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[John Iacoletti]

Oswald wasn't at work when he bought the money order. He was at the Post Office on 400 N.Ervay Street when he bought the money order. It was about a half a mile from where he worked. He had fudged his timesheet to make it appear that he never left work that day.

How do you know all this?

[Tim Nickerson]

I decided to go back and find your statement, just to set the record straight that you are the one who confused barrel irregularities with palm characteristics.

In reply to my point that Scalice said nothing about seeing barrel irregularities in the palmprint lift, you said the following:

In response to this, I said that the matching points that Scalice identified would have been ulnar loops, ridge flows, etc., and I repeated the point that Scalice said nothing about seeing any barrel irregularities:

Matching points/points of identity are not irregularities, and certainly not rifle barrel irregularities, but are characteristics shared by the lift impression with an undisputed print impression made of the person's palm or fingers. If Scalice had found any irregularities from the barrel present in the palmprint lift, certainly he would have said so. 

You know, we would not be having this conversation if Lt. Day had done the same thing with the palmprint that he did with the trigger-guard prints, namely, take in situ photographs of them before lifting them. He followed long-established, common-sense procedure with the trigger-guard prints, but passed up every opportunity to do so with the palmprint. If he had photographed the palmprint before supposedly lifting it, and if the photos of the palmprint had been sent along with the rifle when it was first sent to the FBI, there could be no suggestion that the print was planted on the rifle between 11/24 and 11/26.

Similarly, if Lt. Day had not repeatedly claimed that the palmprint was still visible on the rifle when he handed it over to Drain, you would not be left with explaining how the palmprint, along with any indication that the barrel had even been processed for prints, magically disappeared in the few hours before it reached FBI HQ in DC.

Of course, if Lt. Day had even processed the barrel for prints, at least some latent lift powder would have still been on the barrel when Latona examined the rifle a few hours later. That powder doesn't fall off easily.

We might also ask why Lt. Day did not cover the palmprint with cellophane, which was standard procedure, but did so with the trigger-guard prints. It was standard procedure to cover any detected prints with cellophane, and Day did so with the trigger-guard prints, but, once again, veered from standard procedure with the palmprint. Gee, why was that? When asked this question, Lt. Day said that he saw no need for cellophane with the palmprint because the print was on a part of the barrel that was protected by the wooden foregrip!  Oh, okay. Then what happened to the palmprint and the surrounding latent print dust between Dallas and FBI HQ?! Poof! Gone! Magic!

Latona not only saw no trace of a print on the barrel, but he saw no trace that that part of the barrel had even been dusted for prints. That's because Lt. Day did not dust it for prints. He did not dust because he logically assumed that the gunman could not have touched that part of the barrel during the shooting because it was protected by the wooden foregrip.

By the way, Latona added that as of 11/23 he had heard nothing about a palmprint being found on the rifle.

When they planted the palmprint on the rifle, they knew they could not plant it anywhere on the rifle that had already been dusted for prints, so they planted it on a part of the barrel under the foregrip of the wooden stock. But they couldn't do this until they had gotten Oswald's palmprint at the morgue and until the rifle was returned.

That's why nobody in the DPD said one blessed word about finding a palmprint on the rifle until 11/24. Veteran journalists with long-time sources in the DPD were reporting as late as the night of 11/23 that their police sources were telling them that Oswald's prints had not been found on the rifle.

  I honestly don't know how to respond to that. I really don't.

[Jerry Freeman]

  I honestly don't know how to respond to that. I really don't.

Doesn't have a response? This is truly a first!

[Michael T. Griffith]

Quote from: Tim Nickerson on Today at 06:36:13 AM
For goodness sakes Michael, would you just stop and think about what you are posting before actually posting it?

LOL! Yeah, okay. You have done nothing but duck and dodge and bob and weave about the holes in the palmprint story. You're the last person in the world to be telling anyone about thinking about what they're posting before they post it.

You have painted yourself as a fringe online propagandist with your lowlife claim that a respected, Pulitzer-Prize-nominated scholar like Henry Hurt was a "kook." I'd bet good money that you don't even know that Hurt differed with most conspiracy theorists on a number of issues about the assassination.

