In the Eye of History Bethesda Hospital Medical Evidence in the JFK Assassination William Matson Law with Allan Eaglesham JFK Lancer Productions & Publications, Inc. Southlake, Texas III Second Edition © 2005 by William Matson Law All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review. Page layout and design by Ray Wiiki E mail: wiihi [email protected] - - Cover design by Ken Jacobs JFK Lancer Productions & Publications, Inc. 100 Stonewood Court Southlake, Texas 76092 http://www.jfklancer.corn ISBN: 0-9656582-8-7 Printed and bound in the United States of America IV To the family One of John F. Kennedy's favorite poems I HAVE A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH At some disputed barricade, When Spring comes back with rustling shade And apple-blossoms fill the air— I have a rendezvous with Death When Spring brings back blue days and fair. It may be he shall take my hand And lead me into his dark land And close my eyes and quench my breath— It may be I shall pass him still. I have a rendezvous with Death On some scarred slope of battered hill, When Spring comes round again this year And the first meadow-flowers appear. God knows 'twere better to be deep Pillowed in silk and scented down, Where love throbs out in blissful sleep, Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath, Where hushed awakenings are dear... But I've a rendezvous with Death At midnight in some flaming town, When Spring trips north again this year, And I to my pledged word am true, I shall not fail that rendezvous. —Alan Seeger (1888-1916) VI CONTENTS Acknowledgments(cid:9) VIII Author's Note(cid:9) X Foreword by David W Mantik MD, PhD(cid:9) XII Prologue(cid:9) XXI Dennis D. David(cid:9) 1 Paul K. O'Connor (cid:9) 31 James C. Jenkins(cid:9) 65 Jerrol F. Custer (cid:9) 109 James W. Sibert & Francis X. O'Neill— Part 1(cid:9) 143 Part 2(cid:9) 205 Part 3(cid:9) 213 Harold A. Rydberg(cid:9) 289 Saundra K. Spencer (cid:9) 309 Afterword(cid:9) 315 Appendix(cid:9) 321 Photo section(cid:9) 331 Index(cid:9) 362 VII ACKNOWLEDGMENTS My love of oral history comes from my mother and father. Indeed, the first stories I learned were those my parents told of growing up in the south. I would sit at their feet, legs crossed, wide-eyed as my mother told of her life on one of the last plantations, of picking cotton until her back ached and her fingers bled. My father would regale my big sister Kay and me with stories of the Great Depression, ad- ventures in the CC camps as a young man and later as a solder in World War II. My mother usually told her tales from her easy chair, working her crochet, a smile or frown playing upon on her face, depending on the narrative. My father was at times greatly animated, sitting on the couch or at the dinner table, leaning for- ward looking you right in the eye for emphasis, using his hands as much as his voice. I see them now in my mind's eye and hear their southern drawl as I write these lines, and it makes me smile. The style of this volume owes much to those stories. Both my mother and father had the ability to take me back in time and give me the feeling of actually being in the tale. There is nothing like that feeling, and I have attempted to pass it along to you, the reader. My father, Jesse Dean Law passed on nearly a decade ago and my mother Dorothy Elizabeth Law has been gone half that long, leaving legacies of love and stories that I now tell my children about their grandparents' lives in a faraway place called Arkansas. The love of my life and mother of three of my children, Lori Ann, has shown the utmost understanding and patience as I have crisscrossed the United States in search of answers to the Great Mystery. Without her, this book would not have been possible. Childhood is fleeting, both for parent and for child, and in this personal search for balance to history I have stolen precious time away from my youngest children and grandchildren. Ryan Matson Law, Shawn Garrison Law, and Haylee Elizabeth Law (Sissy), and my grandchildren Christian Dean Law and Trey Eliot Law deserve my gratitude. I hope that when they are adults they will feel my efforts were worth it. My love and thanks to my sister Jessie Kay Wilson. Her passing has left a hole in my being that cannot be filled. I miss the sound of her laughter. This was truly a family project. My eldest son Trevit Clay Law helped to prepare me for interviews, as did my nephew Wesley Dean White. My brother-in-law Robert Dale White did double duty helping with video equipment, and along with my sister Elizabeth Ann White, helped to entertain Paul O'Connor and Dennis David during their all-too-short stays with us for their interviews. Elizabeth Ann also typed a large portion of the manuscript. I have been grateful for their love and support during this project, and throughout my life. VIII Words cannot express the debt I owe my editor, Allan Eaglesham. Allan took this project on at a time when he was already overburdened with work. He has given of his time to make this book a reality. His has been a firm, guiding hand. Raymond Wiiki was there when Allan and I needed him to make the final push to ready the manuscript's layout for printing. Debra Conway has been a generous sounding-board, offering her support and gathering background materials, and has been a welcome traveling companion on some of my adventures. Her contri- bution is incalculable. My thanks to David Mantik for his wonderful foreword. A man of great courage and intellect, if the Kennedy assassination is ever solved, it will be due in no small measure to Dr. Mantik's groundbreaking work with the autopsy X-rays and photographs. David Lifton is due thanks for his masterwork Best Evidence (Carrol & Graf, 1988). Mr. Lifton and 1 have had our disagreements over one point or another about this case; in the process I learned much and I am in his debt. Noel Twyman has been very helpful in my research; I consider his book, Bloody Treason (Laurel, 1997), to be the new cornerstone in the continuing inquiry into Kennedy's murder. I thank Walt Brown, editor and publisher ofJFK/ Deep Politics Quarterly, for kindly and promptly providing copies of the autopsy photographs that appear in this volume. My friend from across the "big pond," Matthew Smith, author of The Second Plot (Mainstream, 1992), has also been extremely supportive—reading a late draft of the manuscript and offering advice; I treasure his friendship. Robert Gagermeier has been of great assistance in put- ting his typing skills at my disposal, copying documents and offering his expertise to induce my aged computer to do my bidding. I also thank Steve Conway, Beverly Oliver Massagee, the late Madeleine Brown, Bill Newman, Gayle Newman, Mark