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MEDIA ADVISORY
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DATE: AUGUST 21, 1996
CONTACTS: TOM SAMOLUK, EILEEN SULLIVAN
(202) 724-0088
The Assassination Records Review Board, an independent federal agency appointed by President Clinton to oversee the review and release of records related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, will hold a public hearing in Los Angeles on Tuesday, September 17, 1996.
The hearing will be held in the Los Angeles Board of Education Hearing Room which is Room H-160, located on the first floor of 450 North Grand Avenue. The Board will hear a wide range of expert testimony on the identification and location of assassination records and receive an update from a National Archives representative on the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection. A witness list will be made available approximately one week in advance of the hearing.
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Event: Assassination Records Review Board Public Hearing
Date: Tuesday, September 17, 1996
Time: 10:00 a.m.
Location: Los Angeles Board of Education Hearing Room
Room H-160 (1st Floor)
450 North Grand Avenue
Los Angeles, California
**********The Assassination Records Review Board was established by The President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act, which was signed into law by President George Bush. The five members of the Board were appointed by President Clinton, confirmed by the U.S. Senate, and sworn in on April 11, 1994. The law gives the Review Board the mandate and the authority to identify, secure, and make available all records related to the assassination of President Kennedy. It is the responsibility of the Board to determine which records are to be made public immediately and which ones will have postponed release dates.
The Coalition on Political Assassinations (COPA) has scheduled its third annual National Conference for October 18-20, 1996 at the Omni-Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C. This is the same location the conference was held in 1995. For more information call COPA's Conference Hotline: (202) 310-1858.
COPA has also scheduled meetings in Dallas for November 22-24, "The Killing of a President," at the Paramount Hotel. The Paramount is at 302 S. Houston Street near Dealey Plaza. For reservations, call (214) 761-9090 by November 1. Special Coalition discount of $59 for single or double rooms. Registration: $10 for day events, $15 for evening events, $35 for COPA membership and all events if sent by November 1. Scheduled speakers (evening events) include Dr. Gary Aguilar, Walt Brown, Ph.D., Jim Marrs, Robert Groden, Jack White, John Armstrong, and John Judge.
JFK-Lancer will hold its first annual Dallas Conference November 21-23. Presentations are scheduled from Jospeh Riley, Ph.D., Mary Ferrell, author David Lifton, George Michael Evica, and Fourth Decade editor Dr. Jerry Rose. For more information contact Evica via email at evica@uhavax.hartford.edu, or snailmail at 107 N. Beacon St., Hartford CT, 06105. You can also phone (860) 232-9673.
Joe Backes, a regular contributor to Fair Play, is making the tapes available for ten dollars a copy. He is also making available photocopies of ARRB documents for ten cents a page.
Email Joe at JoeBackes@aol.com for more information. (If your Web browser supports forms, click on the highlighted text for a pre-addressed email document.)
BALTIMORE -- Get ready to rekindle the never-ending conspiracy theories surrounding the death of President Kennedy.
This tiine, one of those theories will be played out in federal court in Baltimore, where a former U.S. Secret Service agent assigned to protect John F. Kennedy on the day of his death nearly 33 years ago is suing for libel.
A little-known book called "Mortal Error: The Shot That Killed JFK" claims the agent slipped and accidentally pulled the trigger of his high-powered AR-15 rifle, striking Kennedy in the head Nov. 22, 1963.
It's a theory -- first advanced by a ballistics expert from Towson -- that just won't go away.
"We're trying to stop this now while Hickey's still alive," said Mark S. Zaid, an attorney for former agent George W. Hickey, 73. "He doesn't want his grandchildren growing up and hearing other children say,'Hey, your grandfather killed the president of the United States.' "
Hickey is seeking untold damages from St. Martin's Press in New York. He also wants an apology, preferably printed on full-page ads in The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Baltimore Sun, his lawyer said.
It's not likely Hickey will see an apology anytime soon.
"The case is utterly without merit," said David N. Kaye, chief attorney for St. Martin's.
Hickey's suit, filed last week in U.S. District Court in Baltimore, says "Mortal Error" is simply false, and other Kennedy assassination experts agree. Published in 1992, the 350-page book recounts the day of the assassination and focuses on the actions of Hickey.
Written by Missouri-based journalist Bonar Menninger, the book claims that when Hickey heard the first volley in Dallas' Dealey Plaza that day, he pulled out an AR-15 assault-type rifle while standing in a trailing Cadillac outfitted for the Secret Service.
The first shot by Lee Harvey Oswald [according to Mortal Error] hit the pavement. The second -- the so-called "magic bullet" -- struck Kennedy in the neck. At that point, Hickey lost his balance in the Cadillac, "Mortal Error" claims, and he accidentally pulled the trigger, hitting the president in the head.
The lawsuit -- which does not name Menninger as a defendant -- says "Mortal Error" is "replete with false and misleading defamatory statements and innuendos.'' The suit says the book libels Hickey by accusing him of a crime -- negligent homicide for shooting Kennedy -- and by claiming that the agent has participated in a deliberate coverup for three decades.
The lawsuit quotes numerous passages from the book, calling them libelous and saying they were published with "reckless disregard" of the truth.
"So Hickey reaches down and grabs the AR-15 off the floor, flips off the safety and stands up on the seat, preparing to return fire," one passage reads. "But his footing is precarious. The follow-up car hits the brakes or speeds up. Hickey begins to swing the gun around to draw a bead on Oswald, but he loses his balance. He begins to fall. And the barrel happens to be pointing toward Kennedy's head. And the gun happens to go off."
Hickey, who lives in Abingdon, declined through his lawyer to discuss the case. Menninger did not return a call to his home in Kansas City, Mo. But Howard Donahue, the ballistics expert responsible for the theory, said Wednesday that he still stands by it.
As we reported in the last issue, the Cooper film is silent. In spite of (mostly broadcast) reports to the contrary, portions of this film have been seen before. The shot of LBJ leaving Parkland Hospital, for example, shows up in Nigel Turner's The Men Who Killed Kennedy. There's a familiar shot of journalist Seth Kantor interviewing Senator Ralph Yarborough. And some of the shots of grief-stricken bystanders look very familiar, although what we're seeing may be people seen in other footage, from a slightly different angle.
There's some junk: shots of maids, for example, changing the linen on beds in JFK's hotel room in Forth Worth.
Obviously, this film would be far more valuable if it had sound. But we aren't holding our breath waiting for a soundtrack to surface.
The question about the Cooper film as of this writing (late August) is, when will it be readily available in its entirety to anyone who wants it? As Fair Play understands it, Gaylord Communications is attempting to claim ownership of the film. This outfit was apparently the employer of Roy Cooper at the time he shot the film. (It is apparently irrelevant that the film was salvaged from a waste basket and that Gaylord Communications was presumably unaware of it for all these years.) What happens if Gaylord Communications succeeds in its claim is not known. But Fair Play believes that given the history of ownership of this film, it should be placed into the public domain.
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