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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 4, 2021 10:31:12 GMT -5
Preliminary Hearing When Clay Shaw was arrested, Jim Garrison took an unusual step by making a motion for a preliminary hearing. This otherwise defense procedure was the first time in Louisiana history a prosecutor took this action on behalf of a defendant. His application meant 3 judges were appointed to hear evidence concerning the charges and decide to go to trial or dismiss. The four day procedure began March 14, 1967. Garrison was there briefly but avoided grandstanding by also using Asst. DA's Charles Ward and Alvin Oser to present the evidence. Some of the evidence related to Oswald's arrest in New Orleans in August '63. This was the altercation with Carlos Bringuier, a Cuban exile that campaigned against Castro. Other witnesses included the coroner photographer that took the pictures of David Ferrie's body, "To go out on any violent death, any suspicious death, that they call me on, to be on twenty-four hour call." Perry Russo, was an insurance agent from Baton Rouge that had attended a party at Ferrie's house that included Clay Shaw. Also, there was audio tape of an interview Russo did for Channel 12, WVUE, New Orleans. On that tape, Russo was asked directly if he knew Clay Shaw, but answered he had not, as he was introduced to him as Clem Bertrand. Q. Do you know Clay Shaw?
A. Clay Shaw? No, I don't; I don't know Clay Shaw.Other discussions included Russo's impression of Ferrie's roommate. He was introduced as Leon Oswald, but was bearded, grubby and dirty. He had an idea it might be, but was not able to positively identify him as Lee Harvey Oswald arrested in Dallas on Nov 22 nd. The doctor was called to discuss the effects and procedure of sodium Pentothal, (truth serum) administered to Russo. Much of the hearing centered around Perry Russo, and what he had seen and heard at that party in Sept 1963. Another witness called was Vernon Bundy, a New Orleans heroin addict that had seen both Clay Shaw and Lee Oswald together that Sept. He was close enough to identify Shaw and Oswald being together at the seawall, as well as hear part of their conversation. In the end the Judges decided there was enough evidence to proceed and Shaw was to be held for a trial by jury. Then, in a last gasp effort to shut down the proceedings, the Defense tried to introduce the Warren Commission's conclusion of a lone gunman. BY MR. DYMOND:"If the Court please, at this time pursuant to the provisions of RS 13:3713, the Defense would like to offer, introduce and file into evidence the report of the Warren Commission, a one-volume report, being the official volume as published by the United States Printing Office in accordance with the requirements of the statute cited, and we would like to mark the same D-32." BY JUDGE BAGERT:"As to the introduction of that particular volume, Judge O'Hara feels that it is in accordance with the statutes of the State of Louisiana and should be admitted in evidence. Judge Braniff and I believe that it should not. And my reason is simply this. If we are going to accept the Warren Commission's report as being factual, we have just wasted a whole week of time here. I don't care what statute was ever enacted, to accept the Warren Report, even if it were a constitutional amendment, and at some time later we, or any law abiding agency, law enforcement agency, would some day conceivably come up with six confessions, six photographs, six eyewitnesses, it would all be for naught." BY JUDGE BRANIFF:"I am objecting to it because it is fraught with hearsay and contradictions." BY JUDGE O'HARA:"Mr. Wegmann, when I agreed that it was admissible, I don't want it implied or inferred that I am in complete agreement with the findings of the Commission. I would just like to make that perfectly clear. It's admissible for what it's worth. That's my position."
