Thursday, February 2, 2023

JFK Assassination Records in Private Hands

NARA Seeks Check for Classified Docs in Private Hands 

As reported by CBS News: 

National Archives asks representatives of past six administrations to check for classified documents - CBS News

"The National Archives and Records Administration is asking representatives of the six most recent past presidential administrations to comb through their personal records again to check for any classified or other presidential records, according to the text of a letter obtained by CBS News."  

"The request comes after documents with classification markings were found at the private residences of former Vice President Mike Pence, former President Donald Trump and President Joe BidenCNN was first to report the requests from NARA to past presidents and vice presidents." 

"The Presidential Records Act, passed during former President Jimmy Carter's administration but not effective until the Reagan administration, outlines requirements for the preservation and turning over of all presidential records upon leaving office. The National Archives is responsible for the storage and safekeeping of those records. Letters were sent to representatives of the Trump, Obama, W. Bush, Clinton, H.W. Bush and Reagan administrations." 

"Over the last year there have been several instances reported in the media where records containing classified information and subject to the Presidential Records Act (PRA) have been identified outside of the physical custody of the National Archives and Records Administration," the letters say. "... The responsibility to comply with the PRA does not diminish after the end of an administration. Therefore, we request that you conduct an assessment of any materials held outside of NARA that relate to the Administration for which you serve as a designated representative under the PRA, to determine whether bodies of materials previously assumed to be personal in nature might inadvertently contain Presidential or Vice Presidential records subject to the PRA, whether classified or unclassified."

Now this is turning into a big deal and the new Republican Chairman of the House Oversight Committee - James Comer (R. Ky), is making it a political issue. 

But there's no reason why they should focus on the enforcement of the Presidential Records Act (PRA) while ignoring the JFK Act of 1992, that is not being enforced or given any oversight. 

I have a number of good examples of how significant government records related to the JFK assassination are still in private hands when they should be in the JFK Collection at the National Archives and open to the public - 1) The SS Tampa Advance Report; - 2) Mrs. Lincoln's Oval Office records, and - 3) the HSCA files of the first chief counsel G. Robert Blakey. 

When former SS agent Abraham Bolden correctly noted that the Secret Service intentionally destroyed JFK assassination records AFTER the Congressional passage of the JFK Act, including the Tampa Advance report, another former agent, Gerald Blaine, wrote in his book on the Kennedy Detail, that he personally wrote the Tampa Advance report and kept a copy in a box under his bed all these years, over his wife's objections. 

When I called the attention of the NARA to this passage in his book, they contacted him, obtained numerous documents from him, including the Tampa Advance report, and sent me copies of some of it in appreciation. 

In reading the Tampa Advance report I didn't notice why it was so sensitive the official copy had to be destroyed, other than the fact that the local police were investigating a threat on the life of the president and that the Tampa Sheriff's office stationed deputies with shotguns on every overpass along the motorcade route as well as sharpshooter with rifles on major building. 

What I don't understand is if Blaine had these documents in his possession, why weren't all of the still living SS agents questioned as to whether or not they had any similar documents in their possession. 

From what I understand, until the law was changed under the Carter administration, it was a common practice for government employees to take records home with them, especially when they left office and cleaned out their desks. So why not ask all the SS agents if they have any records?

JFKCountercoup2: James Mastrovito - Destroyed USSS Records and JFK Evidence

 Post - Vince Palamara's Posts 1 - Quora- SS Records Destroyed 

JFKcountercoup: Secret Service Records Previously Thought Destroyed Turned Over to NARA

Papers of Gerald S. Blaine | National Archives

JFKcountercoup: The Tampa Plot in Retrospect

JFKcountercoup: Gerald Blaine’s handwritten notes

- MRS. LINCOLN'S OVAL OFFICE RECORDS 

When JFK was killed, the SS agent who installed it unplugged the tape machines that recorded all of the Oval Office conversations and phone calls made by the president. 

Mrs. Lincoln was then put in charge of cleaning out the Oval Office and with RFK's permission, took pretty much everything home with her, including the tapes, the rocking chair, JFK's watch, etc. 

Then when RFK was killed, she kept most of the items, and when she was not invited to Caroline's wedding, she made out a last will giving all of what was left to a celebrity autograph hound, Robert White, a will that held up in court. White put together a sort of mini-museum that opened at the Trump Towers in New York City, and then moved to the Trump Plaza in Atlantic City where I was asked to write an article promoting it. When I figured out what was going on I declined, but kept up on the story. 

