From: mst4298@zeus.tamu.edu (Mitchell S Todd)
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy.jfk
Subject: Re: Head wounds
Keywords: Head wounds
Date: 11 Apr 92 19:14:00 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Incontinental Blather, Inc
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

david@cats.ucsc.edu (David Wright) writes...
>mst4298@rigel.tamu.edu (Mitchell S Todd) writes:

>Mitchell writes that the Parkland people say the photos are what they saw.

>I say this is irrelevent since:

>1. The parkland people saw different wounds. The only wound that makes sense in
>   this context is the head exit wound.

	The only "different" wound they saw was the quarter-inch hole
	to the left of the gaping wound. In the rush of the Parkland ER,
	with their concentration fixed on the throat wound and the avulsive 
	exit wound, the Parkland staff could have easily missed it.
	Especially considering that JFK's hair could have obscured
	the small hole. The search for wounds in JFK's back, for 
	instance, was cursory --that's why Parkland missed it.

	Once again, becuase the Parkland doctors didn't see it doesn't
	mean that it was there. Does the description of a left temple
	wound by only two doctors mean that it was 20% existing at the 
	time? Of course not.

	In the end, however, the statements made by the Parkland four
	strongly refute Lifton's theory.
	

>2. It only says that the Parkland people--except for Crenshaw--do not want
>   to admit of conspiracy. Comparisons of their statements at the time reveal
>   differences. See my reply to Joel or Bruce's reply to some article.

	Do you expect the Parkland doctors' statements to agree perfectly
	with Bethseda and the photos of the body? The Parkland statements
	(as you and others yourselves have pointed out) don't agree with
	each other! The large wound moves around and changes sizes. There's
	either a wound in the right temple, or the left temple, or no wound
	in the temple, etc. Only Jenkins seems to have known of the back
	wound. Are these contradictions the result of some arcane conspiracy?
	No. In all sorts of disasters, one is confronted with numerous
	conflicting --and even contradictory-- reports, even from people
	whom one would expect to know exactly what's going on.

	It's the same with the Dealy Plaza witnesses. Some remember only
	hearing two shots. Some claim to have heard four. Most say they
	heard three shots. One person heard eight shots. Some thought
	the shots came from the knoll, while about the same number thought
	the shots came from the TSBD. Some people thought the shots came
	from neither. A very few people heard shots coming from more
	than one location. Most people weren't able to place the source
	of the shots. Some people thought that the shots were grouped
	1,2 and then 3, while about as many thought that the grouping
	was just the opposite (ie, 1 and 2,3). Others remember the 
	shots to be evenly spaced. 

	Is there a conspiracy in this? No. It's like the five blind men
	who felt up the elephant and couldn't agree on just wat it was.
	

	
>3. The throat wound is indeed different--as Crenshaw says. Oddly, Dr. Baxter
>   said that the front neck wound and the back wound could be both entrance
>   wounds. It is unknown if the Parkland doctors saw the throat wound
>   recently. Yet they did explain to Lifton that the throat wound was precisley
>   1-2 inches, and not 6-7 inches. 

	Your ignorance of human physiology, or at least of human scale,
	is showing. A six- to seven-inch incision in JFK's neck would 
	stretch from ear to ear. And who claimed there was a six inch
	wound in JFK's neck to begin with? 


	Regarding Crenshaw:

	Apparently, Crenshaw was a bit-player in the drama at Parkland.
	From Oswald's operative record, Crenshaw's responsibility was
	to insert IV tubes. He was a junior member of the team. In
	fact, several of the other doctors at Parkland don't remember
	Crenshaw being in the ER when JFK lay dying.



>Mitchell asks about if explanations change from Parkland, Bethesda, FBI, WC and
>then the autopsy stuff. It is clear Mitchell has not read Lifton clearly. Let
>me refer Mitchell to 

	I read Lifton over a yar ago, and I did so clearly. While I may
	not remember every little detail, I know what Lifton said.
	You mistake my being unimpressed with Lifton's notions  and
	overemphases with my not reading him carefully.
	
