Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 18:19:50 CST
From: <U54778@uicvm.uic.edu>
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy.jfk
Subject:    WECHT'S LETTER TO JAMA



                  A LETTER TO THE EDITOR OF JAMA
                                BY
                       Cyril H. Wecht, M.D.
          Past President, American Academy of Forensic Sciences;
          Past President, American College of Legal Medicine.

(This letter, dated October 27, 1992, was rejected for publication
by JAMA.  It was reprinted in the journal The Third Decade in
January, 1993)

Dear Sir:
     It was only with much intellectual restraint that I refrained
from submitting a lengthy, detailed letter to the editor, refuting
point by point the self-serving statements, retrospective
confabulations, and complacent arrogance of the two retired Navy
pathologists, Drs. James J. Humes and J. Thorton Boswell, set forth
in the incredibly one-sided, blatantly biased, interview-articles
published in JAMA on May 27,1992.  I chose to devote my time and
energy to point out the inaccuracies and deliberate
misrepresentations by Humes and Boswell through numerous interviews
with news media throughout the country.  I also participated in a
press conference with Dr. Charles Crenshaw in Washington D.C. for
this same purpose, and I was afforded the opportunity to debate the
Warren Commission Report with Dr. George Lundberg on the "Larry
King Live" national television show shortly after the articles
appeared.  I concluded there was no way that I could cover this
subject properly within the limitations of a letter to the editor,
assuming that it were to be accepted for publication.
     However, I should like to comment on the statement contained
in the "Reply" by Dennis L. Breo, in which he states that "the nine
members of the 1979 House Select Committee on Assassination's blue-
ribbon Forensic Pathology Panel" concluded that there were two
shots fired from the rear.  Inasmuch as I was a member of that
Panel and testified before the entire House Committee, I can state
with complete confidence that Mr. Breo's statement is incorrect.
I never agreed that there were only two shots fired from the rear.
Such a conclusion would automatically endorse the infamous "single
bullet" theory, the greatest forensic scientific hoax that has ever
been conceived in the history of modern day medicolegal
investigation.  I have been strenuously arguing against the "magic"
bullet theory for 25 years, and I made it quite clear in my
testimony before Congress in 1978 that I did not concur with my
colleagues.
     A few other critical observations are in order.  Dr. Pierre
Finck now states in his interview with Mr. Breo that there was no
interference with the autopsy by an Army General.  In 1969,
testifying under oath in the Clay Shaw trial in New Orleans, Dr.
Finck stated that he and his colleagues were ordered by a General
(whose name he was unable to remember) not to dissect out the
bullet wounds of JFK's back and neck.  Which statement do you think
is more likely to be true ---- the one made six years after the
autopsy under oath, or one made 29 years later in an unsworn, self-
serving interview?
     Dr. Finck now states in his interview that the post-mortem
examination on JFK was a "complete autopsy".  In his written report
to the commanding officer at the Armed Forces Institute of
Pathology, General Joseph Blumberg in 1963, shortly after the
autopsy, Dr. Finck stated that the autopsy was "incomplete".  At
which point in time do you think Dr. Finck was demonstrating more
honesty and integrity about this matter ----- within a matter of
days following the badly bungled autopsy, or 29 years later?
     The most glaring inconsistency is one that Mr. Breo and Dr.
Lundberg appear to have missed in their rush to retroactively
whitewash the Warren Commission Report and rehabilitate the
original prosectors.  In the autopsy report submitted to the Warren
Commission, Humes, et al., placed a small bullet hole of entrance
at the level of the right occipital protuberance, approximately one
inch to the right of the midline.  It also described beveling and
cratering at that site.  This hole was subsequently moved up four
inches by the so-called Clark Panel in 1968, and reaffirmed by my
colleagues on the Forensic Pathology Panel of the House Select
Committee on Assassinations in 1978.  At that time, Humes, Boswell,
and Finck were interviewed by the Panel members, and after a
lengthy interrogation, they recanted their previous testimony
before the Warren Commission and agreed that the entrance hole was
located at the top of the head in the cowlick area.  Now, after 14
years have elapsed, Humes, Boswell, and Finck move the entrance
hole down four inches to the occipital protuberance.  Inasmuch as
beveling and cratering have been described in conjunction with this
bullet entrance hole by Humes, Boswell, and Finck in one location,
and the same detailed description is given by the eight forensic
pathologists (please do exclude me) at a site four inches higher,
then the question that obviously arises is which conclusion is
correct?  You cannot have two separate entrance holes on the head
and still have a single assassin.  That should be perfectly obvious
even to the most ardent WCR apologists and sycophants!!!
     From a legal standpoint, I should like to point out that
diametrically opposed, inconsistent, medical testimony in a
homicide case from two experts on the same side will almost
certainly result in the case being dismissed by the court.  Indeed,
the same thing would usually be true in a medical malpractice
action and other civil litigation involving medical testimony.
     How did JAMA deal with this glaring inconsistency?  Dr.
Lundberg and Dr. Breo either deliberately chose to ignore these
divergent opinions, or they simply do not understand the
rudimentary aspects of the JFK assassination.
     In light of JAMA's extensive presentations of the interviews
with Humes, Boswell, and Finck, and accompanying articles and
editorials declaring the validity of the Warren Commission Report,
I should like to suggest that intellectual objectivity,
journalistic fair play, and common decency demand that equal space
be given in a future edition of JAMA to other physicians and
forensic scientists to set forth their findings and opinions that
totally reject and unequivocally refute the conclusions of the
Warren Commission Report and the present day reaffirmations by
Humes, Boswell, and Finck of the scientifically untenable opinions
they expressed in 1963-64.
     The passage of 29 years does not change immutable facts.  One
thing that I did agree with as a member of the Forensic Pathology
Panel, and which was stated very clearly by all of us in our report
to the House of Representatives, was that the autopsy on JFK was
incomprehensibly inept, incomplete, and thoroughly bungled.  That
is an evaluation which no well-trained, experienced, competent
forensic pathologist in the entire world would disagree with.  It
is most sad and unfortunate that JAMA has permitted its pages to
be used in such a journalistically unbalanced and intellectually
dishonest fashion for reasons that are known only to the editor.


