Oswald in the doorway: the blog of the Oswald Innocence Campaign, by Ralph Cinque

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD!

I don't know whether to laugh or cry upon reading this. It's the testimony of Michael Paine, and it is unbemudderpluckinglievable.

How could this guy ponder what is wrapped up in blanket to the extent that he did without looking to see? 

What, was it hermetically sealed? It was a blanket. 

How hard is it to open a blanket? And you say it was tied off? How hard was it to untie it?


Paine: " I picked up this package and the first time I picked it up I 
thought it was camping equipment and thought to myself they don't make 
camping equipment of iron anymore ... I supposed it was camping equipment 
because it was wrapped in this greenish rustic blanket and that was the 
reason I thought it was a rustic thing ... there was also a certain 
wideness at one end and then I thought of a folding tool I had in the 
Army, a folding shovel and I was trying to think how a folding shovel fit 
with the rest of this because that wasn't quite, the folding shovel was 
too symmetrical ... I first thought it was tent poles and then I thought 
there are not enough poles here, enough to make a tent ... I visualized a 
pipe or possibly two, and with something coming off, that must have come 
off kind of abruptly a few inches at 45° angle ... I wasn't thinking of 
a rifle. Definitely that thought never occurred to me ... I would lift the 
package up, move it, put the package down and one time I was trying to 
puzzle how you could make camping equipment out of something - this is 
only one pipe in the package ... if I had been the least bit curious I 
could have at least felt this blanket but I was aware of personal 
privacy ... " 

So, the "wide thing" at one end, it never occurred to you that that could be the butt of a rifle, even though you were in the fucking Army? 

How long did you ponder on whether it could be a folding shovel? And who wraps shovels in blankets? 

I've owned shovels all my life. My father owned shovels before me, and his father before him. None of us ever wrapped a shovel in a blanket or thought to do so.  

What would be the fucking point, Paine? To keep it clean? It's a  shovel. 

So, you pondered whether it was a shovel. And you pondered whether it was tent poles, but then you wondered whether there were enough of them to actually pitch a tent. And then you started mentally visualizing the poles and how they came together, and at what angle. 

You could have felt the blanket? But, you said you picked the package up and moved it and placed it down- repeatedly. Didn't you have to handle the object or objects inside the blanket in order to do that? 

And apparently, you were the least bit curious, and more than the least bit curious, because if you weren't the least bit curious, you would have moved it without giving it any thought at all instead of trying to guess what was inside of it and ponder different possibilities. 

You know what you did, Mr. Paine, and you're not getting away with it. There is going to be a reckoning. History will not absolve you, and neither will I.