insidethearrb

RETHINKING the Question: "Why Was the First Draft of JFK's Autopsy Report Destroyed?"

insidethearrb

June 13th, 20:41

In Volume III of my book "Inside the Assassination Records Review Board," in Chapter 11, I wrote in the text on page 866, and summarized in a data table on page 872, that the proximate cause, or stimulus, for why the unsigned, draft version of the JFK autopsy report (reviewed on Saturday, 11/23/63 at Bethesda Naval Hospital by CDR Humes, CDR Boswell, and CAPT Canada) was abandoned, and subsequently destroyed by Humes in his fireplace on Sunday, 11/24/63, was the fact that James Tague's wounding on Main Street in Dealey Plaza (as a result of the ricochet of a bullet off of the Main Street curb) was evidence of a missed shot. BACKGROUND FOLLOWS: The three shot scenario---the conclusion that there was only one assassin, and that he was above and behind the limousine, and that he fired only three shots---was adopted by the Dallas police department and the U.S. government on Friday afternoon; Richard Lipsey, the Aide to General Wehle (Commandant of the Military District of Washington), recounted to the HSCA staff with great certainty that he heard the pathologists discussing a three-hit scenario---that is, three hits on JFK without any discussion of what had happened to Connally---in the autopsy morgue; and yet the version of the autopsy report entered into evidence by the Warren Commission (CE 387) concluded that there were only two hits on President Kennedy. Clearly, at least one change to the autopsy conclusions had taken place between the time Lipsey heard the pathologists discuss three hits on JFK, and the time CE 387 was entered into evidence during the testimony of James J. Humes before Arlen Specter in March of 1964.

At the time I drafted this chapter it seemed obvious to me that public knowledge of James Tague's wounding, and therefore of a missed shot which had struck the curb on Main Street, had forced Humes, et. al. to abandon the 3-shot, 3-hit scenario arrived at inside the Bethesda morgue in front of Richard Lipsey late Friday evening (after the FBI agents had departed at 11:00 PM).

It is now apparent, as a result of an astute question asked of me by a friend, that the James Tague wounding could NOT have been the proximate cause, or stimulus, for junking the first draft of the JFK autopsy report. WHY? Because as James Tague clearly stated in his own book, published in 2003, there was no widely available public mention of his wounding until newspaper journalist Jim Lehrer published the results of his interview with Tague in the Dallas Times-Herald on June 5, 1964. This was followed by an FBI interview and subsequent Warren Commission testimony. While it is true that Deputy Sheriff Buddy Walthers spoke to Tague about the wounding on the very afternoon of the assassination, and photographer Tom Dillard photographed the curb strike (and Tague himself) the afternoon of the assassination, there is no evidence that this information was publicly available on November 23rd, or that it was known within the confines of Bethesda Naval Hospital by Humes, Boswell, or Canada.