REOPENKENNEDYCASE - 

Warren Commission reservations concerning Jack Dougherty


March 12, 1964, a memo was sent from Warren Commission lawyer Melvin A. Eisenberg to J. Lee Rankin. Eisenberg set out his suspicions concerning the testimony and actions of Jack Edwin Dougherty who was employed as an order-filler at the Texas School Book Depository.



The memo was sent approximately one month before Dougherty was due to give his sworn testimony concerning events in the Texas School Book Depository on November 22, 1963 in front of the Warren Commission.



Although TSBD superintendent Roy Sansom Truly tried to paint a picture of Jack Dougherty as being mentally retarded I believe the facts claim otherwise. He finished High School in Dallas. He was accepted into the Army where he served for just over two years. He was also quite articulate according to his Warren Commission testimony even though he did seem to make errors concerning times and dates.



The “retardation” is simply a cover story.



Here is the memo:



MEMORANDUM

TO: J Lee Rankin

FROM: Melvin A. Eisenberg

SUBJECT: Identity of Assassin



I think a thorough investigation should he run on a TSBD employee named Jack Dougherty.



On the morning of November 22, Dougherty was part of a crew laying a new plywood floor on the sixth floor of the TSBD. This crew consisted of Danny Arce, Dougherty, Charles Givens, James ("Junior") Jarman, Billy Lovelady, and Bonnie Rae Williams, all regular employees in the TSBD shipping and. order-filling department.

They were apparently working under the direction of William Shelley the senior employee in that department.



In a written statement to the Dallas police on November 22,

Dougherty gave the following story: On the morning of November 22, he had worked [with the floor laying crew] on the sixth floor until 12:00, when he went down to the first floor to eat his lunch. After lunch he returned to work [on the sixth floor] and then went down to the fifth floor "to get some stock," when he heard a shot, which sounded as if it had come from inside the building. He then went down to the first floor and asked Eddie Piper, the TSBD Janitor, whether Piper had heard anything. Piper said yes, he had heard 3 shots. Dougherty then returned to the sixth floor. (81B.20)[


SA Blake of the Secret Service, who interviewed Dougherty between December 2 and December 5, reported that "when Dougherty was interviewed he seemed to be very confused about time and places. Mr. Truly [Roy S. Truly, Superintendent of the TSBD] finished the information that although Dougherty is a very good employee and a hard worker, he is mentally retarded and has difficulty in remembering facts, such as dates, times, places, and. has-been especially confused since the assassination." (SS 1*91 at p. 7)



I am suspicious of Dougherty for several reasons.



(1) He has no alibi. Of the six employees on the floor laying crew, Givens claims to have been with a friend at a parking lot several blocks away when the assassination took place; Williams and Jarman were together on the fifth floor with another employee named Norman; Lovelady was standing outside the TSBD (and was photographed); and Arce claims to have been standing outside the TSBD.

Dougherty was inside the TSBD and all alone.


(2) His story is very thin.

(a) It does not make sense that Dougherty, one of a six-man floor laying crew, should begin working before the other five members returned from lunch.

(b) It is questionable that Dougherty would have had to go to the fifth floor to get "stock" in connection with the floor-laying project.



1/ Dougherty’s father told the FBI that Dougherty had received a medical discharge from the U.S. Army and had considerable difficulty coordinating his mental facilities and his speech. (5.367)





(c) Jarman, Norman, and Williams, who were at the southeast window of the fifth floor at the time of the assassination, and ran from there to the southwest window, make absolutely no mention of having seen Dougherty on the fifth floor.

(d) It does not seem credible that Dougherty would have gone down to the first floor, found out that the three shots had been fired, and then casually returned to the sixth floor.

(e) No report indicates that Dougherty or anyone else was on the sixth floor when that floor was searched

(f) Since Dougherty heard the shots on the fifth floor, and since the shots were fired at approximately 12:32, Dougherty must have returned to the sixth floor, allegedly to go back to work, before 12:30. This seems odd, since the TSBD lunch period extends until 12:45.

(3) If Dougherty is “mentally retarded,” it may explain some of the inconsistencies in his story. On the other hand, the “mental retardation” may be an emotional problem, which would itself be grounds for suspicion. In this connection, I find disturbing Truly’s comment that Dougherty “has been especially confused since the assassination.”



cc: Ball

Belin

Craig

Adams

Specter

Redlich



A couple of questions jump out of this:

• None of these “concerns” or “suspicions” were explicitly discussed with Dougherty when he was on the stand and from the existing record they weren’t discussed with him by the FBI or the Dallas Police after Eisenberg had raised them.
  
  
• Eisenberg claims the time of the shots was 12:32PM. This is the time also laid out in other documents relating to the assassination investigation. So what time was Kennedy actually shot?