Harold Weisberg is the author of a number of books on the assassination of John F. Kennedy, including the Whitewash series, Oswald in New Orleans, Post Mortem, Never Again!, and Case Open. Weisberg was a journalist, investigator for the Senate Committee on Civil Liberties, and analyst for the Office of Strategic Services in World War II. He died in Maryland in 2002.

Oswald in New Orleans

A Case for Conspiracy With the CIA

By Harold Weisberg

Skyhorse Publishing

Copyright © 1967 Harold Weisberg
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-62636-058-7

Contents

Foreword by Jim Garrison,
Prologue,
Introduction,
1. The Captain and the Generals and the Cubans,
2. The Raveled Threads,
3. The Unsecret Secret,
4. Creatures of the CIA,
5. The “Gay Boys” and Their Jive-Talking Lawyer,
6. The Spy Who Stayed Out in the Cold,
7. Assassination: A “Colloquial Expression”,
8. Ferrie Private, Ferrie Public,
9. “Checked Out and Found Clear”,
10. Dr. Jekyll — or Mr. Hyde — or Both?,
11. “President Kennedy Should Have Been Assassinated After the Bay of Pigs”,
12. A Thousand Medusas,
13. Seek (Nothing) and Ye Shall Find (Nothing),
14. Garrison’s Gallery,
15. Preliminary Postscript from Miami,
Conclusion,
Shadow of a Happy Ending — An Epilogue,
Index,

CHAPTER 1

THE CAPTAIN AND THE GENERAL AND THE CUBANS

Wesley J. Liebeler, now professor of law at the University of California at Los Angeles and one of the two most active and most important of the assistant counsel on the Commission’s staff, conducted a major part of this investigation for the Commission and left big holes in it. This is not surprising, from his record of incomplete and inconclusive interrogations, interrogations in which he failed to ask the obvious questions and failed to introduce the most obvious evidence.

The deposition of slightly more than four pages that he took from Frederick S. O’Sullivan in the Old Civil Courts Building at Royal and Conti Streets in New Orleans, for some inexplicable reason is indicated as having been taken on two days, April 7 and 8, 1964. Yet Liebeler was a veritable whirlwind deposition-taker in Dallas {Whitewash II, Part 3), eliciting more than twice this much testimony in but ten minutes.

O’Sullivan, then a New Orleans vice squad detective, had been Oswald’s classmate in Beauregard Junior High School. They had been interested in the Civil Air Patrol together. Ferrie, the man arrested in New Orleans on November 25, 1963, as a suspect somehow involved in the assassination, had been the leader of each of the two New Orleans CAP wings.

In asking O’Sullivan about Ferrie (8H30), there was this exchange:

Mr. Liebeler: Am I correct in understanding that there has been publicity here in the New Orleans area concerning a possible relationship between Oswald and Ferrie?

Mr. O’Sullivan: Yes, sir; I believe Captain Ferrie was arrested. I am sure he was arrested, and I believe it was in connection with this Oswald situation. He was booked at the first district station. I don’t know just what he was charged with, I believe just 107, under investigation of whatever it was, I don’t know.

There Liebeler’s and all official interest in the Ferrie arrest ceased.

Likewise, although O’Sullivan informed Liebeler that the records of the Civil Air Patrol for the period when Oswald may have been a member still existed (8H30) and gave the name of their custodian, Robert Boylston, Liebeler did not call Boylston as a witness. Nor did he obtain the files, available under subpoena if not voluntarily. Lt. Paul Dwyer, of the New Orleans police, who went with O’Sullivan to examine Ferrie’s plane, also was not called as a witness. The Report says Oswald “was briefly a member of the Civil Air Patrol” (R679).

Liebeler is an especially important man in the story of “Oswald in New Orleans,” for he took depositions from a large number of people who, directly and indirectly, play significant roles, including Mrs. Sylvia Odio, Dean Andrews, Orest and Ruperto Pena, Eoaristo Rodriguez, FBI Agents John Lester Quigley and James P. Hosty, Jr., William E. Wulf, Carlos Bringuier, Lt. Francis L. Martello, Dial Ryder, Charles W. Greener, Gertrude Hunter, Edith Whitworth, Marina Oswald, Warren Reynolds, and General Edwin A. Walker.