White wasn't very wealthy, and when he needed money he sold off some of the items to his construction company friend, including the Oval Office recordings and the watch. 

White died early on at the age of 54, and the rest of the material was set for auction in New York City when some of the Kennedy family complained and took back some personal items, while the NARA confiscated classified documents that were to be sold at auction. 

Mrs. Lincoln also had two cargo trunks of documents sent to her personal lawyer and friend in Nebraska. The lawyer turned the trunks over to the local Sheriff, who placed them in a secure location - the evidence locker, but when he retired, he took them with him. When I located him and talked with him on the phone, he would not tell me what became of the contents of the two trunks and said he wouldn't respond to anyone or anything other than a court or congressional subpoena. 

JFKCountercoup2: Mrs. Lincoln's Trunks

JFKCountercoup2: Mrs. Lincoln's Trunks - The NARA Never Got Them

Robert L. White, 54, collector of JFK items – Baltimore Sun

JFKcountercoup: The Inheritance - What Became of Mrs. Lincoln's JFK Memorabilia - Updated

JFKcountercoup: The Inheritance - Reconsidered

JFKCountercoup2: Christopher Fulton's Controversial Sale of Second Watch

Bouck, Robert I.: Oral History Interview - JFK #1, 6/25/1976 | JFK Library

JFKCountercoup2: The Oval Office Tapes

JFKCountercoup2: Oval Office Tapes - Where are they today?

RICHARD SPRAGUE, ESQ. 

When I learned that Philadelphia attorney Richard Sprague was named chief counsel of the HSCA, I read in the papers that he had his staff read a book - Legacy of Doubt - by CBS TV editor Peter Noyes (Who is still alive).The book concerns one Jim Brading - aka Braden, who was taken into custody as a suspicious person at Dealey Plaza in the moments  after the assassination. Noyes learned that Brading had legally changed his name to Braden a few weeks before the assassination, and was a swindler, con-man and possibly money man for the Meyer Lansky syndicate. 

Noyes mentioned that Brading was arrested for gambling in Camden, NJ in 1948 but the Camden police would not respond to his requests for a copy of the arrest report. Since my father was a Lieutenant in the Camden police department at the time, I showed him the passage in Noyes' book and the next day he came home from work and handed me Brading's original arrest report and mug shot, that I made copies of and shared with Noyes, Bill Turner, other researchers and I took a copy to Sprague's Philadelphia law office and left it for him. 

I didn't think much of it until after Sprague was fired and replaced by G. Robert Blakey, the founder of the Cornell Institute on Organized Crime and author of the RICO statute to prosecute organized crime conspiracies. After the HSCA folded, I received a phone call from Blakey who said he heard I had obtained Brading's Camden arrest report and asked for a copy. I told him I gave a copy to Sprague and it should be among the HSCA records, but Blakey said that Sprague took all of his files with him, and I said I was glad he did since Blakey locked away the HSCA records for 50 years and as Congressional records, they were not subject to the FOIA. 

Blakey then proceeded to write a book blaming the assassination on organized crime. 

Jim Braden was interviewed for two days behind closed door but those transcripts were sealed until the JFK Act was passed. 

When I contacted the NARA JFK Collection and asked them for any records they in Sprague's files, they referred me to their on line data base for Richard Sprague, but I informed them that was a photo and film consultant to the HSCA, not Richard Sprague, Esq., the first chief counsel. 

While they had thousands of documents in G. Robert Blakey's file, they had nothing at all for Richard  Sprague, Esq.

I informed them when Sprague was still alive that he had his HSCA files in his Philadelphia law office, and they wrote him a letter that he didn't respond to. 

Sprague's son Thomas Sprague is now in charge of that office, but no one seems interested in getting him to search for and turn over the government records that belong in the JFK Collection at the NARA. 

Donated Papers of Richard E. Sprague | National Archives

JFKcountercoup: Double Identities in Historical Research and the HSCA Records of Richard A. Sprague, Esq.

Richard A. Sprague

Attorney Richard A. Sprague — the ‘fearless, fearsome, and feared’ giant of the Philadelphia legal world — has died at 95

Sprague Law, LLC – Philadelphia and NJ Law Office

They are only three examples, there are many more, but my point is made. 

Billkelly3@gmail.com 



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