The JFK Assassination Discussion & Debate > JFK Assassination Discussion & Debate

Acoustic Evidence

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Michael T. Griffith:

--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---MG: No, he said he didn't see the two men behind the fence during the shooting. You guys brush them aside, but two of Bowers' friends said he didn't publicly reveal everything he saw. And, naturally, you dismiss journalist Penn Jones' report that Bowers' wife told him on the record that her husband was told not to talk.

Which side of the fence is "behind," from Bowers' perspective? Bowers told both Thompson and Lane that one of the men kept disappearing from his view behind the fence. The only way that would work was that the man was on the south side of the fence.  In his interview for Lane's film, in a bit left of the cutting room floor for some reason, Bowers is clear that he saw no one north of the fence at the time of the shooting. And (again!) if you've read Thompson's books, you know he gives short shrift to Bowers' "friends."
--- End quote ---

So all of his friends were just lying, and Jones just fabricated his wife's statement. Okay, thanks for sharing. I think there is good reason to believe that Bowers did not want to publicly share everything he saw. You disagree. We'll agree to disagree.


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---MG: LOL! Bowers certainly didn't think they were "looking for a place to park." They certainly didn't act like they were just "looking for place to park."
Have you actually read Bowers' account? Have you ever been in that parking lot? I have. There would have been no need to spend several minutes "probing," as Bowers put it, if they were merely looking for a parking spot. That lot is quite small. They could have spotted a parking place in a matter of seconds.

Bowers said that the first car was driving around "as if he was searching for a way out, or was checking the area." Checking the area is indeed what someone would do if they were looking for a parking spot. Or, since this was one of the cars with out-of-state plates, it might have just been someone unfamiliar with Dallas streets taking a wrong turn and was looking for the way back to pavement. But, when you read Bowers' testimony, there's nothing more than three cars driving around in a parking lot. Nothing special at all in itself. To make anything more out of it, you have to project sinister motive. But that is just your own projection.
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So 25 minutes before the motorcade arrived, three cars -- not one, not two, but three cars in the space of 25 minutes -- just happened to take the one and only short extension road into the parking lot behind the knoll and were merely looking for a way out of the parking lot once there or were just looking for a parking space! Please tell me you don't work in law enforcement, because you'd never solve a crime.

Bowers said the first car seemed to be "searching for a way out" or to be "checking the area" (6 H 285). Needless to say, "checking the area" is not the same as just looking for a parking space, since the car "circled the area in front of the tower, and to the west of the tower" (6 H 285). No car merely looking for a parking space would have done that. 

And, of course, "searching for a way out" bears no resemblance to looking for a parking space. Moreover, as someone who has spent considerable time in Dealey Plaza, I can tell you that any car that turned west onto Elm Street and came to the extension road would have been immediately able to see from the top of the extension road that the road led into a parking lot. So the idea that three cars in a row "made a wrong turn" when they took the extension road is far fetched.

The parking lot is rather small, as Bowers mentioned ("a small amount of parking area of the employees" [6 H 285]). So no one would have needed to spend several minutes ("three or four minutes") driving around in front of the tower and west of the tower to look for a parking space, nor would anyone have needed several minutes to discern that there was no other exit from the parking lot. They would have been able to see in a matter of seconds that the extension road was the only entrance and exit.

Bowers said the second car spent "3 or 4 minutes cruising around the area" and that it "did probe a little further into the area than the first car" (6 H 286). Bowers added that the driver "seemed to have a mike or telephone or something" that he was "holding something up to his mouth with one hand and he was driving with the other, and gave that appearance" (6 H 286). When Ball asked how Bowers could tell that, Bowers said the car came "very close to the tower" (6 H 286).

"Just looking for the way back" or "looking for a place to park"?! Really? And, of course, there was nothing the least bit unusual about a driver "looking for the way back" or "looking for a place to park" to be talking into a microphone while driving around for "three or four minutes," right? "Nothing to see hear," right? Again, please tell me you don't work in law enforcement.

Bowers said the third car arrived 7-9 minutes before the shooting, spent even more time driving around the small parking lot, "probed" one spot at the tower in the process, and paused just above the assassination site before driving out of Bowers' sight:

Mr. BALL. Did you see another car?

Mr. BOWERS. Third car, which entered the area, which was some seven or nine minutes before the shooting. . . .

Mr. BALL. What did it do?

Mr. BOWERS. He spent a little more time in the area. He tried -- he circled the area and probed one spot right at the tower in an attempt to get and was forced to back out some considerable distance, and slowly cruised down back towards the front of the School Depository Building. . .

The last I saw of him he was pausing just about in -- just above the assassination site. (6 H 286)

Are you kidding? "Just looking for the way back" or "looking for a place to park"?! To repeat, if the cars had merely been looking for a way to leave the parking lot after all three supposedly accidentally entered it, they would not have needed to spend several minutes "checking" and "probing" the lot. They would have been able to discern in a matter of seconds that the extension road was the only way out of the lot. Ditto for trying to find a parking space.

To anyone whose thought process is not chained down by the lone-gunman theory, it is obvious that the cars were doing a recon. Bowers clearly thought so, and for good reasons.


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---MG: And never mind that the area had been sealed off since 11:00 and that there had been virtually no movement in the area since then, which is why the three cars' strange behavior caught Bowers' attention, right?
 
The area was never "sealed off" until after the assassination. That is just Bowers' inference or yours. The officers stationed in and around Dealey Plaza said that they didn't stop traffic until a few minutes before the motorcade arrived. No one was going to split the downtown of a major American city in two for an hour and a half (beginning a half-hour before the President even landed!) for a motorcade.
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Bowers:

Mr. BALL. Close to noon, did you make any observation of the area around between your tower and Elm Street?

