Tulsa Man Discovers What May Be Assassin's Spy Camera
EXCLUSIVE - ONLY ON NEWSCHANNEL 8
UPDATED - November 14, 2001 4:03pm
Tulsa - An exclusive investigation that's been more than a year in the making may be hard to believe. A Tulsa man discovered a spy camera taped to the back of a dresser, but there's more. That spy camera may have belonged to Lee Harvey Oswald. The man shared his story only with NewsChannel 8's Jerry Giordano.
Joe San Miguel may have stumbled across a missing piece of American history -- a Minox spy camera, circa 1963.
"When we checked it out on the internet, it was like 'Wow! Oswald had one of these.'"
Joe is referring to Lee Harvey Oswald, assassin of President John F. Kennedy. In Dallas in 1963, some records indicate police removed a camera exactly like it from Oswald's possessions. Problem is, it somehow disappeared and has never been seen since. Perhaps, until now.
How did Joe find the camera? It was taped to the back of a dresser drawer bought at a Salvation Army store in Dallas. "I was pulling out drawers to match socks is all I was doing", he said. "There was so much dust like it had never been moved. You could literally see the dust."
But did that camera actually belong to Lee Harvey Oswald, and if it did, exactly what, if anything, is on the film. We went with Joe and his uncle to find out.
But finding a place to develop film this old on this type of camera wasn't easy. The closest place, ironically, is where it all began, in Dallas. It's a five-hour trip and with each passing mile, Joe wonders whether what is on the film could change the course of history.
"I don't want to be famous. But, if there's a story behind it, Oliver Stone could make a movie out of this. And if we could prove the crime, that's the main thing."
And the next afternoon, we took the camera and the film to Expert Imaging for what's certain to be a painstaking developing process. But Joe's entourage suddenly got bigger. He hired a high-powered Boston attorney to protect his rights and his property. A film expert from Kodak was also brought in for the process.
But, even those who do this for a living aren't optimistic about finding anything that could survive this test of time. "It requires a lot of TLC if you will, because film this old is gonna suffer the effects of age, heat, moisture variability. The result could be a very brittle film that could be easily damaged."
Bottom line -- damaged film means no pictures, not to mention no proof of who the camera actually belonged to.
It's a long and nerve bending process, attempting to develop pictures taken nearly four decades ago. But, amazingly, some images did survive. Joe is ecstatic.
"Definite images of kids, people, a picture of a woman with a house in back. We're hoping to use addresses off houses to id people. It's exciting."
But, exactly who those people are and how they may relate to Lee Harvey Oswald is a question that is still being investigated. San Miguel's attorney and his mother-in-law are both in Louisiana to meet with relatives of Lee Harvey Oswald, trying to confirm who is in those pictures. They've also met with Oswald's widow, Marina to show her what they found.
Both Joe and his attorney are very confident that the camera did indeed belong to Lee Harvey Oswald. The pictures are being copyrighted and we're not allowed to show you them yet. KTUL management was able to get a glimpse of the pictures and the images are obviously very old, in black and white, showing a number of different people and locations.
Now that we have seen the pictures, we can begin to help San Miguel investigate who those people are. We'll bring you the latest on the investigation as it becomes available.