence on the Grassy Knoll immediately after the murder of JFK.
One is a lady whom I interviewed in Dallas in 1994 who told me:
"As you know, I was one of the first people to run up to the Grassy Knoll...and when I got there, I saw Tippit there and so I thought everything was 'alright' ".
For her own protection, I still keep her identity secret.
However, there is another whom I can identify. I could not tell many people of this in 1963 nor in 1994 but...
I too saw Tippit on the Grassy Knoll on November 22nd, 1963 but I didn't know it was him until now.
Robert D. Morningstar is a computer systems and imaging specialist living in New York City. During the 1960 campaign, RDM worked as a volunteer for the election of John F. Kennedy in NYC. He is a graduate of Power Memorial Academy with a degree in psychology from Fordham University. RDM is an acknowledged Tai Chi master and has taught for the East Asian Studies Department at Oberlin College and as an Adjunct Lecturer at Hunter College (1994-95), City University of New York. From 1992-1994, he was a movement therapist in the Behavioral Sciences Department at The International Center for the Disabled teaching in Stress Management and Behavioral Modification Programs in New York City.
Morningstar is also an FAA licensed pilot and Instrument Ground Instructor. He is a member of The U.S. Naval Institute, The Air Force Association, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association and the Air Safety Foundation. His biography is listed in "Who's Who in The East" (24th & 25th Editions)."
R. D. Morningstar has studied the assassination of John F. Kennedy since the day it occurred. In 1992, at the Third Decade Symposium on the JFK Assassination in Chicago, R. D. Morningstar became the first scientist to expose publicly the use of gestalt psychology in the alteration and doctoring of the Zapruder Film.
In June, 1997, RDM was elected Presider of the Ancient Druid Order of England in a Druid ceremony at Stonehenge directly linking him spiritually to the Arthurian legacy.
As we approach the 35th anniversary of the death of JFK, Robert D. Morningstar is proud to present to all Americans yet cherish truth, liberty, and freedom of speech, in memory of President John F. Kennedy, "The Ultimate Secret":
Prologue
"Once you have eliminated the impossible, what remains, however improbable, is the Truth"
- Sherlock Holmes.
THE ULTIMATE SECRET OF THE JFK ASSASSINATION:
The JFK-Tippit Double Murder
"The killing of Officer Tippit is the Rosetta Stone of the JFK assassination"
Wesley J. Leibeler, Warren Commission counsel
PREFACE
For 35 years, the world has wondered about the circumstances surrounding the John F. Kennedy Assassination. The facts of the case lay in murky darkness mired, like a body sunken in a bog awaiting resurrection or revival.
For 35 years, having been a witness to these historical events, I have collected the facts surrounding that singular moment in our dark history in the hope of someday bringing the truth to light. I did this for one reason and one person only. The quest has lead me across continents and oceans, even back to Camelot. I have descended into the underworld. I have communed with the dead. I have drawn the Sword from the Stone to redeem the soul and restore the body of a Celtic king to his rightful place. The journey is dangerous but the reward is to arrive one day out of darkness into light.
WARNING: AN AMERICAN GOTHIC HORROR
I forewarn the reader that what follows is a story so ghastly that it would be worthy of Mary Shelley, Bram Stoker, or H.P. Lovecraft. However, for us it is far worseit is true. What follows are the
actual facts culled from the bog which we have come to call The Warren Commission Report.
THE HEAD OF THE BEAST UNMASKED
"And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed; and all the world wondered after the beast. And they worshipped the dragon which gave power onto the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? Who is able to make war with him?"
---The Revelations of St. John The Divine, 13:3-4.
TTHE REAL PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY
My fellow Americans, The President of the United States, the real John
F. Kennedy.
THE KEY TO THE GRAIL MYSTERY:
On June 26th, 1992, in Chicago, I was invited by Mr. Douglas Carlson to address a closed session of Kennedy assassination researchers at the Third Decade JFK Symposium on my discovery within the Zapruder Film several alterations which employed what I have dubbed "Gestalt Editing Techniques". I also reported the discovery visible condensation trails in Frame Z-295.
The discovery of this condensation trail by this writer in New York City and independently by researcher Roy Schaeffer in Dayton, Ohio in 1992, proves conclusively the presence of a shooter high on the Criminal Courts Building.
THE RIGHT QUESTION
It was while preparing for the Chicago lecture that one of my research associates asked me, "Robert, where was J. D. Tippit shot?"
"In the left eye, I believe..." I replied, for that was the story I'd read in the New York Times many years before. "But", I added, qualifying my reply, "let me make sure." At that moment, Jim Bishop's "The Day Kennedy Was Shot" was on my desk at arms length, and I read the section on the
death of Officer J. D. Tippit.
J. D. Tippit was the Dallas policeman murdered on November 22, 1963, 45 minutes after the shooting of JFK. Tippit's murder was immediately pinned on Lee Harvey Oswald.
Tippit's killing has always been pictured as a chance encounter in the Oak Dale District between an alert, cruising (hero) policeman and a "suspect" in the shooting of JFK based on the APB (all points bulletin) put out minutes before by the Dallas Police Department. His assassination has always been pictured as a random killing forced by circumstances on the fleeing Oswald. I recalled that he had been buried the following day (November 23rd) in a sealed casket because his wound had purportedly disfigured his face. Tippit's body disappeared from 10th and Patton that afternoon (1:15 p.m. November 22nd), was processed through two hospitals within 2 hours, and was never seen again by kith or kin. I remember his funeral shown on CBS, a light bronze coffin was laid to rest surrounded by many mourners, Mrs. Tippit, their 3 children and waves of weeping policemen.
AMAZING COINCIDENCE
In Jim Bishop's account, much to our amazement, besides being shot in the torso several times, Tippit as was described as having been shot the right temple, specifically the right temporal area, the very same region of the head where the fatal shot passed through President Kennedy.
I was stunned. My mind boggled at the thought that this might be a mere coincidence--that the man accused of killing both Tippit and JFK could shoot 2 people within 45 minutes of each other, within 4 miles of each other, one with a rifle from a high building and one with a handgun at short range (on the run), and inflict exactly the same type wound. I resolved to inquire about this of experts in Chicago.
MEDICAL DISCREPANCIES
I had already read of some unusual medical discrepancies between photos and x-rays of the President in several books, which I recommend highly. These included Harrison Edward Livingstone's "High Treason II" and David Lifton's "Best Evidence", others are mentioned in the body of this report. His report uses the lexicon employed by Livingstone in "High Treason II" in the autopsy photo analysis in acknowledgement of Mr. Livingstone's great Contribuyions to the JFK medical debate.
At the Third Decade conference, at a panel of the country's foremost experts on the Kennedy assassination, I inquired
whether anyone there had ever considered the possibility that we might be seeing rear view photos and X-rays of Tippit substituted for those of JFK, based on the amazing similarity of the temporal head wound in both victims. Some cynics laughed in the audience but from the podium, the moderator, George Michael Evica, author of "...And We Are All Mortal", responded with a most unusual answer:
"It's interesting that you should ask this question because...I've studied Tippit, and when I went down to Dallas I found out that Tippit bore a remarkable resemblance to President Kennedy, so much so that HIS FRIENDS IN THE DALLAS POLICE DEPARTMENT USED TO RIB HIM AND CALL HIM 'JACK' AND 'JFK'". (emphasis mine)
I then inquired whether anyone had ever seen any pictures of Tippit other than the one I had dubbed "The Tippit-Elvis Picture," which showed him in a cowboy shirt, head slightly tilted, hair slicked back, appearing to be about 26-28 years of age. To my knowledge, it was the only one that had been published since his death. I also inquired whether anyone there had ever seen Tippit's autopsy report or knew his personal history. Later, Dan Du Pont, a researcher from North Hollywood, CA, approached me to discuss my inquiry. He promised to send me a copy of Tippit's autopsy report to assist in my research.
THE REAL SECRET OF THE TIPPIT MURDER
In late July of 1992, I received from Dan Du Pont a 1964 manuscript by Gary Murr entitled "The Death of Officer J. D. Tippit". It contained the report of FBI Special Agent Arthur Carter on the autopsy of Officer J. D. Tippit, conducted by the Texas Coroner, Dr. Earl Rose. While studying the entry wound diagrams by Dr. Rose, I saw a remarkable similarity between Dr. Rose's Tippit diagrams and the wound I perceived in the purported JFK lateral x-ray. I realized that the lateral x-ray purported to be that of the late President might in fact be that of Officer J. D. Tippit.
Rose Autopsy Diagram. Compare with the purported JFK X-ray (left).
Dr. Rose's description of the path taken by the bullet through Tippit's brain approximates the trajectory described by the Warren Commission and House Select Committee on Assassination reports of the bullet's path through the late President's brain.
In the enlargement below, the red arrow depicts the path followed by the missile as described by the autopsy team.
This further correlation with JFK's head wound indicated that we had uncovered a very significant omission of the Warren Commission Report.
THE CEREBRAL PEDUNCLES PARADOX RESOLVED
Furthermore, while comparing Dr. Rose's autopsy of Tippit with Humes' and Boswell's autopsy report on the President's brain, I noted that both autopsies described the lacerations severing the same brain parts, the "cerebral peduncles".
This is a part of the midbrain, which could not have remained intact and recognizable in President Kennedy when we see the head wound sequence depicted in frame Z-313 ff. in the Zapruder Film. The eyewitness testimonies of Dr. Kemp Clark, Malcom Perry, Dr. Charles Crenshaw and others at Parkland Hospital, and eyewitnesses on Elm Street and near the Grassy Knoll are at great variance with the head wound depicted in the Stare of Death photos and "The Back (F3)" close-ups. Nor do they tally with drawings of the head wound used by the Warren Commission and its henchmen to dupe the doctors at Parkland Hospital and many other medical experts in the intervening years since the death of the President Kennedy.
I found few differences between Rose's report of Tippit's brain and that of Humes, Finck and Boswell for
JFK's brain. One was the weight, the others were the presence of a "parasagittal laceration from the optic lobe" to just behind the orbit of the right eye, and the severing of the corpus callosum of the victim in Bethesda. This cannot easily be explained as the result of the passage of a bullet.
However, both these lacerations could be those described by Rose as the autopsy incisions performed during Tippit's autopsy: the parasagittal laceration was an "intermastoid incision" performed to determine the trajectory of the bullet and to retrieve it from Tippit's brain. The severing of the corpus callosum may have been a consequence of the removal of Tippit's brain from the cranial cavity. The damage to the skull of J.D. Tippit described by Dr. Rose matches the lateral x-ray of JFK exactly.
THE DISCOVERY OF THE JFK HoaX-RAYS
I then decided to compare the purported X-rays of JFK with photos of both the President and Tippit. By properly sizing transparencies of the two men and comparing them, it became evident that Tippit and JFK, from the cheeks down to the jaw, were in appearance almost fraternal twins (see below, Tippit in Police Uniform/JFK at Love Field). When viewed from
the side, there was, as George Michael Evica had stated in Chicago, "a remarkable resemblance."
