Important Disclosure about William King Harvey in Recently Released Document

[Lance Payette]

Just to refresh peoples' memories, Clay Shaw's testimony at the Garrison trial runs 80 pages. This is the total of what he was asked about the CIA:

Q: Mr. Shaw, have you ever worked for the Central Intelligence Agency?

A: No, I have not.

This was on direct examination by Shaw's own attorney. There was zero follow-up on cross.

It was not Shaw's obligation to ask "What do you mean by 'worked for'?" Nor was it Shaw's obligation to volunteer "Well, I did serve as a domestic contact for a few years." It was up to the prosecution on cross to ask "Have you ever had any relationship or association with the CIA?"

[Benjamin Cole]

LP-

Well, Shaw seems to have perjured himself in that answer in the courtroom, but draw your own conclusions.

I don't understand why Fred Litwin has gone out of the limb, and said that despite that the CIA historian, in writing, in a report, said that that Shaw was a "highly paid contract source" that Shaw was actually a "highly rated contact source." This is CT-nut level stretching of evidence by Litwin. Usually Litwin is shrewdly cynical and skeptical.

In fact, I don't understand what the big deal is. So Shaw was a "highly paid contract source." So what? Given his position in a trade mart, he is a likely candidate for the role. Maybe he was overpaid. Oh, that never happens on a government contract.

Shaw as a CIA contract asset does not prove there was a JFKAC, or that Shaw had anything to do with it.

I rather suspect Shaw was asked to take a look-see on LHO, who was surely someone worth taking a look-see at. Just like the CIA guy in Dallas asked deMohrenschildt to look at LHO. LHO had defected to Russia and might have been a KGB asset, after all.

LN'ers should avoid CT-type hysterics. But, what goes around comes around.

Caveat emptor, and draw your own conclusions. 

[Lance Payette]

LP-

Well, Shaw seems to have perjured himself in that answer in the courtroom, but draw your own conclusions.

I don't understand why Fred Litwin has gone out of the limb, and said that despite that the CIA historian, in writing, in a report, said that that Shaw was a "highly paid contract source" that Shaw was actually a "highly rated contact source." This is CT-nut level stretching of evidence by Litwin. Usually Litwin is shrewdly cynical and skeptical.

In fact, I don't understand what the big deal is. So Shaw was a "highly paid contract source." So what? Given his position in a trade mart, he is a likely candidate for the role. Maybe he was overpaid. Oh, that never happens on a government contract.

Shaw as a CIA contract asset does not prove there was a JFKAC, or that Shaw had anything to do with it.

I rather suspect Shaw was asked to take a look-see on LHO, who was surely someone worth taking a look-see at. Just like the CIA guy in Dallas asked deMohrenschildt to look at LHO. LHO had defected to Russia and might have been a KGB asset, after all.

LN'ers should avoid CT-type hysterics. But, what goes around comes around.

Caveat emptor, and draw your own conclusions.

I believe the CT implication is that "highly paid contract source" suggests some much more elaborate and sinister relationship than the contact source relationship we know Shaw had. Due to Shaw's wealth, association with the Trade Mart, and international travel, he would have been an exceptional contact source - which well could have included international travel that was only marginally TM related and more CIA related (although I have yet to see any evidence of this).

Shaw did not perjure himself unless, perhaps, he actually was a highly paid contract source. I am sure the question was carefully crafted by his lawyer. "Work for" implies employment, quite distinct from "do any work for." It was up to the prosecution to flesh out the relationship if they had been on their toes. Since Shaw's relationship had ended by 1956 by all accounts, including McDonald's memo, it's not clear to me why he would have dodged simply saying something like, "As did tens of thousands of other patriotic Americans, I provided information to the Agency's domestic contact service in New Orleans on a dozen or so occasions in connection with my Trade Mart contacts and travels."

BTW, the cross-examination of Shaw is almost comical for its gentleness. This was the defendant, for crying out loud, and the prosecution's opportunity to nail him. If you aren't paying attention, you can barely tell where the direct examination ends and the cross begins. There is no attempt at all at impeachment. One gets the impression of a prosecution team that had lost its enthusiasm for the case.

You've slid right past what seem to me two very telling points: (1) McDonald's memo has the "contract source" relationship ending precisely when everything else says the "contact source" relationship ended (1956); and (2) while McDonald's title was Chief of the History Staff, he was not purporting to be writing a history of anything. He was summarizing the History Staff's review of the 64 boxes of CIA materials assembled for the HSCA and making a recommendation as to what to do with them (i.e., transfer them to the National Archives). The comment about Shaw is in the vein of "Oh, by the way ...."

My question is, where is anything - anything - to support that this wasn't simply a mistake by McDonald's staff? This seems to me by far the more plausible explanation. Where was any follow-up by anyone? Instead, CTers do with McDonald's memo what they always love to do - seize upon the phrase in McDonald's memo as though it had vast significance and then use it for all sorts of dark speculation - but do no follow-up at all, probably because they fear that any follow-up will expose yet another Double Nothing Whopper with bacon and cheese. (McDonald wrote the foreword to a CIA-related book in November of 2023 and for all I know may still be around.)

