JFK's Head Was Hit with Frangible Ammo, not FMJ Ammo

[Michael T. Griffith]

By the way, Lucien Haag, cited by lone-gunman theorists as a ballistics expert, admitted in his 2014 article that when he shot fiber-glass-wrapped melons with FMJ bullets, not one of them fragmented. He acknowledged that the bullets "failed to expand or fragment during their penetration of the melons" and that "the melons (which were free to move) remained in place, and the entry and exit holes were small."

So did Haag admit that his tests proved that the lone-gunman theory's head-shot bullet did not behave like an FMJ bullet? No, but, oddly enough, he did admit that after his first set of tests (the ones where the FMJ bullets did not fragment), he did another set of tests in which he first cut off part of the bullets' noses to expose their lead cores! Think I'm exaggerating? Let me quote him:

"The noses of subsequent WCC Carcano bullets were slightly compromised to expose the soft lead cores for the subsequent shots. Just as with an impact to thick bone, these modified bullets immediately deformed and fragmented as they entered the melons, resulting in large exit defects and the expulsion of large quantities of the internal contents."

As I have said, the Haags are quacks, or frauds, when it comes to the JFK case. Below is a critique of  Haag's article on the lone-gunman theory's missed shot written by forensic scientist Frank DeRonia. DeRonia earned a Master's degree in metallurgy from Columbia University and worked in the FBI's crime lab for over 20 years. After he retired from the FBI, he continued to provide forensic metallurgy and engineering services through his company Forensic Metallurgy Associates. He has been accepted as a forensic expert on more than 150 occasions in more than 30 states (in both federal and state courts).

"Lucien Haag’s Flawed Analysis of the First Shot Fired in the JFK Assassination"
https://www.washingtondecoded.com/site/2016/11/haag.html

[Michael Carney]

So did Haag admit that his tests proved that the lone-gunman theory's head-shot bullet did not behave like an FMJ bullet? No, but, oddly enough, he did admit that after his first set of tests (the ones where the FMJ bullets did not fragment), he did another set of tests in which he first cut off part of the bullets' noses to expose their lead cores! Think I'm exaggerating? Let me quote him:

"The noses of subsequent WCC Carcano bullets were slightly compromised to expose the soft lead cores for the subsequent shots. Just as with an impact to thick bone, these modified bullets immediately deformed and fragmented as they entered the melons, resulting in large exit defects and the expulsion of large quantities of the internal contents."

Sounds like he was creating hollow point or frangible rounds to see what would happen, sounds like he learned that he was wrong about the head shot.

[Michael T. Griffith]

I thought it would be instructive to take a quick look at one of Dr. John Lattimer’s articles on the medical evidence. We will look at his article titled “Observations Based on a Review of the Autopsy Photographs, X-Rays, and Related Materials of the Late President John F. Kennedy,” published in Resident and Staff Physician in May 1972.

Let us start with what Dr. Lattimer said about the numerous bullet fragments seen in the autopsy skull x-rays. Be advised that he accepted the Clark Panel’s cowlick entry wound, which was a whopping 10 cm/4 inches higher than where the autopsy doctors said it was.

CLUSTER of FRAGMENTS -- An elongated (4 cm) cluster of about 19 tiny metallic fragments in the front of the head was scattered along a line from the anterior edge of the large head wound of exit, back in the direction of the wound of entrance. Four or five similar tiny metallic fragments were embedded in the bone near the anterior edge of the wound of exit and a half-round 1 cm notch in the corner of the largest loose fragment of skull also had a crescent of tiny metallic particles arranged around it. . . .

Several other tiny fragments were scattered between the wound of entry and the wound of exit. . . .

The x-rays of the head taken before the start of the autopsy, revealed at least 35 small metal fragments, mostly less than 1 mm in diameter, scattered throughout the right side of the top of the head.

Comment: Lattimer’s wording can be confusing, but if you look at his diagram (Figure 7), he puts the cluster of 19 fragments to the right of the right ear, and part of the cluster seems to extend into the frontal region.

So far, not a single ballistics test done with FMJ bullets and simulated or cadaverous human skulls has produced an FMJ missile that fragmented into 35 or more fragments, and forensic science knows of no head-shot case where an FMJ bullet behaved in this manner.

BULLET FRAGMENT IN FRONT OF BRAIN -- The second largest metallic fragment (7 mm x 3 mm but crescentic) had come to rest in the front margin of the brain just above the top of the frontal sinus on the right. . . .

The largest was a 6.5 mm rounded fragment stuck on the sharp margin of the bone at the wound of entry into the back of the skull.

