Was Hickey's AR15 in burst mode?

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

Richard Lester in 1974 found a 52 grain deformed remnant of i reckon an AR15 55 grain hollow point slug on the railroad overpass above the south side of Commerce St, buried a couple of inches, between the narrow roadway and the fence, approx where shown by the red star.  This slug might have been one of Hickey's that ricocheted off the road & then curb, or just off the curb.

Lester wishfully thought it was a 6.5mm. The FBI said that it was 6.5mm but had not been fired from Oswald's rifle. Lester believed that the FBI returned a different slug.  I reckon that they were wrong re  the slug being 6.5mm, it was very deformed. And i doubt that 6.5mm slugs can be that small, they are usually around 160 grain. That 52 grain slug doesnt have much missing, it was originally 55 grain not 160 grain.  It had the marks of 4 lands, i havent been able to find out whether the AR15 601 had 4 lands & grooves in the rifling, i think it did. I think modern AR15s have 6 grooves.  The deformation is very symmetrical, unlike a ricochet. Praps the slug hit the vertical face of one of the posts/gaps of the concrete barrier that acts as a fence.

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

The Lester slug was found at the southern end of the "narrow road" ie footway.  The solid fence on the western side in the pix was back in 1974 when he found the slug just a flimsy open fence i think.  I reckon that in 1963 the slug hit a vertical concrete face, possibly one of the gaps in the eastern barricade.  And it was probly moved by someone or something during the 11 years.

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

The red line is a possible traject of a slug that possibly ricocheted off the curb 23'4" from the underpass & possibly stung Tague's left cheek.  The red star is possibly where Lester found his slug.  It is a long way south of where it was more likely to be resting, praps it was moved during the 11 years.

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

Clemon Johnson standing on the underpass saw puffs of smoke on Elm St, not near the picket fence.

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

Here is an excerpt from the Kennedy Assassination website, with my comments.
https://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/witnesses.htm
Witnesses Make Wild and Wacky Statements
Anybody who reads the unfiltered and unselected witness testimony will quickly find that even honest sober witnesses have wild, wacky, and often downright bizarre elements in their testimony. Consider, for example:
J.C. Price, who thought that Kennedy and Connally were in different cars in the motorcade, and that a final shot was fired at the motorcade as much as five minutes after the first shots.
Sam Holland, who thought that after Kennedy was shot Jackie "jumped up and tried to get over in the back seat to him."
My Comment:  Holland's complete statement is very interesting & i will look into it in more detail later.

Bill Newman, who thought that the President, after the first shot rang out, "jumped up in his seat" and "was standing up."
Austin Miller, who thought the sound of shots during the shooting came from inside the President's limo.
My Comment:  Hickey's auto burst of 4 or 5 or 6 shots from Queen Mary would have sounded as if inside JFK's limo.  Miller was on top of the underpass.

Mrs. Joseph Eddie Dean, who said that after the first shot she saw Kennedy "reach to the back of his neck" before slumping down.
My Comment:  JFK did reach to the back of his neck, but we know that that was at Zapruder Z113 when he was hit by shrapnel from Oswald's shot-1 which ricocheted off the signal arm guy rod.  Dean was standing on the steps of the TSBD, ie level with the signals.  Her words confirm that Oswald's shot-1 was at Z113.   Towner's footage does indeed show JFK raising his right hand to his neck, which i have pointed out in my other thread.

Jack Franzen, who said he saw Secret Service agents in the car behind the presidential limousine"unloading from the car, some with firearms in their hands . . . ."
My Comment:  Three agents got off Queen Mary – Hill, who climbed onto JFK's limo – Landis & Ready, who then got back onto the running board (we know that both got off the running board because we can see their feet touching the tarmac under Queen Mary in Nix footage)(everyone knows that Ready jumped off & on, but i alone have pointed out before that Landis also jumped off & on).

Marvin Faye Chism, who said:
The President's wife immediately stood over him, and she pulled him up, and lay him down in the seat, and she stood up over him in the car. The President was standing and waving and smiling at the people when the shot happened. . . . The two men in the front of the car stood up, and then when the second shot was fired, they all fell down and the car took off just like that. (Decker Exhibit 5323, 19H472)
My Comment:  We know that at Z313 Hickey in Queen Mary stood fully up & then fell, which is why he accidentally fired his auto burst with his AR15.  Later, in the JFK limo, Jackie got up a little, but she didn’t fall, but anyhow she aint a man.  Just before Hickey fell Hill jumped down to chase the JFK limo, & later Hill tried say three times to get up on the back step, &  fell off say twice.  And Landis & Ready jumped off the running board of Queen Mary, but then got back on, but that was well before Hickey stood up & fell.  I think Chism is referring to Hickey & Hill.

