Destroyed, Missing, Withdrawn and Withheld Records

Destroyed, Missing, Withdrawn and Withheld Records 

Both the judge in the MFF v. Biden and NARA case and Congress need to know exactly what records have been destroyed, are missing, were available but have been withdrawn and are being wrongfully withheld. 

The judge has even instructed the NARA to inform the Department of Justice of any records that have been destroyed, and Bill Simpich and Larry Schnapf, the attorneys for the MFF Plantiffs are compiling lists that they can present to the judge in a scheduled meeting next week.

That is not a problem since there are many examples of each of the categories we are compiling lists for, beginning with the JFK assassination records destroyed. 

For starters the Department of Defense (DOD) informed the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) in the late 1970s that it "routinely" destroyed their files on the accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald. 

The most blatant destruction of assassination records was conducted by the Secret Service (SS) AFTER Congress passed the JFK Act of 1992 that specifically forbade the destruction of such records. 

Among those records the SS claimed to have destroyed was the Tampa Advance Report, but the author of that report, as i mentioned in my affidavit to the court in the  MFF v. Biden and NARA case, SS Agent Gerald Blane, in the book The Kennedy Detail, bragged that he had kept copies of his reports in a box under his bed. When I notified the NARA about this, they obtained Blaine's reports and they are now available as part of the JFK Collection open to the public. 

In the course of reading the reports of the Assassinations Records Review Board (ARRB), I came across an interview with former SS Agent James Mastrovito, who acknowledged being responsible for the 5-6 filing cabinets of SS records on the assassination, and being instructed by Chief Rowley to remove "irrelevant material," in 1965. Then later being instructed by his superior Walter Young to "cull" them, which he took to mean destroy them, and did so around 1970. Mastrovito also informed the ARRB interviewer that the SS had a lab vile of material that was labeled "JFK Brain matter" and Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, that he said he disposed of in a "food processor." 

Mastrovito passed away in 2006, and his obituary says he also worked for the FBI before the SS and CIA afterwards. But the HSCA knew in 1978, when G. Robert Blakey sought SS records Mastrovito had destroyed, the ARRB knew from 1993 and NARA knew from then on that these records were intentionally and illegally destroyed but did nothing about it. 

MISSING AND PRESUMED DESTROYED 

There are so many missing assassination records the list would be untenable so I will only mention the highlights, or lowlights. 

For starters, the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) informed the ARRB that there were no assassination records among the files of the former Director of ONI Ruffus Taylor, the first director of ONI who actually had a background in intelligence. This is impossible because we already have one document from the ONI director Taylor shared and saved from another agency. 

But since almost all documents, except the most highly classified, are distributed to more than one person, there are multiple copies among the various desks, bureaus and agencies, as was the case with Rufus Taylor, whose office distributed at least one document to another agency that released it, and it is a Whopper. The one document from ONI Director Taylor indicates that he had two former Navy men acting undercover in Jack Ruby's Carousel Club, selling and maintaining the sound equipment, microphones and speakers. And they reported to ONI Director Taylor that they believed they saw the accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald in the club with Jack Ruby, who is later accused of killing Oswald while in police custody. "Oswald" and Ruby visited the electronics office they operated out of to have a microphone fixed. Both electronic technicians employed by Ruby (Langford and Patterson) were former Navy men who reported to ONI and Ruffus Taylor mentions them in his report. 

ONI Agent for San Diego Robert Steel investigated Oswald twice, once when he defected and then after the assassination, filing reports each time, but those reports are not among the records turned over to the NARA by ONI. 

ONI assigned Lt. Commander Terri Price to collect any ONI records on the assassination to comply with the JFK Act of 1992. Among the records Price labeled as "JFK Act Records" was a box of documents with the title of ONI Defector File, and while those records were sent to the NARA they were intentionally kept out of the JFK Collection, not given a RIF# and are considered Not Believed Relevant - NBR because they ostensibly don't mention Oswald. 

JFKcountercoup: ONI Records Revisited

AIR FORCE ONE RADIO TRANSMISSION TAPES AND TRANSCIRPT 

Probably the most intriguing of missing assassination records is the original unedited Air Force One Radio Transmission Tapes and Transcript, that we positively know exist or once existed because we have copies that contain visible edits, and three reputable journalists read and quote from the unedited transcript of the tapes. 

Vince Salandria was the first to call attention to the significance of these tapes and transcripts, and I believe that, like the Gen. Clifton version of the AF1 Radio Tapes, the original tapes exist somewhere, possibly on a dusty shelf in a closet or archive vault. 

