Reclaiming History

by Vincent Bugliosi

  On the basis of the time tests, the Warren Commission concluded “that Oswald could have fired the shots and still have been present in the second-floor lunchroom when seen by Baker and Truly.”149

  Of course, the critics vehemently disagree with the Commission’s conclusion. But, like many other aspects of the assassination, their arguments ultimately crumble in the face of abundant physical and testimonial evidence that shows Oswald killed Kennedy. Because of the strength of this evidence, we know that Oswald, of necessity, was able to beat Baker to the second-floor lunchroom. There can be no other reasonable answer that is compatible with the overwhelming evidence of Oswald’s guilt.

  There are three further points often cited by conspiracy theorists as affirmative, circumstantial evidence of Oswald’s innocence. Rejecting Lord Byron’s dictum that calmness is not always the attribute of innocence, they point out, most notably, that when Warren Commission counsel asked Baker whether Oswald was “calm and collected” when he confronted Oswald in the second-floor lunchroom, Baker responded, “Yes, sir.”150† As previously noted, Roy Truly, superintendent at the Book Depository Building, was present with Baker and Oswald and also said Oswald “didn’t seem to be excited or overly afraid or anything.”151 Surely not the conduct of someone who just shot the president, conspiracy theorists say. But this is very naive thinking. Did they expect Oswald to act guilty? Obviously, if he had just shot the president, he would have acted as calmly as he possibly could when confronted by the authorities. That’s just common sense.

  But there is another important point to be made here. Though clearly in the minority, it is known that there are those who curiously become very calm in moments of crisis. Oswald gave every indication of being one of these people.* Indeed, we have absolute proof that even when we are 100 percent sure that Oswald had every reason to act nervously, he acted in the same, calm way.

  For instance, Howard Brennan, who saw Oswald in the sixth-floor window, said that Oswald “didn’t appear to be rushed. There was no particular emotion visible on his face.”152 Helen Markham testified that when she saw Oswald shoot Officer Tippit, “it didn’t seem like it bothered him…He was very, very calm.” And after she saw Oswald shoot Tippit, “He just walked calmly [away], fooling with his gun.”153 And after Oswald was arrested in the Texas Theater, following a struggle over his gun, for the murder of Officer Tippit, and he was surrounded by the media and an angry crowd, other than his hollering out that he was going to protest the police brutality on him, he was very calm. Dallas police officer M. N. McDonald, the first officer to confront Oswald in the Texas Theater, and who was struck by Oswald in the face, described Oswald thereafter as being “quite calm and cool.”154 Dallas police officer Bob Carroll, who wrested Oswald’s gun from him and admits hitting Oswald on the side of the head thereafter, said, “The way he acted you’d think he’d barely been arrested for a traffic ticket because he never had the usual symptoms of nervousness, or breaking out in a sweat, or shaking, or anything like that. He was just a real cool individual.”155 Dallas police officer C. T. Walker, who had snapped the handcuffs on Oswald at the theater, said that Oswald “was real calm. He was extra calm. He wasn’t a bit excited or nervous or anything.”156 Dallas Police Department detective Richard Sims was present during much of Captain Will Fritz’s interrogation of Oswald, and said Oswald “was calm” during the questioning.157

  When Oswald called Ruth Paine to ask her to contact attorney John Abt for him, she said Oswald, who had just been charged with murdering the president of the United States, “sounded to me almost as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.”158

  “He seemed calm?” Gerry Spence asked Mrs. Paine at the London trial.

  “Yes,” she answered.159†

  So throughout the assassination event, those who saw and spoke to Oswald were unanimously struck by his calmness, most using that very word. And therefore, in addition to the fact that if he killed Kennedy (which all the other evidence shows he did) he would have every reason to feign calmness when confronted by Officer Baker, it apparently was natural for him to be that way anyway.

  Against the massive amount of evidence pointing toward Oswald’s guilt, the conspiracy theorists point to another small incident that, if it were accurate, would point in the direction of innocence. But it almost assuredly is not accurate. William Whaley, the taxi driver who drove Oswald in his cab after the shooting in Dealey Plaza, testified before the Warren Commission on March 12, 1964 (almost four months after the assassination), that right after Oswald got in his cab at the Greyhound bus station, “an old lady” stuck her head in the window of his cab and said, “Driver, will you call me a cab down here,” whereupon Oswald said, “I’ll let you have this one,” and she said, ‘No, the driver can call me one.” Whaley said he didn’t call her a cab because he knew one would be there shortly.160 If true, it doesn’t sound like Oswald was in too much of a rush to escape. And conspiracy theorists have so argued.161 But Whaley’s memory must have failed him, because on the very day after the assassination, he gave a signed affidavit under penalty of perjury in which he recalled the incident completely differently. He said that after Oswald got in his cab, “a lady came up to the cab and asked if she could get [my] cab. As I recall, I said there will be one behind me very soon. I am not sure whether the man passenger [whom he identified in a lineup as Oswald] repeated this to her or not, but I think he may have. I then drove away.”162 So what we have here is that on the day after the incident, Whaley remembers it one way, not even being absolutely sure of all of the details, yet nearly four months later he recalls the incident differently and remembers all the details, even the exact words uttered. Human experience would cause one to conclude that Whaley’s first rendition of the incident is the one that is accurate. This is particularly true here since the version of the incident that Oswald himself gave Captain Fritz is more consistent with Whaley’s original account than his later one. He told Fritz that when he got in the cab a lady also wanting a cab came up, and the driver told Oswald to tell the lady to “take another cab.” Without saying anything more on the matter to Fritz, Oswald was therefore implying that this is what he did.163

