(Not So) Deep Sh*t with Chris & Steve
(Not So) Deep Sh*t on The JFK Assassination - Part 1
Unlock the hidden history with Chris & Steve in Part 2 of their examination of the JFK assassination, the ultimate "conspiracy theory" that continues to fascinate the public.
Chris & Steve highlight overlooked witnesses, expose flaws in the official investigation, and questions the Warren Commission's conclusions. Get ready to confront many unanswered questions and consider the possibility of a different truth.
As the echoes of Dealey Plaza's gunshots fade, many are left with a sense that the story we've been told might not be complete. Join Chris & Steve as they piece together the fragments and explore the possibility of a conspiracy, never accepting a simple explanation when the truth demands further investigation.
The Kennedy assassination may have happened decades ago, but to Chris & Steve, as well as the court of public opinion, the case remains wide open, and is indeed some "Deep Shit".
Contact Us:
Twitter: @NotSoDeepShit
Facebook.com/NSDSChrisandSteve
Instagram.com/nsdschrisandsteve
Email: nsdschrisandsteve@gmail.com
Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE, LIKE and LEAVE A REVIEW for the show!
Unlock the hidden history with Chris & Steve in Part 2 of their examination of the JFK assassination, the ultimate "conspiracy theory" that continues to fascinate the public.
Chris & Steve highlight overlooked witnesses, expose flaws in the official investigation, and questions the Warren Commission's conclusions. Get ready to confront many unanswered questions and consider the possibility of a different truth.
As the echoes of Dealey Plaza's gunshots fade, many are left with a sense that the story we've been told might not be complete. Join Chris & Steve as they piece together the fragments and explore the possibility of a conspiracy, never accepting a simple explanation when the truth demands further investigation.
The Kennedy assassination may have happened decades ago, but to Chris & Steve, as well as the court of public opinion, the case remains wide open, and is indeed some "Deep Shit".
Contact Us:
Twitter: @NotSoDeepShit
Facebook.com/NSDSChrisandSteve
Instagram.com/nsdschrisandsteve
Email: nsdschrisandsteve@gmail.com
Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE, LIKE and LEAVE A REVIEW for the show!
I'm Chris, I'm Steve, and we're talking about some deep shit, and we're back to talk about some more deep shit. How's it going, steve? Chris, how you doing? Not too bad. We're fresh off of our last episode, which was all about conspiracy theories in general, and, and now today we're going to dig into a specific conspiracy.
Speaker 2:Yes, one of the largest that I know about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and the the, the big, the big daddy of all conspiracies, right, the JFK assassination. Here we are talking about it and it's worth being said that you know there's so much on this topic. I think we, I think we said this last last episode too, and we last episode too, and we when we touched on it that like it's impossible for for us to really give it the in-depth treatment, the whole thing. It's just there's so much there. It would it would require many, many episodes. So we're just going to focus on some of the more interesting parts. I mean, we're not going to get to everything, but there's a lot here. There's definitely a lot here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I I think that maybe, maybe sometime in the future, we revisit and talk about some other points, only because there's just when I'm, when I was taking it all in, I was like god, there's just so many things and each one takes you down a different rabbit hole.
Speaker 1:yes, yes, and it all, yeah, it all spirals off in different directions and then spirals into other things. Yeah, it ties up with other conspiracies too, which you know. It's just. There's miles and miles of stuff, of material on this. On this topic, I asked chat gbt just to. I was curious if it could tell me how many books have been published about the jfk assassination. It's even chat gbt said it was impossible to estimate and I said, well, give me a ballpark. And it said, well, at least several hundred it's crazy.
Speaker 1:Several hundred, and that's just books, right you? Know you have movies, documentaries, I'm sure there's been, you know, radio programs and things like that. So probably other podcasts. So I'm sure there's, I'm sure there's probably dozens upon dozens of podcasts. There's probably podcasts that have been running for quite some time that only cover the JFK and every, every time they do like a different element of it.
Speaker 2:And it's interesting why this topic just resonates with so many people. Right, because it's been in this November it'll be 61 years since it happened, right.
Speaker 2:So what is it about it? And I think what it is about it is. First of all, it's interesting, right. Second of all, it's kind of mind-blowing to think that, if there's some truth to it, that that's what's happening, that that's what happened. Our government decided to hold something back, or decided to be the perpetrator. I have no idea. It's just. It's something a lot of people, I think, have a hard time wrapping their heads around.
Speaker 1:Right, and it's so many open questions. And what's what I found interesting in going back and kind of looking at it is some of those open questions were there right from the beginning. I think I always assumed that, like at the time, it was only in hindsight that people started to to come up with conspiracy theories about it. But what you find out is that the conspiracy theory started almost immediately.
