THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION - WHY OSWALD IS NOT GUILTY w/notes

THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION - WHY OSWALD IS NOT GUILTY

of being the Sixth Floor Sniper and Assassin of President Kennedy 

By William Kelly [billkelly3@gmail.com (609) 425-6297

The assassination of President John F. Kennedy remains an unsolved cold case homicide because it has never been properly investigated as a criminal case, the main suspect and accused assassin was murdered while in police custody before he could be tried in a court of law, and no one has been convicted of the crime today. 

The FBI said that they will maintain it as an open case forever, while many hundreds of independent citizens continue to investigate the case and try to answer some of the outstanding questions that can still be resolved, and researchers pour of recently released government records and continue to seek the many documents still being withheld for reasons of national security.

The assassination of President Kennedy is not yet a matter of history, but remains a cold case unresolved homicide that can and should be solved to a legal and moral certainty, as it can be if the remaining records are released and the still living witness are properly deposed before they die.

Still there are those who claim that the case has been solved all along - by the Dallas Police, within a few hours of the assassination, and the one and only guilty person - Lee Harvey Oswald did it for his own perverted, psychological reasons that we will never know.

While only an extremist - less than 20% of the people believe Oswald is guilty of killing JFK alone, [1] they include the most powerful people in government, law enforcement, academia and the media, including former Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB) Chairman Judge John Tunheim and former prosecutor Gary Cornwell, a deputy counsel to the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA).

Excuse me, Judge John Tunheim and Gary Cornwell and those who have publicly pronounced Lee Harvey Oswald guilty of killing President Kennedy, but I’d like you to consider a few facts that prove to me that Oswald is not guilty of murdering the president.

Can you give Lee Harvey Oswald a break? Can you give the accused assassin of President Kennedy the benefit of the doubt? Can you assume that he’s innocent, if only for a few minutes while I try to convince you he didn’t kill President Kennedy?

Do you support the time honored American tradition of presumption of innocence - a constitutional right that presupposes one’s innocence until proven guilty in a court of law? Well Oswald was never convicted in a court of law - other than for disturbing the peace for rumbling around on a New Orleans street corner with some anti-Castro Cubans, and now he can’t defend himself because he was murdered while in custody of the Dallas Police, which greatly reflects on the law enforcement officers who first considered him a suspect. [2]

If you can at least try to keep an open mind, and consider a few basic previously established facts - four facts that if true, prove Oswald is innocent of killing the President, then maybe you can view the assassination in a new light and from a different perspective, and join the effort to try to identify the real assassins.

For a variety of reasons, most people believe Oswald is not guilty of being the assassin and was framed as a patsy, as he himself claimed, and they consider him a pawn in a larger conspiracy, one that still affects us today. The unresolved nature of the assassination of President Kennedy still affects us today in the continued unhindered use of political assassination as a means of controlling power and the continued withholding of government records relating to the assassination on grounds of national security.

But a few people still believe that Oswald was the lone, deranged gunman, and maintain he is guilty of the crime. Those who think Oswald did it alone also usually attribute to him a psychological motive - such as seeking fame. As Judge Tunheim put it: “I think his motivation is he thought he was supposed to be someone famous in his own mind, and if he did this he would be viewed with great glory in the Soviet Union and Cuba,” an informed opinion that belies the fact that Oswald denied the deed.

Since it can be clearly shown, as I will do, that Oswald could not have been the Sixth Floor Sniper, then what can be made of the motivation of the patsy, framed for the crime, just as he claimed to be?

Whatever you believe, your opinion is based on something - probably some true facts that you learned over the years - or maybe it is based on an accumulation of a lot of knowledge about the case, but the positive proof Oswald is not guilty of killing JFK is based only on a few simple officially acknowledged facts that were established in the first few minutes after the assassination.

Those predisposed to Oswald’s singular guilt usually list the hard, circumstantial evidence that proves to them, that Oswald shot the president from the Sixth Floor Sniper’s nest. As they attest, the rifle found on the Sixth Floor was ordered by Oswald, his palm print was on the rifle, three bullet shells found at the scene were ejected from Oswald’s rifle and the bullet found at Parkland hospital was fired from the rifle. What more do you need to convict him? [3]

Although Dallas Police Chief Jesse Curry was one of the first to proclaim Oswald guilty, - after he was told by Washington officials that “You have you’re man,” Curry also acknowledged that, after all is said and done, “we can’t put him in that window.” And for good reason. [4]

The preponderance of testimony and evidence supports the fact Oswald wasn’t the Sixth Floor Sniper, as those who did eyeball the man in the window exonerate Oswald as they unanimously agree the gunman wore a white shirt, while Oswald was wearing a brown one, and as one witness noticed, the sniper had a distinguishing bald spot on the top of his head, a detail that excludes Oswald as a sniper suspect. [5]

There are also witnesses who saw a man with a rifle in the Sixth Floor widow at 12:15 p.m., [6] when Oswald was seen on the first floor. [7] And after the assassination a court clerk from across the street saw a man in the Sixth Floor window five minutes after the last shot was fired, [8] when Oswald was on the second floor. If Oswald was the Sixth Floor Sniper, then who was the man seen in the window with a rifle fifteen minutes before the assassination, when Oswald was on the first floor? And if not Oswald, who was the man in the sniper’s window five minutes after the last shot, when Oswald could not have been there?

These questions don’t seem to bother those who are set in their belief that Oswald shot the President from that window and then quickly ran down the steps to the Second Floor Lunchroom, and it seems like that regardless of whatever exculpatory evidence is presented, Oswald is the designated patsy.

                                  TECHNICALLY NOT GUILTY

The bottom line is - Oswald was not convicted in a court of law and probably wouldn’t have been if subjected to a trial for a number of reasons, as enumerated by former Manhattan prosecutor Robert K. Tanenbaum, the first deputy chief counsel to the HSCA. [9.]

