Forum: Political Debate+ Section: JFK Debate Subj : "Get Garrison" To : Lisa Pease, 70540,113 Sunday, August 06, 1995 8:11:24 PM From : Lisa Pease, 70540,113 #394010 In today's New York Times Magazine (August 6, 1995), we find this headline: "GARRISON GUILTY. ANOTHER CASE CLOSED." Before I even address what's in the article, let's address why the article was written at this time. As anyone who has been following the assassination case knows, the Assassination Records Review Board (a Presidentially appointed panel mandated by the JFK Records act, passed in response to public outcry generated by Oliver Stone's film JFK,) recently made a trip to New Orleans to gather whatever records were there pertaining to the assassination of President Kennedy. One of sets of records the Review Board was particularly interested in was the set from then New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison's investigation into the assassination of President Kennedy, that ultimately led to Garrison's arrest and trial of New Orleans businessman Clay Shaw. Some of Garrison's records were in a filing cabinet left behind in 1974 when Garrison yielded the office to incoming District Attorney Harry Connick, father of Harry Connick, Jr., the famous singer. Most of Garrison's records, however, had been kept at the Garrison home, overseen by one of his sons. When the Review Board went to New Orleans, Garrison's son Lyon turned these records over to the Review Board so that Garrison's information would be available to anyone through the National Archives JFK Records collection. Harry Connick had previously told a researcher (and the researcher has this on tape) that he would only turn these records over to a representative body of the federal government. In keeping with that, when the ARRB came to town, Connick promised to turn over the records, although not without first trying to insinuate that many other records left behind had been "stolen" by Garrison's staff. Connick went on to praise the board's efforts to make a complete historical record in an attempt to put to rest questions about the assassination. (As of this writing Connick has yet to turn over the promised records.) Then an interesting development happened. A former member of Connick's staff told a newscaster in New Orleans that Harry Connick had destroyed some of Garrison's records when he first took over the office, and had asked this staffer to specifically burn the grand jury testimony relating to the Clay Shaw trial. The former staffer argued with Connick about the historical importance of these records, but Connick insisted they be burned. This staffer was so concerned by this that he did not follow orders and instead kept these records at his house for many years. When he heard the Review Board was coming into town, he went to the newscaster and said he would allow the newscaster to see them if he would promise to turn the testimony over to the Review Board after his broadcast. The deal was brokered. Newscaster Frank Angelico did a special segment on Harry Connick and these records which amounted to an ambush. Harry Connick was again telling the newscaster of the importance of the historical records, but when confronted with the affidavit from this former staffer that Connick had destroyed records and asked others to destroy records, Connick, after an uncomfortable pause, said "I wouldnt deny that....What's your point?" The point of his hypocrisy was not lost on the people of New Orleans, some of whom soon thereafter donned shirts saying "What's the point, Harry?" Connick was furious, and began to subpoena people who had the grand jury testimony transcripts, claiming the records belonged to the state, not the federal government. Besides issuing subpoenas for the former staffer and the newscaster, Connick went so far as to subpoena the staff of the ARRB in an attempt to recover the grand jury transcripts. Enter Gerald Posner. Researchers present at the ARRB hearings in New Orleans noticed Gerald Posner was in town, and when asked why, Posner had indicated it was just a coincidence, he just happened to be passing through at this time. Posner now says, in this article in the New York Times Magazine, that instead Connick had "invited" Posner down to New Orleans to "examine the files before he was scheduled to send them to the Assassination Records Review Board." This is an interesting development, if true. Connick was quite adamant that he would only allow a representative of the government to see the records. Does Connick consider Gerald Posner a representative of the government? Indeed, there are some in the research community that do, and are hardly surprised at this curious development. So we return to this article. Now that Connick has made the records seem rather important, due to his efforts to recover and suppress them, it became necessary to revive the old disinformation campaign against Garrison and his investigation, just as had been done at the height of the trial in the late 60's. Three times the government manufactured false cases against Garrison while he was alive. Three times the government failed to show any wrongdoing on the part of Jim Garrison. But now that Garrison is no longer alive to defend himself, the same old issues are raised again. The subheading of the article reads: "Newly opened files reveal that Jim Garrison - the New Orleans prosecutor, Oliver Stone hero and J.F. K. conspiracy hunter - himself conspired to frame an innocent man." Through a sadly typical, misrepresentative selection of