FWIW, here is a 2-hour presentation at the National Archives in 1996 that includes a number of current and former members of the CIA History Staff, including McDonald: https://www.c-span.org/program/public-affairs-event/cia-in-the-early-postwar-period/57851.

Now I will read the Shaw book and reemerge as a Shaw authority as well as a Sports Drome authority. 

[Steve M. Galbraith]

LP-

Well, Shaw seems to have perjured himself in that answer in the courtroom, but draw your own conclusions.

I don't understand why Fred Litwin has gone out of the limb, and said that despite that the CIA historian, in writing, in a report, said that that Shaw was a "highly paid contract source" that Shaw was actually a "highly rated contact source." This is CT-nut level stretching of evidence by Litwin. Usually Litwin is shrewdly cynical and skeptical.

In fact, I don't understand what the big deal is. So Shaw was a "highly paid contract source." So what? Given his position in a trade mart, he is a likely candidate for the role. Maybe he was overpaid. Oh, that never happens on a government contract.

Shaw as a CIA contract asset does not prove there was a JFKAC, or that Shaw had anything to do with it.

I rather suspect Shaw was asked to take a look-see on LHO, who was surely someone worth taking a look-see at. Just like the CIA guy in Dallas asked deMohrenschildt to look at LHO. LHO had defected to Russia and might have been a KGB asset, after all.

LN'ers should avoid CT-type hysterics. But, what goes around comes around.

Caveat emptor, and draw your own conclusions.

But there's no corroborative evidence that Shaw was paid much less highly paid. We have a memo that is, as others point out, filled with errors (e.g., Gilberto Alvarado did not say, as this document claimed, that he saw Oswald at a party in Mexico City). And as others have pointed out, the phrase "contract source" was not a term the CIA used.

You are plucking out a single memo and uncritically accepting it and ignoring all of this other evidence (Marchetti's claims for example). If there's anything we should have learned about all of these documents it's how filled with errors they could be. Carpenter cites several CIA memos on Shaw and there's nothing even remotely mentioning anything about him being a paid source.

The evidence shows, to me, that Shaw was not just an ordinary American who was debriefed by the CIA, someone who visited Spain and then was questioned by Leake. It looks like he had a more formal relationship with them (for obvious reasons). But there's nothing about being paid for his information. This was the Cold War. Stalin was running the Soviet Union, the Korean War was going on, it was a dangerous period. Of course you'd help the CIA deal with that threat.

But as usual with this conspiracy nonsense, none of this gets us to Dallas at 12:30 p.m. on November 22, 1963. How do you go from Shaw to that event? You can't. Shaw was allegedly seen at a gathering where he, Oswald and Ferrie plotted the assassination. With complete strangers listening in (who believe that?). Then what? What did Shaw do? Connect Shaw to Dallas, please. But they can't. It's all conspiracy mongering by the usual suspects, people whose heads spin when they hear "CIA", and who, for some reason, people still think are credible.

[Fred Litwin]

https://www.onthetrailofdelusion.com/post/two-reasons-why-clay-shaw-never-admitted-to-being-a-domestic-contact-of-the-cia

[Lance Payette]

Of course, lying to the CBC is scarcely perjury. In a Penthouse interview by James Phelan, Shaw likewise said "I have never had any connection with the CIA."

I have no doubt that the question to Shaw by his attorney Dymond at the Garrison trial was carefully crafted and rehearsed because it would have been Malpractice 101 to do otherwise, especially when the witness was the defendant in a serious criminal trial. I have a hard time believing Shaw's attorneys weren't aware of this CIA connection by then, although even Fred's nemesis Jim DiEugenio concedes that Shaw had said nothing to them seven months after being indicted. As the CIA document says, it's "hard to believe" that Shaw hadn't alerted them to his prior cooperation as a contact source and that the question wasn't carefully crafted to dodge "voluntary cooperation as a contact source" by saying "worked for." On the other hand, I don't know why Dymond would have waded into this at all unless he was confident the prosecution wouldn't follow up. It's a classic example of "opening the door" to what could become awkward questions on cross. Very odd.

As far as I can tell, most of those who cooperated with the Domestic Contact Division (later Service) were simply tourists, business travelers and immigrants. One memo says the Domestic Contact Division, which had offices in 15 cities, was "openly identified as being connected with the CIA" and engaged in "overt collection of positive intelligence" by "picking the brains" of citizen volunteers. A Senate report said that alerting Domestic Contact volunteers that their information might be used in furtherance of clandestine operations by other divisions of the CIA would "violate the important rule of compartmentalization." Although the memo says Shaw was merely "enjoined to secrecy" and apparently not required to sign a Secrecy Agreement, there are such agreements (basically one-pagers) being requested by the Domestic Contact Service. Although I couldn't find any definite protocols, I would assume all contacts were at least "enjoined to secrecy" both for the protection of the program (i.e., types of questions being asked) and their own safety. I would guess that Shaw, given the nature of his position with the Trade Mart and frequent international travel, was a "highly valued contact source" who was in the upper echelons of contacts and took the admonition to secrecy seriously. Clearly, his relationship was more ongoing during the years in question than that of a mere tourist or routine business traveler.