When he was Chairman of the ARRB, Judge Tunheim didn’t take a public position as to whether there was a conspiracy, or pass judgment on Oswald, as his job was not to investigate the assassination, but to locate and release sealed government records to the public and to let people make up their own minds. But Judge Tunheim has more recently been quoted in the media that he personally believes Oswald guilty. [10]

Judge Tunheim must have read a lot about Lee Harvey Oswald, and he certainly knows much more about the accused assassin than most people, but he’s also a federal Judge and should know better than to describe Oswald as “guilty,” a legal term that applies only to those who have been convicted in a court of law.

When discussing Oswald, open minded and honest people, especially those familiar with legal terminology, refer to Oswald as the “accused assassin” or “alleged assassin,” as the TSBD historic marker correctly calls him, because that’s what he is.

And the gunman in the window should be referred to as the Sixth Floor Sniper, because it has never been established for certain that it was Oswald, and there is a preponderance of evidence that Oswald wasn’t on the Sixth Floor at the time the shots were fired, as I will demonstrate.

                                  OSWALD - PAWN & “MERE PATSY?”

Judge Tunheim isn’t the only well-informed person to publicly express a personal belief in Oswald’s guilt, as Gary Cornwell, the former Deputy Chief Counsel to the HSCA does in his book. After the resignation of the first HSCA Chief Counsel Richard Sprague, Cornwell was recruited by second chief counsel G. Robert Blakey.

In his book “Real Answers” Cornwell wrote: “…we confirmed that much of what the Warren Commission said was wrong. But we also found that most of the many reasons that led critics of the Warren Commission to conclude that Oswald was a mere patsy were also wrong, and were based upon inadequate access to the available evidence, questionable assumptions and logic, and/or faulty ‘scientific’ analysis…”  [11]

“Mere patsy”!?

Certainly if Oswald was framed for the crime, and was set up as the patsy, as he claimed, and as much of the evidence indicates, then the assassination wasn’t the work of a deranged lone nut, but was a well planned and successfully executed conspiracy by unknown confederates still at large, and the case is an unsolved homicide and a major national security threat today.

There’s nothing “mere” about it.

If Oswald wasn’t the Sixth Floor Sniper and was a patsy, then he most certainly played a smaller role - that of a sacrificial pawn - in a much larger game and a scheme of things that has yet to be figured out.

Since Gary Cornwell not only thinks Oswald guilty, but that those like me who have concluded Oswald was a “mere patsy” are wrong because we have had inadequate access to the available evidence, make questionable assumptions and use faulty logic and/or make faulty scientific analysis, I’d like him to evaluate the four facts, the logical reasoning and the scientific analysis that leads me to believe that Oswald is not guilty of killing the President. I’d like for him to point out where I am wrong, or acknowledge Oswald is really not guilty, if these four facts and reasons are agreed on and correct.

While Cornwell, like Tunheim, probably knows a lot about Oswald, I’m pretty sure neither of them have reviewed these four basic facts, acknowledged by the Warren Commission, that whatever else you believe about him, if they are true, prove Oswald didn’t kill the President.

My purpose here is to present this evidence in a public forum and use it to convince them and anyone else who believes Oswald is guilty, that he deserves the benefit of the doubt and a presumption of innocence that the Constitution, as well as the evidence in the case, legally and morally grants him.

So I publicly ask, challenge Gary Cornwell and Judge Tunheim to consider the following facts and refute or agree 1) that Oswald should not be considered or referred to as “guilty” and 2) there’s at least the distinct possibility that Oswald was not the Sixth Floor Sniper.

Judge Tunheim must recognize that Oswald, not having been convicted in a court of law, should not be considered “guilty,” as that word is a legal term reserved for those convicted in a court of law, and Cornwell should acknowledge, based on these four acknowledged facts, that it is possible that Oswald wasn’t the Sixth Floor Sniper, and therefore the investigation into this unsolved homicide should consider the probability that someone other than Oswald killed the President.

In his book Cornwell doesn’t address the reasons that lead me to believe that Oswald could not have been the Sixth Floor Sniper, but I would like him and Judge Tunheim to consider them and respond.

I base my conclusion on just four facts from the evidence and testimony provided to the Warren Commission, four facts that if true, completely exonerate Oswald from being the Sixth Floor Sniper.

This is not to say that Oswald is innocent of everything. I don’t know who killed President Kennedy, I don’t know who took a shot at General Walker and I don’t know who killed Dallas Police officer J.D. Tippit, but I do know for a fact that Lee Harvey Oswald didn’t kill President Kennedy.  

Not my original observation, I credit Howard Roffman, in his book “Presumed Guilty,” of first pointing out most of these details, though I’ve since come across some additional documents (Truly Affidavit) and evidence that supports the contention that Oswald is not guilty and was framed as the patsy, and I believe it can be proven to anyone interested in reviewing these facts, that Oswald was not the Sixth Floor Sniper. [12]

Oswald did not kill President Kennedy if you believe the two men who claim they ran into Oswald in the Second Floor lunchroom ninety seconds after the last shot - Dallas police officer Marrion Baker and Roy Truly, the superintendent of the Texas School Book Depository (TSBD).

There are dissenting voices who think they are lying, and there are those who believe the first police reports and discount the later official testimony, and these objections are certainly worth considering. [13]

But the following analysis is based strictly on four points of fact that have been entered into evidence in the official record as published in the Warren Report, and it rests entirely on the credibility of Dallas Policeman Marrion Baker and TSBD superintendent Roy Truly, and what they said occurred in the first two minutes after the assassination.

                   OSWALD’S ALIBI - PHYSICALLY NOT GUILTY

Among the Dallas motorcycle policemen escorting the President’s motorcade through Dallas, Marrion Baker was behind the last press car when shots rang out on Dealey Plaza. Baker had just turned the corner onto Houston Street when he and was startled by the gun shots, his attention drawn to the roof of the building in front of him where a flock of pigeons took flight.

The digital clock on the Hertz car rental sign on the roof read: 12:30.

Baker pulled out of the motorcade, parked his bike, dismounted, and as seen in the film taken by Malcolm Couch, entered the front door of the building he suspected shots were fired from the roof - the Texas School Book Depository (TSBD).  [14.]