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 4, 2021 10:31:37 GMT -5
Tried to Lie Perry Russo was a 25 yr old insurance agent from Baton Rouge LA, he contacted Garrison's team in Late Feb. '67. David Ferrie was dead. Russo told Sciambra he attended a party at Ferrie's house around the middle of Sept. 1963. He was there with his then girlfriend Sandra Moffett, Moffett denied being at the party then blocked all efforts from the team to extradite her from the states she had moved since leaving New Orleans (Iowa and Nebraska). At this party were David, a few Cubans that had visited him from time to time, a tall and distinguished man with white hair was introduced to Russo as "Clem Bertrand", there was an unshaven, ratty looking guy, "Leon Oswald" that kept to himself. Russo was never able to identity that man as, Lee Harvey Oswald, accused killer of the president. As the evening wore on the party wore down. Two people Russo came with left, leaving Ferrie, Shaw, Leon, and some Cubans. The discussion moved to eliminating Castro, until Ferrie started ranting about Kennedy. Soon the target being discussed was JFK. Ferrie was going on about triangular cross fire, with a "patsy" or "fall guy" being picked up to take the blame. "As it happened, triangulation fire does appear to have been used to kill President Kennedy—at least one shooting
point from the knoll in front of him and apparently at least two from the buildings behind him." It was the conversation and the meeting of Oswald and Shaw at the seawall, that prompted the arrest of Clay Shaw. He was being charged until three judges decided there was enough evidence to indict Shaw in a conspiracy to commit murder. In legal terms, the indictment charged that he “did willfully and unlawfully conspire with David W. Ferrie, herein named but not
charged and Lee Harvey Oswald, herein named but not charged, and others, not herein named, to murder John F. Kennedy.”Russo was the star witness for the prosecution and was suddenly the focal point of attacks by those wishing to stop the investigation. There is much controversy surrounding statements he made during and after the trial. The problems caused him to regret coming forward. However, it does not mean he wasn't telling the truth in his initial statements. Perhaps he was afraid of exposing his relationship with Ferrie. Regardless, there came a time when Russo was afraid for his life and at one point wanted out of the case and the enormous pressure it caused. Charles Schiber was a student at LSU in 1966-67. He remembered hitchhiking back and forth to campus with a friend during the school year. Late one night, they were picked up by Perry Russo. The radio began discussing the Garrison probe, and with no reason to lie, Perry spoke up. "... When I was at LSU and a buddy of mine and I were hitchhiking back to the LSU campus, Perry Russo picked us up.
He told us about his meeting with Oswald and Shaw and that Garrison had just released him from many hours of interrogation in New Orleans.
He drove us about 45 minutes. He believed someone was trying to kill him. I was glad we got to the campus and he let us out.
He had no reason to lie to us."++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ On the Trail of the Assassins | Jim Garrison "Some months later, Russo went on to testify, approximately in March 1964, he happened to drive into David Ferrie’s new service station. As he arrived there, he saw Ferrie in conversation with a familiar-looking individual. It was the tall, white-haired man who had been at Ferrie’s place, the man who then had been introduced to him as Bertrand. At the conclusion of his testimony, Russo was asked to identify the man. Unhesitatingly, Russo indicated the defendant, Clay Shaw. On cross-examination Shaw’s lawyers spent hours trying to discredit Russo and his testimony. They focused particularly on the hypnosis and Sodium Pentothal treatments, implying that we had somehow drugged Russo and brainwashed him into telling this wild story. Their efforts failed, though."
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 4, 2021 10:32:00 GMT -5
Vernon Bundy Vernon Bundy was a heroin addict in New Orleans in 1963. He had a routine after scoring. He would go down to the seawall at Lake Pontchartrain and prepare his dose. One morning in July '63, he was getting ready when he saw a man get out of a car and walk toward him. The man made a comment about the weather as he walked past about 15 or 20 feet and was just standing there. He was an older man, tall with white hair, and after a few minutes a younger man approached. Bundy was straight at the time, scared of these two, and did not shoot his heroin until after the men had left. They talked for about 15 minutes, and before leaving the older man gave the younger guy what looked like a roll of money. From photographs he identified the older man as Clay Shaw and the younger man as Lee Harvey Oswald. He was close enough to hear their conversation, and at one point the young man seemed quite agitated, and shouted back, "...What am I going to tell her."
