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... Book Depository, at that nights police lineup he failed to positively identify Oswald. What is interesting to note is that in a repeatedly contradictory testimony, Brennan decided that it was indeed Oswald whom he saw in the window. Later when the FBI questioned him he went back to his original story and told them he was no longer certain who it was in the perch. But when it finally came time for him to testify to the Warren Commission, he was able again to positively identify Oswald as the man. The Warren Commission snapped up his statements and used them as valuable evidence in their report (Hurt, 89).
Other key witnesses, Carolyn Walther and Ruby Henderson, both testified that they saw two snipers in the perch. Walther told the FBI, I saw two men in the open window on the upper floors, one was holding a rifle and had lightish and wearing a white shirt, and the second man was wearing a brown suit. (Hurt, 93). Ruby Henderson told the FBI that she also saw two men in the window. If one chooses to disregard these witnesses it is understandable, but one cannot hide from the motion picture taken on the day of the assassination, revealing that there were two men in the window. Robert J. Garden, one of the panels consultants on the photographic evidence and a long critic of the Warren Commission analyzed the film.
His conclusions were very startling, stating: The fact there is movement in two pairs of windows that are separated by a good eight feet indicates beyond question that there was more than one person up in the perch (Hurt, 94). In the end, the Warren Commission chose to disregard both the statements made by Walther and Henderson, as well as the motion picture, yet decided to use Howard Brennan's very unreliable testimony (stating that Oswald was the lone assassin) as crucial evidence in their attempt to prove there was only one shooter. Witnesses have also reported that the person they saw in the perch seemed to be in no hurry, slowly withdrawing his rifle after the last shot. Had Oswald been one of the snipers, he would have had to fire the shots, slowly squeeze through a rather tight opening, wipe his prints off the rifle, and then stash it on the other side of the room, all this in under ninety seconds.
He then would have had to run down five flights of stairs in order to fit the timeframe when he was spotted by a police officer and a fellow Book Depository employee on the second floor lunchroom. Tests done by the Warren Commission and the Assassination Committee have shown that it was definitely possible for Oswald to have accomplished this, but that he would have had to run down the stairs at a very quick pace (Summers, 107 - 113). If Oswald was on the sixth floor, then three female employees on the stairwell did not even notice him as he passed them in a frantic rush. And if Oswald had hurried down five flights of stairs after just committing a murder one would assume that he would be nervous and out of breath. When a cop and a fellow employee spotted him, the two of them noticed nothing unusual about him (Hurt, 90). In the hysteria of the assassination it is plausible that the three women might not have noticed a man running past them and that Oswald could have composed himself in front of the policeman, but it does seem ironic that even the Warren Commissions timeframe on Oswald is a bit of a stretch.
Of all the debate surrounding the actual shooting, nothing has caused more argument than whether or not Oswald could have executed the amazingly fast and accurate shots (Hurt, 98). The Warren Commission believed he could, but there is a great amount of evidence saying that it was impossible, thus creating a conspiracy. If Oswald was the sniper, he would not only have had to been extremely swift but also would have had to be incredible accurate, something that those who knew him recognized he had none of. Oswald's records in the Marine Corp reveal that he had an awful shot.
In a firing test, He scored only one point over the lowest possible level of qualification. (Hurt, 99). The Warren Commission heard testimony from one former Marine, Nelson Delgado, who stated that Oswald's marksmanship was a joke, and that he could barely qualify on the range (Summers, 99). Also, less important, but relevant to the shooting was the gun which was used for the shooting. The fifteen-year old, bolt-action Mannlicher-Carcano, represents the opposite of what any sniper would carry. One handbook on rifles has called it an odd choice for an assassination, since it has no great reputation for accuracy. (Hurt, 100). Mechanix Illustrated, dismissed this rifle as being, crudely made, poorly designed, dangerous, inaccurate unreliable on repeat shots, and the fact that the telescope on the rifle was off center gave Oswald an even greater handicap (Hurt, 100).
Oswald's poor marksmanship, and his inferior weapon presented a considerable challenge to the Warren Commission. This challenge was heightened when expert sharpshooters, using the same rifle, failed to duplicate Oswald's accuracy. The first two shots were fired only 1. 66 seconds apart, ironic considering that Oswald's alleged murder weapon took a minimum of 2. 5 seconds to recycle. There is the same problem with the third and fourth shots which were fired only. 82 seconds apart. For one man to make these shots is physically impossible, and is almost indisputable proof that in fact, there were most likely three gunmen forming a triangular crossfire to massacre the president, thus proving a conspiracy.
