LNers Can't Explain the 6.5 mm Object on the JFK AP Skull X-Ray

[Michael T. Griffith]

Lone-gunman theorists still refuse to come to grips with the hard scientific evidence that the 6.5 mm object was added to the JFK autopsy anterior-posterior (AP) skull x-ray, even though this fact has been confirmed by scores of optical density (OD) measurements, and even though the ARRB forensic radiologist admitted that there is no object on the lateral skull x-rays that corresponds in density and brightness to the 6.5 mm object on the AP skull x-ray.

The 6.5 mm object is the largest and most obvious non-bone object on the AP skull x-ray. A first-year medical student would have no problem quickly identifying it as the largest apparent bullet fragment on the AP x-ray. The object appears to be located on the rear outer table of the skull. The Clark Panel, the Rockefeller Commission’s medical panel, and the HSCA’s medical panel, not having the benefit of OD measurements, logically concluded that the object was a bullet fragment.

The problems with the 6.5 mm object start with the fact that, incredibly, the autopsy doctors did not mention the object in the autopsy report. They did not mention it during their Warren Commission testimony. They said nothing about it in their HSCA testimony. When the ARRB asked them about the object, they said they did not see it during the autopsy. They did not see it during the autopsy because it was added to the AP x-ray after the autopsy.

Since the nose and tail of the supposed single headshot bullet were found in
JFK’s limousine, any fragments on the rear outer table of the skull would have
had to come from the internal cross-section of the bullet. However, Oswald allegedly
used full-metal-jacketed (FMJ) bullets, and FMJ bullets have never been known
to deposit fragments from their cross-section at the entry site when they hit a
skull. Never. This fact led HSCA ballistics expert (and lone-gunman theorist)
Larry Sturdivan to acknowledge that the 6.5 mm object could not be a bullet
fragment (Sturdivan, The JFK Myths: A Scientific Investigation of the Kennedy
Assassination, Paragon House, Nook Edition, 2005, pp. 168-170).

Dr. David Mantik and Dr. Michael Chesser have done OD measurements on the 6.5 mm object. These measurements prove that the object is not metallic. The OD measurements and high-magnification analysis of the object reveal that it is a ghosted image that was added to the x-ray via double exposure. Dr. Mantik has even able to duplicate the method that was used to add the object.

The 6.5 mm object was ghosted over the image of a small genuine fragment on the back of the head. The small genuine fragment is on the right side of the object (viewer’s left). There is also a very tiny metallic fleck in the right side of the object (viewer’s left). The OD measurements confirm that the small fragment on the viewer’s left side of the object is metallic.

Most lone-gunman theorists cite Larry Sturdivan's far-fetched explanations for the 6.5 mm object. Sturdivan has offered three explanations: one is that a drop of acid somehow fell on the AP x-ray film and created the 6.5 mm object; one is that a stray metal disk somehow got stuck on the x-ray film cassette; and the third is that a stray metal disk fell the autopsy table and was not noticed when the AP x-ray was taken.

Leaving aside the question of where a drop of acid would have come from in the first place, since when do drops of acid include a well-defined notch that disrupts an otherwise perfectly round shape? The 6.5 mm object has a notch missing on its bottom right side (viewer’s right), but the rest of it is perfectly round. This is one of several problems with the acid-drop theory. The fatal problem with the theory is that if the 6.5 mm object were caused by an acid drop, the x-ray film's emulsion would be visibly altered at this site, but the emulsion is completely intact (Mantik, JFK Assassination Paradoxes, p. 150).

That leaves the stray-metal-disk theories. First of all, what kind of metal disk would have been present that could have somehow dropped onto the autopsy table or gotten stuck in an x-ray film cassette during a presidential autopsy? Anyway, if a metal disk had been inside the film cassette, it would have produced a dark area at the spot of the 6.5 mm object, not a transparent one.

