News Traveled Fast on Nov. 22, 1963

 

Click photo for enlarged version.

Notice the date of publication. November 22 (Third Edition). California would have been two hours behind Texas, making the time of the assassination 10:30 instead of half past noon. But still, to have these quotes from Dallas Police and a photo of Lee by the end of the day is quite amazing. Did the information Gannaway furnished the press come from the FBI or from some other source?

On April 24, 1964, the Dallas Morning News had contained an article concerning a "five-paragraph memo" prepared by Lieutenant Jack Revill, which had been passed along to Chief of Police Jesse Curry. Curry, who had testified before the Warren Commission (WC) during the third week of April, gave the Commission a copy of the memo. Following up on Curry's testimony, the Dallas Morning News quoted "a source close to the Warren Commission" about the evidence presented to the WC, including Revill's memo. The Associated Press called Lt. Revill at a convention in Sacramento, California, and were told that another Dallas policeman could confirm that FBI Agent James (Joe) Hosty had told the local police: 

"We knew he [Oswald] was capable of assassinating the president..."

Jack Revill had first appeared before the Warren Commission on March 31, three weeks before his Chief, but had been questioned only in regard to the shooting of Lee Oswald by Jack Ruby. Apparently the WC questioners were unaware of the Friday afternoon headlines which zeroed in on Oswald and quoted Revill's immediate superior, W. Pat Gannaway, saying that Oswald had been to the Soviet Union and had a Russian wife, even obtaining a 1959 photo of Oswald when he left Fort Worth, later ending up in Moscow.

While the AP contacted Revill in California, the rival paper of the Morning News, the Dallas Times Herald, contacted FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. He furnished them a most amazing statement:

"This is absolutely false. The agent made no such statement and the FBI did not have such knowledge."

The only thing absolute in this flap was that somebody was lying. Was it a member of the local Dallas police, or was it a member of the FBI?

To discover the truth, Lt. Revill was called back to the WC on May 13 to testify about his conversation with Agent Hosty in the DPD. Revill said he had previously conducted a "systematic search" of the Texas School Book Depository offices (located at 411 Elm) along with numerous other detectives from his office. He went directly from that location to the basement of DPD, where he got out of his car and allowed it to be parked by a staff member. Before he could enter the headquarters building, he testified, Agent Hosty had run up to him, saying:

"Jack, a Communist killed President Kennedy....Lee Oswald killed President Kennedy....He is in our Communist file. We knew he was here in Dallas." 

 Both Gannaway and Revill have been discussed previously at this blog in connection with the framing of Candy Barr for narcotics possession. As undercover narcotics policemen in Dallas, they also knew George W. Owen, a man once married to Maurine Biner, the woman John Dean eventually married shortly after the Watergate break-in in Washington, D.C. Owen was said to have been present at the Murchison home on November 21, 1963, along with LBJ's girlfriend, Madeleine Duncan Brown, and others who overheard LBJ threaten that after the following day Johnson would not have to put up with Kennedy any more. Is it possible Owen's police friends heard about the plan from him and were prepared to release the background on Oswald quickly? Also according to Brown, George Owen had driven to Redbird Airport in Dallas the night of the 21st to meet J. Edgar Hoover's plane and deliver him to the Murchison party. She said Owen was ready to talk when he suddenly dropped dead. Read more on this story at the March 26, 2011 posting, "

George W. Owen, a Friend of LBJ's Mistress."