Speaker 2:Right and um, I think yes, and I also think that what had was happening immediately is there was a. There were different people that were just wondering well, why is somebody not listening to my story, or why are they not considering this? And then I think it started becoming a theory of a conspiracy, especially after the official Warren Commission report came out. Yeah, and I think that's when people said oh, wait a minute, they're not thinking of all these other things.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, and we'll talk a little bit about that. So in case you don't know what happened and I know that most people are aware, but let's just give the basic facts. So November 21st 1963, president Kennedy, accompanied by his wife, jacqueline Kennedy, and Vice President Johnson, accompanied by his wife, jacqueline Kennedy and Vice President Johnson, they undertook a two-day five-city fundraising trip to Texas. They were hitting a bunch of cities. So on November 22nd they were in Dallas as part of this trip. So they had a little event. And then there was a motorcade the last time, of course, that motorcades with the president were like in a convertible. Right can looking back and seeing that it blows your mind, because now when the president comes to town he practically in an arm and limousine right now and but but back then it's just like hey, here's a convertible and here's the president sitting there like doing his thing. You know, it's just strange. So at approximately 12, 30 p30 PM, shots rang out as the motorcade passed through daily Plaza in Dallas. Kennedy was struck in the neck and the head by bullets. That's important. The motorcade sped to nearby Parkland Memorial hospital where Kennedy was pronounced dead at 1 PM. So that's crazy too. Like the, the shots took place around 1230 and then by 1 PM he was pronounced dead 1 pm, so that's crazy too, like the shots took place around 1230. And then by 1 pm he was pronounced dead. So that happened quick, right, he was probably dead before he got there. Yeah, I mean his head was blown, and we'll talk a little bit about that, because there's some interesting stuff there.
Speaker 1:Lee Harvey Oswald, he's a former Marine who had spent some time in the Soviet Union union. He was arrested shortly thereafter and accused of killing uh, kennedy, uh. And then oswald himself was uh murdered while being transferred in police custody two days after kennedy's death. Right, that's always you know. And then the warren commission, which was established um, headed by a us supreme court chief, uh justice earl warren, was established to investigate the assassination and they eventually released an 888-page report concluding that Oswald acted alone from the book depository which I believe we talked about that a little bit last time what a book depository? It's a school book depository, I guess, a place where they keep excess school books that he alone killed Kennedy with his rifle, and that was it Right. So that's the official story.
Speaker 2:So here we are to talk about a little more details that might make that official story seem not so solid.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and most people. It's funny you talk to most people. Very few people I've ever asked about this would like defend the Warren Commission and say, no, they figured it out. There was so many questions like right from the beginning that I thought and about the bullets and all that Right and about the bullets and all that.
Speaker 2:Right Today, I'm sorry, 2024, it's very difficult to find anyone that you say you bring this subject up to. That just says well, I mean, there's a warrant, commission, a report, why are we talking about this? Nobody. Everybody has their own thoughts on it and none of those thoughts generally are, I believe, the official story.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's true, and even among people who haven't looked into it, you know people who have a casual relationship with this story, meaning that maybe they saw the JFK movie by Oliver Stone.
Speaker 2:It was such a well-crafted movie. Yeah, it really was. I think he's a very good director and again, it's a movie Right, but it kind of piqued everyone's interest again.
Speaker 1:He was back in the news not even too long ago, revisiting.
Speaker 2:Oh, he's a believer. I mean, he didn't just do, I'm sorry, he did it to make money, I'm sure, but he is a believer in that topic.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so where do we want to start? What's the best? Where do you feel is a good place to kind of kick off this discussion?
Speaker 2:I think that it's pretty well established that something happened, right? So we know that John F Kennedy was in the limousine. Well, the car, right, and it was a convertible, it was open, he's driving through. A number of shots were fired. There's a question was it three, was it four? That's something we could talk a little bit about, but I think that we all know what happened. So the question is, first of all, we know that Lee Harvey Oswald was blamed as the perpetrator, right? And I think maybe where we start is what are our thoughts on whether or not he was the perpetrator? I guess, because there's just again I don't investigate murders, I don't investigate assassinations generally, but every single detail has something that says maybe that's not correct, right? I've never seen anything like this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, In the heat of the moment you can understand that there's some discrepancies between how many shots people heard. Yes, and you can kind of understand that, because in the heat of the moment you're not expecting it.
Speaker 2:And where it's located. They were kind of in the middle of some buildings where you could see maybe echoes could be an issue. So I mean, just because someone heard something that to me isn't. Oh well, we got a conspiracy. But there's just so many more things, right?
Speaker 1:The whole grassy knoll Knoll. Is that what they call it? Grassy knoll?
Speaker 2:Yeah, some people that because we have a few recordings that maybe we'll play, Hopefully. Some people called it a hill.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, I think the grassy knoll has a has has become something in our culture of saying.
Speaker 1:Right, right and only, which only applies. I've never heard somebody refer to a grassy knoll in any other context besides the Kennedy assassination. No, no, but I mean I don't know, is it? Maybe it's more of a Southern thing to say I have no idea we weren't to show what a book depository was either, like we'd never heard of that. So did they make this stuff up? The whole thing's fictional that this is a recording of one of the witnesses that was there that day, named James Leon Simmons, and at the time he was working for the train company.
Speaker 2:And listen to this clip which they were operating somewhere kind of behind the area of where the Grassy Knoll was actually.
Speaker 1:Right, and so there's two employees that we have another one named Lee Bowers, but we'll play James Leon Simmons first that were working for the train company that had a view of this. So, yeah, it seems like they were right there to see it, Right? So let's listen to what Mr Simmons has to say.
Speaker 5:Yes, we are in Mesquite, Texas, in the home of James Leon Simmons, a car inspector for the Union Terminal Railroad. Mr Simmons, how long have you been employed by the Union Terminal?
Speaker 4:I've been employed by the Union Terminal 11 years.
Speaker 5:Were you a witness to the assassination of President Kennedy?
Speaker 4:Yes, I was standing on the Elm Street overpass at the time of the assassination.
Speaker 5:Were you there alone or with others?
Speaker 4:There was a group of employees from the Union Terminal at the time and two Dallas policemen.
Speaker 5:What did you see and what did you hear?