"...as though he was, to me, it referred to, as though he was talking about his wife himself, you know.
"What am I going to tell my wife," in other words. And he said, the older guy told him, he said, "Don't worry about it."
He said, "I told you I'm going to take care of it." And all the while they thought maybe I overheard the conversation,
he was trying to get me -- trying to get him to, you know, kind of quieten down [sic]. And, I'm still looking at them;
I'm wondering what they're doing. So, afterwards, this older fellow gives the young guy, to me, what looked like,
I can't be too sure, but it looks like a roll of money." ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ On the Trail of the Assassins | Jim Garrison "...Bundy stepped down, walked across the silent courtroom, and put his hand over the gray-white hair of Clay Shaw. That moment, everyone in the courtroom seemed frozen in shock. Then, apparently receiving a nod from Judge Bagert, the minute clerk announced, “This court will take a recess.” It was as the judges were stepping down from their seats behind the bench that the crowd burst into a sustained uproar. I glanced over at the defense table and saw, for the first time, the slightest signs of frowns on the foreheads of the defense attorneys. On the other hand, seemingly above it all—appearing for all the world to be an elegant Gulliver set upon and strapped into his chair by Lilliputians—Shaw continued to savor his cigarette, his eyes above the crowd as he glanced across the courtroom. On cross-examination, of course, the defense lawyers came at Vernon Bundy like rabid wolves. Disconcerted at first, he appeared to relax and soon was recounting his story steadily and patiently. I knew all the questions they would be asking a hundred times over. It was a long-held custom of mine in trials seldom to object when a witness is standing up firm against the opposing lawyers. I waited a long time for Shaw’s attorneys to wear themselves out against Bundy, but in the end they did. At the conclusion of the preliminary hearing on March 17, the three-judge panel ruled that the prosecution had presented sufficient evidence and ordered Clay Shaw to be held for jury trial."
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 8, 2021 10:33:27 GMT -5
Blitzin' Black & White Once the Garrison went public they were converged upon by the press and the public. Statements ahead of the trial were created to undermine it. A response from Chief Justice Earl Warren in Sept. 1967, stated the District Attorney had nothing to refute the Commission's findings. He said he had not heard "one fact" that could prove anyone else was involved other than Lee Harvey Oswald. Without being under oath, Warren could say whatever he wanted, but any witness that heard these statements would be hesitant to call him a liar. Attacks from the media were relentless. Newsweek, Time, The New York Times, the New York Post, and the Saturday Evening Post, "...All shared the basic view that I was a power-mad, irresponsible showman who was producing a slimy circus with the objective of getting
elected to higher office, oblivious of any consequences." One example was Newsweek’s May 15, 1967, article by Hugh Aynesworth. He never did reveal whose life was cut short by this investigation. Jim found out the bribe of $3,000 was allegedly made to Alvin Babeouf. Baneouf later admitted it never happened and Aynesworth was never able to produce any tape he claimed to have to prove it. This was typical of the news stories appearing in the mainstream media. Each time without basis or merit, each time designed to sabotage. James Phelan, was a writer for the 'Saturday Evening Post'. He had written articles praising Garrison for his success in fighting crime in New Orleans. Now with a piece called, 'Rush to Judgment in New Orleans', he attacked Garrison at every turn, going after Perry Russo in particular. He accused the DAs office of drugging the young man and planting a conspiracy story in his brain while he was in this somewhat suggestible state. "Phelan’s colorful fiction later fell apart at Clay Shaw’s trial when it was made clear that Russo had provided Sciambra with a full
description of all significant events prior to any medical treatments."++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ On the Trail of the Assassins | Jim Garrison"The simple truth is that public officials really do not go unobserved so long by the people who elect them. I have never heard of a district attorney who was able to build a career on drugging witnesses so that they would say whatever he ordered them to say. If a prosecutor was so deranged that he resorted to such measures, the word would get around quickly enough and he would not be a prosecutor much longer. It would be much the same if he sought to enhance his career with the aid of thumbscrews and other torture devices."