		
>3) Point out that two Parkland doctors say the entrance wound was in the 
>*left* front of Kennedy's head! There are a large number of contradictory
>explanations that have a variety of explanations. I cannot go into all of
>these now, but they are easily available in Lifton, in diagramatic form.

	I nkow that one of the two doctors recanted, saying, in effect, that he
	mistook the left for the right. Some ten doctors wrote reports
	detailing JFK's wounds, yet only two (one counting the recantation)
	mention the left temple wound.

	Actually, this is something of a moot point. I'm arguing that there
	is no real discrepancy between what we see in the Z-film,
	the consensus at Parkland, Bethseda, and the photos and x-rays.
	None of the Parkland doctors remember finding the entry hole in
	the back of the head; this is, however, understandable given 
	the small wounds relative obscurity and the focus of the doctors
	at Parkland on the large wound and the throat wound.
	
	Again, I find that Lifton makes too much of what conflicts there
	are. In the conspiracy world, a single, imprecise word choice
	gets blown up into a new, ever more nefarious plot. For
	instance, several conspiracy writers (including Weisberg and	
	Garrison) make much of a reciept given to Bethseda by FBI
	agents Sibert and O'Neill, acknowledging the trasfer of
	"a missle". Conspiracy hack suddenly make this into a big
	issue, assuming that "a missle" must mean a fully intact bullet.
	Actually, the truth is found both in the autopsy report
	and in Sibert and O'Neill's report. Both mention that the
	FBI agents were given two bullet fragments taken from
  	JFK's brain, and that the reciept for those fragments was
	included as addenda to the autopsy report.
	

>The question of the authenticity of the x-rays are interesting. McClelland says
>that there are descrepencies in the x-rays. Mitchell says that McClelland needs
>to see computer enhanced photos. Did he in fact see those? We do not know. Nor
>do we know what he is referring to if in fact the compter enhancements make
>a difference. Since the enhancements are widely availble, I do not see why
>McClelland did not see them. 

	I've read McClelland's statements about the x-rays (in Summers'
	book _Conspiracy_, among others), and his statements indicate
	that he had not, in fact, seen the enhancements. His statements
	about the missing right eye socket are the key. In the enhancements,
	the right eye socket can be seen with little difficulty.

	Interestingly enough, the mysterious "missing" areas overlap
	the actual wound in the original facial x-ray. Other areas,
	like the upper part of the left eye socket and a good deal
	of the left temporal area disappear, too. In the latter two
	cases, it is clear that the "missing" areas fade out, as if 
	there was some error in either exposure of development, rather
	than stop abruptly, as would be expected for a serious, bullet-
	caused wound. in several parts of the 'missing' area on the
	right side of the head, the magins can also be seen to fade out.


>Finally, there is a question of the "fake" photo. The photo, as released,
>supports drawings such as Lattimer, page 216 which shows an entry at the back
>, and and exit towards the front, leaving intact the rear part of the head. 
>However, the photo is a fake or reconstruction in the sense that the scalp
>has been folded over to show where an entry wound might be located. Mitchell
>argues that the photo was not ill-intentioned, and merely wanted to show
>the location of the wound. Yet there is no reason to reconstruct the head to 
>show the hole in the scalp.  


	Yet another example of a conspiracy buff overstating a 'problem'.
	
	Someone pulled the flap of scalp over the wound. This becomes
	"reconstruction" in David Wright's words. At one time, according
	to David's pen, this made the picture a "forgery". Reconstruction
	is far too strong a word. Recalling the head x-rays, the known photos
	of the head wounds, the descriptions by Bethseda, Parkland,
	HSCA, et al, I believe that the flap of skin would have to 
	be pulled out to clearly show the wound and its location.
	The small hole looks to be quite close to the major wound.


>Also the location of the wound is not consistent
>with Hume's description of the entry  wound. He apparently not only had nothing
>to do with the photos, but the WR, who add access to autopsy photos, let
>pictures of Humes' lower entrance wound be published in the report. 

	I don't think that Humes saw the photos until 1978. When he saw
	the Dox drawing of the photo of the back of JFK's head, he claimed
	that the photo *did* show the wound he remembered. However, he
	continued to claim that he made the right measurement.
	


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