[Steve M. Galbraith]

Of course, lying to the CBC is scarcely perjury. In a Penthouse interview by James Phelan, Shaw likewise said "I have never had any connection with the CIA."

I have no doubt that the question to Shaw by his attorney Dymond at the Garrison trial was carefully crafted and rehearsed because it would have been Malpractice 101 to do otherwise, especially when the witness was the defendant in a serious criminal trial. I have a hard time believing Shaw's attorneys weren't aware of this CIA connection by then, although even Fred's nemesis Jim DiEugenio concedes that Shaw had said nothing to them seven months after being indicted. As the CIA document says, it's "hard to believe" that Shaw hadn't alerted them to his prior cooperation as a contact source and that the question wasn't carefully crafted to dodge "voluntary cooperation as a contact source" by saying "worked for." On the other hand, I don't know why Dymond would have waded into this at all unless he was confident the prosecution wouldn't follow up. It's a classic example of "opening the door" to what could become awkward questions on cross. Very odd.

As far as I can tell, most of those who cooperated with the Domestic Contact Division (later Service) were simply tourists, business travelers and immigrants. One memo says the Domestic Contact Division, which had offices in 15 cities, was "openly identified as being connected with the CIA" and engaged in "overt collection of positive intelligence" by "picking the brains" of citizen volunteers. A Senate report said that alerting Domestic Contact volunteers that their information might be used in furtherance of clandestine operations by other divisions of the CIA would "violate the important rule of compartmentalization." Although the memo says Shaw was merely "enjoined to secrecy" and apparently not required to sign a Secrecy Agreement, there are such agreements (basically one-pagers) being requested by the Domestic Contact Service. Although I couldn't find any definite protocols, I would assume all contacts were at least "enjoined to secrecy" both for the protection of the program (i.e., types of questions being asked) and their own safety. I would guess that Shaw, given the nature of his position with the Trade Mart and frequent international travel, was a "highly valued contact source" who was in the upper echelons of contacts and took the admonition to secrecy seriously. Clearly, his relationship was more ongoing during the years in question than that of a mere tourist or routine business traveler.

I'm pretty sure that Shaw's lawyers said he denied to them having any contacts with the CIA. Not just whether he had ever worked for them. I think this is mentioned somewhere by Carpenter but I can't find it offhand. Or maybe it's in the Lambert book.

Thus the willingness of Dymond to broach the topic. He thought there was nothing there. If Shaw had mentioned this relationship with the DCS then it seems obvious that Dymond wouldn't have opened that door. He's setting up his client in a potential perjury trap. With no discovery he doesn't know what Garrison had on Shaw. Let Garrison introduce the issue. Then respond but otherwise play it safe.

There's a CIA memo mentioned in the Carpenter book where they told Lloyd Ray, Leake's boss in NO, after he inquired about what to do if he was asked to admit that Shaw had provided information. But neither Garrison (or the defense team) questioned him about Shaw. If Garrison had done so then Dymond just put his client in a lot of trouble. See page 364 for details.

[Lance Payette]

Carpenter deals with the issue at some length in different parts of the book. He says it has never been satisfactorily resolved as to what, if anything, Shaw told his attorneys about his CIA connections. He says that both Washington and New Orleans CIA officials assumed Shaw had told his attorneys but then became concerned that perhaps he hadn't (their concern being the possibility that Garrison might ambush them at trial). The DOJ and CIA legal staffs considered alerting the attorneys but were willing to do this only if they were certain the attorneys themselves could be trusted. The issue arose again in connection with the issue of the signature at the airport VIP room, but then that issue seemed to resolve itself. One of Shaw's attorneys, Wegmann, made inquiries of Garrison's office, but it's not clear if Wegmann knew of Shaw's connections or was just trying to see what Garrison knew.

Carpenter mentions Dymond's raising of the CIA issue at trial but does not seem to attach any great significance or provide any explanation. It simply had to be the case that Dymond knew what answer he would receive from Shaw - this is Trial Practice 101 - so either Shaw flat-out lied to his own attorneys despite the attorney-client privilege or they had arrived at a scenario where Dymond would carefully phrase the question as "worked for" and Shaw would answer no. If Shaw lied to his own attorneys, which sounds more probable, he comes across as rather more stupid and smelly than I would have thought, enough so to make me wonder what else he lied about; he could have easily "cleared" with someone at the CIA that he was going to be honest with his own attorneys about his mere service as a contact source more than a decade ago. The scenario of a carefully worded question and answer would have been extremely risky unless they absolutely knew Garrison had nothing to impeach Shaw with. There is also the professional rule that a lawyer cannot knowingly allow his client to commit perjury, so the only plausible scenario is that Shaw in fact lied to his own attorneys, as he did to the CBC and Penthouse, about a matter that seemingly would not have been significant enough to lie about.