Another key fact that Humes withheld in his WC and HSCA testimony was that there were multiple drafts of the autopsy report. Humes claimed he burned the “rough first draft” because it had blood on it, but he said there was no substantive difference between the first draft and the final draft. This lie was exposed with the release of the transcript of the 1/27/64 WC executive session, which reveals that Rankin discussed two early drafts of the autopsy report, both of which said the back wound had no exit point.

For a detailed discussion on the drafts of the autopsy report, I would refer interested readers to Doug Horne’s 64-minute video presentation The Evolving JFK Autopsy Report..

As mentioned, the autopsy doctors were careful to conceal the fact that after the chest organs were removed, they were able to probe the back wound to its end point and could see that the wound path did not enter the chest cavity. Their later cover story was that the contracted back muscles prevented them from probing the back wound.

Only Boswell eventually abandoned this story, but he did not do so until his ARRB interview in 1996, when he said that initially the muscles prevented them from probing the back wound but that after they opened the chest, they were able to “get at” it and see that the bullet did not pierce the “lung cavity” but merely caused bleeding “outside the pleura” (the lining of the chest cavity).

In his HSCA interview, Boswell said that he and the other doctors thought the tracheotomy “was a wound.” The interviewer, Andy Purdy, added that Boswell “meant to convey the impression that that the doctors thought it was a bullet wound” (HSCA interview: J. Thornton Boswell, 8/17/77, p. 3).

Later in the interview, Boswell said he remembered “seeing part of the perimeter of a bullet wound in the anterior neck” (p. 8 ).

This brings up the crucial point that the bottom half of a round small bullet hole can be seen fairly easily in the bottom of the throat wound in autopsy photo F1. So, it is not a bit surprising that Boswell spotted this during the autopsy.

But, still later in the interview, perhaps realizing he had said too much, Boswell began to vacillate about knowledge of the throat wound during the autopsy and about when the autopsy doctors concluded that a bullet had fallen out of the back wound (which Boswell usually referred to as a “neck" wound). Toward the very end of the interview, Boswell said that “in the later courses of the autopsy” the doctors thought the tracheotomy “may have included the exit wound of a bullet” (p. 12).

Yet, we know that the first two drafts of the autopsy report said nothing about the throat wound being an exit point for a bullet. The second draft said the throat wound was an exit point for a fragment from the head shot. Both drafts said the back wound had no exit point.

In a very revealing comment, Boswell said the doctors got themselves into trouble (“in dutch”) with the Secret Service over the "neck" (back) and throat wounds:

We had gotten ourselves in dutch with the neck and throat wounds with regard to the Secret Service” (p. 4).

For some reason, the interviewer did not ask Boswell to expand on this statement, and Boswell did not volunteer why they were in trouble with the Secret Service agents over the “neck” and throat wounds.

Boswell added that one of the Secret Service agents was “on the phone most of the time” during the autopsy (p. 4).

Boswell noted that during the autopsy, Dr. Robert Karnei “served in effect as the chief assistant of the autopsy doctors” and that Dr. Karnei assisted with the post-autopsy brain exam (pp. 5, 11).

In his ARRB interview, Boswell said the doctors concluded during the autopsy that the throat wound was the exit point for the back wound! He said their first impression of the throat wound was that it was just a tracheostomy but that after they found the back wound and after they opened the chest and saw blood outside the pleura “we had a track” (i.e., they inferred a track, not that they actually saw it):

Q. When you referred to the wound in the anterior neck, what was your first impression as to what that wound was?

A. I'm not sure what our first impression -- oh, we thought that they had done a tracheostomy, and whether or not that was a bullet wound, we weren't sure, initially. It was after we found an entrance wound and then the blood external to the pleura that we had a track, and that proved to be the exit wound; but it was so distorted by the incision, initially we just assumed it to be a tracheostomy.

Q. Did you reach the conclusion that there had been a transit wound through the neck during the course of the autopsy itself?

A. Oh, yes. (ARRB interview: J. Thornton Boswell, 2/26/96, p. 34)

In other words, Boswell claimed that the autopsy doctors deduced/inferred a back-to-throat track during the autopsy based on the bleeding outside the pleura. At no point did he ever claim they actually saw this alleged track. The only way they could have actually seen such a track would have been to dissect the wound, but they did no dissection because an Army general refused to let Finck dissect the wound, as Finck reluctantly admitted under cross-examination at the Clay Shaw trial. 

So we see that on two occasions Boswell contradicted Humes’s tale that they were unaware of the throat wound until the following morning.

A major problem with Boswell’s statements about the back-to-throat conclusion being reached during the autopsy is that they are contradicted by the first two drafts of the autopsy report, by Dr. Karnei’s statements, by Dr. Ebersole’s statements, by med-tech Jenkins’ statements, by FBI agent O’Neill’s statements, by FBI agent Sibert’s statements, and by the Sibert and O’Neill report on the autopsy, not to mention by Humes’s WC and HSCA testimony.

