LNers Can't Explain the Two Back-of-Head Bullet Fragments

[Jack Nessan]

First, a few follow-up points:

-- F-32 (Figure 29 in 7 HSCA 125) removes any doubt about the accuracy of Dr. Riley’s placement of the cowlick site in his “HSCA Entrance” graphic in “What Struck John.” One can perhaps understand how someone could mistakenly think that Riley placed the site higher than it is placed in F-307, but only if they did not stop to consider the fact that F-307 shows the site from a lower-rear view, whereas Riley shows it from a top-of-head view. F-32, however, showing a largely right profile view, makes it clear that the HSCA put the site exactly where Riley put it (and vice-versa), right around 1 inch above the lambda, at least 1.25 inches above the lambdoid suture, and about 0.75 inches to the right of the sagittal suture. 

F-32 Loc of Cowlick Entry Site
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Zi8tMkBylXHGY3OUxBA0DI7vyt-rMwry/view?usp=sharing

F-32 and Riley Graphic
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Tix6R8Nk0Uu1vLMs-oDjStCuUDeECVs2/view?usp=sharing

This is a crucial point because, as Riley notes, the top-of-head autopsy photos show intact cerebral cortex in the location of the cowlick entry site, proving that the site cannot be a bullet wound. Thus, on this basis alone, the cowlick entry site is both invalid and impossible.

-- Dr. Finck specified in his 1/25/1965 memo to General Blumberg on the autopsy that he saw the rear head entry wound in the scalp and in the underlying occipital bone:

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I examined the wounds. The scalp of the back of the head showed a small laceration, 15 X 6 mm. Corresponding to this lesion, I found a through-and-through wound of the occipital bone, with a crater visible from the inside of the cranial cavity. This bone wound showed no crater when viewed from outside the skull. On the basis of this pattern of the occipital bone perforation, I stated that the wound in the back of the head was an entrance. (p. 1)
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We see from the date of this memo that he wrote this account barely 13 months after the autopsy. Thus, his placement of the entry wound in the occipital bone is strong evidence for the EOP site, since it boggles the mind to think that a certified forensic pathologist would have located in the occiput a wound that would have been clearly above the lambdoid suture and above the lambda and thus obviously in the parietal bone.

-- The HSCA’s trajectory expert, NASA’s Dr. Tom Canning, in order to get the sixth-floor-to-cowlick-site trajectory to “work,” found it necessary to place JFK a good 2 feet farther to the left than any photo or footage shows him (HSCA exhibit F-138). Indeed, Canning put JFK nearly to the middle of the seat. This is what Canning had to do to maintain the fiction that a bullet from the sixth-floor window could have hit the cowlick site and then exited above the right ear. 

F-138 Canning Head Shot Trajectory
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JiMg1s78C0x8jAPNGTtsI4-JkY2gteCG/view?usp=sharing

This is especially odd because in his SBT diagram (F-140), Canning put JFK at the far-right end of the seat, right next to the right door of the limo, exactly where photos and footage show him (but Canning had to put Connally substantially farther to the left than any photo or footage shows him to get the SBT trajectory to “work”).

F-140 Canning SBT Trajectory
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YBP6t_mE_IaLfgbCL2rghMh359dg0Kr5/view?usp=sharing

Here are more problems that the medical and trajectory evidence poses for any lone-gunman scenario regarding the cowlick entry site and/or the EOP entry site:

-- The autopsy report says the rear head entry wound was 6 x 15 mm. It says the scalp wound was 6 x 15 mm and that there was a “corresponding wound” in the underlying skull, i.e., that the hole in the skull was the same size as the hole in the scalp. Unless one wants to assume that the autopsy doctors severely mismeasured the wound, this poses a serious problem for those who claim that a 6.5 mm bullet made this wound. Why? Because entry wounds in skulls are always, always larger than the diameter of the penetrating bullet. Always.

The WC explained the 6 mm width by conjuring up the fiction that “the elastic recoil of the skull shrinks the size of an opening after a missile passes through it.” Uh, no, it does not. Scalp tissue will slightly recoil after a bullet penetrates it, but skull bone will do no such thing. At least the WC did not make the absurd argument that the autopsy doctors mismeasured the wound.