The three journalists who were permitted to read the transcript of the unedited tapes were William Manchester, hired by Jackie Kennedy to write The Death of a President, and The Making of President 1964 author Theadore White, both of whom were given permission by President Johnson to read the transcript but not make a copy. They both quote portions of the transcript that are not on the existing recordings. 

Former JFK Press Secretary Pierre Salinger obtained a copy of the transcript from the JFK Library in Boston, quotes from it in his book, and informed Vince Salandria that he returned his copy to the JFK Library, that now can no longer locate it. 

NPIC - National Photo Interpretation Center records. 

When the ARRB staff tracked down a  retired NPIC secretary, she told them that Attorney General Robert Kennedy requested she collect all NPIC assassination records, box them and send them to the Smithsonian Institute, rather than the NARA where they belonged. But the ARRB never asked the Smithsonian for any assassination related records, and the NPIC records, ostensibly including the missing Pathfinder Plan folder from JMWAVE, remain unaccounted for.

During the Church Committee investigations, eight NPIC technicians came forward to say they knew about a CIA plan to kill Castro called Pathfinder, that was run by Carl Jenkins. It called for Castro to be shot in the head by snipers with high powered rifles in Veradero as he drove by I an open jeep enroute to the DuPont Xandau estate, that he frequently visited. 

The Pathfinder Plan folder they said, was kept in the NPIC section of the JMWAVE station rather than the Operational Files where it should have been filed.

When the Assassinations Archive and Research Center (AARC) filed an FOIA request to the CIA for the Pathfinder file, they had no record of it. 

NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY (NSA) RECORDS 

The NSA has records on the assassination they have not turned over to the NARA, including a document intentionally leaked to the Scripps Howard News Service (SHNS) that attempted to implicate Fidel Castro in the assassination of President Kennedy as well as promote Castro as trying to kill then President Reagan a few weeks before John Hinkley shot Reagan in 1980. 

In addition, when Valery Mitrokin, a KGB defector to UK implicated former NSA file clerk Robert Lipka as a KGB spy, Lipka told the arranging judge in court that one of the NSA documents he passed on to the Russians was one that "named JFK's real assassin." When a reporter in the court asked Lipka, as he was being led away, what was his name, he replied - Luis Angel Castillo, a known MKULTRA hypto-programed assassin who was arrested for trying to kill the president of the Philippines. 

Neither the document leaked to the SHNS nor the Castillo document were turned over to the ARRB or NARA by the NSA, but are publicly known to exist. 

MRS. LINCOLN AND THE OVAL OFFICE RECORDS AND TRUNK 

JFK had a SS agent place a recording device in his desk that permitted him to switch it on and tape record conversations in the room and on the Oval Office desk telephone. Shortly after JFK was killed, the SS agent removed the recording devices and tapes but Mrs. Lincoln kept the tapes among the Oval Office records that included filing cabinets of documents, a rocking chair, JFK's wrist watch and other items. RFK ordered Mrs. Lincoln to keep those records at her home, which she did even though she also kept an office at the JFK Library in Boston for awhile. 

When Mrs. Lincoln was not invited to the Caroline Kennedy's wedding, she began hording the JFK material, and gave some to a celebrity autograph collector, eventually willing him whateever she had from the Kennedy Oval Office. The collector then placed some of the items for sale at a NYC auction and sold the wrist watch and some of the Oval Office phone tapes to a wealthy contractor, who wrote about them in his book The Inheritance, that quotes some of the Oval Office phone conversations that indicate their importance. The JFK Library in Boston has tapes and transcripts from the Oval Office and phone records and Caroline wrote a book containing many of the conversations, but the official records end on October 8, 1963, so the tapes in private hands represent the key conversations from October 9 until November 20, 1963. The FBI raided the former President Trump's home in Florida looking for such records, but no one is trying to get these tapes and put them in the JFK Collection where they belong. 

Then there's Mrs. Lincoln's Trunks, two of which were full of Oval Office documents that in her will she had sent to her personal attorney in Kansas, who had them placed in the evidence locker of the local Sheriff. When that Sheriff left office, they were removed and are now in private hands, but when I asked about their contents I was told that he would only answer questions if subpoenaed by a court or Congress. 

CHURCH COMMITTEE RECORDS 

When archivist Steve Tilly was in charge of the JFK Collection at the NARA in 1995 he made sent a memo of the fact that many of the records of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Activities (SSCIA) aka Church Committee, were missing, to Charles Battaglia, then the staff director of the Senate Intelligence Committee. 