In order to avoid any more evidence proving the Commissions theory false, a member of the HSCA committee, Robert Blakey said, While it is not impossible for Oswald to have fired these shots, none of my experts were able to duplicate his marksmanship. (Marrs, 432). With those words said, the Commission disregarded any of the other evidence presented and ran, using it as decisive evidence confirming that Oswald was the lone assassin. Using common sense, one can easily see that it was impossible for Oswald to have fired these shots, thus spelling conspiracy. What is even more suspicious than the extremely flawed autopsy are the events surrounding Oswald's prints on the rifle. The Warren Report cited the palm print found on the rifle confidently as evidence linking Oswald to what is considered the assassination rifle. There are no questions concerning whether or not it was Oswald's print on the rifle, but instead questions arise over how the print actually got there.
Before removing the rifle from the Book Depository, Lieutenant Carl Day of the Dallas police crime laboratory dusted the rifle and tried to expose some of the vague prints he noticed in the vicinity of the trigger (Hurt, 106). He found nothing that was of any forensic value. After taking the rifle to the laboratory to continue his efforts, he concluded and told the Warren Commission, I could not make any positive identification of these prints. (Hurt, 107). The rifle was then taken to an FBI laboratory in Washington where professionals examined it. After much deliberation it was decided that they could not identify the prints found on the rifle to be Oswald's. It is in the following events that take place where much speculation transpires.
After Oswald's autopsy, his body was taken to Millers Funeral Home in Fort Worth to be prepared for burial. The only visitors reported were a team of FBI agents, who spent more than an hour with his body, and it was said that these agents came with crime lab kits (Hurt, 107). Paul Good, the funeral director recalled the visit in an interview: I was not in the rhombus I had to clean up his fingers after they got through fingerprinting him. They put black gook on his fingers, and they couldnt get it off It was a complete mess of his entire right hand, which would leave me to believe that they did take his (Oswald's) prints off his palms (Hurt, 107).
In an interview with FBI Agent Drain, a man closely involved in the investigation, he stated that there was no reason why the FBI would have needed further prints from Oswald, because they had already taken sufficient ones for the case. What was even more puzzling to Drain was the time in which the agents went to the funeral home, for he felt there had been ample earlier opportunities (Hurt, 107). The day after the FBI agents had visited Oswald's body, his palm print was found on the rifle. It is a bit suspicious that they found Oswald's print on the rifle after they visited him, for when the rifle was tested professionally two times prior no prints were found. The Warren Report failed to address the significance of these peculiarities in the emergence of the palm print. They chose simply to overlook the reasons that weighted against the legitimacy of the print, and embrace it as further evidence of the guilt of Lee Harvey Oswald.
All the Warren Commission needed was proof that Oswald was related to the rifle found. How this was gone about did not matter. The only evidence that the Warren Commission found to be relevant to their case was evidence that pointed towards Oswald as the lone assassin, all the other evidence was basically disregarded, and for this, there must have been a conspiracy. Twenty-two years after the JFK assassination, a festering reservoir of indisputable, disjointed facts has made its way into the public domain.
Some of the points raise the most frightening questions. Of all the gross deficiencies on the part of the government agencies and the Warren Commission, one ingredient is common at each juncture: an obvious disregard for the truth. This fundamental mistake is at the core of every major debacle in the investigation of Kennedys assassination. Who controlled Kennedys autopsy, and why were the people performing it so un-qualified? Why was the Warren Commission so insistent on proving the single-bullet theory, when it was deemed impossible? Why were so many reliable witnesses (who said they saw two men) disregarded, and those who were un-credible (who said they only saw one man, Oswald) used as key evidence?
How did Oswald's prints make it onto the rifle when it was made certain that the prints could not be identified? These are just a few questions which those who were connected with the case sought to cover up, and still remain unanswered. While it is unlikely that we will ever know the truth behind these questions, we can be sure of one thing: a conspiracy did indeed exist. And ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. (John 9: 32) Bibliography: Hurt, Henry.
Reasonable Doubt. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1985. Marrs, Jim. Crossfire: The plot that Killed Kennedy. New York: Carroll and Graf Publishers, 1989. Sloan, Bill.
JFK: The Last Dissenting Witness. Gretna: Pelican Publishing Company, 1992. Summers, Anthony. Conspiracy. New York: McGraw Hill Book Company, 1978. JFK.
Director Oliver Stone. 1992
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Research essay sample on Lone Assassin Warren Commission
