JFK Assassination Forum

It also seems like questionable strategy for the defense. Two trials means two chances for the prosecution to get a conviction. Also two chances to get a death sentence. Combining the trials means the defense only needs to convince one jury of reasonable doubt.

Uh, no. Probably it would have made more sense right before the JFKA to ask himself "Shall I go to Irving and get the clunker rifle that is traceable to me out of Ruth Paine's garage, with all the risks that will entail, or should I check the classified ads for a better rifle that isn't traceable to me?" Indeed, in 1963 you could buy a gun in Texas or Arizona from a GUN DEALER with no ID at all.

To be blunt, it seems that way to you because you are a know-it-all on almost every topic you know nothing about. Probably 97% of all cases, including murders,  do not result in reported decisions. A reported decision is published only if the case is appealed and the appellate court believes its opinion is significant enough to publish. I have no idea, and am certainly not going to attempt to research, whether there are reported decisions involving the issue of whether a trial involving multiple murders should have been severed. Probably there are, but surely not many. The Texas Penal Code pretty much tells us the answer: One trial is permissible if two crimes are part of the same "episode," but the defense may object that trying the crimes together would be unfairly prejudicial. Hence, the determination is made on a case-by-case basis. It is highly unlikely that two murders separated in time, location and circumstance, requiring entirely different evidence and witnesses, would be tried together. The prejudice to Oswald would be exactly why an LN zealot like you would want them tried together - if he killed Tippit, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, he must've killed JFK. It is highly unlikely that the prosecution would even want them tried together because this would be handing the defense an almost guaranteed grounds for appeal. In the case of the Tippit murder, I believe the defense would have a solid threshold argument that this was not even the same episode as the JFK murder.

Lawyers go to law school to learn to "think like a lawyer." Believe me, your nuance-free, black-and-white view of every issue would've put you at the bottom of the class.

\  To test the location of the car either parked along the south (or north) curb of the Elm Extension, as seen in the Wiegman film, I plotted Wiegman’s position with test south curb versus north curb cars on a DP map. The plot showed the north curb car about twice the distance from the camera compared to a south curb car. Then for equal sized cars the north curb car would appear about one half the size of the south curb car to Wiegman’s camera.  I made a quick 3D view animation to demonstrate this and added a 5.5’ black suit man for comparison. It looks to me that the Wiegman car is nearer to the south curb. Note that I gave the test cars a steel-blue color (not white) for the 3D animation for modeling development use.