by Mark Lane
Bolden was not aware of all of the secret plans devised by the CIA. However, had his request to testify before the Warren Commission been accommodated, he would have revealed that during January 1964, less then two months after the assassination, the Secret Service withdrew the CIA-prepared identification documents and issued new credentials prepared by its own agency.86 To an inquiring group of investigators, that information might well have served as the Rosetta stone.
Later, representatives of the Dallas Police Department, the FBI, the Secret Service, the CIA and the Warren Commission said it was a joint effort, referring of course, to their investigation. There did seem to be evidence of inter-agency cooperation even before the shots were fired.
The Actions of the Secret
Service Agents in the
Presidential Limousine
Secret Service Agent William R. Greer was driving the presidential limousine. Sitting to his right was another Secret Service agent, Roy H. Kellerman. Kellerman was in charge of the White House detail for the two days that President Kennedy was scheduled to be in Dallas. Kellerman testified, “I was in charge of the detail for this trip for President Kennedy for this trip to Texas for those two days.”87 However, Kellerman was an emergency fill-in for the Secret Service agent who had made the plans for the visit to Dallas and was in charge of the detail. Agent Gerald A. Behn, apparently at the last minute, decided to take a vacation and directed the ill-prepared Kellerman to take his place. Behn was not the only absentee that day.
Eleven of the most experienced members of the White House detail had been transferred at their own request to other assignments within sixty days before the assassination, requiring less experienced agents to take their places. Each request for a transfer had been granted. The Warren Commission never explained those anomalous events leading up to November 22, 1963. There are only two references to Behn in the Warren Commission Report. The first is the assertion that he was in charge of the White House detail and had inquired about “potential sites for the luncheon that was planned for President Kennedy on November 22.”88 The second reference is that after the assassination, Kellerman and Hill “telephoned the head of the White House detail, Gerald A. Behn, to advise him of the assassination.”89 The commission never discussed what precluded Behn from being present when there had been so many threats to the president regarding that visit or why the most experienced members of the White House detail had been permitted to abandon their posts at the crucial time.
After the first shot was fired, according to the commission, “Agent Greer immediately accelerated the presidential car.”90 That statement was false and was known to be false by the commission as demonstrated by all of the available evidence, including eyewitness testimony of spectators and of Secret Service agents and documents, including the Zapruder film. It is true that the presidential limousine had the capacity to accelerate quickly. Kellerman testified, “I have driven that car many times, and I never ceased to be amazed, even to this day, with the weight of the automobile plus the power that is under the hood; we just literally jumped out of the God-damned road.”91 However, the acceleration began only after President Kennedy had been assassinated. Many of the witnesses stated that after the first shot was fired, Greer had brought the limousine to a stop and that he took no evasive action by swerving the vehicle and that he was not told to leave the scene quickly by Kellerman until after the president had been killed. Here is the relevant testimony of Greer and Kellerman.
Greer, the driver, testified, “So I heard this noise … and then I heard it again. And I glanced over my shoulder and saw Governor Connally like he was starting to fall. Then I realized there was something wrong. I tramped on the accelerator.”92 Kellerman testified that when he spoke to Greer about leaving the area, “the car leaped forward from an acceleration.”93 Kellerman explained the delay by stating that when he first heard the rifle shot he thought that the “report (was) like a firecracker, pop.”94 He also said that “I heard a voice from the back seat and I firmly believe it was the president’s, ‘My God, I am hit.’ ”95 A bullet had previously entered the president’s throat and Kellerman’s testimony, supported by no credible evidence, was a fabrication.
Greer testified that when he heard the shot fired, he did not believe it was a firecracker; he explained, “I heard a noise that I thought was a backfire of one of the motorcycle policemen, and I didn’t—it did not affect me like anything else. I just thought that is what it was.” By the time he even considered accelerating, a final shot had killed President Kennedy.
Secret Service agents are trained to distinguish the sound of a rifle shot from a backfire or firecracker. Anyone who has ever fired or heard the sound of a high-powered rifle shot can usually distinguish it from the sound created by a firecracker or a backfire. Even I, who have not fired a rifle since I was eighteen years old while taking basic training during World War II, can tell the difference.
Secret Service agents assigned to the White House detail who may be assigned to drive the presidential limousine are trained at the first sound of what might be gunfire to immediately accelerate and to take evasive action by swerving. They are repeatedly instructed that slowing the vehicle is not an option and is counterproductive.
Secret Service Agents riding in, but not driving, the presidential limousine are instructed that at the first indication of a noise that might be a shot to immediately cover the body of the president in an effort to prevent him from being assassinated. We need no testimony from eyewitnesses to support Kellerman’s own testimony and the Zapruder film, which demonstrates without question that Kellerman never moved from his seat after the first shot was fired until he arrived at the hospital with the dead president in the backseat of the limousine.
