Historical Overview

Indented material is from the abstract of a presenter. Quotations within, unless indicated otherwise, are the presenter's comments made at the COPA conference.

The JFK Assassination Controversy and the Future of American Democracy

by Daniel S. Alcorn, COPA Executive Committee

Over the past thirty-two years, fundamental questions about the events in Dallas on November 22, 1963 have never been satisfactorily addressed by our government. By 1995, we find numerous references to the assassination in news and commentary articles about other subjects in major newspapers, particularly in relation to the Oklahoma City bombing investigation. A mind-set of suspicion of the federal government appears to be widespread, perhaps a majority opinion in the country, affecting our politics and public life in many ways, and may be spawning domestic terrorism.

Conspiracy theories are commonly believed in the nation---Waco, Ruby Ridge, Vincent Foster's death, and a New World Order plan to enslave Americans are among the subjects. A frequent thesis of these theories is that the U.S. government and mainstream media lied and covered up the facts of the assassination of JFK, thereby making it more likely that the other conspiracies exist. Further, the critical investigative techniques applied to the JFK case by the research community are now being applied and misapplied to other events.

My thesis is that the unresolved JFK murder case now threatens the future of our American democracy. Along with other events it has loosened the loyalties of Americans for their government, and has unleashed widespread suspicion and paranoia of our basic institutions.

A consequence has been increased momentum of movements which are racist and anti-semitic. The current climate of extreme suspicion among the public is being used by these factions to bring their allies to power. Unfortunately the mainstream media has undermined its own credibility to the point that negative forces have gained a larger audience by presenting facts not reported by the mainstream press.

My conclusion is that the leaders of the American democracy---political, media, and governmental---must provide leadership to honestly explain the meaning of the events of Dallas in 1963, and to act on the lessons of the event. It is not acceptable to allow the truth to trickle into the public consciousness with no resolution of the emotions aroused. The events themselves require public leadership and governmental action. NOr is it acceptable to reform public institutions for other reasons in the hope that this will resolve the suspicions released by the JFK murder case. Only direct and truthful explanation and leadership will preserve American democracy.

In fact, an honest correction of the problems revealed in the JFK murder would enhance and strengthen America as a nation by restoring some confidence in our institutions. Given the historical moment in which we find ourselves, the United States can go down one of two paths---one would be the decline and decay which has overtaken previous large governments. The other path would support a democracy by confronting the lessons learned.

That data, or most of it, remains unexamined, but Hewett and her partners Steve Jones and Barbara Lamonica have been able, in recent years, to examine thousands of pages of documents relating to Ruth and Michael Paine. Their findings are outlined in this article.

"I find the Paines the most interesting, yet least studied, of the people surrounding the assassination," researcher Barbara Lamonica said at the start of her presentation. "After all, they were the people who were closest to Lee Harvey Oswald---just prior, and leading up to, November 22. And wittingly or unwittingly, they contributed to the subsequent condemnation of Oswald, and therefore to the success of the conspiracy and coverup.

"Furthermore, there are two timeframes, being the spring and fall of 1963, when the lives of the Paines and Oswalds are especially intertwined, that coincide with some very significant events.

"Ruth Paine first makes contact after she first met [Marina] on February 22 at a party arranged by Everett Glover, who was a friend of Michael Paine's and George DeMohrenschildt's," Lamonica continued. "But she doesn't try to make contact with Marina until March 8, when she sends her a note. On March 20, she visits Marina. In between these two dates, on March 13, Oswald purchases, or orders, the rifle. On April 2 Ruth invites the Oswalds to dinner. On April 7, Ruth writes a note, asking Marina to come and live with her. She never sends this note, but she keeps it. On April 11 she visits Marina again. On April 20 there's a picnic with the Oswalds and Ruth Paine. And by the end of the month, Marina is staying with Ruth temporarily, while Lee goes to New Orleans to seek employment and try to find an apartment.

"In the middle of this cluster of activity the Walker incident occurs on April 10. During the summer the Paines and Oswalds part company. They are reunited in the fall. Marina is again living with Ruth Paine. Now, Ruth and Michael have been separated. Michael has agreed to continue to support Ruth, naturally, and his children. But interestingly enough he has also agreed to contribute to the upkeep of Marina financially.