  Finally, we have the most famous and enduring words ever uttered by Lee Harvey Oswald, “I’m just a patsy,” which surprisingly were only recorded in one place in assassination literature. Scripps-Howard newspaper reporter Seth Kantor jotted the words down when Oswald spoke them to reporters, Kantor’s notes say, at 7:55 p.m. on the evening of the assassination.164 Oswald’s declaration, which is audible in TV footage, has been repeated for years by conspiracy theorists far and wide as evidence of his innocence. “Maybe, just maybe,” New Orleans DA Jim Garrison tells his staff in Oliver Stone’s movie JFK, “Lee Oswald was exactly what he said he was—a patsy.”

  The only problem is that Oswald’s declaration has been taken out of context by the conspiracy theorists, who want people to believe that when Oswald said he was just a patsy he was referring to being a patsy for the conspirators behind the assassination. But it appears from the context that he was not. From TV footage we hear this exchange:

  First reporter: “Were you in the [Book Depository Building] at the time [of the shooting]?”

  Oswald: “Naturally, if I work in that building, yes, sir.”

  Second reporter: “Back up, man!”

  Third reporter: “Come on, man!”

  Fourth reporter: “Did you shoot the president?”

  Oswald: “No. They’ve taken me in because of the fact that I lived in the Soviet Union. I’m just a patsy.”165

  It is clear from the context that Oswald is saying that the Dallas authorities (who he obviously is not suggesting are responsible for and behind Kennedy’s murder) are blaming him for the assassination simply because of the fact that he had defected to the Soviet Union and he was a convenient person for them to accuse.

  But let’s assume, just for the sake of argument, that Oswald was not referring to the authorities. The gi
st of the conspiracy theorists’ position is that Oswald didn’t just simply deny guilt. He got specific and said he was a “patsy,” which suggests, they say, that Oswald was a part of some group that, most likely with his unwitting cooperation,* conspired to kill Kennedy. They allege he was the “designated fall-guy who takes the rap while the real culprits escape unscathed,”166 “the designated patsy.”167 So they place special significance in Oswald’s use of the word patsy.†

  But should they? Perhaps most conspiracy theorists are unaware that the principal defense, by far, that defendants in criminal cases use is the so-called alibi defense. When prosecutors don’t have evidence, such as eyewitnesses or fingerprints, to put the defendant in the area of the crime, and frequently even when they do, the defendant says he has an alibi; that is, he has witnesses, usually members of his family, close friends, or relatives, who say he was somewhere else with them at the time of the crime. However, when it is incontestable that the defendant was in the area of the crime—here, Oswald worked at the Book Depository Building and several people saw him in the building around the general time of the crime—he obviously couldn’t say he had an alibi. He couldn’t say, for instance, that he was somewhere across town at the time of the shooting in Dealey Plaza. Therefore, he could use only one other defense to the president’s murder—that he was “set up” or “framed,” or was a “patsy” or “fall guy,” and so on. I mean, short of confessing, what else could he say?

  Just saying he didn’t kill Kennedy (which he also said) would obviously not be enough for him. He’d want to say something else to help convince the authorities of his innocence. And since he was precluded from saying he was somewhere else (i.e., the alibi defense), he was forced to use one of the very few words that mean he was set up or framed. Why he chose the word patsy over words of similar meaning to express himself, I don’t know—and it is immaterial. However, I would ask conspiracy theorists to ask themselves this question. If Oswald, instead of using the word patsy, had said he was “set up” or “framed” or was a “fall guy,” wouldn’t you have the same, identical feeling you have from his use of the word patsy? Once you concede the word patsy is not special, and since Oswald couldn’t say he had an alibi, what other word in the English language could he have used to defend himself that would not have caused you to draw the inference of conspiracy that you have? Since there is no such other word, the argument that his use of the specific words “I’m just a patsy” points toward his innocence has to fall.

  If, as so many conspiracy theorists believe as an article of faith (even though they have absolutely no evidence, of any kind, to warrant such a belief), Oswald was just a patsy for a group of conspirators responsible for Kennedy’s assassination, and he never fired one shot at Kennedy, the only purpose the conspirators would have in making Oswald such a patsy, of course, would be to divert law enforcement away from them, the investigation ending with the arrest, conviction, and execution of the patsy, Oswald.

  But such a notion in this case makes no sense. Why in the world would anyone agree to be arrested, convicted, and put to death for a murder he didn’t commit? Certainly we know Oswald wouldn’t, since we know he tried to escape and resisted arrest. So we know he wasn’t a knowing patsy, chosen, with his consent, to take the fall. That only leaves us with the one remaining possibility, that he was an unwitting patsy, as many conspiracy theorists boldly speculate without any evidence at all to support their speculation. Under this scenario, Oswald may not have even known that Kennedy was to be murdered,* and was simply instructed by his “handlers” to go to a certain place at a certain time in the Book Depository Building and await further instructions.

