Part 7 of John Armstrong's new series; this concerns the aftermath of Oswald's arrest.
WESTBROOK'S WHEREABOUTS AFTER OSWALD'S (HARVEY'S) ARREST
Mr. Belin. Do you remember about what time of the day they arrived?
Mr. Johnson. Well, it must have been around 1:30 or 2 o'clock---the best I remember.
Mr. Belin. When did you get home that day from your work?
Mr. Johnson. Well, it was around 1 o'clock or maybe a little bit after.
Mr. Belin. How long had you been at the house when the officers arrived?
Mr. Johnson. Oh, probably 30 minutes.
Mr. Belin. All right. What happened when the officers got there? They asked if Lee Harvey Oswald lived there?
Mr. Johnson. Yes.
The owner of 1026 N. Beckley was Mr. Johnson's wife, Mrs. A.C. Johnson, and she was questioned by WC attorney Joseph Ball:
Mr. Ball. On the day of the 22d of November, were you home around 1 o'clock?
Mrs. Johnson. It must have been 1:30 or 2, something like that.
Mr. Ball. When you came home?
Mrs. Johnson.Yes; after serving lunch.
Mr. Ball. Did Earlene Roberts say anything to you whether or not this man had returned?
Mrs. Johnson. No; after these officers came in, well, then she began to-tell them that he did come rushing in......…..
The housekeeper, Mrs. Earlene Roberts, told the WC, “Well, it was Will Fritz' men---it was plainclothesmen and I was at the back doing something and Mr. Johnson answered the door and they identified themselves and then he called me. WC attorney Ball questioned Mrs. Roberts:
Mr. Ball. Do you remember the day the President was shot?
Mrs. Roberts. Yes; I remember it---who would forget that?
Mr. Ball. And the police officers came out there?
Mrs. Roberts. Yes, sir.
Mr. Ball. And they asked you if there was a man named Lee Oswald there?
Mrs. Roberts. Yes.
Mr. Ball. And you told them "No"?
Mrs. Roberts. Yes.
Mr. Ball. Then what happened after that?
Mrs. Roberts. Well, he was trying to make us understand that-I had two new men and they told me--Mrs. Johnson told me, "Go get your keys and let them see in." I had gone to the back and they still had the TV on, and they was broadcasting about Kennedy. Just as I unlocked the doors Fritz' men, two of them had walked in and she come running in and said, "Oh, Roberts, come here quick. This is this fellow Lee in this little room next to yours," and they flashed him on television, is how come us to know.
Mr. Ball. Then you knew it was the man?
Mrs. Roberts. Yes; and I come in there and she said, "Wait," and then again they flashed him back on and I said, "Yes, that's him-that's O. H. Lee
Mr. Johnson, Mrs. A.C. Johnson, and Mrs. Earlene Roberts memories concerning the time the plainclothes police officers were at 1026 N. Beckley is confirmed by the time of television broadcasts. At 2:10 PM (CST), 11/22/63, local television broadcast pictures of (HARVEY) Oswald as he was being escorted through the basement at police headquarters. Reporters announced that he was under arrest for the Tippit murder and being questioned about the assassination of President Kennedy. As Oswald was being paraded around Dallas police headquarters and allowed to speak on camera, the planners had to feel that their plot was about to unravel. They quickly brought in Jack Ruby, as a last-ditch effort, to eliminate Oswald.
The Warren Commission was never able to identify these three plainclothes officers, nor understand how they knew the address of Oswald's rooming house before Oswald had arrived at police headquarters. While riding in the squad car to police headquarters (HARVEY) Oswald refused to give the police his name or address. But Capt. Westbrook was familiar with HARVEY Oswald, very familiar, and Westbrook was very likely one of the three plainclothes officers who arrived at 1026 N. Beckley around 2:00 PM, and was there when (HARVEY) Oswald first appeared on television at 2:10 PM.
Now, why were these plainclothes officers at Oswald's rooming house only minutes after he was arrested? Their purpose, and perhaps their only purpose, may have been to plant evidence that would further implicate HARVEY Oswald in the murders of JFK and Tippit. This was the perfect opportunity to plantm amoung other items, a .38 leather holster that would implicate HARVEY in the murder of Tippit. Whoever they were, and whatever they were doing, not one of these officers filed a police report concerning their visit. The WC was never able to determine the names of these officers nor were they able to understand how anyone knew the address of Oswald's rooming house prior to his arrest. Whoever they were, these officers were probably very loyal to Capt. Westbrook.
It is worth remembering that from 12:35 PM to 1:10 PM and from 1:52 onward Westbrooks location and his activities are unknown. At 1:10 PM he rode with officer Hill, DA Bill Alexander, and reporter Jim Ewell to 10th & Patton. At 1:45 PM Westbrook was driven to the Texas Theater (the names of officers who accompanied Westbrook, if any, are unknown). After (HARVEY) Oswald was placed in the squad car around 1:52 PM Westbrook's whereabouts, and the people he was with, are unknown.