Mr. BOWERS. Yes; because of the fact that the area had been covered by police for some 2 hours. Since approximately 10 o’clock in the morning traffic had been cut off into the area so that anyone moving around could actually be observed. (6 H 285)

Bowers in his 1966 filmed interview:

Well, for some time that morning, since perhaps 10:00 in the morning, we had had the area pretty well sealed off. Policemen had been stationed on the triple underpass as well as other strategic corners in the area. There was very little traffic moving into this area at this time. . . .

After 11:00 or 11:30, there was practically no movement in the area whatsoever.


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---MG: Oh, yeah, sure it is. You don't even know what you're talking about, and I can tell you've read next to nothing on the subject.

I've read and written quite a bit on the acoustic analysis. Enough that I was name-checked in Michael O'Dell's response to Thomas. You're the guy who has no idea what he's talking about.
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Uh-huh, we'll see in a moment who doesn't know what he's talking about.


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---MG: The BBN acoustical scientists used the same methods and scientific principles in analyzing the DPD dictabelt that they used when they analyzed the audio recording of the 1970 Kent State shooting.

As far as I've ever been able to find, the BBN methodology used for the Dictabelt has never been thoroughly tested in a controlled environment, so we have no idea if it really works as well as Barger, et al, would have us believe. Just from the match data that Barger presented in HSCA exhibit F-367 implies that the BBN method isn't very sensitive to source location, which is of course critical to the analysis.
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Hogwash. And you claim to know what you're talking about with the acoustical evidence?

In the Kent State case, Dr. Barger and his team used a combination of waveform physics, sound-speed calculations, vector triangulation, and an onsite reenactment to identify the location and timing of the numerous shots that were fired. They identified the shock waves and muzzle blasts of the rifle fire. By measuring the precise time-delay intervals between the arrival of the shock waves and the arrival of the muzzle blasts, the BBN scientists were able to mathematically calculate which National Guardsmen were the first to fire shots.

Does any of this sound familiar? Huh?

If you had read the reports that the BBN and Queens College acoustical scientists submitted to the HSCA, you would know these were the same methods and principles that those scientists used to analyze the DPD dictabelt. Dr. G. Paul Chambers, a physicist who has worked with NASA, with the Naval Surface Warfare Center, and with the Naval Research Laboratory, recognizes this fact. I quote from his explanation of the intricate correlations between the dictabelt impulse patterns and the impulse patterns from the Dealey Plaza test firing and how the HSCA's acoustical scientists established them:

The HSCA commissioned the acoustics firm of Bolt, Beranek, & Newman (BBN) to perform a scientific analysis on the Dictabelt recording. This firm had previously successfully utilized acoustical analysis to determine the events that transpired during the Kent State shooting in 1970. Their acoustical analysis was later used as evidence presented to a grand jury to determine which national guardsman had fired first. BBN was also pointed by Judge John J. Sirica to serve on a panel of technical experts to analyze President Richard Nixon’s Watergate tapes.

Led by their chief scientist, Dr. James Barger, BBN converted the sounds on the tapes [the Channel 1 tape and the Channel 2 tape] to digitized waveforms. They then ran the waveforms through electronic filters to eliminate repetitive background noise like the sound of the motorcycle pistons firing. The firm then examined the processed waveforms for “sequences of impulses.” Their analysis indicated that there were six sequences of interest, spaced together within an eleven-second period recorded on channel 1, which could be consistent with the sounds of gunshots. . . .

Weiss and Aschkenasy reviewed Barger’s analysis and conclusions. They found that Barger’s analysis was valid and his conclusions supported by the evidence on the tape. They concurred with his recommendation to conduct live-fire tests in Dealey Plaza to determine the origin and direction of the gunshots, and they approved his plan for acoustical reconstruction. . . .

In Dealey Plaza, the sounds of gunshots would produce similar echoes. When recorded and captured on a specialized electronic device like an oscilloscope that converts sound patterns into pictures, these echoes appear as “acoustical waveforms” and appear as unique signatures of sound-producing events. In the case of a rifle shot in Dealey Plaza, the acoustical signatures would differ based on the origin, direction, and velocity of the shot, as well as the location of the recording microphone. The echo patterns would depend on the timing of sound reflections off building or other structures and obstructions in the plaza. . . .

A recording was made of the sounds received at each microphone during each test shot, making a total of 432 recordings of impulse sequences. . . . Each recorded impulse sequence was then compared with each of the six impulse patterns on the channel 1 Dictabelt recording to see the degree to which significant points in each impulse pattern matched. . . .

The time of the arrival of the impulses, or echoes, in each sequence of impulses was the characteristic being compared, not the shape, amplitude, or any other characteristic of the impulses or sequences. . . .

When the BBN team performed their analysis of the acoustical waveforms, they found something extraordinary. When they compared the impulse sequences from the acoustical reconstruction to the sequences on the original Dictabelt recording, they found a number of significant matches. When the locations of the microphones that recorded matches in the reconstruction were plotted on a graph of time versus distance, it was found that the location of the microphones that recorded matches were clustered around a line on the graph that was consistent with the known speed of the motorcade (11 mph). . . .

Of the thirty-six microphones placed along the motorcade route, the one that recorded the sequence of impulses that matched the third impulse on the 1963 dispatch tape [the dictabelt tape] was farther along the route than the one that recorded the impulses that matched the second impulse on the dispatch tape.