Dear Mr. Battaglia: It has come to my attention that certain transcripts of testimony given before the Select Committee To Study Governmental Operations With Respect To Intelligence Activities may not be among the records transferred to the National Archives for inclusion in the JFK Collection. I discussed this matter with Ms. Judy Hodgson on April 13, and she suggested that I inform you in writing about this matter…

In response to the researcher’s inquiry, I learned that the testimony of the “FBI supervisor” was not among the records in our custody. I began to read other footnotes in the report and realized that other transcripts of testimony were referenced that I had not seen on our list. I decided to review every footnote in the report and compiled of (sic a) list of transcripts of testimony, summaries of interviews, and affidavits described in the footnotes that are not among our holdings. I have also enclosed a copy of this list for your use. I call your attention to the fact that most of these transcripts are dated in 1976. A review of our folder title list shows that most of the transcripts in the records in our custody are dated in 1975. It goes without saying that the individuals who gave this testimony, whether identified by name or title, are very significant persons in the history of the assassination…….

For more: https://jfkcountercoup2.blogspot.com/2013/03/missing-sscia-docs.html?m=1

Among the missing records were footnoted references to documents that are not in the JFK Collection, and some of the testimony taken in secret executive sessions, including some of the entire days of secret testimony of John Rosselli, the mobster recruited by the CIA to assist in their efforts to kill Fidel Castro. 

Rex Bradford, who has studied the Church Committee records carefully, and British researcher Malcolm Blunt both have reported missing Church Com records. Blunt mentions that a folder of interviews with US marines who were stationed with Oswald were empty. 

While working for the Church Committee, Gaeton Fonzi interviewed CIA weapons specialist Mitch Werbel on tape, but when Malcolm Blut tried to listen to it there was nothing there. Acoustic Forensic specialist who reviewed the AF1 tapes and determined they were edited, concluded Fonzi's tape of his inerview with Mitch Werbel was intentionally erased, though we still have Fonzi's hand written notes, that reveal CIA commercial assets (Pan Am Bank of Miami) among other things. 

RECORDS WITHDRAWN 

John Neman once recognized the importance of a specific document at the NARA and made a copy of it, only to return sometime later and find that the folder in which it was contained had a document that simply read WITHDRAWN, when the JFK Act specifically says that any records that have been released to the public cannot be later withheld. 

PUBLICLY WITHHELD RECORDS 

Besides records kept by SS agents, Mrs. Lincoln's Trunks of Oval Office documents that are in a Nebraska closet, and the Oval Office Tapes that were wrongfully purchased and privately kept, there are other JFK assassination records in private hands that should belong in the JFK Collection at NARA and available to the public. 

Among them are the Minks KGB surveillance records of the accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald from when he lived in the Soviet Union, While some were given to the President directly, others were given to writer Norman Mailer, who visited the USSR while researching his book on Oswald. Mailer's assistant at the time Lawrence Schiller, now has these documents, but refused to turn them over or even copy them for the ARRB, as detailed in their Final Report. 

In addition, the former Chief Counsel of the HSCA Richard Sprague, kept his office files and took them back to Philadelphia with him, where they remain today in his law office run by his son. While there are hundreds of records in the JFK Collection under the second Chief Counsel of the HSCA G. Robert Blakey, there are none whatsoever for Richard Sprague. When I questioned the NARA about this, they referred me to the files of computer and photo specialist Richard Sprague, who with the same name, they confused with the Chief Counsel. 

SAVED FROM DESTRUCTION

Among the JFK assassination records ordered destroyed, we have two examples of what was saved, or salvaged.

When Harry Connick, Sr. replaced Jim Garrison as District Attorney of New Orleans, he ordered one of his staff to collect and destroy Garrisons files, including the Grand Jury records. The staff member instead recognized their historical significance and took them home, then passed them on to the ARRB to be included in the JFK Collection. While Connick threw a hissy fit and tried to take it to court he was over ruled.

Then there's the Andrews Air Force Base Log for 11/22/63 that kept track of relevant air traffic including times of landings of AF1, the Cabinet plane and General LeMay. This hard bound manilla folder log book was removed from a trash bin at Andrews AFB by a janitor, who realized it's significance and turned over to the ARRB. I obtained the log from the NARA, made copies of every handwritten page, transcribed it and posted it on my blog.

BK Notes: This is only a partial list. The tip of the iceberg. More to come.