Who Killed JFK?

The trial of Oswald
I once saw an enactment of the trial of Lee Harvey Oswald, with a real prosecutor, jury and defence lawyer presenting evidence, etc. as they would in a real trial.

The outcome was that Oswald was found guilty of the murder of JFK, but the jury did not reach a unanimous conclusion as to whether he acted alone (just as in the poll starting this thread).

I think we will never know for sure. The human proclivity for mystification tend to run away with us when famous people are involved (celebrities could not die of down to earth causes, right?). A ripping yarn goes a longer way than a dry statements of the facts, and our imagination easily plays tricks with our ability to think critically (hence, the abundance of urban myths).

So when a famous pilot crashes into the sea, like Earheart or Saint-Exupéry, it cannot be a simple navigation error or a common accident (The plane of Saint-Exupéry has been found, by the way, but it remains unclear whether it was shot down or suffered engine failure).

An air crash that I would like to read more about was the one in the Congo (1961) that killed among others the UN secretary general Dag Hammarskjöld. I believe it was declared an accident, but there are persistent rumours (including alleged eye witness accounts) that his plane was actually shot down by a mercenary pilot flying for the Katanga rebels. I wonder if this dossier has ever been reopened and whether an independent investigation was ever conducted.

And if you are interested in another conspiracy including a Swedish politician, what about the murder of prime minister Olof Palme in 1986? That one was never cleared up. A likely suspect was convicted, but freed upon appeal for lack of conclusive evidence (I guess that shows Sweden is a civilised nation which abides by the rule of law). What is certain is that the investigation into the murder was bungled and that many groups have been suspects, including the Kurdish rebel group PKK, the South African secret service, the KGB, the CIA, neo-nazis, and crime syndicates. Take your pick!

Rgrds,
P.

RE: JFK
No matter what you believe, there is some fact out there that can contradict your theory. The Grassy Knoll theory for example, a more common conspiracy theory. 1) Just because Kennedy's head went back and to the left doesn't mean he was hit from the front. Objects can move in the direction of the bullet upon impact. It is called the "jet effect" and can be recreated. 2) The throat wound has always been thought to be an entrance wound because of it's size and shape. While most exit wounds are larger than entrance wounds, if the projectile comes up against something tough upon exit (like a buttoned shirt and tie), the wound can be round and small. 3) It has been debated that Oswald could never have squeezed off 3 shots in the small time frame. But actually there was approx. 8 seconds for those 3 shots. It has been shown that it can be done in approx. 5 seconds with a good amount of accuracy.

I guess the point I am trying to make is that no matter what you think there is going to be something out there to dispute your theory. And science doesn't lie. This proves that it could have gone either way: Oswald alone or Oswald with others.

Drives me crazy but I can't stop learning about it and thinking about it. It is just one of those things....

A very close member of my family was a member of the UN. I mentioned that I remembered the death of Dag Hammerskold. She said "you do know that that was an assassination don't you." She didn't talk much about it, but did say the U.S.(CIA?) was involved, and it was because if his independent stance on issues.

As far as the grassy knoll goes (Im working from memory here) it was first introduced in about 1983 based on acoustic evidence from a police bike that had its mic left running.

the computerised re enactment mentioned previously included the police bike (It was made from the Zapruder film and another one showing the road leading towards the book depository) and it was shown that the 'grassy knoll' interpretation placed the police bike in the wrong place.

Given that oswald was a marksman and for the program a 70 year old man dry fired an identical rifle 3 times in less than the time allowed (aim fire move the bolt, aim fire move the bolt, aim fire) I think a trained marksman would have had no trouble. The distance was around 100 yards and the program showed some of Oswalds military records 49/50 50/50 from a firing range booklet.

Also Oswald killed a policeman who pulled him over just after the assassination and Oswalds brother is convinced he did it.

.....

The most interesting thing about all this is the film JFK - which was made as entertainment has become gospel truth for the conspiracy fans. Gross distortions of the truth for cinematic reasons have become fact

Kaldish -- you're absolutely right about the film. Some people took a work of cinematic art to be an accurate recreation of history, which it was definitely not.

The grassy knoll theory, however, was espoused long before 1983. It was in Mark Lane's book, Rush to Judgement. which was published just months after the assisantion. It might have taken until 1983 for the defenders of the Warren Commission report to come up with this motorcycle cop as an explanation for some, shall we say, anomalies and inconsistencies in that report.

Most of the the film is fiction; the only real truths are that JFK was shot while in Dallas and that he is dead!

Most of what you see in the film is either based on a fact, based on a testimony or based on J. Garrisons studies. The key word here being based.

I think I may have seen the same re-enactment as you. They've done a bunch of forensic research since then. And all the modern investigators can conclude is that there is no definite conclusion. It could have happened any number of ways and being that we can never have a fresh crime scene, evidence has been misused, tampered with or otherwise spoiled, how can we conclude anything for definite?

