Report of the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. KennedyUnited States. Warren Commission
History
Report of the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy
United States. Warren Commission
Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald), 1917-1963 -- Assassination; Oswald, Lee Harvey
During the evening of November 22, the Dallas Police Department
performed paraffin tests on Oswald’s hands and right cheek in an
apparent effort to determine, by means of a scientific test, whether
Oswald had recently fired a weapon. The results were positive for
the hands and negative for the right cheek.[C4-669] Expert testimony
before the Commission was to the effect that the paraffin test was
unreliable[C4-670] in determining whether or not a person has fired a
rifle or revolver.[C4-671] The Commission has, therefore, placed no
reliance on the paraffin tests administered by the Dallas police. (See
app. X, pp. 561-562.)
Oswald provided little information during his questioning. Frequently,
however, he was confronted with evidence which he could not explain,
and he resorted to statements which are known to be lies.[C4-672] While
Oswald’s untrue statements during interrogation were not considered
items of positive proof by the Commission, they had probative value in
deciding the weight to be given to his denials that he assassinated
President Kennedy and killed Patrolman Tippit. Since independent
evidence revealed that Oswald repeatedly and blatantly lied to the
police, the Commission gave little weight to his denials of guilt.
Denial of Rifle Ownership
From the outset, Oswald denied owning a rifle. On November 23, Fritz
confronted Oswald with the evidence that he had purchased a rifle under
the fictitious name of “Hidell.” Oswald said that this was not true.
Oswald denied that he had a rifle wrapped up in a blanket in the Paine
garage. Oswald also denied owning a rifle and said that since leaving
the Marine Corps he had fired only a small bore .22 rifle.[C4-673] On
the afternoon of November 23, Officers H. M. Moore, R. S. Stovall, and
G. F. Rose obtained a search warrant and examined Oswald’s effects in
the Paine garage. They discovered two photographs, each showing Oswald
with a rifle and a pistol.[C4-674] These photographs were shown to
Oswald on the evening of November 23 and again on the morning of the
24th. According to Fritz, Oswald sneered, saying that they were fake
photographs, that he had been photographed a number of times the day
before by the police, that they had superimposed upon the photographs
a rifle and a revolver.[C4-675] He told Fritz a number of times that
the smaller photograph was either made from the larger, or the larger
photograph was made from the smaller and that at the proper time he
would show that the pictures were fakes. Fritz told him that the two
small photographs were found in the Paine garage. At that point,
Oswald refused to answer any further questions.[C4-676] As previously
indicated, Marina Oswald testified that she took the two pictures with
her husband’s Imperial Reflex camera when they lived on Neely Street.
Her testimony was fully supported by a photography expert who testified
that in his opinion the pictures were not composites.[C4-677]
The Revolver
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