MARTIN, please explain the changes in Judyth's story
Dr Truth
SEE BELOW:
Judyth's story leaked on December 23, 1999:
Judyth’s Story
The Plot
1. In 1963, the unsuccessful CIA-Mafia plotting to kill Castro – top-secret
until exposed by the Church Committee in 1975 --was directly linked with the
JFK assassination conspiracy.
If Plan A -- killing Castro by October 25, 1963 – failed, the same group of
conspirators – Mafia, CIA rogue agents, Cuban exiles, backed by Texas
money -- would go to Plan B: killing Kennedy. This is the first time Oswald
has been tied into the kill-Castro conspiracy. Ironically, CIA stonewalling
of the Warren Commission was almost certainly conducted to prevent its
relationship with the Mafia from being exposed. The assassination cover-up
was thus joined by high officials in the CIA who may not themselves have
participated in the assassination.
2. Lee, a CIA operative (not an “agent”), was groomed to look like a
disaffected American for eventual use in Cuba. His defection was faked for
this reason alone. Upon his return from Russia, the CIA arranged for Lee to
take a job in Dallas at a firm that made maps of the Cuban terrain. His
assignment involved identifying the location of safe houses and collecting
names of trusted contacts inside Cuba.
3. When Lee was ordered to move to New Orleans, he met Judyth by accident
(or maybe not) at the central Post Office. They clicked immediately –
despite the fact that he was married and she was to be married in a matter
of days. Lee arranged for both of them to be hired on the same day by the
Reily Coffee Company, owned by a staunch right-winger, who knew he was not
hiring ordinary workers. Lee would interview the Cuban women that cycled
thru Reily’s as part of his fact-gathering mission. Judyth, who was
assistant to the manager, covered for this activity and for his daily
absences from work, making sure to punch him out at or around 5:30PM when he
was no longer there, which was quite often. He also arranged for them to
have apartments within walking distance of each other, and for her to meet
David Ferrie, also a “cancer researcher.”
4. Judyth had already achieved a reputation as a child prodigy in cancer
research. Her mentor, Dr. Alton Ochsner, of the famed Ochsner Cancer Clinic
in New Orleans, had also set up the labs in Ferrie’s and Sherman’s homes.
Ochsner, a rabid right-winger, had overseen Judyth’s work from the age of
16, with funding coming from government medical facilities, principally
Walter Reed. She even worked at Roswell Park under a National Science
Foundation grant on research into “substances which cause… cancer to become
most deadly” (as reported by The Bradenton Herald, Sept. 5, 1961). Now she
was to use this training to develop ways of speeding tumor growth. Her job
was to culture lung cancer cells in the Ferrie-Sherman labs for eventual
transport to medical contacts in Cuba who could arrange for their injection
into Castro.
The lung cancer material she says she created would appear to kill him
“naturally,” as a heavy cigar smoker might be expected to develop lung
cancer. The seeming naturalness of his death would avert a possible
confrontation with Russia that could ignite World War III. She really
believed this was a duty, considering the horrifying alternative. This is a
completely new account of the how those labs were used.
Lee and Judyth actually liked the Kennedys -- and so opposed Plan B -- but
they never thought events would progress that far. In private, Ferrie told
Lee and Judyth that he also opposed the assassination. He was putting on an
act for Shaw, who represented Texas money in N.O.
6. Lee’s trip to Mexico City in October 1963 involved transporting the cell
cultures to a contact who would bring them into Cuba. He was ordered to
make the trip by his CIA-handler, Mr. B, who Lee came to believe was David
Atlee Phillips, but who, through some impressive bit of research, Judyth now
believes was Frank Bender, one alias of Gerry Droller who was posted to
Mexico City at the same time as Phillips.
The material had been tested on a human guinea pig -- the real reason for
the trip to Clinton. Lee and Judyth were heartsick over the decision to
treat a prisoner/mental patient but were powerless to stop this trial and
could not back out of the plot or their lives would be worth nothing.
Anyway, there was still time to get to Castro. Lee’s supposed attempt to
taint CORE through association with a Communist is a ridiculous notion.
There was a delay involved before things were set up in the hospital in
nearby Jackson, so they waited. Lee was pro-civil rights and got on line to
prove they would register him though he lived out of the district. They
didn’t and he quietly walked back to the car. He did nothing to attract
attention to himself as a Communist.
The serum in which the cancer cells were placed included a virus that knocks
out the immune system, thus enhancing the strength of the cancer cells.
This material – from the kidney’s of sick monkeys -- is now the subject of a
new book on the origin of AIDS. Judyth knew of its deadly potential and
wrote letters to have its use stopped at the same time as she was working
with it.
7. Lee was left holding the bag – i.e., no one was there to meet him in
Mexico City to take the material off his hands. He desperately tried to get
into Cuba himself, where his knowledge of the language, the terrain, safe
houses, and contacts could still be used – he hoped. Indeed, initially, he
expected to make the entire trip himself. He was frantic because the
material had a limited life span outside a lab, but the conspirators had
already turned to Plan B without telling him. Lee knew enough not to ask
for an explanation and he was never offered one.
8. Lee staged his own arrest in New Orleans to establish his false identity
as pro-Castro. This staged event was based on an incident he had read about
in a local newspaper months earlier. The story concerned a narcotics agent
who provoked a street fight to build his resume as a bad guy.
9. Judyth saw Lee sign out guns from Guy Banister's weapons storeroom on the
third floor of 544 Camp Street in New Orleans. Lee also kept his own guns
there and he was an excellent shot. She never saw or heard of a
Mannlicher-Carcano. Lee and Ferrie did train Cubans at Lake Pontchartrain
and there was film and she saw it, very likely the same film that Robert
Tanenbaum of the HSCA saw but which is now missing.
10. She personally met other key plotters, including Banister, Shaw, and
Marcello, though, as a girl of 19 or 20, she was often treated as if she
were wallpaper. Wallpaper with ears and the ability to do cutting edge
cancer research.
11. Jack Ruby worked with Banister and Marcello’s organization in
gun-running operations. While Judyth was in Lee’s company, she met Ruby
twice, , in May and June of 1963, when he visited New Orleans, once at
Ferrie's apartment. She only knew him as “Sparky” Rubenstein. When Lee was
killed, she did not know that Jack Ruby and Sparky Rubenstein were the same
man. Anna Lewis will testify to having seen Ruby and Oswald together in New
Orleans. Jack Ruby was shown the lab and told about cancer cell injections.
Before he died of cancer, he insisted he was injected, but no one took him
seriously. His mind was shot and they just assumed it was incoherent
babbling.
12. Ruby and Ferrie both knew Lee when he was just 15 years old. Lee spurned
Ferrie’s advances as well as Ruby’s attempts to recruit him into the Mob.
Lee’s contacts with the Mob came via his uncle and his mother, and he was
trusted by Mob figures, up to and including Marcello. It was Marcello who
told Ruby to look after the boy when they moved to Texas.
13. HL Hunt wanted those associated with the labs to be killed, or so they
believed based on a message to Shaw. Ferrie and Lee both found ways to make
themselves appear useful. They both destroyed evidence that might lead the
plotters to Judyth, who was living in Florida at the time of the
assassination. Ferrie arranged for about 14 back-channel phone calls to Lee
in Dallas, the last on November 20. Lee told Judyth that he made several
unsuccessful attempts to stop the assassination, including calling death
threats to the FBI.
14. They all understood that his grooming in Russia and activities in New
Orleans made him the perfect patsy as early as the third week of August.
Oswald actively embraced the role to get closer to the inner circle of the
conspiracy in Dallas . He played up his connections to Marcello, revealed
his marksmanship, and exaggerated a grudge against Connally to get further
in. He figured he was a dead man if tried to break with the conspirators.
He and Judyth even made plans for an escape and rendezvous in Mexico.
Judyth tells of Ferrie sobbing uncontrollably during phone calls with him
because it had all gone so wrong.
15. Lee told Judyth, on November 20th, of his plan to fire a warning shot
at the motorcade hoping to alert the Secret Service to the attempt on JFK’s
life. If he did fire a warning shot– and at least 5 witnesses reported a
bullet hitting the pavement behind the President’s limo -- it went unheeded
by the sleepy Secret Service agents. The "street shot" bullet was
presumably never found, unless that is what is being picked up by the
"Mystery FBI Man" in photos of Dallas Deputy Sheriff Buddy Walthers and
Officer J.W. Foster.
The Love Story
1. Judyth portrays Oswald as a much more intelligent and charming man than
we have seen in any previous accounts. She knows he was a wife-beater, but
says Lee never raised a hand to her. In fact, she describes no fights of
any kind. Lee told her that Marina mercilessly denigrated him. He admitted
to a mother-wife problem, which they often discussed, and she believes the
abuse stopped (it would be interesting to ask Marina if this was so).
2. Lee and Judyth, who were both married, became lovers in the summer.
While in the company of Oswald, Judyth sometimes posed as Marina, which was
possible because of their physical resemblance and Judyth’s ability to speak
Russian. Judyth’s husband was out of town most of their married life in New
Orleans.
3. In testimony, Marina said Lee was always home at night, but she never
said at what time. In fact, as Anna Lewis attests, Lee and Judyth usually
kept company, often with her and her husband, David, until 8 or 8:30 PM.
Anna even took a call from Marina at the restaurant where she waitressed and
they would hang out at after work. Marina wanted to know if Lee was there
with another woman.
In a taped statement, Anna Lewis said:
- David Ferrie and Lee Harvey Oswald knew each other.
- She knew Carlos Marcello.
- Banister “had guns in his closet for Lee Harvey Oswald, and when they
started talking about the assassination, Banister told Lee Harvey Oswald to
remove his guns out of his closet.”
- Her husband was told to “keep his mouth shut.”
- Lee was going to fire a warning shot if he had the opportunity (Judyth
explains that she asked Anna how she knew this, but that Anna became fearful
and would not answer.)
- Jack Ruby “knew them, all of them…was at the club I mentioned on Bourbon
St. [The 500 Club]. That was the meeting place for all of ‘em, and that’s
where Mr. Carlos Marcello’s office was…”
- “Marina called one night at the restaurant to find out if Lee Oswald was
there with another woman, and I told her…I don’t watch any of my customers
that good.”
- Presented with Marina’s claims that Lee was home at night, she replies
that “He wasn’t home. He was always out with us.”
WHICH THEN CHANGED TO:
Deadly Alliance
By Judyth Vary Baker with Howard Platzman, Ph.D.
OUTLINE OF THE CONSPIRACY
nd Plan B: The Plot to Kill Castro and the Assassination of FK
In 1963, the unsuccessful CIA-Mafia alliance to kill Castro -- top-secret
until exposed by the Church Committee in 1975 -- was directly linked to the
JFK assassination conspiracy. “Plan A” called for Castro to be killed
through the use of a biological weapon that would make his death appear
natural. If he could not be killed by October 25, 1963, the same group of
conspirators would go to “Plan B”: killing Kennedy.
This is the first account of the JFK assassination that links it directly
(in an either-or fashion) to the plot to kill Castro, and the first time Lee
Harvey Oswald has ever been tied to the plot to kill Castro.
What this means is that the JFK assassination plot was an offshoot of a
larger secret alliance that is already established fact. It is, therefore,
not necessary to believe in the existence of a separate conspiracy theory.
Note: Judyth’s knowledge of events in New Orleans is often first-hand. What
she knows or believes about events in Dallas comes from conversations with
Oswald or David Ferrie.
_____________________________________________________________________
Judyth is Recruited: To April 1963
? By the age of 15, Judyth achieved a reputation as a science whiz kid,
having invented a new way to extract magnesium from seawater.
? Her real passion, though, was cancer research. Col. Philip Doyle set up a
special lab for Judyth at her high school (Manatee High, in Florida), and
introduced her to CIA asset and biological weapons expert, Dr. Canute
Michaelson, who provided financial support for her initial work.
? Her appearance at an international science fair brought her to the
attention of other medical figures with military or intelligence
backgrounds, as well as top officials of the American Cancer Society:
Dr.Harold Diehl and Dr. Alton Ochsner (of the famed Ochsner Cancer Clinic in
New Orleans). Ochsner was Judyth’s principal behind-the-scenes mentor
through her late teen years.
? Judyth’s lab was expanded and she received research materials from doctors
at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, Eli Lilly, Oak Ridge, et al.
Evidence: A letter dated 9-2-60 from Dr. David Jacobus at Walter Reed,
making specific reference to chemicals supplied her and promising more.
? She was REQUIRED to take a loyalty oath., and, while still in high school,
was required to learn conversational Russian at a local junior college from
a Dr. Concevitch.
Evidence: A yellowed mailing envelope with the addressee, Concevitch.
? Her work came to the attention of Florida Senator George Smathers, a close
friend of JFK’s, who encouraged her to write to the President and volunteer
to put her talents to work in the service of her country.
Evidence: A reply from the White House. (While not very dramatic, she soon
received fresh supplies, as Sen. Smathers told her she would.)
? She spent the summer after high school graduation working under a National
Science Foundation grant at Roswell Park in Buffalo, NY, the world’s oldest
cancer research center. Her studies centered on "substances which cause
cancer to become most deadly."
Source: The Bradenton Herald, 9-6-61.
? Of the 60-plus students working under a grant, she was the only member of
the group chosen by Dr. George Moore, head of Roswell Park, to work directly
with him -- and she was the only one forced to stay at the local YWCA. She
was, in essence, “kidnapped” from an off-site apartment she tried to rent
and returned to the Y.
Evidence: BROCHURES, YWCA RECEIPT, AND FORMS. Copious newspaper clippings
on her achievements.
Corroborating testimony: Judyth recently located DR.ROB STROM, who also
exhibited at the science fair. He REMEMBERED HER. THOUGH HE ALSO RECEIVED
ATTENTION FROM MANY FRONTS, HE TOLD HER HIS LEFT-WING VIEWS MADE HIM A POOR
CANDIDATE FOR CIA RECRUITMENT.
Who Was Dr. Alton Ochsner?
Along with Judyth herself, Ochsner is the primary new figure to emerge in
this account of Oswald’s stay in New Orleans.
Notes
? Ocshner was friends with Clay Shaw, who was unsuccessfully prosecuted by
New Orleans D.A. Jim Garrison for conspiring to assassinate JFK. Ochsner
was director of International House at the same time Clay Shaw was a
managing director (1961-1962). At different times, he and Shaw headed this
organization AND the International Trade Mart. The two ORGANIZATIONS merged
some years later.
? Ochsner’s biographers quote him as fearing that he would be indicted by
Garrison (John Wilds and Ira Harkey, Surgeon of the South)
? Ochsner was also friends with “Wild Bill” Donovan, head of the OSS, the
prescursor to the CIA. Both were elected officials of the American Cancer
Society in 1949.
? Ochsner founded the virulently anti-Communist Information Council of the
Americas (INCA), which later figured heavily into the activities of both
Judyth and Lee.
? Author Thomas Karnes (Tropical Enterprise) describes Ochsner as a
consultant to the US Air Force “on the medical side of subversive matters.”
_____________________________________________________________________
Lee is Groomed: To April 1963
? Lee Oswald, a CIA operative, was groomed to look like a disaffected
American for eventual use in Cuba. This was the primary reason for his fake
defection to Russia.