-- As Howard Donahue noted, the HSCA’s proposed exit point made no sense when considered in light of the skull x-rays. The x-rays show that the skull shattered for 5 inches above and behind the exit point, yet there is no defect below or in front of it! If the bullet smashed skull for 4-5 inches above and behind its exit point, it surely would have created at least a small portal of damage below and in front of it.

-- Moreover, as several medical experts have noted, how can fragments be embedded in the inner table of the top of the skull all across those 5 inches of missing skull bone? What is holding those fragments in place if the skull was blasted out at that location? If the skull x-rays are to be believed, there would have been no bone there in which fragments could have been embedded, yet there they are. Something is seriously wrong here.

-- The Clark Panel did not see the small “semi-circular” exit point that the HSCA FPP claimed to identify in the right temple in the skull x-rays. The Clark Panel identified “relatively large fragments, more or less randomly distributed . . . in the right cerebral hemisphere,” and noted a trail of tiny fragments 1.8 inches long that allegedly lined up with the cowlick site but that dissipated before reaching a point in the frontal region.

-- The autopsy report says that fractures radiated from the EOP entry wound:

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Upon reflecting the scalp multiple complete fracture lines are seen to radiate from both the large defect at the vertex and the smaller wound at the occiput. (p. 4)
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However, the WC’s own wound ballistics tests failed to produce a single entry wound in skull bone with extensive cracking emanating from it, even though the tests were done with dried human skulls. Dried skulls are more brittle than live skulls, yet no extensive fracturing originated from any of the entry wounds in the WC’s tests. 

Does this invalidate the EOP site? No, because the cracking could have been caused by an exiting bullet after a bullet entered the EOP site. This would explain why part of the EOP entry wound was contained in a large late-arriving skull fragment. The first head shot hit the skull at the EOP site. The second head shot hit the skull in the right temple and exited the occiput, causing extensive fracturing and creating the large defect in the lower half of the occiput that dozens of witnesses in three different locations described.

Wow. This is so far removed from reality that it staggers the imagination and absolutely flies in the face of any common sense. All the experts who viewed this evidence, Canning, Sturdivan, and even Wecht and you are a believer of someone like Dr. Riley. Even Cyril Wecht does not buy any of this nonsense. Is that why you don’t quote him? 

Not a shred of evidence anywhere in the theory let alone a basis for shooters front and rear of JFK, two shooters both armed with carcanos. Unbelievable. My belief is, in all the medical jargon spouted here, that you do not even know where the EOP is let alone measuring from it.

[Jerry Organ]

I see that Jerry Organ has posted another one of his comical, blundering, and dishonest graphics in Reply #176. In his silly graphic, Organ ignores HSCA exhibits F-32 and F-307 and claims that Riley put the cowlick site 2 inches above the lambda and nearly 3 inches above the lamdoid suture!

The 2D drawing of the encased brain is not at issue. The problem is that Riley (and the stooges who then endorsed it) applied a 2D drawing to a photograph with notable perspective.

Seriously, is this guy a closet conspiracy theorist who's trying to embarrass the lone-gunman position? Anyone with two working eyes can see that Riley put the cowlick site 1 inch above the lambda, not 2 inches.

Andrew Mason's looking for a photogrammetry specialist to model his Sure-Fire Theory. You two should get together.

[John Mytton]

The 2D drawing of the encased brain is not at issue. The problem is that Riley (and the stooges who then endorsed it) applied a 2D drawing to a photograph with notable perspective.

Nice work Jerry, as we know Griffith's perception of perspective is amateurish at best, for instance his laughable analysis of the Zapruder film is downright hilarious and even when his childish conclusions are proven beyond all doubt to be wrong, the man who never met a conspiracy that he didn't like, doubles down with the stupidity!

JohnM

 

[Michael T. Griffith]

The 2D drawing of the encased brain is not at issue. The problem is that Riley (and the stooges who then endorsed it) applied a 2D drawing to a photograph with notable perspective.

No, the problem is that you are ignoring clear reference points, ignoring HSCA exhibit F-32, and ignoring where Riley and the HSCA placed the cowlick site in relation to those points (lambda and lambdoid suture). Your silly graphic has the cowlick site so far forward that it's nearly directly above the right ear! Anyone can look at Riley's graphic and see that he put the site well behind the right ear. They can also see that he put the site only 1 inch above the lambda, whereas you have the "CT Cowlick Wound Area" 2 inches above the lambda.