A. J. Millican, who testified that:
Just after the President's car passed, I heard three shots come from up toward Houston and Elm right by the Book Depository Building, and then immediately I heard two more shots come from the Arcade between the Book Store and the Underpass, and then three more shots came from the same direction only sounded further back. (Decker Exhibit 5323, 19H486)
My Comment:  So Millican heard 8 shots.  I reckon that Oswald fired 2 shots & Hickey fired 4 or 5 or 6, ie perhaps 8 shots in all.  Millican probly heard 3 shots plus echoes.  Hickey's auto burst at 400 rps would have sounded like a single shot unless u were very close by.

Millican also testified that: "A man standing on the South side of Elm Street, was either hit in the foot, or the ankle and fell down." (ibid.)
Sometimes, it's easy to see how the witness might have been wrong. Jack Franzen, for example, probably saw reporters and photographers leaving the various press cars (several cars behind the Presidential limo), and perhaps also got a glance of Agent Hickey in the follow-up car brandishing an AR-15. Millican may well have seen someone like Malcolm Summers hit the ground and assumed he had been shot.
But in other cases, heaven knows where the witness got that piece of testimony.

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

Hickey was indeed a tall dude.
Yes, when he was fully standing in the back of Queen Mary the AR15 didn’t have to be at his shoulder for an accidental slug to clear the Queen Mary windshield.
See my Reply#5 on page 1 of this thread, this shows the famous drawing of the needed elevation of the AR15, with my new overlay.
This pix is the only decent pix i could find of Hickey. 
He was one of the first Agents to react, swinging around to look for a sniper, then quickly picking up his AR15.
But an acceleration or a braking of Queen Mary caused him to accidentally squeeze the trigger, triggering an auto-burst.
Either that or the AR15 01 suffered a slamfire where it auto-fired without anyone touching the trigger.
The slamfire problem was fixed in the 02 model by taking 2 gm off the wt of the firing pin.
It was rotten luck, he was only doing his job.
Notice that there is no crack in the glass left of the mirror. 
Notice there is no dent in the chrome trim above & right of the mirror.
The vertical angle of the slug that (at Z314) made the dent happens to be exactly the same angle as the vertical angle from the camera lens to the chrome trim that we see in this pix. The slug cleared the top of the rollbar by say 1/8".
Notice that there is no hole in the carpet tween the jump seats. But there will be a hole in the floor of the limo after shot-1 ricochets off the signal arm.

[Marjan Rynkiewicz]

Hickey's Colt Armalite AR15 01 we now know didn’t have a BURST mode, it had an AUTO mode. 
And we can be fairly certain that Hickey accidentally fired an auto burst of at least 4 shots, probably 5, possibly 6.
Here is my latest effort re a possible arc for a 6-shot burst.
The first shot is the JFK headshot.  The remnant slug exits & cracks the windshield where shown just left of the mirror.
Shot-2 puts a dent in the chrome trim above & right of the mirror. Fragments dent the back of the mirror.
Shot-3 hits the tarmac of Elm St.
Shot-4 hits the concrete curb.
Shot-5 hits grass.
Shot-6 hits the tarmac of Main St & ricochets onto the curb 23'4" from the pier, near Tague.
Tague's left cheek is stung & bloodied by a fragment of lead from Shot-3 or 4 or 6.
The 52 grain deformed remnant of the 55 grain slug from shot-6 or 4 or 3 is found buried on top of the triple underpass by Lester using a detector in 1974.
This freeze frame from Dale Myers' cartoon footage does not show accurately Hickey's view from Queen Mary (i should say the AR15's view), but it will have to do.
[edit][as explained in my thread Bronson Saw Hickey Shoot JFK the Bronson film frame B09 is at Zapruder Z319 & B09 shows Hickey sitting high up in his seat holding the AR15 up at 50 deg, & we know that the JFK headshot was at Z313, hence if Hickey had a 6 shot burst then shot-6 had to be the headshot & shot-5 had to dent the chrome trim etc & shot-1 or one of the other shots wounded Tague, hence the above shot numbers have to be reversed.]