? Lee told Judyth that he gave the Soviets information that he believed
allowed them to shoot (REMOVE HYPHEN)down the secret U-2 spy plane (he had
been stationed at the U-2 base in Atsugi, Japan).
Lee said that the military wanted to derail an upcoming summit in which it
was feared that President Eisenhower, declining mentally, might be bested by
Krushchev.
Note: Downed U-2 Pilot Gary Powers has stated his belief that Oswald had the
information needed to bring him down.
? Upon his return from Russia, the CIA arranged for Lee to take a job at a
Dallas graphic arts firm, Jaggers-Chiles-Stovall, that was involved in
highly classified work for the government, including the creation of
detailed maps of Cuba. His CIA assignment involved LEARNING THE TERRAIN AND
identifying the location of safe houses.
Lee was not yet part of the CIA-Mafia plot in a concrete way, but would be
linked to it in the spring of 1963.
_____________________________________________________________________
Judyth and Lee
? When Lee was ordered to move to New Orleans in April 1963, he met Judyth
by accident (or maybe not) at the new post office. They hit it off
immediately, despite the fact that he was married and she was to be married
in a matter of days.
? Lee arranged for both of them to INTERVIEWED (MAY 9) AND TO be hired (MAY
10) by the Reily Coffee Company. He ALSO got them apartments within
walking distance of each other.
Evidence: Judyth’s W-2 form and pay stubs verify her contemporaneous
employment AT THE SAME ADDRESS with Oswald. (REILY’S OPERATED AT VARIOUS
LOCATIONS).
Evidence: Want ads for both positions in the New Orleans Times-Picayune (to
create a “cover” of normalcy).
EVIDENCE: JUDYTH’S CANCELED CHECKS SHOWING RENT PAYMENTS TO “SUSIE
HANOVER” BEGAN IN MAY 1963 AT 1032 MARENGO ST. RENT WAS PAID THROUGH
FIRST WEEK OF MAY TO “MRS. WEBBER” FOR PRIOR RESIDENCE AT A ST. CHARLES
STREET. ADDRESS.
Note: Both William Reily and Judyth’s boss, William Monaghan, were active
members of INCA. Monaghan, though nominally the company’s VICE PRESIDENT
AND credit manager, was actually ex-FBI and an expert in industrial
security.
? At Reily’s, Lee interviewed Cuban women, refugees, that were cycled thru
the factory. Winning their trust, he would extract from them the names of
safe contacts they had left behind in Cuba.
? Both Reily and Monaghan were aware of Lee’s mission and Judyth’s role as
his “aide.” But Lee’s immediate supervisors were not.
? Judyth covered for Lee’s activity, and for his daily absences from work,
making sure to punch him out at 4:30PM or 5:30PM when he was no longer
there, which was almost always.
Evidence: The Warren Report shows precise time-outs on the half-hour, an
impossibility since there was a line to wait on and such precise time-outs
could not occur accidentally. It didn’t occur to Judyth to vary the time-out
stamp.
Evidence: She also wrote an obviously phony background report on Lee for
Reily’s files. This report is also a Warren exhibit, although Judyth insists
it has not been published in its entirety. One missing piece refers to a
bank account; the WC reported no evidence that Lee had such an account.
? Often Lee would go through The Crescent City Garage, next door to Reily’s,
to get UNOBTRUSIVELY to the offices of ex-FBI man, now-CIA operative, Guy
Banister, who was deeply involved in anti-Castro causes. This necessitated
his befriending garage owner Adrian Alba.
Note: Previous accounts have maintained that Lee whiled away time at the
garage reading gun magazines.
Note: The garage was regularly used by FBI and CIA cars. Alba has
testified that he saw the driver of one such car pass a white envelope to
Lee.
? Lee was fired after he stole a green glass Judyth was admiring but could
not afford.
These glasses were packed together with tea made by the company. According
to the Warren Commission, he had been reprimanded by supervisors who often
could not find him (as well he should have been, because he was often not
there). The glass incident was the proximate cause of his dismissal, but his
work at Reily’s was done anyway.
Corroborating testimony: She told her children in 1980 of this episode.
Judyth still treasures the glass.
? Judyth was fired from Reily’s on August 9, after she was seen with Lee
leafleting on Canal Street..
Evidence: Judyth is 90% certain that Warren Commission exhibit Pizzo 453-B,
a photo of the scene, includes her standing near Lee. The picture is
blurry, but there is a resemblance between the girl in the photo and
contemporaneous photos of Judyth. The dress pattern in the picture matches
close-up photos of a dress Judyth wore in other photos in her possession.
The original film from which the still was made was recently sent by TV
station WDSU, on which it aired, for archiving at the University of New
Orleans. The last time we checked, it was still unarchived, in one of many
unmarked boxes.
Evidence: Her last pay stub was cut that very day.
Note: The site of the leafleting USUALLY DESCRIBED AS ON CANAL STREET IN
FRONT OF MAISON BLANCHE, was also NEXT DOOR TO the site of INCA’s
headquarters.
_____________________________________________________________________
The Noble Conspiracy
This is a totally new account of what was going on in David Ferrie’s
home-based lab.
? Lee arranged for Judyth to meet David Ferrie, who she would soon learn was
an associate of New Orleans Mafia boss Carlos Marcello. FERRIE WAS a
CIA-operative who flew missions into Castro’s Cuba, and an “amateur cancer
researcher.”
Note: Ferrie had lost his job as an Eastern Airlines pilot because of his
homosexuality. The 15-year-old Lee had spurned Ferrie’s homosexual advances
when Ferrie captained Lee’s Civil Air Patrol Unit (CAP).
Corroborating evidence: After decades of denials that Oswald and Ferrie
were acquainted, a photo emerged showing the two at a CAP picnic. Judyth
says there was an additional photo of the group, including Lee, hanging on
the wall in Ferrie’s apartment.
? In early May, Judyth was told Ochsner had set up both Ferrie’s home-based
cancer lab, as well as a smaller lab in the apartment of Dr. Mary Sherman, a
luminary at Ochsner’s Clinic. The labs were devoted to “the medical side of
subversive matters,” i.e., a form of biological warfare.
Corroborating evidence: The existence of the “cancer labs” is documented in
an obscure book by Ed Haslam, Mary, Ferrie and the Monkey Virus.
? Judyth put her extensive training in ways of speeding tumor growth in the
service of her government. Her job, which she accepted as a patriotic duty,
was to culture the strongest possible strains of lung cancer for eventual
transport to medical contacts in Cuba who could arrange for their injection
into Castro through a seemingly “innocuous innoculation.”
? This lung cancer material would appear to kill Castro "naturally," as a
heavy cigar smoker might be expected to develop lung cancer. This
“assassination by natural causes” would avert a possible confrontation with
Russia that could ignite World War III. Judyth really believed this was a
duty, considering the horrifying alternative.
? The serum in which the cancer cells were placed included a virus that
knocks out the immune system, thus enhancing the strength of the already
powerful cancer cells. This material – scraped from the kidney’s of sick
monkeys – was, in fact, the PRECURSOR OF THE AIDS virus.
Note: This material, DERIVED FROM VIRAL CONTAMINANTS FOUND in the early
polio vaccine and other applications, is now the subject of an important new
book on the origin of AIDS, Edward Hooper’s The River. Judyth knew of its
deadly potential and wrote letters to have its use stopped at the same time
as she was working with it.
..
_____________________________________________________________________
Associates
Judyth personally met other plotters, including Banister, Shaw, and
Marcello, though, as a girl of 19 or 20, she was often treated as if she
were wallpaper. Wallpaper with ears, a 160 IQ, and the ability to do
cutting edge cancer research.
Banister
? Banister used Lee to collect the names of Communist sympathizers at
area{DELETE s ] colleges.
Corroborating testimony: Prof. Michael Kurtz, an historian specializing in
Louisiana history, personally witnessed Lee, in Banister’s company, making
anti-integrationist remarks at Tulane. Banister was a racist. Lee, Judyth
says, was staunchly pro-civil rights.
? Lee sometimes used a work area on the second floor of the 544 Camp
building that housed Banister’s offices.
Note: Critics of DA Jim Garrison insist there was no stairway ALLOWING
ACCESS between the two offices.
According to Judyth, while there was no public stairway, there were stairs
leading down from the second floor to a door inside Banister’s private
office.
Corroborating Testimony: Anna Vincent, a new witness and ex-wife of
Banister “detective” David Lewis, confirms the existence of the stairway (on
audiotape).
? Judyth saw Lee sign out guns from Banister's weapons storeroom on the
third floor of 544 Camp. Lee also kept his own guns there and, contrary to
the belief of most conspiracy theorists, she maintains that he was an
excellent shot. She never saw or heard of a Mannlicher-Carcano, the gun
Oswald supposedly used to kill Kennedy.
Ruby, Marcello
? While Judyth was in Lee’s company, she met Jack Ruby twice, in May and
June of 1963, once at Ferrie's apartment and once at The 500 Club, a
Marcello hang-out. Ruby worked with Banister and Marcello in running guns to
Cuban exiles.
Corroborating testimony: Anna Vincent: “Ruby knew all of ’em,” including
Oswald. She also claims that David Lewis knew Lee before Judyth ever met
him, she believes in 1962. It has long been suspected that Ruby and
Banister ran guns to the exiles.
Corroborating testimony: Prof. Kurtz and others claim that Ruby was in New
Orleans on several occasions in 1963.
Corroborating testimony: Gerry Patrick Hemming, head of Interpen, a
mercenary group linked by some to the assassination, says he saw Oswald at
the New Orleans airport in “mid-1962.” (Actually, Hemming claims other
members of his group were involved, but that he turned down two contracts
from Texas money, believing he was going to be made the patsy. Hemming is
still very much alive and talking.)
? Judyth knew Ruby as "Sparky" Rubenstein. When Lee was killed, she did not
know that Jack Ruby and Sparky Rubenstein were the same man! The shock of
seeing Lee killed on TV, AND FEAR THAT SHE WOULD ACCIDENTALLY REVEAL HER OWN
INVOLVEMENT IN THE MATTER, caused her to avoid all further coverage of the
assassination, as well as the official investigations that followed.
? Lee told Judyth that he first met Sparky when he was just 15, and that he
spurned Ruby’s attempts to recruit him into Mob business. Even so, he ran
errands for his uncle, Dutz Murrett, who ran a bookmaking operation for
Marcello. Judyth accompanied Lee on one such errand soon after she met him.
? Lee told Judyth that he was trusted by Mob figures, up to and including
Marcello, for his ability to keep his mouth shut. Marcello told Ruby to
look after the boy when the family moved to Texas.
Corroborating evidence: Oswald’s ties to the Mafia came not just via his
uncle, but from his mother, who dated a number Marcello employees, including
Sam Termine. Oswald and his mother ONCE lived in a Mafia neighborhood on
Exchange Alley.
CIA Work
? Lee and Ferrie HELPED TEACH [taught] combat techniques to Cuban exiles at
the CIA-established training camp NEAR [at] Lake Pontchartrain (other camps
were in Florida), and portions of these training sessions were filmed.
Judyth saw some of this film in Ferrie’s apartment.
Corroborating testimony: Robert Tanenbaum, Deputy Counsel of the House
Select Committee on Assassinations, saw such a film before he quit the
investigation in disgust.. He believed it was archived at the Georgetown
Library, but it is no longer there. His attempts to relocate it have proved
fruitless. Like so much other evidence (including the President’s brain and
numerous autopsy photos!), it is missing. Tanenbaum is today a very
successful mystery writer, as well as the former mayor of Beverly Hills.
Tanenbaum’s novel Corruption of Blood was a very thinly veiled account of
his experience with the HSCA, and includes a description of the film.
? Judyth saw Lee use an expensive Minox camera, typically used in espionage
work.
Corroborating evidence: The FBI tried to get the Dallas police to change
its evidence inventory from “small German camera” to "light meter" --
efforts fully documented by the officers they pressured. An FBI document
refers to Minox film retrieved from Oswald’s possessions after the
assassination.
Lead: Where is the film today? Where is the camera or light meter? In
fact, a Minox camera sits in the National Archives today (owner unknown).
It is glued shut so its serial number cannot be seen. In any case, how could
Oswald, supposedly a virtual pauper, afford a $200 spy camera?
Note: According to Judyth, Lee’s Minox was so sensitive that she never saw
IT USED with a light meter.
? To establish his pro-Castro bona fides, Lee handed out leaflets bearing
the name of the “Fair Play for Cuba Committee” three times in August. He
got the idea for leafleting from an episode of “I Led Three Lives,” an early
1950s TV show about Herbert Philbrick, an FBI man pretending to be a
Communist.
Evidence: Lee’s brother, Robert, confirms his fascination with that show.
Note: Lee [AT SOME TIME] [later] met the real Herbert Philbrick, who was a
consultant to Ochsner’s group, INCA. He found his boyhood hero unimpressive
in the flesh.
? Lee staged his own arrest at an August 16th leafleting. His “fight” with
Cuban exile leader Carlos Bringuier was based on an incident he had read
about in a local newspaper months earlier. The story concerned a clean-cut
narcotics agent who provoked a street fight to enhance his cover as a bad
guy.
Evidence: Judyth has the May 4, 1963 article.
Corroborating testimony: Ex-CIA agent William Gaudet said he saw Oswald
inside the International Trade Center several times. Judyth says Lee stored
some of his propaganda materials there. Gaudet has said the street scuffle
was “a sort of PR operation” and declared his belief that Kennedy was the
victim of an anti-Communist conspiracy. Gaudet was a friend of Ocshner’s.
? At a meeting arranged by Ochsner’s group, INCA, held to prepare for a
radio interview of Lee, someone accidentally uttered the name [ACTUALLY,
THEY SAID ‘DAVID PHILLIPS,’AND LEE RECOGNIZED THIS AS DAVID ATLEE PHILLIPS]
“David Atlee Phillips.” Lee came to believe his CIA handler, “Mr. B.," was
actually Phillips. Judyth waited in the car as the meeting took place at
Reily’s.
Lead: Phillips, propaganda specialist in Cuban affairs, denied ever knowing
Oswald. There are reports of a death-bed confession in which he admitted,
at the very least, that he did meet Oswald. Judyth’s source, a national
book award winner, claimed this information came from Phillips’s nephew,
[REMOVE a] Shawn Phillips, but THE WRITER now refuses to help us locate this
man.
? Lee then participated in a radio debate with Bringuier, also organized by
Ochsner’s group, INCA.
? Shaw and Ferrie knew each other well. Once, Judyth accompanied Lee to an
airfield where Ferrie took the other two men on a flight to Canada.
Corroborating testimony: Others have reported on Ferrie-Shaw flights to
Canada.
Corroborating testimony: An ex-secretary of Ochsner’s, Aura Lee, worked at
Shaw’s Trade Mart and claimed that Ferrie, a distinctive-looking gentleman,
was a frequent visitor to Shaw.
_____________________________________________________________________
Judyth’s Lee
Judyth portrays Oswald as a much more intelligent and charming man than we
have seen in most previous accounts.
? Although Lee confessed to her within days of their meeting that he beat
Marina, Judyth says he never raised a hand to her. In fact, she describes
no fights of any kind. Lee told her that Marina mercilessly denigrated him.
