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

Did they kill Ike Altgens? I can't say for sure but I strongly suspect that they did. Officially, he and his wife died from a gas leak at their home in Dallas. But, let's consider the facts:

1) He died in 1995 during the Assassination Record Review Board hearings, which were started in response to the public furor over the movie JFK. 

2) Altgens was rich. He lived in the most posh neighborhood of Dallas; the equivalent of Bererly Hills. He most certainly was not servicing his own gas furnace. He surely had first-rate equipment that was professionally serviced. 

3) Initial reports said nothing about a gas leak. They just said that he and his wife hadn't been seen or heard from in several days, and a niece or nurse went there to check on them and found them dead in the house. Was there no rotten egg smell from the gas? Sulfur compounds are added to odorless gas precisely so that people will become aware of gas leaks. That has been standard practice for a long time.

4) There was no mention of police starting an investigation afterwards. If incompetent heating service was provided by a service company that resulted in the death of two elderly people, didn't that warrant an investigation? Were they going to wait until somebody else got killed? 

6) And here's the biggest concern of all:  In reporting what happened, it was added that both Altgens and his wife were in failing health. What? Were they suggesting that old age and ill-health combined with carbon monoxide poisoning to kill them, that it was a double whammy? But, that is ridiculous, and, it is especially ridiculous since it involved two people. The odds of a man and his wife dying of natural causes at the exact same time are practically nil.  Plus, there is no evidence that James Altgens was in frail health. He was 76, and he looked vigorous. He had good proportions, and he kept himself lean. It's like they were trying too hard to sell the story.

I don't know if James Altgens is included as a mysterious death connected to the JFK assassination, but I'm here to tell you that he should be.