Really good documentary on the "three casket entries" at Bethesda

[Lance Payette]

   (2) "At some point JFK's body was actually placed in a Shipping Casket for CONVENIENCE....".  Are you serious? The only thing "convenient" about shifting JFK's body into a shipping casket would be to clandestinely be able to move it around. Personnel at Parkland Hospital verify cleaning JFK's body, wrapping it in sheets, and then placing it inside the elaborate ceremonial casket. Where between Parkland Hospital and Andrews Air Force Base was the JFK Body moved from that elaborate ceremonial casket to the shipping casket? Answering that question breaks the case wide open. There is No Legit Reason for moving the body of JFK to a shipping casket. None.

Well, no, shipping caskets were standard operating procedure in the military precisely because they made shipping and handling a great deal easier. I don't find it inconceivable at all that a decision might have been made to transfer the body to a shipping casket for precisely this reason and to withhold this unpleasant fact from Jackie. Where and when this occurred - or if it occurred - I have no idea. In the abstract, it is far more likely than the body-alteration scenario. Good grief, if body-alteration were required, how difficult would it have been simply to leave the body in the Dallas casket and explain that the autopsy would be delayed a bit while the doctors were "getting things ready"? The Horne/Lifton scenario simply makes no sense.

[Lance Payette]

Comments disabled. That's all you need to know.

FWIW, comments are disabled on all of Horne's videos. I subscribe to a couple of channels of highly reputable organizations where the comments are disabled. When the subject matter is controversial and likely to bring nutcases out of the woodwork, disabling comments doesn't strike me as unreasonable or suspicious. FOX allows comments and CNN doesn't - and when you read the comments on FOX (including mine), you start to see the wisdom of CNN's decision!

[Lance Payette]

No, I only use them when they fit the facts. The things I've described that we "know" are things that are documented in black and white in the ARRB materials.

Then perhaps you are not inclined to follow the evidence where it leads when it leads to conclusions that you find too disturbing. I don't know how you could view the evidence that Horne presents and then say you don't think it proves anything. I think you mind is just locked shut against conspiracy.

How can that be? The Marine Corps NCO who headed the security detail that was tasked to guard JFK's body, SGT Boyajian, wrote in his 11/26/63 report that the casket with the body arrived at 6:35 PM, a fact that he confirmed when interviewed by the ARRB, and a fact that Dennis David also confirmed. 

Oh, come on. This makes no sense. When Lifton's book came out, the lone-gunman camp and government officials who were involved in the handling of the body swore up and down that the body never left the ceremonial casket until it was removed in the morgue minutes before the autopsy began. Even after the ARRB disclosures, this is still the position of nearly all WC defenders.

There would have been no "convenience" in moving the body into a shipping casket. How about the body bag that the body was zipped into in the shipping casket? What would have been "convenient" about putting the body in a body bag when it had already wrapped in sheets in Dallas?

Just HUH??? This would have been the natural, logical, sensible reaction of the plotters in response to finding out that things had not gone according to plan in Dallas. Their first, most urgent objective would have been to get the body out of the Dallas casket and into the hands of military doctors who could try to remove as much damning evidence as possible before the official autopsy began, military doctors who were under orders, who were told this was a matter of national security, and who were threatened with court martial if they talked.

Where do you get this? Why would "at least 25 people in Dallas and Washington" have had to be in on the scam? This is not what happened. Only a small number of people knew what was going on with the body. The others only saw isolated incidents and had no idea how what they saw related to anything else.

You seem to be forgetting, or perhaps don't know, that every witness who had anything to do with the autopsy, even if they did not see the autopsy, were forced to sign non-disclosure agreements that threatened court martial if violated. Have you not read the ARRB materials?

That is just utter nonsense. How in the devil would the 6:35 arrival have been "observed by nobody"? What about the Marine Corps security detail, headed by SGT Boyajian? It was their job to guard the body. They were there when the casket was brought to the morgue's rear landing area at 6:35, and Boyajian reported this, in writing, just three days later and also confirmed it when interviewed by the ARRB.

I suspect that even if a death-bed recording of Humes admitting to the body's early arrival and to pre-autopsy surgery surfaced, you would say he must have been delusional from pain and medication and that his admission was worthless.

