Oswald Talked: The New Evidence in the JFK Assassination
This is something quite new in assassination literature: a book by a husband-and-wife team who are basically TV documentary makers-and in fact aired some of their discoveries in segments on network TV-but who write with vigor, persuasiveness and (almost unique in assassination literature) some humor. If only their discoveries had been up to their presentation, this would have been a significant contribution. As it is, despite the catchpenny title (a TV legacy), the book does not offer any very startling disclosures. There are three advances the authors made by painstaking research, however: they found a man who had been jailed in a cell next to Oswald-and whose incarceration in Dallas that day the FBI had hidden for more than 30 years. The man claims that Oswald knew a jailed gunrunner, as well as Jack Ruby. They discovered that Oswald carried a Defense Department card after his release from the Marines that gave him all sorts of privileges only an active agent would normally receive. And they determined that the famous "tramps" arrested on Dealey Plaza that day really were tramps, and their arrest had indeed been recorded. Beyond that, the LaFontaines have much interesting information about the bootleg gun trade in Dallas in 1963, and about the anti-Castro underground, which they are convinced was closely involved in the assassination. This is an entertaining book, by smart people with open minds, but it doesn't take us a whole lot further.Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.