Quote from: Tim Nickerson at 06:36:13 AM] Latona testified in April of 1964. He never tried to match the lift with the barrel until September of 1964.

Oh, of course! Gosh, it just never occurred to him to check for this until he was asked! This is Exhibit 15 for what I said above. Latona was no rookie. If he had seen non-human impressions in the palmprint, surely, surely it would have occurred to him to check the barrel to see if those impressions came from the barrel, because this would have strengthened his identification. You might want to read Sylvia Meagher's section on the palmprint in Accessories After the Fact. The entire book is available for free online reading and PDF download:

https://archive.org/details/AccessoriesAfterTheFact

Just once, do some homework before you try to see the emperor's new clothes.

Why didn’t they call him back, then? They called Whaley back just to make him say he dropped his passenger off two blocks sooner.

Good questions indeed. Also, why didn't Hoover name the lab examiners in his memo? Why didn't he have them make sworn statements? Why didn't the WC make any effort to verify Hoover's claim?

For that matter, why wouldn't Lt. Day sign the affidavit that the WC wanted him to sign to reaffirm his story about the palmprint? Clearly, because when Day was asked to sign the affidavit, he realized that the WC and/or the FBI doubted his story, that they might discover that he'd lied, and if they ended up finding evidence that he'd lied, he would be in more trouble for signing a second affidavit.

Quote from: Tim Nickerson on Today at 06:36:13 AM
Oswald wasn't at work when he bought the money order. He was at the Post Office on 400 N. Ervay Street when he bought the money order. It was about a half a mile from where he worked. He had fudged his timesheet to make it appear that he never left work that day.

You don't know any of this. You are just repeating the kool-aid you have read in pro-WC books. You clearly have not read anything that challenges the money order story.

I see that now you are willing to entertain the idea of evidence tampering!  My, my!  Here you have rejected every previous suggestion of evidence tampering, no matter how compelling. But, oh, now you are willing to posit tampering to explain Oswald's timesheet, apparently not realizing the kind of job Oswald had at the time.

Anyway, leaving aside for a moment the issue of Oswald's timesheet, there is also the fact that the envelope containing the money order was stamped and mailed in postal zone 12, which was several miles from the North Ervay post office and across the Trinity River. I am guessing you were not aware of this fact.

Now why oh why oh why would anyone buy a money order at one post office and then walk 3 miles to mail it from another post office?

Furthermore, returning to the issue of Oswald's whereabouts at the time the money order was purchased, Jaggars-Stovall records show that Oswald worked from 8:00 AM through 12:15 PM on nine printing jobs. Like many high-tech companies, Jagger-Stovall tracked each employee's work for the day, not just their hours. Oswald's job at Jaggars-Stovall was not the kind of job that you could disappear from for 2 hours without being noticed, not to mention that he completed nine printing jobs that morning.

Walking to the North Ervay post office, then walking 3 miles to another post office, and then walking back to Jaggars-Stovall would have taken Oswald at least 2 hours.

And it should be noted again that the money order was never cashed, as anyone can see by looking at the money order itself. It has no dated bank endorsement stamp, in fact no bank endorsement stamp of any kind, and does not have the final date stamp that it should have received if it had gone to the Federal Postal Money Order Center in Kansas City after it was cashed.

When the WC asked Klein's to document that they had cashed the $21.45 money order, Klein's sent the commission a deposit statement from their bank, and the commission uncritically accepted it, apparently not realizing--or assuming nobody would notice--that the statement had neither a bank stamp nor a date stamp and that it was dated 2/15/1963, nearly one month before the money order was even purchased.

It is telling that every single piece of evidence that supposedly incriminates Oswald falls apart when you look at it more closely.

 

[Tim Nickerson]

You don't know any of this. You are just repeating the kool-aid you have read in pro-WC books. You clearly have not read anything that challenges the money order story.

I see that now you are willing to entertain the idea of evidence tampering!  My, my!  Here you have rejected every previous suggestion of evidence tampering, no matter how compelling. But, oh, now you are willing to posit tampering to explain Oswald's timesheet, apparently not realizing the kind of job Oswald had at the time.

It was Oswald himself who fudged on his timesheet. If you want to call that evidence tampering then so be it.