Lee admitted to a mother-wife problem, which they often discussed, and she
believes the abuse stopped (it would be interesting if Marina would confirm
this).
Corroborating testimony: In his unpublished manuscript – I’m A Patsy, I’m A
Patsy – the urbane George DeMohrenschildt[OMIT ,] described by some as Lee’s
CIA “babysitter” in Texas, described Marina’s DEMEANING treatment of Lee.
? Although primarily self-taught, the range of Lee’s knowledge impressed
Judyth, as did his ability to teach himself Russian despite being dyslexic.
Corroborating evidence: Oswald’s library records show that he was an avid
reader. They also show Judyth’s influence (anthropology and sci-fi), as well
as books he took out for her to read (e.g., a primer on C[ O][u]mmunism).
Judyth says he took out more books than are shown in the Warren Report, some
using her or Ferrie’s library cards.
Evidence: Refer to the text of a speech Lee gave to a Jesuit-sponsored
conference in Mobile…a transcript of his radio debate…a short sci-fi story –
[‘HER WAY’][NOT “Her Story”] – A 17 PAGE SCIENCE FICTION STORY he wrote with
Judyth.
Corroborating testimony: DeMohrenschildt praised Lee’s intelligence in his
book (a different account of the man than the one he gave to the Warren
Commission).
Note: “The Baron” committed suicide just prior to meeting with House
investigator Gaeton Fonzi (The Last Investigation) – before he could be
asked to explain these inconsistencies.
? While in the company of Oswald, Judyth sometimes posed as Marina, which
was possible because of their physical resemblance and her ability to speak
Russian. Judyth’s husband was out of town most of their married life in New
Orleans.
Evidence: Judyth has photos of herself at the time, some of which show a
striking resemblance to Marina. THEY WERE ALSO THE SAME HEIGHT AND BUILD.
? In testimony, Marina said Lee was always home at night, but she never said
by what time.
Corroborating testimony: Anna Vincent asserts that she, her husband, Judyth
and Lee were a foursome, meeting after work on a regular basis early that
summer, usually at Thompson’s Restaurant, where Anna worked. Lee and Judyth
would keep company with them until 8:00-8:30 PM. Anna describes a call from
Marina at Thompson’s. Marina wanted to know if Lee was there with another
woman.
? Although they fell in love almost immediately, Lee and Judyth resisted
becoming lovers until the summer.
_____________________________________________________________________
Clinton/Jackson: Mystery Solved
This is a totally new account of the trip to Clinton
? Judyth’s work took longer than expected, and was, to her horror, tested on
at least one human guinea pig -- the real reason for the mysterious trip to
Clinton, probably on August 23, by Shaw, Ferrie, and Oswald.
Note: The House Select Committee on Assassinations found the Clinton
witnesses – including John Birchers and CORE activists – credible, but no
one has been able to come up with a coherent explanation for the trip. All
have been sidetracked by the fact that Oswald tried to register to vote
while in Clinton though he didn’t live there.
? Lee mentioned picking up a man in white hospital garb who guided them to
the mental hospital in Jackson, the next town over from Clinton, and to the
PROPER BUILDING AND ENTRYWAY IN THE LARGE COMPLEX [experimental area] there.
Note: Witnesses reported seeing a fourth man – a “man in white” -- emerge
from the car with Lee in Clinton.
? The true reason for the long stop in Clinton was an unexpected delay: the
prisoner(s) had not yet arrived at the hospital. Oswald got [IN][ on] line
after betting Shaw that he could get registered just because he was white,
EVEN THOUGH HE WAS FROM A DIFFERENT PARISH.
? Lee and Judyth were heartsick over the plan to treat a prisoner/mental
patient, but were powerless to stop it. Several days after the first trip,
Lee took Judyth to the hospital to see the test subject. Shaw OK’d the
trip, as he wanted her professional assessment of the patient’s condition.
? Judyth checked on the bloodwork to see if the serum “took.” If the
bloodwork was not conclusive, an immediate blood sample could have been
drawn and checked while she was still there. As it turned out, radical
changes began quickly. The only man she saw (more than one may have been
treated) was Cuban, white, about Castro's age and physique.
? They made one stop going to Jackson and another on the way home. Judyth
stayed in the car both times.
Corroborating evidence: Despite “slouching,,” she was seen by at least two
witnesses:
? Edwin Lea McGehee:
An "old...battered" car drove up to his barbershop and Lee Harvey Oswald
came inside for a haircut. "There was a woman sitting on the front seat [of
the car]...and in the back seat what I noticed was -- looked like a [baby]
bassinet..." (Judyth says this was a car used by the Lewis’s and that the
bassinet was for the ever-pregnant Anna. ANNA EVENTUALLY HAD TEN CHILDREN.).
? Mary Morgan, daughter of Reeves Morgan, State Representative (and a guard
at the Jackson hospital!):
When Oswald was in the house talking with her dad, she went onto the porch
and “just casually noticed there was a dark colored car parked under a tree
in the front of the house." She remembered "seeing a woman in the car.”
Note: The fact that there were two trips within days of each other explains
why some accounts say this was a three-day trip. It is unlikely that any of
these men, and certainly not Shaw, would make a three-day trip together.
? The test was a success, as the subject died within weeks.
? Lee and Judyth began to realize that they were trapped. They could not
back out of the plot for fear they would be killed.
_____________________________________________________________________
Road to the Assassination
? Lee and Judyth actually liked the Kennedys; in their youthful
overconfidence, they never thought they would be racing a deadline to keep
JFK from becoming a target.
? In private, Ferrie told them that he opposed the assassination; he was
only putting on an act for Shaw, who represented Texas money in New Orleans.
Note: Excluding comments in Banister’s company, every mention in the
historical record of Oswald talking about Kennedy is a positive one. (We
have a compilation of his statements.)
? Based on a message from AN H.L. Hunt EXECUTIVE conveyed to a Shaw
associate, those involved with the labs had reason to fear for their lives
once they had outlived their usefulness.
? Ferrie arranged for Judyth to take a job, beginning in September, at
Peninsular Chem Research in Gaine[S]ville, Florida, which CUSTOM-made
ORGANIC AND [REMOVE highly] toxic chemicals. There she could continue to
contribute to the project by making “custom” chemicals for Ferrie.
Evidence: Judyth has a read-out from a chemical analysis, marked F-1, done
at PenChem on a rare carc[CI][en]ogenic substance.
? The three understood, as early as the third week of August, that Lee's
grooming in Russia and his [PRO-CASTRO] activities in New Orleans made him
the perfect patsy.
? Fearing he was a dead man if he tried to break with the conspirators at
this point, he would pretend to embrace Plan B, walking with eyes wide open
into the patsy role. He hoped to get close to the inner circle of the
conspiracy in Dallas and stop the plot from the inside. To get further
inside, [LEE][he ] played up his connections to Marcello and revealed his
marksmanship.
? At the end of August, Shaw paid for the last of several hotel trysts for
Judyth and Lee. According to Judyth, Shaw felt sorry for them.
? Judyth then left for Florida. The supposedly impoverished Lee gave her
$400 for “emergencies” – equal to about $2,800 in today’s dollars. Judyth
told her family that the money fell out of an ironing board she bought at a
yard sale. “IT BECAME A FAMILY LEGEND,’ SHE SAYS.
.._____________________________________________________________________
Mexico City: Mystery Solved
This is a totally new account of the mysterious trip to Mexico City.
? In August, Judyth trained Lee to handle the deadly material. LEE, IN TURN,
WOULD TEACH A CONTACT IN MEXICO CITY HOW TO HANDLE THE MATERIALS, AND IN
THIS MANNER, THE MATERIALS WOULD SURVIVE TRANSFER TO A CUBAN MEDICAL LAB..
AFTER PLEDGES TO MEET ONCE THIS MISSION WAS OVER, Judyth left for Florida
at the end of the month.
? Lee couriered the materials to Mexico City at the end of September,
expecting to meet a contact who would bring them into Cuba. He was ordered
to make the trip by “Mr. B.”
New information: Mr. B may not have been Phillips. Another CIA figure, Frank
Bender, one alias of Gerry Droller, was known inside the agency as Mr. B.
He was posted to Mexico City at the same time as Phillips. The record says
that Droller worked for the OSS during the war, but there are indications he
had actually worked on biological weapons for the Nazis.
? Lee was left holding the bag -- i.e., no one was there to meet him in
Mexico City to take the materials off his hands. So he desperately tried to
get into Cuba himself, where his knowledge of HOW TO HANDLE THE MATERIALS,
the language, the terrain, safe houses, and contacts might still be used.
Indeed, initially, he expected to make the entire trip himself.
? He was frantic because the materials had a limited life span outside a
lab – hence, the official reports of his erratic behavior. He was also
frantic because he knew what failure meant. In fact, the conspirators had
already turned to Plan B without telling him.
? They were later told that Hurricane Flora had created so much destruction
that information about safe houses, and about Castro’s routine, was no
longer to be trusted, so Plan A had to be called off.
_____________________________________________________________________
Endgame
? With Lee in Texas and Judyth in Florida, Ferrie arranged for about 14
back-channel phone calls through a cooperative (and well-paid-off) operator
in Covington.
Corroborating evidence: Only one call placed to Oswald at the Book
Depository is on record. This call came from “a lady with no accent” The
Warren Commission tried to track the origin of the call, but couldn’t get
past Covington. According to Judyth, the record would not even show this
call except for the fact that the operator putting this call through was not
their usual operator.
Note: Interpen had a presence in Covington.
? Lee told Judyth that he made several unsuccessful attempts to stop the
assassination, including calling death threats to the FBI.
Corroborating evidence: A number of anonymous threats and warnings were
called into FBI offices prior to the assassination.
? In their last conversation, on November 20th, they discussed the option of
fleeing before the assassination. Judyth recalls Lee’s words precisely:
“if I stay, that will be one less bullet aimed at Kennedy.”
? Lee told Judyth of his last-ditch plan: to fire a premature shot, a
warning shot, at the motorcade, hoping to alert JFK’s Secret Service
protectors.
Corroborating Testimony: At least 5 Warren Commission witnesses reported a
bullet hitting the pavement behind the President’s limo. This would have
been his closest and, presumably, easiest shot.
Note: The "street shot" bullet was presumably never found, unless that is
what is being picked up by the "mystery FBI man" photographed with Dallas
Deputy Sheriff Buddy Walthers and Officer J.W. Foster. The photo has long
been the subject of speculation.
Corroborating Testimony: Anna Vincent says it was open knowledge in the
local Mafia that Lee fired a premature shot.
? If he did fire a warning shot, it went unheeded by the sleepy Secret
Service agents.
? Lee and Judyth had made plans for an escape and rendezvous in Mexico.
Judyth tells of Ferrie sobbing uncontrollably during phone calls with him
because it had all gone so wrong. His 400-mile car trip to Houston the day
of the assassination was made in vain (he told Garrison, variously, that he
and two friends went [ICE][roller]-skating or goose-hunting).
_____________________________________________________________________
Deaths After Dallas
? Guy Banister died of an apparent hear[T] attack at his home in early 1964.
New Testimony: According to Anna Vincent, her husband, David Lewis, and
fellow Banister employee, Jack Martin, went to the office immediately upon
hearing the news, only to find the files carted off and yellow
[TAPE][ribbon] surrounding the office as if it were a crime scene. Lewis
played a minor role in the Cuban operation and, according to Anna, was told
to “keep his mouth shut.”
Note: Author Ed Haslam (see above) believes he saw remnants of Banister’s
missing files at INCA’s offices.
? David Ferrie died of an apparent brain anyeurism (not cancer as he told
those curious about his lab) in early 1964.
Note: An empty bottle of Proloid – which could kill a man suffering from
hypertension -- and two typed “suicide notes” keep his death controversial.
? Mary Sherman was brutally murdered in her bed [IN JULY, 1964][just weeks
later,] with reports of cancer cells stolen.
Corroborating testimony: Judyth has a letter from a former resident of New
Orleans in which he recollects radio reports of stolen cancer cells.
? THE NON-SMOKING Jack Ruby died of “a galloping LUNG cancer” in JAIL IN
1967. When [RUBY][ he] visited Ferrie’s apartment in the summer of 1963,
Judyth showed him the lab and told him about the cancer cell injections --
including where on the body the injections should be administered.
Note: In jail, Ruby insisted he was injected with cancer cells, but no one
took him seriously. His mind was shot and they just assumed he was babbling
incoherently.
Clay Shaw died suddenly of SUSPECTED LUNG cancer in 1972 after being treated
for an undisclosed illness at Ochsner’s Hospital.
Note: Of the 8 persons Judyth knew who were connected to the New Orelans
cancer project, 5 were dead by 1967. After 1972, only she and Ochsner
remained -- and she was in hiding.
_____________________________________________________________________
The Participants
Who was involved? Mafia, CIA “rogues,” Cuban exiles, financed by Texas oil
AND INDUSTRY – or a smaller group culled from these. When the CIA-Mafia
alliance was established in 1959, an infrastructure was created that could
be used by a subset of this group to put into motion the assassination of
JFK.
Their Motives
The Mafia
JFK's failure to regain Cuba meant the permanent loss of billions of dollars
from their casinos, HOUSES OF PROSTITUTION, AND DRUG RINGS. Also providing
motive was Bobby Kennedy’s unprecedent assault on organized crime, including
particularly aggressive treatment of New Orleans crime boss Carlos Marcello.
Bobby had the proud Marecello kidnapped [WHEN MARCELLO REPORTED TO A PAROLE
OFFICER][from his office], put on a plane, and dumped in Guatemala. He made
it back to the US, barely surviving the wilds of Honduras. The treatment was
no way to repay a debt, i.e., the Mob’s help in rigging 1960 election
results in Illinois and Texas.
The CIA
After the Bay of Pigs fiasco, JFK threatened to “split the CIA into a
thousand pieces.” He fired CIA Director Allen Dulles (who would later sit
on the Warren Commission!) and General George Cabell (whose brother Earl was
Mayor of Dallas in 1963). JFK was seen as soft on Communism,
[WEAKENING][weakening] his resolve in Vietnam, and extending an olive branch
to Castro AND KHRUSHCHEV.
Cuban Exiles
Kennedy’s betrayals: the Bay of Pigs; the deal with the Soviets that ended
the Cuban Missile Crisis, which included a non-invasion pledge; RFK’s
dismantling of exile training camps the CIA set up for exiles; his
suppression of raids on Cuba; WITHDRAWAL OF FUNDING OF ANTI-CASTRO EXILES,
and, finally, JFK’s attempt late in 1963 at a rapproachmant with Castro.
Texas Money
This group – led by H.L. Hunt –OR POSSIBLY BY HIS LIEUTENANTS--- detested
JFK’s Cuba policy, as well as his integrationist stance, but mostly they
were threatened by his vow to repeal a major tax windfall, the oil depletion
allowance. They wanted a man in the White House they could control, i.e.,
LBJ, and they needed to get him there fast, as the Bobby Baker and Billy Sol
Estes scandals threatened his continuation as Vice President.
If this cabal couldn’t get to Castro, paving the way for a rebellion, or at
least more compliant leadership, they had decided to go after Kennedy. With
the blame pinned on Oswald, who was groomed to look like a Communist, and
would soon be groomed to look pro-Castro, they hoped to spark a second
invasion of Cuba.