"The Paines are significant in several ways. First they insured the continued separation of Lee and Marina, allowing Lee to live unencumbered, and with no witnesses to his activities or associates during the principal time leading up to the assassination. Secondly, they provided a storage space for evidence that would be used against Oswald. Almost everything that would convict him in the public mind, including the alleged murder weapon, came out of the Paine's garage. Also found in the garage, among other things, was the Walker photograph, the backyard photograph, the Klein's Sporting Goods tear-out order for the rifle, among other things...there was also some radical magazines.

"One wonders why someone intending to commit a crime would allow such items to be stored in another's garage, instead of destroying the incriminating evidence. Michael Paine's testimony is used to confirm that Lee had a rifle, and indeed it had been stored in their garage---in retrospect, of course, because Michael Paine said he never realized it was a rifle." Michael Paine stated, Lamonica said, that when he was working in his garage---he kept a number of tools there even though he and Ruth were separated---he thought the wrapped-up rifle, which he had occasion to pick up, was camping equipment.

"It's hard to believe that a man like Michael Paine, who had been in combat artillery in Korea, and then in the Army Reserves for six years, could not recognize the feel of a rifle," Lamonica told the audience. "Especially since it belonged to someone who he considered a person who advocated violence.

"I think maybe Michael Paine is lying here. He either knew it was a rifle, and is choosing to hide that fact, or maybe it wasn't a rifle at all...in either case he distances himself from the situation by saying he just didn't realize [what was going on.] And this is characteristic of the Paines all along---they try to distance themselves from Oswald.

"Ruth's testimony pinpoints the time for placing the weapon in Lee's hands," Lamonica said. "She testified that on the Thursday night before the assassination Lee showed up unexpectedly at her house to visit her family. Now Lee Oswald's habit, if you will, was to visit his family on weekends, so he would usually be there on Friday nights...So during the course of the evening, [Ruth] comes in around o'clock, after dinner, she goes into the garage and finds that the light had been left on. Well she tells the Warren Commission that she would never, ever leave the light on. So therefore Lee Oswald must have been in the garage to retrieve some of his belongings. This allows the Warren Commission to infer that this was the moment that Oswald got his gun, in preparation for the assassination. But the only thing that this testimony really tells us for sure is that Ruth was in the garage."

Do the Paines unwittingly hold a piece of the assassination puzzle? Documents reveal that they, like Lee Harvey Oswald, had associations with people from the left wing, the right wing, and the intelligence community.

Michael Paine, described in numerous documents as a sullen loner, was a wealthy man by 1963 standards. He existed in part on the largess of his rich relatives, the Forbes of Massachusetts, and the influence of his stepfather, Arthur Young, inventor of the Bell Helicopter. His real father was a notorious Trotskyite who was on the FBI Security Index. Although from disparate worlds, Michael Paine and Lee Harvey Oswald share many psychological and biographical similarities, raising the question, "Was the relationship between them more extensive than Michael Paine is willing to admit?"...

On the surface, Ruth's background seemed "liberal," even "left." Active with the Quakers since college, Ruth was the chair of the East-West Contact Committee, a cultural organization dedicated to bringing about world peace through greater contact with the Russian people. Out of this experience grew Ruth's long lasting efforts to learn the Russian language, and her friendship with Marina Oswald. In reality, however, three members of her family were involved with intelligence agencies, and several documents show Ruth to be virulently anti-communist. Ruth Paine's motivations for taking in Marina Oswald to her home are consistently described by her friends as rooted in her religious faith and generous nature. But members of the Dallas white Russian community may have had their own motivations for bringing Marina and Ruth together. And why might the conspirators want to see them separated after the assassination? Her poltical activities in years subsequent to the assassination---for example, her journeys to NIcaragua on behalf of "Pro-Nica," may provide clues to her role in the events of 1963.

"I believe the Paines are significant persons in the lives of the Oswalds, and warrant further research," Lamonica said, in concluding her portion of the Paine presentation. "Although they probably did not participate in a plot to kill the president, and they might have downplayed their relationship with Oswald merely in an attempt to distance themselves from a tragic event, they are, I believe, nevertheless withholding evidence about Oswald. Robert Oswald himself claimed, right after the assassination, that he felt Michael Paine knew more about that event than he was revealing. I think we should take Robert Oswald's claim seriously, and look into the Paines further."