At the front door Baker met Roy Truly, who identified himself as the building superintendent. Baker said he wanted to go to the roof, so Truly led Baker back through the first floor to the rear service elevators that went up to the roof.

Just inside the front door there are steps that lead up to the second floor, and a passenger elevator that went up to the fourth floor, but Baker suspected the shots came from the roof, and that’s where he wanted to go, and Truly knew that only the back stairs and two rear service elevators went to the top floors and roof, so that’s where they headed.

At the back of the first floor, looking up the open elevator shaft, Truly saw that the two service elevators were stopped together on the fifth floor, so Baker followed Truly as they ran up the rickety wooden stairs.

During their Warren Commission testimony, commission counsel David Belin, Commissioner Allen Dulles, Senator John Sherman Cooper and Congressman Hale Boggs all questioned both Truly and Baker about their lunchroom encounter with Oswald.

Mr. Dulles: “You do not think he used any of the elevators at any time to get from the sixth to the second floor?” 

Mr. Truly: “You mean after the shooting? No, sir; he just could not, because those elevators, I saw myself, were both on the fifth floor, they were both even. And I tried to get one of them, and then when we ran up to the second floor - it would have been impossible for him to have come down either one of those elevators after the assassination. He had to use the stairway as his only way of getting down - since we did see the elevators in those positions.”

When Roy Truly got to the top of steps on second floor, he said he made a sharp left turn walked ten feet and started to ascend the steps to the third floor, thinking Baker was right behind him. [15]

Truly: “I suppose I was up two or three steps before I realized the officer wasn’t following me…I came back to the second-floor landing. I heard some voices, or a voice, coming from the area of the lunchroom, or the inside vestibule. I ran over and looked in this door…I opened the door…I saw the officer almost directly in the doorway to the lunchroom facing Lee Harvey Oswald.…He was just inside the lunchroom door, two or three feet possibly. When I reached there, the officer had his gun pointing at Oswald. The officer turned this way and said, ‘This man work here?’ And I said, ‘Yes.’ … Then we left Lee Harvey Oswald immediately and continued to run up the stairways.”

                                        THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION [16]

When Marrion Baker got to the top of steps on the Second Floor landing he started to turn the corner a few feet behind Truly but suddenly stopped, later testifying under oath that as he turned the corner on the second floor, he “scanned the room” and out of the corner of his eye, he saw a man through the glass window of a door.

Marrion Baker: “As I came out to the second floor there, Mr. Truly was ahead of me, and as I come out I was kind of scanning, you know, the room, and I caught a glimpse of this man walking away from this — I happened to see him through this window in this door. I don’t know how come I saw him, but I had a glimpse of him coming down there.” [17]

The Warren Report:  “On the second floor landing there is a small open area with a door at the east end. This door leads into a small vestibule, and another door leads from the vestibule into the second-floor lunchroom. The lunchroom door is usually open, but the first door is kept shut by a closing mechanism on the door. This vestibule door is solid except for a small glass window in the upper part of the door. As Baker reached the second floor, he was about 20 feet from the vestibule door. He intended to continue around to his left toward the stairway going up but through the window in the door he caught a fleeting glimpse of a man walking in the vestibule toward the lunchroom.”

Attracted by the man in the door window, Baker suddenly stopped, took out his .38 revolver from its holster and moved towards the door.

At the moment Baker caught a fleeting glimpse of a man through the Second Floor lunchroom window, the Hertz clock on the roof read 12:31, within ninety seconds after the last shot was fired.

                                      THE LUNCHROOM ENCOUNTER

As Harold Weisberg concluded, “The lunchroom encounter was Oswald's alibi; it proved that he could not have been at the sixth-floor window during the shots.” [18]

That Oswald didn’t do it is the only conclusion that can be reached. What exonerates Oswald is the combination of four basic facts. 1) Roy Truly didn’t see anyone at the top of the Second Floor stairs; 2) Moments later Marrion Baker saw someone through the lunchroom door window; 3) that person was Lee Harvey Oswald; and the clincher 4) that door was closed when Baker saw Oswald though the window. 

Those are the basic facts of the case, as presented by the Warren Report, facts that exonerate Oswald as the assassin.

Since the door had to be closed when Baker first saw Oswald though the window, Oswald couldn’t have entered through that door, or Truly would have seen him, so he didn’t come down the stairs, wasn’t on the Sixth Floor when the shots were fired, and didn’t kill the President.

The lunchroom door had to be closed for Baker to see Oswald through the window because science requires that if the door was open, even if only an inch or two, physics and pure geometry dictate the 2 foot by 2 foot square window decrease in size as the door opens and closes, which makes it impossible for Baker, standing 20 feet away at the top of the stares, to see anything through the window. The door had to be closed for Baker to see Oswald through that window. [19]

Rather than recognize the significance of Baker seeing Oswald through the lunchroom door window, the Warren Commission tried to establish that it was at least possible for Oswald to have gone from the Sixth Floor window to the Second Floor lunchroom within the allotted ninety seconds it took for Truly and Baker to get there.

The Warren Commission, the Commission staff attorneys, the FBI and the Secret Service merely ignored the problem with the closed lunchroom door, as they also tried, as they did with the missed shot that injured James Tague, to just ignore it. Then, like magicians, they deflected attention from the closed door that Truly didn’t see Oswald go through, to the amount of time it took for Baker and Truly to get to that spot. They repeatedly timed how long it would take to go from the Sixth Floor Sniper’s window to the lunchroom, and decided that would constitute proof that it could be done. [20]

As Roffman indicates, “One of the crucial aspects of Baker's story” (that proves Oswald’s innocence) is his position at the time he caught a ‘fleeting glimpse’ of a man in the vestibule (through the door window). Baker marked this position during his testimony as having been immediately adjacent to the stairs at the northwest corner of the building.”