How do you explain mortician Tom Robinson's testimony that he saw Humes sawing the skull before the autopsy began and that the topside damage to the head was made by Humes and Boswell? How do you explain Humes and Boswell's charade of saying there appeared to have been surgery to the head before they got the body?

Excellent post, albeit not for the reasons you think. You illustrate the conspiracy mindset to the nth degree.

Because you are a CT zealot, anyone who does not immediately agree with you is, ipso facto, an equally closed-minded LN zealot. In actuality, I would be DELIGHTED to encounter a genuinely plausible, evidence-based conspiracy theory that caused me to say "Well, I'll be danged. Oswald didn't act alone." DELIGHTED, I tell you!

As with all CT zealots, you can't see the forest for the trees. You posit a conspiracy so clumsy and inept that, immediately after the assassination, the conspirators KNOW the body is riddled with wounds and bullet fragments that will reveal their designated patsy wasn't the lone gunman. How and why, other than sheer Three Stooges ineptitude, did they allow this to occur?

Some of them, apparently, were right there at Parkland and in a position to make sure the Parkland doctors and local coroner never saw the revealing wounds and fragments. Who were they, and how did they arrange this? How could they be sure of success? How could they control what took place in Trauma Room 1 and thereafter? How could they be sure LBJ or Jackie wouldn't be agreeable to a Texas autopsy? How could they be sure the body would be transported to Bethesda rather than Walter Reed?

OK, the Bethesda medical team is standing by to do the necessary body alterations. When were they brought into the loop, and by whom? They ALL agreed to this without reservation? All of these folks risked EXECUTION for ... what?

OK, between Dallas and Bethesda the conspirators had to get the body into a shipping casket. Why - why add this layer of complexity? When and how was this done, unobserved by anyone except those connected with the conspiracy? Was there already a shipping casket on Air Force One, or did the surreptitious transfer occur at Andrews? Why not just take the Dallas casket into Bethesda and buy yourself 45 minutes with the excuse that the conspiratorial doctors were "getting things ready."

How and why, other than sheer Three Stooges ineptitude, were all the assorted non-conspirators allowed to observe the shenanigans at 6:35, 7:17 and 8:00? Why were Boyajian and Dennis told anything about JFK - why was not everyone connected with the 6:35 arrival told it was Lt. Fuzzy, who had just been killed in a car wreck (even if they had to kill Lt. Fuzzy as part of the plan)?

I'm just reacting off the top of my head. I haven't even thought through all the insane risks your scenario would entail.

As is always the case with CTers - ALWAYS the case, I repeat - you posit activities in which the conspirators were bumbling, fumbling, 40 IQ stooges at multiple critical points in your scenario, from Dealey Plaza to Bethesda. You cherry-pick evidence that even I will acknowledge is puzzling and weave it into a narrative that simply MAKES NO SENSE (unless, I repeat, the conspirators were bumbling, fumbling 40 IQ stooges who somehow found jobs in the Secret Service, FBI, military and White House).

It all makes sense to you because - wait for it - you are Exhibit A for the conspiracy-prone mindset.

[Michael T. Griffith]

For those who might be new to this issue, here are some helpful sources that explain the importance of the new evidence that Horne has uncovered and that present an overview of the evidence that the body was illicitly brought to the morgue before Jackie arrived with the Dallas casket:

Military Fraud in the JFK Autopsy
https://www.fff.org/2018/09/14/military-fraud-in-the-jfk-autopsy/

A Fascinating Development in Doug Horne’s New Documentary
https://www.fff.org/2025/07/28/a-fascinating-development-in-doug-hornes-new-documentary/

Douglas Horne, Inside the ARRB (Part IV), review by Dr. David Mantik
https://www.kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-reviews/horne-douglas-inside-the-arrb-part-iv

ARRB Master Set of Medical Exhibits
https://history-matters.com/archive/contents/arrb/contents_arrb_med-exhibits.htm

[Royell Storing]

Well, no, shipping caskets were standard operating procedure in the military precisely because they made shipping and handling a great deal easier. I don't find it inconceivable at all that a decision might have been made to transfer the body to a shipping casket for precisely this reason and to withhold this unpleasant fact from Jackie. Where and when this occurred - or if it occurred - I have no idea. In the abstract, it is far more likely than the body-alteration scenario. Good grief, if body-alteration were required, how difficult would it have been simply to leave the body in the Dallas casket and explain that the autopsy would be delayed a bit while the doctors were "getting things ready"? The Horne/Lifton scenario simply makes no sense.

