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JFK Assassination Discussion & Debate / Re: Fourth Edition of "Forensic Science and President Kennedy's Head Wounds"
« Last post by John Corbett on Yesterday at 10:33:32 PM »I know. His argument is so ridiculous.
When Corbett first began to engage me in this forum, he cited the WC's headshot wound-ballistics test as evidence that Oswald's alleged ammo was the ammo that hit JFK's head. But, when I proved that the WC's test shows the exact opposite, that's when he started peddling this line that wound-ballistics tests are essentially worthless because they can't "perfectly replicate" every aspect of a shooting.
I must be having a senior moment. I don't remember having made that argument. I don't remember even thinking that. I'm not even familiar with that particular test. The evidence that Oswald's ammo killed JFK is the fragmented bullet found in the limo by the Secret Service. Two of those fragments could be positively matched to Oswald's rifle to the exclusion of all other weapons in the world.
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Now, probably because of Stewart Fillmore's comments, Corbett has modestly modified this argument to say that "individual elements of a shooting can be tested" but that no test can "perfectly replicate" all aspects of a shooting.
Can you name one shooting in the history of firearms that was perfectly replicated?
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Okay, then it should be noted that every single test that has tested "individual elements" of the SBT has produced results that directly contradict those elements. In the 1967 CBS SBT test, not one of the bullets managed to penetrate the simulated thigh after passing through a ballistics gelatin block and then hitting a cadaver wrist, even though they didn't have to hit a rib bone before hitting the wrist. In fact, many of the bullets didn't even leave the wrist.
Do you think that perfectly replicated the SBT.
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In the 1992 AAT SBT test, a 6.5 mm FMJ bullet was fired into two gelatin blocks. The second gelatin block contained animal bones to simulate the shattering of a rib bone and the smashing of a wrist bone. The bullet transited the first gelatin block and struck the animal bones in the second block. It emerged markedly more deformed than CE 399.
You don't seem to understand that simulating is not replicating.
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What's more, four of the bullets in Lattimer's SBT test actually hit the simulated rib and wrist bones after passing through a simulated neck, and the only one of those bullets that Lattimer published a photo of was badly mangled (he admitted he threw away the three other bullets -- I wonder why).
I don't. None of the tests replicated the shooting of JFK and JBC. [/quote]
The most fraudulent SBT test to date was arguably Dr. Martin Fackler's 1992 test. Fackler made no effort to simulate a human neck, a human chest, a rib bone, and a human thigh. He lowered the velocity of his bullets to 1100-1335 fps and fired them directly into cadaver wrists. Fackler said that the two bullets that went through the wrists emerged with no deformity ("absolutely undeformed"). [/quote]
One more test that didn't replicate the shooting. Replication is impossible.
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In other words, he simply assumed that if the bullets had torn through a human neck and through a human chest, shattering 4 inches of rib bone in the process, the bullets would not have been deformed and would have had enough velocity to then penetrate a human thigh after smashing the wrist.
When I first read about Fackler's SBT test, I thought the article I was reading had to be mistaken, that no one would have conducted such an obviously bogus test, but then I found Fackler's own article on his test and saw that he admitted that the only part of CE 399's alleged journey that he simulated was the hit on the wrist and that he fired his reduced-velocity bullets directly into the wrists. Yet, some WC apologists in this forum continue to cite Fackler's bogus SBT test.
You have pointed to a number of tests that tried to simulate, but could not replicate the actual shooting. At best, any test can show what is possible. None can prove what did happen. I find it puzzling that people put so much emphasis on replicating the assassination. It's a fool's errand.
When the Haag's did testing for the Nova program, they tested individual elements of the shooting. They fired a Carcano bullet through both ballistic gel and ballistic soap. The gel showed a bullet COULD yaw upon exiting soft tissue. That doesn't prove CE399 did yaw. The best evidence of that was the elongated entrance wound on JFK's back. The ballistic soap was used to show the pressure cavity a Carcano bullet creates as it passes through a body. Unlike the gel, the soap doesn't collapse after the bullet passes through maintaining the pressure cavity.
I know of no case in the history of firearms in which a shooting was replicated. The JFKA is the only shooting I am aware of where such a thing was tried.
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