Ironically, CIA stonewalling of the Warren Commission was almost certainly
conducted to prevent its relationship with the Mafia from being exposed, as
well as its surveillance operation in Mexico City. Thus, the assassination
cover-up was thus joined by high officials in the CIA, who may not
themselves have participated in the assassination.
_____________________________________________________________________
On Proof and Evidence
While there is no “smoking gun” proof -- no government document, for
example -- for this particular plot, no such proof should be expected for a
project kept so secret. However, the account provided by Judyth Vary Baker
is much more detailed than any previous account by a late-emerging witness,
and it explains [MUCH OF WHAT WAS][a lot] previously subject to wild, and
widely divergent, speculation.
____________________________________________________________________
Last Words
“They did it too good.”
Gerry Patrick Hemming, Interpen, on why the conspirators failed:
"What backfired on the plotters was painting this picture that it was a
Castro hit. It scared the shit out of some high-ranking people, and they
covered it up….How could these people [the plotters] possibly figure out
that this scenario would scare the shit out of the people in Washington?
Jesus Christ, the best laid plans of mice and men. They did it too good.
They painted too clear of a picture that burned its way right back to Fidel
Castro. It scared the fuck out of the powers that be. They wouldn't go to
war. The American people never realized we had come so fucking close to
nuclear holocaust."
“…Who Struck John”
James Jesus Angleton, CIA counterintelligence spymaster:
"A mansion has many rooms and there were many things going on during the
period of the bombings. I'm not privy to who struck John." [The New York
Times, March 1975]
WHICH THEN CHANGED TO THIS:
Deadly Alliance
By Judyth Vary Baker with Howard Platzman, Ph.D.
OUTLINE OF THE CONSPIRACY
nd Plan B: The Plot to Kill Castro and the Assassination of FK
In 1963, the unsuccessful CIA-Mafia alliance to kill Castro -- top-secret
until exposed by the Church Committee in 1975 -- was directly linked to the
JFK assassination conspiracy. APlan A@ called for Castro to be killed
through the use of a biological weapon that would make his death appear
natural. If he could not be killed by October 25, 1963, the same group of
conspirators would go to APlan B@: killing Kennedy.
This is the first account of the JFK assassination that links it directly
(in an either-or fashion) to the plot to kill Castro, and the first time Lee
Harvey Oswald has ever been tied to the plot to kill Castro.
What this means is that the JFK assassination plot was an offshoot of a
larger secret alliance that is already established fact. It is, therefore,
not necessary to believe in the existence of a separate conspiracy theory.
Note: Judyth=s knowledge of events in New Orleans is often first-hand. What
she knows or believes about events in Dallas comes from conversations with
Oswald or David Ferrie.
_____________________________________________________________________
Judyth is Recruited: To April 1963
By the age of 15, Judyth achieved a reputation as a science whiz kid, having
invented a new way to extract magnesium from seawater.
Her real passion, though, was cancer research. Col. Philip Doyle set up a
special lab for Judyth at her high school (Manatee High, in Florida), and
introduced her to CIA asset and biological weapons expert, Dr. Canute
Michaelson, who provided financial support for her initial work.
Her appearance at an international science fair brought her to the attention
of other medical figures with military or intelligence backgrounds, as well
as top officials of the American Cancer Society: Dr.Harold Diehl and Dr.
Alton Ochsner (of the famed Ochsner Cancer Clinic in New Orleans). Ochsner
was Judyth=s principal behind-the-scenes mentor through her late teen years.
Judyth=s lab was expanded and she received research materials from doctors
at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, Eli Lilly, Oak Ridge, et al.
Evidence: A letter dated 9-2-60 from Dr. David Jacobus at Walter Reed,
making specific reference to chemicals supplied her and promising more.
She was REQUIRED to take a loyalty oath., and, while still in high school,
was required to learn conversational Russian at a local junior college from
a Dr. Concevitch.
Evidence: A yellowed mailing envelope with the addressee, Concevitch.
Her work came to the attention of Florida Senator George Smathers, a close
friend of JFK=s, who encouraged her to write to the President and volunteer
to put her talents to work in the service of her country.
Evidence: A reply from the White House. (While not very dramatic, she soon
received fresh supplies, as Sen. Smathers told her she would.)
She spent the summer after high school graduation working under a National
Science Foundation grant at Roswell Park in Buffalo, NY, the world=s oldest
cancer research center. Her studies centered on "substances which cause
cancer to become most deadly."
Source: The Bradenton Herald, 9-6-61.
Of the 60-plus students working under a grant, she was the only member of
the group chosen by Dr. George Moore, head of Roswell Park, to work directly
with him -- and she was the only one forced to stay at the local YWCA. She
was, in essence, Akidnapped@ from an off-site apartment she tried to rent
and returned to the Y.
Evidence: BROCHURES, YWCA RECEIPT, AND FORMS. Copious newspaper clippings
on her achievements.
Corroborating testimony: Judyth recently located DR.ROB STROM, who also
exhibited at the science fair. He REMEMBERED HER. THOUGH HE ALSO RECEIVED
ATTENTION FROM MANY FRONTS, HE TOLD HER HIS LEFT-WING VIEWS MADE HIM A POOR
CANDIDATE FOR CIA RECRUITMENT.
Who Was Dr. Alton Ochsner?
Along with Judyth herself, Ochsner is the primary new figure to emerge in
this account of Oswald=s stay in New Orleans.
Notes
Ocshner was friends with Clay Shaw, who was unsuccessfully prosecuted by New
Orleans D.A. Jim Garrison for conspiring to assassinate JFK. Ochsner was
director of International House at the same time Clay Shaw was a managing
director (1961-1962). At different times, he and Shaw headed this
organization AND the International Trade Mart. The two ORGANIZATIONS merged
some years later.
Ochsner=s biographers quote him as fearing that he would be indicted by
Garrison (John Wilds and Ira Harkey, Surgeon of the South)
Ochsner was also friends with AWild Bill@ Donovan, head of the OSS, the
prescursor to the CIA. Both were elected officials of the American Cancer
Society in 1949.
Ochsner founded the virulently anti-Communist Information Council of the
Americas (INCA), which later figured heavily into the activities of both
Judyth and Lee.
Author Thomas Karnes (Tropical Enterprise) describes Ochsner as a consultant
to the US Air Force Aon the medical side of subversive matters.@
_____________________________________________________________________
Lee is Groomed: To April 1963
Lee Oswald, a CIA operative, was groomed to look like a disaffected American
for eventual use in Cuba. This was the primary reason for his fake defection
to Russia.
Lee told Judyth that he gave the Soviets information that he believed
allowed them to shoot (REMOVE HYPHEN)down the secret U-2 spy plane (he had
been stationed at the U-2 base in Atsugi, Japan).
Lee said that the military wanted to derail an upcoming summit in which it
was feared that President Eisenhower, declining mentally, might be bested by
Krushchev.
Note: Downed U-2 Pilot Gary Powers has stated his belief that Oswald had the
information needed to bring him down.
Upon his return from Russia, the CIA arranged for Lee to take a job at a
Dallas graphic arts firm, Jaggers-Chiles-Stovall, that was involved in
highly classified work for the government, including the creation of
detailed maps of Cuba. His CIA assignment involved LEARNING THE TERRAIN AND
identifying the location of safe houses.
Lee was not yet part of the CIA-Mafia plot in a concrete way, but would be
linked to it in the spring of 1963.
_____________________________________________________________________
Judyth and Lee
When Lee was ordered to move to New Orleans in April 1963, he met Judyth by
accident (or maybe not) at the new post office. They hit it off immediately,
despite the fact that he was married and she was to be married in a matter
of days.
Lee arranged for both of them to INTERVIEWED (MAY 9) AND TO be hired (MAY
10) by the Reily Coffee Company. He ALSO got them apartments within
walking distance of each other.
Evidence: Judyth=s W-2 form and pay stubs verify her contemporaneous
employment AT THE SAME ADDRESS with Oswald. (REILY=S OPERATED AT VARIOUS
LOCATIONS).
Evidence: Want ads for both positions in the New Orleans Times-Picayune (to
create a Acover@ of normalcy).
EVIDENCE: JUDYTH=S CANCELED CHECKS SHOWING RENT PAYMENTS TO ASUSIE
HANOVER@ BEGAN IN MAY 1963 AT 1032 MARENGO ST. RENT WAS PAID THROUGH
FIRST WEEK OF MAY TO AMRS. WEBBER@ FOR PRIOR RESIDENCE AT A ST. CHARLES
STREET. ADDRESS.
Note: Both William Reily and Judyth=s boss, William Monaghan, were active
members of INCA. Monaghan, though nominally the company=s VICE PRESIDENT
AND credit manager, was actually ex-FBI and an expert in industrial
security.
At Reily=s, Lee interviewed Cuban women, refugees, that were cycled thru the
factory. Winning their trust, he would extract from them the names of safe
contacts they had left behind in Cuba.
Both Reily and Monaghan were aware of Lee=s mission and Judyth=s role as his
Aaide.@ But Lee=s immediate supervisors were not.
Judyth covered for Lee=s activity, and for his daily absences from work,
making sure to punch him out at 4:30PM or 5:30PM when he was no longer
there, which was almost always.
Evidence: The Warren Report shows precise time-outs on the half-hour, an
impossibility since there was a line to wait on and such precise time-outs
could not occur accidentally. It didn=t occur to Judyth to vary the time-out
stamp.
Evidence: She also wrote an obviously phony background report on Lee for
Reily=s files. This report is also a Warren exhibit, although Judyth insists
it has not been published in its entirety. One missing piece refers to a
bank account; the WC reported no evidence that Lee had such an account.
Often Lee would go through The Crescent City Garage, next door to Reily=s,
to get UNOBTRUSIVELY to the offices of ex-FBI man, now-CIA operative, Guy
Banister, who was deeply involved in anti-Castro causes. This necessitated
his befriending garage owner Adrian Alba.
Note: Previous accounts have maintained that Lee whiled away time at the
garage reading gun magazines.
Note: The garage was regularly used by FBI and CIA cars. Alba has
testified that he saw the driver of one such car pass a white envelope to
Lee.
Lee was fired after he stole a green glass Judyth was admiring but could not
afford.
These glasses were packed together with tea made by the company. According
to the Warren Commission, he had been reprimanded by supervisors who often
could not find him (as well he should have been, because he was often not
there). The glass incident was the proximate cause of his dismissal, but his
work at Reily=s was done anyway.
Corroborating testimony: She told her children in 1980 of this episode.
Judyth still treasures the glass.
Judyth was fired from Reily=s on August 9, after she was seen with Lee
leafleting on Canal Street..
Evidence: Judyth is 90% certain that Warren Commission exhibit Pizzo 453-B,
a photo of the scene, includes her standing near Lee. The picture is
blurry, but there is a resemblance between the girl in the photo and
contemporaneous photos of Judyth. The dress pattern in the picture matches
close-up photos of a dress Judyth wore in other photos in her possession.
The original film from which the still was made was recently sent by TV
station WDSU, on which it aired, for archiving at the University of New
Orleans. The last time we checked, it was still unarchived, in one of many
unmarked boxes.
Evidence: Her last pay stub was cut that very day.
Note: The site of the leafleting USUALLY DESCRIBED AS ON CANAL STREET IN
FRONT OF MAISON BLANCHE, was also NEXT DOOR TO the site of INCA=s
headquarters.
_____________________________________________________________________
The Noble Conspiracy
This is a totally new account of what was going on in David Ferrie=s
home-based lab.
Lee arranged for Judyth to meet David Ferrie, who she would soon learn was
an associate of New Orleans Mafia boss Carlos Marcello. FERRIE WAS a
CIA-operative who flew missions into Castro=s Cuba, and an Aamateur cancer
researcher.@
Note: Ferrie had lost his job as an Eastern Airlines pilot because of his
homosexuality. The 15-year-old Lee had spurned Ferrie=s homosexual advances
when Ferrie captained Lee=s Civil Air Patrol Unit (CAP).
Corroborating evidence: After decades of denials that Oswald and Ferrie
were acquainted, a photo emerged showing the two at a CAP picnic. Judyth
says there was an additional photo of the group, including Lee, hanging on
the wall in Ferrie=s apartment.
In early May, Judyth was told Ochsner had set up both Ferrie=s home-based
cancer lab, as well as a smaller lab in the apartment of Dr. Mary Sherman, a
luminary at Ochsner=s Clinic. The labs were devoted to Athe medical side of
subversive matters,@ i.e., a form of biological warfare.
Corroborating evidence: The existence of the Acancer labs@ is documented in
an obscure book by Ed Haslam, Mary, Ferrie and the Monkey Virus.
Judyth put her extensive training in ways of speeding tumor growth in the
service of her government. Her job, which she accepted as a patriotic duty,
was to culture the strongest possible strains of lung cancer for eventual
transport to medical contacts in Cuba who could arrange for their injection
into Castro through a seemingly Ainnocuous innoculation.@
This lung cancer material would appear to kill Castro "naturally," as a
heavy cigar smoker might be expected to develop lung cancer. This
Aassassination by natural causes@ would avert a possible confrontation with
Russia that could ignite World War III. Judyth really believed this was a
duty, considering the horrifying alternative.
The serum in which the cancer cells were placed included a virus that knocks
out the immune system, thus enhancing the strength of the already powerful
cancer cells. This material B scraped from the kidney=s of sick monkeys B
was, in fact, the PRECURSOR OF THE AIDS virus.
Note: This material, DERIVED FROM VIRAL CONTAMINANTS FOUND in the early
polio vaccine and other applications, is now the subject of an important new
book on the origin of AIDS, Edward Hooper=s The River. Judyth knew of its
deadly potential and wrote letters to have its use stopped at the same time
as she was working with it.
..
_____________________________________________________________________
Associates
Judyth personally met other plotters, including Banister, Shaw, and
Marcello, though, as a girl of 19 or 20, she was often treated as if she
were wallpaper. Wallpaper with ears, a 160 IQ, and the ability to do
cutting edge cancer research.
Banister
Banister used Lee to collect the names of Communist sympathizers at
area{DELETE s ] colleges.
Corroborating testimony: Prof. Michael Kurtz, an historian specializing in
Louisiana history, personally witnessed Lee, in Banister=s company, making
anti-integrationist remarks at Tulane. Banister was a racist. Lee, Judyth
says, was staunchly pro-civil rights.
Lee sometimes used a work area on the second floor of the 544 Camp building
that housed Banister=s offices.
Note: Critics of DA Jim Garrison insist there was no stairway ALLOWING
ACCESS between the two offices.
According to Judyth, while there was no public stairway, there were stairs
leading down from the second floor to a door inside Banister=s private
office.
Corroborating Testimony: Anna Vincent, a new witness and ex-wife of
Banister Adetective@ David Lewis, confirms the existence of the stairway (on
audiotape).
Judyth saw Lee sign out guns from Banister's weapons storeroom on the third
floor of 544 Camp. Lee also kept his own guns there and, contrary to the
belief of most conspiracy theorists, she maintains that he was an excellent
shot. She never saw or heard of a Mannlicher-Carcano, the gun Oswald
supposedly used to kill Kennedy.