Comment: Lattimer badly misread the AP x-ray as showing the 6.5 mm object to be in the back of the head, when in fact it is near the right eye. The Clark Panel, the Rockefeller Commission's medical panel, and the HSCA medical panel made the same mistake, a mistake that was not corrected until Dr. David Mantik, a radiation oncologist and physicist, examined the x-rays at the National Archives and took optical density measurements with an optical densitometer. The three ARRB medical experts, one of whom was a forensic radiologist, confirmed Dr. Mantik’s finding, as have Dr. Gary Aguilar, Dr. Michael Chesser, Dr. Joseph Riley, and a number of other experts. We now know that the 6.5 mm object is a ghosted image that a forger placed on the AP x-ray. It was ghosted over the image of one of the two smaller, genuine fragments in the rear outer table of the skull.

THE WOUND OF ENTRY IN THE HEAD -- The head "wound-of-entry" could be clearly seen In four of the color photographs to consist of an ovoid penetrating wound of the back of the head about 7 x 15 mm in size, and about 2 cm to the right of the midline, high up above the hairline and where the calvarium was starting to curve forward.

Comment: If the cowlick entry wound could “clearly be seen” in four of the autopsy photos, how in the world did the autopsy doctors miss it? The three ARRB medical experts saw no such wound when they examined the original autopsy photos, and they noted that no such wound appears in the skull x-rays, a finding that Dr. Mantik and several other experts have confirmed. When the HSCA showed the autopsy doctors the autopsy photos, the doctors rejected the claim the cowlick wound could be seen in the photos.

So what in the world is going on here? Either the autopsy doctors were legally blind and unbelievably incompetent or the extant autopsy photos that show the back of the head intact have been altered. The autopsy doctors had the body in front of them for over three hours. They handled the head repeatedly. It is absurd to argue that they somehow “mistook” a wound in the cowlick for a wound that was 4 inches lower at the EOP, especially when they had the EOP itself and the hairline as reference points. Such a colossal, mind-boggling “mistake” is just not plausible or believable.

This, of course, raises the issue of the fragment trail in the autopsy skull x-rays. The fragment trail that Lattimer, the Clark Panel, and the HSCA FPP identified is high in the skull. But the autopsy doctors mentioned no such fragment trail in the autopsy report, nor in their testimony. Instead, they described a much lower fragment trail, one that started at the EOP and went to a point just above the right eye. However, no such low fragment trail appears in the extant autopsy skull x-rays.

Again, what in the world is going on here? Were the autopsy doctors once again legally blind and mind-bogglingly incompetent? Didn’t they see the very noticeable high fragment trail on the skull x-rays? If so, why didn’t they mention it in the autopsy report or in their testimony? And why do the extant skull x-rays show no trace of the low fragment trail described in the autopsy report? These are enormous discrepancies that raise unsolvable problems for those who argue that the autopsy materials have not been altered.

It is just not credible to suggest that all three autopsy doctors, plus the radiologist, somehow “mistook” the fragment trail now seen on the skull x-rays for a trail that started at the EOP, especially on the lateral x-rays, where the difference between a top-of-head fragment trail and an EOP-to-right-eye fragment trail would have been obvious even to a first-year medical student.

The conspirators who were handling the medical cover-up were faced with two severe problems: (1) the bullet that struck just above the EOP could not have come from the Oswald window, and (2) the high fragment trail, with its cluster of fragments in the front part of the skull, suggested a frontal shot. It appears that they first opted to ignore the high fragment trail but that later they decided that the EOP entry site was a more severe problem.

Therefore, they ensured that the autopsy report said nothing about the high fragment trail; but, later, they changed their minds and attempted to change the location of the rear head entry wound and added the 6.5 mm object, in order to avoid the EOP site’s impossible trajectory and to attempt to explain the high fragment trail. Their alterations fooled the Clark Panel, the Rockefeller Commission’s medical panel, and the HSCA FPP (but not some of the FPP’s outside consultants, who raised questions about the cowlick entry site and who noted the presence of a second fragment on the back of the head).

Here is a link to Lattimer’s article:

https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1fa2/bee3d41bc4815f0874d9dd74598ad4fcb55e.pdf

[Michael Carney]

I think with so much conflicting information and Lattimers mistakes and confusing description I need to get out of the minutia and get above it all. What do we know? A frangible round hit JFK in the back of the head depositing small fragments inside the head. There were FMJ 2 fragments on the back of the head from the ricochet and several seen on the interior on an x-ray admittedly placed there by Jerrol Custer as ordered to do so by Dr Ebersole. A frangible round could have also come from the front. 

So again we have to ask what was the source of the frangible round from the back?

If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.

[Michael T. Griffith]

I think with so much conflicting information and Lattimers mistakes and confusing description I need to get out of the minutia and get above it all. What do we know? A frangible round hit JFK in the back of the head depositing small fragments inside the head. There were FMJ 2 fragments on the back of the head from the ricochet and several seen on the interior on an x-ray admittedly placed there by Jerrol Custer as ordered to do so by Dr Ebersole. A frangible round could have also come from the front. 

So again we have to ask what was the source of the frangible round from the back?

If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.