"The Warren Commission portrayed Ruth Paine as a very devout, humble, good Samaritan woman, who by cruel circumstances of fate just happened to get caught up in one of our country's greatest tragedies," Steve Jones began. "Now this may be true---but it may not be true. From studying the FBI documents, Secret Service documents, and Ruth Paine's testimony before the grand jury of the Clay Shaw trial in New Orleans, we get the indication that Ruth Paine was not quite the woman that she pretended to be, or that the government told us she was."

For example, her family background, Jones said. "Ruth's father William Avery Hyde served in the OSS during World War Two...We came across an FBI document that stated the CIA had approached Hyde about running an educational cooperative alliance in Vietnam in 1957, but for some unknown reason they decided against that." Hyde was also a high-ranking executive for Nationwide Insurance Company, Jones said, and travelled abroad frequently.

From 1965 he was on leave from Nationwide to work for the Agency for International Development (AID), a mysterious agency about which not much is known. "There is much evidence that AID was a CIA front," Jones went on. Quoting former Ohio governor John Gilligan, who headed AID during the Carter administration, "At one time AID field offices were infiltrated from top to bottom with CIA people. The idea was to plant operatives into every type of activity we had overseas---government, volunteer, religious---every kind."

Ruth Paine also stated in her grand jury testimony that her father was "on loan from Nationwide to the government's International Cooperation Alliance, known as ICA, while travelling abroad. The years for this are unknown." George DeMohrenschildt, suspected by many researchers of being Lee Oswald's CIA "babysitter" in Dallas, claimed in his Warren Commission testimony that he travelled abroad while working for ICA. "We came across a document," Jones said, "that stated in 1957, DeMohrenschildt was working for ICA while he was living in Yugoslavia. There is also evidence that ICA was used as a CIA front, but there is precious little information about this organization.

"Could it be," Jones wondered, "that this businessman William Avery Hyde was recruited by the CIA, and that while doing insurance business abroad also worked as an asset for the intelligence organization? If Ruth's father had been a loyal, longtime asset, could this possibly have inspired Ruth to want to serve her country by collaborating with the CIA...like father, like daughter?

"These are not accusations, but they are reasonable questions that we must ask based on the evidence as presented in the government documents...

"The grand jury testimony [of the Clay Shaw trial] is fascinating to read, because Garrison asked very probing questions. You can really tell Ruth squirmed on the hot seat. It's much different than the Warren Commission testimony."

Jones also discussed Ruth Paine's trip around the United States in late summer, 1963.

On Saturday, July 27th, Ruth left the Dallas suburb of Irving in her 1955 Chevy station wagon to begin an itinerary that would take her through the Northeast. She took along her two small children, ages two and four. Before leaving, she wrote Marina Oswald in New Orleans about her expected itinerary and gave her addresses so that Marina could write to her. She also made arrangements for a New Orleans Quaker lady by the name of Ruth Kloepfer to check in on Marina. Ruth's trip began with a five day journey to Nashuon Island off the coast of Massachusetts next to Marth'a Vineyard, where upon arrival she would spend almost two weeks at the summer home of her wealthy in-laws. Along the way however, she stopped to visit friends in Indiana, Ohio, and NYC. While with her in-laws, Arthur and Ruth Forbes Young, at Nashuon Island, she apparently made a side trip to Vermont to visit a college she had once briefly attended. On August 11 she left for Paoli, Pennsylvania outside of Philadelphia to stay at the Young's primary residence. While in the Philadelphia area for almost two weeks, she would visit more friends.

In late August, she traveled south to suburban Washington, DC to visit her sister, Sylvia Hyde, and some oldfriends by the name of Houghtons. While there she attended the famous August 28th Civil Rights march in Washington DC. She never mentioned this march to anyone and her participation in it would not have been learned but for an FBI interview with the Houghtons. Ruth then returned to the Philadelphia area for the Labor Day holiday and from there went to Columbus, Ohio to visit her mother for one day, then on to Yello Springs, Ohio to visit her brother for a few days. Yellow Springs happened to be the location of Antioch College, where Ruth obtained her B.A. degree in 1955. Ruth then continued westward to Indiana again and visited more friends. During this leg of her trip, the 6th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama was bombed on September 15th. Apparently moved by this tragedy, Ruth travelled to Birmingham to donate money to the church. From there she travelled to New Orleans where she arrived on September 24th to meet up with the Oswalds. She also met up with Ruth Kloepfler while at the Oswalds'. Mrs. Kloepfler, incidentally, was active in the "ban the bomb" movement in New Orleans, yet has some interesting connections to Clay Shaw as recently uncovered by other researchers. Ruth departs the next day for Irving, Texas with Marina and the Oswalds' daughter June, while Oswald disappears, presumably to Mexico.