Ruby, Marcello
While Judyth was in Lee=s company, she met Jack Ruby twice, in May and June
of 1963, once at Ferrie's apartment and once at The 500 Club, a Marcello
hang-out. Ruby worked with Banister and Marcello in running guns to Cuban
exiles.
Corroborating testimony: Anna Vincent: ARuby knew all of =em,@ including
Oswald. She also claims that David Lewis knew Lee before Judyth ever met
him, she believes in 1962. It has long been suspected that Ruby and
Banister ran guns to the exiles.
Corroborating testimony: Prof. Kurtz and others claim that Ruby was in New
Orleans on several occasions in 1963.
Corroborating testimony: Gerry Patrick Hemming, head of Interpen, a
mercenary group linked by some to the assassination, says he saw Oswald at
the New Orleans airport in Amid-1962.@ (Actually, Hemming claims other
members of his group were involved, but that he turned down two contracts
from Texas money, believing he was going to be made the patsy. Hemming is
still very much alive and talking.)
Judyth knew Ruby as "Sparky" Rubenstein. When Lee was killed, she did not
know that Jack Ruby and Sparky Rubenstein were the same man! The shock of
seeing Lee killed on TV, AND FEAR THAT SHE WOULD ACCIDENTALLY REVEAL HER OWN
INVOLVEMENT IN THE MATTER, caused her to avoid all further coverage of the
assassination, as well as the official investigations that followed.
Lee told Judyth that he first met Sparky when he was just 15, and that he
spurned Ruby=s attempts to recruit him into Mob business. Even so, he ran
errands for his uncle, Dutz Murrett, who ran a bookmaking operation for
Marcello. Judyth accompanied Lee on one such errand soon after she met him.
Lee told Judyth that he was trusted by Mob figures, up to and including
Marcello, for his ability to keep his mouth shut. Marcello told Ruby to
look after the boy when the family moved to Texas.
Corroborating evidence: Oswald=s ties to the Mafia came not just via his
uncle, but from his mother, who dated a number Marcello employees, including
Sam Termine. Oswald and his mother ONCE lived in a Mafia neighborhood on
Exchange Alley.
CIA Work
Lee and Ferrie HELPED TEACH [taught] combat techniques to Cuban exiles at
the CIA-established training camp NEAR [at] Lake Pontchartrain (other camps
were in Florida), and portions of these training sessions were filmed.
Judyth saw some of this film in Ferrie=s apartment.
Corroborating testimony: Robert Tanenbaum, Deputy Counsel of the House
Select Committee on Assassinations, saw such a film before he quit the
investigation in disgust.. He believed it was archived at the Georgetown
Library, but it is no longer there. His attempts to relocate it have proved
fruitless. Like so much other evidence (including the President=s brain and
numerous autopsy photos!), it is missing. Tanenbaum is today a very
successful mystery writer, as well as the former mayor of Beverly Hills.
Tanenbaum=s novel Corruption of Blood was a very thinly veiled account of
his experience with the HSCA, and includes a description of the film.
Judyth saw Lee use an expensive Minox camera, typically used in espionage
work.
Corroborating evidence: The FBI tried to get the Dallas police to change
its evidence inventory from Asmall German camera@ to "light meter" --
efforts fully documented by the officers they pressured. An FBI document
refers to Minox film retrieved from Oswald=s possessions after the
assassination.
Lead: Where is the film today? Where is the camera or light meter? In
fact, a Minox camera sits in the National Archives today (owner unknown).
It is glued shut so its serial number cannot be seen. In any case, how could
Oswald, supposedly a virtual pauper, afford a $200 spy camera?
Note: According to Judyth, Lee=s Minox was so sensitive that she never saw
IT USED with a light meter.
To establish his pro-Castro bona fides, Lee handed out leaflets bearing the
name of the AFair Play for Cuba Committee@ three times in August. He got
the idea for leafleting from an episode of AI Led Three Lives,@ an early
1950s TV show about Herbert Philbrick, an FBI man pretending to be a
Communist.
Evidence: Lee=s brother, Robert, confirms his fascination with that show.
Note: Lee [AT SOME TIME] [later] met the real Herbert Philbrick, who was a
consultant to Ochsner=s group, INCA. He found his boyhood hero unimpressive
in the flesh.
Lee staged his own arrest at an August 16th leafleting. His Afight@ with
Cuban exile leader Carlos Bringuier was based on an incident he had read
about in a local newspaper months earlier. The story concerned a clean-cut
narcotics agent who provoked a street fight to enhance his cover as a bad
guy.
Evidence: Judyth has the May 4, 1963 article.
Corroborating testimony: Ex-CIA agent William Gaudet said he saw Oswald
inside the International Trade Center several times. Judyth says Lee stored
some of his propaganda materials there. Gaudet has said the street scuffle
was Aa sort of PR operation@ and declared his belief that Kennedy was the
victim of an anti-Communist conspiracy. Gaudet was a friend of Ocshner=s.
At a meeting arranged by Ochsner=s group, INCA, held to prepare for a radio
interview of Lee, someone accidentally uttered the name [ACTUALLY, THEY SAID
>DAVID PHILLIPS,=AND LEE RECOGNIZED THIS AS DAVID ATLEE PHILLIPS] ADavid
Atlee Phillips.@ Lee came to believe his CIA handler, AMr. B.," was actually
Phillips. Judyth waited in the car as the meeting took place at Reily=s.
Lead: Phillips, propaganda specialist in Cuban affairs, denied ever knowing
Oswald. There are reports of a death-bed confession in which he admitted,
at the very least, that he did meet Oswald. Judyth=s source, a national
book award winner, claimed this information came from Phillips=s nephew,
[REMOVE a] Shawn Phillips, but THE WRITER now refuses to help us locate this
man.
Lee then participated in a radio debate with Bringuier, also organized by
Ochsner=s group, INCA.
Shaw and Ferrie knew each other well. Once, Judyth accompanied Lee to an
airfield where Ferrie took the other two men on a flight to Canada.
Corroborating testimony: Others have reported on Ferrie-Shaw flights to
Canada.
Corroborating testimony: An ex-secretary of Ochsner=s, Aura Lee, worked at
Shaw=s Trade Mart and claimed that Ferrie, a distinctive-looking gentleman,
was a frequent visitor to Shaw.
_____________________________________________________________________
Judyth=s Lee
Judyth portrays Oswald as a much more intelligent and charming man than we
have seen in most previous accounts.
Although Lee confessed to her within days of their meeting that he beat
Marina, Judyth says he never raised a hand to her. In fact, she describes
no fights of any kind. Lee told her that Marina mercilessly denigrated him.
Lee admitted to a mother-wife problem, which they often discussed, and she
believes the abuse stopped (it would be interesting if Marina would confirm
this).
Corroborating testimony: In his unpublished manuscript B I=m A Patsy, I=m A
Patsy B the urbane George DeMohrenschildt[OMIT ,] described by some as Lee=s
CIA Ababysitter@ in Texas, described Marina=s DEMEANING treatment of Lee.
Although primarily self-taught, the range of Lee=s knowledge impressed
Judyth, as did his ability to teach himself Russian despite being dyslexic.
Corroborating evidence: Oswald=s library records show that he was an avid
reader. They also show Judyth=s influence (anthropology and sci-fi), as well
as books he took out for her to read (e.g., a primer on C[ O][u]mmunism).
Judyth says he took out more books than are shown in the Warren Report, some
using her or Ferrie=s library cards.
Evidence: Refer to the text of a speech Lee gave to a Jesuit-sponsored
conference in MobileYa transcript of his radio debateYa short sci-fi story B
[>HER WAY=][NOT AHer Story@] B A 17 PAGE SCIENCE FICTION STORY he wrote with
Judyth.
Corroborating testimony: DeMohrenschildt praised Lee=s intelligence in his
book (a different account of the man than the one he gave to the Warren
Commission).
Note: AThe Baron@ committed suicide just prior to meeting with House
investigator Gaeton Fonzi (The Last Investigation) B before he could be
asked to explain these inconsistencies.
While in the company of Oswald, Judyth sometimes posed as Marina, which was
possible because of their physical resemblance and her ability to speak
Russian. Judyth=s husband was out of town most of their married life in New
Orleans.
Evidence: Judyth has photos of herself at the time, some of which show a
striking resemblance to Marina. THEY WERE ALSO THE SAME HEIGHT AND BUILD.
In testimony, Marina said Lee was always home at night, but she never said
by what time.
Corroborating testimony: Anna Vincent asserts that she, her husband, Judyth
and Lee were a foursome, meeting after work on a regular basis early that
summer, usually at Thompson=s Restaurant, where Anna worked. Lee and Judyth
would keep company with them until 8:00-8:30 PM. Anna describes a call from
Marina at Thompson=s. Marina wanted to know if Lee was there with another
woman.
Although they fell in love almost immediately, Lee and Judyth resisted
becoming lovers until the summer.
_____________________________________________________________________
Clinton/Jackson: Mystery Solved
This is a totally new account of the trip to Clinton
Judyth=s work took longer than expected, and was, to her horror, tested on
at least one human guinea pig -- the real reason for the mysterious trip to
Clinton, probably on August 23, by Shaw, Ferrie, and Oswald.
Note: The House Select Committee on Assassinations found the Clinton
witnesses B including John Birchers and CORE activists B credible, but no
one has been able to come up with a coherent explanation for the trip. All
have been sidetracked by the fact that Oswald tried to register to vote
while in Clinton though he didn=t live there.
Lee mentioned picking up a man in white hospital garb who guided them to the
mental hospital in Jackson, the next town over from Clinton, and to the
PROPER BUILDING AND ENTRYWAY IN THE LARGE COMPLEX [experimental area] there.
Note: Witnesses reported seeing a fourth man B a Aman in white@ -- emerge
from the car with Lee in Clinton.
The true reason for the long stop in Clinton was an unexpected delay: the
prisoner(s) had not yet arrived at the hospital. Oswald got [IN][ on] line
after betting Shaw that he could get registered just because he was white,
EVEN THOUGH HE WAS FROM A DIFFERENT PARISH.
Lee and Judyth were heartsick over the plan to treat a prisoner/mental
patient, but were powerless to stop it. Several days after the first trip,
Lee took Judyth to the hospital to see the test subject. Shaw OK=d the
trip, as he wanted her professional assessment of the patient=s condition.
Judyth checked on the bloodwork to see if the serum Atook.@ If the
bloodwork was not conclusive, an immediate blood sample could have been
drawn and checked while she was still there. As it turned out, radical
changes began quickly. The only man she saw (more than one may have been
treated) was Cuban, white, about Castro's age and physique.
They made one stop going to Jackson and another on the way home. Judyth
stayed in the car both times.
Corroborating evidence: Despite Aslouching,,@ she was seen by at least two
witnesses:
Edwin Lea McGehee:
An "old...battered" car drove up to his barbershop and Lee Harvey Oswald
came inside for a haircut. "There was a woman sitting on the front seat [of
the car]...and in the back seat what I noticed was -- looked like a [baby]
bassinet..." (Judyth says this was a car used by the Lewis=s and that the
bassinet was for the ever-pregnant Anna. ANNA EVENTUALLY HAD TEN CHILDREN.).
Mary Morgan, daughter of Reeves Morgan, State Representative (and a guard at
the Jackson hospital!):
When Oswald was in the house talking with her dad, she went onto the porch
and Ajust casually noticed there was a dark colored car parked under a tree
in the front of the house." She remembered "seeing a woman in the car.@
Note: The fact that there were two trips within days of each other explains
why some accounts say this was a three-day trip. It is unlikely that any of
these men, and certainly not Shaw, would make a three-day trip together.
The test was a success, as the subject died within weeks.
Lee and Judyth began to realize that they were trapped. They could not back
out of the plot for fear they would be killed.
_____________________________________________________________________
Road to the Assassination
Lee and Judyth actually liked the Kennedys; in their youthful
overconfidence, they never thought they would be racing a deadline to keep
JFK from becoming a target.
In private, Ferrie told them that he opposed the assassination; he was only
putting on an act for Shaw, who represented Texas money in New Orleans.
Note: Excluding comments in Banister=s company, every mention in the
historical record of Oswald talking about Kennedy is a positive one. (We
have a compilation of his statements.)
Based on a message from AN H.L. Hunt EXECUTIVE conveyed to a Shaw associate,
those involved with the labs had reason to fear for their lives once they
had outlived their usefulness.
Ferrie arranged for Judyth to take a job, beginning in September, at
Peninsular Chem Research in Gaine[S]ville, Florida, which CUSTOM-made
ORGANIC AND [REMOVE highly] toxic chemicals. There she could continue to
contribute to the project by making Acustom@ chemicals for Ferrie.
Evidence: Judyth has a read-out from a chemical analysis, marked F-1, done
at PenChem on a rare carc[CI][en]ogenic substance.
The three understood, as early as the third week of August, that Lee's
grooming in Russia and his [PRO-CASTRO] activities in New Orleans made him
the perfect patsy.
Fearing he was a dead man if he tried to break with the conspirators at this
point, he would pretend to embrace Plan B, walking with eyes wide open into
the patsy role. He hoped to get close to the inner circle of the conspiracy
in Dallas and stop the plot from the inside. To get further inside,
[LEE][he ] played up his connections to Marcello and revealed his
marksmanship.
At the end of August, Shaw paid for the last of several hotel trysts for
Judyth and Lee. According to Judyth, Shaw felt sorry for them.
Judyth then left for Florida. The supposedly impoverished Lee gave her $400
for Aemergencies@ B equal to about $2,800 in today=s dollars. Judyth told
her family that the money fell out of an ironing board she bought at a yard
sale. AIT BECAME A FAMILY LEGEND,= SHE SAYS.
.._____________________________________________________________________
Mexico City: Mystery Solved
This is a totally new account of the mysterious trip to Mexico City.
In August, Judyth trained Lee to handle the deadly material. LEE, IN TURN,
WOULD TEACH A CONTACT IN MEXICO CITY HOW TO HANDLE THE MATERIALS, AND IN
THIS MANNER, THE MATERIALS WOULD SURVIVE TRANSFER TO A CUBAN MEDICAL LAB..
AFTER PLEDGES TO MEET ONCE THIS MISSION WAS OVER, Judyth left for Florida
at the end of the month.
Lee couriered the materials to Mexico City at the end of September,
expecting to meet a contact who would bring them into Cuba. He was ordered
to make the trip by AMr. B.@
New information: Mr. B may not have been Phillips. Another CIA figure, Frank
Bender, one alias of Gerry Droller, was known inside the agency as Mr. B.
He was posted to Mexico City at the same time as Phillips. The record says
that Droller worked for the OSS during the war, but there are indications he
had actually worked on biological weapons for the Nazis.
Lee was left holding the bag -- i.e., no one was there to meet him in Mexico
City to take the materials off his hands. So he desperately tried to get
into Cuba himself, where his knowledge of HOW TO HANDLE THE MATERIALS, the
language, the terrain, safe houses, and contacts might still be used.
Indeed, initially, he expected to make the entire trip himself.
He was frantic because the materials had a limited life span outside a lab B
hence, the official reports of his erratic behavior. He was also frantic
because he knew what failure meant. In fact, the conspirators had already
turned to Plan B without telling him.
They were later told that Hurricane Flora had created so much destruction
that information about safe houses, and about Castro=s routine, was no
longer to be trusted, so Plan A had to be called off.