DISCOVERY OF THE TIPPIT X-RAY SWITCH
I then proceeded to compare the x-rays with photos of both men, and found that the intact portion of the purported JFK x-ray fit the skull contours of J. D. Tippit, but not that of JFK.
While conducting the skull contour studies, I realized that I could recreate an analog of an undamaged skull x-ray mimicking an undamaged contour by mirroring the intact half of the skull in the purported JFK x-ray. I later mirrored the damaged half as well, creating a facsimile of symmetrical damage to both sides of the skull, dubbing it "Total Destruction". This would later confirm the fraudulent nature of the famous "Stare of Death Photos," first exposed by Harrison Livingstone in "High Treason II" (HT2).
In the interest of simplicity, consistency and in appreciation of this significant work by Harrison Livingstone, we employ much of the vocabulary and lexicon that he established (in HT2) for the medical evidence in the analysis which follows.
RECONSTRUCTION OF THE SKULL X-RAY
Reproducing transparencies of the x-rays, bisecting them, and aligning them along the nasal septum, I produced a "Reconstructed Skull X-Ray of President John F. Kennedy" seen here:
This revealed that the x-rays are not those of he skull of the President. Although JFK and Tippit bore a close facial resemblance, the differences between their skull contours and hair lines. In the right three-quarter profile comparison of JFK and Tippit , it is obvious that President Kennedy had a much larger cranium--thus explaining the discrepancy between the x-ray contour and the photo of JFK. The skull x-rays are those of Tippit, after removal of the fractured bones of the frontal and temporal area.
MISSING TIME: WHERE WAS TIPPIT'S BODY?
In 1993, Dr. Jerry Rose of the State University of New York at Fredonia informed the writer that the Dallas Police Department lost track of Tippit's body for over an hour, because he was removed from the murder scene by an ambulance before police arrived. Another strange and suspect fact is that Officer Tippit seems to have had bullets removed at two different locations. First on the way to Methodist General Hospital, where some bullets were purportedly removed in the ambulance. Then at Parkland Hospital by Dr. Earl Rose, who describes removing the same bullets supposedly removed at Methodist General, where he had been pronounced DOA. Why was he moved, then, to Parkland Hospital?
The Texas Coroner, Dr. Earl Rose, argued with the Secret Service over custody of the
President Kennedy's body until 2:08 PM, when the Presidential party departed Parkland, absconding with the body. Despite this, Dr. Rose reported completing Tippit's autopsy at 3:15 PM. I thought this a little quick until I read, in Dr. Charles Crenshaw's "Conspiracy of Silence," of Rose's boast that "We can have him [Kennedy] out of here in 45 minutes." It appears that Dr. Rose was working under time pressurebut who is "we"?
WHO IS REALLY BURIED IN ARLINGTON?
We come now to the most disturbing discovery of this on-going investigation. I have uncovered evidence suggesting that it is not President Kennedy who is buried in Arlington National Cemetery under the Eternal Flame.
The testimony of the closest eyewitnesses indicate that it is not JFK but very likely J. D. Tippit.
As shocking as this may seem, consider the words of Senator Robert F. Kennedy as he viewed the body in the open casket. William Manchester reports that as RFK looked at his "brother" for the last time, he said:
"It doesn't look like him at all".
This writer goes much further: "It isn't him at all!" SUBLIMINAL TERRORISM
This photo is pure theatrics and cosmetics. Much of the horror fades away when one consciously begins to ignore the "subliminal swaztika" which the cosmetics artists imbedded within the dark area of the head, the hair, hairline, and "The Devil's Ear". This creates an embedded psychic disturbance to frighten the viewer of this photo and to distract him as well from discerning the actual identity of the victim. Creating a right angle to complete one corner of the "subliminal swaztika" may well have been the purpose of
"The Devil's Ear".
How else can one explain the transparency of this fraud and the successful duping of scores of medical experts all the way up the A.M.A. ladder to Dr. George Lundberg. Dr. Lundberg is the President of the A.M.A. whom I personally observed defending the WCR conclusions during the Medical Panel of the Third Decade Symposium in Chicago in 1993. Hissed and booed by the irate crowd, Dr. Lundberg defended the WCR conclusion as best he could but was soon drowned out and swamped by the venom of the crowd and the vitriolic eloquence, rhetoric and wit of Dr. Cyril Wecht.
"And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed; and all the world wondered after the beast."
I had to ask myself: "Could this scene of pandemonium in Chicago be the actual fulfillment of that strange and mystifying prophecy of the Revelations of St. John?" There were we all truly marveling at "the head of the beast" as it had been wounded to death yet we could not reconcile how "the deadly wound was healed". I turned to Randy Robertson, a radiologist with more than passing interest in the case and said, "The problem is that these people are all arguing about x-rays and photos that are not those of JFKTippit was shot on the same side of the head as JFK. I think we're looking at pictures of the back of Tippit's head."
Another "true believer", for more than three decades, has been Dr. John Lattimer, whom I debated at the Bay Shore Historical Society in Brooklyn, New York on November 16, 1994. Dr. Lattimer, the eminent urologist to Lyndon Johnson, seems to have sworn a loyalty oath to Johnson and the Single Gunman Theory, much like Herman Goring, whose family signet ring Dr. Lattimer wears as a personal trophy from his Nuremberg days (as personal U.S. Army physician to the Reich's Marshall). I did not ask him how he acquired it (nor why, to this day, no one knows how Goring retrieved the cyanide capsule from his personal possessions stored under security guard without "someone's" help). When I pressed him for another meeting or another debate, he replied, "Well, I must be going,I'm up to my ears in Nuremberg? When I gave him a quizzical look, he added "The anniversary is coming up!". However, after having seen the photos herein presented, though a bit startled, Dr. Lattimer had the graciousness (and honesty) to say: " I must say that you have compiled the most compelling set of photographic evidence I've seenthank you." With that , he turned and left for "Nuremburg."
Pathetically, during the Medical Panel in Chicago, it was obvious that Dr. Lundberg, in complete honesty, really believed the so-called "facts" and the "medical evidence". The Warren Commission Report is a collection of falsehoods regularly presented by the government to many intelligent and well-intentioned (but cognitively disadvantaged) medical experts all too willing to take what was presented as "evidence" at face value.
I had to admire his courage although I could not admire his flawed perception and gullibility. The indignant and self-righteous crowd was brutal on Lundberg , Lattimer and the SBT (Single Bullet Theorists) faction.
It was quite unjustified, in fact, for the jeering, booing crowd itself believed the photos and the x-rays to be those of John F. Kennedy and that their interpretation of same was "more" correct when , in fact, it was just as wrong! That is one of the bitter pills of disinformation taken as "Truth": everyone is fooled; everyone is blinded; and, all are left divided. Agreement and consensus are impossible when arguing over nonsensical information. The blind lead the blind. THE FAKE JFK "STARE OF DEATH PHOTOS"
As I became more familiar with Tippit's features, I began to see many distinguishing characteristics. There is one in particular which makes the identification conclusive. In "HT2", H. E. Livingstone noted that the person in the "Stare-of-Death Photos" has a nose that does not resemble Kennedy's, and that moles and facial hair seen in photos taken of JFK on the morning of November 22 are absent.
One detail Livingstone did not notice is that, in addition, a mole which was not on JFK's neck that morning mysteriously appears very prominently in the "Superior Right Profile (G1)" picture purported to be JFK. The proof of Tippit's identity came when I noticed the unique black neck mole in the color version of the photograph. Due to the darkness and graininess of the black and white versions published in recent years, the true nature of the black mole was easy to overlook.
However, in the color version, the mole's nature is clear. It lies on the right side of the neck, almost parallel to the base of the hyoid bone or "Adam's Apple". Though I had studied photos of JFK for ars, I could not remember ever seeing such a blemish on his neck, but on other photos of Tippit, the mole is plainly visible.
Furthermore, I discovered another unique ear mole pattern on Tippit's left ear which matches the left ear mole pattern of the man in Fox Photo F4 (the "Left Profile" photo). Another search of photos of JFK turned up no such mole.
RECOVERING TIPPIT PHOTOS 1992-1998
An investigation which began with a single photo of the deceased grew slowly as a team of investigators and supporters began to coalesce around my initial discoveries of the doctoring of the Z-Film and radically new theories on the assassination scenario. I searched for over a year for other pictures of Tippit, but with little success. No other pictures were forthcoming until September 1992 when I found a very rare right three-quarter profile of Tippit in police uniform (later dated by Larry Ray Harris as mid-1950's) in a national
magazine. Printed in the magazine the size of 2 postage stamps, I was able to laser copy and enlarge the photo for initial comparisons with the face of JFK. The photo below was further enhanced using the modern digital computers. OFFICER J. D. TIPPIT IN DALLAS P. D. UNIFORM
It was this second comparisonof the photo above with the photograph below of President Kennedy at Love Field on the morning of the assassination that convinced me that we had found the key and were on the right track.
Comparison of Jaw Structure first conducted in 1994 of Tippit (left) with that of JFK at Love Field on the morning of November 22nd, 1963
TIPPIT IN CIVILIAN CLOTHES
Two Tippit photos showing Tippit in casual attire, the Tippit-Elvis Photo (circa 1952) and the Tippit-1959 photo, both show the black neck mole as seen in the "Superior Right Profile" photo (G1) as well as those photos attributed to James K. Fox (F1).
I am grateful to Professor David Porter of Empire State College, who directed this investigator to this rare Tippit photo. I had long suspected that the Tippit-Elvis picture showed a man much too young to be the 39-year-old man killed on November 22, 1963. It was later confirmed by Tippit expert Larry Ray Harris that the Tippit-Elvis photo was taken in 1952, when Tippit was 28 years old. Why, one might wonder, would anyone want to hide Tippit's real age and features from public scrutiny?
THE REFERENCE BLACK TRIANGLE
Following this discovery, the purpose and the need for the what is called by researchers (like H. E. Livingstone) the "Reference Black Triangle" became obvious. Although President Kennedy and Tippit bore a great likeness to each other in the bone structure of the jaw, brow, nose, and cheeks, there were distinct differences above the brow line. Tippit's cranium was rounder and smaller.
The President had full, red-brown hair, Tippit had black hair and a pronounced receding hairline. In order to create the appearance of the same hairline in an area that had no hair, it became necessary to fake one of the same contour by surgically rearranging a section of scalp. The altered scalp and the underlying surface area were thus made to appear to be both hairline and the consequence of an actual wound. In view of this, the accuracy of the Sibert and O'Niell FBI report, discovered by David Lifton in the 1960s, becomes evident: "It was also apparent that a tracheotomy had been performed as well as surgery of the head area, namely, in the top of skull."