You see, when you guys are confronted with irrefutable photographic evidence that destroys the lone-gunman theory, you just can't face it. Instead, you see the Emperor's New Clothes and post ridiculous graphics that a child can see are bogus.

And, as I've said before, it is mighty bold of you to get on a public forum and claim that a respected and published neuroscientist couldn't tell the difference between 2 inches above the lambda and 1 inch above the lambda, and couldn't distinguish between a point on the skull that was clearly well behind the right ear and a point that was nearly directly above it. Wow. I mean for you, who thought the cerebellum was part of "the right cerebrum," to even be challenging Dr. Riley on anything is amusing.

[John Mytton]

No, the problem is that you are ignoring clear reference points, ignoring HSCA exhibit F-32, and ignoring where Riley and the HSCA placed the cowlick site in relation to those points (lambda and lambdoid suture). Your silly graphic has the cowlick site so far forward that it's nearly directly above the right ear! Anyone can look at Riley's graphic and see that he put the site well behind the right ear. They can also see that he put the site only 1 inch above the lambda, whereas you have the "CT Cowlick Wound Area" 2 inches above the lambda.

You see, when you guys are confronted with irrefutable photographic evidence that destroys the lone-gunman theory, you just can't face it. Instead, you see the Emperor's New Clothes and post ridiculous graphics that a child can see are bogus.

And, as I've said before, it is mighty bold of you to get on a public forum and claim that a respected and published neuroscientist couldn't tell the difference between 2 inches above the lambda and 1 inch above the lambda, and couldn't distinguish between a point on the skull that was clearly well behind the right ear and a point that was nearly directly above it. Wow. I mean for you, who thought the cerebellum was part of "the right cerebrum," to even be challenging Dr. Riley on anything is amusing.

Hmmm, in the red corner we have 1 man who isn't a forensic scientist and in the blue corner we have an accomplished medical panel with many decades of combined experience in Forensic Pathology. And the winner is Griffith's vivid imagination!!! Hahahaha!



Another factoid I find particularly amusing is that the results you so vigorously endorse from Riley, who clarified that he was working with the assumption that the autopsy photos, x-rays etc were authentic! Do you, Mr. Griffith truly believe that the medical evidence is authentic?? Or will your position forever remain flexible enough to support whatever conclusion that reinforces your latest lamebrain theory?


https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=48771#relPageId=3

JohnM

[Steve M. Galbraith]

Hmmm, in the red corner we have 1 man who isn't a forensic scientist and in the blue corner we have an accomplished medical panel with many decades of combined experience in Forensic Pathology. And the winner is Griffith's vivid imagination!!! Hahahaha!



Another factoid I find particularly amusing is that the results you so vigorously endorse from Riley, who clarified that he was working with the assumption that the autopsy photos, x-rays etc were authentic! Do you, Mr. Griffith truly believe that the medical evidence is authentic?? Or will your position forever remain flexible enough to support whatever conclusion that reinforces your latest lamebrain theory?


https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=48771#relPageId=3

JohnM

Apparently the conspirators were/are able to fool the top forensic and photographic experts in the nation, people with hundreds of years of experience and who studied the original material, but some guy sitting behind a computer examining 12th generation photos is able to see through their ruse.

I'm not convinced.

[John Mytton]

Apparently the conspirators were/are able to fool the top forensic and photographic experts in the nation, people with hundreds of years of experience and who studied the original material, but some guy sitting behind a computer examining 12th generation photos is able to see through their ruse.

I'm not convinced.

Griffith has a long history of scouring the internet and finding evidence from an "expert" who may well be proficient in an unrelated profession, but are typically analyzing material that far exceeds their limited experience.

JohnM

[Jerry Organ]

Nice work Jerry, as we know Griffith's perception of perspective is amateurish at best, for instance his laughable analysis of the Zapruder film is downright hilarious and even when his childish conclusions are proven beyond all doubt to be wrong, the man who never met a conspiracy that he didn't like, doubles down with the stupidity!

JohnM

Thank you for the compliment, JohnM. I believe some people struggle with 3D visualization. Remember when Cartoon Ernie was here, and Craig and you would point out some error he made because he didn't allow for perspective? Ernie thought perspective was an LN trick.

Griffith can't see the problem with applying a 2D orthographic image (representing a level horizontal plane) to a photograph taken obliquely. Add to that the nearness of the camera to the object that induced a substantial amount of perspective.