_____________________________________________________________________
Endgame
With Lee in Texas and Judyth in Florida, Ferrie arranged for about 14
back-channel phone calls through a cooperative (and well-paid-off) operator
in Covington.
Corroborating evidence: Only one call placed to Oswald at the Book
Depository is on record. This call came from Aa lady with no accent@ The
Warren Commission tried to track the origin of the call, but couldn=t get
past Covington. According to Judyth, the record would not even show this
call except for the fact that the operator putting this call through was not
their usual operator.
Note: Interpen had a presence in Covington.
Lee told Judyth that he made several unsuccessful attempts to stop the
assassination, including calling death threats to the FBI.
Corroborating evidence: A number of anonymous threats and warnings were
called into FBI offices prior to the assassination.
In their last conversation, on November 20th, they discussed the option of
fleeing before the assassination. Judyth recalls Lee=s words precisely:
Aif I stay, that will be one less bullet aimed at Kennedy.@
Lee told Judyth of his last-ditch plan: to fire a premature shot, a warning
shot, at the motorcade, hoping to alert JFK=s Secret Service protectors.
Corroborating Testimony: At least 5 Warren Commission witnesses reported a
bullet hitting the pavement behind the President=s limo. This would have
been his closest and, presumably, easiest shot.
Note: The "street shot" bullet was presumably never found, unless that is
what is being picked up by the "mystery FBI man" photographed with Dallas
Deputy Sheriff Buddy Walthers and Officer J.W. Foster. The photo has long
been the subject of speculation.
Corroborating Testimony: Anna Vincent says it was open knowledge in the
local Mafia that Lee fired a premature shot.
If he did fire a warning shot, it went unheeded by the sleepy Secret Service
agents.
Lee and Judyth had made plans for an escape and rendezvous in Mexico.
Judyth tells of Ferrie sobbing uncontrollably during phone calls with him
because it had all gone so wrong. His 400-mile car trip to Houston the day
of the assassination was made in vain (he told Garrison, variously, that he
and two friends went [ICE][roller]-skating or goose-hunting).
_____________________________________________________________________
Deaths After Dallas
Guy Banister died of an apparent hear[T] attack at his home in early 1964.
New Testimony: According to Anna Vincent, her husband, David Lewis, and
fellow Banister employee, Jack Martin, went to the office immediately upon
hearing the news, only to find the files carted off and yellow
[TAPE][ribbon] surrounding the office as if it were a crime scene. Lewis
played a minor role in the Cuban operation and, according to Anna, was told
to Akeep his mouth shut.@
Note: Author Ed Haslam (see above) believes he saw remnants of Banister=s
missing files at INCA=s offices.
David Ferrie died of an apparent brain anyeurism (not cancer as he told
those curious about his lab) in early 1964.
Note: An empty bottle of Proloid B which could kill a man suffering from
hypertension -- and two typed Asuicide notes@ keep his death controversial.
Mary Sherman was brutally murdered in her bed [IN JULY, 1964][just weeks
later,] with reports of cancer cells stolen.
Corroborating testimony: Judyth has a letter from a former resident of New
Orleans in which he recollects radio reports of stolen cancer cells.
THE NON-SMOKING Jack Ruby died of Aa galloping LUNG cancer@ in JAIL IN
1967. When [RUBY][ he] visited Ferrie=s apartment in the summer of 1963,
Judyth showed him the lab and told him about the cancer cell injections --
including where on the body the injections should be administered.
Note: In jail, Ruby insisted he was injected with cancer cells, but no one
took him seriously. His mind was shot and they just assumed he was babbling
incoherently.
Clay Shaw died suddenly of SUSPECTED LUNG cancer in 1972 after being treated
for an undisclosed illness at Ochsner=s Hospital.
Note: Of the 8 persons Judyth knew who were connected to the New Orelans
cancer project, 5 were dead by 1967. After 1972, only she and Ochsner
remained -- and she was in hiding.
_____________________________________________________________________
The Participants
Who was involved? Mafia, CIA Arogues,@ Cuban exiles, financed by Texas oil
AND INDUSTRY B or a smaller group culled from these. When the CIA-Mafia
alliance was established in 1959, an infrastructure was created that could
be used by a subset of this group to put into motion the assassination of
JFK.
Their Motives
The Mafia
JFK's failure to regain Cuba meant the permanent loss of billions of dollars
from their casinos, HOUSES OF PROSTITUTION, AND DRUG RINGS. Also providing
motive was Bobby Kennedy=s unprecedent assault on organized crime, including
particularly aggressive treatment of New Orleans crime boss Carlos Marcello.
Bobby had the proud Marecello kidnapped [WHEN MARCELLO REPORTED TO A PAROLE
OFFICER][from his office], put on a plane, and dumped in Guatemala. He made
it back to the US, barely surviving the wilds of Honduras. The treatment was
no way to repay a debt, i.e., the Mob=s help in rigging 1960 election
results in Illinois and Texas.
The CIA
After the Bay of Pigs fiasco, JFK threatened to Asplit the CIA into a
thousand pieces.@ He fired CIA Director Allen Dulles (who would later sit
on the Warren Commission!) and General George Cabell (whose brother Earl was
Mayor of Dallas in 1963). JFK was seen as soft on Communism,
[WEAKENING][weakening] his resolve in Vietnam, and extending an olive branch
to Castro AND KHRUSHCHEV.
Cuban Exiles
Kennedy=s betrayals: the Bay of Pigs; the deal with the Soviets that ended
the Cuban Missile Crisis, which included a non-invasion pledge; RFK=s
dismantling of exile training camps the CIA set up for exiles; his
suppression of raids on Cuba; WITHDRAWAL OF FUNDING OF ANTI-CASTRO EXILES,
and, finally, JFK=s attempt late in 1963 at a rapproachmant with Castro.
Texas Money
This group B led by H.L. Hunt BOR POSSIBLY BY HIS LIEUTENANTS--- detested
JFK=s Cuba policy, as well as his integrationist stance, but mostly they
were threatened by his vow to repeal a major tax windfall, the oil depletion
allowance. They wanted a man in the White House they could control, i.e.,
LBJ, and they needed to get him there fast, as the Bobby Baker and Billy Sol
Estes scandals threatened his continuation as Vice President.
If this cabal couldn=t get to Castro, paving the way for a rebellion, or at
least more compliant leadership, they had decided to go after Kennedy. With
the blame pinned on Oswald, who was groomed to look like a Communist, and
would soon be groomed to look pro-Castro, they hoped to spark a second
invasion of Cuba.
Ironically, CIA stonewalling of the Warren Commission was almost certainly
conducted to prevent its relationship with the Mafia from being exposed, as
well as its surveillance operation in Mexico City. Thus, the assassination
cover-up was thus joined by high officials in the CIA, who may not
themselves have participated in the assassination.
_____________________________________________________________________
On Proof and Evidence
While there is no Asmoking gun@ proof -- no government document, for
example -- for this particular plot, no such proof should be expected for a
project kept so secret. However, the account provided by Judyth Vary Baker
is much more detailed than any previous account by a late-emerging witness,
and it explains [MUCH OF WHAT WAS][a lot] previously subject to wild, and
widely divergent, speculation.
____________________________________________________________________
Last Words
AThey did it too good.@
Gerry Patrick Hemming, Interpen, on why the conspirators failed:
"What backfired on the plotters was painting this picture that it was a
Castro hit. It scared the shit out of some high-ranking people, and they
covered it upY.How could these people [the plotters] possibly figure out
that this scenario would scare the shit out of the people in Washington?
Jesus Christ, the best laid plans of mice and men. They did it too good.
They painted too clear of a picture that burned its way right back to Fidel
Castro. It scared the fuck out of the powers that be. They wouldn't go to
war. The American people never realized we had come so fucking close to
nuclear holocaust."
AYWho Struck John@
James Jesus Angleton, CIA counterintelligence spymaster:
"A mansion has many rooms and there were many things going on during the
period of the bombings. I'm not privy to who struck John." [The New York
Times, March 1975]
WHICH THEN CHANGED TO THIS:
Before the Silence Came: Lee=s Last Telephone Calls
=====================================================================
Please note: The writing of this book, including the reconstruction of the
telephone calls I received (below) is based on principles I learned at the
feet of Luis Urrea, 1999 American Book Award winner, whose works Across the
Wire, By the Lake of Sleeping Children, and Nobody=s Son were written based
on his personal experiences as a blonde, blue-eyed half Mexican who has
lived with and fought prejudice and violence on both sides of the
Mexican-American border.
In Urrea=s ACreative Non fiction@ courses taught at the University of
Louisiana at Lafayette, I learned how to better recreate my memories into
the most accurate reconstruction of the actual events. Urrea=s creative
nonfiction works successfully bring to life his own extraordinary
experiences, and include reconstructed dialogues. I have used Urrea=s
methods in reconstructing the events between April and December of 1963 in
that same manner.
Further, in 1998 at The University of Louisiana at Lafayette, I also had
the opportunity to study additional techniques of reconstruction of events
and the writing of nonfiction narrative under the tutelage of Dr. Ernest
Gaines, a world-renowned writer whose based-on-true-life works include The
Sky Is Gray, A Gathering of Old Men, and A Lesson before Dying, a recent
novel of choice of Oprah Winfrey. Dr. Gaines= thoughts and comments
concerning my own work have helped me to better present my own
based-on-true-life narrative.
And finally, my experience as a newspaper reporter in the Houston area
for a handful of years was important in helping me to learn how to report
events as accurately as possible. Of course, nobody is perfect, and I do not
mean to imply that ALL my recollections have been recounted here, since
every time somebody questions me, it may remind me of something I had
forgotten. Lee=s own natural reticence also forced me to sometimes guess
what he really meant.
=====================================================================
Years have passed, but sometimes it seems I heard his voice only last
night. Years have passed, but many elements of the last telephone calls, the
last times I heard Lee=s voice, remain embedded in my soul, never to be
forgotten.
Getting them out on paper has been painful. I=ve had nightmares reliving
them.
I have already mentioned part of the telephone call of October 25th,
but there was a great deal more that occurred during this call. I received
this call, as best as I can remember, while still at work. I was on the
phone more than an hour, but I had provided an excuse for myself, knowing
this call was coming, and it would be a long one. Lee had missed a post
call, and could not miss another without changing the call pattern, so I was
certain he would call me at the earliest opportunity, which he did. He,
himself, was supposedly Astill at work@ when he called me, even though he
wasn=t even in the book depository building at this hour, since he was using
a payphone in downtown Dallas.
So much had happened since we had last spoken, and between pieces of
information, we kept making our little comments to each other. We had
developed our own love language, which would have sounded incomprehensible,
i suppose, to anyone listening in, since some of it was in Russian.
Eventually, I was able to tell Lee I was sorry I=d missed his birthday,
and he said gently to me, AMy birthday present was Rachel. Noegan to tell me
why he=d been so busy he=d missed our scheduled call. It had started
earlier in the week when Michael Paine asked him to go to a patriotic rally
of ultra right-wingers, in order to hear (ret) Gen. Edwin Walker speak.
However, Lee curiously did not give me Walker=s name. He only told me that
he had gone to hear Aa notorious right-winger@ and that Paine had acted
Afascinated@ with the man. Michael Paine was no ordinary fellow. He had been
doing research with atomic energy, had built Van DeGraaf generators, and was
doing research on helicopters for bell helicopter. He was a brilliant man
who has downplayed his brilliance, I notice, in his Warren Commission
testimony. He also downplayed his interest in Lee. Why would such a
brilliant man like that be interested in inviting Lee Oswald
anywhere--unless they either had something in common, or Paine recognized
Lee=s intelligence and insight? Yet this week Mike Paine had taken Lee to
hear Gen. Walker=s speech, and just the night before, to an ACLU meeting.
Lee and Mike had one thing in common: both men were not getting along with
their wives, and worked in town all week, staying out of their lives except
for the weekends. This arrangement for both men occurred, too, at about the
same time, which i found peculiarly coincidental.
If you make a list of all the Acoincidences@ in the assassination
literature, as i now call it, you=ll be amazed. There are too many such
Acoincidences@ to be accounted for by mere chance. I was married to a man
who specialized in statisticsC he took a major in the subject---and I,
myself, was trained to use statistics. And when you look at all the people
who died connected with the Kennedy assassination, don=t bother with how
they diedC deaths can seem like heart attacks with sodium morphate, and a
man can be injected with ether through the roof of his mouth and seem to die
of natural causes. Just jot down the date of birth for each death, and the
date of death. Then go to the expected lifespan tables, and jot down the
differences one way or the other. That=s when you=ll come to realize that
far too many of these people died before their time. One might say that
lifestyle is also a factor, but if a random list is made of persons of
similar occupations born the same age, and their death dates checked, you=ll
see that it wasn=t healthy to have been involved.
Lee specifically told me, for the second or third time, that he did
not trust Michael Paine, and that I should never have anything to do with
the Paines C they were wild cards, he said.
What hugely interested me was Lee=s desire to step up Kennedy=s
protection when he came to Dallas. Lee was not only in the circle of
plotters, by now he=d offered top be one of the snipers. The way Lee told me
this was in the most sparse of terms. He simply said, AI=m part of the rifle
now.@
But his words chilled me. Of course we both knew he was being let in so
that he could be set up. AAt least,@ he said, Anobody knows I was in Mexico
City. I=ve got the photos to prove it.@
I did not know what this meant until 1999. I thought he had faked some
photos to Aprove@ he was still in Texas when he was actually in Mexico City.
I now believe that the photos of the Asecond Oswald@ which were provided
from the CIA=s station in Mexico City were assembled with Lee=s knowledge.
When Lee was questioned by Dallas police after his capture, and his visit to
Mexico City was brought up, I read that this was the only time Lee lost his
composure. He respn there, of course. Nevertheless, to know that he had
been so thoroughly betrayed--that his presence in Mexico City was allowed to
be known, when it could all come back on everybody=s heads--even Dr.
Ochsner=sC this had to be a shocker for Lee, and he must have known then how
expendable he really was. Lee had told his interrogators at that time that
he knew the soft and the hard methods of questioning, warning them that they
would not be able to break him. We had read together portions of a manual
Dave Ferrie had floating around at his place, along with the MK/ULTRA
materials, called KUBARK or CUBARC (sp?) Which described all sorts of
interrogation methods. Lee said that he had been trained to deal with all of
them. The only one that concerned him was the sensory deprivation method.
Nobody had ever been through 24 hours of sensory deprivation, Lee said,
without breaking. And prisoners who had been secretly subjected to this
deprivation procedure would say almost anything rather than be subjected to
it again. The entire body was fitted with a rubber suit, and all sounds were
blocked off, except what came from the water in which the person was
immersed up to the chin. Total darkness, and nothingness. Nobody could
withstand it. Sparky had been present when we looked at these manuals--they
had just come into Dave Ferrie=s handsC and we spent a whole night
discussing them, a discussion which evolved into matters of ethics, religion
and philosophy.