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 8, 2021 10:34:19 GMT -5
In Living Color When the printed word was not enough, the team heard special investigators from the NBC Television network were in town. Led by Walter Sheridan and Richard Townley, they made it very clear to the people they interviewed, they there to shut down the investigation. They contacted Marlene Mancusco (the one time wife of Gordon Novel, a witness Garrison had been trying to apprehend). Mancusco wrote to Jim,
Richard Townley told me that he had been trying to contact me for a couple of weeks. He said that he worked for NBC and that his intuition
told him that I would be involved eventually. He said Mr. Garrison would get a jail sentence. He said he figured that I was going to be
Mr. Garrison’s star witness, and that Mr. Garrison was going to use me to discredit Gordon and make him appear as a second Oswald.
He kept going back that he wanted a taped interview that would show me in a good light. He said that otherwise I would probably
be subpoenaed and there would be a lots [sic] of newspapermen around me and a state of confusion and I would look very bad.
Townley kept telling me that it would be more intelligent to be presented nicely than to be shown in a bad light coming out of the courtroom.
He said they are going to expose Mr. Garrison as a fraud and that he is working with NBC, out of WDSU, on this…After Mancuso, the two went to Perry Russo with an even bold approach. Andrew Sciambra wrote a memo documenting what Russo told him they said. Perry had been visited by Townley and James Phelan six times over the past few weeks. Each time they put pressure on Russo to change his story. Walter Sheridan told Russo, his contacts at NBC, would guarantee no retaliation by his employer, Equitable Insurance. When Russo told Sheridan he was taking a vacation to California, Sheridan offered him a safe haven in the Golden State. He could assure that. The program 'The JFK Conspiracy: The Case of Jim Garrison', was hosted by NBCs Frank McGee and aired to a national audience June 19,1967. Two Garrison witnesses were convinced to tell stories of bribery or promise of release in exchange for testimony against Clay Shaw. These allegations were proven false when the pair were brought before the Grand Jury and refused to confirm the statements they made on television. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ On the Trail of the Assassins | Jim Garrison"...Sheridan, Russo continued, said that they could set him up in California, protect his job, get him a lawyer and that he could guarantee that Garrison could never get him extradited back to Louisiana. Sheridan then told him that N.B.C. flew Novel to McLean, Virginia, and gave him a lie detector test and that Garrison will never get Novel back in Louisiana. Russo said that Sheridan told him that what he wants Russo to do is to get on an NBC National television show and say, “I am sorry for what I said because I lied, some of what I said was true
but I was doctored by the District Attorney’s staff into testifying like I did”… Perry said that James Phelan of The Saturday Evening Post told him that he was working hand in hand with Townley and Sheridan and they were in constant contact with each other and that they were going to destroy Garrison and the probe..."