So what is so unusual about this summer trip? After all, Ruth made the same trip the previous year. For starters:

1. Michael Paine did not accompany Ruth on this trip. Although separated from Ruth they enjoyed many social functions togetrher and a joint summer vacation would have been typical of this couple. We did learn that MIchael obtained at least six weeks worth of vacation pay in July, yet his only known travel was a three day trip, beginning August 22 (?) that he took to California to visit his father. Otherwise, Michael's whereabouts are unknown for this time frame.

2. After the assassination, there were at least four "Oswald" incidents reported in the Northeast that coincided with Ruth's trip. One occurred in NYC where a person claiming to be Oswald called a NYC radio talk show host and offered to appear on the radio to speak about Cuba. Another report claimed that Oswald was seen in Phladelphia at a Quaker-sponsored "ban the bomb" rally. This rally occurred on August 15 (?) at the same time Ruth was in the Philadelphia area. Also in August, there was a report of Oswald being sighted in Montreal at another "ban the bomb" rally. Yet another report claimed that Oswald was at a summer Fair Play for Cuba Committee meeting at Antioch College. Oswald's presence in New Orleans during these two months is well documented. So who is causing sincere citizens to report incidents that just happen to coincide with Ruth's journey? Was there someone out there who looked like Oswald or who was holding himself out to be Oswald? Were these incidents related to Ruth's trip in any way? Was this second "Oswald" Michael Paine?

3. At every locale that Ruth visited, she announced to her friends and family that she was returning first to New Orleans to take Marina back to Texas with her because the Oswalds were having marital problems again and Ruth was concerned for Marina's welfare. Yet there is nothing in the correspondence between Ruth and Marina during this time period that indicated that Marina knew of such plans for that the Oswalds were having marital problems that required a separation. These plans seemed to have been pre-arranged whithout Marina's participation, but by whom?

4. When Ruth arrived in New Orleans, the Oswald household was already packed up yet Ruth testified that she did not suggest to Lee that Marina go with her until she actually could consult him face to face in New Orleans. Oswald was conveniently packed fore this turn of events and readily agreed to Ruth's suggestions that very day---or had he and Ruth known all along?

5. Ruth testified that when she asked Lee where he would be travelling, he didn't reveal his plans to go to Mexico; instead he replied that he was going to Houston or Philadelphia to look for work. Where did Oswald get the notion to even consider Philadelphia? In Oswald's notebook were found three Philadelphia addresses relative to Russian exile activities---did Ruth supply him with these addresses? Why? One clue is contained in the FBI statement of one of Ruth's Philadelphia friends that Ruth was looking for work in Philadelphia for Marina noting that there was a much larger Russian community in Philadelphia than in Dallas. Were Ruth and Lee making plans for the Oswalds to relocate to Philadelphia? Ruth and Michael Paine's summer of 1963 certainly deserves closer scrutiny.

According to Steve Jones, any routine background check on the politics of Ruth and Michael Paine---with numerous indications, in the vernacular of the time, of left wing tendencies---should have raised enough red flags for the FBI to consider them possible suspects in the assassination. But, Jones said, "The single event that convinced [Dallas FBI agent James] Hosty that the Paines really were not subversives, despite all these other various liberal-leaning activities that they were involved in, was that in October 1963 Michael Paine had attended a single John Birch Society meeting...If only all the people who were compelled to appear before the House Un-American Activities hearings during the 1950s had known that, they could have saved themselves a lot of grief by sitting in on one right-wing group meeting...

"Ruth is now 63 years old, and Michael is 67. They are still relatively young and in good health. Over the last thirty years we have seen a lot of witnesses pass on. While the Paines are still living we should not let the opportunity pass to ask them some very hard questions---questions that they should have been asked honestly in 1963 and 1964."