The locations of the microphones were consistent with the distance a motorcycle traveling at about 11 mph would cover in the elapsed time between impulses on the dispatch tape. . . . Applying a statistical formula, Barger estimated that since the microphones clustered around a line representing the speed of the motorcade, there was a 99 percent probability that the Dallas police dispatch tape did, in fact, contain impulses transmitted by a microphone in the motorcade in Dealey Plaza during the assassination. . . .

Weiss and Aschkenasy, specialists in sonar applications . . . examined Dealey Plaza carefully to determine which structures were most likely to have caused the echoes recorded by the microphone in the acoustical reconstruction that had exhibited a match to the shot from the grassy knoll. They verified and refined their identifications of echo-producing structures by examining the results of the 1978 reconstruction [the test firing in Dealey Plaza]. This approach allowed them to look for matches in the data with a 1 ms [millisecond] correlation. . . . Matches at this level of temporal precision substantially reduced the possibility that a match could occur as a result of random noise.

In Dealey Plaza, echoes from gunshot test patterns arrive in two discrete [different] clusters, differing in time by about 190 ms. Echoes originating from structures along Elm Street arrive within 85 ms, while echoes from structures farther back on Houston Street arrive in the last 95 ms of a typical 370-ms-duration test pattern. In addition, a “muzzle blast” is usually prominent at the beginning of a gunshot acoustical pattern, while an N-wave (a shock wave traveling faster than the speed of sound due to the rifle bullet exceeding the sound barrier) arrives prior to the muzzle blast. The waveform identified as the grassy knoll shot is shown in figure 13. The presence of an N-wave in this waveform was consistent with the acoustical signature of a supersonic rifle bullet. (Chambers, Head Shot: The Science Behind the JFK Assassination, 2010, pp. 96-102)


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---The military uses the same scientific principles and methodology to acoustically locate gunfire today that the HSCA's acoustical scientists used. In fact, Dr. Barger, as I've pointed out, developed patented new technology for the military and police forces to acoustically locate gunfire.

No, they don't! The HSCA analysis used a correlative methodology comparing a test recording against a library of recordings of test shots. Modern shot location detection systems use either epicentric methods, stereophonic methods, or a combination of stereophonic+shockwave detection and only operate on live acoustic input. Like  I said, you're the guy who doesn't know what he's talking about.
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LOL! Uh, partner, this nonsense is further proof that you are the one who doesn't know what he's talking about. One, the HSCA analysis included shockwave detection and muzzle-blast and muzzle-blast-echo interval timing identification, just as present-day military systems use. Have you not read Weiss and Aschkenasy's HSCA report on their sonar analysis of the 144.9 impulse pattern, for starters?

Now, of course, in terms of the equipment used in present-day operations vs. what the HSCA's acoustical scientists used, obviously there is a difference, but the core scientific principles used are the same.

I have the advantage of having had basic acoustical training in my training to be a signals interceptor in the military. I also have the advantage of having done technical editing of classified and unclassified military manuals on signals detection and direction-finding equipment for several years. Now, just to be clear, I'm not claiming to be an acoustical scientist, but I do know a whole lot more about acoustics than your average Joe knows.


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---BTW, the new research done by BBN scientists, including Dr. Barger, from 2015-2018 proves that the dictabelt's impulse patterns were recorded in Dealey Plaza during the assassination and debunks the NRC/NAS's claim that the Decker "hold everything" transmission is crosstalk.

At best, the latest bit of face-saving from BBN shows that PCC is so dependent on the assumptions input into it that it can't prove or disprove anything.
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What?! So PCC analysis "can't prove or disprove anything"?! Gee, that's not what Linsker and his colleagues said about their PCC test! They claimed it proved that the Fisher "I'll check" transmission is not crosstalk! Have you not even read their article? You have no clue what you're talking about, do you? I think you're using words whose definition you don't even understand.

At best, you're clumsily trying to whitewash the fact that Linsker et al. botched, or rigged, their PCC test by using the ridiculous sample-width window of 512, which was guaranteed to produce inaccurate results loaded with extraneous data, and they used that window for all three potential crosstalk transmissions. As Dr. Barger explained to Thompson, this is not how an actual PCC test is done, noting that a 512 window is "a much coarser measurement tool."

Linsker and his buddies also made the false assumption that the NRC/FBI playback contains no skips, when in fact it contains at least four skips.

Linsker and his colleagues declined to publish the raw data of their PCC test of the Fisher transmission, but they claimed that the test showed the Fisher transmission was not crosstalk because the obtained PCC peak was not at the "expected speed warp." This was pure hokum, and they surely knew it, or should have known it.

As they should have known, the actual speed warp at any given moment would be a small deviation from the expected speed, and the computer in a PCC analysis overcomes this problem by comparing the two recordings at increments of warp. It starts with the "expected" speed and then samples iteratively at 1% too fast, then 1% too slow, and then 2% too fast, then 2% too slow, etc., etc. In this case the "expected" speed warp was 1.08, and so the computer sampled at warps between 0.85 to 1.14. The best match, or highest peak, was found at a speed warp of 1.12, about 4% off from expected. This proves it is irrelevant that the peak was found at a different speed warp than the expected speed. This is exactly why the computer makes the comparison iteratively at increments of speed warp that deviate from the expected speed. Long story short, when Linsker et al. tested cross-talk instances that they favored, they ignored their "not at the expected speed warp" excuse for rejecting the Fisher transmission as crosstalk and assumed that the "correct" speed was whatever speed generated the highest peak.

The most charitable assumption we can make is that Linsker et al. botched their PCC test because not one of them was an acoustical scientist. 