If a metal disk had been lying next to JFK's head on the autopsy table when the AP x-ray was taken, it would appear on the lateral x-rays as well, but it does not. Of course, it goes without saying that if the radiologist and/or the x-ray technician had noticed a disk lying on the autopsy table after they took the AP x-ray, they would not have taken the lateral x-rays until they retook the AP x-ray.

For more information on the 6.5 mm object as hard scientific evidence that the JFK autopsy AP skull x-ray has been altered, see the following studies:

The John F. Kennedy Autopsy X-Rays: The Saga of the Largest “Metallic Fragment” (Dr. Mantik)
https://themantikview.org/pdf/The_JFK_Autopsy_X-rays.pdf

A Review of the JFK Cranial Autopsy X-Rays and Photographs (Dr. Chesser)
https://assassinationofjfk.net/a-review-of-the-jfk-cranial-x-rays-and-photographs/

Dr. Mantik’s response to Pat Speer’s critique of his research on the JFK autopsy materials (includes several pages dealing with the 6.5 mm object)
https://themantikview.org/pdf/Speer_Critique.pdf

The Suspicious 6.5 mm “Fragment” (yours truly)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QXCUhA5i4FmCic2nLDOnwMdCNSOa1Q10/view

JFK Autopsy “Bullet Fragment” X-Ray Was Faked (Jim Marrs)
This is a good summary in layman’s terms of the scientific evidence regarding the 6.5 mm object.
https://www.naturalnews.com/050959_jfk_assassination_x-ray_evidence_forensic_analysis.html

[Charles Collins]

Michel Jacques Gagne, “Thinking Critically About The Kennedy Assassination”, pages 371-372:


… Some major causes of artifacts are improper handling of the film and processing errors. Film radiography artifacts can take various shapes, including clear spots formed by air bubbles sticking to the film during processing, by fixer splashed on the film prior to developing, and dirt on the intensifying screen. One of the artifacts identified by the HSCA’s Dr. McDonald is the white circle that Mantik claims is a faked 6.5 millimeter Mannlicher-Carcano bullet. The other smaller irregularity - an elongated 7 x2 millimeter vertical spot located above and slightly to the left of the circular “object” - receives little attention from Mantik.

While the circular 6.5-millimeter “object” (or artifact) has elicited much conspiracist speculation, it seemed to have troubled none of the autopsy doctors. In fact, it was not even mentioned in their report. While this seems suspicious to Mantik, it is only so if one first assumes that the autopsy team had a hidden agenda. Indeed, neither the Warren Commission, nor the Rockefeller Commission, nor the HSCA (which, remember, was actively searching for a conspiracy) ever tried to argue that the white blob was a Mannlicher-Carcano bullet or fragment that proved Oswald’s guilt. While the 1968 Clark Panel did believe the “object” was a bullet fragment, it did not attempt to use this to further incriminate Oswald. There was certainly enough evidence available to affirm the general conclusions of the Warren Commission without drumming-up a never-before-seen bullet fragment on a newly forged X-ray. If Mantik is correct, on the other hand, this would imply that the conspirators planted false evidence which they had no intention of using and whose only utility has been to help David Mantik expose them three decades later. This is an example of the furtive fallacy: the faulty assumption that nothing happens by accident, and that events are guided by some nefarious agent.

In 1997, the ARRB discovered during its deposition of Jerrol Custer, a Bethesda Hospital X-ray technician who was on duty that night, that Dr. Ebersole had indeed seen Mantik’s alleged “6-millimeter object” during the autopsy - a “half circle that appears to be the lightest part of the film […] in the right orbital superior” - after Custer pointed it out to him as a possible bullet fragment. This suggests that the “6.5-millimeter object” already appeared on the X-ray before the body was dissected and was not added later, as Mantik suggests.76 Ebersole dismissed it offhand, telling Custer it was an artifact.77 If Custer is right, Ebersole would presumably have said the same thing to the pathologists if they inquired, which explains why no mention of it was made in the autopsy report and why it was easily forgotten until the HSCA’s Forensic Pathology Panel questioned them about it 15-years later. Like the “white spot” at the back of JFK’s head, the “6.5-millimeter object” is little more than a distraction caused by circular logic. What is missing here is not just a motive, but also the signature hypercompetence of the JFK buffs’ all-powerful enemy. Instead, Mantik offers us a one-time ad hoc explanation to suggest that, rather than being devilishly cunning, the men who killed Kennedy were in fact wildly incompetent.78 We can therefore safely conclude that the “object” on the X-ray is just what many experts said it was, an artifact, and that Mantik is seeing monsters in his bedroom closet.