THE DEVIL'S EAR
In addition to the "Black Reference Triangle," another artifact which has confounded medical researchers is the one called "The Devil's Ear". It is an unusual flap seen in the right temporal area of the victim's head in both the Fox and Groden photos.
Dr. Rose's autopsy report describes the entry of Tippit's head wound occurring in the area between the ear and the brow. The purported "JFK Lateral X-ray" shows what appears to be a semicircular fracture at a point where the temporal bone joins the zygomatic process, between the ear and the brow. It is interesting to compare this characteristic of the JFK lateral x-ray with Dr. Rose's description of Tippit's wound. Dr. Rose describes it as "wound No. 1." It was actually the fourth wound placed with surgical precision by Tippit's killer after he approached the fallen officer to administer the coup de grace:
"No. 1 is 4 3/4 inches from the top of the head and 3 3/4 inches to the right of the midline. This measures 3/8 x 1/4 inch and is surrounded by a contusion ring."
The missile proceeded "slightly upwards, backwards and to the left". It caused extensive fractures around the temporal bone and surrounding areas. The bullet went on to strike the inner surface of the occipitoparietal bone (the rear part of the skull), also fracturing it extensively, "but it did not exit". It was recovered by Rose in the area of the calcarine gyrus, where it exited the brain tissue but not the skull.
This path, when reversed, coincides with the Warren Commission's description of President Kennedy's head wound more closely than the eyewitness reports of JFK's wound at Parkland Hospital, all of which describe a large temporal entry wound and a large exit wound in the right rear occipital area.
The HSCA's "High Head Wound" photographs are most likely those of J. D. Tippit. One of the objections of experts to the High Head Wound Photos is the presence of clearly visible hair inside the entry wound. This would be impossible in a rear-entry puncture wound. The path of the bullet which caused Tippit's head wound ended precisely where these photos purport to show the entry point of JFK's high head wound.
Since the bullet struck the inner surface of Tippit's occipitoparietal bone "but did not exit," it is logical to assume then that the point of impact would demonstrate signs of depression on the external surface of the skull, with the scalp sinking into the area of the cavity and beveling on the inner surface. Thus, not having been punctured or perforated, hair would naturally appear intact within the depressed area, as is clearly seen in the High Head Wound photos.
THE OTHER PURPOSE OF "THE DEVIL'S EAR"
The true nature and purpose of the Devil's Ear now clearly reveals itself. While the head wound of J. D. Tippit may be described as a simple, circular, puncture type of entry wound, the President's entry and exit wound was of a different nature. The President's head wound was clearly an explosive
one, more characteristic of a fragmenting or exploding bullet. In order to pass off Tippit's wound for JFK's, it was made to appear similar by using the same technique used to create "The Black Reference Triangle". An area of scalp was surgically altered to create a flayed, bloodied area approximately equal in to that of the President's mortal wound seen at Zapruder frame 313 ff.
However, when compared to the catastrophic damage done to the President's head depicted in the Zapruder Film, one quickly realizes that the area of the Devil's Ear is much too small to be the consequence of the explosive wound(s) seen at Z-313 ff.. Tippit's real wound was altered and disguised to appear to be JFK's mortal head wound.
FOX PHOTO "F6" REVEALS TIPPIT'S CHEST WOUND
In Fox Photo "F6", the "Top of the Head Photo", one can see clearly that, despite the overhead angle of the photo, the wounds on "JFK's" torso are those of Officer Tippit.
In the "F6" photo, the wound on the right side of the chest perfectly coincides with Dr. Rose's description of Tippit's chest wound. Dr. Rose states:
"Wound No. 2 is 17 inches from the top of the head on the right chest. It is 4 inches to the right of the midline, above and slightly medial to the right nipple. It is 3/8 by 1/4 inch and is surrounded by a contusion ring. No powder tattooing is noticed."
The wound seen in F6 is precisely situated and exhibits the same dimensions and characteristics as Tippit's wound. This wound is in the wrong position for it to be
the point of insertion for the right chest tube into Preident Kennedy. Dr. Charles Crenshaw, in "Conspiracy of Silence," says:
"The doctors inserted the chest tubes into the President's body by making incisions between the ribs on both sides of his chest in the mid-clavicular lines."
This refers to the area around the collar bone, much higher than the wound depicted in the Fox photos. The chest tube incisions, which were linear, were then further opened and stretched by the insertion of trocars which preceded the insertion of rubber tubing. No such incision appears in these photos. The wound on the chest of this victim is too low and does not correspond with the position of the 2 cm. incision drawn by Dr. Boswell on the official autopsy face sheet
to be President Kennedy. The wound appears in uncropped Fox photo F1 below.
This wound had previously gone unnoticed, due to its close proximity to the right nipple, with which it could easily be confused. However, when one looks closely at it one can see that it is too low too close to the midline of the body to be the right nipple.
There is also a deep fold of flesh visible in the overhead photos (F5 & F6) of "President Kennedy," lower down and to the left of the centerline, which fits the description and the position of Tippit's Wound No. 4, which was caused by a bullet that struck a button on his police uniform, driving it into his body.
Disinformation regarding Tippit's wounds had begun early. As previously mentioned, I had read a New York "Times" report stating that Tippit had been shot in the left eye. Jim Bishop's "The Day Kennedy Was Shot" describes a spurious head wound as being in the "middle of the forehead" in addition to the correct entry site previously described. This is also clearly disinformation handed on to Jim Bishop, as evidenced by the Rose autopsy report and diagrams.
Rose writes:
"Wound No: 4 on the left chest is 20 1/2 inches from the top of the head, 1 1/4 inches to the left of the midline. The wound measures 3/4 by 3/8 of an inch, is transverse and surrounding this is a 1/4 x 3/4 inch abrasion."
The gash or abrasion of the fold of flesh visible to the left of the midline below the left side of the chest in Fox photo F6 fits this description.
In Fox Photo F5 (The Back):
Let us note an amazing coincidence regarding the position of the back wound in photo F5. This was a shallow wound from which no bullet was retrieved, and which was no deeper than the length of a finger when examined in Bethesda by Humes and Boswell.
THE BLOOD ON THE PEN OF GERALD FORD
This supposed wound was seized upon by Arlen Specter and the "Magic Bullet" theorists as the point of entry for their amazing missile. Gerald Ford assisted him in formulating his "theory" by altering the location of the entry site from the region of the third thoracic vertebra (between the shoulder blades) to "the base of the back of President Kennedy's neck" (WCR) or the "right cervical region" (see A.P. article) with the stroke of a hand-penned note to Chief Counsel J. Lee Rankin.
Gerald Ford and Arlen Specter forged and tampered with the medical evidence "to force true" the Magic Bullet Theory. Without these alterations, their rationalizations for their deceit of an entire generation would have been self-evidently nullified. In order to contradict the testimonies of the Parkland Hospital medical staff, it is clear
that the swapping of the photos of Tippit for those of JFK was done immediately after the assassination. It also means that this part of the assassination was planned well in advance as the lynchpin which would assure success.
In December of 1963, these photos were already being used to try to coerce, discredit, browbeat and, at last, to convince Dr. Malcolm Perry, Dr. Kemp Clark, Dr. Robert McClelland, and the Parkland Medical staff that:
1. the throat wound was a wound of exit ; 2. that they had completely missed the back wound (later moved to the "right side of the cervical region" by
Ford's fraudulent alterations);
1. that the back wound was the entry point for the throat wound; 2. that Dr. Malcolm Perry's surgical technique in performing the tracheostomy had obliterated the evidence and
proof that the throat site was indeed "a wound of exit".
The hand written note by Gerald Ford was released in June-July of 1997 by the Assassination Records Review Board, the incriminating note was the subject of an Associated Press report by Mike Feinsilber which appeared on July 3rd, 1997 world wide. Below is a scan of the New York Times National News Briefs column.
This key change by Gerald Ford, which constitutes criminally altering assassination evidence and tampering, served the psychological purpose of making the "Magic Bullet Theory" not credible but marginally plausible. "The Magic Bullet Theory" stood like a house of cards tenuously supported. With the discovery of Ford's self incriminating note, the stacked deck of the Warren Commission Report came crashing down.
The real back wound was described thusly in the official death certificate by Dr. Burkley, the President's physician:
"a second wound occurred in the posterior back at about the level of the third thoracic vertebra."
This statement refers to an area a couple of inches below the neck and between the shoulder blades, or scapula. When we study this photo alongside Dr. Rose's description of the path followed by the bullet which caused Tippit Wound No. 2, we find an amazing "coincidence." Dr. Rose states:
"The wound described as No. 2 is found to go between the second and third rib. The missile...is recovered slightly to the left of the vertebra approximately 16 inches from the top of the head, having pursued a
course very slightly upward, to the left and backwards." Is it not remarkable that the bullet which caused wound No. 2 in Tippit should end its flight at the fourth (4th) thoracic vertebra, the one directly adjoining the point of "entry" of Arlen Specter's "Magic Bullet" in Kennedy's body at "about the level of the third thoracic vertebra"? Is it not more likely that that we are really seeing is the point of entry of the course followed by Dr. Rose in the recovery of the bullets which caused wounds No. 2 and No. 3 from Tippit's body?
In this context, the befuddlement of the autopsy team is quite easily understandable. Sibert and O'Neill report that
"Inasmuch as no complete bullet of any size could be located in the back or any other area of the body as determined by total body X-rays and inspection revealing there was no point of exit, the individuals performing the autopsy were at a loss to explain why they could find no bullets."
I believe that Dr. Earl Rose had them. It is now known that Chief Jesse Curry of the DALLAS POLICE DEPARTMENT had some bullets in his "collection" of JFK assassination artifacts shown in the book which he published circa 1990-91 cataloguing his "assassination memorabilia".
Regarding Ford's alteration of the facts, there is quite a significant difference between the third thoracic (the actual entry site) and the region of the third cervical vertebrae. All this was done in order to make the simple assertion that the missile "passed through striking no bony tissue" marginally credible.
This made this incredible marring of history only slightly plausible but "plausible enough" for the public to give the Warren Commission conspiracy the benefit of the doubttemporarily.
LIVINGSTONE: TIPPIT'S NOSE NOT JFK'S
Regarding the Right Superior Profile photo (G1), H.E. Livingstone writes "HT2": "Although the sharpness of the nose may be due to the camera angle, the nose nevertheless does not appear to be Kennedy's."
I agree with Livingstone's assessment. Furthermore, the nose ridges and shadows in Fox photos F1, F4, F6 and F7 also
demonstrate that it is Officer Tippit when compared to the Tippit-Elvis and the William Allan photo of one of the arresting officers in the Tramp photos.
The "Left Profile Photo" (F4), when compared to Kennedy's real profile, shows clear distinctions in structure (see below: Disguising Tippit's Receding Hairline in Fox Photo F4).