Speaker 4:As the presidential limousine was rounding the curve on Elm Street, there was a loud explosion. At the time I didn't know what it was, but it sounded like a loud firecracker or a gunshot and it sounded like it came from the left and in front of us, towards the wooden fence, and there was a puff of smoke that came underneath the trees on the embankment. Where was the puff of smoke, mr Simmons, in relation to the wooden fence? It was right, directly in front of the wooden fence.
Speaker 5:After you heard the shot and saw the smoke, what did you?
Speaker 4:do. I was talking with a patrolman foster at the time and as soon as we heard the shots we ran around to the wooden fence and when we got there there was no one there, but there was footprints in the mud around the fence and there was footprints on the wooden tube before railing on the fence. Were you questioned by the Dallas police on that day? Yes, I was.
Speaker 5:Did you give your name to the Dallas police?
Speaker 4:Yes, I did.
Speaker 5:Did you tell them what you just told me?
Speaker 4:Yes, I did.
Speaker 5:Were you subsequently questioned by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation?
Speaker 4:About a month later, I was questioned by the FBI.
Speaker 5:Did you tell them what you told me and what you told the Dallas police? Yes, I did. Were you ever called as a witness by the Warren Commission? No, sir, I wasn't. As a witness by the Warren Commission? No, sir, I wasn't. This is the Warren Commission report. The back of it has an index of every person who is referred to by the commission. Is your name present there?
Speaker 4:No, sir it is. Do you think it's rather?
Speaker 5:curious that you had such a fine view of the whole Dealey Plaza area and you were among those who saw smoke coming from evidently behind the fence and yet you were not called by the commissioners and witnesses.
Speaker 4:Well, I always found it peculiar, but I thought that's the way they did business.
Speaker 1:Wow, he sounds very sincere. Yeah, I mean, first of all they asked him how long you worked there. He wasn't just hired the day before He'd been there for a little bit.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:And he saw what he saw when he reported it.
Speaker 1:He didn't make any conclusions, he just said this is what I saw. A couple people asked him. Obviously, they said that he told the police, he told the FBI, but he wasn't called or referenced in the Warren Commission, which is just that, right off the bat. It's like there's an inconsistency. Maybe he misheard, Maybe he missaw, maybe the smoke that he saw was something else. It's like there's an inconsistency. Maybe he misheard, maybe he missaw, maybe the smoke that he saw was something else. It's very possible. But you think they would at least like hey, we looked into this aspect and we found out it was a kid with firecrackers or it was somebody who was smoking a cigarette and that's why you saw a puff of smoke.
Speaker 2:Exactly at the same time, jfk was shot Right, and the people you were with all saw the same thing because you all went over there to look Right. So none of those people were interviewed by the Warren Commission. Yeah, so this is just one aspect, right, so if you had a trial and this person wasn't called, that would be you could have a mistrial.
Speaker 1:Right. Right, because if you were doing a criminal trial, reasonable doubt. So if, let's say, lee Harvey Oswald was the one on trial and you're trying to prove that he shot from the book depository and that was it, he was the one guy that did it. And now all of a sudden you have this guy come in and say well, I, I saw, like all of a sudden like you're introducing potentially reasonable doubt.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I and um, I think, if you look at it from that angle which I tried to, that, if you look at the evidence um, some of it we're going to talk about today right, if you had this at a criminal trial which is what would have happened eventually if Oswald wasn't killed right, you'd have had a trial. And if you had a trial with all the facts, just that, maybe that we're going to talk about today, it would be hard to find that he would be found guilty, right, because there is a lot of reasonable doubt. I'm not saying he didn't do it Right, I'm just saying that there's a lot of evidence that either he didn't do it or he didn't do it by himself.
Speaker 1:I don't think there's much evidence that he didn't have anything to do with it Otherwise, because then the question would come up well, what exactly were you doing in that building, but with a rifle?
Speaker 2:Well, that's the question. So there is some evidence just on the rifle, whether or not he actually had it.
Speaker 1:That's right, because he never really they never really got much out of him.
Speaker 2:No one saw him walking in with anything that would resemble. Some people placed him that he was walking in with some long thing, right, right, but most people say, no, we didn't see him with anything. Nothing, because that would cause that would actually you walk in with some long thing that usually just work at a book place, right, this was like a like a kind of a middle place or the distribution for school books, right, really what it was right what did he do there?
Speaker 1:no huh, what did he do there? Do you know what he, what his job was?
Speaker 2:he worked there he did work there and I don't I am not positive. I believe it was kind of in the like shipping receiving kind of D clerk kind of stuff Okay. Yeah, he was. It wasn't a high level job.
Speaker 1:That's the, the part of the that. You know, what makes it a dead end is the fact that he was caught and then, and then, like two days after transferring him, oh yeah, you know, he gets killed and then. That's all your all the answers to most of your questions have just gone away. Uh, you know, and that's another whole direction to go down, is the jack ruby thing of like, why did suddenly this guy just decide he was so incensed about this guy potentially killing kennedy? He decided to vigilante justice you know.
Speaker 2:so this is out of character, right? So I mean we could talk about how did he even get into the police station, right, there's a lot there.
Speaker 2:So the whole thing there was. They believe that he came down this ramp okay, that was kind of under the police state like to get down, because this happened kind of in the basement level right where he Ruby shot Oswald and there was only one area he could have come in and it was this ramp right and they did have a police officer there right and that police officer said that one police officer there was a few other ones further away from the ramp right those few other ones said nobody came down that ramp. That they all said no, nobody came down that ramp. There's one guy that says that a man passed by, that that man looks like he might've had a gun. This is what the police officer says okay, that he thought it was okay because he saw that man speaking to his supervisor. Everybody else says there's nobody that went down that ramp. Wow. So every way you go, you know Right.