"This concerns Ruth's activities in the 1990s," Hewett said. "We see that Ruth was a political activist in the 1960s; she spent a great deal of time trying to learn Russian. I guess she failed at this, and decided it was time to learn Spanish instead, because in the 1990s we find her in Nicaragua, of all places.

"During the ensuing decades following the assassination the focus of U.S. intelligence activities shifted away from Cuba to Central America, culminating in the Reagan Administration's efforts to destabilize and overthrow Nicaragua's Sandinista government through a CIA proxy war. In the early Sixties the CIA molded anti-Castro Cuban refugees into paramilitary mercenary gangs dubbed the 'Liberation Brigade,' just as in the eighties they would bankroll former Samoza national guardsmen into the mercenary army dubbed the 'Freedom Fighters.' Several illuminai from the Bay of Pigs rogue's gallery materialized to train the Contras," including Felix Rodriquez and Theodore Shackley.

"In third world countries the CIA routinely utilizes religious organizations to undermine the social movements of indigenous peoples, and to advance the goals of U.S. policy. This was also a clarion call to the CIA to increase funding to the missionary and relief efforts of more conservative and fundamentalist groups who supported the Contras. It was also believed that the more progressive relief groups were heavily infiltrated."

Hewett then told the story of Sue Wheaton, an assassination researcher who also works with the Office of Aging in Washington D.C. In 1991, she and her husband, an Episcopalian priest, were part of the progressive relief effort in Nicaragua. In the course of this work, Wheaton chanced to meet Ruth Paine at a Quaker group. After confirming that she was the same Ruth Paine from the assassination saga---a fact that she admitted only reluctantly---Ruth told Sue Wheaton that the Quaker group was funded primarily by six wealthy conservative individuals from the Southeast...

"It was curious to Wheaton that conservative individuals would want to support humanitarian aid to Nicaragua, especially during the previous Contra war. Ruth's particular group also ran a sawmill [?] project on the eastern coast of Nicaragua, a Contra holdout and a nexus of CIA-based activity. Recall the Lake Pontchartrain gang outside of New Orleans, whose cover was operating a lumber mill as well.

"Ruth Paine showed up at one of Sue Wheaton's council meetings of the anti-Contra group, of which pro-NICA was a part. According to Sue Wheaton---and this is quoting Sue directly, from some correspondence she shared with us---

I myself did think that Ruth was taking down information about Americans in Nicaragua, who opposed U.S. policies there. She constantly wrote down the names of individuals and organizations. Her project---that is, Ruth's project---sent a letter to all of the U.S. peace organizations which visited Nicaragua, encouraging them to stay at the Quaker hospitality house. Someone told me that Ruth studied the bulletin board there, copying down everything that was on it. Also, Ruth made reference to people she knew in the U.S. embassy. Most of us---[that is, people that Sue associated with]---did not know any people in the embassy, as we associated it with policies we abhorred.

"Sue Wheaton goes on to recount how Ruth and an associate of Ruth's by the name of John [Reese?] attended several meetings of a Solidarity Committee...while there, Ruth took copious notes, and another friend of Ruth's, by the name of Sean Miller, made several tape recordings and took photographs. Ruth claimed that the photographs were being taken for the Nicaraguan Network in Washington, D.C. Later, when a friend of Sue Wheaton's checked with the Nicaraguan Network, the network claimed that they had not commissioned anyone to take pictures in Nicaragua. Thus the explanation given by Ruth Paine as to why her associate was taking pictures of members of the U.S. community in Nicaragua was false." "Ruth is now living in St. Petersberg, Florida," Hewett said. "She's been divorced from Michael for quite some time. She's active with a Quaker group there in St. Petersberg.

Ruth and Michael Paine's Mystery Vehicle
by Carol Hewett, Esq.

For years before his apparent suicide, Dallas County Sheriff's deputy Roger Craig claimed that he saw Oswald escape the Texas School Book Depository in a light-colored Rambler station wgaon. According to Craig, when Oswald was questioned about his vehicle, his response was that the station wagon belonged to Ruth Paine and that she had nothing to do with the assassination. This comment by Oswald was never corroborated; indeed, Dallas Police Captain Will Fritz would later testify before the Warren Commission that the exchange never took place. Rather than focus on the validity of Craig's claims, let's look at the vhicles that the Paines did own. It seems that the Paines had in fact acquired a third vehicle for the benefit of the Oswalds but it was not a Rambler station wagon.