The Livingstone-Groden Debate: The Divergent Eyes
Another consistent observation made by several witnesses who viewed earlier versions of the Stare-of-Death Photos is the divergence of the eyes in some these photos. Discussing the Fox photo (F1) in "High Treason II", Livingstone writes:
"Note how wide the eyes are, yet the eyes are not divergent, nor is the right eye popped from the head as it was described by medical witnesses."
This discrepancy again indicates that the individual in the currently available Stare-of-Death pictures is Tippit. The eyewitness account of Domingo Benevides, who saw the Tippit murder supports this theory:
"That is when I got out of the truck and walked over to the policeman, and he was lying there and he had, looked like a big clot of blood coming out of his head, and HIS EYES WERE SUNK BACK IN HIS HEAD, and just kind of made me feel real funny." [emphasis added]
DISGUISING TIPPIT'S LEFT SIDE RECEDING HAIR LINE
As mentioned above, I believe that the "surgery of the head area, namely top of the skull" described in the Sibert & O'Niell report refers to the Reference Black Triangle, which was used to hide Tippit's receding hairline. However, Tippit's receding hairline was nearly symmetrical, and so necessitated camouflaging on the left side also.
In Fox photo F4, "The Left Profile," we can see that this was achieved by combing the hair forward and down from the area around the region of the coronal suture, near the ear line, which resulted in an artificial whorl of hair or "cowlick" in that region. If one looks closely, one can actually see Tippit's bald pate beneath two of the combed hairlocks. Note that the angle of the sideburn is identical with that of one particular arresting officer, whom I identify as Tippit, in the Tramp photos.
Studying the profile, one can see two very distinctive nose ridges, one above the nose bridge, and another "notch" below the nasal septum, which President Kennedy did not possess, these are also readily discernable in the Tippit-Elvis photo. These ridges produced the "nose ridge shadows" which disproves the authenticity of Fox Photo F1 (the Stare-of-Death photo).
THE THROAT WOUND CONTROVERSY
One of the the repeated challenges to the authenticity of the "Stare-of-Death Photo" and the Groden "Superior Right Profile" is the question of the alteration of the throat wound.
Dr. Malcolm Perry's tracheostomy, as described by the Parkland team, is quite at odds with the long gash across the throat of the victim in these photos. Eyewitness after eyewitness has attested to the alteration of the throat wound. Dr. Charles Crenshaw, who witnessed Dr. Perry's work firsthand, has described what is presented in the Groden frauds as "the work of a butcher". Why was it necessary?
If we compare a close-up of the face of the arresting officer (Tippit) in William Allen's "Three Tramps" photo with the President's official photo, published on the cover of the New York "Times" on November 22, 1963, their similarity in jaw structure and other facial features is clear. But Tippit's "laugh lines" and the furrow formed by a "scowl line" leading from the right nostril to the corner of the lips in a stretched "S" distinguish him from the President. DISTINCTIVE MOLE PATTERNS IDENTIFY THE CORPSE WITH TIPPIT
In the Groden-leaked photo, acne scars are visible on Tippit's face on the the right cheek and two distinct ones along the scowl lines about 1/2 inch below and and 3/4 of an inch behind the corner of the right side of the lips. Tippit also bears TWO distinct moles below the right sideburn, one level with the middle ear and the other level with base of the opening
of the auditory canal.
This pattern is also visible in the William Allen Tramp photo, and on the face of the victim in "Superior Right Profile."
All of the details above:
1. distinguish the right side of the face of J. D. Tippit from that of President Kennedy; 2. distinguish the face of the real President Kennedy from the face of the victim in the Fox Photos and "Superior
Right Profile (G1)"; 3. confirm that the victim in the Stare of Death photos is Officer J. D. Tippit.
DR. CHARLES CRENSHAW'S "A BUTCHER'S WORK"
This leads us to the reasons for the Throat Slash (it can no longer be called a "tracheostomy"). It was plastic and psychological surgery.
The surgery had three purposes:
First, it produced a wound in the throat, because it the President had been wounded there, and Tippit had not been.
Second, it diminished the distinct jowls of Tippit's double chin. The incision across the throat made the flesh of the jowls sag, tightening the flesh closer to the jaw line. This camouflaged the differences described above by softening the "laugh lines" and the furrow of Tippit's scowl line, making him look more like a younger JFK.
The third purpose of the Throat Slash is the psychological aspect. The wound is designed to distract viewers from the obvious facts which expose the fraud. The shock induced by such a gruesome sight mesmerizes the viewer, freezes reason, and makes one's logical thinking falter. Few people can look at these photos without feeling fear and dread at the thought that these atrocities could have been visited upon the President of the United States.
These photos were meant to fool medical experts of the time and future historians. They were also designed to instill fear into every citizen and into every President: a fear of asking the right question. They have been designed using Gestalt psychology to terrorize viewers into silence. The message is, psychologically speaking, an implied threat: if "they" could do that to the President of the United States, then what can they do to you, little man! A slit throat means silence--"ask no questions!" is the psychological message behind these photos. However, some Americans cannot be silenced that way.
WHO COULD HAVE ALTERED THE BODIES?
Who could have perpetrated such an atrocity? It had to be a group (doctors & photographers) who knew what the President's actual wounds looked like and one in close proximity to both bodies. Who had the authority to view and touch the President's body, and who had the skill to execute the cosmetic surgery? Who was close enough to both bodies? Who had the opportunity and the authority to view the President's wounds and those of Officer Tippit?
Given the official time frame of the Warren Commission, until recently we had to conclude that only two known men fulfilled the requirements: Texas Coroner Earl Rose and President Kennedy's personal physician, Admiral George Burkley. The proof herein presented makes it self-evident that unknown physician(s) in Dallas altered Tippit's body, with Rose signing for them.
DR. CRENSHAW EXPOSES "CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE"
The memoirs of Dr. Charles Crenshaw in "Conspiracy of Silence" shed much needed light on events at Parkland Hospital and reveal the roles of Dr. Vernon Stemmbridge, chief of surgical pathology, and Dr. Sidney Stewart in precipitating the legal battle between Dr. Earl Rose and the Secret Service over possession of the President's body at Parkland. Stemmbridge and Stewart insisted that THEY had priority and legal jurisdiction over the President's autopsy. Dr. Rose was apparently called in to affirm and defend their legal rights according to Texas law over the body of the fallen President.
It now appears very likely that someone other than Rose had autopsied Tippit by 1:45. Using the theatrics of Rose's argument with the Secret Service over the President's body as a diversion, JFK's body could have been surreptitiously switched by the group who now evidently worked over Tippit's body.
THE TRIP TO BETHESDA NAVAL HOSPITAL
One of the bodies was placed inside a body bag, which could have been shipped in the right side cargo bay of Air Force One or on another jet separately arriving in Bethesda in a plain metal shipping casket.
Once the bodies were "in the bag", it was easy to orchestrate shipment to Bethesda Naval Hospital via Walter Reed with Air Force and Army brass overseeing the theatrics which followed. Eyewitnesses reported seeing a helicopter take a body bag from the right side of Air Force One which then proceeded fly at ground level into a hangar at Andrews AFB.
Anyone who witnessed the proceedings at Andrews AFB on television as did this writer can recall the loud and powerful drone of unseen helicopters drowning out the voices of the reporters as they maneuvered in the darkness behind Air Force One.
Both bodies may have been transported to Walter Reed Army Hospital, where the JFK facsimile, using Tippit's body, was completed. They were later moved to Bethesda Naval Hospital, where they were shuttled from one operating room to another as revealed by Harrison Livingstone in "High Treason II".
THE ALTERNATIVE CONCLUSION
The idea of the alteration of a second corpse never occurred to David Lifton nor Harrison Livingstone but that is easy to comprehend. Who, the devil, could conceive such a diabolical and twisted scheme? Anyone suggesting such a thing must be living in "The Phantom Zone". The inability of these and other hallowed researchers and medical experts even to consider such an impossibility has lead many to receive some eyewitnesses' testimony with leery skepticism and disbelief, sometimes ascribing the discrepancies to faulty memory, shock or some dark motive or agenda.
ASKING THE RIGHT QUESTION
However, when one asks oneself "the right question", the scenario described above becomes "a logical conclusion."
The right question is: What is the logical conclusion if the eyewitnesses are all really telling the truth, accurately and factually?
THE AIR FORCE 1 TAPES
There is evidence in the Air Force One tapes of an urgent telephone conversation between Admiral Burkley, aboard the President's plane, and Army Surgeon General Leonard Heaton at Walter Reed Army Hospital. The contents of the Burkley-Heaton conversation are deleted. The audio tape jumps abruptly to other topics.
However, evidence uncovered and revealed by David Lifton in "Best Evidence" indicates that the missing conversations were discussing the recovery of the Harper fragment which was blown to the left side of Elm Street by the force of the blast from the Grassy Knoll shot.
This is where this investigation stood on November 22, 1996, in Dallas.
THE GRAIL QUEST: THE RECOVERY OF THE TIPPIT AUTOPSY MATERIAL
The history of this investigation is the story of a quest, a quest for understanding and reason in the face of mass confusion and mass deception. In time, a single thread was to lead this writer on a journey that has criss-crossed the continent physically, telephonically and electronically to recover the facts surrounding the most mysterious and occult deaths in our history.
The success that we have achieved in unearthing the truth about this barbarous affair could not have occurred without the moral and spiritual support which I have received from a cadre and network of many supporters around the world. These are the people who have helped to assemble small pieces of information, like those of a gigantic jigsaw puzzle, until enough small pieces coalesced and came together to produce this work.
What began with a single phrase in Jim Bishop's book, within the course of few years had panned out and lead to the organization a network of researchers and "information surveyors" who ultimately as team procured the last piece of evidence necessary to confirm the "incredible" hypothesis presented above.
A DIFFERENT COUP IN DALLAS
At the JFK Lancer conference in Dallas, on November 21 st & 22 nd , 1996, a long time friend and colleague in assassination research, Professor James Fetzer, McKnight Professor of Philosophy at the University of Minnesota and author of "Assassination Science", informed me that he had succeeded in locating and recovering the Tippit autopsy photographs. Professor Fetzer promised to send me a xerox copy and a set of negatives.
Professor Fetzer had retrieved the photos in a most serendipitous fashion which he outlined in a recent e-mail to this writer:
" Robert,
Thanks for the email and the phone message. Of course I have no problem with your relating the history of how the Tippit photographs came into your possession, but I was the intermediary in all of this.
They were originally obtained from the National Archives by Frank J. Sarna III, who mentioned them in a letter to THE THIRD DECADE, which led me to contact him, obtain copies of negatives made from his copies, and reproduce the photographs locally, which I subsequently shared with youHe should get the lion's share of the credit for this. When I subsequently visited the National Archives, for example, with box number in hand, they came up dry--the photographs were at that time not where they were supposed to be. I have learned from the ARRB, however, that they are now available so, presumably, it was simply an oversight that there were not available during my visit Best, Jim"
This was a momentous event for this writer. My theories and geometric proofs, as thorough as they were, had reached an impasse which could only be resolved by comparing the victim at Bethesda with actual autopsy photos of J.D. Tippit. I was ready to stake my reputation (or, as some thought, my life) on my geometric proofs but only the acquisition of the actual photos could make or break my theory.