Speaker 1:And it's entirely possible that you know everybody else says there's nobody that went down that ramp. Wow. So the every way you go, you know. So Right, and it's entirely possible that you know that group of people who said they didn't see anybody, it's entirely possible that they were engrossed in a conversation or that they were in the process of, you know, clearing some people out of the area and you know somebody walked by. So it area, and you know somebody walked by. So it's possible. It's not outside the realm of possibility. It's just more inconsistencies to the whole story that make you go. Well, that's you know.
Speaker 2:And again, I'm not gonna sit here and say what somebody said is or is not truthful I don't know, I'm just reading things. Maybe sometimes we're like just we just did listening to something, but I can't gauge if you're right. But the police officer that said I let him go by and it looked like he had a gun, but I thought it was okay. That's odd. What are you talking about?
Speaker 1:Because he was talking to my supervisor.
Speaker 2:There was no actual communication with his supervisor. So it was not like his supervisor said yeah, he has a gun, but it's perfectly okay. I just thought it was okay. It's not like two In what?
Speaker 1:perfectly okay, I just thought it was okay, and it's not like too, in what?
Speaker 2:world. Would that happen?
Speaker 1:When he was talking to the supervisor was he waving the gun around?
Speaker 2:So he said well, my supervisor had his hand in his jacket.
Speaker 1:Right, he said what are you?
Speaker 2:talking about. This guy is protecting the police, you're protecting the police station from the very thing that you say you saw walking in. You thought it was okay, like think you're there, you're there to protect, but anyway. So, right from the beginning, chris um oswald was found because of a description given by a gentleman that was in a building across across the way. It was on the seventh floor, his name was howardnan.
Speaker 2:Okay, he's the one that gave the description, all right. So he says that he was just, you know, just like other people, looking out the window to watch what was going to happen. And he said he noticed a man in his hold on, man in his thirties, okay, and this man was hold on, I have it over here. Okay, and this man was Hold on, I have it right over here. This man, 30s, white, sitting in the window. He basically says he sees this guy sitting in the window, notices him. Then he says and he, you know, they're doing their thing right and he hears a shot ring out. Okay, so he's looking around. And he happens to look over and see, and now the same guy is holding a rifle. He shoots it again, drops it and takes off. That's basically what he says.
Speaker 1:So he said he saw, he heard a shot, saw that person in the window of the book depository yes, and described it, and that he saw him fire a second shot, yeah, or he saw him. So he only saw him fire one shot. He heard a shot, yeah, he looked around. He looked across to him, saw him holding a rifle, yeah, and then saw him fire a shot, yes, and then drop it, which is interesting because that would mean at most Oswald could have fired two shots, yes, the first one that this guy heard and then the second one that this guy saw, and then he dropped the rifle and went, yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean again, was it one shot? Was it two shots that he heard? I don't know. Well, that's the question, right. Right, he says this is what he says. That's the question, right? Right, he said this is what he says. He says that he saw a man with a gun shouldered to his right shoulder, holding the gun with his left, took a positive aim and fired the last shot. Okay, this man then let the gun down to his side, stepped out of sight. I could see this is what he said. I could see this man from the belt up. I believe I could identify this man if I ever saw him again. Guess what? He saw him again.
Speaker 1:Really fast.
Speaker 2:Not too long after he, not too long after this, he saw him again at a police lineup. And guess what he did? At the police lineup he said I don't know if that's him Really. Yes, he said I can't. How did he say it? Interesting. This was Howard Brennan really. Yes, he said I can't wait. What? How did he say it? He's interesting. This was Howard Brennan.
Speaker 1:How far was he? Do you remember how far he was? Like he across the way across the way. Yeah, it's his distance, I mean, he'd be hard.
Speaker 2:So I'm reading his voluntary statement to the police.
Speaker 1:He gave it and notarized it on 11, 22 16th of the day of the assassination right. Is that the day of the day after the day?
Speaker 2:after 22nd was the day of the assassination. Yeah, so the day of. I'm sorry, he said. This man let the gun down to his side, stepped out of sight. I could see this man from the belt up. I believe I can identify this man if I ever saw him again. So that same night, that same night, same day, okay, he sees a police line, goes to the lineup. He says he looks like him, but the man I saw wasn't disheveled like this fella.
Speaker 1:I can't, I just can't be positive right and I'm just saying no, it's interesting and but one could reasonably argue that the dishevelment that he was referring to was, you know, you know, lee harvey. Oswald did the thing and yes, and then, you know, then was arrested and shoved in a car and spent some, you know, spent some time in a cell before the police line up, like that could account for the dishevelment. But just the fact it is odd because this guy's like, if I saw him again I could identify him. And then the same day you show him the guy and he says I'm not sure, right, does that mean that you know it's again, it's more questions, it's a question and you know, and I mean I'm sure you know from cases, I mean people's perception, people's recollection are all flawed.
Speaker 1:You and he could have, you know, had a, had a very strong picture in his head at the moment and say, oh, I could totally, you know, identify this guy if I saw him again. And then hours pass and the memory kind of fades a little bit, and then you see it and he and he goes. Well, I don't know, it could be it kind of looks like him, but I'm not sure, because your memory can fade like immediately after the event, like when it's real. One could argue that of course.
