Warren Commission (05 of 26): Hearings Vol. V (of 15)United States. Warren Commission
History
Warren Commission (05 of 26): Hearings Vol. V (of 15)
United States. Warren Commission
Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald), 1917-1963 -- Assassination; Oswald, Lee Harvey
Mr. BELMONT. I believe the answers speak for themselves, although in
view of Mr. McCloy's questions a little while ago, I would be very
happy to make clear our approach to this matter. For example, the
fact that our interest in defectors, in this case, is shown by the
fact that in early November 1959 we opened a file on Oswald based on
the newspaper publicity as to his defection. And the fact that he had
applied to renounce his citizenship. We checked our files then to see
was this a man we had a record on, and found that we had a fingerprint
record solely based on his enlistment in the Marines.
We had no other record on him but we placed a stop or a flash notice
in our fingerprint files, at that time so that if he should come back
into the country unbeknownst to us and get into some sort of trouble
we would be immediately notified. That is our opening interest in the
case with the thought in mind that should he come back to the country
we would want to know from him whether he had been enlisted by Soviet
intelligence in some manner.
That is our procedure because of our experience that these things have
happened, and we consider it our responsibility to settle that issue
whenever we can.
Mr. STERN. Could you explain, Mr. Belmont, this procedure of placing a
stop in the files that you just referred to?
Mr. BELMONT. We merely notify our identification division to place what
we call a flash notice in the man's fingerprint file, which means that
should he be arrested and the fingerprints be sent to the FBI, that the
appropriate division, in this case the domestic intelligence division,
would be notified that the man had been arrested, for what and where he
was arrested, thus enabling us to center our attention on him.
Our next interest in this man arose as a result of the fact that his
mother had sent, I believe, $25 to him in Moscow, so we went to her in
April 1960 and we talked to her. At that time she told us that he had
told her that he would possibly attend the Albert Schweitzer College in
Switzerland.
So as a followup, we had our legal attache in Paris make inquiry to see
whether he had enrolled in this college. The resultant check showed
that while they had expected him and a deposit had been placed that he
did not show up at the college.
Mr. STERN. I think that is all covered in quite adequate detail in the
answer to the first question.
Mr. DULLES. I have one question I would like to put to you on the first
question and answer in your letter of April 6, in Exhibit 833--the
Bureau's letter of April 6. You refer, first, to the fact that the
first news you got about Oswald was from a news service item, and then
later on at the bottom of the second full paragraph you state, "A file
concerning Oswald was prepared and as communications were received from
other U.S. Government agencies those communications were placed in his
file."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account