Roffman: “It should be noted that the Report never mentions Baker's position at the time he (first) saw Oswald in the vestibule. Instead, it prints a floor plan of the second floor and notes Baker's position ‘when he observed Oswald in lunchroom.’ This location, as indicated in the Report, was immediately outside the vestibule door. The reader of the Report is left with the impression that Baker saw Oswald in the vestibule as well from this position. However, Baker testified explicitly that he first caught a glimpse of the man in the vestibule from the stairs and, upon running to the vestibule door, saw Oswald in the lunchroom. The Report's failure to point out Baker's position is significant.” 

The Warren Commission marked an X at a point on the map of the Second Floor, [21] that was introduced into evidence, just outside the closed lunchroom door where Baker -through the window - saw a man in the lunchroom walking away from him, so Baker opened door and with gun drawn, halted the man who stopped and turned around, as Baker ordered the man to “Come here.”

With Baker’s revolver aimed at his belly, the man slowly walked back towards Baker and appeared perplexed, but not surprised or out of breath.

In his testimony before the Warren Commission, Allen Dulles and Hale Boggs recognized the significance of this encounter, and questioned Baker about it.

Dulles: “Where was he coming from, do you know?”

Baker: No, sir. All I seen of him was a glimpse of him go away from me. He was walking away from me about 20 feet away from me in the lunchroom… I hollered at him at that time and said, ‘Come here.’ He turned and walked right straight back to me.”

Baker couldn’t say where the man was coming from. He first saw the man from the top of the stairs through the door window and couldn’t say that the man went through that door, and he wasn’t going to.

Commissioner Boggs: “Were you suspicious of this man?”

Baker: “No, sir; I wasn’t.”

Boggs: “When you saw him, was he out of breath, did he appear to have been running, or what?”

Baker: “It didn’t appear that to me. He appeared normal, you know.”

Boggs: “Was he calm and collected?”

Baker: “Yes, sir; He never did say a word or nothing. In fact, he didn’t change his expression one bit.”

Mr. Belin: Did he flinch in anyway when you put the gun up . . .?
Mr. Baker: No, sir.

Sen. Cooper: He did not show any evidence of any emotion?
Mr. Baker: No, sir.

They go “off the record” a number of times while taking the testimony of both Baker and Truly, and you have to wonder what they are talking about, trying to get their stories straight, but the most curious thing is, if Baker saw Oswald as he had just entered through the door, then Truly - a few steps ahead of Baker, should most certainly have seen Oswald going through the door - but he didn’t see anyone.

In reenacting what the Warren Report says happened, if you stop the action with Baker at the top of the stairs seeing Oswald through the closed door window, and back things up - the door opens a foot, two feet, Oswald backs out, his left hand goes on the door handle, Baker descends the steps backwards, Truly comes back to the top of the steps, he is directly facing Oswald walking through the door - how come Truly doesn’t see anyone?

Mr. BELIN. All right. Then what did you do?
Mr. TRULY. I went up on a run up the stairway.
Mr. BELIN. Could you again follow--from Point B, could you show which way you went? All right.
Mr. TRULY. What is this here? (Looking at map of 2nd Floor)
Mr. BELIN. This is to show this is a stairway, and there is a stairway above it, too. But you went up the stairs right here?
Mr. TRULY. That is right.
Mr. BELIN. Okay. And where was this officer at that time?
Mr. TRULY. This officer was right behind me and coming up the stairway.
By the time I reached the second floor, the officer was a little further behind me than he was on the first floor, I assume - I know.
Mr. BELIN. Was he a few feet behind you then?
Mr. TRULY. He was a few feet. It is hard for me to tell. I ran right on around to my left, started to continue on up the stairway to the third floor, and on up.
Mr. BELIN. Now when you say you ran on to your left, did you look straight ahead to see whether there was anyone in that area, or were you intent on just going upstairs?
Mr. TRULY. If there had been anybody in that area, I would have seen him on the outside. But I was content--I was trying to show the officer the pathway up, where the elevators - I mean where the stairways continued….

Rather than dwell on this important point that exonerates Oswald, Belin picks up the action at the lunchroom door.

Mr. Belin: Did you see any expression on his face? Or weren't you paying attention?
Mr. Truly: He didn't seem to be excited or overly afraid or anything. He might have been a little startled, like I might have been if someone confronted me. But I cannot recall any change in expression of any kind on his face.

Counsel Belin: All right. How far was the officer’s gun from Lee Harvey Oswald when he asked the question?”

Truly: …it seemed to me like it was almost touching him.

Baker asked, “Does this man work here?” and Truly said yes, identifying the man as an employee.  Baker lowered his gun and then Truly and Baker continued their assent up the stairs to the roof, and Oswald proceeded to buy himself a coke.

Numerous attempts were made to time how long it took for someone to traverse the distance from the Sixth Floor window to the lunchroom within a minute and a half, as Oswald would have had to do if he was the assassin. Repeated tests successfully demonstrated that the Sixth Floor Sniper could have made it to the Second Floor lunchroom in that amount of time, but logically, that doesn’t prove Oswald did it, it only proves that anyone could have traversed that distance in that amount of time. 

They also repeatedly timed Truly and Baker walking and running from the front curb to the Second Floor lunchroom door, and came up with the same one minute and thirty seconds, give or take ten seconds one way or another. So the Second Floor lunchroom incident occurred approximately ninety seconds after the last shot was fired.

As Michael Roffman, after a thorough analysis, concluded, “Had Oswald been the assassin, he would have arrived in the lunchroom at least five to eleven seconds after Baker reached the second floor, even if Baker took the longest time obtainable for his ascent - a minute, 30 seconds. Had Baker ascended in 70 seconds - as he easily could have - he would have arrived at least 25 seconds before Oswald (or someone descending from the Sixth Floor). Either case removes the possibility that Oswald descended from the sixth floor, for….he unquestionably arrived in the lunchroom before Baker.”

In his book (“Presumed Guilty”) Roffman writes: “The circumstances surrounding the lunchroom encounter indicate that Oswald entered the lunchroom not by the vestibule door from without, as he would have had he descended from the sixth floor, but through a hallway leading into the vestibule. The outer vestibule door is closed automatically by a closing mechanism on the door When Truly arrived on the second floor, he did not see Oswald entering the vestibule. For the Commission's case to be valid, Oswald must have entered the vestibule through the first door before Truly arrived. Baker reached the second floor immediately after Truly and caught a fleeting glimpse of Oswald in the vestibule through a small window in the outer door. Although Baker said the vestibule door "might have been, you know, closing and almost shut at that time," it is dubious that he could have distinguished whether the door was fully or ‘almost’ closed.” 