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---The heterodyning that accompanies and corresponds exactly with the channel 1 "I'll check it" proves that it's a native channel 1 transmission and not crosstalk.
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LOL! I guess you didn't read my previous comments on this point. Rather than reinvent the wheel, I'll just quote part of what I said to Barber when he floated this argument:

Did you miss the fact that even Bowles admitted that the Fisher "I'll check" transmission is crosstalk? Again, did you even read my reply or did you just glance at it before you rubber-stamped Corbett's inane reply?

Did you miss the fact that Dr. Mullen's PCC test proved that the Fisher "I'll check" transmission is actual crosstalk and that the Decker "hold everything" transmission is nothing but an overdub that was not even recorded at the same speed as the acknowledged crosstalk transmissions?

As for your spurious argument that the Fisher transmission can't be crosstalk because it is accompanied by heterodyne tones, I take it you're unaware that heterodyne tones also occur near and during the Decker transmission. So, according to you, the Decker transmission can't be crosstalk. You would have known better than to repeat the heterodyne argument if you had read Dr. Thomas's research or Dr. Thompson's research.

BTW, Linsker and his colleagues tried to conceal the fact that even their own incompetently done PCC test disqualified the Decker transmission as crosstalk if they accepted the heterodyne argument (Thompson, Last Second in Dallas, p. 512).

This whole erroneous heterodyne argument started with the NRC/NAS panel because they didn't understand the relationship of the transmitters and didn't understand how broadcasts can be superimposed from one channel onto another. They wrongly assumed that the Channel 2 broadcast had been picked up over the motorcycle's transmitter, i.e., its open microphone, but the broadcast was actually picked up by another transmitter, most likely a police unit parked at the Trade Mart where police officers had gathered for JFK's expected arrival.


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---MG: I notice you haven't laid a finger on any of the evidence that the HSCA's acoustical scientists documented in support of their findings (the timing-movement correlations, the sonar analysis that verified the grassy knoll shot, the windshield-distortion correlations, and the presence of N-waves, muzzle blasts, and muzzle-blast echoes in the correct order and interval and only when the microphone was in position to record them).

I only have so much time to devote to these exchanges, and your dedicated posts on the matter are so full of misunderstandings, misapprehensions, and misrepresentations that I'd be pulling 24/7 shifts to devote justice to each and every one of your "points." By the way, an "N"-wave is a waveform so-named mererly because it is shaped like a capital letter "N," and are not unique to shock waves.
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LOL! Oh my goodness! Even the NRC/NAS panel did not float this comical gaffe, but many WC apologists, knowing little or nothing about the acoustical evidence, continue to make this erroneous argument -- and here you are repeating it. You clearly don't understand the N-wave evidence that the HSCA's acoustical scientists identified and explained.

This "N-waves are not unique to shock waves" argument started with one of the three dissenting HSCA congressmen, Congressman Edgar, and Weiss and Aschkenasy debunked it (5 HSCA 609-610). Yes, random noise can create a waveform that resembles an N-wave when displayed on an oscillogram (an oscilloscope printout), but that waveform is not going to include the waveforms of a muzzle blast and then muzzle-blast echoes, much less a muzzle blast and muzzle-blast echoes that occur in the correct order and interval. Never.

I'm guessing you don't know that the N-waves on the dictabelt include these key traits: muzzle blast followed by muzzle-blast echoes, and each phenomenon occurs in the right order and interval.

For a sound wave to be an N-wave, it must come before the muzzle blast, and it must do so in the very small and specific timeframe of 10-30 milliseconds, and then the muzzle blast will come after the N-wave, and then the muzzle blast will be followed by its own echo. Weiss and Aschkenasy explained how these groups of impulses appear in the graphical representation of one of the test-firing shots:

The first waveform appearing in the graph, the large peak at the left-hand side, corresponds to the supersonic shockwave [N-wave] of the rifle bullet. The second large peak is the waveform of the muzzle blast. Following it, with generally diminishing heights, are the waveforms of the echoes of the muzzle blast. The delay time of each echo was determined by direct measurement of the distance from the leading edge of the muzzle blast waveform to that of the echo. (8 HSCA 24)

And Weiss and Aschkenasy's sonar analysis proved that all 26 of the echo patterns of the grassy knoll test shot matched with the 26 echo patterns of the dictabelt’s 144.9 impulse pattern (8 HSCA 27-29). 

There is also the fact that the N-waves on the dictabelt not only include a muzzle blast and muzzle-blast echoes, but they occur only when the microphone was in position to record them.


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---MG: I think one of the first things people will notice is that you ignore the fact that five of the reactions are supported by the recognized science of blur analysis (I only mention four blur events in the article because I don't mention that a marked blur episode occurs around the time of the Z313 headshot, since no one questions that Z313-317 shows a reaction to a shot).

Is blur analysis actually a "recognized science" and who recognizes it as such?
--- End quote ---

Huh, I guess you haven't read the HSCA PEP's report? Are you aware that testing has proven that people doing filming will always, always jiggle the camera when they hear a gunshot, even if they know the shot is coming? CBS established this fact in one of their tests.

John Corbett:

--- Quote from: Michael T. Griffith on September 19, 2026, 01:05:29 PM ---
So 25 minutes before the motorcade arrived, three cars -- not one, not two, but three cars in the space of 25 minutes -- just happened to take the one and only short extension road into the parking lot behind the knoll and were merely looking for a way out of the parking lot once there or were just looking for a parking space! Please tell me you don't work in law enforcement, because you'd never solve a crime.

Bowers said the first car seemed to be "searching for a way out" or to be "checking the area" (6 H 285). Needless to say, "checking the area" is not the same as just looking for a parking space, since the car "circled the area in front of the tower, and to the west of the tower" (6 H 285). No car merely looking for a parking space would have done that. 