[Michael T. Griffith]

In 1997, the ARRB discovered during its deposition of Jerrol Custer, a Bethesda Hospital X-ray technician who was on duty that night, that Dr. Ebersole had indeed seen Mantik’s alleged “6-millimeter object” during the autopsy - a “half circle that appears to be the lightest part of the film […] in the right orbital superior” - after Custer pointed it out to him as a possible bullet fragment. This suggests that the “6.5-millimeter object” already appeared on the X-ray before the body was dissected and was not added later, as Mantik suggests.

Anything to see the Emperor's New Clothes, hey? Just a few questions about these paragraphs of labored denial:

* If Custer's claim is true, why didn't Ebersole mention the 6.5 mm object when he spoke with the HSCA medical panel?

* Why didn't Ebersole tell this story when Dr. Mantik interviewed him and specifically asked him about the 6.5 mm object?

* Why did the autopsy doctors tell the ARRB that they did not see the object on the autopsy x-rays during the autopsy?

The autopsy doctors surely would have noticed it. If Ebersole had already seen it and had concluded it was an innocent artifact, surely he would have said so to the autopsy doctors when they noticed it.

* Pray tell, what could have caused an accidental artifact that was perfectly round except in its bottom-left section? We just saw that an acid drop could not have done this and that a metal disk could not have done it either. So what could have caused the accidental formation of an artifact that measures, oh so conveniently, 6.5 mm, and that is perfectly round for 3/4 of its shape? Do tell.

* Why doesn't this innocent-accidental artifact appear on the lateral skull x-rays?

* How do you explain the optical density measurements? I notice you said nothing about this hard scientific evidence.

* If "one first assumes that the autopsy team had a hidden agenda." Factually false. It is not necessary to assume that the autopsy doctors "had a hidden agenda" to recognize the logical implications of the evidence regarding the 6.5 mm object. The autopsy doctors were military officers who were subject to superior orders. Dr. Finck admitted at the Clay Shaw trial that a senior military officer prohibited him from dissecting the back wound. We now know that every military member at the autopsy was threatened with a court martial if they disclosed what they had seen at the autopsy.

[Charles Collins]

Anything to see the Emperor's New Clothes, hey? Just a few questions about these paragraphs of labored denial:

* If Custer's claim is true, why didn't Ebersole mention the 6.5 mm object when he spoke with the HSCA medical panel?

* Why didn't Ebersole tell this story when Dr. Mantik interviewed him and specifically asked him about the 6.5 mm object?

* Why did the autopsy doctors tell the ARRB that they did not see the object on the autopsy x-rays during the autopsy?

The autopsy doctors surely would have noticed it. If Ebersole had already seen it and had concluded it was an innocent artifact, surely he would have said so to the autopsy doctors when they noticed it.

* Pray tell, what could have caused an accidental artifact that was perfectly round except in its bottom-left section? We just saw that an acid drop could not have done this and that a metal disk could not have done it either. So what could have caused the accidental formation of an artifact that measures, oh so conveniently, 6.5 mm, and that is perfectly round for 3/4 of its shape? Do tell.

* Why doesn't this innocent-accidental artifact appear on the lateral skull x-rays?

* How do you explain the optical density measurements? I notice you said nothing about this hard scientific evidence.