THE FINAL PROOF
They arrived a few weeks later. When printed and enlarged they confirmed what I had suspected for four years: the victim in the Stare of Death photos and in nearly all the government medical photographs was clearly the body of Jefferson Davis Tippit, they even share THE SAME EXPRESSION in jaw, cheeks, and mouth in BOTH sets of photos, one with eyes open, the other eyes closed. One with throat intact, the other, throat slashed. Inarguably, a perfect set of "before & after" pictures. Officer Tippit died with his eyes open (see Domingo Benavides' testimony above). THE TIPPIT AUTOPSY PHOTOGRAPHS
J. D. TIPPIT HEAD WOUND CLOSE-UP
It is interesting to note that this photo has been shot and cropped in a fashion nearly identical to the purported JFK lateral x-ray. When compared below, they clearly unmask the greatest criminal fraud of the 20 th century: both the x-ray and the photo are of the same person, Officer J. D. Tippit and conclusively NOT that of John F. Kennedy.
BETHESDA VICTIM X-RAY OVERLAPPED ON TIPPIT PHOTO
The contours of Tippit's forehead and the frontal bone of the skull x-ray are identical. A semicircular entry point is visible in the x-ray which corresponds precisely with the wound site depicted in the Tippit Head Wound Close-Up shown above.
Another interesting point which confirms the identification the unity of the two specimens (skull and head) is that the jagged, irregular shape along the line of demarcartion between bright and dark regions of Tippit's right forehead in the photo corresponds in shape to the major fracture line along the frontal bone and the missing portion of the temporal region in the x-ray. The subsidence of the fractured bone inside Tippit's head created a depression along forehead and temple region which created a unique shading resulting in a light defraction pattern like an etching or a template.
CLOSE-UP STUDY OF CHEEK BRUISES, MOUTH AND DENTAL FEATURES
As above, so below, the composite photograph demonstrates unequivocally that both corpses share in common, not only an identical expression around the features of the mouth, jaw and teeth, but the cheek bruises suffered by Tippit as he fell against the street pavement are visible in both. Closer scrutiny reveals the Tippit head wound entry site shown in the photos above to be present in the purported JFK photos as well though intentionally opaqued. These versions of the purported JFK Death Stare were enhanced by the writer by altering and increasing brightness, contrast, sharpness and gamma levels. This method made visible details which had been intentionally suppressed in order to pass the victim off as JFK. The dark mole just above the right collar bone and seen immediately to the left of the throat wound was to this writer the key to realizing the victim's true identity in 1994.
THE CRUX
In addition, it is clear that the face of the victim was shaved and the eyebrows plucked. The redness and rawness of the recently plucked eyebrows is evident in the color versions of the "Superior Right Profile" Photo (see "The JFK Paradox). Researcher Tom Wilson has previously pointed out that the victim's appearance indicated that it had been reconstructed around the temple using a wax-like substance ("The Men Who Killed Kennedy", Pt. 5).
THE ULTIMATE PROOF: TIPPIT'S RIGHT PECTORAL WOUND
THE BEST WITNESSES: ROBERT AND JACKIE
As shocking as this may seem, consider the words of Senator Robert F. Kennedy as he viewed the body in the open casket. William Manchester reports that as RFK looked at his "brother" for the last time, he said:
"It doesn't look like him at all".
Manchester's account (in "Death of A President") continues, "His eyes full, the Attorney General turned to Bill Walton and whispered, 'Please look, I want to know what you think.' Walton looked as long as he could, with a growing sense of outrage. He said to Bob, 'You mustn't keep it open. It has no resemblance to the President. It's a wax dummy...Don't do
it'."
Arthur Schlesinger said: "It is appalling,...At first glance it seemed all right, but I am nearsighted. When I came closer it looked less and less like him."
And according to Manchester, Jacqueline Kennedy said, "It wasn't Jack. It was like something you would see at Madame Tussaud's."
THE ULTIMATE SECRET: THE SPIRIT OF JUSTICE DOES NOT SLEEP
We have arrived now at a crossroads in history. The conspiracy before and after the fact stands exposed but justice has not been served. If I were we to end our history here on such a note it would be a ghastly tragedy. However, this is a story of a collective moral victory and the triumph of spirit over death, truth over deception, science over anti-science and light over darkness. It is the history of a small group of Americans driven by the power of spiritual insight and revelation toward moral restoration and a return to reason. It is the history of a people who do not give up their spiritual kinfolk nor forget their heroes, even unto death.
Though some might be tempted to think that the historical facts (above) which I have divulged might constitute what I have previously described "The Ultimate Secret of the John F. Kennedy Assassination", they would be sadly mistaken. The actual "Ultimate Secret" in code is simply this: "The Spirit of Justice Does Not Sleep".
The task remains: to achieve true justice for JFK, Tippit, Oswald, Kilgallen, and many others who gave their lives that the truth might live and eventually return to light.
For now, "The Ultimate Secret" must remain cryptic (as I am not yet fully liberated from the crypt of JFK) save to say until the day of justice for the fallen.
The Spirit of Justice Does Not Sleep therefore, I must speak for the dead.
Gordon Arnold demonstrates where he allegedly was standing as the assassination began
Was Gordon Arnold really in Dealey Plaza? Does any evidence confirm his presence there? Did events occur as he described them? Was he consistent in his recollections?
To attempt to answer these questions, let’s walk through the events described by Gordon Arnold more or less chronologically.
The agent behind the fence
It was while walking along the rear of the fence just a few minutes before the assassination that Arnold claimed to have encountered the agent in plainclothes. In The Men Who Killed Kennedy, Arnold specified that he encountered the agent just as he was climbing over the steam pipe at the edge of the lot, momentarily straddling it. Researcher Paul Burke observes that this is the same pipeline Officer Seymour Weitzman testified he burned his hands on just a few minutes after the shooting.
1 P. J. Burke, newsgroup post, July 16, 1998. Weitzman burning his hand on the steam
pipe: Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. VII, p. 107.
Close Burke has a point; if Weitzman’s testimony is accurate, Arnold should have
received some memorable burns in a most sensitive area of his anatomy.
How did the agent identify himself, according to Arnold? In The Men Who Killed Kennedy, the man is alleged to have stated, “I’m with the CIA.”
2 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent Television,
England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode two, “The
Forces of Darkness.”
Close But in all previous accounts, the man is identified as a Secret Service agent.
3 Earl Golz, “SS ‘imposters’ spotted by JFK witnesses,” Dallas Morning News, August
27, 1978. Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl
Book Edition, 1987), p. 112. Jim Marrs, Crossfire (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1989),
p. 78.
Close In The Men Who Killed Kennedy, the man is said to have “pulled out an
identification card.”
4 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent Television,
England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode two, “The
Forces of Darkness.”
Close But Arnold told Earl Golz and Henry Hurt it had been a badge.
5 He told Golz the man “showed me a badge . . .” (Earl Golz, “SS ‘imposters’ spotted
by JFK witnesses,” Dallas Morning News, August 27, 1978.) Hurt writes that “the man
pulled out a large identification badge, [and] held it toward the soldier . . .”
(Reasonable Doubt [New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book Edition, 1987], p.
112.)
Close
Why did Arnold obey the agent’s wishes? In the earlier accounts, the agent identifies himself as a Secret Service agent, someone whose job it would be to protect the President of the United States. It only “seemed logical to Arnold,” Hurt tells us, that such an individual might want to restrict access to certain sites overlooking the parade route.
6 Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book
Edition, 1987), p. 112.
Close The Golz and Hurt narratives neither state nor imply that Arnold felt in any way
threatened or intimidated by the agent, despite Arnold’s claim (in 1982) that the man was “wearing a side arm” — a detail present in the Hurt account but no other.
7 Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book
Edition, 1987), p. 112.
Close
In The Men Who Killed Kennedy, however, it’s not Secret Service “logic” but rather CIA force that persuades Arnold. Once the man identified himself as a CIA employee, Arnold says, his reaction was: “Well, that’s enough muscle. I’ll leave.”
8 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent Television,
England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode two, “The
Forces of Darkness.”
Close
There were, it must be noted, two Dallas police officers assigned to keep outsiders off the railroad overpass, but no federal agents of any kind.
9 Union Terminal Railroad employee S. M. Holland helped police officers James W.
Foster and James C. White keep non-railroad employees off the overpass prior to the
assassination. Foster told researcher Larry Sneed he didn’t “see anything suspicious
behind the picket fence or see anyone with Secret Service or FBI identification, as
some have stated.” (Larry A. Sneed, No More Silence [Dallas: Three Forks Press,
1998], p. 212. White told the Dallas Morning News in 1978, “If there was one [a
Secret Service agent] up there [in the railroad or knoll area?], we didn’t know about it.
He wasn’t on that bridge, I know that.” (Earl Golz, “SS ‘imposters’ spotted by JFK
witnesses,” Dallas Morning News, August 27, 1978.) Foster and White testified that no
one was on the overpass at the time of the assassination but railroad workers. (Warren
Commission Hearings, Vol. VI, pp. 241, 255.) S. M. Holland agreed, but for possibly a
few bystanders “that came up there the last few minutes, but the policemen were
questioning them and getting their identification . . . I think everyone was checked by
some person.” (Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. VI, p. 241.) Further corroboration
comes from Associated Press photographer James Altgens, who testified: “My original
assignment was to make a pictorial scene of the caravan with the Dallas skyline in the
background and the triple overpass was selected as the site for making that picture, and
when I arrived on the triple overpass there was no one up there but two uniformed
policemen and one of the uniformed policemen came over to me and asked me if I was
a railroad employee and I told him, ‘No,’ and I showed him my press tag and told him
I had a Department of Public Safety ID card showing I was connected with the AP —
Associated Press, and he said, ‘Well, I’m sorry, but this is private property. It belongs
to the railroad and only railroad employees are permitted on this property.’ And, I
explained to him that this was a public event and I thought I would be privileged to
make a picture from that area, and he says, ‘No. This is private property and no one but
railroad personnel are permitted in this area.’” (Warren Commission Hearings, Vol.
VII, p. 516.)
One potential anomaly lies in Holland’s recollection that he assisted “a couple of
policemen and a plainclothesman” in identifying railroad employees. “I didn’t talk to
him [the plainclothesman],” Holland testified. “I talked to the city policemen.” “You
don’t know what his affiliation was?” Commission counsel Samuel Stern asked him. “I
know he was a plainclothes detective, or FBI agent or something like that, but I don’t
know,” Holland responded. (Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. VI, p. 239-40.) It’s
not clear whether the “plainclothesman” he recalled, if such a person was indeed there,
could have been a policeman in plainclothes, a Sheriff’s Deputy (many of whom
routinely dressed in plainclothes), or perhaps a civilian. Holland described the
“plainclothesman” as being present from about 11:00 AM on, while no such man was
observed by James Altgens at approximately 11:15. (Warren Commission Hearings,
Vol. VII, p. 516.) There were no Secret Service agents stationed in Dealey Plaza.