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Whenever MTG is faced with something for which the explanation is unknown, his knee jerk reaction is to assume a sinister explanation, i.e. one with conspiratorial explanations. MTG's limited ability to think critically prevents him from asking himself a few simple questions. If these three cars were connected to a conspiracy, why was it necessary to send three cars into the parking lot and why did they leave the area without dropping somebody off there.

MTG has been give two plausible reasons for these cars to show up in the parking lot but they are not to his liking because they don't point to a conspiracy. It could have been people looking for a parking place or it could have been plain clothes law enforcement officers doing a security check prior to the arrival of the POTUS. It could have some other explanation that none of us have thought of. No, that's no good for MTG. His mindset is to assume every unexplained even is evidence of a conspiracy.

Given the massive length of this post from MTG, which might be record setting, I'm going to pass on responding, or even bothering to read the rest of it. It's just past 9:00 am in the eastern time zone and college football games begin at noon. I don't want to miss the start of these games.

Steve M. Galbraith:

--- Quote from: John Corbett on September 19, 2026, 02:22:28 PM ---Whenever MTG is faced with something for which the explanation is unknown, his knee jerk reaction is to assume a sinister explanation, i.e. one with conspiratorial explanations. MTG's limited ability to think critically prevents him from asking himself a few simple questions. If these three cars were connected to a conspiracy, why was it necessary to send three cars into the parking lot and why did they leave the area without dropping somebody off there.

MTG has been give two plausible reasons for these cars to show up in the parking lot but they are not to his liking because they don't point to a conspiracy. It could have been people looking for a parking place or it could have been plain clothes law enforcement officers doing a security check prior to the arrival of the POTUS. It could have some other explanation that none of us have thought of. No, that's no good for MTG. His mindset is to assume every unexplained even is evidence of a conspiracy.

Given the massive length of this post from MTG, which might record setting, I'm going to pass on responding, or even bothering to read the rest of it. It's just past 9:00 am in the eastern time zone and college football games begin at noon. I don't want to miss the start of these games.

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In conspiracy world the same Bowers who is not credible because he was supposedly threatened to change what he said he saw behind the fence becomes suddenly credible about what he saw about other matters, e.g., the cars. When he said he didn't see anyone behind the fence he is a liar forced to dissemble by sinister forces who threatened him. When he mentions three cars going through the parking lot (and leaving?) he is truthful; the sinister forces disappear (well, they're driving the cars). Bower is both credible and not credible, honest and not honest, believable and not believable. The sinister forces come and go (and not just in cars); they appear and disappear. It all depends on whether it supports a conspiracy or not. Nothing else matters.

Bowers' account is a textbook example of conspiracy thinking. It's Jim Garrison at his finest. There are many other example but it's one of the better cases. In conspiracy world evidence that doesn't show a conspiracy, that goes against a conspiracy, is turned upside down into evidence there *was* a conspiracy. Because that evidence is faked, phony, staged, false or in the case of Bowers coerced. So evidence of "A" is really evidence of "not A." Evidence there was no gunman behind the fence is really evidence there was a gunman behind the fence.

Bowers said he saw no one behind the fence at the time of the shooting. He said he heard three and only three shots. He said all of the shots sounded like they came from either end of Elm Street, either the TSBD or the underpass. He heard no shots from behind the fence. He saw no one with a rifle. He saw two men "towards the mouth of the underpass". He didn't see them leave. He said they stayed in the area when the police officer (Haygood) went up the knoll/incline.

This is evidence there wasn't a gunman behind the fence. No shots were heard, no rifle was seen, the two men stayed around.

In Michael Griffith's conspiracy world where up is down and down is up this is all evidence there was a shooter behind the fence. This is the deranged thinking of Jim Garrison who said you must think "up is down and down is up."

Michael T. Griffith:
I have to chuckle at Corbett's claim that I've been given two "two plausible reasons for these cars to show up in the parking lot," yet he said nothing -- not one word -- about my demolition of those two implausible reasons. As usual, he simply ignored counter-arguments and contrary facts and repeated his talking point.

As for Corbett's complaint that some of my replies are "massive," some of them are indeed long because, as the famous saying goes, "it takes one minute to tell a lie, and an hour to refute it."

The fact that Mitch Todd would pretend to have a solid grasp of the acoustical evidence and then, in the same reply, repeat the same embarrassing bogus argument that some amateurs on the Internet have made against the dictabelt's N-waves, an argument that even the NRC/NAS panel knew better than to float, an argument that the Queens College acoustical scientists completely destroyed, shows he is not to be taken seriously on the subject.


--- Quote from: Mitch Todd on September 19, 2026, 12:58:08 AM ---And (again!) if you've read Thompson's books, you know he gives short shrift to Bowers' "friends."
--- End quote ---

Oh, really? Well now, either you haven't actually read Thompson's book, or you somehow think I haven't, or you were hoping no one would bother to check your claim. Thompson specifically says that the reports of two of Bowers' coworkers should be taken seriously and that they "suggest that Bowers saw more than he revealed when questioned by Joe Ball and Mark Lane" (Last Second in Dallas, 2021, p. 128).

Let's read more of what Thompson says on the subject in his book, shall we? Here you go:

Also not to be taken seriously are reports from people who knew Bowers that he claimed to have seen one of the men he described put a rifle in the trunk of a car. These reports surfaced in the 1990s when various TV producers were in search of a story. The same cannot be said of the reports of two individuals who, like Bowers, worked for the Union Terminal Railroad.

Both suggest that Bowers saw more than he revealed when questioned by Joe Ball and Mark Lane.