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 8, 2021 10:34:47 GMT -5
Refusal to Affirm 
John Cancler Miguel TorresJohn Cancler was a pimp and burglar, better know as 'John the Baptist' serving time at the State Penitentiary at Angola in 1967 He was called to testify before the Grand Jury on July 12, 1967. He only had to confirm and explain the statements he made on television. He would not answer any questions and had to be brought before Judge Bagert. The court sentenced him to eighteen months in jail, running consecutively with his present term, and a fine of $500.00. Q. Did you talk to a newscaster in Parish Prison? A. I refuse to answer on the grounds that it would tend to incriminate me. Q. Did you make any statements to the press in reference to the investigation of the assassination of President Kennedy? A. I refuse to answer on the grounds that it would tend to incriminate me. Q. Have you appeared on TV recently? A. I refuse to answer on the grounds that it would tend to incriminate me. Q. Do you know Mr. Richard Townley? A. I refuse to answer on the grounds that it would tend to incriminate me. Q. Do you know Mr. Walter Sheridan? A. I refuse to answer on grounds of possible self incrimination. Miguel Torres another witness serving time in same penitentiary for burglary. He was called twice before the Grand Jury in August '67. He also refused to answer any questions and when he was granted to step outside to speak with his attorney, he conveyed questions that were asked. These were secret proceedings, so when Torres was called back a week later, he was not allowed to leave the room. When he was specifically asked to confirm his statements on the program, he pleaded the fifth and like Cancler, was sentenced to additional jail time and fined by Judge Bagert. Q. Now, did you appear on National television in June of this year? A. I refuse to answer on the grounds that the answer might tend to incriminate me. Q. Let me ask one more question. Were the statements that you made on national television over an NBC program in June of 1967 about certain members of the District Attorney's Office true or false? A. I refuse to answer the question on the grounds that it might incriminate me. Q. I would like to get these questions down to take into Court. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ On the Trail of the Assassins | Jim Garrison"Within several days after NBC aired the program, I sent off a furious letter of complaint to the Federal Communications Commission. I requested equal time to reply personally to the network’s rapacious attack on my office. The FCC made NBC provide me with a half hour to reply to the hour-long White Paper. Not exactly equal time, but all I needed. I made my reply live from the network’s local affiliate, WDSU TV, and it was broadcast across the country. Afterwards, I felt I had communicated my message, but I was not left with a satisfied feeling. I kept asking myself, why had NBC worked so long and hard to tear our case apart? Indeed, to tear our office apart."
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 13, 2021 10:59:20 GMT -5
Encompassing Secrets By the Spring of 1967, the Garrison investigation was national news and suddenly volunteers came from all over the country to help. One such proffer came from an ex-CIA agent named William Wood. Wood was a case working for the agency, and Garrison put him thru a test for legitimacy. They had Wood call his ex boss and discuss his current status and the option of coming back to "the company" while the team listened on the other line. Because of the publicity it would cause, the team decided not make any announcement of him coming on board, and his code name going forward was Bill Boxley. He was a hard worker dedicated to the cause, always carried a 45 revolver under his coat and a large rectangular briefcase. As the investigation pursued, more and more evidence pointed to the CIAs involvement in the president's murder. Guy Banister's work with the Cuban guerilla camps indicated the agency's participation, as well as Jules Ricco Kimble having admitted receiving CIA assignments. Oswald at Bolton Ford in 1961, while Lee was in Russia, and having occurred just before the Bay of Pigs Invasion, was another sign of CIAs involvement in this matter. All of this at the direction of the Secretary of State, Allen Dulles, under President Dwight Eisenhower. President Kennedy saw it differently. In a speech at American University in Washington, D.C., in June of '63, JFK made it clear the US and Russia had to find a way to live in peace on Earth. But as early as 1952, American military saw a huge advantage in securing the eastern margin of the Indochinese peninsula. A National Security memo from 1952 stated, "Communist control of all of Southeast Asia would render the U.S. position in the Pacific offshore island chain precarious and would seriously
jeopardize fundamental U.S. security interests in the Far East." In 1954, French troops surrendered to Ho Chi Minh’s forces, and all the countries involved except the US signed a peace treaty separating Vietnam at the 17th parallel. Kennedy inherited this, and at first went along with the agency's advise, but soon made it clear it was not a war for the US, and pledged to remove Americans from the area. In Oct. '63, JFK instructed his Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara to devise a plan to remove all American troops from Vietnam by the end of 1965. He told White House Adviser, Kenneth O'Donnell, "I’ll never send draftees over there to fight." He limited the exposure to Green Beret advisors, pilots, and technicians. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ On the Trail of the Assassins | Jim Garrison"...Along the way he had made implacable enemies—from top level C.I.A. cold warriors like Allen Dulles, General Charles Cabell, and Richard Helms, (then deputy director in charge of covert operations) down to anti-Castro Cuban exiles who felt betrayed at the Bay of Pigs. While it was difficult for me to accept that an entire agency as enormous as the C.I.A. could have sanctioned and carried out a plan to assassinate the President, it did not seem unreasonable that rogue elements within the Agency or contract agents who had been working with them on other projects might well have. That encompassed a lot of people, among them Clay Shaw, Guy Banister, David Ferrie, and a plenitude of Cuban guerrillas who had been trained north of Lake Pontchartrain."