In fact, the door had to be completely closed for Baker to see anything through the door window.

Roffman: “Baker's and Truly's observations are not at all consistent with Oswald's having entered the vestibule through the first door. Had Oswald done this, he could have been inside the lunchroom well before the automatic mechanism closed the vestibule door. Truly's testimony that he saw no one entering the vestibule indicates either that Oswald was already in the vestibule at this time or was approaching it from another source. However, had Oswald already entered the vestibule when Truly arrived on the second floor, it is doubtful that he would have remained there long enough for Baker to see him seconds later. Likewise, the fact that neither man saw the mechanically closed door in motion is cogent evidence that Oswald did not enter the vestibule through that door.” 

It was only for that one fleeting moment - as Baker reached the top of the stairs and began to turn to the left and make his scan of the room when he was attracted by the moving blur in the window - the sideways profile of Oswald’s head as he passed behind that window from right to left. 

“Had Oswald descended from the sixth floor,” writes Roffman, “his path through the vestibule into the lunchroom would have been confined to the north wall of the vestibule. Yet the line of sight from Baker's position at the steps does not include any area near the north wall. From the steps, Baker could have seen only one area in the vestibule - the southeast portion. The only way Oswald could have been in this area on his way to the lunchroom is if he entered the vestibule through the southernmost door, as the previously cited testimony indicates he did. Oswald could not have entered the vestibule in this manner had he just descended from the sixth floor. The only way he could have gotten to the southern door is from the first floor up through either a large office space or an adjacent corridor. As the Report concedes, Oswald told police he had eaten his lunch on the first floor and gone up to the second to purchase a coke when he encountered an officer…”

The significance of Baker’s view of Oswald through the window of the closed lunchroom door became apparent to the Secret Service during the course of their reconstruction of the assassination, as they stopped their reenactment right there at the lunchroom door. [22]

It also came to the attention of Warren Commission investigators who realized that if Baker did indeed see Oswald through the window of the lunchroom door, then he wasn’t the assassin. Proof the Warren Commission recognized this exculpatory evidence is based on the fact they actually recalled Truly to testify a second time, just to put it on the record.

When the Warren Commission attorneys realized the significance of these facts, they recalled Roy Truly a second time, after he had already testified extensively, just to ask him one question, the clincher. At an office in the Post Office Annex just across Dealey Plaza from the TSBD, they placed Truly under oath and created a legal affidavit in order to answer one peculiar question: did the door to the second floor lunchroom have an automatic closing device?

And the answer is yes, it does.

The following affidavit was executed by Roy Sansom Truly on August 3, 1964.

PRESIDENT'S COMMISSION
ON THE ASSASSINATION OF
PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY

AFFIDAVIT

STATE OF TEXAS,
County of Dallas, ss:

I, Roy Sansom Truly, being duly sworn say:
1. I am the Superintendent of the Texas School Book Depository Building Dallas, Texas.
2. The door opening on the vestibule of the lunchroom on the second floor of the Texas School Book Depository Building is usually shut because of a closing mechanism on the door.

Signed this 3d day of August 1964, at Dallas Tex.
(S) Roy Sansom Truly,
ROY SANSOM TRULY [23]

Now those Warren Commission lawyers could have easily walked across Dealey Plaza and in a matter of minutes learned that basic truth themselves, but they recalled Truly to put the question and answer on the record – did the 2nd Floor lunchroom door have an automatic closing device? It is a simple fact that exonerates Oswald from being Kennedy’s killer because, as the affidavit says, the door is usually closed shut because of that mechanism, and in fact, basic physics dictate that the door had to have been closed when Baker saw Oswald through the window of the door.

Of course the Warren Commission lawyers did not explain the ramifications of these facts, they simply dismissed Truly from answering any further questions, and the Secret Service, just stopped their reconstruction of the assassination right there at that door, without bothering to continue to follow Oswald, who was not the assassin.

But they never bothered to explain what it meant, the true significance or the resulting and inescapable conclusions that stem from the fact that since the door was closed, -Oswald didn’t enter the lunchroom through that door when Baker saw him, didn’t descend the stairs, wasn’t on the Sixth Floor when the shots were fired and didn’t kill the President.

In addition, there is other evidence that supports the fact that Oswald didn’t go through that door or come down the steps, and reaffirms his alibi including 1) Truly didn’t see Oswald as he would have if Oswald had gone through the door; 2) Jack Dougherty, a worker on the Fifth Floor landing, who took one of the elevators down, didn’t see anyone run past him, as he should have if the Sixth Floor Sniper had immediately ran down the steps; [24] 3) two secretaries from the Fourth Floor offices didn’t see anyone on the stairs as they descended to the first floor immediately after the assassination, and [25] 4) the three black guys, who witnessed the assassination from the Fifth Floor corner window directly beneath the Sixth Floor Sniper, didn’t see anyone run past them when they were near the steps, where they were when Baker and Truly arrived and took the other elevator to the Seventh Floor and inspected the roof;  [26] 5) minutes after the last shot a court clerk from across the street saw a man in the Sniper’s Window, ostensibly moving boxes around, when Oswald was on the second floor. [27]

Under interrogation Oswald said that at the time of the assassination he was on the first floor in the Domino Room eating lunch, when two of the black guys he worked with walked through. Although they claimed not to have noticed Oswald, the two men acknowledged that before going up to the Fifth Floor they did walk through the Domino Room, so how did Oswald know they were there if he didn’t see him? Further corroboration that Oswald was in the Domino Room came a few weeks after the assassination when his jacket was discovered in the window sill, right where he said he ate lunch. [28]

Oswald said that when he left the Domino Room he went up the front steps to the Second Floor Lunchroom to get a coke, when he was confronted by the policeman and Roy Truly. After buying the coke in the lunchroom, Oswald walked out the door he entered, not the one Baker saw him through, but the one that went into the outer office where he encountered a secretary, who wasn’t there when he had walked through a few moments earlier. She said Oswald walked past her desk with a coke in his hand, and when she said something about the President being shot, she didn’t hear what he mumbled in response. [29]

Oswald ostensibly went down the front steps to the first floor, calmly directed a reporter to a pay phone, heard Bill Shelly say that there wouldn’t be any more work that day, then walked out the front door and onto the streets of Dallas. [30]

At the same time, Roy Truly and Marrion Baker arrived on the roof of the TSBD and found no one there except pigeons.