quotes, not to mention the obligatory but atypical sour-faced picture that accompanies the piece, Gerald Posner attempts to create a portrait of a deranged individual, bent on solving the mystery of the President's assassination at whatever cost, including defaming innocent people. He quotes an author who has himself been exposed as both a government and a liar, James Phelan, without telling you he is quoting James Phelan, when he refers to the alleged Garrison quote that this was "a homosexual thrill-killing" - something Garrison was only reported to say by Mr. Phelan, and is not therefore a primary source nor a credible one. James Phelan, in his own book called SCANDALS, SCAMPS AND SCOUNDRELS, devoted a chapter to the Jim Garrison investigation, in which he made the blatantly false statement that Garrison's key witness against Clay Shaw, Perry Russo, did not mention Clay Shaw's participation in an assassination discussion until Russo was hypnotized by Garrison's staff. Newly released documents show that was a gross lie, as Russo had told that story before he was ever hypnotized. Phelan knew this to be the case because James Phelan personally delivered this information to the FBI. Yet in his book he relies on the audience's ignorance for credibility. So this is the man who is the source of Garrison's alleged comment about a "homosexual thrill killing," gleefully repeated unquestioned by Posner. Posner next tells that Garrison's original witness against David Ferrie, the person Garrison was most interested in regarding the assassination, was a drunk named Jack Martin. Posner doesn't tell you what records have shown, that Martin was also working with the CIA. Martin, the day of the assassination had been pistol-whipped by Guy Banister, in whose office Oswald had been seen by several witnesses. Martin was furious with Banister and went to Garrison to tell what he knew. Later, Martin evidently regretted this decision and tried to take it back. Given Martin's involvement in anti-Castro Cuban and CIA circles, his later denial is not as convincing as his first day revengeful spilling of information to Garrison. What's perhaps the most egregious omission in this article is what Posner doesn't tell you about New Orleans attorney Dean Andrews. Dean Andrews was interviewed by the Secret Service a few days after the assassination and told them that while he was in the hospital, the night of the assassination he received a call from "Clay Bertrand" asking Andrews to provide Lee Oswald with legal assistance. Clay Bertrand suddenly became an interesting and important character. In the course of Garrison's investigation, several people in New Orleans confirmed that Clay Shaw went by the alias Clay Bertrand in his lesser known role as a homosexual in New Orleans. Andrews gave the Secret Service a detailed report of the call, his prior associations with Bertrand, as well as his prior associations with Oswald. Later, Andrews tried to pretend it was all a publicity stunt. Posner says Dean Andrews denied over and over that Shaw was Bertrand. But Posner does NOT tell you that Dean Andrews was also successfully convicted of perjury for denying that very point! Andrews even said that he'd rather go to jail on a lie than have a bullet through his head. But Posner pretends that Andrews is a credible witness against Shaw being Bertrand. Next, Posner describes a couple of memoranda from Garrison's files that he claims show that Garrison was out to get Shaw with no basis in fact. Since plenty of Garrison's files that are ALREADY available show that Garrison had a rather substantial case against Shaw, finding a few memos that leave the question open or even dispute it must be taken in context with the rest of Garrison's case, not as stand alone "proof" that Garrison had no case at all! In fact, much has come out over the years that substantiate much of what Garrison was saying at the time. For example, Garrison said the CIA had a plot to kill Castro. That information was not publicly confirmed until years later, after Garrison had left the DA's office, during the Church Committee hearings. At the time it was just another "crazy" allegation of the "Jolly Green Giant", as Garrison was called (because he put fruits and nuts in the can). But time has proven Garrison to be right about this. Garrison also strongly believed that Clay Shaw had ties to the CIA. Again, at the time this was considered ludicrous, even malicious. Yet former Director of Central Intelligence Richard Helms himself stated that Clay Shaw had in fact worked for the CIA. To this day, Clay Shaw's reports with the Domestic Contacts Division remain classified and out of reach from researchers. If Shaw was doing low-level, unimportant work, as defenders of Clay Shaw attest, why are these files still out of reach? Just a couple of years ago, a most interesting document on Clay Shaw was released that showed that, in addition to reports filed to the Domestic Contact Division of the CIA, Shaw also had covert security clearance for a still unclassified operation known as "QK/ENCHANT". Posner cannot demonstrate that Shaw was guiltless, especially without being able to point to what Shaw was doing for the CIA with that covert security clearance. But this is no change for Posner. On the eve of the release of hundreds of thousands of new documents from the CIA and FBI relating to the assassination, without having read these, Posner was willing in advance to declare the "Case Closed" on any conspiracy surrounding the Kennedy assassination. So, without