Anyway, leaving aside for a moment the issue of Oswald's timesheet, there is also the fact that the envelope containing the money order was stamped and mailed in postal zone 12, which was several miles from the North Ervay post office and across the Trinity River. I am guessing you were not aware of this fact.

Where do you get that the envelope was stamped and mailed in postal zone 12? I'm aware of that CT claim but it's not one with any evidential foundation. And it makes no sense at all. Why would Oswald travel miles away to a different Post Office than his regular one? No, the 12 on the stamp does not represent the number of the Postal Zone. It almost certainly represents the number of the cancelling machine in the Ervay street post office that stamped that envelope.

Now why oh why oh why would anyone buy a money order at one post office and then walk 3 miles to mail it from another post office?

Yeah, as I said, it makes no sense at all. What does make sense is that Oswald's envelope passed through the number 12 cancelling machine at the Ervay street Post office.

Furthermore, returning to the issue of Oswald's whereabouts at the time the money order was purchased, Jaggars-Stovall records show that Oswald worked from 8:00 AM through 12:15 PM on nine printing jobs. Like many high-tech companies, Jagger-Stovall tracked each employee's work for the day, not just their hours. Oswald's job at Jaggars-Stovall was not the kind of job that you could disappear from for 2 hours without being noticed, not to mention that he completed nine printing jobs that morning.

Walking to the North Ervay post office, then walking 3 miles to another post office, and then walking back to Jaggars-Stovall would have taken Oswald at least 2 hours.

By "Jaggars-Stovall records" you mean the timesheet that Oswald filled out himself. The one that he obviously lied on. Oswald likely missed work for no more than a half hour.

And it should be noted again that the money order was never cashed, as anyone can see by looking at the money order itself.

I already told you that I know for a fact that the money order was cashed. And the proof is right on the money order itself.

It has no dated bank endorsement stamp, in fact no bank endorsement stamp of any kind,

So what? If it had a bank endorsement stamp on it , it likely would have been considered invalid.

and does not have the final date stamp that it should have received if it had gone to the Federal Postal Money Order Center in Kansas City after it was cashed.

How have you determined that it should have had a bank endorsement stamp and a final date stamp on it?  It never went to the Federal Postal Money Order Center in Kansas City after it was cashed. It went to the Federal Postal Money Order Center in Washington after it was cashed. Or it might have been Alexandria, Virginia. I can't remember. I'll have to check my notes.

When the WC asked Klein's to document that they had cashed the $21.45 money order, Klein's sent the commission a deposit statement from their bank, and the commission uncritically accepted it, apparently not realizing--or assuming nobody would notice--that the statement had neither a bank stamp nor a date stamp and that it was dated 2/15/1963, nearly one month before the money order was even purchased.

Again, how have you determined that it should have had a bank endorsement stamp and a final date stamp on it?

[Michael T. Griffith]

It was Oswald himself who fudged on his timesheet. If you want to call that evidence tampering then so be it.

How about the 9 printing jobs that he was recorded as doing? Did he fudge those as well, and nobody noticed?

Where do you get that the envelope was stamped and mailed in postal zone 12? I'm aware of that CT claim but it's not one with any evidential foundation. And it makes no sense at all. Why would Oswald travel miles away to a different Post Office than his regular one?

You just can't connect the dots, can you? Read this really slowly: Oswald did not buy the money order and did not mail it to Klein's.

No, the 12 on the stamp does not represent the number of the Postal Zone. It almost certainly represents the number of the cancelling machine in the Ervay street post office that stamped that envelope. Yeah, as I said, it makes no sense at all. What does make sense is that Oswald's envelope passed through the number 12 cancelling machine at the Ervay street Post office.

What were you saying about thinking about what you write before you post it?! Now, think about this: Why would the USPS bother to include the number of the machine that processed the envelope in the postmark? Why? What good would that do? Is it not much more logical that the Post Office would want to be able to document the postal zone from which the letter was sent?

And since when is a machine identified only by a two-digit number? Even making the unlikely assumption that the only ID numbers the USPS put on its processing machines were two-digit numbers, how many machines numbered "12" do you suppose the USPS had just in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area alone?

