Originator: DOS
Document date: 00/00/0000
Document type: PAPER, TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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(124-10073-10424)

2023 RELEASE UNDER THE PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY ASSASSINATION RECORDS ACT OF 1992

JFK ASSASSINATION SYSTEM

IDENTIFICATION FORM

AGENCY INFORMATION

AGENCY: FBI

RECORD NUMBER: 124-10073-10424

RECORD SERIES:

MX

AGENCY FILE NUMBER: 105-3702-1363A

DOCUMENT INFORMATION

ORIGINATOR: DOS

FROM:

TO:

TITLE:

DATE: 00/00/0000

PAGES: 34

SUBJECT:

SEE FBI 105-82555-5612

DOCUMENT TYPE:

ORIGINAL

CLASSIFICATION:

REVIEW DATE:

STATUS

PAPER, TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

Secret

09/24/1997

Redact

NEW

CLASSIFICATION:

UPDATE DATE:

06/08/2001

RESTRICTIONS:

JFK Act & (1)(B)

COMMENTS:

HH 50959

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CIA HAS MR ORUSCHON TO

July 25, 1969

URMATION

MEMORANDUM

. 3110/90)

SUBJECT: Investigacion of Lee Harvey Oswald In Meleo.

1. While serving as Political Officer In the U.S. Embassy a Mexico

City from 1964 to 1967, I became quite friendly with the Mexican play.

right, Elena Garro de Paz. An Intellegent, witty, and outspoken wonan,

I found her a very useful if sometimes biased source of political gossip.

and personal history on significant Mexican personalities.

She Introduced

my wife and me to many important people in Mexico.

She was also,parti-

cularly knowledgeable about agrarian affairs. A biographic report that

I prepared on her on May 3, 1966 is attached (Tab A).

2.

On one occasion, Miss Garro inadvertently mentioned to me that she

had been at a party

with Lee Harvey Oswald and two

American companions

in Mexico just before the Kennedy assassination.

party had been at the home of her cousin, Ruben Duran.

• The memorandum

of that conversation, dated December 10, 1965, is attached (Tab B). I

the Warren Report, but I assumed

that if Oswald had been

to such a party in Mexico, it would have been well known to the Embassy.

I also knew Miss GarIo to be something of a professional anti-communist

who tended to see a communist plot behind any untoward political event.

However, the episode about her being escorted into hiding at an obscure

hotel intrigued me.

Accordingly, I decided to report the matter in

writing.

I gave the memorandum of conversation limited distribution

within

the Embassy, and did not send any copies to Washington..

A few days later I was called to the office of MI. Winston Scott,

was Need han Ferday a 2a Beach Sette 1) A present

with interest my December 10 memorandum of conversation.

They pointed

out that there had been a great many rumors about Oswald at the time of

the assassination and that some could not be verified and others had

proved false.

They asked me, however, to try and get a more detailed

replay of Miss Garro's story.

Mr. Scott made clear that the FBI had 'full

responsibility for any further investigations of the Oswald case:

4. In a memorandum of conversation dated December 25, 1965 (Tab C), I

a nuch more detailed and accurate restatement of Mies, Garro's

alleged encounter with Oswald and subsequent developments.

in my original presentation were corrected.

Miss Garre guessed that the

date of the party at her cousin's house was in early September, 1963 She

admitted that she had gone to the Embassy to report briefly about this matter

on an earlier occasion.

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Durans after the assassination about a party which Oswald had reportedly

attended, but that the transcript of the interrogation was entirely

unsatisfactory by normal, investigatory standards, Furthermore, the party

inquited about was not the one at Ruben Duran's house, reported by

Elena Garro, but at an entirely different place. This transcript may

well be the source of Mr. Ferris*

belief that Elena Garro's story had been

checked out and found to be untrue,

10.

It would appear that whereas the

FBI. has discounted the Elena Garro

allegations, the CIA is still considerably disturbed by them.

The CIA

may not have pressed for further investigation, however, for

a number of

reasons: 1) considering the sensitive overlap

and subtle competition

between two intelligence collecting agencies, it had to yield to the

FBI's clear jurisdiction; 2) there are obvious complications in conducting

such an investigation in a foreign. country; 3) there is a close and

..delicate relationship between the ClA Station Chief and che former Minister

west to fat seat.

appearing in the Elena Garro scenario may well be agents of the CIA. Under

a long carto scenario nay well be agents of

the circumstances it is unlikely that any further investigation of this

matter will ever take place unless it is ordered by a high official in

Washington.

If all the allegations in the attached memoranda were true, they

would not, in themselves, prove that there was a conspiracy to assassinate

President Kennedy.

However, if they were ever made public, those who

have tried to discredit the Warren Report could have a field day in

speculating about their implications..

The credibility of the Warren

would be damaged all the more if it were learned that these allegations

were known and never adequately investigated by the competent American

authorities.

12. Reference is made again to the biographic report (Tab A) on Elena

GatIo.

She is hardly an ordinary

or average person. Her strengths and

weaknesses become exaggerated precisely because she is not.

be easy and convenient to sweep this matter under the rug by claiming

-that-Miss Garro is an unreliable informant since she is emotional,

opinionated, and "artistic." I have been affected at times by that

temptation, myself. No American official, however, knows her better than

I do.

On the basis of the facts that I have presented, I believe that,

on balance, the matter warrants further investigation.

13.

Finally, the record should show that a representative of a major

American publication has at least some knowledge of this story.

U)

Charles William Thomas

-July 25, 1969

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