Time on the Hertz Clock on the roof: 12:33

[For comments and corrections billkelly3@gmail.com (609) 425-6297]

 NOTES:

1. Polls have consistently shown 80% of the people don’t believe the Warren Report conclusion that Oswald alone killed the President and only 20% agree with it. The Pew poll on American public confidence in the government reached a peak in 1963 and has been decreasing steadily since 1964, when the Warren Report was issued.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/9751/americans-kennedy-assassination-conspiracy.aspx

http://abcnews.go.com/images/pdf/937a1JFKAssassination.pdf

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,102511,00.html

http://www.gallup.com/video/20083/JFK-Case-Reprised.aspx

GALLUP NEWS SERVICE PRINCETON, NJ - Americans are skeptical of the official conclusion that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone when he assassinated President John F. Kennedy 40 years ago, but there is no consensus about which conspiracy theory to believe. Three-quarters of Americans recently told Gallup that they think more than one man was involved in Kennedy's assassination. Only 19% of Americans think it was the work of one individual…

2. Innocent until proven guilty. See: The Constitution of the United States.

3. Evidence implicating Oswald - and list of books - Warren Report, William Manchester’s Death of a President, Priscilla Johnson McMillan’s Lee & Marina, Gerald Posner’s Case Closed, Dale Myers’s With Malice, Vincent Bugliosi’s Reclaiming History

4. Both of those men on the street who saw the man with the rife in the Sixth Floor window - Brennan and Eunis said they could identify the gunman if they saw him again, but while they were standing in front of the TSBD with Secret Service SAIC Forrest Sorrells, Oswald ostensibly walked out the front door and neither recognized Oswald as the gunman.

5. Amos Eunis - Mr. EUINS. “I seen a bald spot on this man's head, trying to look out the window. He had a bald spot on his head. I was looking at the bald spot.  I could see his hand, you know the rifle laying across in his hand. And I could see his hand sticking out on the trigger part. And after he got through, he just pulled it back in the window.”

6. FBI Report on Mrs. R. E. Arnold. Howard Roffman notes: “The Warren Commission stated in its Report that it knew of no Book Depository employee who claimed to have seen Oswald between 11:55 and 12:30 on the day of the assassination. This was false, as this FBI report from the Commission's files reveals. The Warren Report never mentions Mrs. Arnold and this FBI document was omitted from the Commission's published evidence.” FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION  Date 11/26/63  Mrs. R. E. ARNOLD, Secretary, Texas School Book Depository, advised she was in her office on the second floor of the building on November 22, 1963, and left that office between 12:00 and 12:15 PM, to go downstairs and stand in front of the building to view the Presidential Motorcade. As she was standing in front of the building, she stated she thought she caught a fleeting glimpse of LEE HARVEY OSWALD standing in the hallway between the front door and the double doors leading to the warehouse, located on the first floor. She could not be sure that this was OSWALD, but said she felt it was and believed the time to be a few minutes before 12:15 PM.
      She stated thereafter she viewed the Presidential Motorcade and heard the shots that were fired at the President; however, she could furnish no information of value as to the individual firing the shots or any other information concerning OSWALD, whom she stated she did not know and had merely seen him working in the building.

On 11/26/63 at Dallas, Texas File # DL 89-43 by Special Agent RICHARD E. HARRISON/rmh Date dictated 11/26/63

7. At 12:15 p.m Arnold Rowland while standing with his wife diagonally across the street from the TSBD, and timed to the chatter of a police radio that announced the motorcade was “at Cedar Springs Road off Turtle Creek,” saw a man on Sixth floor windows standing at “Port Arms” with a rifle. Rowland pointed him out to his wife, but not to the policeman standing a few feet away.

8. Court Clerk 12:34. This witness said that after viewing the motorcade from one floor in the court house, she went to another floor and looked out the window to see the pant legs of a man in the Sixth Floor window, apparently moving boxes around the Sniper’s Nest four to five minutes after the assassination. (Will post link to affidavit ASAP)

9. Tanenbaum - Cyril Wecht Conference, Pittsburgh, Pa. November, 2003.

http://jfkcountercoup.blogspot.com/2013/07/robert-k-tanenbaum-wecht-conference.html

http://jfkcountercoup.blogspot.com/2013/07/oswald-from-out-of-cosmos.html

10. JFK Act 1992, www.nara.gov . The Final Report notes that the ARRB was not to investigate the assassination once again, but to identify and release government records to the public so citizens could make up their own minds. 102nd Cong. Sponsored by Rep. Louis Stokes (Oh. 21), became Public Law No:102-526 on October 26, 1992

For more recent pronouncements see: http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2012/12/04/ventura-supporting-author-who-says-oswald-didnt-shoot-jfk/.

11. Cornwell, Gary. “Real Answers” ( Paleface Press, Tx. p. 45 )

12. Roffman, Howard. “Presumed Guilty” - Dave Ratcliff Rathouse 

http://ratville.jfk ; http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/; http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/PG/PG.html.

