From john.mcadams@marquette.edu Wed Dec 10 22:00:18 2003 Newsgroups: alt.assassination.jfk Subject: Aguilar's "Back of the Head" Witnesses - 2 (Revised) From: john.mcadams@marquette.edu (John McAdams) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 04:00:18 GMT Gary Aguilar claims to have examined the testimony of 46 witnesses to Kennedy's head wound, at both Parkland and Bethesda, and found that 44 of the 46 described the head wound as contradicting the photos and x-rays of the autopsy as they exist in the National Archives. So does Gary have 44 "back of the head" witnesses? And are his 46 witnesses selected so as to avoid witnesses who placed the wound at the top of the head, or the side of the head? Let's take one example: The following quotes from Aguilar are taken from: http://www.assassinationweb.com/ag6.htm Let me warn the reader that Aguilar includes a lot of extraneous material, but I'm including it all so as not to be accused of "selectivity." ---------------------- 4) CHARLES JAMES CARRICO, MD: On the day of the assassination he hand wrote, " (the skull) wound had avulsed the calvarium and shredded brain tissue present with profuse oozing.....attempts to control slow oozing from cerebral and cerebellar tissue via packs instituted...." (Emphasis added) (CE 392--WC V17:4-5) In is first mention of JFK's skull wound to the Warren Commission on 3/25/64 Carrico said, "There seemed to be a 4-5 cm. area of avulsion of the scalp and the skull was fragmented and bleeding cerebral and cerebellar tissue." (6H3), and "The (skull) wound that I saw was a large gaping wound, located in the right occipitoparietal area. I would estimate to be about 5 to 7 cm. in size, more or less circular, with avulsions of the calvarium and scalp tissue. As I stated before, I believe there was shredded macerated cerebral and cerebellar tissues both in the wounds and on the fragments of the skull attached to the dura." (6H6) On 3/30/64 Carrico appeared again before the Commission. Arlen Specter asked, "Will you describe as specifically as you can the head wound which you have already mentioned briefly?" Dr. Carrico: "Sure. This was a 5- by 71-cm (sic--the author feels certain that Dr. Carrico must have said "5 by 7-cm) defect in the posterior skull, the occipital region. (Emphasis added) There was an absence of the calvarium or skull in this area, with shredded tissue, brain tissue present...". Specter: "Was any other wound observed on the head in addition to this large opening where the skull was absent?" Carrico: "No other wound on the head."(WC--V3:361) ------------------------------- So far, Carrico looks like a good "back of the head" witness with the mention of the "occipital region" and cerebellum showing. --------------------------------- In an interview with Andy Purdy for the HSCA on 1-11-78, Dr. Carrico said, "The skull wound "...was a fairly large wound in the right side of the head, in the parietal, occipital area. (sic) One could see blood and brains, both cerebellum/and cerebrum fragments in that wound." (sic) (HSCA-V7:268) --------------------------------- As he did with Jenkins, Aguilar ignores the "right side" statement, and assumes that the term "occipital" means that Carrico is talking about the back of the head. But Aguilar leaves out something from the HSCA record. In the same interview that Aguilar cites, Carrico said the head wound: --------------------------------------- CARRICO: . . . was a much larger wound than the neck wound. It was five by seven centimeters, something like that, 2 1/2 by 3 inches, ragged, had blood and hair all around it, located in the part of the parietal occipital region. QUESTION: Could you just state in layman's terms the approximate place that would be? CARRICO: That would be above and posterior to the ear, almost from the crown of the head, and there was brain tissue showing through. ----------------------------------------- This from 7 HSCA 278. So it seems it was *above* the ear, extending "almost from the crown of the head." Yet buffs have long insisted that the back of Kennedy's head was blown out level with the ear. Then there is something *else* that Aguilar doesn't tell his readers. When THE BOSTON GLOBE was interviewing the autopsy doctors in 1981, Carrico sent them a letter in response to looking at a drawing of the Back of the Head Photo. According to the GLOBE, Carrico "said the official tracing of the autopsy photograph showed 'nothing incompatible' with what he remembered of the back of the head." THE BOSTON GLOBE, June 21, 1981. Aguilar quotes what other