Note from poster, Alan Rogers:
     I usually refrain from entering into any debates over the
     medical/autopsy aspects of this case.  I do this very
     deliberately.  I feel that when one has a no access to the
     original data, namely the body and original pictures and x-
     rays, and glaringly different versions have been given an
     official blessing through the years, there can be no solid
     conclusions that can be drawn.  It can only be a cornucopia
     of empty arguments between partisans and groupies of either
     side of the debate.
          I would not have posted this letter if I had not entered
     it into my computer for other reasons.  But I now feel I have
     to take up one of Wecht's point.  Aside from the determination
     of whether the original autopsy doctors were correct, are
     correct now, or have always been correct or never been
     correct,  the JAMA/Lundberg thrust seems particularly sleazy
     because instead of presenting an open forum, Lundberg seems
     to be sheltering his star doctors from not only the myriad
     non-medical critics but critics within their own peerage, both
     past and present.  This is not science in any form,  it can
     only be seen as political demagoguery.  I certainly would be
     impressed by a Humes rebutting the past forensic critiques of
     his autopsy ably and with factual tenets in his bow but within
     this closed door policy of Lundberg's this will never take
     place.  And all that has been accomplished is to give each
     side of the debate, pro-WC and anti-WC,  another quagmire to
     argue over.  It does nothing to advance the case.  It can only
     be seen as merely more political garbage thrown at an ignorant
     public to propagandize them.   In science, there can be no
     consensual agreements if one side takes the megaphone and
     locks out and ignores any contrary criticism from equals in
     their field.