Speaker 2:Right but his description, apparently, is where the APB came from to look for him. Right and again, we're not talking about a description of a man. That is not common, right, right? A man in his 30s, white, 160 to 175. We're not talking about like this guy that's going to stick out, right? You know, I'm still wondering how they found him in the theater Exactly, but that's another day, right? But Interesting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they found him in the like. How did they check? Yeah, supposedly Interesting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they found him. How did they check? Yeah, supposedly there's just so many damn things, right. But, there was two women that were also working at the school book depository right. They, right after the shots were fired Victoria Adams, sandra Stiles. This is another issue as to whether or not he was there on the sixth floor, because they then went to the stairs, which is the only way Oswald would have had.
Speaker 1:I mean, he could have taken the elevator, but One would think that if you just did a major crime and you're trying to flee the building, that you wouldn't wait for an elevator.
Speaker 2:And there is some testimony that that was the elevator was being occupied by other things at the time.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:That these two ladies were in the stairwell right and they testified and that was at right after the shots were fired. So right after 1230, right, they were in the stairs. They said we didn't hear or see anyone, we didn't see Oswald. But at 1225, another worker this is 1225, five minutes before 1225, another worker at the school book depository, carolyn Adams, said she saw Oswald on the second floor at 1225. So, and there's okay, there's another witness. His name is Aaron Rowland. He was outside he's not, doesn't work at the school book depository. He said he saw a light-skinned man with dark hair and with a scope and a gun, but in a totally different window than Oswald was on the other side of the building. And then there's another witness that says they saw a man. I'm sorry, there was one guy with dark skin, one guy with light skin together in a window right Together. Two guys who's the other guy? A window right together, two guys who's the other guy right?
Speaker 1:this just so the question and then was he, was he even in that window? I don't know right. I mean, if somebody says they saw him on the second floor five minutes before, right, five minutes would not be enough time to go up, to what floor was he on when he, when he shot six, the six. So you have to go four floors and get situated. Yeah, get ready, like yeah that's.
Speaker 2:I don't think that if somebody had the either assignment or you know, my plan is to shoot the president when he comes around they'd be cutting it that close Right, because his opportunity would have been missed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's always been so much about like the number of shots and how, how he could have, could he have even made that shot Like from from that location. You know it's interesting and there was a senior research scientist at IMSG Incorporated named Nicholas Nolley and he did a model of like the shooting thing and determined that the bullet that struck President Kennedy in the head could not have come from the Texas School Book Depository where Oswald was positioned which totally contradicted the Warren Commission findings was positioned, which you know, totally contradicted the Warren Commission findings. So like there have been people who've done analysis and said, well, no, it's. You know, that's the, that whole magic bullet thing comes in which.
Speaker 5:What do you think of?
Speaker 1:that From the moment I heard it it sounds ridiculous. Like I know that Kevin Costner did a good job in the JFK movie of like oh, it kind of stops Like it would have had to stop midair and turn Right, and like that alone should. Well, obviously that didn't happen right, and well, no, we have to keep going with this theory. It's weird. Well, so let's go into our second clip, because this is the one from the other employee of the rail company who was there and who talked about seeing the event go down and hearing the number of shots.
Speaker 1:So let's hear him.
Speaker 5:Mr Bowers, what is your present?
Speaker 3:occupation. I'm vice president of Blockwood Meadows Incorporated, which is a real estate land development company.
Speaker 5:And where were you employed on November 22, 1963?
Speaker 3:At that time I was employed as a tower operator for the Union Terminal Company. And where were you at about 1230 that day was? At the south end of the terminal, of the tower building, or rather looking down toward the terminal and observing the motorcade, as was everyone else in the area At the time of the shooting. In the vicinity of where the two men I've described were, there was a flash of light and there was something which occurred which caught my eye in this immediate area, on the embankment, and what this was I could not state at that time, and at this time I could not identify it, other than there was some unusual occurrence, a flash of light or smoke or something which caused me to feel like something out of the ordinary had occurred there.
Speaker 5:In reading your testimony, Mr Powers, it appears that just as you were about to make that statement, you were interrupted in the middle of the sentence by the commission counsel, who then went into another area.
Speaker 3:Well, that's correct. I was there only to tell them what they asked, so that when they seemed to want to cut off the conversation, I felt like that was the end of it. Mr Bowers, how many shots did you hear, with one shot, then a pause, and then two shots in very close order, such as perhaps almost on top of each other, while there was some pause between the first and the second shots, did you tell?
Speaker 5:that to the Dallas police.
Speaker 3:Yes, I told this to the police and then also told it to the FBI and also I had the discussion two or three days later with him concerning this and they made no comment other than the fact that when I stated I felt like the second and third shots could not have been fired from the same rifle, they reminded me that I wasn't an expert and I had to agree.
Speaker 1:They reminded me that I wasn't an expert.
Speaker 2:Quiet you, you don't know what you heard, Right right, yeah.
Speaker 1:There was a part there that he mentioned the men I had referred to earlier. I cut that a little bit because it was too long, but he just talked about seeing some, some, uh, a couple guys nearby. I'm gonna link both of these. Any of the clips we play, I'm gonna link the original in the show notes, so if you want to watch, you know the whole thing. It's just a little bit longer, but it's fascinating to go back and see some of those black and white um yeah interviews that were just done, you know fresh. Those.