General Walker’s testimony is not unrelated to the account of the involvement of refugee Cubans and their organizations in the assassination. Liebeler took the deposition from the radical-right leader whose campaign to indoctrinate U.S. soldiers in Germany with the propaganda of the radical right led to an international scandal and his resignation from the Army. Liebeler acted as though they were old buddies.

This one deposition took more time than all of Liebeler’s interrogations of the photographic witnesses whose pictures were the Commission’s most important tangible evidence of the assassination (Whitewash 11, pp.l28f£).

Yet Liebeler’s interrogation of Walker is entirely superficial and almost jovial omitting those things concerned with the possibility of a right-wing conspiracy. Instead, Liebeler restricted himself largely to questions about whether Oswald had taken a potshot at Walker. The Commission, on the basis of no real evidence whatsoever, decided Oswald had, thus was violence-prone. Not even Walker believed it. Why this required 25 pages and more than three hours perhaps Liebeler can explain, for this is 12 times the time he devoted to James W. Altgens, who took the most important single picture of the assassination.

Whereas the Commission did not allow Mrs. Arnold Rowland to correct the transcript of her testimony to make it accurate (Whitewash 11, “Eyes So Blind”), Liebeler opened Walker’s testimony with the statement that Walker and his attorney “will be given an opportunity to make whatever changes in the testimony may be necessary, so that the transcript reflects accurately what happened here today” (11H404). But earlier that same morning, 14 pages ahead in the printed volume, when Mrs. Ruth Paine pointed out an error in the page proofs of her earlier testimony (3H45), Liebeler promised, “I will correct the page proofs” (11H390), but he didn’t.

While all the typed transcripts were still “TOP SECRET” three years after the assassination, Liebeler promised that “a copy of the transcript will be made available to General Walker” through the stenographer. It therefore is less than surprising that Liebeler offered this description of his allegedly vigorous, searching examination of the right-wing extremist general, “… this is almost a friendly, if I may say so, session …” (11H415).

It was so friendly that Liebeler himself testified to other incorrect things, consistent with the general’s politics, as with Oswald’s membership in the “Fair Play for Cuba Committee.” Oswald’s was, in fact, an affiliated and entirely phony one-man, self-designated non-organization. Oswald’s selection of the name of the national group seems to have been designed for no good purpose but for purposes consistent with the establishment of what in intelligence is known as a “cover,” a fact that, from the record, entirely escaped the Commission and its assistant counsel.

In what amounts to a reversal of functions, Liebeler offered this “testimony”:

“The fact that Oswald may have been a member of this organization, which he was, of course, is a fact that can be viewed from many different ways” (11H420).

It was so friendly that Liebeler never mentioned or asked about one name above all that; from the evidence, he should have asked with the most persistent and penetrating questions of which he, as a professor of law, should have been capable. Not once did Liebeler mention the names, Colonel Caster, Colonel Castor, or Colonel Castorr. Oswald was known to have had connections with Cuban refugee groups. The FBI and Secret Service knew of the interest in these groups, described as political, of a Colonel Caster or Castor, whose full name and address they never sought from even the phone book and of whose activities the available record indicates a studious official avoidance. The existence of no colonel named Caster or Castor in Dallas at that time is revealed by the telephone book, as is also the existence of a Colonel L. Robert Castorr, who is known to have been a friend of the general’s and to whom we shall return.

As he did in other cases, such as where the Commission’s files contained documentary evidence that Oswald was “all right” to the FBI before the assassination, Liebeler edged up to the point several times without touching on it. For example (11H425):

Mr. Liebeler: Do you recall speaking — pardon me, not speaking, but going to any meetings of anti-Castro Cuban groups during the month of October 1963?

General Walker: During what month?

Mr. Liebeler: October.

General Walker: I don’t remember a date of attendance (sic).