Oakes, Vince Palamara, Douglas P. Horne, Robert Groden, Laura Chaput, Ian Griggs, Jerry Robertson, Donna Edwards, Mark Rowe and Johnny Young. Lastly, but most importantly, I owe very special thanks to Dennis and Dorothy David, Paul and Sandy O'Connor, Jim and Jackie Jenkins, the late Jerrol Custer and his widow Marilyn, James and Ester Sibert, Francis X. O'Neill, Harold Rydberg and Saundra Spencer. William Matson Law Central Oregon IX AUTHOR'S NOTE I was always under the impression that Oswald had killed the president. That was just taken as read, you know. There it was. It's in tablets of stone. —Gary Oldman, who played Lee Harvey Oswald in Oliver Stone's movie JFK. The gentlemen interviewed for this book are among the most important figures involved in the aftermath of one of the darkest turning points in this nation's history: the assassination of President John E Kennedy. Thousands of articles and books have been written about the murder of the thirty-fifth president of the United States. Even some of the best are long on theory and short on fact. My idea was simple: contact those who had been involved in the events at Bethesda Naval Hospital on the evening and night of November 22-23,1963, and ask them to take me, step by step, through their recollections of what they had seen, done and heard and put their words on record. I wanted to meet these indi- viduals face to face, to look into their eyes and get an impression of how they had felt during those momentous events. I tried to start with a clean slate as far as my own opinions on the Kennedy assassination were concerned. However, try as I might, I have not been able to remain neutral. "You have to make a choice," former FBI agent Francis X. O'Neill told me when I explained that I was not taking any side in the controversy, just reporting what I was told. "You have to make choices when putting together pieces from first-, second- or sixth-hand information," he told me. Mr. O'Neill may or may not be surprised to learn that he pushed me to the side of conspiracy (despite his forcefully expressed opinions to the contrary). I learned what most people have learned who have studied the case in depth: things just don't add up. From Lee Harvey Oswald's murky life as a marine, Rus- sian defector, pro/anti-Castroite, until the day he wound up in the Dallas School Book Depository on Elm street, and his death in the basement of the Dallas County jail, it doesn't add up. Similarly, the differing descriptions of the wounds on the president's body as seen in Parkland Memorial Hospital, the differing types of caskets that the body was seen in, the differing descriptions of the wrappings on the body, the amateurish autopsy photographs supposedly taken by civilian pho- tographer John Stringer (who has been described as one of the best medical photographers in the world), the X-rays of the skull showing a large fragment of bullet that the autopsy doctors looked for but never found—the list goes on and on—just don't add up. X The men I interviewed have had parts of their accounts published elsewhere, and to a certain extent their words have been used to bolster authors' pet theories. I had, and still have, no theory to present to the reader as to who was behind the deed. Herein you will find, simply, the words of those who happened to find them- selves involved in the aftermath of the assassination of a president. For the first time, they provide analyses of autopsy photos. In 2000, documents were released that reveal that the ceremonial casket—in which Kennedy's body was supposedly transferred from Dallas to Bethesda—was drilled with holes, weighted with bags of sand and dumped into the Atlantic Ocean. Other documents, reviewed by Douglas P Horne, late of the Assassination Records Review Board, apparently show that two different brains were examined on two different days, both supposedly belonging to the late president. Clearly, some kind of weird shell game was going on with the president's remains. While I am not prepared to declare that white is black and black is white in the assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy—as was stated by Kevin Costner in his role as Jim Garrison in Oliver Stone's movie JFK—I do believe that historical "fact" is not necessarily set in tablets of stone. XI FOREWORD I am exceptionally pleased that William Law, with the able assistance of Allan Eaglesham, has submitted this work for future historians. My primary concern, too, has been that the tragic events of November 22, 1963, should be accurately recounted for future generations. To date, textbooks and media have fallen far short of the mark, due mostly to closed minds and insincere efforts. They have instead chosen the broad and easy road—endlessly echoing the now-terminal Warren Report rather than listening to those who were there. In this volume Law brings us the actual words of autopsy participants as well as others, such as Harold Rydberg, who played his role later. The mysterious role played by William Pitzer is revisited by Allan Eaglesham. The efforts of Law and Eaglesham extend over six years and plainly required immense persistence and dedication. That the two FBI agents, James Sibert and Frank O'Neill, finally agreed to go on the record is a remarkable testimony to the tenacity of Law, in particular. I am delighted to introduce this historic set of interviews to the public, and espe- cially to future historians. For anyone who wants a first-hand look at that long-ago night, this is as close as we can now get. During my decade-long curiosity about these events, I have had the pleasure of meeting many of these interviewees, often speaking to them at length. As a result, when I first read their interviews here, I felt that I already knew them—I could visualize their facial expressions, feel their passion, and recognize their nuances of expression. I met Jerrol Custer, the radiology technician, in New York City in 1993, and then later often spoke to him on the phone. I immediately recognized Paul O'Connor's demeanor from Law's description; I had met Paul both in Dallas and in Florida, the latter during a lengthy panel discussion. I also met James Jenkins and Jim Sibert at the same time in Florida, discussing details with them both formally (during the videotaped panel discussion) as well as informally. 1 had the pleasure of a detailed and intimate discussion with Dennis David while in Dallas several years ago. On the other hand, I have never met Frank O'Neill or Harold Rydberg. I have, however, read all of the transcripts of these men (some several times over) and listened to all of their audiotaped interviews with the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB). XII