Oh, Lattimer's research is loaded with errors--and not just minor errors, but rather severe errors. For example, if you look at the rest of Lattimer's article, he includes an SBT diagram that shows the back wound noticeably above the throat wound, even farther above the throat wound than the WC placed it (Figure 2).

Lattimer also describes Oswald's alleged bullets as "high-speed bullets" and gives their speed as 2200 fps, but the alleged murder weapon was a low-/medium-velocity rifle, so it would not have fired any "high-speed bullets." Plus, 2200 fps is not considered to be "high speed" for rifle bullets anyway. 2200 fps is toward the lower end of the scale for rifle muzzle velocities (the M-1 had a muzzle velocity of 2800 fps; the AR-15 had a muzzle velocity of 3300 fps).

Yet, Lattimer is one of the WC apologists' top "experts."

And, yes, the key point is that the ammo that hit JFK in the head behaved nothing like FMJ ammo but behaved very much like frangible ammo.

[Michael Carney]

So if JFK had a 6mm hole in the back of his head and frangible fragments in his head from that shot then it's a safe assumption the bullet came from behind.
See anything that might give you an idea where it might have come from?

[Joe Elliott]

Oh, Lattimer's research is loaded with errors--and not just minor errors, but rather severe errors. For example, if you look at the rest of Lattimer's article, he includes an SBT diagram that shows the back wound noticeably above the throat wound, even farther above the throat wound than the WC placed it (Figure 2).

The back wound was higher than the throat wound, as is clear from the autopsy photographs.

Besides, a lower back wound makes no sense. The clothes definitely show the bullet came from the back.

Also, if from the front, who would be shooting through the windshield? A minor deflection would cause a miss.

Lattimer also describes Oswald's alleged bullets as "high-speed bullets" and gives their speed as 2200 fps, but the alleged murder weapon was a low-/medium-velocity rifle, so it would not have fired any "high-speed bullets." Plus, 2200 fps is not considered to be "high speed" for rifle bullets anyway. 2200 fps is toward the lower end of the scale for rifle muzzle velocities (the M-1 had a muzzle velocity of 2800 fps; the AR-15 had a muzzle velocity of 3300 fps).

There is no definitive definition as to what the threshold is for a high-speed bullet. A reasonable threshold is the speed of sound. Most handguns are subsonic. I believe all rifles are supersonic, above 1150 feet per second. So the 2160 feet per second WCC/MC can be called a “high speed” bullet.

Yet, Lattimer is one of the WC apologists' top "experts."

I haven’t said so for some time. Since he has died. But yes, he was one of the top experts on medical questions. And for a non-ballistic expert, pretty knowledgeable about the ballistics of the case.

And, yes, the key point is that the ammo that hit JFK in the head behaved nothing like FMJ ammo but behaved very much like frangible ammo.

Where is the ballistic expert who says the bullets behaved nothing like WCC/MC bullets? I don’t care about what other FMJ bullets do.

Do all FMJ bullets have the same muzzle velocity?

Do all FMJ have the same threshold velocity above which they will be damaged by human bone?

Do all FMJ bullets have the same shape, same copper alloy, same thickness of the jacket, same length, same rotation rate, etc.?

It doesn’t matter what other, non WCC/MC FMJ bullets do. Only what WCC/MC bullet do.


Where is the ballistic expert who says the bullets behaved nothing like WCC/MC bullets?

The question you always dodge.

[Joe Elliott]

Joe,

“Hence, some differences between the bullet that went through Skull # 8170 and President Kennedy. The bullet that went through President Kennedy’s head broke up into 3 fragments. The Skull # 8170 bullet remained in one extremely mangled fragment that did not quite separate into multiple fragments, but came close to doing so, as one can see from Figure 20 on Page 122 from Larry Sturdivan’s book “The JFK Myths”. Also, while a string of tiny fragments was left in President Kennedy’s head, there was no string of tiny fragments left within Skull # 8170, suspended in air. Nor should we expect to see such.”

I am not a ballistic expert, but I would say the difference is between a WCC/MC with the lead core exposed, moving through brain tissue, and a similar bullet moving through thin air.

As Larry Sturdivan explained in his book, “The JFK Myths”, but bullet broke into at least 3 fragments while moving through the brain, with smaller fragments being stripped off along the way. I am paraphrasing here with my own words to give the jest of what I recalled he was saying.

And were two of these fragments deposited on the outside back of his head?

And I don’t know anything about any fragments being deposited on the outside of the back of the head.

And where was the third frag found?

The third fragment was never found. It probably just cleared the windshield, nicked Mr. Tague and continued flying through the air and was never found.

A string of tiny fragments found in JFK’s head and not in skull #8170. This is because #8170 was shot with a FMJ  round and JFK was shot with a frangible round.

Moving through thin air, a WCC/MC is not going to leave a string of tiny fragments within Skull # 1870. But would do so within a skull filled with a brain.


Find me a professional ballistic expert who disagrees with any of this. The CTers have not found one, anywhere in the world, for over 56 years.