[104-10305-10000.pdf — page 68]
# 13-00000backed up Sheridan, until ic of the lies, bribes and fakes in the program were revealed.## Apology by NBC for Lies Told by Two 'Witnesses"Frank McGee later had to apologize on NBC for lies told by two of Sheridan's "witnesses" on the special. Sheridan and Townley paid them to give statements against Garrison. The FCC ruled that NBC had to give Garrison equal time after Garrison made an appeal, because the special had not been a news program, but an NIC-Sheridan vendetta against Garrison. NBC did give Garrison 30 minutes (the special was one hour) to respond at a later date in 1967.To illustrate Sheridan's and NBC's techniques in the case, at one point the President of NBC helped in the bribery efforts by calling Mr. Gherlock, head of Equitable Life Insurance Co. in New York. Gher- lock was asked for assurance that Perry Russo, who worked for Equitable in Louisiana, would cooperate with NBC on the Garrison special. Russo was the key witness in the Shaw trial whom Sheridan and Townley tried to bribe.To remind the reader about the Shaw trial, Jim Garrison opened an investigation into the assassination of President Kennedy in late 1966. Senator Long of Louisiana hod convinced Garrison that a conspiracy had existed. Lee Harvey Oswald's activities in New Orleans prior to the assassination, along with the strange actions of David Ferrie, on the day of the assassination, attracted Garrison's attention. He had not made his investigation public but a curious newspaper reporter named Rosemary James broke the story after a few months of effort. Clay Shaw's other identity, Clay Bertrand, had already been uncovered by Garrison, and his involvement in the planning for the assassination had already been suspected by early 1967.## Party in David Ferrie's Apartment.Perry Russo attended a party in David Ferrie's apartment where Clay Bertrand, Ferrie, someone resembling Lee Harvey Oswald and others had discussed the possibility of assassinating President Kennedy. He became the key witness when Garrison arrested Shaw on March 1, 1967, and a grand jury indicted Shaw on March 22 following two hearings on March 14 and March 17 by a three judge panel and a four judge panel, recommending that Shaw be held for trial.## Effort to Have Russo Change His TestimonySheridan and Townley both made up their minds along with most of the news media and the Justice Department, that Garrison had to be stopped at all costs. They decided to really go to work on Perry Russo, since his testimony was all important.Townley tried to get Russo to change his testimony at the Shaw trial to make it seem that Garrison had hypnotized him and had then asked him leading questions to get Russo to testify against Shaw. Townley and Sheridan went to Russo's house, his office, and met him at other places. They badgered him and attempted to bribe him. They pressured and threatened him. They used every trick in the book to try to get him to change his testimony.They threatened him with being discredited, made to seem insane, and perhaps fired from his job. They offered him a chance to work closely, for high rewards, with NBC in Sheridan's all-out effort to get Garrison. Sheridan told Russo, "We're going to destroy Car on and his case along with him." Townley told Russo that he could get Shaw's lawyer, Dymond, to go casy on him at the trial, if he would alter his testimony. He told Russo that his employer had promised NBC that no retaliation would be taken against Russo if he cooperated with MC. However, he might be fired if he didn't cooperate.Sheridan told Russo that NIC could set him up in California where Russo always wanted to live, if he helped bust up the Garrison probe. Sheridan said NBC would pay his expenses to California and to live there, would protect his job, would get Russo a lawyer, and would guarantee that Garrison would never extradite him back to Louisiana.## Gordon Novel, Worker for the CIAAnother important witness in the Shaw trial was Gordon Novel, a bugging and electronics expert who worked for the CIA. Garrison tried to subpoena him, but he left New Orleans and fled to Ohio. Garrison was never able to extradite Novel from Ohio to Louisiana in spite of Novel's public statements that he knew who had killed David Ferrie. (Ferrie died mysteriously shortly after Garrison's probe became public knowledge.)Walter Sheridan told Perry Russo that NBC had helped Novel escape Garrison's clutches by flying him out of Louisiana to NcLean, Virginia (home of the CIA). NBC paid for a lie detector test to be administered to Novel in McLean. The test was supposed to prove that Novel was telling the truth when he said he knew nothing about the Kennedy case. Sheridan told Russo that NBC would do the same thing for him that they had done for Novel, namely, make sure that Novel would never be extradited to Louisiana to testify. Since Novel never was extradited and since Governor Rhodes of Ohio blocked his extradition making Governor McKeithen of Louisiana extremely angry, it would seem that Sheridan was right NBC did possess a lot of clout.Sheridan and Townley also went to work on Gordon Novel's former wife, Marlene Mancuso. She was another important Shaw trial witness, because of her knowledge about Novel's CIA activities and a burglary of a munitions dump in Houma, Louisiana. Townley called her and tried to convince her to grant a taped interview for use on the NBC show. He said Garrison was going to be destroyed and that she should cooperate with NBC.## The NBC Special on June 19, 1967The NBC-Walter Sheridan special on June 19, 1967, titled "The JFK Conspiracy - The Case of Jim Garrison", was packed with Sheridanese. Here are the principal examples:1.  A lawyer named Dean Andrews in New Orleans had played a key role in the Shaw trial because Clay Bertrand had telephoned him in a hospital shortly after the assassination and asked him to represent Lee Harvey Oswald. Andrews told so many different stories about Clay Bertrand that the truth was difficult to determine.Frank McGee asked Andrews on the program about Clay Bertrand and whether he was Clay Shaw. Andrews said Bertrand was actually Eugene C. Davis, a bar owner in New Orleans. Sheridan's coup quickly blew up in his face when Davis denied the whole thing. When the trial finally took place, Shaw was pegged as Bertrand by a woman who saw him sign his name as Clay Bertrand.