witnesses told the GLOBE, but doesn't tell his readers about what Carrico told them. But not all the material from the BOSTON GLOBE interview made it into the article. The JFK Library in Boston has additional materials. On March 5, 1981, C. James Carrico sent a letter to Ben Bradlee (Jr.) of THE BOSTON GLOBE responding to a query from Bradlee. Bradlee had apparently asked him about the standard conspiracist claim that the doctors saw the "back of the head" blown out, and that this contradicted the autopsy photos. Carrico told Bradlee that: ". . . there is nothing in the pictures and drawings that is incompatible with the injury as I remember it." Carrico then makes a statement that I have difficulty interpreting, but maybe it would make sense if I knew exactly what Bradlee had shown him: "According to the drawings from Dr. Lattimer there were two wounds. The photograph also shows a posterior wound." He then continues: "We never saw, and did not look for, any posterior wound. Our responsibility was to evaluate the wounds from the standpoint of what might be done to keep the patient alive. . . . The wounds as we looked at them were from the front and top with the patient laying on a gurney on his back." Carrico then goes on to say he has enclosed a drawing of the wound. The drawing is indeed attached, and it shows the wound *above* the ear, and mostly posterior to the ear. It shows no part of the wound involving occipital bone. It shows no part of the wound anywhere near the EOP. http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/images/carrico_skull.GIF In fact, the drawing is almost indentical to the location we can see Carrico point to in Robert Groden's THE KILLING OF THE PRESIDENT. Groden somehow interprets that as consistent with "back of the head." In another letter from Carrico to Bradley, dated April 8, 1981, Carrico continues: ". . . the drawing which you have asked my opinion about [apparently the McClelland drawing] is, in part, commensurate with what I saw. Specifically, it was a very large wound as indicated in the drawing. However, I do not believe that the large wound was this far posterior since, one thing I can be certain of, is that we were able to see the majority, if not all of this wound, with the patient laying on his back on a hospital gurney. The location of the wound represented in the drawing suggests that it would barely have been visible, if visible at all, with the patient laying in such a position." As he did with Jenkins, Aguilar begins to attack Carrico: ------------------------------ As with several other Parkland witnesses, Carrico's memory seemed to undergo a transformation when confronted by an interviewer who seems to have preferred he recall things differently than he did under oath. In an interview with author Gerald Posner on March 8, 1992, Posner alleges Carrico reported, "We saw a large hole on the right side of his head. I don't believe we saw any occipital bone. It was not there. It was parietal bone...". (Posner, G. "Case Closed". New York. Random House, p.311) The notorious unreliability of recollections so different and so far removed from the original event places Carrico's more recent opinions under a cloud. It seems possible that Carrico has been persuaded that the photographs of the back of JFK's head have been 'authenticated', a scientific impossibility, and therefore he should adjust accordingly his recollections to agree with this 'best evidence'. ------------------------------ Aguilar is speculating that Carrico has been bamboozled into saying the wound was somewhere other than where he remembers it. But, as in the case of Jenkins, he has no evidence of this other than the fact that the testimony has become inconvenient. Aguilar wants to insist that "earliest" testimony is best. That's sensible enough, *unless* first testimony is vague and later testimony is more precise in response to better questioning. Note two things that Aguilar doesn't tell his readers: 1.) Carrico, asked to describe the wound in "layman's terms" put it above the ear. 2.) When shown a drawing of the Back of the Head Photo, he stated that it was consistent with what he saw in the ER. Both pieces of testimony -- neither of which Aguilar tells his readers about -- imply that when Carrico said "the right occipitoparietal area" he wasn't describing the back of the head blown out. And when he drew the wound for the BOSTON GLOBE, it put it above the ear in parietal bone. .John The Kennedy Assassination Home Page http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/home.htm