Speaker 1:The people all seem very sincere, like they're trying to help, like they just they want to tell you what they, what they saw, what they heard. It's just interesting. You know, he was trying to talk about the two guys that he saw over here and the and the and the County commissioner just suddenly like cut him off and walked away, like almost like don't want to hear it. That's, that's part of this. Like it seems like they had a narrative that they wanted to make it work and any, any information that came in that disrupted that. They did what they always do, which is just well. We'll ignore that. Let's just go with what we have.
Speaker 2:It's crazy it doesn't seem like a? Um, a thorough investigation, right, right, and there's another witness that I found, I think, here, and the interesting thing about this guy is you're not going to find a interview of him because he is well, he's not alive anymore, but he was deaf and he was a mute. Oh, wow, okay, and he was there. His name is Ed Hoffman, all right. He says that he saw two guys that had fired shots. They were about 200 yards away. Further closer to, there was a kind of an overpass. Okay, he said he saw the two men, one heavier man in a dark suit and a dark cat, another man who was tall and thin, dressed like a railroad road worker, he says the man the dark suit was standing behind the fence. He reached down for something, lifted it up and he saw a puff of smoke, which corroborates the other railroad workers yes.
Speaker 2:Rail road workers. Sorry, interesting, he said. Hoffman saw this man turn with a long gun, toss the gun to the railroad road worker who twisted it to disassemble it and put it in a brown tool bag and they uh, and they ran down the railroad tracks. That's what he said he saw.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And the FBI. The FBI spoke to him I don't know exactly how they did it, but maybe it was some of the sign language or something and the FBI says that he was mistaken, that he didn't see what he says he saw. And Hoffman claims that the FBI misrepresented what he told them. Right, so it's probably not the easiest interviewing a guy like him, true?
Speaker 1:But you could also argue because he's deaf, he didn't hear the shots. So for all he knew that that person theoretically could have taken the rifle aimed it, but he said he's on a puff of smoke too, right, right, right.
Speaker 2:So I mean, I think that as soon as that first shot was fired, it was just, it was total chaos and you know, people, probably even someone that's deaf and mute, could understand. You know, wow, the actions in front of him that there's something going on.
Speaker 1:It's the three shots, the boom, boom, boom. That is the problem because-. Yeah, talk about that. That is the problem because, yeah, talk about that. Yeah, I mean the rifle that Lee Harvey Oswald had was a 6.5-millimeter Carcano Model 91-38 bolt-action rifle, meaning that each time you fired it you needed to re-cock it, and so you could not have fired two successive. You couldn't have fired that boom, boom, boom.
Speaker 1:Maybe he fired the first one, maybe he fired the second one, but there was another shot going off at the same time, or right, kind of aligned with that, which also explains why some witnesses said they heard two shots and some witnesses said they heard three. Right, Because those two in succession if, if you were, depending on where you were and the echoing, you could have thought those were one shot. You know, if you're like acoustically right, that makes total sense. Right, because that what he said was is those two second shots were right on top of each other, like boom, boom, like almost like they, you know, happening right around the same time. So somebody hearing that could be like oh, I heard one shot instead of two.
Speaker 1:But man, it's like, right off the bat, you got questions about he couldn't have, besides the questions of whether he could have made that shot. Like you're talking about a moving vehicle, the head of a person, and it's a moving vehicle. You're up at six floor, six floor down and they're saying the angles that there's no way you could have hit it, and then you add the magic bullet. It's like what? How is it not clear that something like is fishy here? Because we all, like you said everyone you ask I've never met a person who says I, oh, I believe the Warren commission a hundred percent. Everyone says there's something fishy. But but they just sort of like eh, what are you going to do?
Speaker 2:Right, right, and I think I mean I got a lot of issues with this topic, but one issue I have is this if it didn't happen the way we're told, it had it happened, right, and if the government was not involved at all in terms of any cover-up or anything like that, right, the investigation that the government did into it doesn't look like an investigation someone would do if you weren't covering something up, right, right, because there's just so many unanswered questions, there's so many witnesses, there's so many pieces of evidence that were not considered Right, that you say, if this was really an open investigation, why were you not considering these things? Because there's really not a lot of good answers, you know. Yeah, here's something interesting regarding the gun itself right, so, was Oswald in the window? Was he even there? Right, we were just talking in the window. Was he even there? Right, we were just talking about? Well, was he on the second?
Speaker 1:floor.
Speaker 2:Conceivably, he has to have had the gun, right? J Edgar Hoover himself. Okay, it was in the Warren Commission. I saw, right, it was exhibit. There's a lot of exhibits, this exhibit number 2968. Okay, which was a letter from from J Edgar Hoover. Okay, and he wrote that the cartridge shells and evidence did not possess sufficient characteristics for identifying the weapon which produced them. Think about that. That's J Edgar Hoover writing that. That's J Edgar Hoover writing that. So, according to J Edgar Hoover himself, we cannot prove the shells on the sixth floor came from the Carcano in evidence.
Speaker 1:Right, because they found shell casings on the floor of the sixth floor depository, and that's how they said okay, did they say how many shell casings they found? Four, right, wasn't it four? Was it four?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But then, yeah, then J Edgar Hoover, who was head of the FBI, and said oh, we can't really confirm that those came from the gun that we say did it, which is weird too. Yes, I mean, that smells like need to. We need to establish that this, this is where it happened. Well, let's sprinkle a couple of um shell casings on the floor, but a four like that's odd, right, unless one assumes that before the first shot, he had to eject a previously fired shell casing. Do you know what I'm saying?