Ruth and Michael Paine separated in September of 1962, the same month and year that the Oswalds first separated. Michael moved into an apartment house in Grand Prairie while Ruth stayed in the family home in Irving. During that time and continuing for at least several years after the assassination, each had a vehicle registered in his or her own name. Michael had a 1959 French made Citroen and Ruth had her 1955 light green Chevy station wagon.

In Sptember 1963 Marina Oswald would return to Irving with Ruth Paine while Lee took up residency in a Dallas rooming house following his trip to Mexico City. Apparently at Ruth and Marina's urging, Lee very soon began to take driving lessons from Ruth so as to increase his employment prospects. It is about this time that the Paines acquired a third vehicle: a 1955 blue and white Oldsmobile sedan.

On some undetermined date in October 1963, Michael Paine took Ruth and one or both of the Oswalds to look at this car which was being offered for sale by one of Michael's co-workers named George Stephenson. Although interviewed by the FBI, Stephenson was not questioned about this visit by the Oswald(s); he was questioned only about the date of the sale, price, and method of payment. Nor were Michael and Ruth questioned about why this vehicle was displayed to the Oswalds.

The Oswalds second daughter Rachel was born on Sunday, October 20th. A few days later, on Thursday, October 24, 1963, Michael Paine purchased Stephenson's car for $200.00. He did this with two separate $100.00 checks, both payable to Stephenson. The checks were drawn on Michael's separate account at Southwest Bank & Trust Co. On October 25 Michael Paine wrote a $200.00 check to himself from his separate account at the Irving Bank & Trust Co. and deposited the check int othe Southwest account---presumably to cover the two Stephenson checks he had written the previous day. Neither account was a savings account---the Paines had a separate savings account in their joint names. Stephenson told the FBI that he thought the method of payment was strange and asked Michael why he was doing that. Michael's reply was that he hoped to save the sales tax due on vehicles costing $200.00 or more. If this was Paine's true motive, then he was as miserly as Oswald was reported to be---despite the fact that he had trust funds worth almost $1 million dollars by today's values. Perhaps he had another motive.

One to two weeks after Marina gave birth to Rachel a friend of Michael's by the name of Raymond Krystinik helped Michael Paine deliver the car to Ruth's residence in Irving. This was accomplished by following Paine out to Irving as paine drove the Olsdmobile, then returning Paine to his Citroen which had been left at Bell Helicopter Laboratory in Arlington. This was the first opportunity that Mr. Krystinik had to meet the Russian woman living with Ruth. Krystinik was never asked questions as to the purpose of a third vehicle in the Paine marriage which he helped deliver. In early November, two weeks before the assassination, a man who introduced himself as O.H. Lee visited Ed Brand, an insurance agent who maintained offices across the street from Oswald's rooming house on North Beckley Avenue. Mr. Lee indicated that he expected to have his own car in the very near future and he was interested in obtaining insurance for this car. The timing of this visit to Brand's office follows on the heels of delivering the Oldsmobile to Ruth's house in Irving.

At about the same time, a couple greatly resembling the Oswalds in all respects visited the Furniture Mart in Irving looking over used furniture and seeking directions to a gun shop. The two witnesses describing this incident could not agree on the make or model of the car but one thing was clear: it was a mid-50s blue and white sedan. Unbeknownst to Roger Craig, the Dallas police made an effort to identify automobiles owned by the Paines. A report of December 1963 indicates that the blue and white Olsdmobile parked at Ruth's house was devoid of tags. In January 1965, the police observed a tag on the Olsdmobile but were unable to track down a registration. Later, in May 1965, Oldsmobile had a new tag and was duly registered to the Paines. In 1967, a fourth visit was made to the Paine residence in connection with their cars. This time the Olds was gone and in its place was a 1959 green and white Plymouth wagon.