Sparky was a very circular thinker, and had never had much education,
but he wasn=t stupid. He understood that the means existed to mentally and
physically torture somebody so that nothing would show. This knowledge
terrified him: he could imagine it happening to each of us for getting
involved as we were. I=ll never forget that he said he=d rather shoot any
of us than see us go into a situation that might mean this kind of unseen
and unknown torture. Certainly, he was ordered to kill Lee in the end. But
if he had to convince himself that it was for the best, this is how he would
have been able to do it: saving lee from a fate worse than death by a mercy
killing. Perhaps with the idea of mercy in his head, he thought of the
excuse of giving Jackie Kennedy some Amercy@ in not having to deal with a
long trial of the so-called killer of her husband. It seems the press was
glad to get his excuse, but the reason he thought it up at all is probably
based on Sparky=s excuses that he had to give himself for pulling the
trigger: first, that he was ordered to do so, and secondly, that it would be
saving Lee from torture. That=s the way Sparky=s mind went, up and down
like an emotional yo-yo, in a circle.
Anyway, in this very important phone call, Lee had not only explained
the >right-wing@ meeting, but he realized that if he could help urge on
emotions, the demonstration planned the next night against Stevenson might
display enough roughness that security measures for Kennedy=s visits might
consequently be stepped up.
There were rumbles, apparently, going around after Walker=s speech (I
got the impression Walker was not the only one speaking that night, though),
that a demonstration was going to be held. Lee told me he made some remarks
C especially in the matter of reminding the attendees that StevensonC the
Commie-soft Apinko@--- was going to be speaking in this very auditorium the
next day. A number of people made up their minds, Lee said, to show up and
denounce Stevenson for what he was.
AI read about it in the paper,@ I told him. AHe was spit on. He was hit
with some placards.@
Lee in his conversations referred to JFK as Athe Chief@ -- and he might
also have used JFK=s code name, which I had forgotten, but have been told
was >Lancer=.
ABetter Stevenson getting bops on the head, than the Chief getting
bullets in the head,@ Lee told me. . AStevenson wasn=t in any real danger. I
made sure of that.@
I am reconstructing these words as close as I can to Lee=s actual
words.
If what lee did sounds unethical, as a friend has brought up to me
(Stevenson might have been hurt or killed) i can only say that if Lee said
Ahe made sure@ then I believe Stevenson, though assaulted by placards, was
never in any actual danger of anything worse.
Surely, Lee emphasized, this would raise concern for the safety of the
President.
Lee described his trip with Michael Paine to the ACLU differently than
the way Michael Paine described it to the Warren Commission. Said Paine for
the record: A...I took him in my car, he and I alone, and on the
way...described the ACLU to him, and he didn=t know about it, and described
its purpose.@
On the contrary, Lee knew his politics. He read the papers
avidly--that=s on recordC and he was highly concerned about civil rights.
Lee probably joined the ACLU C not to embarrass the organization, for he
thought his membership would never become common knowledge, I=m sureC but
because he wanted to add his voice to the common causes espoused by the ACLU
regarding civil rights.
Of his trip with Michael Paine, Lee said they=d had Aa debate. I played
my usual part.@ In other words, Michael missed the real man: he got the
Scarlet Pimpernel. Michael Paine said that on Athe night Stevenson spoke in
Dallas= he attended a meeting of the John Birch Society. He said he assumed
Lee had gone to the Stevenson event because Lee had nodded his head when
people brought up at the ACLU meeting how badly Stevenson had been treated.
Lee did not tell me that he attended Stevenson=s meeting, and I=m afraid I
simply assumed he=d been there. Had we had more time to talk about it, i
would have asked more questions, but there were many other things on our
mind. Lee did not mention Paine=s attendance at the John Birch Society
meeting. What he did mention were meetings C several of them--- and he gave
no details, except that he=d been there Awith Sparky@ once. Sparky at this
time learned that the prisoner(s) had died only a month after being injected
with the serum. The topic of health and hospitals had come up because
Sparky=s sister, Eva, had phlebitis (or a similar problem) with her leg, and
he was afraid to have her go to the hospital with everything that was going
on. People were flying in and out of Dallas, he said, and everything was in
a constant state of flux. The word was that the assassination would
definitely take place in Dallas. Lee used code words for Aassassination@ and
even for ADallas.@ We=d worked out our emergency vocabulary quite a while
earlier.
It would not happen in Austin area-- too close to LBJ-- only Dallas
had the reputation (well-deserved at the time) that could allow almost any
story to get concocted. Of particular note was Lee=s remarks that Carlos
Marcello wanted to make sure his deportation trial (fueled by a personal
vendetta run by Bobby Kennedy to kick Marcello out of the country for good)
was going to end in New Orleans in his favor ---the very day Kennedy visited
Dallas. AJust to show how much power he really has,@ Lee told me, Ahe is
going to time it to coincide with----@ Lee broke off, but of course I
understood.
AHe has that much power,@ I said, almost whispering into the phone.
AHe wants to rub Bobby=s nose in it.@
Meaning, Marcello would deal a double dose of venom: if he could
manage it, Marcello would time the very hour of his victory over Bobby
Kennedy with Jack Kennedy=s assassination.
As a matter of fact, that=s just what Marcello did. He was
acquitted, almost at the very moment Kennedy actually died at Parkland
Hospital.. He was having a massive victory celebration by the time Kennedy=s
death was finally announcedC an announcement that wasn=t made until LBJ left
the hospital on his way to the presidential airplane..
Despite all our forebodings, Lee never hung up without saying
something hopeful, something cheerful. ADon=t worry,@ he=d say, even if
somebody was sawing off his leg.
Before he hung up, Lee said he was going to try to call three times
the following week, to make up for having missed once. And he did.
On his call on the 30th of October, I remember Lee reminding me that
his Aanniversary@ was approaching--when he had Adefected@ to Russia. He
also mentioned that he had now been Amad with love@ for me for six months.
AOH!@ I answered, Aand I am mad with love for you, too, mashwah--for six
DAYS now!@
AListen to you!@ he chided me, laughing. AHow am I to concentrate?
You=re always on my mind.@
AMy darling Lee,@ I replied, AMy sweetheart. I can=t concentrate,
either. I was thinking about you at the lab, rolling a handful of liquid
mercury around in the palm of my hand---@
AMy God!@ Lee said, alarmed. Mercury is highly poisonous.
AWell, this huge thermometer broke, and we were scooping it up, trying
to stop it from going down the drain --- and it was so shiny and pretty---
and suddenly, I was thinking of you, and just rolling this stuff around in
my hand--@
I told him how it seemed the whole world was poisoned by what we knew.
And our power to scoop the poison out, to save life, seemed so limited.
AI still have some ideas,@ Lee said. ADave (Ferrie) and SparkyC you
know they are doing everything they can think of----and there are others.
We=ll be hiding our tracks, mixing up trails. We=ll save him (JFK), and if
we fail, you know I=ve got my friends.@
AI know that.@
ASo---I=ll be seeing you again. Sooner than you know,@ he told me.
AAnd when I do,@ Lee said, Ayou=ll know where my heart is, because I won=t
be wearing my wedding band.@
I guess it took me a whole month to finally be able to write down
that last sentence. I did not want to face the picture of Lee in my memory,
as I saw him on television, showing his manacles to the reporters, when they
asked about his handcuffs ---his arms lifted up, so you could see that he
was wearing his favorite jewelry---his silvery ID bracelet and his Marine
ringC but he was not wearing that wedding band.
Later on, I saw --in the glimpses that I had of him in the news---that
his ID bracelet and his Marine ring had both been taken away from him, along
with his shirt, so that he was wearing only a torn, stained tee-shirt for a
long time, and standing in line-ups, I learned much laterC with men dressed
in suits and with nice shirts on. Guess which of these fine men, here, madam
or sir, is the bad guy? It was the Land of the Free: Lee asked for a shirt.
No. He asked to take a shower. He never got one.
..
It was also the Home of the Brave.
As the time drew closer to November 22, I was becoming so anxious
that I could scarcely sleep or eat. David Ferrie called and promised me
that he would do everything in his power to save Lee from becoming the
scapegoat, and that he had worked out some elaborate plans. I already knew
about Hull Field, of course, and once again, I had packed my suitcase. On
November 22nd, I would take an emergency bag of items with me, just in case.
I had enough cash set aside to get a bus to take me to Fort Walton beach.
There was nothing else to do but just do my work--including the last items I
knew Dave had to have (the cancer serum was being kept alive and was still
slated for use against Castro, he told me). A second use for the serum was
its utility in inducing lung cancer so rapidly in mice that experiments in
trying to deal with this virulent cancer strain could proceed more rapidly
than with other lung cancer experiments in mice.
Lee called me early in November, but I don=t remember anything else
about that call.. Around the 7th of November, Lee called again, to tell me
that Sparky=s sister was in the hospital. At this time, Lee mentioned for
the first time that he was penetrating a gun-running ring that Sparky had
leaked information about to him because he=d been so distracted by his
sister=s hospitalization. Sparky, unable to handle all the complications,
asked Lee to help him out. Sparky was in a situation where he liked to make
money for the mob running guns and drugs, but he also was now anxious to
protect himself because of the upcoming shakedown of the mob, should their
part in the assassination come to light. He was anxious to present a good
face to the FBI, with whom he=d had dealings in the past as an informant
(whenever it suited him to blackmail or punish somebody who hadn=t been
cooperative for some reason, Sparky had been known to run to the FBI or to
have clued in some nice payoff to a Dallas policeman, so that a number of
them saw Sparky as their very good friend). In this case, Sparky, distracted
with Eva=s illness, and feeling guilty because he=d recently slapped her
around (Sparky was no angel, that=s for sure), wanted to visit her
constantly. So Lee, seeing this as an opportunity to get it on the record
that he was an infiltrator, was now ready to tip off the FBI concerning some
smuggled guns that would be coming in from the north.
I never knew more than that, but Lee=s attempt to prove he was, as he
put it. AA good guy@ remained in my memories, and when the Elrod story came
to light, I immediately recognized that this must have been the gun-running
infiltration stint where Lee informed the FBI. For an elaboration about the
Elrod story, please see Appendix _____ X. It was because of Eva Grant=s
illness, then, that Sparky involved Lee in the matter, which resulted in a
Dallas policeman stopping a car whose headlight or tail-light (I no longer
remember) had been deliberately put out in some way so that the police would
be sure to take notice of the car. There was a high speed chase, and a
crashC and the guns were discovered.
In the middle of November, Lee began to teach me about the politics
behind the assassination. It was extremely complex. He urged me to remember
certain names, such as Bobby Baker (easy) and Billy Sol Estes (not so easy).
He had not been able to call me on Veterans Day, so this call had to be
later. He wasn=t getting along with Marina at all: he=d had his job a month
by now, and although he had the money to get an apartment for them---in
fact, he had enough saved for three months= rent from legitimate sources
(Lee never used his CIA for FBI money for private matters)--of course he did
not rent an apartment for him and her and their babies. He wouldn=t be in
Dallas more than another week, if all went well. He=d do his part to save
JFK and get the hell out of there.
Marina would receive this saved money (about $150 plus whatever else
Lee could give her) so she=d have enough to live on until George
DeMohrenschildt=s attorney could Aout of pity@ funnel her some more. George
said he would watch over Marina, in return for use of the interest on the
fund. Lee thought he was leaving his wife in good hands, and he always had
hopes that, eventually, we=d be able to show up again after a few years, and
possibly even adopt Lee=s children if Marina didn=t want their burden. I
was all for it: even when married to Robert, who did not want to adopt
children, I saw Robert=s heart grow tender and generous toward some of the
children we brought into our home to nurture during tough times in these
children=s lives. Two of them--Susan Doom and Judy DeVries--have a very
special place in my memories.
So Lee and i were very much the same--wanting lots of children, would
adopt additional if we could, would have lots of pets (dogs, cats, and yes,
if we could, horses!).
We built our castles in the sky because we were young, and we wanted to
believe that Dave Ferrie (so brilliant!) and Lee=s trusted contacts (so
powerful!) would be clever enough to get him out alive, even as the rogue
military, CIA and Texas-centered powers continued to weave a web around him.
The false trails and fake evidence and altered records that Lee and I had
wanted to proliferate so that we could go away and hide and not be traced
turned into a wholesale purging of Lee=s real identity, until there were two
or three of him, at any given time, it seemed C and by now, these
doppelgangers were doing things that would paint Lee in the worst of lights.
Lee himself knew that Richard Nagell, one of his doppelgangers, had
purposely gotten himself arrested for fear of being set up as a patsy.
Nagell carried Lee=s Hidell name -- a name used by more than one person I
had heard about----and other incriminating ID. Nagell let it be known that
he refused to become a designated patsy. He may have thought Lee was the
real thing, Lee told meC that perhaps Castro had commissioned Lee to kill
the President. Having heard of some of the escape plans that Lee was trying
to form in an attempt, of course, to get out of Dallas after he had done all
he could (and not to kill, but to save, though Nagell didn;t know that),
Richard Case Nagell, fearing he=d be set up in Lee=s place, may have
deliberately got himself arrested and out of the action.
I have to add that if I had not known this name beforehand, Lee would
not have spontaneously brought it up. But I had seen a name written on a
check-out form, for taking out untraceable guns, in the Newman Building
where Guy Banister=s office was located, and the name ANagy@ or ANagell@ was
scribbled there. Lee at that time said the name was probably ANagell@--or
maybe Dave Ferrie told me, I no longer recall. But the name stuck with me
because ANagy@ is a Hungarian name associated with royalty, and I, being one
quarter Hungarian, remembered that little detail and was curious about who
the person might be.
Lee knew he was being set up all the way, but he played dumb.
That=s how he stayed in the center of the assassination circle,
although, as he told me, not one of the final players in the scenario were
supposed to know who anyone outside their particular group wasC and there
were, Lee told me Athree@ separate groups who would not be able to recognize
each other. Even the members of the three groups would not be known to each
other, Lee said, until the 20th. That would be the last time, lee said, that
he would call me. I must make ready, and at four o=clock, take a bus to Fort
Walton Beach. On the night of the 21st, I=d make sure that I had a tiff
with Robert.
I felt a little sad at doing this to Bob: he had been extraordinarily
kind to me lately because I=d been so disappointed at not being allowed to
go to school. But as usual, I saw amazingly little of him between his
school and my work at PenChem. It would not be that hard for me to break
away.
==============the next section will deal with the last two telephone
calls====thanks.j
I learned this information on the 18th of November.
WHICH THEN CHANGED TO THIS:
Before the Silence Came: Lee=s Last Telephone Calls
Last section
=====================================================================
,
note slight change in first sentence here, and a little further down, please
add where there are caps!
That=s how he stayed in the center of the assassination circle,
although, as he told me, not one of the final players in the scenario were
supposed to know who anyone outside their particular group wasC and there
were, Lee told me PROBABLY Athree@ separate groups who would not be able to
recognize each other. Even the members of the three groups would PROBABLY
not be known to each other, Lee said, until the 20th. That would be the last
time,(REMOVE: lee said,) that he would call me. ON THE 22ND I must make
ready, and WHEN I HEARD FROM DAVE FERRIE IN HOUSTON ON THE 23RD, ABOUT NOON,
I SHOULD PLAN TO take a bus to Fort Walton Beach ON MONDAY MORNING AFTER
ROBERT WENT TO SCHOOL. I WOULD DRAW OUT THE $400 BEFORE LEAVING. On the
NIGHT OF THE 24TH, I=d make sure that I had a tiff with Robert.