The first is Olan DeGaugh. As yardmaster, he was several levels above Bowers in the railroad company hierarchy. In an oral history interview in 2002, he described Bowers as “a good person, a good worker, a good man. . . . . He was. . . .  one of my best friends.” When asked if he had talked to Bowers about the Kennedy assassination, he replied, “Several times. I don’t know how many times. Not a real long conversation.” When asked if Bowers ever varied his story about what happened that day, DeGaugh said, “I don’t think he ever changed it.”

And what did Bowers tell DeGaugh about the assassination?

DeGaugh said, “Well, the day Kennedy was assassinated, he [Bowers] was looking out the window and there was a car parked next to the board fence out here barely where the street ends and he saw someone holding the trunk of a car put something in it and drive off. And it had been assumed that it had been Oswald. It may have been Oswald.” DeGaugh said the car “was a coupe of some kind . . . an old car.” 

The second is Barney Mozley, the switchman who relieved Bowers by taking the “second trick” in the tower that Friday afternoon.  Also in 2002, Mozley gave an oral history interview. After explaining his difficulty in getting through police lines to relieve Bowers, Mozley pointed out that from the tower, “you can’t see the assassination. I mean, when there was actually shooting. You could hear it, but you couldn’t see it. That was the way it was.” He did talk to Bowers about the assassination within days of November 22.

QUESTION: Did he ever talk to you about the assassination at all ever?

ANSWER: Yeah, he did, but he didn’t want it to be repeated. And I never did say anything about him, but I can say something about him now. He was a . . . yeah, he would do that and tell you, “Now, don’t go around talking about it because,” he said, “It’s dangerous.” But he never said dangerous from whom.

QUESTION: How long after the assassination did he tell you that?

ANSWER: Oh, it was just a few days. (Last Second in Dallas, pp. 128-129)

And while we're at it, let's read some of what Thompson said about Bowers' account in his famous 1967 book Six Seconds in Dallas:

From his perch 14 feet above the ground Bowers controlled eleven tracks in the Union Station and two additional freight sidings. He also had a grandstand seat for observing some unusual happenings in the area of the stockade fence and the parking lot behind.

Traffic into the parking area was cut off at 10:00 A.M. (6 H 285). The lot was already jammed with the cars of people who had come to downtown Dallas to watch the presidential motorcade. Bowers recalled that nothing unusual happened until shortly before noon. His affidavit filed on November 22 tells the story:

At about 11:55 am I saw a dirty 1959 Oldsmobile station wagon come down the street toward my building. This street dead ends in the railroad. This car had out of state license plates with white background and black numbers, no letters. It also had a Goldwater for "64" sticker in the rear window. This car just drove around slowly and left the area. It was occupied by a middle-aged white man partly grey hair.

At about 12:15 pm another car came in the area with a white man about 25 to 35 years old driving. This car was a 1957 Ford, Black, 2 doors with Texas license. This man appeared to have a mike or telephone in the car.

Just a few minutes after this car left at 12:20 pm another car pulled in. This car was a 1961 Chevrolet, Impala, 4 door, am not sure that this was a 4-door, color white and dirty up to the windows. This car also had a Goldwater for "64" sticker. This car was driven by a white male about 25 to 35 years old with long blond hair. He stayed in the area longer than the others. This car also had the same type license plates as the 1959 Oldsmobile. He left the area about 12:25 pm. About 8 or 10 minutes after he left I heard at least 3 shots very close together. Just after the shots the area became crowded with people coming from Elm Street and the slope just north of Elm (24 H 201).

Notice that in this 11/22/63 affidavit, the earliest statement that he made, he said he heard "at least" three shots.

Four months later Bowers was asked by the Commission how he knew the man in the black Ford was operating a radio. He replied:

He was holding something up to his mouth with one hand and he was driving with the other and gave that appearance. He was very close to the tower. I could see him as he proceeded around the area (6 H 286).

Apparently Lee Bowers was not the only person watching the parking lot and stockade fence to the north of Elm Street. About half a minute before the motorcade passed the corner of Elm and Houston Streets, Bob Edwards and Ronald Fischer noticed a young man standing at a sixth-floor, southeast-corner window of the Depository looking in the same direction. Fischer testified:

Bob punched me and said, "Look at that guy there in that window." And he made some remark—said, "He looks like he's uncomfortable" — or something. And I looked up and watched the man for, oh, I'd say, 10 or 15 seconds . . . This man held my attention for 10 or 15 seconds, because he appeared uncomfortable for one, and secondly, he wasn't watching—uh—he didn't look like he was watching for the parade. He looked like he was looking down toward the Trinity River and the triple underpass down at the end—toward the end of Elm Street. And—uh—all the time I watched him, he never moved his head, he never moved anything. Just was there transfixed (6 H 193).

It is, of course, impossible to know for certain why the sniper on the sixth floor of the Depository was more interested in the area to the north of Elm Street than in the motorcade approaching him. A possible clue is furnished by Lee Bowers.

Bowers had worked in the North Tower for over ten years and hence knew by sight the railroad employees who worked in the yards. On that Friday morning he noticed two men he had never seen before standing behind the stockade fence. "They were standing within 10 or 15 feet of each other," Bowers told the Commission, "and gave no appearance of being together, as far as I knew. They were facing and looking towards Main and Houston, and following the caravan as it came down" (6 H 287).