Westbrook returned to police headquarters prior to HARVEY Oswald's first interrogation by Captain Fritz, which began at 2:30 PM. After sitting in on the interrogation Westbrook came back to his office and said, "Our suspect had admitted being a communist-he had previously been in the Marine Corps, had a dishonorable discharge, had been to Russia, and had some trouble with the police in New Orleans for passing out pro-Castro literature."
As DPD officer Gerald Hill began writing his report about the arrest of Oswald, Capt. Westbrook came into the office. Hill told the WC, "I originally had the heading on it, 'Injuries sustained by suspect while effecting his arrest in connection with the murder of Officer J. D. Tippit,' and a few minutes later Captain Westbrook came in the office and said that our suspect had admitted being a Communist. This is strictly hearsay. I did not hear it myself. He himself also said a few minutes later he had previously been in the Marine Corps, had a dishonorable discharge, had been to Russia, and had had some trouble with the police in New Orleans for passing out pro-Castro literature. This still is all hearsay because I didn't actually hear it firsthand myself .... And at about this point Captain Westbrook suggested that I change the heading of my report to include arrest of the suspect in the assassination of the President and in the murder of Officer J. D. Tippit, which I did. Westbrook's insistence that Oswald be named as a suspect in the assassination of JFK and Officer Tippit is further reason to believe that he was a co-conspirator. After the assassination Captain Westbrook relocated to South Vietnam, where he served as a CIA special advisor to the Saigon Police.
LEE OSWALD, STILL WEARING A WHITE T-SHIRT, WAS SEEN SOON AFTER HARVEY OSWALD'S ARREST
HARVEY Oswald, sitting in the Dallas jail, now had both the CIA and FBI desperately trying to distance themselves from him, link him with Castro and/or Cuba, frame him for two murders, hide his true identity, and create a legend that portrayed him as a "lone nut." LEE Oswald was not in jail, and shortly after HARVEY's arrest he was taken out the back of the theater and driven, perhaps by reserve Sgt. Kenneth Croy, to a two-tone blue 1957 Plymouth. A short while later LEE Oswald was driving back and forth on Davis St., six blocks north of the Texas Theater. He drove his car behind a large billboard and appeared to be hiding from the police who were patrolling the streets. T.F. White, a career mechanic who worked across the street at Mack Pate's Auto Service, was curious and walked toward the car. The man, sitting in the car with the engine running, was wearing a white t-shirt and looked directly at Mr. White. As White walked toward the car the driver quickly sped away throwing gravel with his rear tires. White wrote the make and model of the car and the license plate number (PP4537) in his notebook.
Mr. White told FBI agent Charles Brown the man driving the car was (LEE) Oswald. The authorities soon determined the license plates were registered to a two-tone blue 1957 Plymouth that was owned by Tippit's best friend, Carl Mather, an employee of Collins Radio (a very important CIA contractor). So, LEE Oswald murdered Tippit and an hour later was driving a car owned by Tippit's best friend, Carl Mather. Wes Wise (later the Mayor of Dallas), accompanied by a CBS reporter, interviewed Carl and Barbara Mather over dinner. Barbara Mather was calm, but Carl Mather was so upset and agitated that he was unable to eat. Years later Carl Mather agreed to be interviewed by the HSCA, but not before insisting on a grant of immunity. Ken Porter, another employee of Collins Radio, quit his job after the assassination, divorced his wife, and married Oswald's widow--Marina. In the FBI report that described the sighting of Oswald driving Mather's car, the bureau changed the two-tone blue 1957 Plymouth to a red Ford Falcon. This allowed Barbara Mather (Carl Mather's wife) to tell the FBI that they had never owned a red car.
The fate of HARVEY Oswald, in Dallas Police custody until he was killed by Jack Ruby, is well-known. But LEE Oswald's whereabouts following the assassination become increasingly difficult to follow. One intriguing account of his possible escape from the Dallas area comes from a decorated U.S. Air Force 20-year veteran named Robert Vinson. Vinson said that on the afternoon of November 22 he was a passenger on a nearly deserted C-54 cargo plane that departed from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland. Soon after the assassination the plane was diverted and landed on what appeared to be a road under construction near the Trinity River south of Dallas. There, Vinson said, a Jeep carrying two men and a driver pulled up to the plane and the two passengers came aboard. Vinson said the taller man might have been Cuban, and, after he saw televised pictures of Lee HARVEY Oswald, he felt the shorter man "looked an awful lot like Oswald." The flight continued to an Air Force Base in Roswell, New Mexico, where all the passengers deplaned. Vinson said he was told the entire base was on lockdown until later in the evening. Click here for Part 2 of the YouTube interview with Vinson. Additional background information on Vinson is in Part 1 of the interview, also on YouTube.
The next day, after collecting HARVEY Oswald's possessions with a search warrant, the Dallas police found the left half of two dollar bills in his room at 1026 N. Beckley (see attachment). The right half of these dollar bills may have been held by HARVEY's contact for identification. Curiously, neither of these items were listed on the police inventory of 11/23/63, the joint FBI/DPD inventory of 11/26/63, nor photographed. At the National Archives in Adelphi, MD, I inspected and handled each item of inventory listed on the joint FBI/DPD inventory of 11/26/63. These items were not among the inventory.
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