The circumstances surrounding the death of JFK indeed look suspicious but that isn't enough to prove anything. It is also hard to prove something when no one has the same story. Everyone has a different perception of what happened that day. The grassy knoll theory could in fact have been a viable scenario. So could the lone gunman. Or a triple threat. As I stated in my last post, there is a way to "prove" or "disprove" pretty much any theory someone throws at you. The problem lies in the fact that there is no way to know for sure if the autopsy notes are accurate and there is no way to recheck the body. There is no way to re-inspect the vehicle, as it was cleaned and repaired long long long ago, the "evidence" disposed of. Personally, I think that this will remain unsolved for long after I am dead.

As a registered and practicing Pessimist, Kristie, I have to agree with you that the whole truth will probably never be known. But the fact that some evidence appears to have been tampered with, as well as the fact that so many people give quite contradictory testimony, seems to indicate that there is a larger 'truth' to be known. I don't understand how anyone can buy the Warren Commision report as being anything like thorough, let alone accurate, in view of all the loose ends.

Re: The trial of Oswald


The latest theory about Saint-Exupéry is that he committed suicide, suffering from depression after being harassed by de Gaulle's men, of whom he was a political opponent. So, another theory. I guess it is also possible that he suffered a medical problem that led to the crash, after all he was not a spring chicken anymore and had been drinking hard the night before taking off on his last flight.

People always believe what they want, which is why this thing has spiraled so out of control. People have taken the evidence and made it what they wanted it to be, instead of letting the evidence talk for itself. It's pretty annoying. Not to mention, before Vietnam really got all shitty, people weren't as cynical of "the man" so the "truth" was allowed to get all muddled. Today we'd all be like, "What? Ok, yeah sure...freakin' lying politician..."

who killed JFK?
I believe JFK was shot by Ralph Nader to prove convertibles are "Unsafe at any speed."


Just a theory : )........may I will mention it to Oliver Stone.

Merry Andrew:

Some things you should know about America:

America is full of nuts. America is full of guns. America is full of nuts with guns.
America is full of wackos. America is full of wackos with too much time on their hands. America is full of wackos with too much time on their hands, so they start to think.

And they think of the most odd versions of reality.

Um.

We are governed by aliens.
Autistic children may be the real geniuses.
A person doesn't have to pay any taxes if he declares himself to be an 'independent entity', or an 'emancipated citizen' or 'a free-born'. (There are a lot of those thoughts and ideas being taught weekly in airport hotel meeting rooms.).

God has declared the USA to be a divine sanctuary for the white race.

God has declared certain people to be secretly in charge of everything and if you hear His voice telling you you are one of them, you are.

The States of Mississippi and Alabama ought to be given to the black race as reparation for slavery to operate as they see fit.

The government of the US is a fraud which really does not exist therefore it has no power over how anyone makes their money or how many kinds of guns one can possess.

It's okay to steal money from government entities because 1) it's your money anyway and 2) it's really worthless. (Don't ask them why they would want to steal something that's worthless, they just smile.)

And they live regular lives amongst us. The wacko and nuts hold down jobs, go to Wal-Mart to shop and root for their favorite football team.

America is full of nuts. America is full of guns. America is full of nuts with guns. America is full of nuts with guns with wacko ideas.

Or they are wackos with time on their hands, wacko ideas and a Ryder truck van. Same guy, different time frame.

Lee Harvey Oswald was an American wacko who was very, very good with a gun, especially that November day. Timothy McVeigh was an American wacko who held the US government, and us, in his mind as some kind of deep evil which he had to destroy. So he got his buddy to help him mix in the fuel oil and then drove South to Oklahoma City. Lee Harvey brought his rifle to work that day just in case he had a shot at it.

Neither one thought themselves to be wacko or even traitorous to the idea of being American because they were nuts, nuts with wacko ideas.

America is full of them. And every time one of them kills some of us we try to explain it away by some large convoluted conspiracy theory, but the truth is, it could be any of us. We all have time on our hands.

And this is besides all of the wackos around the world who hate us with a passion so blind they can't see the beauty of keeping their own lives.

Joe

Ahhh...I root for my favorite football team (da Jints)...and I cannot help but wonder if there was a message in here for me as well as Andrew.

Joe, no argument that the country is full of whackos. Several of 'em post on A2K and it's only the occasional slip that gives them away. They can be quite articulate. But what's that got to do with the fact that the conclusions of the Warren Commission don't jibe with the available evidence? Perhaps the members of the commission were whackos?

I guess my point, before the martinis started to add in their poetic sense, was that Lee Harvey Oswald was one of those pure American nuts and that he went to the Schoolbook Depository that morning with a burning idea in his head: to kill the President of the United States.

He did his US Marine Corps trained best, he leveled that bolt action rifle at the view out the window and, at just the right moment, squeezed off as many shots as he could in five seconds, then he ducked down like any good sniper would and crawled away towards the stairs. He was gone before people had stopped pointing at the building.

He was going to the movies.

I haven't read about the assassination in years, I don't know what evidence doesn't fit with the idea that Lee could have done it by himself, but it doesn't matter. He did it. That little skinny sonof abitch shot the President and Connelly and if that stupid cop hadn't bumped into him he would have got away clean. Oh, and he didn't figure on there being another nut as nutty as him in Dallas which was pretty dumb, Dallas Texas, then being the nut-capital of the right wing AND the left wing world of American politics, so ---watch the hat--- Jack Ruby gut shot him the next morning as America looked at their TV screens.

