The Horne Presentation part 4

 

Horne's Feb 11, 1998 "memo of conscience":

I asked Doug at Q and A time about how the Parkland doctors finally did get questioned. I did not think they were deposed but the transcript I got of this at the Lancer conference states they were. So, maybe they were. (Note: the "uncorrected" copy of the Parkland Doctors' transcript was given to JFK Lancer by Horne.)

The Parkland Doctors	Trauma Room One	Positions

Horne responded that he and Gunn were allies for many years but had a falling out over the Parkland doctors. David Marwell did not have faith with the descriptions of the wounds by the Parkland doctors noting the discrepancies in the wounds so that was the initial hesitation. But Gunn was curious about their statements, so that's how Horne and Gunn bonded for awhile.

Horne waited, being told maybe the Board would depose the doctors later. After two and a half years, Horne wrote a long, substantial memo on why the Parkland doctors should be deposed and gave it to Gunn. Gunn wanted Horne to await permission to write this memo and was very displeased that Horne had written this memo at all. Horne declined to wait and asked Gunn why they couldn't give it to the Board now. Gunn choose not to.

Later, Tunheim stated that any staff member could talk to any Board member about anything they wanted, so then the gloves were off. Horne did not feel restrained by the chain of command. Horne then gave the memo to Tunheim but Tunheim never got back to him.

Horne granted that a hell of a lot was going on toward the end of the Board's existence. On July 31, 1998 the Board released their medical depositions and other materials so that was when the world noticed that the Board did not depose the Parkland doctors. (Horne gave credit to David Lifton as being the engineer of this fax and letter writing campaign to get the Board to depose the Parkland doctors. A lot of other people helped on this cause too.) This effort resulted in the Board having a conference call very shortly afterwards. Horne was later told by Laura Denk, the then and last chief counsel, that on technical merits the Board would prefer not to hold the depositions but because of public pressure they decided to go ahead.

(Sorry, folks but I am going to take some credit here. It was at an open meeting of the ARRB that Horne himself told me to raise hell about the fact that the Board did not depose any Parkland people and I certainly sent out an email (circulated by JFK Lancer) to that effect while I was still in Washington D.C. I called my parents and had them type up an email that I was dictating to them. I was on a phone at Archives II. This is a great victory for the research community that we got the Board to act when they did not want to.)

Initially, two doctors agreed to come to Washington. Then one didn't want to, and he changed the mind of the other, so neither came. Horne went to Ron Haron and said this was unacceptable, "We have to get them to Washington and get them to see the autopsy pictures and X-rays." "What was the condition of the body when it left Texas?'" is the central question. "Everything else has been asked." Well, Mr. Haron didn't seem to get it, he didn't think it was a big deal.

Haron thought Tilley could arrange the viewing of the autopsy material. Horne said no, it wasn't going to be that easy. So Haron got five of the Parkland people to agree to be deposed in Dallas and called Tilley. Horne thinks Tilley was a little miffed -- "Why are you coming to me at the last minute?" -- kind of thing. Tilley dug in his heels and put the burden for making the arrangements back upon the Board.

Horne knows that Tunheim called Burke Marshall at least once. Horne was not privy to that phone call but the result was a "No." Horne could not understand this as Humes and Boswell were given subpoenas when they did not want to corporate. The same thing happened with Custer and Reed when they stated they were scared of the government. They all came to Washington. The total bullshit excuse given to Horne by at least two ARRB personnel as to why Parkland people were not given subpoenas was that the subpoena would only be good within 100 miles and only requires the person to travel 100 miles and they might not show up. What the hell kind of explanation is this? Finck came from Switzerland! Humes and Boswell were obviously not aware of the 100 mile rule because they showed up. A federal subpoena under the banner of the Department of Justice should compel anyone to show up. This was nonsense. And, most importantly if subpoenaed, there would have been no permission required of Burke Marshall.

When Doug was in the office of George Lardner, Lardner called Steve Tilley about the Parkland depositions. Lardner repeated aloud the answers Tilley gave. Steve Tilley bragged to George Lardner that "I am the one who kept those photos from going to Dallas."

Horne repeated: Lardner recited what Tilley said aloud, so in a way, it's hearsay and not direct knowledge. And already there are three versions of this story. It's now kind of similar to "How did JFK pick LBJ for Vice President?" A mystery that everyone is disagreeing about. [I believe Horne.] Horne said the whole thing was not done the way he would have done it.

Lifton added that Jeremy Gunn had a memo that was originally in the materials released in July '98 as a justification for why the Parkland people were not deposed but this was removed. Lifton said there were people on the Board who said,

"I don't care where the President's wounds were,"

"I don't care either. Why do we have to do this?"

So the Board, responding to public pressure, had to hire someone to do the depositions. Regretfully, they choose Gunn, who was opposed to it in the first place.

---

Part 5: AN AFTERWORD BY DOUG HORNE

Part One

Part Two a

Part Two b

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

joebackes@aol.com

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