One Secret Service agent in the follow-up car, Clint Hill, testified that he left the running board and caught up with the limousine after the president had been killed. Hill testified that “I jumped from the car, realizing that something was wrong, ran to the Presidential limousine.”96 Hill testified that by the time he “jumped on the car … the president at that time had been shot in the head.”97
The fastest runner in the world, in a one-mile race, wearing running shoes and a track suit, cannot attain a speed in excess of fifteen miles an hour. The limousine was specifically designed to accelerate to more than one hundred miles per hour in a very short time. After President Kennedy had been struck in the head, Hill was able to catch the limousine while wearing street shoes and dressed in a suit. The limousine was at that time moving very slowly.
The only Secret Service agent near the president’s limousine who met his obligation that day was Clint Hill. However, he had not been assigned to protect the president; his assignment had been for some time to protect Mrs. Kennedy. No Secret Service agent assigned to provide protection for the president acted responsibly; not one. Some Dallas police officers who were either off duty or assigned to traffic control, none of whom had been trained by the Secret Service, responded to the shots appropriately.
The testimony of two uniformed Dallas Police Department officers is relevant. Bobby W. Hargis was one of the most important witnesses to testify. He was questioned for just a few minutes.98 He was questioned by an assistant counsel, no member of the Warren Commission was present. His name was never mentioned in the Warren Commission Report.99
He testified that he was to the left rear of the presidential limousine while riding a motorcycle.100 He testified that when the fatal bullet struck the president, “the bullet hit him in the head, the one that killed him and it seemed like his head exploded, and I was splattered with blood and brain.”101He testified that after the president was killed the limousine accelerated.102
The testimony of Hargis indicates that the fatal shot was fired from the area of the grassy knoll, that is from the right front of the limousine, and not from the Book Depository Building to the rear. It also demonstrates that the limousine did not accelerate until after all of the shots, including the f
atal one, had been fired, which may explain why the Warren Commission neither mentioned his name nor his testimony in its report. Another factor that may have influenced the commission to retroactively remove Hargis from the scene was his immediate response to find the assassin. He testified that he “got off my motorcycle and ran to the right hand side of the street behind the light pole,”103 thereby running toward the grassy knoll near the railroad overpass.104
Another Dallas Police Department officer offered startling information when he testified. Joe Marshall Smith was questioned by Wesley J. Liebeler, an assistant counsel who became the most persistent supporter of the official line. No member of the commission was present. Smith testified that he was in Dealey Plaza when the shots were fired.105 He told Liebeler that “this woman came up to me and she was just in hysterics. She told me, ‘They are shooting the president from the bushes.’ So I immediately proceeded up there.”106 He ran up the grassy knoll. It was there that he very likely encountered the assassin. The Warren Commission Report does not mention his name.
There is a body of evidence that demonstrates that in fact Secret Service agent Greer had brought the limousine to a complete stop. Vincent M. Palamara has conducted interviews with Secret Service agents and others regarding the assassination and has compiled statements from others. His meticulous and accurately reported interviews provide proof regarding the actions of Greer on November 22nd. In his work, Survivor’s Guilt, he reports that a sampling of sixty witnesses reveals Greer’s misconduct. His interviews and his research provide the basis for the following summary.
Texas Senator Ralph Yarborough said, “When the noise of the shot was heard, the motorcade slowed to what seemed to me a complete stop (though it could have been a near stop) … After the third shot was fired, but only after the third shot was fired, the cavalcade speeded up, gained speed rapidly, and roared away to the Parkland Hospital.” Yarborough also said, “The cars all stopped. I put in there [his affidavit], ‘I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings but for the protection of future Presidents, they [the Secret Service] should be trained to take off when a shot is fired.’”
Presidential aide Kenneth O’Donnell, who was in the motorcade, said, “If the Secret Service men in the front had reacted quicker to the first two shots at the president’s car, if the driver had stepped on the gas before instead of after the fatal third shot was fired, would President Kennedy be alive today?”
Presidential aide Dave Powers, who was also in the motorcade, said, “At that time we were traveling very slowly … At about the time of the third shot, the president’s car accelerated sharply.” On November 22, 1988, Powers was interviewed by CBS reporter Charles Kuralt. Powers spoke about not speeding up in time to save JFK’s life and agreed with Kuralt that if Greer had sped up before the fatal head shot instead of afterwards, JFK might still be alive today.
Jean Hill, the woman who gave the area the name “the grassy knoll,” said, “The motorcade came to almost a halt at the time the shots rang out and I would say it [Kennedy’s limousine] was just approximately, if not—it couldn’t have been in the same position, I’m sure it wasn’t, but just a very, very short distance from where it had been. It [JFK’s limo] was just almost stopped.” Hill had told ABC’s Bill Lord on November 22, 1963, that the car “momentarily halted.”
Mrs. Kennedy said, “We could see a tunnel in front of us. Everything was really slow then… . And just being down in the car with his head in my lap. And it just seemed an eternity … And finally I remember a voice behind me, or something, and then I remember the people in the front seat, or somebody, finally knew something was wrong, and a voice yelling, which must have been Mr. Hill, ‘Get to the hospital,’ or maybe it was Mr. Kellerman, in the front seat … We were really slowing turning the corner [Houston and Elm] … I remember a sensation of enormous speed, which must have been when we took off … those poor men in the front… .”
