MG: Key and revealing information about the cover-up surfaced when the ARRB interviewed autopsy x-ray technician Jerrol Custer. Custer's testimony proves that the plotters were already exploring ways to produce altered skull x-rays the day after the autopsy.
Custer told the ARRB that the morning after the assassination, he was called into the radiology suite by Dr. John Ebersole, the autopsy radiologist, and was told to tape some metal fragments to skull bones and x-ray them. Custer x-rayed them with the same machine, at the same distance, that he used the night before during the autopsy. Custer stated that Ebersole said these x-rays would be used to make a bust of JFK. Custer added that Dr. Ebersole suggested that he “should forget” everything he was about to see:
A: The next morning I took them.
Q: And where did you take those X-rays?
A: In the main department, in a private room, with a portable X-ray unit.
Q: Was it the same x-ray unit that was used m to take the autopsy -
A: Yes, sir. The same distance.
Q: And what was the purpose of taking these x-rays?
A: I was told by Dr. Ebersole that they were to be taken to make measurements, to make a bust of President Kennedy.
Q: What did you do when you took the x-rays? What were the procedures? How did you go about taking them?
A: All I did was place the bone fragments on the film, and I made different exposures at different distances.
Q: Did Dr. Ebersole say anything to you about metal fragments?
A: He gave me three or four different metal fragments, varying in size. And he asked me to tape them to the bones. . . .
Q: Let me try asking you one question, just to make sure that the record is clear on this. Did Dr. Ebersole ask you to tape the metal fragments to the bone after he had returned from the White House? Are you able to say with certainty?
A: Absolutely. As soon as he walked in, that’s the first thing he said. “I want these bone fragments x-rayed with metal fragments taped”. . . .
Q: Is there any question in your mind whether you, in fact, taped metal fragments to the bones?
A: Absolutely no question at all in my mind. . . .
Q: Did Dr. Ebersole ever subsequently explain to you the purpose for taping metal fragments to the bones to be -
A: No, he didn’t. He just stated to me, when he brought the film -- the bone fragments and the metal fragments to me, that he had just come back from the White House after being debriefed.
Q: And what did he say about that debriefing?
A: WelI, he just said that he was debriefed by the Secret Service. And that was it. High-ranking people had talked to him. And he suggested to me that everything that I see from now on, I should forget. (“Deposition of Jerrol Francis Custer,” ARRB, Transcript of Proceedings, October 28, 1997, pp. 143-146)
Obviously, taping bullet fragments to skull bones and then x-raying the bones had nothing to do with making a bust of JFK. Ultimately, the plotters opted not to use these x-rays because they realized that the x-rays could be altered via darkroom techniques that would be virtually impossible to detect at the time.
Scientific proof of the alteration was not discovered until Dr. David Mantik performed optical density (OD) measurements on the skull x-rays in the 1990s. Dr. Mantik discovered that the 6.5 mm object is not metallic and that the white patch in the lower rear parietal-occipital area is a physical impossibility for a human skull.
Dr. Mantik discovered that the 6.5 mm object was ghosted over a somewhat smaller genuine bullet fragment and a tiny bullet fragment. The largest of the two fragments is an irregular and jagged fragment measuring 2.0 mm at its narrowest point and 2.5 mm at its widest point, and measuring right around 6.3 mm in height. The tiny fragment is roughly circular and has a diameter of about 0.25 mm.
The density of these two genuine metal fragments is far less than the impossibly density of the 6.5 mm object as established by its OD measurements. The density of the two fragments is consistent with the density of metal fragments, whereas the 6.5 mm object's density is a physical impossibility if the object is metallic, proving that it is a ghosted image.
Dr. Mantik was even able to duplicate how the 6.5 mm object was added to the AP skull x-ray. The 6.5 mm object does not appear on the lateral skull x-rays, further absolute proof that the object is not metallic.
BTW, when Dr. Mantik read Custer’s ARRB testimony, he contacted Custer and was able to interview him at length. Custer reaffirmed his ARRB testimony in every detail.
JC: It's truly amazing what you accept as proof. 30 year old recollections from an x-ray technician don't prove anything.
Perhaps another one of your ailments is a poor memory, but most people can remember the essentials of important events they experienced decades earlier. Custer expressly said he had absolutely no doubt about his recollection of this incident.