(Warren Commission Document 3, cited in Josiah Thompson, Six Seconds in Dallas
[New York: Bernard Geis Associates, 1967], p. 139 fn. 11. Warren Commission
Report, p. 52, cited in Sylvia Meagher, Accessories after the Fact [New York: Vintage
Books, 1992], p. 26.)
It is, of course, a firm part of conspiracy lore that the absence of genuine agents is
evidence that such agents must have been impersonated. For an extensive discussion of
this subject from a conspiratorial viewpoint, see Debra Conway, with Michael Parks
and Mark Colgan, “The Secret Service Agent on the Knoll.” For some alternative
explanations, check out my own brief article on the subject.
Close
In his 1985 interview with Jim Marrs and 1988 interview for The Men Who Killed Kennedy (but not the 1978 Golz and 1982 Hurt accounts), Arnold described two separate confrontations with the plainclothes agent, the first right off the railroad bridge, and the second occurring when the agent followed him through the parking lot and insisted he leave the area behind the stockade fence completely.
10 Jim Marrs, Crossfire (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1989), p. 78. The Men Who Killed
Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent Television, England, originally
aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Portions of the broadcast were independently transcribed by researchers Don
Roberdeau and Jilmarie von Hennchen.
Close
Interestingly, only a short time before Arnold’s alleged incident, Associated Press photographer James Altgens had walked through the same parking lot in search of a vantage point from which to photograph the motorcade. No one approached him or asked him to leave the area.
11 Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. VII, p. 516. Altgens had been shooed away
from the railroad bridge, however — but by two uniformed policemen, not by a sinister
federal agent.
Close
Arrival on the knoll
Arnold said he then walked around the fence and “stood on a mound of fresh dirt” in order to film the motorcade.
Close There was no mound of dirt there, however; rather, there was a park bench, and
there were two people sitting on that bench eating their lunches.
13 Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain (Danvers, Mass: Yeoman Press, 1994), pp. 73-
75.
Close By the time Arnold came forward with his story, the bench was no longer there,
14 Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain (Danvers, Mass: Yeoman Press, 1994), p. 74.
Close which may explain its absence from his account.
The “mound of fresh dirt” is important, though, because if Arnold had ever stood on the grassy knoll (whether in 1963 or later), he should have been aware that it would have afforded a terrible view for filming the motorcade. While Arnold claimed to have been filming prior to the time the shots were fired, his view of the President would have been largely obscured by road signs, the many spectators lining Elm Street, and, for a brief time, the concrete wall a short distance in front of him. Only once JFK had traveled halfway down Elm Street — to the approximate position of the limousine at the time of the fatal head shot, in fact — would Arnold have had a clear view of him.
15 Cf. Gus Russo, Live by the Sword (Baltimore: Bancroft, 1998), pp. 474-75. Some
have noted the discrepancy between Arnold’s position in the Jay Godwin photograph
that accompanied the original 1978 Earl Golz article (several yards west of the corner
of the wall) and the position assumed by Arnold in The Men Who Killed Kennedy
(behind the corner of the wall). Gary Mack has written, “I asked him about the picture
in our first interview and he said the phot[o]grapher only asked him to stand in the
area.” (Gary Mack, newsgroup post, September 23, 1998.) In an e-mail to researcher
Bill Miller, Earl Golz stated, “Yes, the Godwin photo was not meant to represent the
exact location of Arnold.” (Bill Miller, Web forum post, July 30, 2003.) Miller writes,
“I have twice . . . corresponded with Jay Godwin who took the photo . . . and he could
not say that the picture was meant to respresent [sic] where Arnold stood during the
actual shooting.” (Bill Miller, Web forum post, June 4, 2003.)
Close
Abraham Zapruder, the garment manufacturer who would take what is widely considered the most important film of the assassination, initially intended to film from the knoll, but was unable to find an unobstructed view of the street there.
16 Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. VII, p. 570.
Close The best vantage point Zapruder could find was a four-foot-high concrete
pedestal some twenty feet or so east of Arnold’s alleged position,
17 Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain (Danvers, Mass: Yeoman Press, 1994), p. 60
Close and even this view was completely blocked at one point by one of the larger
street signs in the area.
18 Zapruder’s view of the presidential limousine was obstructed for several seconds.
(Warren Commission Report, pp. 98-105. Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain
[Danvers, Mass: Yeoman Press, 1994], pp. 64-65.)
Close
Arnold at least partially acknowledged these problems during a 1982 interview with Gary Mack. According to Mack, Arnold said he had initially planned “to brace himself by the tree but wound up walking some short distance away as the president neared. He described to me how he watched the traffic and planned out how he would film JFK. He said the [Stemmons Freeway] sign would have blocked his view briefly, so he planned to start filming as soon as Kennedy appeared after the sign.”
19 Gary Mack, newsgroup post, September 23, 1998.
Close
But this makes no sense; the first shot that struck President Kennedy was fired no later than the instant Kennedy came into Abraham Zapruder’s comparable view, and some believe it was fired even sooner.
20 It is almost universally accepted that President Kennedy can be seen reacting to a
bullet strike no later than Zapruder frame 225. For a more specific discussion of the
timing of the bullet strike, click here.
Close If what he told Gary Mack was true, Arnold would have had no time at all to
film before the shooting began.
Confrontation after the shooting
Arnold initially claimed to have had film of the motorcade confiscated by two police officers, one of whom was crying and waving a shotgun. It should be borne in mind that, by his own account, at no point during this alleged confrontation did it occur to him that the police officers might have had anything to do with the shots that had been fired.
21 By Arnold’s account he never associated the shots with his encounter on the knoll
until shown the Mack/White “Badge Man” image on-camera in The Men Who Killed
Kennedy. Gary Mack confirms that Arnold was consistent about this during their 1982
interviews. (Gary Mack, e-mail to author, December 5, 2002.)
Close It seems strange, then, that Arnold, who had shown such willingness to
challenge the authority of the alleged agent “wearing a side arm”
22 Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book
Edition, 1987), p. 112.
Close behind the stockade fence (“You and who else is going to keep me off the
bridge?”),
23 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent
Television, England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode
two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Close should fail to ask these alleged policemen, “Why are you harassing me? The
shots came from right there behind the fence!” (It is worth pointing out, as well, that Abraham Zapruder filmed the entire assassination from just a few yards east of Arnold's alleged location, yet no one tried to seize his film.)
24 Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain (Danvers, Mass: Yeoman Press, 1994), pp. 72-
73, 76.
Close
There is something else that Arnold didn’t think to ask the policemen, or apparently anyone else, for that matter. Recall that Arnold stated specifically that he “automatically hit the ground”
25 Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book
Edition, 1987), p. 112.
Close just as the shots began. “I buried my head in the ground and heard several other
shots,” he said, “but I couldn’t see anything because I had my face in the dirt.”
26 Jim Marrs, Crossfire (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1989), p. 78. There is an apparent
anomaly related to this statement. In his early accounts, Arnold did not see these men
approach because he had “fall[en] down on [his] face” (Earl Golz, “SS ‘imposters’
spotted by JFK witnesses,” Dallas Morning News, August 27, 1978) when the shooting
began. “The next thing I knew someone was kicking my butt and telling me to get up,”
he told Earl Golz, “it was a policeman.” He told the same thing to Henry Hurt: “The
next thing I knew, a police officer was standing there over top of me . . .” (Henry Hurt,
Reasonable Doubt [New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book Edition, 1987], p.
112.) “. . . I couldn’t see anything,” he told Jim Marrs, “because I had my face in the
dirt.” (Marrs, p. 78.) Nevertheless, in 1988, Arnold was able to stand on the knoll and
state that it “seemed like” the man in the police uniform “came from this particular
direction,” indicating behind him to his left, towards the stockade fence. (The Men
Who Killed Kennedy.)
Close
Following his encounter with the two officers, Arnold told Henry Hurt, he “went straight home;”
27 Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book
Edition, 1987), p. 112.
Close according to Jim Marrs, “Arnold ran straight back to his car and drove out of the
parking lot unchallenged.”
28 Jim Marrs, Crossfire (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1989), p. 78.
Close He identified himself to no police officers or other authorities,
Close and never mentioned having spoken to any bystanders in Dealey Plaza.
As upsetting as his alleged encounter may have been, it seems striking that, judging from his own account, he did not bother to ask a single person at the scene: “What happened? Has the President been shot?” Wasn’t he even the slightest bit concerned or curious about what had happened?
When did he learn that JFK had been murdered? How did he feel when he heard the news that afternoon that the shots were believed to have been fired by one man, and not from the knoll, but from the Book Depository? How did he feel ten months later when a blue-ribbon presidential commission reached the same conclusion? Was he not the slightest bit inclined to come forward and “set the record straight?” All accounts of his story are silent about these issues.
Film-flam
If Arnold’s story is true, a question arises as to who removed the film from his camera. In The Men Who Killed Kennedy, Arnold states that he turned his film over to a man wearing a police uniform, but not, he specifies, the camera itself: “I think I’d have gave him almost anything except the camera,” he said, “because that was my mother’s.”
30 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent
Television, England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode
two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Close (Emphasis added.) Likewise, Arnold told Earl Golz in 1978 that he himself
“took his film from the canister” and threw it to the policeman.
But in his 1985 account to Jim Marrs, Arnold says that the police officer “told me to give him my film, so I tossed him my camera. I said you can have everything, just point that gun somewhere else. He opened it, pulled out the film, and then threw the camera back to me.”
32 Jim Marrs, Crossfire (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1989), p. 78.
Close (Emphasis added.)
Of course, if Arnold truly felt “threatened”
33 Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book
Edition, 1987), p. 112.
Close by these policemen (“It wasn’t worth three dollars and something to be shot. All
I wanted them to do was to take that blooming picture [film] and get out of there, just let me go.”),
Close it’s curious that he would be so worried about his mother’s camera.
Seeing double
This brings us to another striking aspect of Arnold’s account in The Men Who Killed Kennedy. The Golz, Hurt, and Marrs accounts are in complete agreement that Arnold encountered two separate policemen: one who kicked Arnold and demanded that he get
up but did not brandish a weapon, and another who was crying and waving around a long gun (specified as a shotgun in the Golz account).
For example, Arnold told Earl Golz in 1978:
“The next thing I knew someone was kicking my butt and telling me to get up.” Arnold said, “it was a policeman. And I told him to go jump in the river. And then this other guy — a policeman — comes up with a shotgun and he was crying and that thing was waving back and forth. I said you can have everything I’ve got. Just point it someplace else.”
Likewise, Arnold specified to Jim Marrs in 1985 that “one of them” (one of the two policemen) demanded his film.