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 13, 2021 11:00:34 GMT -5
Nagel & Novel  Gordon Novel Richard NagelGordon Novel was a resident of New Orleans, born in 1938. As a young man he joined a Neo-Nazi group that bombed a Metairie LA, theater for allowing in blacks. As an adult he owned an electronics shop that specialist in bugging and surveillance equipment. Garrison soon found out he was involved with the CIA. It was him, Sergio Arcacha Smith, David Ferrie and Guy Banister, that participated in the robbery of the Schlumberger Well Company ammunition bunker in 1961. That prompted Jim to subpoena him to testify - instead Gordon fled to Ohio. Garrison's efforts to extradite him failed when the Governor would not allow it. After he left new Orleans, his landlady found a draft of a letter in his vacant apartment, "We have temporarily avoided one subpoena not to reveal Double Chek
activities or associate them with this mess. We want out of this thing before Thursday 3/67. Our attorneys have been told to expect another subpoena to
appear and testify on this matter. The fifth amendment and/or immunity (and) legal tactics will not suffice....Our connection and activity of that period
involves individuals presently about to be indicted as conspirators in Garrison's investigation." Walter Sheridan told Perry Russo, Garrison will never get him. Jim found out that Novel had a picture of him and Oswald taken with the truck that was used for the heist. Gordon sold the picture to Walter Sheridan and it was squashed. Then, once Novel got word that Garrison was looking for him, he skipped town. Jim could never get him back and whatever information he had regarding the case was lost. But obvious hiding behind a no extradition order was a clear indicator of Novel's involvement in the caper. Transporting the goods to New Orleans made it a felony. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Foot the LockerRichard Case Nagel was born n Greenwich NY in 1930, and joined the Army in 1948. He received the Bronze Star and Purple Heart and two years later became one of the youngest man to reach the rank of Captain at the age of 20. In 1954, he survived a plane and after recovery he enlisted in the Army Counter Intelligence Corp. From there he joined CIC as a(Criminal Investigation Command Officer) in both Japan and Korea. When he left the Army in Oct. '59 he achieved rank of Second Lieutenant. As a civilian he worked as a private investigator, but was then hospitalized for a self inflected gun shot wound. After his release in June 1962, he joined the CIA. One year later he was monitoring Cuban exiles in a plot to assassinate Fidel Castro. He claimed to have warned the KGB, CIA and FBI. It is from this investigation that he became involved with New Orleans, Dallas, and the assassination of President Kennedy. When his warnings to US agencies went unheeded, he took action by getting himself arrested. In Sept. 1963 he walked in a bank in El Paso TX and fired a gun. No one was injured as he shot at the ceiling. He then went out to his car, waited briefly, saw no one, then attempted to drive to the front of the building. A police officer stopped and arrested him for attempted bank robbery. Some interesting artifacts in his car and some found later, related to Oswald. However there is no complete official inventory list, and according to author Larry Hancock, the FBI list is missing a page that may have included other items. None of the items were returned to Nagel. His sister told authorities Richard had 5 footlockers of material in storage, all have since disappeared. *One miniature Minolta camera and developing kit.
*Fair Play for Cuba leaflets.
*The P.O. Box for the Fair Play for Cuba committee in New Orleans, Louisiana.