Or present a fake "Ripley's believe it or not" affidavit and if that doesn't work, just say the witness was wrong and you know better.

Oh wait,,, there's another option. Just simply refuse to answer a question and run away in silence.

A fake Ripley's affidavit?  How so?

I've corrected Mary Woodward's article (which has apparently been deleted by Duncan) for her.

Here it is:


The four of us, myself, Maggie Brown, Ann Donaldson, and Aurelia Alonzo, had been waiting about half an hour on the north side of Elm Street when the first motorcycle escorts came by, followed shortly by the President’s car.

The President was waving to spectators on his right.

Very soon there was a horrible, ear-shattering noise that appeared to have come from behind us and a little to the right. My first reaction, and also my friends’, was that as a joke, someone had backfired their car.

I don’t believe anyone was hit by the first bullet.

The President and Mrs. Kennedy turned and looked around, as if they, too, didn’t believe the noise was really coming from a gun.

As the limousine approached us, the President was looking straight ahead, and we were afraid we would not get to see his face. But we started clapping and cheering and both he and Mrs. Kennedy turned and smiled and waved directly at us.

Then after a moment’s pause, there was another shot and I saw the President start slumping in the car.

Instead of speeding up, the President’s car came almost to a halt.

This was followed by another shot. Mrs. Kennedy stood up in the car, turned half-way around, then fell on top of her husband’s body. Not until this minute did it sink in what actually was happening. We had witnessed the assassination of the President.

A Secret Service man got out of the follow-up car and started rushing forward, obstructing our view of the President’s car.

Then I started looking around at the stunned crowd. About ten feet from where we were standing, a man and woman had thrown their small child to the ground and covered his body with theirs. Apparently, the bullets had whizzed directly over their heads. There were three shots altogether.

It still seems like a horrible nightmare.

It will be a real-life nightmare to haunt us all for a long time to come.

As it turned out, we were almost certainly the last faces the President noticed in the crowd.

. . . . . .


Here's the original:

Four of us from Women’s News, Maggie Brown, Aurelia Alonzo, my roommate Ann Donaldson, and myself had decided to spend our lunch hour by going to see the President.

We took our lunch along—some crackers and apples—and started walking down Houston Street. We decided to cross Elm and wait there on the grassy slope just east of the Triple Underpass, since there weren’t very many people there and we could get a better view.

We had been waiting about half an hour when the first motorcycle escorts came by, followed shortly by the President’s car. The President was looking straight ahead and we were afraid we would not get to see his face. But we started clapping and cheering and both he and Mrs. Kennedy turned, and smiled and waved, directly at us, it seemed. Jackie was wearing a beautiful pink suit with beret to match. Two of us, who had seen the President last during the final weeks of the 1960 campaign, remarked almost simultaneously how relaxed and robust he looked.

As it turned out, we were almost certainly the last faces he noticed in the crowd.

After acknowledging our cheers, he faced forward again and suddenly there was a horrible, ear-shattering noise coming from behind us and a little to the right. My first reaction, and also my friends’, was that as a joke, someone had backfired their car. Apparently the driver and occupants of the President’s car had the same impression, because instead of speeding up, the car came almost to a halt.

Things are a little hazy from this point, but I don’t believe anyone was hit with the first bullet. The President and Mrs. Kennedy turned and looked around, as if they, too, didn’t believe the noise was really coming from a gun.

Then after a moment’s pause there was another shot and I saw the President start slumping in the car.

This was followed rapidly by another shot. Mrs. Kennedy stood up in the car, turned half-way around, then fell on top of her husband’s body. Not until this minute did it sink in what actually was happening. We had witnessed the assassination of the President.

The cars behind stopped and several men—Secret Service men, I suppose—got out and started rushing forward, obstructing our view of the President’s car.

Then I started looking around at the stunned crowd. About 10 feet from where we were standing, a man and woman had thrown their small child to the ground and covered his body with theirs. Apparently, the bullets had whizzed directly over their heads.

Next to us were two Negro women. One collapsed in the other’s arms, weeping and uttering what everyone was thinking: “They’ve shot him.”

It still seems like a horrible nightmare.

It will be a real-life nightmare to haunt us all for a long time to come.

That might be a good topic...in the right thread.

It was you who brought up TDS.

Projecting?

You choose to ignore 90+% of the witnesses who heard 3 shots and are corroborated by 3 spent shells in the sniper's nest.

And yet:

You choose to ignore 80% of the witnesses who reported a 3 shot pattern ie. those who put the last two closer together. And that 80% is corroborated by 100% of the witnesses who observed JFK’s reaction to the first shot and 100% of the witnesses whose evidence allows us to place the location of JFK at the time of the first shot ie. the time conflicts with an early first shot (before z186).