Post by Steve M. GalbraithPost by John CorbettPost by Steve M. GalbraithPost by John CorbettPost by Steve M. GalbraithOne of the best columnists in America, Ross Douthat, on conspiracy
thinking and how to distinguish between legitimate conspiracy views -
since conspiacies do occur - and illegitimate ones.
"And this points to an excellent rule for anyone who looks at an official
narrative and thinks that something seems suspicious: In following your
suspicions, never leap to a malignant conspiracy to explain something that
can be explained by incompetence and self-protection first."
The rest here: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/02/opinion/misinformation-conspiracy-theories.html
I couldn't agree more. I believe the biggest error in the entire
handling of the investigation was allowing Jackie to select who would
do the autopsy. The result was it was conducted by pathologists who
were used to doing autopsies on people who died of cancer or heart
disease, not gunshot wounds. They had no experience doing medico-legal
autopsies which require a special type of expertise. I don't blame
those who decided to take the body back to Washington because that was
a prudent move from a security standpoint. Once they got to
Washington, there were plenty of qualified forensic medical examiners
in the DC area to do the job right. Had that been done, it would have
quashed some of the nonsense. Not all of it of course, but it would
have given the conspiracy hobbyists one less thing to talk about.
Well, Finck was very well qualified in the area of "wound ballistics."
He testified that he had done hundreds of autopsies including ones where
the victim died of gunshots. Granted, he assisted the autopsy and maybe
should have been put in charge. Or had a larger role. But Jackie's wish
to have the autopsy done at Bethesda Naval Hospital meant that any
autopsy doctor would likely have little acquaintance with gunshot
wounds.
Finck studied battlefield wounds which is not the same as a medico-legal
autopsy. The latter is a requirement for legally establishing cause of
death. That wasn't what Finck was doing in the autopsies he performed.
While the two are related, there are different requirements.
https://www.homeopathy360.com/2020/02/27/medico-legal-autopsy/#:~:text=Medico-legal%20autopsy:%20It%20is%20done%20in%20cases%20of,on%20embalmed%20dead%20bodies%20to%20enhance%20medical%20knowledge.
Post by Steve M. GalbraithTheir biggest mistake was not dissecting that back wound. And Humes should
have called Perry during the autopsy and not the next day. Take away those
two errors and a lot of this nonsense would have been avoided.
The problem was that since none of them had done a medico-legal autopsy,
they didn't know how important that was. A forensic medical examiner would
have known the importance of that and insisted it had to be done so as not
to jeopardize the prosecution because of a botched autopsy.
Post by Steve M. GalbraithManchester has a great section on the chaos and confusion that ensued the
assassination. Nobody was thinking clearly, everyone was panicking and
confused and didn't know what was going on. Of course conspiracists will
just say they were all acting; they knew what happened - they were just
pretending to be confused. You know the routine.
Even though it was an extraordinary circumstance, that was all the more
reason to follow well established proven procedures. When you make it up
as you go, you are more prone to make mistakes. JFK should have gotten the
same kind of autopsy that a John Doe shooting victim would have gotten.
As you know, for lots of reasons the Kennedys simply didn't want and
wouldn't permit a full autopsy.
It shouldn't have been their call. As AG, RFK should have known why a full
autopsy was necessary and if he wasn't thinking correctly, somebody needed
to explain it to him. The justice of the peace in Dallas released the body
to the SS on the condition that Admiral Burkley stay with the body until a
full autopsy was completed to maintain chain of possession. I'm sure the
expectation was that a qualified medical examiner do a complete autopsy.
Had it been known they would do a half assed job of it, I'm betting the
Dallas authorities would have thought twice about letting the body go
under those circumstances. The autopsy that was done would probably have
been accepted by the court had the case gone to trial but it would have
opened up an avenue for the defense to challenge the legitimacy of the
autopsy and if the were successful in getting the autopsy thrown out,
prosecution would have been problematic.
Post by Steve M. GalbraithWho was going to overrule them?
Somebody with some courage.
Post by Steve M. GalbraithWho had
the authority to do so? Kennedy was attorney general. LBJ? Katzenbach?
McNamara?
RFK was head of the Justice Department. At that point, DOJ had no
jurisdiction. LBJ hadn't ordered the FBI to take over the investigation at
that point. It was still a state murder case and the body was released on
the condition that a proper medico-legal autopsy be performed.
Post by Steve M. GalbraithI doubt that any military hospital - Bethesda or Walter Reed -
had the type of autopsy team that would have been best.
There were plenty of qualified medical examiners in the DC area. Nothing
said it had to be done at a military hospital and in fact it shouldn't
have been.
Post by Steve M. GalbraithThere were no
established procedures to follow in such a situation. Not for a president.
From a legal standpoint, it didn't matter who the victim was. It was a
state murder case and everything that would be done for a John Doe murder
should have been done for JFK. Had people just followed normal procedures
instead of thinking they needed to do something extraordinary, a much
better autopsy would have been performed.
Post by Steve M. GalbraithThey needed several days to go over things. Talk to the ER physicians,
view the films, talk to witnesses. But they were going to bury JFK in a
day. None of that could be done.
They weren't going to bury him until Monday. Yes they wanted the body
available for the ceremonies, lying in state first at the White House for
dignataries and then the Capitol for the public but they had plenty of
time to do a proper autopsy. They just had the wrong people doing it.