*Cuban and Communist literature including the Case against Cuba by Corless Lament,
*A notebook containing the unlisted telephone number of the Cuban embassy, the same number as found in Oswald's notebook. The CIA denied Nagel having any connection with the CIA, though it would have been a natural step for Army Intelligence to move to the CIA. In 1992 Dick Russell wrote the book "The Man Who Knew Too Much", documenting Nagel's story. In 2018 he provided the following re: CIA's 201 files: "The CIA maintains what are designated “201 files” on “subjects of extensive reporting and CI investigation” and on “prospective agents and sources,”
according to the Agency’s Clandestine Services Handbook. Nagell’s is listed as 201-746537. (Oswald had one too, 201-289248).
However, the CIA cable with Nagell’s 201 number asserts: “No indication Nagell involved in espionage, Communist Party, or Fair Play for Cuba Committee activity.”
This was despite the CIA’s Office of Security having earlier pored over Nagell’s notebook — seized at the time of his 1963 arrest in El Paso —
listing at least six of its employees, as well as alleged communists and Fair Play for Cuba officers."+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ On the Trail of the Assassins | Jim Garrison"In mid-1963 he had been working for the United States government, so Nagell’s story began, in an agency which he would not identify. The people for whom he worked, a vagueness from which he never departed, were curious about a project involving a fellow named Lee Oswald and some other men. Consequently, Nagell was assigned to spend some time establishing the necessary relationships and observing. In late August or early September of 1963, for reasons he would not spell out, it became apparent that an exceedingly large—he emphasized the word “large”—operation, pointing toward the assassination of President Kennedy, was under way. At just about the time of this discovery, for reasons he would not explain, the individual who had given him his assignment was moved to another part of the country, and Nagell suddenly found himself without a direct contact." "I asked him the names of the other men. He hesitated, but when the answer came, it was specific: Guy Banister, Clay Shaw, and David Ferrie. With what organization were these men connected? Now he looked at me with a half-smile and shook his head slowly. I pressed. Were they connected with the C.I.A.? “I cannot discuss or name any government organization,” he replied."
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 13, 2021 11:01:35 GMT -5
Set Up | Walk Out One time, Garrison had to fly to Albuquerque to speak at the University of New Mexico. He spoke to students for several hours with encouraging results. When he got back to his motel, he found Bil Boxley, the ex- CIA agent he had hired, in the lobby. Boxley told him he gotten a lead of a plan to kill him and he was there for his protection. Jim was furious. “I don’t appreciate your dumping this paranoid garbage on me. And I don’t appreciate your inability
to follow a simple order. Especially,” I added, “when it means that I personally am going to end up paying for your flight out here and back.
The last I growled at him almost savagely because Boxley was always out of money, and I continually had to write checks for him." The next morning the two went to the airport, Garrison was flying off to Los Angeles and Boxley would go back to New Orleans. Jim had told Boxley that whenever he arrived at LAX he would have to wait for his luggage. He had a habit of taking a reading break in the quiet of the men's room while he waited. On this trip he did just that. With no one in the room, he chose the last of the empty stalls and simply sat down to read. After a few moments he heard whispering outside his stall and immediately knew something was wrong. Because all he intended to do was read, he stood up, and quickly walked out. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ On the Trail of the Assassins | Jim Garrison "I remembered a curious phone call I had received about three weeks earlier from Los Angeles. The call had come to my house in New Orleans, where I had an unlisted telephone number. The caller was a man I had not seen in many years. I had once represented him briefly on a federal case. I recalled him as a grimy, furtive, and disheveled homosexual who sold pornographic photographs for a living. Such a client was hardly to my choosing, but at the time I was in the business of representing criminal as well as civil cases, and so I had accepted his case. But this man failed to pay me, and I notified the court that I was no longer his attorney. Years later, only three weeks before the bizarre incident at the airport, this character had called me out of the blue. After he identified himself, I asked him how he had obtained my unlisted number. He responded vaguely that he had connections. I then asked him why he