Second Edition
Michael T. Griffith
1996
@All Rights Reserved
The fact that Officer Marrion Baker saw Lee Harvey Oswald on the second floor of the Texas School Book Depository (TSBD) building less than 90 seconds after President Kennedy was shot is proof that Oswald could not have been the assassin. Officer Baker claimed he spotted Oswald just inside the foyer door leading to the second-floor lunchroom. Baker said he saw Oswald through the foyer door's window. If so, then Oswald could not have been on the sixth floor during the shooting, and therefore could not have shot President Kennedy from the window identified by the Warren Commission (WC) as the point from which all the shots were allegedly fired.
Let us begin by analyzing Officer Baker's actions after he heard the shots. Here is how the WC described what Baker did after he heard gunfire:
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When the shots were fired, a Dallas motorcycle patrolman, Marrion L. Baker, was riding in the motorcade at a point several cars behind the President. He had turned right from Main Street onto Houston Street and was about 200 feet south of Elm Street when he heard a shot. Baker, having recently returned from a week of deer hunting, was certain the shot came from a high-powered rifle. He looked up and saw pigeons scattering in the air from their perches on the Texas School Book Depository Building. He RACED his motorcycle to the building, dismounted, scanned the area to the west and pushed his way through the spectators toward the entrance. There he encountered Roy Truly, the building superintendent, who offered Baker his help. They entered the building, and RAN toward the two elevators in the rear. Finding that both elevators were on an upper floor, they DASHED up the stairs. (WCR 5, emphasis added)
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The evidence is clear that on the day of the shooting Patrolman Baker encountered Oswald less than 90 seconds after the shots were fired. During the WC's reenactments, Baker's fastest time was 75 seconds; this was the time for his second, and final, simulation. Although Baker claimed to the Commission that his 75-second reenactment time was the "minimum" time in which he could have reached the second-floor landing, the evidence strongly indicates otherwise. For example, Baker admitted to the WC that in that test he merely "kind of ran" outside the Book Depository and that he moved only at "kind of a trot" inside the building. And these were not the only aspects of the WC's simulations that were unrealistic.
Roy Truly, the building manager who ran ahead of Baker through the building, likewise said his simulation time was the minimum time. But Truly did not seem certain about this. When asked if his simulation pace had even been "about" the same as his pace on the day of the shooting, Truly replied, "I THINK so" (3 H 228, emphasis added). If he wasn't positive that the simulation pace had even been "about" the same as his 11/22/63 pace, one wonders how he could have been certain that his simulation time was the "minimum" possible time. At one point he described his simulation pace as a WALK, but then said it was a "trot." Whenever Truly referred to his 11/22/63 pace through the building, he consistently used the word "ran" (e.g., 3 H 221, 222, 223, 224, 227). As with Baker's simulation speeds, the evidence indicates that Truly's reenactment pace was slower than his pace on the day of the assassination.
Pauline Sanders' testimony and Baker's own filmed statements in 1988 indicate Baker ran quite fast after he dismounted from his motorcycle. In the frames from the Couch film in which Baker is visible, he is seen to be running rapidly. During the WC's reenactments, moving slower, and quite possibly starting slightly earlier than he did on the day of the shooting, Baker made it to the TSBD's entrance in just 15 seconds.
WC supporters note that the simulations did not attempt to duplicate Baker's pushing people aside en route to the entrance, and that therefore in the reenactment Baker made it to the entrance as fast or faster than he did on the day of the shooting. But it stands to reason that this action took no more than 5-6 seconds, and possibly as little as 2-4 seconds. Whatever small difference in time this action would have made in the simulation was substantially, if not completely, offset by the fact that in the simulation Baker moved more slowly than he did after the shooting.
WC defenders also note that the Commission's simulations did not take into account the fact that Baker and Truly had to push their way through a few people as they approached the front of the TSBD. Truly, however, indicated it took he and Baker very little time to do this, and that therefore omitting this action from the simulation didn't really matter:
for more click on this link http://www.kenrahn.com/jfk/the_critics/ ... swald.html