  The immense problem with this speculative theory is that it would necessarily mean that the conspirators (CIA, mob, etc.) made a decision to place the entire fate and success of their killing the president of the United States and getting away with it completely on the shoulders of the completely unreliable Lee Harvey Oswald—that they trusted him implicitly to do exactly what they told him to do, without the slightest deviation. Because if Oswald (who we know disliked taking orders from anyone) did not follow their orders exactly, at the precise moment in time of the shooting in Dealey Plaza by the real killer, some employee of the Book Depository Building might have seen Oswald at a place such as the lunchroom on the second floor, or walking on the stairs between the second and third floors, and so on. If so, this witness’s sighting of Oswald at the moment of the shooting, and without a rifle in his hands, would automatically eliminate Oswald as Kennedy’s killer. And with his exoneration, the whole patsy operation would be dead and the police would be in hot pursuit of the conspirators, not Oswald.

  Indeed, even if Oswald did do exactly what he was instructed to do by his “handlers,” the conspirators would still have no assurance that one or more people would not see him at the exact moment of the shooting, again exonerating him of Kennedy’s murder and thereby killing the whole patsy plan.

  Likewise, how could the conspirators possibly know that some employee or employees of the Book Depository Building wouldn’t see the actual killer of Kennedy at the sixth-floor window? I mean, we know that three Book Depository Building employees watched the motorcade pass by from the fifth-floor windows. What if they had watched it from the sixth floor? They would have seen the true killer, and again, Oswald wouldn’t be a patsy and the conspirators would be on the run from the authorities.

  So in addition to there not being one speck of evidence to support the patsy theory, it doesn’t even make sense. Further, as discussed earlier, it appears from the context of Oswald’s declaration that he wasn’t even suggesting he was a fall guy for the true conspirators behind the assassination.

  It should be noted that if Oswald weren’t a knowing or even unwitting member of an alleged group that conspired to murder Kennedy, but simply, as some conspiracy theorists claim, someone they chose to frame for the murder, then the frame-up or patsy argument becomes even more far-fetched, if that’s possible. How would the framers possibly know where Oswald was going to be at the time of the shooting? And therefore, and again, how would the framers know that Oswald wouldn’t be somewhere at the time of the assassination where witnesses could vouch for his innocence? For instance, he may have called in sick that day, and not even be at the Book Depository Building, or he may have been out on Elm Street watching the motorcade. When you frame someone, it’s always done in a manner where the framers know, in advance, that the party being framed will be unable to prove his innocence or have a very difficult time doing so. Here, the framers would have every reason to believe that Oswald, even if he were at work, would be out on the street with other Book Depository employees, who would be witnesses to his innocence. Nearly all Book Depository employees were outside the building watching the motorcade, and the framers, who would have to play the percentages, would have to anticipate that Oswald would be too. So this scenario of framing Oswald makes no sense either.

  The bottom line is that evidence of Oswald’s innocence in the Kennedy assassination is about as rare as hundred-dollar bills on the floor of a flophouse.

  The Grassy Knoll

  No term has been associated with the assassination of President Kennedy as much as grassy knoll, which refers to a patch of sloped lawn on the north side of Elm Street leading up to a wooden picket fence* on top of the knoll, with a concrete retaining wall and pergola to the fence’s northeast.

  The origin of the term grassy knoll as applied in the Kennedy assassination to this patch of land has not been conclusively determined. Among assassinologists, it is not even certain what area of the sloping lawn constitutes the knoll. Gary Mack, the curator of the Sixth Floor Museum, says that the grassy knoll is “considered to be from Zapruder’s pedestal [on the concrete wall] west,” thereby excluding most of the pergola area, an area that many researchers believe is a part of the grassy knoll. Mack’s position is fortified by the fact that the gradual slope of the lawn starts to become more of a hill or
knoll from the Zapruder platform west.

  As the reader can see from the map in the photo section of this book, the grassy knoll was located to the president’s right front at the time he was hit by the two bullets. The knoll’s fame is understandable. Since the majority of Americans believe there was a conspiracy in the assassination, and the conspiracy theorists have controlled and dominated the dialogue in the debate for well over four decades, the theorists’ belief that the deadly shots emanated from the grassy knoll has been burned into the consciousness of nearly all Americans. The term has become so much a part of the American lexicon and culture that it is routinely used metaphorically (e.g., “He has a grassy knoll mentality,” referring to a highly suspicious person who believes there’s a conspiracy behind every major tragedy) and as an element of humor (e.g., “Everyone and their grandmother was on the grassy knoll that day” and “I saw Nixon that day. He was on the grassy knoll talking to G. Gordon Liddy”). For years, a Manchester, Vermont, conspiracy theorist even published the Grassy Knoll Gazette. There’s no question that the grassy knoll, which the evidence shows was not the source of any of the shots, is far better known than the Texas School Book Depository Building, which was.