From jxxl Mon Oct 16 19:47:43 PDT 1995 Article: 56942 of alt.conspiracy.jfk Xref: netcom.com alt.conspiracy.jfk:56942 Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy.jfk Path: netcom.com!jxxl From: jxxl@netcom.com (John Locke) Subject: SBT Experimentally Confirmed Message-ID: Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest) Date: Sat, 7 Oct 1995 16:48:14 GMT Lines: 185 Sender: jxxl@netcom.netcom.com One of the central assertions of the conspirati is that it would be impossible for a single bullet to make as many wounds, hit as much bone, and emerge as unscathed as CE399, the "magic bullet," is alleged to have done. Harold Weisberg stated this view for the umpteenth time in a letter to the Washington Post, January 11, 1992: It [is] a physical impossibility for this magic bullet [CE399] to have the imagined career indispensable to the lone-assassin "solution"...there is nothing like this career in science or mythology. In "Conspiracy" (pp. 69-70), Anthony Summers repeats the assertion using dissident pathologist Cyril Wecht for support: Above all, [Cyril Wecht] refuses to believe that a bullet could emerge almost intact after causing as much bone damage as was done to the Governor. To demonstrate this, Wecht points to the condition of Mannlicher-Carcano ammunition after firing into cotton wadding, a goat carcass--which sustained a broken rib--and through the wrist of a corpse. All the test bullets are visibly more damaged than the bullet alleged to have caused the wounds to the President and the Governor. Wecht deplores the fact that the Assassinations Committee did not try to reproduce the "magic bullet" by performing similar tests and has challenged his colleagues to produce even *one* bullet that had emerged similarly undamaged. Wecht's challenge has now been met by Dr. Lattimer. It has been proven that a single bullet could make all the wounds and break all the bone and emerge as relatively unscathed as CE399. Therefore, the long-held assertion of the conspirati must now be completely discarded as evidence of conspiracy. Lattimer's experiment is described in the following article: [Excerpted from "Experimental Duplication of the Important Physical Evidence of the Lapel Bulge of the Jacket Worn by Governor Connally When Bullet 399 Went Through Him" by John K. Lattimer, M.D., et al, in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, May 1994. The article describes an experiment which supplies the most complete verification of the Single Bullet Theory yet performed.] The most important new piece of physical evidence in the analysis of the shooting of President Kennedy and Governor Connally has been the reaffirmation of the precise moment when bullet 399 [the so-called Magic Bullet] passed through the body of Governor Connally. This is graphically demonstrated in frame 224 of the Zapruder movie by the sudden forward bulge of the right lapel of the suit jacket of Governor Connally. This was clearly demonstrated by enhancement of the motion picture in the laboratories of Failure Analysis Inc., by Jeffrey Lotz in 1992. ... Even running the Zapruder movie at an ordinary "slow motion," rate, one does not appreciate the sudden forward "bulge" of the lapel. It is necessary to run the movie very slowly, "freezing" each frame for a moment, before the flap of the lapel and the bulging of the jacket become obvious. Photo enhancement makes it easier to see, once you know when and where it occurs. Having established this fact, it then becomes apparent that the right arms of both men react immediately and simultaneously to the stimulus of the bullet having passed through them. The arms of Kennedy start an upward jerk into Thorburn's reflex position and the right hand of Connally, containing his big white Stetson hat, begins to snap up into view as his biceps contract and he jerks his painful forearm up into the view of Zapruder's camera. ... REENACTMENT OF THE WOUNDING OF GOVERNOR CONNALLY (FRAME 224). As with any study of small photographs (movie frames), it is desirable to try to verify the findings by duplicating the situation as closely as possible, using the exact same type of rifle, cartridges, clothing, necks, ribs and radiuses, as at Dallas. In an attempt to verify and study this phenomenon further, a duplication of President Kennedy's size 16 neck and of Governor Connally's chest and jacket were tested to see exactly what would happen. A size 16 neck simulation was created, using fresh pork muscle, with the bone removed and the skin still in place. A rack was prepared to hold a rib cage at a distance of 24 inches from the Kennedy neck. A white dress shirt and tropical worsted jacket were placed over the rib cage on a special rack. A necktie was tied in place to simulate the clothing Governor Connally wore at the time of the shooting in Dallas. An array of radiuses (arm bones), encased in simulated forearms, was arranged in front of the right lapel of Governor Connally and a bullet trap was mounted beyond this array. Bullets of the Western Cartridge Company 6.5 millimeter ammunition of the same lots used by Lee Harvey Oswald were fired from a Carcano carbine exactly like the one used by Oswald. We knew from our previous experiments [as described in Lattimer's book "Kennedy and Lincoln"] that our test bullets would almost certainly "tumble" and would strike our "Governor Connally back" at about