13. Parker, Greg. ReopenJFKcase.blog - “The Lunchroom Encounter that Never Was”

http://jfkthelonegunmanmyth.blogspot.com/2013/01/the-lunchroom-encounter-that-never-was.html?spref=fb. In his first statement, written when he was sitting in Captain Fritz’s office a few feet from Oswald, Baker reported that he encountered an man in a brown shirt on the fourth floor, which is either a mistake for the second floor lunchroom encounter with Oswald, or possibly the real assassin or the man in the brown sportscoat. 11/22/63 Affidavit of Marion L. Baker

http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/baker_m3.htm

AFFIDAVIT IN ANY FACT THE STATE OF TEXAS COUNTY OF DALLAS

BEFORE ME, Mary Rattan, a Notary Public in and for said County, State of Texas, on this day personally appeared M. L. Baker, Patrolman Dallas Police Department who, after being by me duly sworn, on oath deposes and says: Friday November 22, 1963 I was riding motorcycle escort for the President of the United States. At approximately 12:30 pm I was on Houston Street and the President's car had made a left turn from Houston onto Elm Street. Just as I approached Elm Street and Houston I heard three shots. I realized those shots were rifle shots and I began to try to figure out where they came from. I decided the shots had come from the building on the northwest corner of Elm and Houston. This building is used by the Board of Education for book storage. I jumped off my motor and ran inside the building. As I entered the door I saw several people standing around. I asked these people where the stairs were. A man stepped forward and stated he was the building manager and that he would show me where the stairs were. I followed the man to the rear of the building and he said, "Let's take the elevator." The elevator was hung several floors up so we used the stairs instead. As we reached the third or fourth floor I saw a man walking away from the stairway. I called to the man and he turned around and came back toward me. The manager said, "I know that man, he works here." I then turned the man loose and went up to the top floor. The man I saw was a white man approximately 30 years old, 5'9", 165 pounds, dark hair and wearing a light brown jacket.

s/ M. L. Bakerm SUBSCRIBED AND SWORN BEFORE ME THIS 22 DAY OF November A.D. 1963 /s/ Mary Rattan  Notary Public, Dallas County, Texas

14. Baker enters TSBD. Gary Mack, using the Malcom Couch  [Couch Film: http://www.youbute.com/watch?v=bIdb0352160] and Zapruder films as a guide, estimates that Baker didn’t enter the TSBD until 45 seconds after the last shot. For more on Mack’s analysis see note 31) Response.

In a second affidavit, Baker estimated it took fifteen seconds. 8/11/64 Affidavit of Marrion L. Baker http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/baker_m2.htm Affidavit Of Marrion L. Baker The following affidavit by Marrion L. Baker on August 11, 1964.

PRESIDENT'S COMMISSION ON THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY AFFIDAVIT  STATE OF TEXAS,  County of Dallas, ss:

I, Marrion L Baker, being duly sworn say:
1. I am an officer in the Dallas Police Department.
2. On November 22, 1963, upon hearing shots I rode my motorcycle 180 to 200 feet, parked the motorcycle, and ran 45 feet to the Texas School Book Depository Building.
3. On March 20, 1964, counsel from the President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy timed a re-enactment of my actions after hearing the shots on November 22, 1963. During this re-enactment, I reached the recessed door of the Texas School Book Depository Building fifteen seconds after the time of the simulated shot. Signed this 11th day of August 1964, at Dallas, Tex.

(S) Marrion L. Baker, MARRION L. BAKER.

15. Truly, Roy. Warren Commission testimony of Roy Sansom Truly (May 14, 1964) 3H 224. Truly said he didn’t know Baker saw Oswald “through the window” until days later.

http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/truly3.htm

http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/truly1.htm

http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/truly2.htm

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh7/pdf/WH7_Truly.pdf

16. Oswald had checked out the New Orleans library book “Doors of Perception” by Aldous Huxley, about psychedelic drugs, which also inspired the name of Jim Morrision’s band.

17. Baker, Marrion. WC Testimony of Marrion L. Baker http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/baker_m1.htm

3H225-252-263 WC Exhibit 497, Point B-3H225, 3H252, 7H591, 3H255, R182, 3H256, CE497, R14 9-51. R150, CE1118, 3H256.

Also see: The Warren Report - p. 151.

18. Weisberg, Harold. As quoted by Howard Roffman.“Presumed Guilty.”

http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/; “Whitewash.”

19. Door closed. Science, physics and geometry dictate that the door had to be closed for Baker to see anything through the window. Truly’s affidavit also proves that the door “is usually closed,” because of an automatic mechanism.

20. Timing distances. For details see: Note 31) below.

21. 2nd Floor map. Second Floor Diagram Floor Plans  CE 1061

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh22/pdf/WH22_CE_1061.pdf
CE 1118  http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wcvols/wh22/pdf/WH22_CE_1118.pdf

22. Secret Service reenactments. See: SS Reenactments videos on Youtube.

(Will post links to these films ASAP).

23. Roy Truly Affidavit of August 3, 1964. The Exculpatory Document. Truly Affidavit - http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/04/0487-001.gif

The following affidavit was executed by Roy Sansom Truly on August 3, 1964.

PRESIDENT'S COMMISSIONON THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY AFFIDAVIT STATE OF TEXAS, County of Dallas, ss:

I, Roy Sansom Truly, being duly sworn say:
1. I am the Superintendent of the Texas School Book Depository Building Dallas, Texas.
2. The door opening on the vestibule of the lunchroom on the second floor of the Texas School Book Depository Building is usually shut because of a closing mechanism on the door. Signed this 3d day of August 1964, at Dallas Tex.

(S) Roy Sansom Truly, ROY SANSOM TRULY.

24. Jack Doughterty said he was on the fifth floor landing when heard a shot, and then descended to the first floor in one of the elevators. The other was used by Truly and Baker to go to the seventh floor and roof. (Will post Dougherty testimony link ASAP)

25. Victoria “Vicki” Elizabeth Adams and Sandra Styles, left their fourth floor office within a minute of the last shot and descended the back steps without seeing anyone until they arrived on the first floor where they encountered William Shelley and Billy Lovelady. See book: “The Girl on the Stairs” by Barrny Ernest.

http://bit.ly/girl-on-the-stairs-by-barry-ernest

26. The Fifth Floor Witnesses. The three black guys who were in the window below and adjacent to the Sixth Floor assassin, saw and heard Truly and Baker take the elevator but remained hidden behind a book bin so Truly and Baker didn’t see them.