It is clear that the incident with Dr. Ebersole still bothered Custer, and understandably so. When a senior officer who is the chief of radiation therapy, the training director for nuclear medicine, and the director of the Radiation Exposure Evaluation Laboratory at your hospital tells you to perform the very odd action of taping bullet fragments onto skull bones and x-raying them, then gives you the transparently phony excuse that this is being done for a bust of JFK, and then tells you that you should forget everything you're about to see--that's gonna get burned into your memory.
Even if true, the conclusions you draw from his statement are highly illogical. You assume every unexplained event has sinister connotations.
Really? Then let's hear your innocent explanation for why senior White House officials sent Ebersole back to the hospital with orders to have x-rays made of bullet fragments taped to skull bones. Let's hear it.
I notice you at least had enough sense not to parrot the farcical "JFK bust" explanation. I guess you realized that even a high school student would understand that x-rays of bullet fragments taped to pieces of skull would have been worthless for making a bust of JFK. The White House press office alone had literally hundreds of high-quality photos of JFK's head that could have been used to make a bust of him.
My conclusions about this incident are not the least bit "highly illogical." The Ebersole-Custer incident was clearly an early attempt by high officials to create composite x-rays that would show images not found on the original x-rays. The only reason they didn't use the fraudulent Ebersole skull x-rays was that they realized they could alter the autopsy skull x-rays with darkroom techniques.
We know the autopsy skull x-rays are altered copies of the originals from the following facts:
(1) The hard scientific evidence of multiple and independent optical-density (OD) measurements of the x-rays.
(2) The hard physical evidence that the x-ray film of the lateral neck x-ray has no emulsion missing from the side of the film in the area where the T-shaped symbol was etched into the x-ray, which is a physical impossibility unless the x-ray is a copy.
(3) The fact that the 6.5 mm object has been positively determined to be a ghosted image (both by high-magnification analysis and by independent OD measurements, not to mention that Dr. Mantik was able to duplicate how the object's image was added to the AP x-ray, and not to mention that forensic science tells us that an FMJ bullet will never "shear off" a fragment into the outer table of the skull as it penetrates the skull, especially not from the
bottom side of the bullet when it's striking the skull at a
downward angle of 15 degrees).
(4) The fact that the impossibly dense white patch on the lateral x-rays is not seen on the AP x-ray, a physical impossibility if the x-rays are pristine originals.
(5) The fact that the impossible white patch is not seen on JFK's pre-mortem skull x-rays.
(6) The fact that any area resembling the impossible white patch did not appear on any of the skull x-rays that Dr. Mantik and Dr. DeSalles used as controls.
I quote from my book
A Comforting Lie: The Myth That a Lone Gunman Killed President Kennedy:
Doug Horne, a former chief analyst for the ARRB, provides more detail on the historic research on the white patch:As a scientific “control,” Mantik and his research partner Dr. Doug DeSalles took OD measurements of lateral skull x-rays from nine coroner’s cases to obtain a range of numerical measurements between the brightest and darkest areas on these skull x-rays. In general, the brightest areas of the nine coroner’s cases transmitted about two or three times as much light as the darkest areas.
Furthermore, subjective, visual examination of the lateral x-rays of these nine skulls did not reveal the extreme contrast between very bright and very dark areas that is seen in the JFK lateral skull x-rays. The subjective visual evidence was consistent with the OD measurements, and vice-a-versa.
On the right lateral JFK skull x-ray, Dr. Mantik took many OD measurements of two specific areas. The optical density measurements for one extremely bright area located anatomically behind the ear, which he labeled “P” (for posterior) in a diagram at his lectures [i.e., the white patch], was compared with the optical density measurements for a very dark area in the front of the cranium [skull] labeled “F” (for front).
Amazingly, on the right JFK lateral skull x-ray, OD measurements revealed that area “P” (in the rear of the skull behind the ear) transmitted about 1100 times more light than area “F” (in the forward part of the skull which appears so dark in the x-ray image). That’s worth repeating: The “great white area” in the rear of the skull behind the ear in the JFK right lateral skull x-ray transmitted about1100 times more light than the dark area in the front of the cranium, whereas on the “control” x-rays the ratio was only about 2 or 3 to 1 between the brightest area and the darkest area on each lateral x-ray. (205:546)Horne further notes that on four of the nine control lateral skull x-rays, the front part of the skull was brighter than the rear part of the skull (205:546 n 28). (A Comforting Lie, pp. 275-276)
