Bugliosi has performed a useful function by scrubbing away a number of nutty theories that have surfaced since Nov. 22, 1963. But what about Bugliosi's more serious intent -- to resuscitate a variant of the Warren Commission's account of the assassination?
In 1993, another lawyer, Gerald Posner, tried the same thing in his book "Case Closed." Yet Bugliosi cites numerous examples of Posner's "distortion" and "misrepresentation." He quotes approvingly a Washington Post review of Posner's book, which criticized him for presenting "only the evidence that supports the case he's trying to build, framing the evidence in a way that misleads readers."
But this is exactly what Bugliosi does. Like any experienced prosecutor, he highlights the evidence that furthers his case while ignoring or confusing contrary evidence. Examples of this approach can be found almost everywhere in the book.
Take his spirited defense of Warren Commission junior counsel Arlen Specter's "single-bullet theory." Bugliosi agrees that this theory -- that Kennedy and Texas Gov. John Connally were hit by the same bullet -- is necessary to conclude that Oswald acted alone. He also acknowledges that the theory was developed by Specter and other commission staff members in the spring of 1964 to save the single-assassin conclusion. He also notes that when the time came to approve it, the commission split down the middle.
To his credit, he tells us Connally denied from first to last that he was hit by the same bullet that hit Kennedy. His wife, Nellie, testified that she heard a shot and saw the president react to being hit. Only then did she see and hear a second shot crash into her husband's back.
Bugliosi tells us Nellie Connally was "confused" and that her husband relied upon her confusion. However, you will find nowhere in Bugliosi's book the fact that no witness in Dealey Plaza could attest to both men being hit by the same shot or that the FBI's review of the Zapruder film led them to conclude Connally and Kennedy were hit separately.
He tells us that Dr. Malcolm Perry at Parkland Hospital estimated the size of the supposed bullet exit hole in JFK's throat to be "3 mm to 5 mm in diameter," but he neglects to tell us that wound ballistics experts at Edgewood Arsenal carried out experiments showing bullets from Oswald's rifle would cause exit wounds two to three times that size.
Even more egregious is his handling of the trajectory through JFK's back and neck. A face-sheet on which notes were taken during the autopsy shows the supposed exit wound in the throat to be higher than the entry wound in the back.
When the autopsy photos were finally produced in the 1970s, a medical panel concluded that the course of the bullet through Kennedy was at an upward angle (the accepted number is 11 degrees). So how does Kennedy get shot from the sixth floor of a building when the bullet takes an upward path through his body?
The Warren Commission took the simplest course. The staff let the autopsy doctor instruct a medical illustrator to raise the back wound from the back to the neck. Commission member U.S. Rep. Gerald Ford then corrected a final draft of the panel's report to read "neck wound" rather than "back wound." Voila, a "back wound" had become a "neck wound."
Faced with that 11 degree upward angle, the House Select Committee on Assassinations took a more inventive approach in its 1978-79 investigation. It just leaned Kennedy forward at the time he was shot.
And Connally, who took a shot at a 27-degree downward angle? His body position was leaned back a sufficient amount. Voila, an 11-degree upward angle through one body had become a 27-degree downward angle through a second body, thus a straight line had been maintained.
Like any good prosecutor, Bugliosi admits it was "upward" but never tells us how much. Then he publishes a diagram from the House's report showing Kennedy bent forward. He says in a caption that the diagram shows "his head tilted forward slightly more than it actually was as shown in the Zapruder film."
That's quite an understatement since the Zapruder film never shows Kennedy bending forward at all. He's sitting erect in the back seat waving to the crowd. Then when the limousine travels behind a sign and emerges three-quarters of a second later, he's sitting erect but wounded.
The Zapruder frames contained in Bugliosi's book show Kennedy never took the position he had to take for the Warren Commission's single-bullet theory to work.
Bugliosi gets it to work by telling his readers only part of the story and by using a diagram even he admits is inaccurate. This prosecutorial approach infects the whole book and makes it unreliable as a guide to the evidence.
