The "Domino Room Alibi"

[Anthony Clayden]

Walt,

The majority LN view is that he was not downstairs at that time and the naming of 2 people who just happened to walk through that area just prior to the shooting was either luck or him hearing them on the 5th whilst he was on the 6th.

[Walt Cakebread]

Walt,

The majority LN view is that he was not downstairs at that time and the naming of 2 people who just happened to walk through that area just prior to the shooting was either luck or him hearing them on the 5th whilst he was on the 6th.

the naming of 2 people who just happened to walk through that area just prior to the shooting was either luck or him hearing them on the 5th whilst he was on the 6th.

the naming of 2 people who just happened to walk through that area just prior to the shooting was luck....  Luck??  Could Lee have simply made a lucky guess that "Junior" (Jarman) and his companion a little short Negro ( Norman) had walked past the Domino room at 12:26??

The odds are astronomical....  And if he hadn't seen them do you believe he would have made such a WAG and told the interrogators that he had seen them as they traveled from the front of the TSBD to the west elevator??  Lee wasn't stupid .....He would have known that the cops would likely verify every word he uttered.


or him hearing them on the 5th whilst he was on the 6th.

Lee didn't know either Jarman or Norman....He recognized that they were employees when he saw them walk by but he didn't know them....So how the hell would he identify them by the sound of their voices through the floor of the sixth floor if he had been there??

[Colin Crow]

Walt,

The majority LN view is that he was not downstairs at that time and the naming of 2 people who just happened to walk through that area just prior to the shooting was either luck or him hearing them on the 5th whilst he was on the 6th.

So, if he heard them on the 5th, just minutes before the shots, how would that qualify for any type of alibi? He mentions two witnesses he knows were within a few feet of the SN at the time of the assassination. How did he know where they had been in the previous 30 minutes? They had not even associated until just before they went to the front steps. If he had been on the 6th floor just after noon, for all he knew they could have been anywhere. Obviously Williams said nothing on his arrival with them or his voice was not distinctive.

I suggest the LN position is best left as "no idea" or "pure luck".

[Peter Kleinschmidt]

Again this argument carries very little credence. Yes going down the stirwell would make some noise, but if a person was trying to avoid detection they are hardly likely to come down fe-fi-foing now are they...and there's also the fact that the commotion and noise coming from the throngs of people out on the street would've drowned out any noise coming from the stirwell...and please remember the action was outside so the people on floors 3/4/5 would've obviously be looking out of the building to try and see what actually happened. By the time Baker & Truly hit the stirwell,the person decending, given the timeline, could've easily been on the second floor. And you make it sound as if it is impossible for the person decending to avoid being seen.

Nothing in this thread or in any other thread gives any real reason why a fit and active person could not decend from the 6th to the 2nd, in the time frame, without being seen or heard.Nothing. Whether that person was Oswald or whether Oswald was the shooter, is another matter.I believe he was the shooter.Others may differ.

 

if a person was trying to avoid detection they are hardly likely to come down fe-fi-foing now are they.

You don't know if he was on the 6th floor

What about the yahoo on the 5th floor who said he heard casings hitting the ground.

Would a person who says he heard casings striking the ground but then say he did not hear a person racing down the stairwell have a case of selective hearing?

Or would an alleged shooter let 3 casings be heard hitting the ground but then race across the 6th floor and down the stairs selectively avoid detection?

[Thomas Graves]

So, if he heard them on the 5th, just minutes before the shots, how would that qualify for any type of alibi? He mentions two witnesses he knows were within a few feet of the SN at the time of the assassination. How did he know where they had been in the previous 30 minutes? They had not even associated until just before they went to the front steps. If he had been on the 6th floor just after noon, for all he knew they could have been anywhere. Obviously Williams said nothing on his arrival with them or his voice was not distinctive.

I suggest the LN position is best left as "no idea" or "pure luck".

Colin,

What did Killer Oswald have to lose by offering that as an alibi? 

If he heard Jarman and Norman one floor below him, he could reasonably assume that they had passed sufficiently near the D.R. to be visible to someone inside the D.R. while on their way there (to the fifth floor), or even earlier while possibly exiting the building from the front.

Do you think Killer Oswald could have come up with a better alibi than that?

-- MWT 

[Colin Crow]

Colin,

What did Killer Oswald have to lose by offering that as an alibi? 

If he heard Jarman and Norman one floor below him, he could reasonably assume that they had passed sufficiently near the D.R. to be visible to someone inside the D.R. while on their way there (to the fifth floor), or even earlier while possibly exiting the building from the front.

Do you think Killer Oswald could have come up with a better alibi than that?

-- MWT 

A "killer Oswald", protesting innocence, has nothing to gain by claiming to have been within earshot of two people he knows were directly underneath him at the time of the shooting. An 'innocent Oswald, claiming innocence, would offer any observation he felt that might substantiate his claim of occupying the domino room within minutes of the shooting.

Here is an analogy, probably not great but I'll give it a shot.