Bowers watched the motorcade turn right on Houston Street. Then it disappeared, to emerge a moment later on Elm Street. Just as the presidential car disappeared behind the concrete colonnade to the north of Elm Street, the shots rang out. At precisely this instant Bowers noted some "commotion" near the stockade fence (6 H 288). Asked by Commission Counsel Joseph A. Ball to be more explicit about what attracted his attention, he replied:

I just am unable to describe rather than it was something out of the ordinary, a sort of milling around, but something occurred in this particular spot which was out of the ordinary, which attracted my eye for some reason, which I could not identify. (6 H 288)

Much later Bowers was asked by Mark Lane to amplify his answer. In a tape-recorded interview Bowers remarked:

At the time of the shooting, in the vicinity of where the two men I have described were, there was a flash of light or, as far as I am concerned, something I could not identify, but there was something which occurred which caught my eye in this immediate area on the embankment. Now, what this was, I could not state at that time and at the 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.

This "unusual occurrence—a flash of light or smoke or something" was observed by other witnesses who reported it to law-enforcement officers on the scene. Deputy Sheriffs L. C. Smith, Seymour Weitzman, A. D. McCurley, and J. L. Oxford all later spoke of witnesses who called their attention to the stockade fence. Smith reported that as he ran toward the knoll "I heard a woman unknown to me say the President was shot in the head and the shots came from the fence on the north side of Elm Street" (19 H 516). Weitzman recalled that:

As he came to the fence at the top of the grassy slope, some bystander mentioned that the firecracker or shot had come from the other side of the fence, and he requested a bystander to bend over and he used the bystander's back as a step and vaulted over the fence (Archives, CD 5).

McCurley and Oxford independently reported being told by a witness or witnesses that smoke had been seen near the corner of the stockade fence. McCurley recalled:

I ran over and jumped a fence and a railroad worker stated to me that he believed the smoke from the bullets came from the vicinity of a stockade fence which surrounds the park area (19 H 514).

Oxford gave a similar account:

We jumped the picket fence which was along Elm Street and ran over into the railroad yards. When we got there, there was a man who told us that he had seen smoke up in the corner of the fence (19 H 530).

The "railroad worker" mentioned by McCurley and the "man" noted by Oxford may in fact be the same person. And this might possibly be S. M. Holland, who, only hours after the shooting, signed an affidavit which reads in part:

The President's car was coming down Elm Street and when they got just about to the Arcade I heard what I thought for the moment was a firecracker and he slumped over and I looked over towards the arcade and trees and saw a puff of smoke come from the trees and I heard three more shots after the first shot but that was the only puff of smoke I saw . . . the puff of smoke I saw definitely came from behind the arcade through the trees (20 H 163).

So Holland was not only certain he saw a puff of smoke come from behind the fence, but he heard four shots -- one shot that sounded like a firecracker and then then "three more shots after the first shot." 

Four and one-half months later Holland reiterated his contention concerning the puff of smoke to Assistant Counsel Stern:

There was a shot, a report . . . and a puff of smoke came out about 6 or 8 feet above the ground right out from under those trees. And at just about this location from where I was standing you could see that puff of smoke, like someone had thrown a firecracker, or something out, and that is just about the way it sounded. It wasn't as loud as the previous reports or shots (6 H 244).

Counsel Stern pressed Holland on whether he had indeed heard four shots. Holland replied:

I have no doubt about it. I have no doubt about seeing that puff of smoke come out from under those trees either (6 H 244).

When we interviewed Holland in Dallas we asked him to point out on a photograph exactly where he had seen the puff of smoke. He told us:

Right under these trees, right at that exact spot, about ten or fifteen feet from this corner, the corner of the fence here, back this way, right under this clump of trees, right under this tree, particular tree. It's that exact spot, right there . . . That's where it was . . . just like somebody had thrown a firecracker and left a little puff of smoke there; it was just laying there. It was a white smoke; it wasn't a black smoke or like a black powder. It was like a puff of a cigarette, but it was about nine feet off the ground. It would be just about in line with, or maybe just a little bit higher than that fence, but by the time it got out underneath the tree, well, it would be about eight or nine feet . . . [the ground slopes off sharply in front of the fence] "Right under these trees . . . it was (Taped interview, Nov. 30, 1966).

Holland was not the only witness to see the puff of smoke. Richard Dodd, who had stood next to Holland on the overpass, later reported that "the shot . . . the smoke came from behind the hedge on the north side of the Plaza." Austin Miller swore out an affidavit on November 22 in which he declared: "I saw something which I thought was smoke or steam coming from a group of trees north of Elm off the railroad tracks" (24 H 217). When interviewed by the FBI in March, 1964, James Simmons reported seeing "fumes of smoke near the embankment in front of the TSBD [Depository]" (22 H 833), while Clemon Johnson stated that "white smoke was observed near the pavilion" (22 H 836). In addition, both Walter Winbom and Thomas Murphy told an independent investigator that they had observed smoke in the trees along the knoll. In all, at least seven people standing on the overpass saw smoke in the area of the parking lot and the stockade fence.

Dodd, Simmons, and Holland were so sure a shot had come from the corner of the fence that (as soon as the President's car disappeared beneath them) they ran to their left off the overpass and into the parking lot adjoining the fence. They had to leap a steam pipe and then make their way across the tangle of cars in the lot. Jumping over bumpers and crawling over hoods, they arrived near the corner of the fence a minute or two later. . . . Dodd recalled that "there were tracks . . . where someone had been standing on the bumper looking over the fence." Seymour Weitzman joined the railroad workers at about this time and later reported noticing "numerous kinds of footprints that did not make sense because they were going different directions" (7 H 107). Holland gave a similar description of these strange footprints to the Warren Commission (6 H 245-246). During our interview we asked Holland about these footprints and he told us:

And I got over to the spot where 1 saw the smoke come from and heard the shot; I was looking for empty shells or some indication that there was a rifleman or someone over there. Well, you know it'd been raining that morning and behind the station wagon from one end of the bumper to the other, I expect you could've counted four or five-hundred footprints down there. And on the bumper, oh about twelve or eighteen inches apart, it looked like someone had raked their shoes off; there were muddy spots up there, like someone had been standing up there (Taped interview, Nov. 30, 1966).

