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

Larry Schnapf, instead of choosing to question a medical witness to talk about Kennedy's wounds and his reactions, which had NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with Oswald, could have called in a legal expert considered to be an expert on affidavits. And, he could have questioned him about Marina Oswald's affidavit, made on November 22, 1963. In one stroke, he could have gotten Oswald acquitted. 

In her affidavit, Marina said that when police came to her house that afternoon, they asked her if Lee owned a rifle, "and I said that he used to have a rifle to hunt with in Russia." The expert could have explained to the jury that when a subject cites a distant reference (and that one was very distant; distant in time and distant in geographical distance) it is usually because they don't have a nearer reference to give police. He could have stated that if Marina knew that her husband currently owned a rifle, that she would have cited that, and it is very likely that she would not have mentioned the rifle in Russia at all. 

I am going to post the affidavit, but first I want to realize that Marina could not read English. So, someone typed it, and she signed it, but we can't presume that she had any way of confirming that what it stated were her exact words. So, that leaves us on somewhat shaky ground, but still, let's see what it says. And you know darn well that if they monkeyed with her words, it was in the direction of supporting the State's story. 

It says that she knew there was "a" rifle in the garage, wrapped in a blanket. She never stated that it was her husband's rifle. And she said that that rifle was no longer there. Of course, the implication is that Lee took it and returned to the TSBD with it on Friday morning, but that's not her implication. The fact is that she never identifies the rifle in the blanket as belonging to her husband. And then, the piece de resistance is that when they showed her the rifle in evidence and asked her if it looks like her husband's, she again referred to the past.  She said: "this is like the rifle my husband had." HAD. Past tense. HAD. Had, had, had, had, had, had, had, had, had. And then, she said she didn't remember the sight. And then she said she wasn't sure about anything. 

The point is that she could provide the police with NOTHING concrete about Oswald currently owning a rifle, and her referring to a rifle in Russia suggests that that was the nearest reference she had to when her husband owned a rifle. 

This wasn't just a rifle; it was a rifle with a story. The story was that this rifle that went on a journey to get to the 6th floor of the Texas Book Depository, and the journey started when Oswald, using the alias A. Hidell, ordered the rifle from Klein's Sporting Goods in Chicago and had it sent to a P.O. Box in Dallas. But, he was living with Marina at the time, and nobody ever suggested that he left it at the Post Office. So, he must have taken it home, and yet, Marina, on 11/22/63, knew ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about any of that. Her affidavit contradicts that whole story, and the legal expert could have explained that to the jury in no uncertain terms. Here's the affidavit:

 

Remember: all they had to establish was "reasonable doubt". This affidavit alone establishes reasonable doubt. But, Larry Schnapf was too busy interviewing a medical witness about the wounds and and head movements etc. Imagine if he had skipped that guy; never even considered bringing him in; and discussed this instead with a legal expert on affidavits. 

So, they could have had this, plus Larry Rivera's fabulous image work proving that Oswald was standing in the doorway at the time of the shots, plus the good stuff that Brian Edwards said. The very worst they could have done with all that was an overwhelming acquital-pointed hung jury, but with a darn good chance of an actual acquittal. In a word, they could have won. The prosecution was weak. Very weak. It's a disgrace they didn't win.