having read the rest of Garrison's files, Posner is typically using only whatever he can find to support his contention that Garrison had nothing, while quoting records that only he himself has seen, so as to make refutation impossible on a point by point basis. Once the documents are released to the research community, likely the authors of the memoranda that Posner quote will give us a clue to who was working within Garrison's office to discredit his case. The House Select Committee on Assassinations found nine infiltrators in Garrison's office. It would be typical of Posner to be quoting from those sources. Let's look at the big "new" charge against Garrison leveled by Posner: Garrison is suddenly "found" to be taping conversations of journalists like James Phelan! For someone touted as a "researcher", it is pretty amazing to see Posner represent this as some sort of new or astonishing revelation. In a book heavily touted by anti-conspiracists, AMERICAN GROTESQUE, written by a man self-professedly enamored of Shaw, James Kirkwood, he tells of how Russo was wired for sound when he was sent by Garrison to find out what Phelan and Walter Sheridan, then doing a hit piece on Garrison for NBC, were up to. Garrison had been disturbed how witnesses who had formerly said they would testify suddenly were changing their stories and backing away, and Garrison wanted to know what was being said to these people. Russo was one of the few who stuck by his story, and Garrison had him wired to hear the pitch that was made by Walter Sheridan, then doing a hit-piece on Garrison for NBC (which was so blatantly one-sided Garrison won the right to respond under the then-law called the Fairness Doctrine) and Phelan. What's the most telling about Posner is that he will tell you these 'journalists' (both of whom worked for the FBI at one time or another, Sheridan as an agent and Phelan as an informant) were 'eavesdropped' upon, but Posner neglects to tell you what was discovered. What Russo and Garrison found was that Sheridan and Phelan were offering witnesses legal assistance, money, and new careers if they would change their story. Russo refused to do so. Others were not as strong. And of course, Posner never tells you just how thoroughly Garrison's office was infiltrated both electronically and personally with CIA and FBI informants, some of whom ended up stealing files and turning them over to the defense. It would take a book to show the enormous lies Gerald Posner has created in his own book CASE CLOSED. In fact, such a book is nearing completion at this very moment. One example will for now have to suffice as an example of his credibility. Before the Conyers Committee a few years ago, Posner testified that he had spoken to one of the original autopsists of John Kennedy, Thornton Boswell. On tape, Boswell has denied not once but twice that such a conversation ever took place. Posner offers phone records in defense. But Boswell specifically remembers that Posner called while he was out. He knew who he was and was quite specific that he had never had that conversation with him. Three others whom Posner has claimed interviews with also denied ever being interviewed by him. But that's just the beginning. Posner's book is one long series of half-truths, selective quoting and deliberate misrepresentation in an effort to bolster the government's original conclusion that Oswald alone killed Kennedy. For those not familiar with a large segment of history poorly addressed by the media, it's easy to wonder why the New York Times would give space to such an easily discredited spokesman as Posner. But step back in time to the seventies, when Carl Bernstein wrote a landmark article about the CIA's relationship with the media (Rolling Stone, October 20, 1977). "By far the most valuable of these associations, according to CIA officials, have been with the New York Times, CBS and Time Inc." The Times has a long history of misrepresenting the facts of the Kennedy assassination; it is entirely appropriate that Gerald Posner would follow in the footsteps of former New York Times writers David Belin (a staff attorney for the Warren Commission) and Priscilla Johnson McMillan (a CIA employee who wrote a biography called MARINA AND LEE about Oswald and his wife that Marina Oswald later said was full of lies that Ms. McMillan knew were lies) as the Times continues its unbroken disinformation about this important event from our past. But the larger issue the paper and Posner neatly sidestepped is not the New Orleans records, which while interesting and valuable, will not ultimately take us to the highest levels of the conspiracy. While Posner and the Times attempt to refocus our attention onto Garrison and the past, the Review Board stands poised for battle with the CIA over the release of the Oswald CIA headquarters files- files the Review Board very much thinks we should see - files the CIA very much wants to suppress. No matter how many headlines, no matter how many books, the case can never be closed until all the files have first been opened, released, and examined by those more honest and unbiased than Gerald Posner. The New York Times would better serve the interests of this country by pressing for full disclosure by the government. Until the government, and by extension the press, give us the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, no amount of saying 'the case is closed' will satisfy the growing suspicion among the people of this country that our leaders are not worthy of our trust.