the point where he was actually struck. Our test bullet also struck a rib (just as in Governor Connally), removing 4.5 centimeters of the rib and exited in the area that would have been under his right nipple. The flying fragments of rib, marrow and soft tissue, accompanying the exiting, tumbling bullet, caused a large ragged hole in the shirt and the jacket lining and plastered them with fragments of rib and soft tissue, just as in the Governor's instance. The bullet exited under the right lapel, still tumbling, making a 3 centimeter transverse bullet wound in the cloth. It then struck one of the forearms arrayed in front of the jacket. The bullet was captured in a bullet trap beyond this point. A videotape of the motion of the jacket was obtained, along with frames from a rapid-firing 35 millimeter camera. These revealed that the jacket bulged out about 6 inches and then snapped back. The lapel flipped over against the neck area. The forward motion of the bulging jacket was completed in 3/30th of a second, whereupon the backward snap began on our static model. This was completed by 16/30th of a second from the shot. After this, the jacket and lapel were again back in normal position. While the rib and soft tissue fragments caused a large ragged wound in the shirt, just as described in Governor Connally's shirt, the exit hole of the bullet in the front of the jacket was elongated to a length of 3 centimeters (almost exactly the length of the tumbling bullet). The large shirt wound and the bulge of the jacket were more related to the hail of fragments of rib and soft tissue. The bullet then struck one of the radiuses mounted in front of the jacket. The bullet from this experiment was flattened on one side and bent from hitting the rib and radius while traveling sideways, just as bullet 399 was flattened and bent for the same reasons (399 is definitely not "pristine"). Lead extruded from the rear of our bullet as with bullet 399. The radius was fractured and tiny fragments of lead were left adherent to the periosteum, exactly as in Governor Connally. One of the most dependable features of this Kennedy and Connally mockup was the characteristic manner in which these Carcano bullets turned sideways (tumbled) after exiting the neck of Kennedy. THE BULLET MUST TRAVERSE THE NECK OF JOHN F. KENNEDY FIRST OR NO JACKET BULGE OCCURS. In an effort to determine what would happen if the bullet did *not* go through the neck of Kennedy first, but hit Connally primarily, we fired a bullet through our Connally jacket and thorax preparation without running it through the model of Kennedy's neck first, so it did not tumble. The jacket did *not* bulge out and the lapel did *not* turn over. The shirt collar flipped briefly. With the bullet going straight ahead, wounds to the rib, shirt and jacket were punctate and the rib fragments were not enough to bulge out the front of the jacket. This made it seem even more likely that bullet 399 had gone through the neck of President Kennedy first, turned sideways and caused the very obvious jacket and lapel distortions, which we have recorded herein and which occur in frame 224. If the bullet did *not* go through the neck of Kennedy first, the jacket bulge and lapel flap did *not* occur. SUMMARY By duplicating the wound to the neck of President Kennedy, which caused bullet 399 to turn sideways, and having it *then* hit a Connally-type rib cage with shirt and jacket, we reproduced the right-sided bulge of the jacket worn by Connally, with lapel eversion, which is so significant in frame 224. The extensive damage to his shirtfront was from the hail of rib fragments and soft tissue, exactly as described with his own shirt. Our tumbling bullet then went on to fracture a radius and be recovered intact except that it was somewhat flattened and bent and had lead extruded from the rear, as did bullet 399. Fragments of this lead were scraped off on the ragged bone-ends of some of our fractured radiuses, just as with Governor Connally's radius. It is believed that this duplication of the jacket and lapel bulge of Governor Connally, which occurred dependably, when we reproduced the circumstances at Dallas, confirmed this very important detail in this technical demonstration of the findings in the shooting of President Kennedy and Governor Connally. The bulge and the lapel eversion of the jacket worn by Governor Connally, starting in Zapruder frame 224, does indeed establish, beyond any shadow of a doubt, the exact moment when bullet 399 went through him. The right arms of both men were seen to react simultaneously, immediately thereafter. It also permits us to establish that there was plenty of time (three and one-half seconds) between the first two shots (frames 160 to 224) and even more time (five seconds) between the last two shots (frames 224 to 313), for Oswald to reload, reacquire the target (the head of President Kennedy) plus two full seconds to lock onto it. If the bullet does not traverse the neck of President Kennedy, it does not cause Governor Connally's jacket and lapel to bulge. The lapel bulge is a very important bit of actual physical evidence in establishing the fact that one bullet hit both men and that Oswald had plenty of time to hit the President, first in the neck and then in the head. These experiments confirm the mechanism of the lapel bulge and the behavior of the bullet. ---