Speaker 2:Well, it's interesting about the four only because there's a gentleman that says he was hit in the right cheek. I think his name was James Teague. He was also an observer outside and he says that he was hit by something in the right cheek and that fourth bullet would account for that. As they say, maybe Oswald missed everything once and hit the sidewalk and some concrete hit this guy in the face. That's the story. To account for that.
Speaker 1:It's odd, though, because, as far as I know, did any of the witnesses say they heard four shots? Like most of them were either two or three right, exactly.
Speaker 1:So that's so weird. It's just crazy that with so many inconsistencies, so right off the bat, like from the get-go, it's not like. At first it seemed like a solid case and as things went, you know, problems were were injected into it. It's like almost right off the bat something smells fishy. It's um, I mean that, that gun.
Speaker 1:I was doing some research into how fast that gun could fire. How fast could you fire that 6.5 millimeter Carcano model 9138? And I asked ChatGPT and I said, hey, how fast. And according to ChatGPT, he said the Warren Commission they found that a skilled shooter could fire three aimed shots within a span of approximately 5.6 to 8.3 seconds. This means that the time between each shot could vary, but on average, first to second shot about 2 to 2.7 seconds apart, and second to third shot, same 2 to 2.7 seconds apart. So the fastest that somebody could fire that is two to 2.7 seconds, which wouldn't account for the boom, boom, boom, because that's not two seconds between those shots.
Speaker 1:And then you know the added thing you're on the sixth floor. You're aiming down on a moving vehicle, right, that vehicle did not stop at any time. I think it only moved faster once, that, once the you know event had taken place. Yep, so you'd have to reacquire the aim. So you're not going to be able to fire off two, you know two, shots. Um, it's just it. It it makes no sense, right off the bat of it.
Speaker 2:Well, here's something interesting the rifle that they found there on the sixth floor right was this Carcano rifle right. There is not really a ton of evidence that. Oswald really received the gun. He supposedly ordered it through the mail. Okay, the PO box that he had was under his name.
Speaker 1:Okay, okay, that's where the gun was sent.
Speaker 2:That's where the gun was sent.
Speaker 1:You can have guns sent to a PO box. That's odd.
Speaker 2:No, no, yeah, and there was a special form. Well, it's Texasas. There was a special form that had to be filled out. Okay, okay, um, because you know you're shipping a firearm, right, right, and maybe it's still today. There's a form, there's a federal form that had to be filled out. There is no federal form for that gun that was shipped. Okay, there is, there is none. Excuse me, there's none. But I think, interestingly, the PO Box that Oswald first of all, oswald denied he ever ordered a gun, okay, but the PO Box that it was shipped to was under his own name, but he also had this alias, apparently, that he used. It was AJ Heidel or something like that. Right, the gun was ordered supposedly by an AJ Heidel. Would that have been delivered to a PO box that was not for AJ Heidel, right? So, like you know, if I ordered something under Steve Blair, right, and I had it sent to your PO box, they wouldn't deliver it. They'd just send it back and say you know.
Speaker 1:I don't know. Actually, I think when you give a PO box, the name doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:The name doesn't matter, no because nobody knows.
Speaker 1:I mean the name is on file somewhere, but who's to say, I mean, if you put PO box this, that the other thing they deliver to that PO box. So I don't think the name would have necessarily done it, but again it seems like there's. He denied ordering the gun, right? I mean he obviously denied everything, right? He denied he had anything to do with anything, which of course he would. So his interesting, he's not going to admit to ordering the gun if that same gun was used in an assassination that he does not say he did. So one could easily imagine him saying well, I didn't do it, I didn't do anything. But I don't know what about prints on the gun?
Speaker 2:Oh, so here's interesting on the prints right, there was a lieutenant of the Dallas Police Department, lieutenant Day, where he had kind of a central part of the fingerprints. He examined the rifle shortly after it was discovered. Okay, it was a guy named Deputy Sheriff Boone found it All right. There are two areas of the rifle where fingerprint evidence was potentially found a metal housing near the trigger and a lifted palm print from underside of the barrel. Okay, which is an odd place to have your hand.
Speaker 1:Wouldn't you hold it there If you were holding the barrel? Okay, which is an odd place to have your hand. Wouldn't you hold it there If you were holding the rifle? Wouldn't your hand be underneath the barrel to support the barrel?
Speaker 2:Well, not on the barrel itself, it would be on the-.
Speaker 1:Oh, you're right, it would be on the the guard underneath.
Speaker 2:Oh, this is on the barrel. It's on the barrel. It's an odd place to put your hand when when you're firing a gun. Okay, but it's even. It's a little weirder than that, all right. So, yeah, that's weird. The Lieutenant Day looks at the rifle and he examines it for fingerprints. Then he takes a fingerprint from the trigger. Okay, the trigger. Okay, they take it and they put cellophane over it and they, they send it out for the FBI to look at it. Okay, well, between that time and a few, about six days later, which is important the FBI had visited Oswald in the morgue. Okay, okay, whatever. After six days, lieutenant Day says, oh, you know, he sends in that. He also found the palm print on the barrel, right, and everyone said well, why are you telling us this now, right, six?
Speaker 2:days later and his story is well. And also, why didn't you cover that part up with the cellophane? Why did you just do the trigger Right? His story is that. This is what's interesting. How does he explain this? One, he's the sole witness the Warren Report relies on for the proposition that, one, a palm print was found on the rifle. He's the only witness, Okay. And two, the palm print was lifted from the rifle. Okay, Day, Lieutenant Day took no photographs of the palm print.