Mary Gallagher reported in her book that Mrs. Kennedy “mentioned one Secret Service man (Greer) who had not acted during the crucial moment, and said bitterly to me, ‘He might just as well have been Miss Shaw!107*’” Jackie also told Gallagher, “You should get yourself a good driver so that nothing ever happens to you.” Mrs. Kennedy stated, “If the agent had hit the gas before the third shot, Jack might still be alive.”
AHouston Chronicle reporter, Bo Byers, who was in the White House press bus, twice stated that the presidential limousine “almost came to a stop, a dead stop”; in fact, he has had nightmares about this.
Dallas Police Department (DPD) officer Earle Brown said, “The first I noticed the [presidential limousine] was when it stopped … after it made the turn and when the shots were fired, it stopped.”
Secret Service agent John Ready, in the follow-up car, said, “I heard what sounded like fire crackers going off from my post on the right front running board. The president’s car slowed.”
Dallas Morning News reporter Robert Baskin, who was in the National Press Pool Car, stated “The motorcade ground to a halt.”
Dallas Morning News reporter Mary Woodward said, “Instead of speeding up the car, the car came to a halt.” She said that the president’s limousine came to a halt after the first shot. Then, after hearing two more shots, close together, the car sped up. She spoke forcefully about the car almost coming to a stop and the lack of proper reaction by the Secret Service in 1993.
Alan Smith said, “The car was ten feet from me when a bullet hit the president in the forehead … the car went about five feet and stopped.”
According to Palamara, Ochus V. Campbell told him that after Campbell heard the shots, “he then observed the car bearing President Kennedy to slow down, a near stop, and a motorcycle policeman rushed up. Immediately following this, he observed the car rush away from the scene.”
Peggy Joyce Hawkins was on the front steps of the Texas School Book Depository and “estimated that the president’s car was less than fifty feet away from her when he was shot, that the car slowed down almost coming to a full stop.”
Hugh Betzner said, “I looked down the street and I could see the president’s car and another one and they looked like the cars were stopped … then the president’s car sped on under the underpass.”
Bill Newman recalled that after the final shot, “the car momentarily stopped and the driver seemed to have a radio or phone up to his ear and he seemed to be waiting on some word. Some Secret Service men reached into their car and came out with some sort of machine gun. Then the cars roared off.” He added, “I’ve maintained that they stopped. I still say they did.”
William E. Sale, an airman first class aircraft mechanic assigned to Carswell Air Force Base and stationed at Love Field before, during, and after the assassination, stated that, “When the agent who was driving JFK’s car (Greer) came back to Air Force One he was as white as a ghost and had to be helped back to the plane.”
When he testified before the commission, Kellerman was questioned, perhaps more accurately assisted, by Arlen Specter. Specter asked, “Now, in your prior testimony, you described a flurry of shells into the car. How many shots did you hear after the first noise which you described as sounding like a firecracker?” Kellerman answered, “Mr. Specter, these shells came in altogether.” Both the testimony of Kellerman and the questions asked by Specter are incomprehensible. Obviously, no “shells” entered the limousine. A shell is part of a cartridge that remains with the weapon or is ejected onto the ground when the bullet is fired. Whether shots came from the Book Depository Building or from behind the fence on the grassy knoll, no “shells” entered the presidential vehicle. However, the “flurry of shots” referred to by both Specter and Kellerman, apparently after the first shot was fired, tend to refute the Warren Commission’s conclusion that only three shots had been fired, an invention created by Specter, who had apparently forgotten his statement to the witness that there had been a flurry of shots.
The Secret Service Agents in
the Vic
e President’s Car
A standard approach in the medical profession to determine the efficacy of treatments or drugs is the double blind study. Rarely do we have an opportunity to employ that scientific methodology in a murder case. Here we can contrast the failure of the Secret Service agents in the presidential limousine to distinguish between a firecracker or a backfire and the sound of rifle shots with the perception of a Secret Service agent seeking to protect the vice president in a vehicle just behind the follow-up car. And of greater importance we can contrast the reaction of the agents to perform their sworn duty.
Clearly this concept was of little importance to the Warren Commission or the legion of FBI agents and CIA operatives whom they relied upon. The Warren Commission was appointed during November 1963; it issued its report during September 1964. It was not until July 1964, long after the commission had reached its final conclusion, that the commission wrote to Lyndon Johnson and Mrs. Johnson requesting from each of them a written statement about what they had witnessed that day. Not known to the commission, Lady Bird Johnson had privately dictated her recollection during a two-day period after the assassination using, as she described it, a “small tape recorder.” She sent that information to the commission’s counsel, pointing out that almost three-quarters of a year after the event her memory was not fresh, implying that she should have been questioned much earlier. She wrote her “recollection and impressions” had obviously faded, “at this late date,” and added that “the quality of the tape recording is very poor.” Nevertheless, she had arranged for a transcription to be made, which she sent to the commission.