was calling me, and he launched into a weird explanation. He was thinking of visiting New Orleans during the next Mardi Gras, he said, and he thought perhaps we could get together. I told him that I had no intention of getting together with him anytime or anywhere and slammed down the phone. Now, I suddenly realized who had been placed in the booth next to me just prior to my intended arrest at the Los Angeles airport. As an experienced prosecutor, it was not difficult for me to envision what would have happened had I not shot out of the men’s room so quickly, emerging along with the two policemen. One way or the other, my seedy former client would have arranged to come out of his stall at about the same time as I emerged from mine. Any of a variety of eminently prosecutable scenes would have been created. The airport police would have responded, and at my subsequent trial for violating some obscenity misdemeanor under California law, I would have found myself as the defendant under cross-examination. At the appropriate moment a prosecutor would have asked me if I still had any relationship with my former client, who would have just finished testifying for the prosecution. I would have responded, of course, that I did not. Then the prosecutor would have produced the man’s Los Angeles telephone bill. It would have on it a long distance call to me at my unlisted home number in New Orleans. That would have been the end of the ballgame." ---------------------------------------------------- It was a set up. But Jim couldn't figure out how the Los Angeles Police had gotten his flight number. Much later it was suggested by Asst DA Vince Salandria, that it was Boxley that had penetrated the investigation and was working with the US Government. Jim called Bill and asked him to come by the office. After a couple of hours he did not show up. Jim and Lou Ivan took a ride to his place and found there was no matching phone number there, the landlady hadn't seen him in six months, and he probably had stayed in some CIA sponsored safe house nearby. That's when it hit him. It was Boxley that had known the details of his trip to Los Angeles and had tipped off the police on his arrival time and flight number. Boxley then flew to Beumont TX, and made an announcement to the press he had quit the investigation because Jim Garrison was addicted to drugs. Jim was devastated, how could he be so foolish? This man and his large briefcase, had been in and out of their files hundreds of times. He could only assume all of his files up to that point had been duplicated by the Federal Government.
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Post by Michael Capasse on Aug 13, 2021 11:02:05 GMT -5
March 04, 1967 From the Associated Press:
"U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark said in Washington Thursday that the FBI had investigated Shaw late in
1963 and cleared him of any link with the assassination. The FBI refused to say why Shaw was questioned.
Earlier in the day the new U.S. Attorney General, Ramsey Clark, said the FBI had investigated Shaw late in 1963
and cleared him of any link with the assassination. “On the evidence that the FBI has, there was no connection found,”
Clark said in Washington."From the Washington Star:"Atty. Gen. designate Ramsey Clark said today the Federal Bureau of Investigation
already has investigated and cleared Clay L. Shaw -- a businessman arrested in New Orleans -- of any part in
the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Clark made the statement to reporters moments after the
Senate Judiciary Committee approved his nomination to become Attorney General."From the Associated Press:Shaw, a wealthy retired director of the International Trade Mart, at New Orleans
has been booked on a charge of "conspiracy to commit murder.” In the Kennedy assassination investigation
being run by New Orleans Dist. Atty Jim Garrison In a brief corridor interview Clark said the Justice Department
knows what Garrison’s case involves and does not consider it valid. However, the former chief counsel to the
Warren Commission J. Lee Rankin, said earlier that as far as I know, we’ve never heard of this person (Shaw).
The Warren Commission’s Report did not mention Shaw.
Clark said Shaw “was included in an investigation in November and December of 1963."“We have the evidence
and we can assume what their conclusions are,” Clark said. On the evidence that the FBI has, there was no
connection found “between Shaw and the assassination of the President in Dallas on Nov 22, 1963, Clark said.
“He was checked out and found clear?” Clark was asked. “That’s right," Clark replied."George Lardner | Washington PostThe Attorney General’s remarks consequently amounted to an acceptance of Garrison’s
charge that Clay Shaw and "Clay Bertrand” are one and the same. “It’s the same guy,”
said one source in the Justice Department.
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