* If "one first assumes that the autopsy team had a hidden agenda." Factually false. It is not necessary to assume that the autopsy doctors "had a hidden agenda" to recognize the logical implications of the evidence regarding the 6.5 mm object. The autopsy doctors were military officers who were subject to superior orders. Dr. Finck admitted at the Clay Shaw trial that a senior military officer prohibited him from dissecting the back wound. We now know that every military member at the autopsy was threatened with a court martial if they disclosed what they had seen at the autopsy.

So, many unanswerable questions. The M.O. of conspiracists.


My point is that the title of this thread is blatantly wrong. Your biased view just doesn’t “like” the explanation.

[Steve M. Galbraith]

So, many unanswerable questions. The M.O. of conspiracists.


My point is that the title of this thread is blatantly wrong. Your biased view just doesn’t “like” the explanation.

Yes, which is why I gave that Hofstadter quote, viz.: "The paranoid mentality is far more coherent than the real world, since it leaves no room for mistakes, failures or ambiguities... It believes it is up against an enemy who is as infallibly rational as he is totally evil, and it seeks to match his imputed total competence with its own, leaving nothing unexplained and comprehending all of reality in one overreaching consistent theory."

"Leaves no room for mistakes, failures or ambiguities...." He wrote this before the JFK assassination.

If the conspiracy believers used this method in examining their conspiracy claims they could never make even the slightest claim about one taking place. But they don't; they take the flimsiest of evidence and weave a conspiracy out of it. As we see here.

This is why we see so many different conspiracy explanations. The CIA over here, the Pentagon over there, rich Texas oilmen in another corner, the FBI in another, fake this and planted that, altered films and wounds...it's an endless series of claims and counter claims many of which contradict one another. In each case the conspiracy believer is selecting that evidence which support his pre-existing conspiracy belief. Conspiracy confirmation bias.
It's been almost 60 years and these people can't agree on anything other than "the government" killed JFK. After that it's a free-for-all.

[Michael T. Griffith]

So, many unanswerable questions. The M.O. of conspiracists.

Read: They are perfectly valid and logical questions about your absurd arguments, but you can't provide rational, believable answers to them. Why can't you answer the question "how do you explain the OD measurements?"? It's only "unanswerable" if you have no rational, credible explanation for them.

If Ebersole had seen the object and had concluded it was an innocent artifact, surely, surely he would have mentioned this to the autopsy doctors, who could not have failed to see it had it been there during the autopsy, and Ebersole would have had no conceivable reason not to mention this to the HSCA and to Mantik. You guys just refuse to use common sense and logic.

How could a 3/4-perfectly round innocent artifact magically form on the AP x-ray and not show up on the lateral x-rays? Why is this an "unanswerable" question? Because sensible people who aren't pathologically committed to defending the lone-gunman myth know that such an object would not be created accidentally.

You says it's "unanswerable" to ask why the autopsy doctors insisted that they never saw the 6.5 mm object during the autopsy. Why is that? Nobody denies that the object is brazenly obvious on the AP x-ray. Why would they have lied about not seeing it when it would have appeared to constitute strong evidence of Oswald's guilt? Why?

It is nonsensical to claim that the autopsy doctors missed the 6.5 mm object, and it's even sillier to believe that Ebersole saw it but said nothing about it to the autopsy doctors, and that he chose to say nothing about this to the HSCA or to Mantik.

Your non-reply reply is so typical of the M.O. of lone-gunman theorists: When confronted with hard scientific evidence that you can't explain away, you float downright silly arguments that don't even address the scientific evidence itself but that rely on a load of hypotheticals that make no sense.

My point is that the title of this thread is blatantly wrong. Your biased view just doesn’t “like” the explanation.

Because the explanation is ridiculous. I was going to title the thread "LNers Can't Rationally, Credibly Explain the 6.5 mm Object. . . ." but I thought that would be too polemical for a title.