Michael Paine, in response to a Warren Commission question as to the purpose of purchasing the vehicle, replied that he did so to demonstrate to the Oswalds that the purchase of a car was feasible for them and within their means. Ruth Paine's answer to the same question differed. She replied that it was a spare vehicle in case her husband's vehicle should break down. (Never mind that it was taken to her house and not his apartment.) During the Garrison investigation, Ruth Paine furnished a third explanation for the acquisition of the Oldsmobile. This time she told the grand jury that it was purchased for spare parts. It would appear then that the vehicle was purchased for the benefit of the Oswalds. So why would Ruth and Michael Paine not own up to this? Because to do so would suggest a much closer relationship between the Paines and the Oswalds---one that the Paines apparently did not want to admit to after the assassination.

A Theory of the JFK Assassination

by George Michael Evica, Ph.D. (Based on The Iron Sights: New Evidence and Analysis in the Assassination of JFK, a work in progress. The author subtitled this abstract "Part One;" there is no part two available at this time.)

Security stripping on a massive scale occurred on November 22nd, 1963: the president was rendered mortally vulnerable.

That security stripping (JFK's Secret Service men were told) was part of a covert test of the President's security including a planned simulated attack in Dealey Plaza. Within the structure of the simulated attack, certain individuals were informed that the attack would be traced to pro-Castro elements.

The simulation was then converted to an actual attack on JFK, a perfect cover for the assassination.

Though most of the President's security forces were ordered to cooperate in the simulated attack by not taking part in the protection of the President, some members of the Dallas Police, some members of the Secret Service, and some members of military intelligence were aware of the actual planned attack.

The intelligence and security forces of the U.S., Texas, and Dallas were all rendered accessories before the fact in this stunning plot. Everyone---except the FBI---was perceived to be complicit.

But some FBI agents in New Orleans and Dallas (with Organized Crime, CIA, and anti-Castro connections) were parties to the assassination. And the principle accessory before the fact in the Bureau was Director J. Edgar Hoover himself, with prior knowledge of the assassination.

Every U.S. investigative body associated with the JFK assassination was complicit in either the assumed simulatd attack, the actual murder, or in the post-assassination cover-up.

The assassination and the following cover-up were facilitated by the planned False Sponsorship of the Dealey Plaza murder. Representatives of anti-Castro Cuban groups, corrupt Teamsters locals, anti-Communist paramilitary groups, the U.S. Armed Forces, military and civilian intelligence, European reactionary forces opposed to JFK, right-wing domestic organizations (including anti-Soviet emigre and "captive nations" groups), Organized Crime, and corporate organizations opposed to Kennedy (whether they were active participants in the assassination conspiracy or not) were falsley implicated in the murder of JFK in a variety of ways, including infiltration by government agents, informers, and provocateurs.

Among others, Richard Case Nagell, Lee Harvey Oswald (and the Other Oswalds), Gordon Novel, and Jack Ruby (all witting or not) were operational links to the False Sponsors. Later, the Garrison investigation became a major opportunity to vent a dozen False Sponsorship "leads."

The CIA-sponsored anti-Castro plots were chosen as the perfect False Sponsorship program to conceal the actual JFK assassination plotters. The plots were coopted and then planned to fail, 1) so that a credible Castro motive could be postulated, including the Dealey Plaza simulation (to be attributed to pro-Castroites): a dead Castro before November 22, 1963, would have become a relief from political pain for the JFK administration and an unqualified joy for anti-Communist and anti-Castro forces, even perceived by those same forces as a Kennedy triumph. Castro had to remain alive on November 22, 1963, and the plots against him fail in order for both the "simulation" and the False Sponsorship plan to work; 2) so that the anti-Castro forces and all other False Sponsors would become increasingly frustrated and ultimately blame JFK for the plots' lack of success.

Representatives of False Sponsors (many of them in the South and Southwest) were invited to Dallas, even to Dealey Plaza itself, to view 1) the simulatd attack or 2) the actual murder. Several recognizable hit men were recruited from the Mafia, the reactionary Right, and U.S. Intelligence to make appearances in Dallas, regardless of their actual participation in the assassination.

Elements of the Dallas police, the FBI, Military Intelligence, and the Treasury's ATF were aware of both Oswald and at least one known Other Oswald; three U.S. intelligence officers (with close associatons to the Dallas Police Department's Special Services Bureau) met together in Dallas as late as the morning of the JFK assassiantion in the offices of the FBI, having knowledge of both Lee Harvey Oswald and the known Other Oswald. These intelligence agents may have (though unwittingly) been complicit in framing Oswald as part of the False Sponsorship program

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