The killing of John Fitzgerald Kennedy was America's first reality TV show and the three networks pretty much got it right. Weirdo misfit shoots the most beloved President in recent memory and in return is shot himself by a low-life gun- toting strip joint operator.

LBJ' is sworn in on the plane to Washington in front of the slain President's blood smeared widow.

And so it goes.

==

As to the Commission: it was formed too soon. America was still swooning over the events of the day and the mindset was --What the hell happened here?---- (We are a different people now, in 2001 the call for a Commission on 9/11 was delayed until we stopped crying.) The Warren Commission found that Lee was the shooter and he did it by himself. Good, cause that's what the truth is.

All the other stuff, echos and magic bullets and head movements are all bullhockey. Hang around enough emergency rooms and you'll see just how many magic bullets there are--- suckers change directions three times before exiting---and sounds of shots-- shoot, there's more echo chambers in that Square then in Pdiddy's Hampton home. So give it up, it's history. Lee shot John. That's it.

Just another American gun nut who took his shot.

tha'Zit


Joe

PS I'd be interested in what you think is the most compelling evidence for more than one person being involved November 22nd. And why you think it matters today?

Very interesting Joe...I think you and I could spark quite a debate! :wink:

I don't know that it matters much anymore what happened...the man is dead and no amount of evidence is going to bring him back. However, regardless of whether it has been 6 months or 60 years, the families of those who are killed by unnatural means deserve an answer. Not to mention American's think they are safe in their country and when the President of the United States is killed we realize that we aren't as safe as we thought we were (look at 9-11 aftermath)

I think the reason people are so infatuated with this is because no one has a straight answer. There is no solid proof of anything, either for or against Oswald. You can get into the "I personally think..." statements but forensically there is no right or wrong answer. They can prove that Oswald did it just as easily as they can prove that there was a conspiracy. Depends on which angle you take.
For example, the biggest conspiracy evidence is the "back and to the right" head motion and the gaping exit wound where JFK was hit in the head. Now, forensics has shown (as you may have read in an earlier post) that there is such a thing as the "jet effect" in which the exit wound looks like an entrance wound and vice versa (entrance appears to be an exit). IF this happened, the head would snap back first, not forward. Also, since Kennedy was sitting up higher than Connely, the bullet could feasibly have passed through Kennedy's throat (that first shot) and hit Connely. There was no change in parade route (as come conspiracy theorists have claimed) and Kennedy had been the one to ask to keep the bubble off the motorcade and that the Secret Service not ride on the car. So here you have the beginning of a viable defense for the single gunman theory. But what about all the "convenient and strange" deaths of those involved? Didn't exist. Those people died in the same ways and at the same rate as the rest of us. And for being able to get that many shots off? It can be done without a doubt.


On the flip side, you could say that there is no way to tell that the throat wound was in fact from a shot from behind. The tracheotomy destroyed that evidence, as the doctor used the hole already in JFK's throat. Also, one could say that the hole in Kennedy's head could only have come from a shot low to the ground and from the front (trajectory either places the gunman low to the ground in front or high in back), the exiting of the bullet blowing the back of his head off. There happens (coincidentally or not) to be a drain in the curb at a point in front of the motorcade which would allow for a man to stand and shoot upward at the President as he drove by. There is the fact that the car was sent immediately back to Michigan to be repaired and the evidence destroyed. Or that the autopsy pictures and report are inconsistent and/or not complete. The picture of Oswald with the rifle has been labeled as faked...in the testimony of Jack White, the "expert", he admitted he did not have a background or experience in forensic photography. (Real viable witness) This shows that Oswald was set up and in fact was a patsy.

You can go on and on and on....I doubt we'll ever know what happened.

As for the 'compelling evidence', Joe, most of it has been cited in the 18 pages of posts above. Just browse the discussion. As to why I think it matters today -- it doesn't, not in any practical, material sense of the word. It matters only because I think that historical accuracy and truth are important. It certainly won't change a single thing. We're not talking about bringing the guilty to justice here; we're talking only about gaining a satisfactory answer as to what really hapened in Dallas that day and the couple of days following the assasination.

Okay. I'll read it over, see you Friday.

Joe

Look at the new school books, history has been rewritten already.

I think that it was Col. Mustard in the grassy knoll with a candle stick.

Hi guys i am new to this forum but i am very interested in the topic. I am 22 years old so by no means was i living when jfk was shot. but i am currently in school to become a private investigator and i chose the jfk assassination to do one of my reports on. While doing research i cam upon this forum and would like to share my opinion. It is hard to fathom that some one could with any doubt belive that oswald was alone in this. There is simply to much controversy in all aspects of the case. The evidence, witnesses and even the investigators all all rumored to be tampered with. I don't see how you can not question everything about the case. I don't have time to give my whole opinion but i will be back later to share with you what i find on the subject.