Jim is apprehended by police and accused of not stopping after a collision with a pedestrian. The accident occurred on a road Jim routinely takes and he knows Harry and John who work with him also take the same road every day. Just minutes before the accident, Jim saw them a few cars back in his rear view mirror. Harry and John stop at and provide assistance to the pedestrian shortly after the event. When apprehended he pleads innocence by claiming was driving just behind them when the accident happened as his alibi.

[Colin Crow]

Well.....come on LN's

Anyone have any evidence to back David's "better chronology"?

Rowland clearly places the timing of the gunman on the 6th floor at about1 2.15pm.

Mr. SPECTER - When, after you first observed him did you have a conversation about him with your wife?
Mr. ROWLAND - Right afterwards. There was--just before I observed him there was a police motorcycle parked just on the street, not in front of us, just a little past us, and the radio was on it giving the details of the motorcade, where it was positioned, and right after the time I noticed him and when my wife was pointing this other thing to me, I don't remember what that was, the dispatcher came on and gave the position of the motorcade as being on Cedar Springs. This would be in the area of Turtle Creek, down in that area.

A timeline of the Presidential Motorcade taken from Dallas Police Radio logs indicates the The Motorcade got to Turtle Creek at 12.14 and Cedar Springs at 12.16pm.

Now some Harold Norman....

AFFIDAVIT
State of Texas
County of Dallas
City of Dallas
I Harold Norman, wish to make the following statement to Special Agents William Carter and Arthur W. Blake, United States Secret Service.
I am 25 years of age, and I live at 4858 Beulah Street, Dallas, Texas. I do not have a telephone at my residence. I have been employed as an order filler at the Texas School Book Depository, 411 Elm Street, Dallas, Texas for about three years.
I was acquainted with Lee Oswald during the time that he was employed at this company, but I never did get to know him well. I have spoken to him briefly to say "Hello" or in connection with my work, but I never carried on any conversations with him. He did not mix with the employees and did not appear to want to make friends with me or any of the others. I never saw him at any time other than in the building at work.
On the 22nd of November, 1963, to the best of my memory, the last time I saw him was about 10:00 A.M. when we were both working on the first floor of the building. I did not speak to him at that time.
About 12:15 P.M. on this same date, after I had eaten my lunch, I went to the fifth floor of the building to watch the parade of the President pass the building. Bonnie Ray Williams and James Jarman, who also worked at this building went with me. We took a position in the south-east corner of the building on the fifth floor and I was looking out the window which is closest to the east end of the building overlooking Elm Street.
Just after the President passed by, I heard a shot and several seconds later I heard two more shots. I knew that the shots had come from directly above me, and I could hear the expended cartridges fall to the floor. I also could hear the bolt action of the rifle. I saw some dust fall from the ceiling of the fifth floor and I felt sure that whoever had fired the shots was directly above me. I saw all of the people down on the street rut towards the west side of the building, so I went to that side with Williams and Jarman, and looked out the west side window. We discussed the shots, and where they had come from and decided we better go down stairs. We walked down the stairs to the first floor and did not see anyone else on the stairway as we went down. From the time of the shots until we started down-stairs was about five minutes.
I have read over the above statement and it is the truth to the best of my knowledge.
/s/Harold Norman
Harold Norman
Subscribed and sworn to before me this 4th day of December, 1963.
s/William N. Carter
William N. Carter, Special Agent U.S. Secret Service

PS. David feel free to post any on these posts of mine on your website, (as you see fit). 

As an update the Dallas police logs show that the ambulance was called to Dealey Plaza by officer 289 between 12.18 and 12.19pm

"Give us an ambulance, 100 block North Houston Street. Epileptic seizure."

Also.....

this comment by Rowland "There was--just before I observed him there was a police motorcycle parked just on the street, not in front of us, just a little past us

Would this mean that as Rowland was on the east side of Houston the bike would be parked on the same side closer to the intersection of Houston and Elm?

Mr. TRULY.  I noticed just before the motorcade passed there were, I believe, three of our colored boys had come out and started up, and two of them came back. And I didn't see them when the motorcade passed. But they had started across Houston Street up Elm, and they came back later on, and I think those were the ones that were two of them were the ones on the fifth floor. Possibly they could not see over the crowd. They are short boys. I wasn't doing too well at that, myself.

Mr. NORMAN. Well, we stayed there I believe until we got the news that the motorcade was coming down, let's see, is that Commerce, no Main, because Commerce- we went beck in the building, James Jarman and I.

[Thomas Graves]

A "killer Oswald", protesting innocence, has nothing to gain by claiming to have been within earshot of two people he knows were directly underneath him at the time of the shooting.

It's unlikely the investigators would be able to put "2 plus 2 together" and realize that:

1) Oswald could hear Jarman and Norman below him

2) Oswald recognized their voices

3) Oswald concocted his D.R. alibi based on the above two factors, plus his remembering that anyone walking in the front door and going upstairs could be seen by someone sitting in the D.R. but wouldn't necessarily be seen by that person, himself.

Even if his alibi doesn't  "wash" with the investigators because, for example, Jarman and Norman entered the building from the rear rather than from the front, or they never even went outside during the lunch break, what has Killer Oswald got to lose by proffering it?

--  MWT