But we do not need to guess about the information in the postmark. Turning to the USPS's official website, we learn that postmarks are intended to provide "the location and date" the USPS accepted custody of the item:

A postmark indicates the location and date the Postal Service accepted custody of a mailpiece. (https://about.usps.com/handbooks/po408/ch1_003.htm)

The USPS did not institute zip codes until April 1963. Before then, starting in 1943, the Post Office divided cities into zones:

1943: The United States Post Office Department divides cities into zones. (https://www.zip-codes.com/united-states-zip-codes-timeline.asp#1943)

So, obviously, it made sense to stamp the letter with a postmark that included the postal zone from which the letter was mailed.

By "Jaggars-Stovall records" you mean the timesheet that Oswald filled out himself. The one that he obviously lied on. Oswald likely missed work for no more than a half hour.

Here again, as you are prone to do, you base your arguments on debunked or unproven assumptions. Why don’t you go read Robert Stovall’s WC testimony and come back and tell me that Oswald could have been gone for 30 minutes, much less 2-3 hours, without anyone noticing, and could have gotten away with claiming to have done nine printing jobs that he did not do.
 

I already told you that I know for a fact that the money order was cashed. And the proof is right on the money order itself.

Really? I suspect that you did not look at the money order but simply decided to repeat what you read on some pro-WC site.

I invite you to post a copy of that money order that shows a dated bank endorsement stamp, or a bank endorsement stamp of any kind, and the final date stamp that it should have received if it had gone to the Federal Postal Money Order Center in Kansas City, or from any PMOC, after it was cashed. Let's see it.

The only stamp on the back of the money order is an undated stamp put there by Klein's Sporting Goods, Inc., in the “PAY TO” field, the same kind of stamp that any business puts on the back of a check/money order before sending it to their bank to be cashed/deposited.

The only other marks on the back of the money order are dated initials that were made by federal agents who handled the document after the assassination.

So, yes, show me an image of that money order that shows a single bank endorsement stamp of any kind on the money order. Let's see it.

So what? If it had a bank endorsement stamp on it , it likely would have been considered invalid. Again, how have you determined that it should have had a bank endorsement stamp and a final date stamp on it?

Seriously? Have you never seen a cashed money order? How about a cashed check--ever seen one of those? I mean, good grief, how can you not know that when a bank deposits any kind of a check, it stamps it with a dated endorsement stamp to show that it was cashed? Go to your online bank account and look at the image of the back of one of your cashed checks.

John Armstrong provides numerous examples of cashed checks and vouchers from 1963 to show what we should see on the $21.94 money order that Oswald supposedly sent to Klein's.

http://harveyandlee.net/MoneyOrder.html

How have you determined that it should have had a bank endorsement stamp and a final date stamp on it?  It never went to the Federal Postal Money Order Center in Kansas City after it was cashed. It went to the Federal Postal Money Order Center in Washington after it was cashed. Or it might have been Alexandria, Virginia. I can't remember. I'll have to check my notes.

It should have gone to the KC PMOC. But, wherever it went, once it got there, it would have been stamped a second time after it had been cashed by an associated bank and/or had through the Federal Reserve. The money order contains no such stamp. Because it was not cashed.

The fact that the money order was not cashed explains why Klein’s could not come up with a genuine bank deposit statement from their bank that showed the money order had been deposited. Instead, as I mentioned in my previous reply, Klein’s sent the WC a deposit statement that seemed to show the deposit but that was dated “2/15/1963,” which was nearly a month before the money order was supposedly bought. If you doubt this, just go look at the last page of CE 10, and see for yourself.

[Jerry Organ]

Seriously? Have you never seen a cashed money order? How about a cashed check--ever seen one of those? I mean, good grief, how can you not know that when a bank deposits any kind of a check, it stamps it with a dated endorsement stamp to show that it was cashed? Go to your online bank account and look at the image of the back of one of your cashed checks.

John Armstrong provides numerous examples of cashed checks and vouchers from 1963 to show what we should see on the $21.94 money order that Oswald supposedly sent to Klein's.

http://harveyandlee.net/MoneyOrder.html

Those show unemployment payments and paychecks. Not money orders. Just why "should we see" such stamps on a US money order?