Later on in the interview Holland told us that the marks were men's footprints and that he was puzzled by their narrow grouping. "That was the mystery to me," Holland exclaimed, "that they didn't extend further than from one end of the bumper to the other. That's as far as they would go. It looked like a lion pacing a cage."

BTW, the location with the odd footprints that Holland and others saw, the location from which they also saw smoke emitted and from which they were certain they heard gunfire -- this location was just a few feet from the location of the grassy knoll gunfire identified by the HSCA's acoustical analysis. Just an incredible, cosmic coincidence, right?!

It is possible that these footprints bear some relation to the sixth-floor sniper's interest in this area. It is also possible that the prints belonged to one of the two strangers spotted behind the fence by Lee Bowers.

But if we suppose that someone was standing here (some 10 to 15 feet down from the fence corner) at the time of the shooting, then what happened to this individual? How did he disappear in that 1- or 2-minute interval between the last shot and when Dodd, Simmons, Holland, and Weitzman arrived on the scene? Holland himself has provided a plausible suggestion:

Just to the west of the station wagon [Holland told us], there were two sets of footprints that left . . . I noticed these two footprints leaving; now they could have stepped out between the second and third cars on the gravel or they could've got in the trunk compartment of this car and pulled the lid down, which would have been very, very easy (Taped interview, Nov. 30, 1966).

On this theory, so Holland suggests, since the trunk compartments of cars in the lot were not searched, a confederate may have returned to the area sometime later and driven away the car in question. (Six Seconds in Dallas, 1967, pp. 115-123)

John Corbett:

--- Quote from: Michael T. Griffith on September 20, 2026, 01:26:52 PM ---I have to chuckle at Corbett's claim that I've been given two "two plausible reasons for these cars to show up in the parking lot," yet he said nothing -- not one word -- about my demolition of those two implausible reasons. As usual, he simply ignored counter-arguments and contrary facts and repeated his talking point.

As for Corbett's complaint that some of my replies are "massive," some of them are indeed long because, as the famous saying goes, "it takes one minute to tell a lie, and an hour to refute it."
--- End quote ---

I think a more appropriate saying would be, "If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with  BS:"
--- Quote ---
For example, the only way to show the vacuous and misleading nature of Mitch Todd's portrayal of Bowers' account is to quote Bowers' statements at length, and the only way to refute Mitch Todd's sweeping erroneous claims about the acoustical evidence is to provide detailed, documented information that disproves those claims.
--- End quote ---

You don't quote Bowers. You give second and third hand hearsay accounts of what Bower's supposedly said and you expect us to give that more weight than what Bowers said for himself on the record and under oath.

Why is it that the things witnesses have supposedly said off the record always seem to conflict with what they have said on the record. Could it be they never actually said the things other people have attributed to them?
--- Quote ---
The fact that Mitch Todd would pretend to have a solid grasp of the acoustical evidence and then, in the same reply, repeat the embarrassingly bogus argument that some amateurs on the Internet have made against the dictabelt's N-waves, an argument that even the NRC/NAS panel knew better than to float, and an argument that the Queens College acoustical scientists completely destroyed, shows he is not to be taken seriously on the subject.
--- End quote ---

Here is where MTG pretends to be an expert in all technical fields related to the investigation of the JFKA. It goes back to the saying, "If you can't dazzle them with brilliance,.........".

--- Quote ---
Oh, really? Well now, either you haven't actually read Thompson's book, or you somehow think I haven't, or you were hoping no one would bother to check your claim. Thompson specifically says that the reports of two of Bowers' coworkers should be taken seriously and that they "suggest that Bowers saw more than he revealed when questioned by Joe Ball and Mark Lane" (Last Second in Dallas, 2021, p. 128).

Let's read more of what Thompson says on the subject in his book, shall we? Here you go:

Also not to be taken seriously are reports from people who knew Bowers that he claimed to have seen one of the men he described put a rifle in the trunk of a car. These reports surfaced in the 1990s when various TV producers were in search of a story. The same cannot be said of the reports of two individuals who, like Bowers, worked for the Union Terminal Railroad.

Both suggest that Bowers saw more than he revealed when questioned by Joe Ball and Mark Lane.
--- End quote ---

MTG thinks Tink Thompson is an empirical source. Too funny.
--- Quote ---
The first is Olan DeGaugh. As yardmaster, he was several levels above Bowers in the railroad company hierarchy. In an oral history interview in 2002, he described Bowers as “a good person, a good worker, a good man. . . . . He was. . . .  one of my best friends.” When asked if he had talked to Bowers about the Kennedy assassination, he replied, “Several times. I don’t know how many times. Not a real long conversation.” When asked if Bowers ever varied his story about what happened that day, DeGaugh said, “I don’t think he ever changed it.”

And what did Bowers tell DeGaugh about the assassination?

DeGaugh said, “Well, the day Kennedy was assassinated, he [Bowers] was looking out the window and there was a car parked next to the board fence out here barely where the street ends and he saw someone holding the trunk of a car put something in it and drive off. And it had been assumed that it had been Oswald. It may have been Oswald.” DeGaugh said the car “was a coupe of some kind . . . an old car.” 
--- End quote ---

More second hand hearsay accounts that conflict with Bowers' sworn testimony. Real compelling stuff.

Time for me to check out again. I could easily spend another two hours refuting the rest of MTG's  BS:, but this is just a hobby to me, not my job so I budget the amount of time I spend on it.

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