Then Walker acknowledged that he had attended a meeting of what apparently was the “DRE,” or the “Student Revolutionary Council.” Liebeler asked. “They came from Miami?” and Walker replied, “I believe they came from Miami.”

Liebeler’s only interest was in whether Walker met Oswald there; the general said he had not.

This group — only one of the many Cuban refugee groups, and Liebeler asked not a single question about any other, including similarly named ones — is, as we shall see, that of a former Oswald New Orleans contact, Carlos Bringuier. It is Bringuier who fought with him in August 1963 and gave Oswald the public image and newspaper clippings he used in Mexico City in an unsuccessful effort to pose as a friend of Castro and gain entrance into Cuba.

Aside from the numerous other groups and the possible, if not probable, connection Walker had with them, including by political interest and through the unidentified colonel, there is other remarkable concord between this too-limited questioning by Liebeler and the Commission’s knowledge, both its public record and its files. The characters in the story of “The False Oswald” were in Dallas at that time and they were from Miami, near where they were engaged in training Cubans for an invasion of Cuba, save for one, who was a trainee. In this Liebeler had no interest, here or elsewhere in his relatively lengthy questioning of the radical-right general!

He did not even ask if Walker had any relations of any kind, directly or indirectly, with these Cuban groups with which the Commission’s own evidence showed the general did have connections.

Liebeler had no interest in the strong suggestion made by the general of Cuban involvement in the shooting of Warren Reynolds, one of the very few witnesses to the murder of Officer J. D. Tippit who did not immediately identify the man leaving the scene of the crime as Oswald. Walker volunteered of the Reynolds shooting that “a Latin type was seen running away” (11H418).

What can be said for Liebeler is that he is consistent. With the witnesses he should have asked about the Dallas police document that quoted the FBI as saying of Oswald before the assassination that he was “all right.” In his hearing room, Liebeler ignored the fact and the document. With Walker in front of him, Liebeler asked him not a single question — in all three hours of largely pointless “friendly” questioning — about his own relations with the Cuban groups so obviously involved in the assassination, either direct relations or through others, like his friend the colonel, or members of his own staff, whose composition Liebeler also failed to ask.

Not unrelated is the testimony of Warren Reynolds, the used car salesman who was shot through the head after he had not identified Oswald as the killer of Officer Tippit. Reynolds is one of a number of witnesses to the departure — it can hardly be called “flight” — of the man who killed the policeman. Strange things have befallen others, as set forth in Penn Jones’s book, Forgive My Grief.

These excerpts from Reynolds’s testimony bear on his relationship with General Walker, on the fact of physical violence against an eyewitness who was not in accord with the official account, a subtlety that from the record seems to have escaped Liebeler, and the description of Reynolds’s assailant:

Mr. Liebeler: Have you considered, when you thought about this problem, that there are other people that actually went down to the police station and viewed Oswald In lineups, and have testified in Washington before this Commission, and received international publicity in connection with the identification of Oswald as the murderer of Tippet and that so far at any rate, they have not been attacked in any way such as you were?

Mr. Reynolds: Yes, I have.

Mr. Liebeler: Can you suggest to me why you were picked out to be shot for this reason and not these other people?

Mr. Reynolds: The ones that I know, I am the only aggressor in the whole bunch. I am the only one that actually did something more than just look. I actually did something.

Mr. Liebeler: But that is the only distinction you can see between yourself and those other people?

Mr. Reynolds: That’s right.

Mr. Liebeler: Have you discussed this question of the possible relationship between your shooting and the assassination, with General Walker?

Mr. Reynolds: Yes, I have.

Mr. Liebeler: What did you say to him and what did he say to you about this matter, if you remember.

Mr. Reynolds: Oh, I said to him basically the same thing that I have said to you, and he said it could be and he thinks that it’s strange that I was shot. I think anybody would think it strange. But of course, if you have ever talked to him, he wouldn’t say yes or no.

Mr. Liebeler: Does General Walker know of any facts, so far as you know, that would relate your shooting to the assassination?

Mr. Reynolds: No.

Mr. Liebeler: He has never expressed a firm opinion to you one way or the other as to whether there was in fact, any connection between the two, has he?