   Your "getting things ready" excuse is exactly what they did to FBI Agents Sibert & O'Neil to keep them out of the morgue room where the JFK Body was. If it was "standard operating procedure" to place the JFK Body inside a Shipping Casket, why wouldn't they just say that and put all the hoopla to bed? Why? Because NOBODY would believe that  Think about it.

[Lance Payette]

For those who might be new to this issue, here are some helpful sources that explain the importance of the new evidence that Horne has uncovered and that present an overview of the evidence that the body was illicitly brought to the morgue before Jackie arrived with the Dallas casket:

Military Fraud in the JFK Autopsy
https://www.fff.org/2018/09/14/military-fraud-in-the-jfk-autopsy/

A Fascinating Development in Doug Horne’s New Documentary
https://www.fff.org/2025/07/28/a-fascinating-development-in-doug-hornes-new-documentary/

Douglas Horne, Inside the ARRB (Part IV), review by Dr. David Mantik
https://www.kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-reviews/horne-douglas-inside-the-arrb-part-iv

ARRB Master Set of Medical Exhibits
https://history-matters.com/archive/contents/arrb/contents_arrb_med-exhibits.htm

For those not inclined to review the links, the theory is that LBJ was in charge. Left open is the question of whether he knew of the need for body alteration before the JFKA or learned of it post-JFKA. ("There's been a slight screw-up, Mr. President. We had to shoot JFK from the front and, well, the body doesn't exactly look like our patsy did it. If you're OK with it, we're pretty sure some military medical types in Washington will agree to, er, fudge the body a bit to conform to the patsy thing. Yeah, Mr. P., it's an effing mess, but these things happen. We just need you to make sure the body leaves here pronto and goes to Bethesda. The same screw-ups responsible for all this will take it from there, and they promise they'll do better this time. Yes, you are correct, sir, it's an effing mess.")

The theory is apparently that the shipping casket originated in Washington, at least that's what I gather. JFK's body was somehow transferred from Air Force One at Andrews to a mystery helicopter and taken from the helicopter to the Bethesda morgue in a black hearse rather than the obvious choice of a Navy ambulance. I have yet to read a convincing explanation as to when and how JFK's body was removed from the Dallas casket at Andrews and why the Dallas casket seemed to be rather heavy for an empty casket as it was offloaded from Air Force One (a conspirator inside as part of the plan, perhaps?). The CT narratives that I have read ignore this critical detail, focusing on events after 6:35 PM. Yes, you are correct, Mr. President, it was an effing mess.

I'm not going to wade into this any deeper, but I did note that Boyajian's report says his security detail was ordered to report to Admiral Galloway at 5 PM and arrived at Bethesda at 6 PM. It was a security detail, not a body or casket detail. He says "the casket" arrived at 6:35 but never says it was JFK's casket. When interviewed by Horne in 1997, he didn't remember the arrival of the casket at all. Given the choice between (1) a massive, risk-filled, near-insane body alteration conspiracy and (2) Boyajian and others simply being sincerely mistaken that the 6:35 casket was JFK's, I'm going to go with #2 unless and until there is definite proof of at least some compelling aspect of #1.

And that's all I have to say about that. As with all aspects of Conspiracy Gospel, it's a bottomless rabbit hole to nowhere. I did enjoy Horne's documentary, however, and it gave me a much clearer understanding of the physical aspects of Bethesda. And, yes, I still regard his evidence as puzzling.

[Royell Storing]

  There's the phone call between LBJ and Hoover the morning after. The 2 got on the same page right then. 1 Shooter. Done deal.

[Lance Payette]

Although I did enjoy Horne's documentary and think it was well done, I am no longer puzzled:

https://www.jfkassassinationforum.com/index.php/topic,4435.0.html#google_vignette

Now I understand why body alteration fans conveniently ignore the rather critical questions as to how JFK's body got from Air Force One onto a mystery helicopter, into a metal shipping casket, and on its way to Bethesda in a black hearse.

The answer: It didn't.

You're welcome. Next factoid, please.