[Charles Collins]

Read: They are perfectly valid and logical questions about your absurd arguments, but you can't provide rational, believable answers to them. Why can't you answer the question "how do you explain the OD measurements?"? It's only "unanswerable" if you have no rational, credible explanation for them.

If Ebersole had seen the object and had concluded it was an innocent artifact, surely, surely he would have mentioned this to the autopsy doctors, who could not have failed to see if it had been there during the autopsy, and Ebersole would have had no conceivable reason not to mention this to the HSCA and to Mantik. You guys just refuse to use common sense and logic.

How could a 3/4-perfectly round innocent artifact magically form on the AP x-ray and not show up on the lateral x-rays? Why is this an "unanswerable" question?

You says it's "unanswerable" to ask why the autopsy doctors insisted that they never saw the 6.5 mm object during the autopsy. Why is that? Nobody denies that the object is brazenly obvious on the AP x-ray. It is nonsensical to claim that Ebersole missed it, but it is even sillier to claim that he saw it but said nothing about it to the autopsy doctors, and that for some unknown reason Ebersole said nothing about this to the HSCA or to Mantik.

Your non-reply reply is so typical of the M.O. of lone-gunman theorists: When confronted with hard scientific evidence that you can't explain away, you float downright silly arguments that don't even address the scientific evidence itself but that rely on a load of hypotheticals that make no sense.

Because the explanation is ridiculous. I was going to title the thread "LNers Can't Rationally, Credibly Explain the 6.5 mm Object. . . ." but I thought that would be too polemical for a title.

Distortion by omission. Why did you omit Custer’s account in your original post? If you ever come up with evidence that can disprove Custer, you won’t have to omit his account…

[Michael T. Griffith]

My point is that the title of this thread is blatantly wrong. Your biased view just doesn’t “like” the explanation.

But you didn't even address the OD measurements in your "explanation." What kind of "explanation" is that? Organ initially compared the known, established science of OD measurement to "seer stones." But, after I documented that OD measurement is a recognized science, he back-peddled and said he wasn't questioning the science, just Mantik's use of it. Okay, Mantik's measurements have been published for years now, yet no scientist has challenged their validity, and the only scientist who did his own OD measurements found that his measurements mirrored Mantik's.

Grasping for anything, WC apologists cite the fact that Dr. Fitzpatrick, the ARRB forensic radiologist, told Doug Horne that he disagreed with Dr. Mantik's research on the autopsy x-rays. Yet, Fitzpatrick failed to offer any explanation for the OD measurements, for the 6.5 mm object, for the white patch, and for the presence of emulsion under the T-shaped inscription on the left lateral x-ray, which is a physical impossibility unless this x-ray is a copy. When Dr. Mantik attempted to engage Fitzpatrick in a discussion on these matters, he declined.

Simply claiming that the 6.5 mm object is an innocent artifact does not explain the object. That is not an "explanation." That is merely a claim. HOW could an object that is perfectly round in 3/4 of its shape be formed on the AP skull x-ray during a presidential autopsy? HOW? Beyond this basic question, there is the glaring issue of the object's size and placement: it is perfectly positioned over the image of a smaller, genuine fragment, and it is exactly 6.5 mm in size, the precise diameter of the ammo that Oswald allegedly used. The least implausible of Sturdivan's three theories--that a stray metal disk somehow ended up on the table just before the AP x-ray was taken--is not only unprecedented (no one has yet identified another case where such a far-fetched scenario occurred), but it requires one to believe that the radiologist or his assistant spotted the disk before they took the lateral x-rays were taken but did not retake the AP x-ray after spotting the disk, a preposterous idea.

The conspiratorial explanation is a credible, scientifically supported explanation because it not only identifies the 6.5 mm object as an artifact that was created intentionally over the image of a smaller, genuine fragment, but it includes a proven method by which the object could have been placed there; it explains the OD measurements; and it provides a logical explanation for why the autopsy doctors failed to mention the object in their report and in their repeated testimonies. THAT is an explanation.