The truth about Raymond Cummings:
https://www.onthetrailofdelusion.com/post/did-a-cabbie-take-oswald-and-ferrie-to-ruby-s-nightclub
fred
I address these attacks in my book.
I think anyone who watches Cummings' interview will conclude that he was a sincere and reluctant witness.
I am surprised at the use of the Clay Shaw defense attorney memo on Shaw, given what we have known for years about the sleazy tactics employed by Shaw's defense team (of course, some of Garrison's tactics weren't much better, admittedly). Plus, the memo contradicts itself. First it says that cab company records show that Cummings was not employed at the time of his reported trip, but then it says that Cummings' log for the trip says nothing about making a trip with Oswald and Ruby to Ruby's club. Which is it?
The Shaw defense team's anti-Cummings memo makes a lot of accusations but provides little actual evidence to support them. Regarding Cummings' "failed" polygraphy test, I repeat the point that the polygrapher was later found to have falsified several of his other polygraphs.
It should be noted that when Garrison's staff showed Cummings pictures of Clay Shaw and asked if Shaw was the third passenger, Cummings said no, the Shaw picture was not the third passenger. If Cummings had wanted to embellish and make his account even more appealing to Garrison, he could have said yes, but he said no.
When you're dealing with this level of society, that stratum of society, the witnesses you find will often have spotty backgrounds, will be less than Boy Scouts, but that doesn't mean that everything they say is false. And, after all, Cummings was a former Marine and a former police officer. His attackers have made many accusations against him, most of which have no direct bearing on his account but are mainly character attacks, and they have produced little evidence to actually document those charges that do involve his account.
Contrary to Shaw's defense team memo, Cummings never gave any sign of being a "publicity seeking nut." No one who watches his interview can reach that conclusion. Recall that Cummings never sought out a journalist or a newspaper. In fact, he tried to avoid publicity, only contacted law enforcement people, and just wanted to share his account and return to his normal life. That is not the behavior of a "publicity seeking nut."
It is curious how many times pro-conspiracy witnesses were accused of being "nuts," "unstable," etc. For example, FBI and CIA elements accused Elena Garro of being crazy and unstable because she insisted that she saw Oswald in Mexico City with several other people, two of them known Communists, at a time when the real Oswald was not there, according to the official account of his movements. Moreover, Garro had corroborating witnesses and evidence to back up her story. Garro moved in the upper circles of Mexican society. She was an intellectual, a screenwriter, and an award-winning novelist. But these facts didn't stop certain people in the CIA and the FBI from accusing her of being "nuts."
Mary Haverstick deals with Garro's account in detail in her new book
A Woman I Know.