Mr. Reynolds: Let me just let him answer that when he talks to you.

Mr. Liebeler: Did you know that he is going to talk to us?

Mr. Reynolds: Yes, I do.

Mr. Liebeler: How do you know that?

Mr. Reynolds: I talked to him.

Mr. Liebeler: Talked to him since we have invited him to come over and talk to us?

Mr. Reynolds: Yes.

Mr. Liebeler: When is the last time you talked to General Walker?

Mr. Reynolds: Around noon today.

Mr. Liebeler: Talked to him on the telephone? Or in person?

Mr. Reynolds: Telephone; yes.

Mr. Liebeler: Did you discuss with him your appearance before the Commission here?

Mr. Reynolds: Yes.

Mr. Liebeler: Would you tell us the general subject of your conversation?

Mr. Reynolds: I just don’t want to answer that, really.

Mr. Liebeler: Preceding your conversation at noon today, when was the last time you talked to him before that, do you remember, approximately?

Mr. Reynolds: About a week ago. Maybe 2 weeks.

Mr. Liebeler: How many times have you talked to him about this question altogether?

Mr. Reynolds: I have no idea; five or six.

Mr. Liebeler: Now, in fact, General Walker sent a telegram to the Commission suggesting that we take your testimony, did he not?

Mr. Reynolds: Yes.

Mr. Liebeler: You knew that he did? Did he tell you that?

Mr. Reynolds: Yes. May I go off the record?

Mr. Liebeler: Sure. (11H440-1)

Mr. Reynolds: I would like to say something that might be important. About 3 weeks after I got out of the hospital, which would be around the 20th of February, my little lo-year-old daughter — somebody tried to pick her up, tried to get her in a car.

Now, again, whether that has any connection or not, I don’t know, but it did happen, and it never had happened before nor after. But they even offered her money. She was smart enough to run and get away (11H441-2).

Mr. Liebeler: When did you see the man run off?

Mr. Reynolds: When I ran upstairs and ran around to the right to get this towel, and he came up out of the basement. I saw him and two more people saw him.

Mr. Liebeler: You then got the towel. Did you call the police?

Mr. Reynolds: I was able to call the police. Then I laid down just for a few minutes, and the ambulance got there and carried me to the hospital, and by some miracle, I survived, very much a miracle. The police got the call at 9:19 p.m. in the evening of January 23.

Mr. Liebeler: Now were you able to identify the individual who ran up out of the basement?

Mr. Reynolds: No.

Mr. Liebeler: Do you have any idea who it was?

Mr. Reynolds: No.

Mr. Liebeler: What kind of fellow did he look like? Did you get a physical description of him?

Mr. Reynolds: No; it was just a blur to me. It was just a blur, but the people that saw him said he was around 5 foot 4, weight around 130 or 140 pounds, and was either Spanish or Cuban or Indian or something like that; not Negro.

Mr. Liebeler: He was not a Negro, but he was of a foreign extraction or foreign appearing, or dark colored?

Mr. Reynolds: Yes, dark colored, the way they described him. He had a rifle (11H437-8).

Reynolds described a Latin. He specifically said Cuban. Liebeler changed this to omit any reference to Latin or Cuban identification, substituting what is much less specific, “of foreign extraction or foreign appearing.’ What purpose this served consistent with an honest and thorough investigation he alone can explain. But this is only part of what Wesley Liebeler should explain.

Explanations are not forthcoming from him. Instead, we get charges, often slanders, against those who dare say the government has presented less than the truth about the assassination of President Kennedy. He usually commands a good press and generous attention. Most recently he has become the fox hired to guard the chickenhouse. He has actually bamboozled the University of California into sponsoring his “investigation” of the Warren Report, for he now says it is time for “both sides” to be heard, as though this is not what the taxpayers hired him and the rest of the staff to do, as though this is not what was expected of and promised in the Report.

(Continues…)Excerpted from Oswald in New Orleans by Harold Weisberg. Copyright © 1967 Harold Weisberg. Excerpted by permission of Skyhorse Publishing.
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