This is not the case in The Men Who Killed Kennedy, however, in which Arnold describes being accosted by a single police officer:
And what happened was that while I was laying on the ground, it seemed like a gentleman came from this particular direction. And I thought it was a police officer . . . But it didn’t really matter much at that time because, with him crying like he was, and with him shaking when he had the weapon in his hand . . . And literally what the man did was kick me, and asked me if I was taking a picture. I told him that I was. And when I looked at the weapon, it was about that big around, and I decided that I would let him have the film. I gave it to him, and then he went back off in this direction . . .
Further modifications
Arnold’s interview in The Men Who Killed Kennedy also adds two new details to his description of the individual (or, according to his earlier accounts, the second of two individuals) who accosted him on the knoll. To Earl Golz, Arnold had simply described this man as “a policeman;”
Close in Henry Hurt, he was a “second policeman.” But by the time of Arnold’s
appearance in The Men Who Killed Kennedy, he seems to have developed some doubts about the man’s occupation: “I thought it was a police officer [emphasis added] because he had a uniform of a police officer, but he didn’t wear a hat, and he had dirty hands.”
36 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent
Television, England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode
two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Close
He didn’t wear a hat, and he had dirty hands.
This description appears in none of Arnold’s earlier accounts, but it’s reminiscent of two items of evidence with which he may have become familiar by the time he was filmed in 1988.
Joe Marshall Smith
The first item consists of statements by Dallas police officer Joe Marshall Smith, who had described to the Warren Commission encountering a man on the grassy knoll immediately after the shooting who displayed the identification of a Secret Service agent. To Earl Golz in 1978, Smith said, “I remember one thing, he kind of had dirty looking hands or dirty fingernails it looked like.”
37 Smith did not state the detail concerning the “dirty looking hands” during his Warren
Commission deposition of July 23, 1964:
Mr. LIEBELER. There is a parking lot in behind this grassy area
back from Elm Street toward the railroad tracks, and you went down to the parking lot
and looked around?
Mr. SMITH. Yes, sir; I checked all the cars. I looked into all the
cars and checked around the bushes. Of course, I wasn’t alone. There was some deputy
sheriff with me, and I believe one Secret Service man when I got there.
I got to make this statement, too. I felt awfully silly, but after the
shot and this woman, I pulled my pistol from my holster, and I thought, this is silly, I
don’t know who I am looking for, and I put it back. Just as I did, he showed me that he
was a Secret Service agent.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did you accost this man?
Mr. SMITH. Well, he saw me coming with my pistol and right
away he showed me who he was.
Mr. LIEBELER. Do you remember who it was?
Mr. SMITH. No, sir; I don’t—because then we started checking
the cars. (Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. XII, p. 535.)
Close Golz printed this in the same August 27, 1978, Dallas Morning News article that
introduced Gordon Arnold to the world. Note that the man with “dirty looking hands” was not a man in a police uniform, however, as in Arnold’s story, but a man Smith believed to be a Secret Service agent.
38 Warren Commission Hearings, Vol. VII, p. 535.
Close
Smit’s description of this alleged agent also bears scant resemblance to Arnold’s Secret Service (or CIA) agent behind the stockade fence. While Arnold’s agent dressed in a “light-colored suit”
40 Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book
Edition, 1987), p. 112.
Close the man described by Smith “looked like an auto mechanic. He had on a sports
shirt and sports pants. But he had dirty fingernails, it looked like, and hands that looked like an auto mechanic’s hands.”
41 Anthony Summers, Conspiracy (New York: Paragon House, 1989), p. 50.
Close
It’s hard to escape the impression that Arnold was simply mixing and matching elements from various stories he had heard or read — and there can be little doubt that Arnold had read Smith’s story in 1978.
Enter “Badge Man”
The second item of evidence that may have influenced Arnold’s story is an image discovered by Texas researcher Gary Mack in October 1982, in an “exceptionally clear” second-generation transparency slide copy of a print of Mary Ann Moorman’s Polaroid photograph of John F. Kennedy’s assassination that author Josiah Thompson (Six Seconds in Dallas) had obtained in the 1960s from United Press International.
42 Gary Mack, newsgroup post, April 26, 2000.
Close The image seemed to depict the head and shoulders of a man behind the
stockade fence, in a stance possibly consistent with the firing of a rifle, his face partly obscured by a white image that could be interpreted as a muzzle flash or smoke from a rifle.
43 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent
Television, England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode
two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Close
Enlarged and enhanced by photo-optics technician Jack White, the image yielded more apparent details. While this theorized man did not appear to be wearing a hat or cap, what was said to be his chest and arm seemed to contain images reminiscent of a badge and insignia, not unlike those worn by a police officer. Mack dubbed the image “Badge Man.”
44 Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain (Danvers, Mass: Yeoman Press, 1994), pp. 255-
56.
Close
After subjecting the enlargements to further scrutiny, Mack and White discovered a less clearly defined image near “Badge Man” that they thought could be Gordon Arnold.
45 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent
Television, England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode
two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Close Shortly thereafter, Mack reports, he conducted three telephone interviews with
Arnold, during one of which, Mack says, “I told him I had a photograph that may show him [emphasis as in original], but I didn’t want him to see it until I was certain I had obtained the clearest possible version.”
46 Gary Mack, newsgroup post, April 26, 2000.
Close Arnold’s filmed interview for The Men Who Killed Kennedy took place in the
summer of 1988, Mack notes, and, according to Mack, “it truly was the first time he [Arnold] had ever seen any version of the Badge Man blowups.”
47 Gary Mack, newsgroup post, April 26, 2000.
Close
Is it possible that, contrary to what Gary Mack believes, Arnold had seen or heard about the “Badge Man” image, published by Mack in 1982,
48 Gary Mack, ed., Coverups!, October 1982.
Close prior to his filmed interview for The Men Who Killed Kennedy, and it was this
development that inspired the new description of the police officer as one who was wearing “a uniform of a police officer,” but “didn’t wear a hat”?
49 Mack believes that Arnold had mentioned that the police officer had been
bareheaded during one of their 1982-83 telephone interviews, before Arnold could
have possibly seen the “Badge Man” enlargement (Gary Mack, newsgroup posts of
October 15, 1998, and April 26, 2000); but Mack has been unable to verify this, as his
notes from these interviews have gone missing. (Gary Mack, newsgroup post of April
30, 2000; e-mail to author, December 5, 2002.)
Close Another element of Arnold’s evolving story suggests this may well have been
the case.
In addition to the “Badge Man” and alleged Gordon Arnold images in the Moorman enlargements, Mack and White discovered a third image, which they believed to be a man wearing a hardhat and white T-shirt standing directly next to the “Badge Man” figure — a particularly troublesome claim given the fact, acknowledged by both Mack and White,
50 Newsgroups posts of Gary Mack and Jack White.
Close that “Badge Man” and friend would have to have been elevated several feet
above the ground (for example, standing on the bumper of a car) in order for their chests to be seen over the five-foot-high fence from Moorman’s vantage point, as Mack and White believed.
51 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent
Television, England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode
two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Close
“Badge Man” and friends, as envisioned by Gary Mack and Jack White
When shown a color-tinted version of a Moorman enlargement created by White and Mack,
52 In order to clarify the images Mack and White perceived in White’s Moorman
enlargements, Jack White (with some assistance from Mack) created the color-tinted
version, adding blue to denote the sky in the background, tan to denote Gordon
Arnold’s uniform, etc. Mack regards the color-tinted version as “extremely accurate”
to the details he and White perceived in the black-and-white original. (Gary Mack, e-
mail to author, June 23, 2003.)
Close purportedly for the first time, one of Arnold’s reactions was to ask someone off-
camera (presumably director Nigel Turner), “Would this fella back here [the figure with the hardhat] be the railroad man I asked you about this morning? Because when I was walking to the site, and I had never told anybody that I had, when we were out there filming, it reminded me that there was a railroad worker just standing out there by the railroad tracks.”
53 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent
Television, England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode
two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Close
So in his interviews for The Men Who Killed Kennedy, Arnold has subtracted one of the two policemen from his earlier accounts, specified for the first time that the man (or one of the men) wearing a police uniform was bareheaded, and added a railroad worker who plays only a passive role in his story.
54 This is Arnold’s complete response to being shown Jack White’s hand-tinted version
of White’s Moorman enlargement:
Looks like a soldier in a summer uniform with an overseas cap
on. It looks like it would have been my uniform. It looks like there’s a camera or
there’s something up in front of the face.
Looks like a white spot. If it’s a flash, it would be like off of a
muzzle flash.
This looks like a police officer because that would be the badge,
that would be the arm emblem.
Would this fella back here be the railroad man I asked you about
this morning? Because when I was walking to the site, and I had never told anybody
that I had, when we were out there filming, it reminded me that there was a railroad
worker just standing out there by the railroad tracks.
Could that — it looks like somebody’s taking a picture. I
couldn’t figure out why would I be standing crooked until I flipped that up. And if
that’s a muzzle blast, or flash, then whoever’s standing there would have been a fool to
stand up straight. He’d be trying to get away from harm’s way is what it boils down to.
And that could very well be me. Son of a gun. That would be the
closest thing that I’ve ever — to be honest with you the picture bothers me because if
this is a true thing of what has occurred, then I could be the only one that saw the man.
He killed the President and to be honest with you, if I’d ‘a known this, I wouldn’t have
given the interview. ‘Cause, that hits too close to home right now.
Close
If these interviews were conducted, as both Nigel Turner and Gary Mack state, before Gordon Arnold became aware of the hypothesized contents of the Mack/White Moorman enlargements, it would indeed be remarkable that his 1988 account suddenly fit so perfectly what Mack and White believed to be shown in Mary Ann Moorman’s photograph.
Can we be as certain as Turner and Mack that Arnold’s recollections were untainted by any knowledge of what Mack and White had discovered, published, and publicized within the Kennedy assassination research community?
Exit “Badge Man”
Regardless of whether one accepts Gordon Arnold’s story, however, does the Moorman Polaroid corroborate his presence on the grassy knoll that tragic day?
In a word, no.
The simple fact of the matter is that, if the images in the Moorman enlargements were indeed Gordon Arnold and a man in a police uniform (“Badge Man”), as Mack and White believe, a distance of about ten feet would have separated the two
55 Jack White places Arnold twenty-five to thirty feet from “Badge Man” (twenty-five
feet: Jack White, Internet post, December 10, 2002; thirty feet: Jack White, newsgroup
post, November 8, 1996), but this is extremely unlikely; more plausible is Dallas
researcher Greg Jaynes’ estimate of eight feet between the alleged Arnold position and
the picket fence. (Greg Jaynes, e-mail to author, February 22, 2003.)
Close — about the same distance that separated President John F. Kennedy from
Dallas police officer Robert W. “Bobby” Hargis at the exact same instant, as depicted in the Zapruder film.