Speaker 1:But he took photographs of the other, the other print. Yeah, he took, and he didn't wrap that one up in cellophane either. He wrapped the other one up in cellophane, yeah, there was another.
Speaker 2:There was a FBI agent that Latona. He said he never saw the palm print on the rifle. All right, so Lieutenant Day's word is that he lifted the palm print then sent it to the FBI separate from all the other evidence. His explanation is he didn't realize he had completely lifted the palm print and he expected the other agent, latona, to find it on his own. So he didn't tell anybody about it and didn't take any pictures about it. This is his story. He just expected someone else to find it, and that someone else said I never found anything. That is so. It's just what I mean, like you keep adding.
Speaker 1:And, yes, is his story conceivable? Yeah, I guess I guess it's conceivable. Like it's, nothing in his story is like so far out of the realm that it couldn't happen. But it doesn't make sense. Like, if you are checking it for prints and you are wrapping said prints in cellophane to protect them, why would you only wrap one and not the?
Speaker 1:other wrapping said prints in cellophane to protect them. Why would you only wrap one and not the other? And then, like you said, the FBI visits Lee Harvey Oswald in the morgue and, lo and behold, more prints are found right. And it's like, yeah, it's like everything in this, it has a smell.
Speaker 2:So his in this the chief counsel of the Warren Commission. His name is J Lee Rankin. Right, mr Rankin? Attorney Rankin also had an issue with this late arriving palm print. This is now the chief counsel of the Warren Commission. Okay, august 28th 1964, so a little less than a year afterwards he said that quote Mr Rankin, which is the attorney here, advised that because of the circumstances that now exist, there is a serious question in the minds of the commission as to whether or not the palm impression was removed from the rifle barrel or whether it was obtained from some other source. This is the Warrant Commission themselves Right Questioning the only witness regarding this.
Speaker 1:You know, with government commissions and reports I've seen this in the UFO area as well is what often happens is that there's the conclusion, the report has a conclusion, and then all that supporting evidence is inside it. And what people do is they read the conclusion and that's what they go with and they never read the report, which in some cases contradicts completely the conclusion. That was the case of um in the ufo. There was a um, a report that was done I can't remember off the top of my head it was um just basically to disprove it. And at the end of this report they said, oh, this has nothing to it. But then if you actually read the report you'd find that that's not quite true, right? So it seems like it's a similar thing where it's like the conclusion of the report was that lee harvey oswald, by himself, with no help, did it. And people would read that and go, oh, that's what they concluded. And you know, read the 800 and 888 pages and go well, that's not quite what you said.
Speaker 2:No. So this Rankin went one step further. He asked the FBI to question Lieutenant Day about what his problem was. So the FBI did they questioned Day. Okay, and the FBI, oh, they questioned Day. They also questioned an agent, vincent Drain. Agent Drain says he was never told about the palm print when he picked up evidence. Lieutenant Day says he did tell him about the palm print. Okay, but Drain must have just forgotten. So then, agent Drain then asked Lieutenant Day to sign a statement. Lieutenant Day would not sign a statement.
Speaker 2:So, just that itself, the chain of custody of the evidence. One guy says, hey, you didn't tell me about it. The other guy says, yes, I did Sign something, saying you told me no, right. That alone should be that alone would say well, what are you doing, what do you mean?
Speaker 1:Yeah, when two parties have a disagreement and one of them will willingly speak under oath and the other one won't, like that's immediate.
Speaker 2:That's a red flag.
Speaker 1:That's more than that's a series of flags. Right, that's six flags.
Speaker 2:There's lots of flags on that, on the party I mean and this is the guy that is relied on as the only I know this is people say, well, that's only one small piece of evidence. Well, you're right, it is, but it's important, it's the murder weapon, it's, yeah, it's important. And they say, well, what about his finger on the trigger? That is a problem. I mean, that's a problem if you were defending Oswald, right, that is a problem, the fact that you can't show exactly where the fingerprint came from on the handprint. Maybe there's an issue on the fingerprint, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Well, all right. So here's my issue with that. And I am not an expert in fingerprints. I am not an expert in firearms. I guess I'm really not an expert in anything, but I will say this as a lay person A trigger is a very small thing, yes, very, very narrow. So one would have to think that the fingerprint that they got off the trigger is not a whole finger, because if you put your finger across the trigger, it's right, it's not well, his it's not right.
Speaker 1:So what I'm saying is is that what they got was a partial print.
Speaker 2:Oh, I want to. Yeah, I was going to talk about that, okay, yeah, yeah, so the agent latona okay, uh, it says on november 23rd the rifle with the prints was sent to the FBI fingerprint expert. Agent Latona the area near the trigger was protected with cellophane, like we just talked about right said that the prints near the trigger were insufficient for purposes of either affecting identification or determination that the print was not identical with prints of people. He concluded that the trigger prints were ultimately of no value. Agent Latona then examined the rest of the weapon for fingerprints and found none. He also noted that there was no evidence of any lifted fingerprints.
Speaker 2:So this is the FBI expert that said there are no marks on this gun that tie him to Lee Harvey Oswald. Right, yeah, I mean. So there's questions whether this guy was even in the window, right, right, I'm not saying he wasn't Right, I'm just saying there are questions. There are questions whether or not he ever had that gun in his hands. Right, I mean, right from the beginning. You'd say I don't know if we're going to be able to convict this guy. Right, if he wasn't killed and you had that as your evidence, you got a problem right from the beginning, we'll be right back. I'll see you next time.