27. The Sixth Floor Sniper’s Nest was constructed by the floor laying crew, and the boxes on the window were re-arranged after the last shot by either the Sixth Floor Sniper or his spotter, as can be seen in the photos of the window taken from the street moments apart by Dillard and Powell. A court clerk from across the street saw a man in the Sniper’s Window four to five minutes after the last shot, apparently re-arranging boxes.

28. Oswald in Domino Room. Oswald was seen reading a newspaper in the first floor Domino Room, and was elsewhere on the first floor at 11:55, noon and 12:15.

29. Mrs. Robert Reid, Warren Commission testimony of 3H 278—279) http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/04/0496-001.gif  Mrs. Robert Reid  TSBD secretary - met Oswald on 2nd floor w/ Coke.  November 22, 1963—12:32 p.m., CST—time approximated from context. Texas School Book Depository, Dallas, Texas. Mrs. Robert Reid, Clerical Supervisor at the Book Depository commented to her employers that she believed the shots came from “our building.”  

Mrs. Reid: “The thought that went through my mind, my goodness I

must get out of this line of shots, they may fire more. I ran into the building.

I do not recall seeing anyone in the lobby. I ran up to our office…up the

stairs…the front stairs…I went into the office. I kept walking and I looked

up and Oswald was coming in the back door of the office. I met him by the

time I passed my desk several feet… I had no thoughts of anything of him

having any connection with it at all because he was very calm. He had

gotten a coke and was holding it in his hands and I guess the reason it

impressed me seeing him in there I thought it was a little strange that one of

the warehouse boys would be up in the office at that time, not that he had

done anything wrong.”

Counsel Belin: “Was there anything else you noticed about him?

Anything about the expression on his face?”

Reid: “No; just calm.”

Commissioner Dulles: “Was he moving fast?”

Reid: “No; because he was moving at a very slow pace. I never did

see him moving fast at any time.”

30. Front Door.

31. Timing is everything. Responses to the first posting of this article included the following from Gary Mack.

GM: “Let's dispense with Roffman's Baker-Oswald theory right away.  The Mal Couch/WFAA film begins AFTER his car came to a stop in the intersection and it shows Charles Hester rising from the grass on the north side of Elm.  That action can be matched with other films, including Zapruder, to yield a highly accurate time line.  The result?  Baker, who can be seen at the same moment in the Couch film running across the Elm Street extension, didn't reach the front door until 40-45 seconds after the last shot.  And that data means even more time elapsed than previously thought, thus allowing Oswald extra seconds to reach the lunchroom ahead of Baker.  And that also means the two women employees went down the stairs AHEAD of Oswald and thus could not, and should not, have seen him.”

- Gary Mack

Gary Mack Wrote:

Let me add some more information:

Once Jack White and I looked at a frame blowup from a very clear print of the Wiegman (note spelling) film, we saws the limo still on Elm; from there it was easy to locate the car on the street and, therefore, connect it to the Z film at about frame 450, or 7.5 seconds after the head shot.

From a video tape of the original Wiegman film as broadcast on NBC that day, the timing was relatively easy and it showed that Dave Wiegman started filming from near the Elm/Houston intersection two to three seconds before the head shot.  Unlike the Wiegman film in Groden’s videos – which is slightly edited – the uncut original film and an intact first generation print at the Dallas NBC affiliate (where I worked in the 80s and 90s) provide an extension of the Zapruder clock.  The Wiegman film shows when Charles Hester stood up, left his wife on the ground, and ran into the pergola.

The Malcom (that’s how he spelled it) Couch film shows Hester in the pergola as his wife stands up on the grass, thus tacking on another extension to the clock.  Her movements happened a couple seconds after Baker crossed the Elm extension headed to the TSBD doorway.

I don’t have the exact numbers memorized, but the 40-45 second time frame I wrote earlier is quite accurate.  What we don’t know is how much time Baker spent in the lobby looking around wondering what to do until Truly found him, nor do we know what other minor delays they may have encountered yet never mentioned on the way to the stairwell.

So what does all this mean?  As folks may know, the TSBD stairwell was removed in the late 70s when Dallas County rehabbed the building for office space.  They left the sixth and seventh floors alone, however, and the stairwell is still there leading both halfway down and up from the sixth floor.

I can only speculate, but the timing tells me the two women were far ahead of Oswald and of no further significance.  But I can see how Oswald, going down the stairs to the front door, heard two men coming up so he quickly darted into the lunchroom to establish an alibi.

Truly didn’t see him or the swinging door because he was watching the floor with his eyes focused to the left to make the turn out of the stairwell, across the landing, and up the next stairwell.  Baker, following close behind, was specifically looking for someone or something out of the ordinary and happened to spot the back of Oswald’s head in the vestibule and, for reasons known only to Baker, decided to question the guy.

It could also be that Oswald, hearing people approaching, may have entered the vestibule and ducked down out of sight, then stood up and entered the lunchroom door – thus revealing his presence to Baker.

It’s especially interesting that Howard Roffman, back in the mid-70s working on Presumed Guilty but without having access to the rest of the footage, figured out the Couch film could answer much of the timing question.  It does.

- Gary Mack

Marrion Baker affidavit - http://jfk.ci.dallas.tx.us/04/0426-001.gif

1964 INTERVIEW WITH DALLAS POLICE OFFICER MARRION BAKER

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQYPbbcXIuc

Marrion L. Baker is interviewed by the CBS Television Network in 1964.
http://JFK-Archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/oswald-baker-truly-and-coca-cola.html

Baker: Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BL9u-ED6ftY

Texas School Book Depository Employees - part 1 HelmerReenberg

1964 INTERVIEW WITH DALLAS POLICE OFFICER MARRION BAKER

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQYPbbcXIuc

[BK: In this Helmer Reenberg prosecution, a photo of the front stairs is shown as the stairs Truly and Baker ascended to the second floor, when in fact they went up the much smaller rear stairs next to the duel service elevators. The broad steps in the photo only go one floor – to the second and the adjacent passenger elevator only went to the fourth floor.]