You're expected to do better than that on the Forum here. This is not "JFK Assassination Debate" at the so-called Education Forum.

[Tim Nickerson]

How about the 9 printing jobs that he was recorded as doing? Did he fudge those as well, and nobody noticed?

He fudged the time that it took to do them. Or some of them anyway.

You just can't connect the dots, can you? Read this really slowly: Oswald did not buy the money order and did not mail it to Klein's.

Read this very slowly: It's Oswald's handwriting on the money order, as confirmed by four or five handwriting identification experts. Oswald bought the money order and he mailed it to Klein's.

What were you saying about thinking about what you write before you post it?! Now, think about this: Why would the USPS bother to include the number of the machine that processed the envelope in the postmark? Why? What good would that do? Is it not much more logical that the Post Office would want to be able to document the postal zone from which the letter was sent?

And since when is a machine identified only by a two-digit number? Even making the unlikely assumption that the only ID numbers the USPS put on its processing machines were two-digit numbers, how many machines numbered "12" do you suppose the USPS had just in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area alone?

But we do not need to guess about the information in the postmark. Turning to the USPS's official website, we learn that postmarks are intended to provide "the location and date" the USPS accepted custody of the item:

The USPS did not institute zip codes until April 1963. Before then, starting in 1943, the Post Office divided cities into zones:

So, obviously, it made sense to stamp the letter with a postmark that included the postal zone from which the letter was mailed.

David Von Pein reached out to a number of different entities 8 years ago to try and settle the question of the number 12 mark on the stamp.

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-postmark-on-commission-exhibit-773.html

I would encourage you to read through the whole thing. Here is some of what you'll find there.

DAVID VON PEIN SAID:

As I predicted, it didn't take long to get some responses on Facebook to my question about the "12" on the postmark. On the evening of August 5, 2012, I got this additional response from a member of the "Machine Cancel Society":

"The 12 is the machine number that canceled the envelope. Larger post offices have multiple machines to cancel their mail, so they number the machines and sometimes the machine number appears in the postmark, and sometimes it appears in the killer bars."
=============================================

The purpose of the "12" is to distinguish the mail from any other machine that cancelled mail from Dallas. Each post office uses these methods to track workers assigned to cancelling, to distinguish mail from one station from another, to identify the machine that applied the cancel, and the list goes on. --Ohio collector, A J Savakis
=============================================

Here's one from a friend of mine:

"At first glance, David . . . the postmark seems to be of a Model G flyer, of which we still use one in Greenville [South Carolina] to this day. An electric machine, it probably dates to the 1930's, but is still useful to cancel heavy, non-automation pieces.

There would have been absolutely NO local zone classification for cancellations in 1963, as there are absolutely none to date on this equipment. The number 12, most assuredly, would have indicated a machine number at the processing plant in Dallas. Nothing more, nothing less. I have been with USPS for 29 years now. Nothing on a postmark other than city, state, and zip code has EVER indicated an origination.

[The] MPO [Main Post Office] in Dallas would have typically had a large workroom area with multiple flyer machines in 1963. It is also quite probable that they had as many as twelve mechanized Mark II cancellation machines. The dies would be nearly identical and would merely indicate the machine number. I believe, firmly, that no conclusion can be drawn about the origin of the letter within the Dallas community by observing the postmark.

Also David, the time of 10:30 [which is also stamped on Commission Exhibit 773] would indicate the 'clearance' time for delivery. Anything before 10:30 would constitute next day service. That which was received later would not. There would have been ABSOLUTELY no changing of the dies to reflect what time the letter was received . . . with the letter volume of 1963 as compared to today's internet generation . . . the notion is ludicrous . . . cancellations in Dallas at the time were probably upwards of 300,000 letters per day."-- Jimmy Orr, Manager/Supervisor at the U.S. Postal Service, Greenville, South Carolina

Here again, as you are prone to do, you base your arguments on debunked or unproven assumptions. Why don’t you go read Robert Stovall’s WC testimony and come back and tell me that Oswald could have been gone for 30 minutes, much less 2-3 hours, without anyone noticing, and could have gotten away with claiming to have done nine printing jobs that he did not do.

Oswald could easily have gone down to the Post Office on Ervay Street and not be noticed as missing from work.