JFK Doctors Were Slapped with Gag Orders

Physicians at JFK's autopsy received letters of silence

For the past 60 years, there has been much debate over the findings of the official autopsy for President John F. Kennedy. What is certain is that newly-declassified JFK files show the autopsy physicians at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland were compelled to sign letters of silence under threat of court martial, and for good reason: what they saw contradicted the official theory of a “lone gunman.”

ARRB Master Set of Medical Exhibits - MD196

The wounds observed by the doctors at Parkland and Bethesda, as well as FBI agents James Sibert and Francis O’Neill, were not consistent with the government’s claim that JFK was shot from behind by Lee Harvey Oswald. Aside from multiple witnesses claiming to see a gaping wound at the rear of the President’s skull, a shallow bullet wound was discovered in his back that could be probed by a finger, contradicting the controversial ‘single bullet’ theory later put forward by Arlen Specter.

ARRB Master Set of Medical Exhibits - MD161

Too Many Bullets

An FBI memo sent by assistant director Alan Belmont to associate director Clyde Tolson, the number two official in the Bureau, on the night of the assassination states:

“I told SAC Shanklin that Secret Service had one of the bullets that struck President Kennedy and the other is lodged behind the President’s ear and we are arranging to get both of these.”

If two bullets were recovered at the autopsy and one allegedly at Parkland Hospital, that in and of itself, was evidence more than three shots were fired in Dealey Plaza.

Admiral David Osborne, told the HSCA in 1978 of some interesting observations that were contrary to other witnesses:

“Osborne said that a slug rolled out of his (JFK’s) clothing and onto the table. Osborne said that the slug was copper-clad and that the Secret Service or FBI took possession of this. Upon further inquiry, Osborne emphasized that the slug was a fully intact missile and not a fragment.”

‘No Exit Wound’

The Sibert-O’Neill Report of November 26, 1963, raised two problems for the single bullet theory:

 ARRB Master Set of Medical Exhibits - MD46 James Sibert

1. Dr. Humes located a bullet hole below the shoulders and two inches to the right of the spinal column. Further probing of this wound determined the distance travelled by this missile was a short distance as the end of the opening could be felt with the finger.

2. When told a bullet was found on a stretcher at Parkland Hospital, which was never confirmed to have been the President’s stretcher, Humes made the following assumptions: that one bullet had entered the President’s back and worked its way out of the back during external cardiac massage and that a second high velocity bullet had entered the rear of the skull and fragmented prior to exit through the top of the skull.

If this explanation is valid—and there is reason to believe it is not where the head shot is concerned— it still does not account for a shot that missed the limousine entirely or the wounds sustained by Governor Connally.

The Sibert-O’Neill Report also made no mention of the pathologists dissecting the back wound to determine a path of exit through the front of the throat. In fact, it summarizes the conclusions of Dr. Humes this way:

“Dr. HUMES stated that the pattern was clear that the one bullet had entered the President's back and had worked its way out of the body during external cardiac massage and that a second high velocity bullet had entered the rear of the skull and had fragmentized prior to exit through the top of the skull.”

Autopsy Controversy

Although Humes signed a gag order in 1963, this did not stop him from speaking about the case with others. A Jan. 10, 1967, CBS memorandum summarizes a discussion between him and Jim Snyder of the CBS bureau in Washington, D.C. Humes apparently felt the need to air his grievances about the Sibert-O’Neill Report amid criticism directed at him related to the controversy and inaccuracies of the autopsy:

“Humes said FBI agents were not in the autopsy room during the autopsy; they were kept in an ante room, and their report is simply wrong. Although initially in the autopsy procedure the back wound could only be penetrated to finger length, a prober later was made — when no FBI men were present — that traced the path of the bullet from the back going downwards, then upwards slightly, then downwards again exiting at the throat.”

However, this claim flies in the face of a June 2, 1966, FBI memo that states all of the information in their report concerning the autopsy was obtained from Humes himself and none of it was hearsay. It also confirms that either Sibert or O’Neill were in the autopsy room at all times, not kept in an ante room as Humes told CBS News.

In fact, according to O’Neill’s affidavit for HSCA, he “remained right next to the body, a distance of less than two yards during the entire length of the actual autopsy. Sibert, [and Secret Service agents] Greer and Kellerman were also present during the entire length of the autopsy.”

Also, when exactly did Humes conduct this probe to trace the path of a bullet from the back and exiting the throat? According to O’Neill’s HSCA affidavit:

“I do not see how the bullet that entered below the shoulder in the back could have come out the front of the throat. I disagreed with Dr. Boswell’s depiction of the location of the back (thorax) wound. It was and is my opinion that the bullet which entered the back came out the back. I last saw the body just prior to the dressing after the morticians were through.”

According to Dr. Pierre Fink’s HSCA testimony, the doctors were told by an unidentified Army General not to dissect the bullet wound in the back and in the neck:

MD 30 - Finck Testimony Before HSCA Medical Panel (3/11/78)

Warren Commission lawyer Arlen Specter had no use for statements given by Sibert or O’Neill. Despite interviewing both men in 1964, Specter did not call them to testify to the Warren Commission:

MD 47 - O’Neill Affidavit for HSCA

In this 2005 interview, James Sibert took exception with disingenuous claims made by Arlen Specter in a memo sent to J. Lee Rankin after their interview. Sibert and O’Neill were not permitted to take notes during the interview with Specter, so they immediately drafted their own internal memo to have the discussion on the record.

Alterations of Wounds?

According to a 1995 ARRB Call Report, Clarence Israel was the brother of a deceased orderly who was present in the autopsy room. The orderly hold his brother he had been verbally threatened by a guard at the autopsy. He also shared that the orderlies noticed one doctor waiting in the autopsy room for some time before the body arrived. After it arrived, people were forced out of the room (supposedly for taking of X-Rays) and the doctor performed “some type of mutilation of three bullet punctures to the head area.”

If this account is accurate, it could explain the contradictions of the head wound descriptions from Dallas and possibly reveal sinister intentions to alter the wounds to make it appear all shots came from behind the President.

Who to Believe?

Humes and Boswell remained friendly years after the assassination, while Finck was treated as an outcast after testifying at the 1969 trial of Clay Shaw, the New Orleans businessman who was acquitted of conspiracy charges.

Arlen Specter and Dr. Humes remained on very friendly terms according to his HSCA interview in 1977.

ARRB Master Set of Medical Exhibits - MD19

Which begs the question: if everything was on the up and up at Bethesda, why were the physicians compelled to sign letters of silence under threat of court marital if they spoke of what they saw and did at the autopsy that night?