I felt a little sad at doing this to Bob: he had been extraordinarily
kind to me lately because I=d been so disappointed at not being allowed to
go to school. But as usual, I saw amazingly little of him between his
school and my work at PenChem. It would not be that hard for me to break
away.
==============the next section will deal with the last two telephone
calls====thanks.j
Last Phone Call, November 20th, 1963
AIt=s me again,@ he said.
AOh, Lee!@
I couldn=t act the part I wanted to play of the light-hearted and
encouraging lover. We were both very down. A weight had settled upon us. I
very well knew i might never hear his voice directed to me again, nor would
he hear my words of love. I felt like I was choking. It was a cool
afternoon, and he had called me back right away. It was either this date,
or on the 18th, that I had to call Lee, because he missed the call to me i
had expected on the 19th, and Dave had called to tell me that Lee had to set
up a new call schedule for me: it was getting very close to impossible for
him to call me again.
I was able to place a person-to-person call through the operator, but
Dave=s operator was not yet in place, and the lady who took the call made me
tell her Lee=s exact name, or she would not put through the call. I was
quite spoiled with our special operator, and angry that this operator had
taken the call, but there was no help for it: I had already asked to be put
through to the Texas State Book depository, to cue in Lee that I could take
his call whenever he was ready, and this lady demanded his name before she
would put the call through. Okay, I thought to myself, this is not our
operator, so i will be very brief, in case she listens in! I certainly
would not wait for Lee to answer the phone, as I had originally planned. .
At least he knew that I had been reached by Dave. After a minute, and some
trouble as it seemed to me, a lady answered the phone, and I used my most
official-sounding adult voice, clearly and slowly asking her if Lee Oswald
worked there. It seemed to me that she was not sure, and then I told her
that he was a janitor. AJanitor@ was the code word that meant AJ.A.@ (My
first two initials) was calling. We felt that lee could possibly be
described as a janitor without anybody catching on, if I had to contact him.
I asked the lady to pass the message on to the Ajanitor@ that somebody had
called for him, and hung up.
The exchange at Covington must have been put into order again pretty
quickly, or else Lee took a chance, because I waited less than an hour at
PenChem=s phone (I often worked overtime, and Robert would only pick me up
when i called him, so I had time to wait for this call). My paycheck stubs
from this time period show i was working an extra hour a day--mostly because
i was working on Dave=s chemical projects C and also because I could get
phone calls with nobody around at the payphone there, if Lee said not to use
the payphone station set-up.
Because time was so short now, Lee told me there wouldn=t be another call
from him unless he reached Laredo.
ALee,@ I said slowly, Ayou didn=t say until. You said Aunless.=@
AI apologize,@ he answered. I heard him suck up his breath. We were both
very close to tears. Outside, it was sunset.
AYou=ll go to Cancun,@ Lee said. AYou=ll stay in a fine hotel. I=ll be
there C if they---@
We were both speechless.
AYou know,@ he said then, Aif I don=t make it outC you have to go on
with everything.@
AOh, sure!@ i said, bitterly. I told him that I would never allow
anyone to replace him in my heart.
ABut promise me,@ he said. AThat you=ll have babies.@
AI don=t want to have babies with anyone but you.@
AOh yes you will,@ he answered. AYou take home baby birds and feed
them. So you have to have babies. So promise me.@
I promised.
Four and a half years after Lee=s death, the first baby, conceived
with Robert, was born. I named her Susan, calling her ASusie@ in honor of
Susie Hanover. Susie=s middle name AMavinee@ satisfied me because it rhymed
with Lee and had two ee=s.. Robert insisted on naming the three boys we next
had. Our fifth and last child, Sarah Marie, was a girl, so I was finally
allowed to name another baby.. This child once again carried a middle name
that rhymed with ALee,@ --and in fact, I wanted to name her ASarah Lee,@ but
Bob objected, saying it would sound too much like a food product. Even so,
in school, Sarah=s Marie=s high school friends called her ASarah Lee,@ which
of course pleased me very much.
I never spoke another word of Russian after November 20, 1963. I could
not bear to do so. Only because I had a few Russian books in our house,
which the children noticed, did they have any idea of my long-faded ability
to converse in Russian. I still have a set of Latin cards that Lee and I
studied, trying to impress Dave Ferrie with. I=d studied Latin from the
seventh through eleventh grades, and knew most of the Mass in Latin as well.
Lee liked to use flash cards to help him memorize Spanish, so we obtained
the Latin flash cards as well.
AHow much can you say?@ I asked him, because of course i wanted to know
what he was up against.
AI=ll be meeting tonight,@ he said. ATwo different places. Then I=ll go
to bed and miss you.@
AAnd tomorrow?@
ATomorrow, I=ll go say goodbye to Junie and Rachel and Marina....@
Lee took a gasp of air, as if he couldn=t breathe. Tears had started
streaming down my cheeks
AOh God, Lee!@
I could hear him crying. We were in the very depths of hell. I
couldn=t see, I couldn=t even stand. I leaned against the phone and cried,
too.
AJust go!@ I urged him. AGet outC it=s too late to help him.@
AEven if I wanted to, which I do not,@ Lee said, his voice trembling,
AI couldn=t. Not only me--they=d come after my family. They=d find you.
You=d all die---@
What could i say? I knew it was true.
AYou just remember ---,@ Lee said, ADavid Atlee Phillips.@
AI won=t forget.@
AI=m going to get out alive,@ Lee said, trying to choke back his
emotions. AYou=ll see---@
ASure.@
AJuduffki--Minnie Mouse---@ he said, and that was enough to get me
almost into hysteria. He was calling me those pet names of his, and I
couldn=t take it.
AJust tell them you=re ill. Swallow a bunch of laxatives----@
Lee probably made a bitter, harsh laugh, I don=t know.
AThey=d just get another gun in there to take the place of mine,@ he
told me. AIf I stay, that will be one less bullet aimed at Kennedy.@
As this sank in, he added, AMaybe i can still do something. They=re
going to pin it on me anyway.@
AI hate the human race,@ I told him.
AStop it,@ he said, almost commandingly. AI can still do something.
I might be able to fire a warning shot. That=s what I intend to do.@
I was speechless with hope.
AThe Secret Service will react,@ Lee said. AThe Chief might react.
Even the driver---@
AEven the driver?@ I repeated.
Lee told me that the driver=s habits had been studied, and a shot
going off would cause him to brake, which would slow the vehicle down. This
was desired because even this cabal feared Aristotle Onassis, who would send
killers out to track down anyone who killed Jackie Kennedy, or so the rumor
went--and besides, everybody liked Jackie and orders were out not to hit
her. It was to spare Jackie that some very expert marksmen missed or delayed
their shots that day in Dealey Plaza: she was in their line of sight a great
deal of the time, according to David Ferrie, who got the report from
Marcello=s henchmen as soon as he arrived in the Houston area.
But that=s another story. I would receive a call from a Dave Ferrie
who was in tears, totally broken down over what had happened to Lee. The
call came while I was still at PenChem, and still reeling from the horror of
the assassination and the news that Lee had been captured.
Dave asked me if I had the medical library pass card that had his name
on it, and which had been issued through the Ochsner system. I said that i
did, and that=s when Dave told me that somebody told him his library card
had been found on Lee when he was arrested. While Dave knew this was
impossible--Lee had returned the library card---nevertheless, before he took
off for Houston in what was a driving rain, he had gone even to Lee=s
apartment, despite the presence of police and of snitches, to see if the
landlady had seen >a library card@ because he remembered that one was still
out there, missing.
Indeed it was. I had forgotten to give lee the library card before
leaving for Ganesville, and the medical library card was still in my
possession. In fact, it was in my purse. I had expected that somebody would
call me if Lee had been arrested--Dave had promised me he would do so as
soon as he could, so I would know what to do, if plans changed. That meant,
of course, that he might not call. But he had. I destroyed the card.
I think David Ferrie would have had a heart attack if I hadn=t
reassured him half a dozen times that the card was in little pieces. In
typical Ferrie fashion, he asked me to dissolve the pieces in
semi-concentrated sulphuric acid. I told him that I would, but I didn=t want
to go back into the lab. Instead, I buried the bits of the card under pine
needle debris, since i was near some pine trees.
Dave told me that he still had a chance to get Lee out, and that he
had only been connected so far with Officer Tippit=s death, which he
believed was a total set-up. Tippit and Sparky, he said, were friends, and
it was Tippit who was supposed to drive Lee to Red Bird airport. Unless
Tippit turned out to be a traitor. Another police officer, whose name was
POSSIBLY Roscoe White (AS I HAVE TOLD OTHERS, AND ALSO, MOST RECENTLY, DEBRA
CONWAY, I WAS NOT TOLD THIS NAME, ONLY THAT IT WAS AN OFFICER WHO WOULD
INTERCEPT LEE=S FILM AND MINOX CAMERA, TO PROTECT THEM FROM
DESTRUCTION--LEE=S EVIDENCE OF HIS ACTUAL ACTIVITIES. BECAUSE I RECALL THE
NAME AROCKY@ I THOUGHT THIS MIGHT BE ROSCOE WHITE, BUT IT=S ONLY A GUESS.
AT ANY RATE, SOMEONE, WHO WOULD TRY TO INTERCEPT THE FILM AND CAMERA, had
been brought specially in.
. The minutiae about the Minox and its film records are too detailed to
go into here, but Lee had arranged with some officer to intercept the film
before it reached the wrong hands, and to make sure that it would be kept in
a safe place so that its contents, which may have included photos of the
notes he wrote to the FBI, could be used to prove his innocence, should he
be captured.
The Minox camera proved to be a very difficult problem for the FBI.
Lee, supposedly a poor man, had possession of a camera that was very
high-tech, equivalent to a poor man=s owning a high-class professional
camcorder today. It just didn=t fit the pattern. But of course, Lee=s
disappearing ink chemicals, his pedometer, HIS SPYGLASS (INCORRECTLY
DESCRIBED AS A TELESCOPE) and a lot of other things didn=t really fit that
profile, either.
They certainly were clueless about LEE=S technical training in so many
areas, and all the trade craft that he knew.
When Lee said goodbye to me that day, he told me that he would be
wearing the brown shirt that I had bought for him. This shirt was identical
to one that Marina knew about, except it was newer. I=d purchased it for
Lee when he impulsively said that the shirt, which was on sale, was just
like his own, which had been damaged. Lee told me that he would be wearing
>the brown shirt@ when he came to me. Imagine how I feel, seeing that shirt
on him, in those pictures. The shock was even greater because I had
avoided--for over thirty-five years--looking at anything to do with the
matter. I kept nothing about the assassination--not even the smallest
newspaper article. Nothing.
Even though I=ve kept souvenirs of all the other big events in American
histiry since then, as my children well know, I never had a scrap about
Kennedy, the assassination, or Lee. There is a hole in the newspaper
collection.
Indeed, when the kids brought home the movie JFK to see, i did not see
it with them. I couldn=t bear it, and i was afraid i=d give way to my
emotions.
Only in 1998, on the 35th anniversary of the event, did i finally watch
the movie, which had a lot of errors, of course. Still, I was much moved by
the challenge Oliver Stone made. He said that to remain silent was to be a
coward.
That hit home.
When Lee said goodbye to me, it was the last time i ever heard his
voice,
But I would never forget that I promised to tell his story, so that his
children would not have to live in shame, and so that justice might be done.
I have done what i could: I pray God bless it for good.
Judyth Vary Baker (who kept the name ABaker@ even after her divorce, to stay
hidden, and who originally planned to die, and let this story be told from
the grave--but that would have been the cowardly thing to do.).
AND OF COURSE THIS: NOTE DATE:
----- Original Message -----
From: <Ho...@aol.com>
To: <jud...@sprintmail.com>
Cc:
Sent: Wednesday, December 29, 1999 8:56 PM
Subject: Stuck on Stuckey
>J -
>
> Just reading thru Weberman on New Orleans. (Boy, he does range far and
> wide!) Found his comments on Stuckey's Saturday morning meeting with Lee.
> He is quoted as saying that he went to Lee's place around 8 AM to be sure
> to
> catch him before he left home for the day. He makes it sound like this
> was
> his initiative whereas we have got Lee insisting on the Saturday AM visit
> (having done so at the meeting at Reily's with the INCA types, if I
> recall,
> with you waiting outside). I can't think of any reason why Stuckey would
> lie
> about this. He then goes on to say some very complimentary things about
> Lee:
> clean-cut, articulate, etc. Do you have a specific memory of Lee telling
> you
> that he insisted on Stuckey's visit?
>
> - H
Martin Shackelford
account at three different points. The essentials haven't changed at
all. None were written by Judyth, and all were works in progress as
additional evidence was located and included.
Martin
Martin Shackelford
been saying--that the chapter was gradually being corrected from the
agent's errors--and those are two stages of that correction.
Martin
Dr Truth
corrected (it had been altered or changed by an agent in the interim) by a
PhD written from his interviews and notes with Judyth Baker, who took
classes on constructing a story although she was a major, well educated CIA
supported cancer researcher, and had access to 35 some odd years of books
and television programs and the Internet.
Thank you very much for clearing that up. I appreciate your candor.
Regards,
Bob
"Martin Shackelford" <msh...@concentric.net> wrote in message
news:ch1klq$p...@dispatch.concentric.net...
Martin Shackelford
something.
Martin
John McAdams
wrote:
>Martin, I know one thing I've learned....if Judyth Baker is telling the
>truth, and
>it is ever proven she is telling the truth, she should be arrested and
>imprisoned for having prexisting knowledge of the murder of JFK and NOT
>coming forth. Further, if you think she didn't come forward because she
>"loved Ozzie" then I ask you straight out:
>
>If you were Judyth Baker in 1963, Martin, and you loved Lee Harvey Oswald
>and you knew the guy was married, and you were married, too, and all of a
>sudden Lee announced to you that he was going to Dallas and that the
>President of the United States was to be killed and that he was involved,
>would you rush back into his arms? Would you still love him? Would you
>still care for him? Or, Martin, would you sit down and think: Gee, what
>the heck have I gotten myself into here? I love this guy and he's off to
>Dallas to take part in the assassination of the President of the United
>States, oh well, what the heck? Or, Martin, would you say...Oh my God, I've
>got to stop this horrble thing from happening?
>
Judyth's claim is that Lee was an unwilling participant, and tried to
undo the plot by arranging for Adlai Stevenson to be roughed up, and
then by shooting to miss JFK.
But of course, this is pretty lame compared to going to officials --
Secret Service, FBI, cops, etc.
But I'm sure she would claim they were *all* in on it.
>It's just like Files, Martin. If Files was telling the truth, and he's not,
>what do you think should happen to him? A pat on the back? Hey, good boy?
>My man?
>
>No, Martin, if he had told the truth and he is really the one who shot JFK,
>he should fry like lightning in the electric chair in Texas.
>
>But, I don't hear anything sizzling, Martin, except the back of the neck of
>Judyth Baker because her museum didn't work and her story has been
>discredited and she is not going to make any money off of it.
>
>Oh and stay tuned. I'll have the inside scoop on her TV debut soon. You're
>gonna love that.
>
I can't wait to hear it!
>
>"Martin Shackelford" <msh...@concentric.net> wrote in message
>news:ch3rl0$9...@dispatch.concentric.net...
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