Walker- I went in the alley up to the back door. When I arrived there, there was several officers ... around the back of the theatre, and myself, and/McDonald, and Officer Hutson went in the back door. And this man [Brewer] told us, or this boy told us that there was someone, said the person that he had seen was inside the theatre, and that he had changed seats several times, and he thought he was out there in the middle now ...
This is a highly significant detail from Patrolman Walker.
Mr. Brewer's story was always that he did NOT know where Mr. Oswald was until the lights were turned on: last he had seen of the man was when he ducked into the entrance area of the Texas Theatre. Now we have him (and it presumably is him) telling officers the same story that Mr. Jack Davis will tell: Mr. Oswald had changed seats
several times.
How do we reconcile these conflicting accounts?
Well, Mr. Brewer must have picked up this information via someone who had, unlike him, actually seen the odd behavior of Mr. Oswald.
Perhaps Mr. Burroughs. Perhaps Mr. Davis himself. Perhaps some other patron (the pregnant woman?). 'Yeah, there's a guy who keeps changing seats on the main floor.' Mr. Brewer, hearing this, assumed that this must be the man he had seen behaving suspiciously out in the street--------the 'suspect'. The lights come on, and Mr. Oswald gets into a ruckus with Officer McDonald. Mr. Brewer convinces himself that this must be his 'suspect' from the shoe store.
What Mr. Brewer doesn't know, however, is that THIS man's (i.e. Mr. Oswald's) strange seat-changing behavior started
many minutes before the shoe store sighting. He assumes all this must have happened
just in the last few minutes. He doesn't realize that Mr. Oswald cannot possibly have been the man acting suspiciously at the shoe store.
Note also the continuation of Patrolman Walker's account:
"
And this man [Brewer] told us, or this boy told us that there was someone, said the person that he had seen was inside the theatre, and that he had changed seats several times, and he thought he was out there in the middle now" "He
thought he was out there in the middle now": this is very different to a confident pointing out of the man. Mr. Brewer has merely HEARD that the man who kept changing seats is now sitting in the middle section of the main floor. THIS is the second-hand information he passes on to the officers. He does not NOT point out Mr. Oswald specifically. He does NOT identify him positively as the man he saw at the shoe store. There is NO visual recognition here. And Officer McDonald, going only on the tip that the suspect is "in the middle now", first shakes down two men in the middle section, AND ONLY THEN Mr. Oswald.
If Mr. Brewer afterwards realized that this was a case of mistaken identity, he opted to play along with the official story. Indeed, he revelled in his heroic role as The Man Who Helped Capture the Presidential Assassin. And, in order to play his role the better, he embellished his story (radio report, matching description, brown shirt, etc.).