At left: eyewitness Jean Hill in red, Officer Bobby Hargis, Mary Moorman about to snap her picture
Officer Hargis is also prominent in Mary Moorman’s Polaroid: look at the obvious disparity between the relative size of the President’s head compared to that of Hargis, and that of the alleged figure of Gordon Arnold compared to that of Mack and White’s “Badge Man,” though each pair of figures would be located approximately the same distance apart.
Simply put, while either Mack and White’s “Badge Man” or “Gordon Arnold” figure could conceivably depict an actual human being on the knoll, it is impossible for both to
be people. Of course, if either one of these images is nothing more than an illusion, it raises serious questions about the validity of both.
As researcher Greg Jaynes points out, the features of the “Badge Man” image are remarkably well defined, while the edge of the white concrete wall, located some thirty-seven feet closer to the camera than the theorized position of “Badge Man,” is captured in Moorman only as a sea of gauze and fuzz;
56 Greg Jaynes, e-mail to author, February 25, 2003.
Close the same criticism applies to the “Gordon Arnold” and “Hardhat Man” figures.
Of course, it is a photographic impossibility for objects further from the plane of focus of the photograph to be in sharper focus than objects nearer to it; this strongly suggests that the three images are illusions resulting from photographic artifacts, light glimpsed through the trees in the background, distortions resulting from an object located in between Moorman’s camera and the picket fence, or a combination of some or all of these factors — just like other “assassins” found in Mary Moorman’s grainy Polaroid and eventually debunked by analysts, including Gary Mack himself.
57 Researcher David Lifton discovered one such image, dubbed “Number 5 Man,” in
1965. It was publicized in 1967 by researcher Raymond Marcus, then revived in 2000
by John Kelin. When Kelin announced his new article on the subject, Mack responded:
This is an embarrassingly bad, outdated article, and I’m very
sorry, John, that you were fooled by such misleading information.
Shortly after publication of the Badge Man image in my October
1982 issue of “Coverups!”, Ray Marcus kindly sent me his best copies of the work he
had done on the Moorman photo 15 years earlier. Not long after that, David Lifton
showed me the “negative” he had acquired. It’s a negative, all right, of a half-tone!
And that is the source of what Ray Marcus worked from.
For those who are not familiar with printing, to reproduce
photographs in a newspaper or magazine, pictures have to be “screened,” which is a
mechanical conversion of a continuous image — the photograph — into a series of
large and small dots. That’s a half-tone, and in the process, you lose a lot of the small
details in the original picture. Lifton’s picture is a half-tone, which doesn’t even begin
to compare with the actual photograph or photographic copies of it.
The “man” ceases to become a man when one looks at a real
Moorman photograph of the area. Furthermore, the Charles Bronson film and
photograph, unknown to researchers until 1978, also shows that area and there is no
man or anything else. It is nothing more than a shadow pattern that was distorted by the
screening of the image for reproduction. (Gary Mack, newsgroup post, March 1, 2000.)
See also Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain (Danvers, Mass: Yeoman Press, 1994),
pp. 254-57.
Close
Furthermore, Gordon Arnold stated consistently that he dropped to the ground just after the first shot was fired; but the first shot was fired no later than the time frame 224 of the home movie taken by Dallas garment manufacturer Abraham Zapruder was exposed,
58 Warren Commission Report, pp. 98-105.
Close and very possibly as early as Zapruder frame 155.
59 Gerald Posner, Case Closed (New York: Random House, 1993), pp. 321-322. For a
detailed discussion, please click here.
Close If Arnold’s account is accurate, how can he still be standing at the time of the
head shot (captured in Zapruder frame 313, about the same time the Moorman Polaroid was taken)?
Finally, if Gordon Arnold’s story is true and the Mack/White “Badge Man” theory is also true, where was “Badge Man” just a few minutes earlier, when Arnold was allegedly behind the fence?
Arnold consistently stated that he had been “walking behind [the] fence on top of the grassy knoll minutes before the assassination” toward the railroad bridge.
Close After his purported encounter (or encounters) with the federal agent, Arnold
“walked the complete length of the fence,”
61 The Men Who Killed Kennedy, television miniseries, Central Independent
Television, England, originally aired in October 1988: Nigel Turner, director, episode
two, “The Forces of Darkness.”
Close this time in the other direction, before he got around on the other side. We know
that the President’s motorcade was running some five minutes behind schedule.
62 Warren Commission Report, p. 3.
Close If a man in a police uniform was supposed to kill the President from behind the
fence on the grassy knoll, where was he?
Enter “Black Dog Man”
As far as photographic corroboration for Arnold’s story goes, the only issue that remains is whether or not he could be the figure known as “Black Dog Man.”
“Black Dog Man” is the name given to a bystander glimpsed hidden in shadow behind the concrete wall in photographs taken by spectators Phil Willis and Hugh Betzner; the description comes from the silhouette’s slight resemblance to a black dog crouched upon the wall. As this person has never identified him- or herself, and his or her features are far too indistinct in these photographs to allow for any possible identification, his or her identity remains open to speculation.
63 A 1967 Itek study commissioned by Life magazine concluded that “Black Dog Man”
was an unidentified spectator who “joined two other persons on the steps by the time
the car” had reached its position at the time of the President’s fatal head shot. (Richard
Trask, Pictures of the Pain [Danvers, Mass: Yeoman Press, 1994], p. 174.) Author
Richard Trask advances the possibility that the image was one member of the young,
black couple described by eyewitness Marilyn Sitzman as having been behind the
concrete wall at the time of the assassination. (Trask, p. 174.) For more on the latter
possibility, please click here for an article by Jerry Organ.
Close
Exit “Black Dog Man”
“Black Dog Man” cannot be Gordon Arnold, however, as he or she appears to be standing against the wall (see below), while Arnold claimed to have been standing a short distance across the sidewalk from the wall; and “Black Dog Man” certainly does not appear to be filming the motorcade.
Left: researcher J. Gary Shaw demonstrates “Black Dog Man’s” position for Robert Groden.
Right: Gordon Arnold stands where he claimed to have been positioned during the assassination.
Eyewitness corroboration for Arnold’s story?
Despite the dearth of evidence, there is one eyewitness who has been alleged to confirm Gordon Arnold’s presence in Dealey Plaza.
As noted previously, Arnold’s story was first publicized in a Dallas Morning News story of August 27, 1978. A follow-up story of Sunday, December 31, 1978, again authored by Earl Golz, noted, “Some assassination researchers said they doubted Arnold’s story because they could not find him in photographs and movie film taken at the time of the assassination.”
64 Earl Golz, “Panel Leaves Question of
Impostors,” Dallas Morning News, December
31, 1978.
Close
However, Golz wrote, Arnold’s “presence on the grassy knoll was confirmed Saturday by former U.S. Sen. Ralph Yarborough of Texas, who was riding in the motorcade two cars behind the presidential limousine. He was a passenger in a car with Vice President Lyndon Johnson and Mrs. Johnson.”
65 Earl Golz, “Panel Leaves Question of Impostors,” Dallas Morning News, December
31, 1978.
Close
“Immediately on the firing of the first shot I saw the man you interviewed throw himself on the ground,” Yarborough told The News. “He was down within a
Faces in Odd Places If one looks at enough photographs, faces can turn up in all kinds of strange places. Consider, for example, this photo of the World Trade Center towers in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Some see the face of Satan, perhaps gloating over the evil he has caused. Then there is this famous photo of the "face on Mars," photographed by NASA's Viking Orbiter in 1976. How did it get there? Does it show intelligent life, perhaps trying to communicate with other races from other planets? As it happens a probe in 2001 obtained a much higher resolution photo of the same area, and the "face" is shown to be a rather ordinary geological structure. It's not possible, unfortunately, to go back to Dealey Plaza and rephotograph "Badgeman." If he was ever there, he's now long gone.
second of the time the shot was fired and I thought to myself, ‘There’s a combat veteran who knows how to act when weapons start firing.’”
66 Earl Golz, “Panel Leaves Question of Impostors,” Dallas Morning News, December
31, 1978. In his affidavit submitted to the Warren Commission, Yarborough stated, “I
heard three shots and no more. All seemed to come from my right rear. I saw people
fall to the ground on the embankment to our right, at about the time of or after the
second shot, but before the cavalcade started up and raced away.” (Warren
Commission Hearings, Vol. VII, p. 440.)
Close
Yarborough elaborated slightly upon his statement ten years later, in The Men Who Killed Kennedy:
During that shooting my eye was attracted to the right. I saw a movement and I saw a man just jump about ten feet like at the old time flying tackle in football and land against a wall. I thought to myself, “There’s an infantryman who’s either been shot at in combat or he’s been trained thoroughly: the minute you hear firing, get under cover.”
Yarborough saw someone “jump about ten feet like at the old time flying tackle in football and land against a wall;” Gordon Arnold said he “hit the dirt”
68 Henry Hurt, Reasonable Doubt (New York: Henry Holt and Co., First Owl Book
Edition, 1987), pp. 112-13.
Close Yarborough surmised that the bystander he saw was an infantryman or combat
veteran, because he appeared to know “how to act when weapons start firing.”
Was Yarborough describing Gordon Arnold, or someone else entirely?
In 1993 Ralph W. Yarborough was interviewed at his Austin home by historian David Murph of Texas Christian University. Murph reminded Yarborough that he had been quoted as saying he had witnessed a man on the grassy knoll throw himself down on the ground, and that the man had impressed him as a combat veteran.
Yarborough seemed puzzled to hear that his words had been applied to someone standing on the grassy knoll. That couldn’t possibly be correct, he insisted repeatedly. “Remember where I was in the motorcade — with the Johnsons,” he cautioned Murph, “too far back to have been able to see anyone [on the knoll] drop to the ground when firing began.”
69 David Murph, e-mails to author, July 8 and 10, 2003. Thanks to David Perry for
putting me in contact with Dr. Murph.
Close
Whoever Yarborough had described (and there were many people in Dealey Plaza throwing themselves down on the ground as the shots rang out),
70 Journalist Hugh Sidey was a passenger in the motorcade. When the vehicle he was
in turned the corner to Elm Street, he would recall, “It looked like a giant hand or wind
had swept the place, everybody was lying down on the grassy knoll. At the curb there
was a young man [probably a reference to eyewitness Bill Newman] with a little boy.
He was hammering the ground with his fist, with his other arm over the boy protecting
him, just in anguish.” (The Newseum with Cathy Trost and Susan Bennett, President
Kennedy Has Been Shot [Naperville, Ill.: Sourcebooks, Inc., 2003], p. 25.)
Close it could not have been Gordon Arnold.
What really happened on the knoll during the assassination? Does any evidence corroborate Gordon Arnold’s claims about what occurred during and after the shooting?
![JFK [Undated]](https://static.documents.pub/doc/80x56/56d6bd961a28ab30168e8def/jfk-undated.jpg)