During the latter stages of this autopsy, Dr. Humes located an opening which appeared to be a bullet hole which was below the shoulders and two inches to the right of the middle line of the spinal column.

This opening was probed by Dr. Humes with the finger, at which time it was determined that the trajectory of the missile entering at this point had entered at a downward position of 45 to 60 degrees. Further probing determined that the distance traveled by this missile was a short distance inasmuch as the end of the opening could be felt with the finger.

Inasmuch as no complete bullet of any size could be located in the brain area and likewise no bullet could be located in the back or any other area of the body as determined by total body X-Rays and inspection revealing there was no point of exit, the individuals performing the autopsy were at a loss to explain why they could find no bullets.

A call was made by Bureau agents to the Firearms Section of the FBI Laboratory, at which time SA Charles L. Killion advised that the Laboratory had received through Secret Service Agent Richard Johnson a bullet which had reportedly been found on a stretcher in the emergency room of Parkland Hospital, Dallas, Texas. This stretcher had also contained a stethoscope and pair of rubber gloves. Agent Johnson had advised the Laboratory that it had not been ascertained whether or not this was the stretcher which had been used to transport the body of President Kennedy. Agent Killion further described this bullet as pertaining to a 6.5 millimeter rifle which would be approximately a 25 caliber rifle and that this bullet consisted of a copper alloy full jacket.

Immediately following receipt of this information, this was made available to Dr. Humes who advised that in his opinion this accounted for no bullet being located which had entered the back region and that since external cardiac massage had been performed at Parkland Hospital, it was entirely possible that through such movement the bullet had worked its way back out of the point of entry and had fallen on the stretcher."

Law: Here's a piece I don't know what to think of. He said- Custer again - he's talking about finding a bullet fragment in the autopsy room. I've talked to quite a few people and no one else remembers this: "I called one of the pathologists over and said, 'Hey, we have a bullet here.' As soon as they heard that, they came down off the raised platform, they ran over and then picked it up. Then Sibert and O'Neill also came over and said, `Well, we want that.'

Sibert: We never... the only thing we took position of, William, was a little jar with bullet fragments that had been removed from the brain. You know, metal particles?

Law: That's the only thing I've ever had reported to me, and Mr. Custer has since passed away

Sibert: I don't remember anything about a bullet - you know they couldn't find that bullet wound in the back - and they probed that and there was no exit. So, I said, "Well, let me go and call over at the lab, see if there is any kind of an ice bullet that might have fragmentized completely" That was when I called agent Killion over at the lab, and he said, "Have you learned about the bullet they found under the stretcher over at Parkland?" Now, I came back and reported that to Humes, the chief pathologist, and that's the only - I never saw that bullet. They were sending that bullet in, but it didn't come into the autopsy room. I think they flew it into the Washington area, and that went directly to the FBI laboratory, the firearms section.

Law: I've talked to Mr. O'Neill quite a bit about this and asked him about his belief in the single-bullet theory, and he said, "Absolutely not, it did not happen!"

Sibert: Well, you can put me in the same category! Have you read Arlen Specter's latest book, Passion For Truth?"

Law: No, I haven't. I do not believe in the single-bullet theory from all I've read, and how can...

Sibert: I told them before they asked me to come up for the [ARRB] deposition, I said: "Well, before I come up, I want to tell you one thing: I don't buy the single bullet theory." And they said, "We don't expect you to."

Law: Yes, when I talked to Mr. O'Neill, he was adamant that it did not happen.

Sibert: In the first place, they moved the bullet wound, the one in the back. See, I don't know if you recall, but over at Parkland, they weren't even aware of the back wound, because they had a big fight over there as to who had jurisdiction. Texas had a law that any kind of a murder done in Texas, the autopsy had to be performed there. They didn't know about the back wound. But they get to Bethesda - here's the pathetic part-they found the wound in the back, of course, they took the wound in the neck as a straight tracheotomy and they didn't find out that it was a bullet wound until the next morning when they called Parkland.

Law: Do you think it was a straight tracheotomy?

Sibert: Oh! They said over there that the... I forget who tile doctor was there but he said he made that tracheotomy right over a bullet wound.

Law: That was Malcolm Perry.

Sibert: Perry, yeah. And you know, a lot of them over there said first that they thought it was an entrance wound. So, you had Parkland not knowing about the back wound, you had Bethesda not knowing about the bullet wound in the neck, taking it as a tracheotomy; which really gets you off on the right foot.

Law: Were you surprised you weren't called before the Warren Commission?

Sibert: I was at the time, but now I can understand why.

Law: Why do you think you weren't called?

Sibert: Why? In other words, with that single-bullet theory, if they went in there and asked us to pinpoint where the bullet entered the back and the measurements and all that stuff, how are you going to work it? See, the way they got the single-bullet theory, was by moving that back wound up to tile base of tile neck.

Law: I've talked to Mr. O'Neill quite a bit about this and asked him about his belief in the single-bullet theory, and he said, "Absolutely not, it did not happen!"

Sibert: Well, you can put me in the same category! Have you read Arlen Specter's latest book, Passion For Truth?

Law: No, I haven't. I do not believe in the single-bullet theory from all I've read, and how can...

Sibert: I told them before they asked me to come up for the [ARRB] deposition, I said: "Well, before I come up, I want to tell you one thing: I don't buy the single-bullet theory." And they said, "We don't expect you to."

Law: Yes, when I talked to Mr. O'Neill, lie was adamant that it did not happen.

Sibert: in the first place, they moved the bullet wound, the one in the back. See, I don't know if you recall, but over at Parkland, they weren't even aware of the back wound, because they had a big fight over there as to who had jurisdiction. Texas had a law that any kind of a murder done in Texas, the autopsy had to he performed there. They didn't know about the back wound. But they get to Bethesda - here's the pathetic part-they found the wound in the back, of course, - they took the wound in the neck as a straight tracheotomy and they didn't find out that it was a bullet wound until the next morning when they called Parkland.

Law: Do you think it was a straight tracheotomy?

Sibert: Oh! They said over there that the - I forget who the doctor was there but he said he made that tracheotomy right over a bullet wound.

Law: That was Malcolm Perry.

Sibert: Perry, yeah. And you know, a lot of them over there said first that they thought it was an entrance wound. So, you had Parkland not knowing about the back wound, you had Bethesda not knowing about the bullet wound in the neck, taking it as a tracheotomy, which really gets you off on the right foot.

Law: Were you surprised you weren't called before the Warren Commission? Sibert: I was at the time, but now I can understand why (laughing).

Law: Why do you think you weren't called?

Sibert: Why? In other words, with that single-bullet theory, if they went in here and asked us to pinpoint where the bullet entered the back and the measurements and all that stuff, how are you going to work it? See, the way they got the single-bullet theory, was by moving that back wound up to the base of the neck.

Law: I was going to ask you to tell me your thoughts on Mr. Specter and the single-bullet theory.

Sibert: Well I-that single-bullet theory-when they had me come up to the ARRB deposition there at College Park, I said, "Well before I come up there, I want you to know one thing. I'm not an advocate of the single-bullet theory." I said, "I don't believe it because I stood there two foot from where that bullet wound was in the back, the one that they eventually moved up to the base of the neck. I was there when Boswell made his face sheet and located that wound exactly as we described it in the FD 302." And I said, "Furthermore, when they examined the clothing after it got into the Bureau, those bullet holes in the shirt and the coat were down 5 inches there. So there is no way that bullet could have gone that low then rise up and come out the front of the neck, zigzag and hit Connally and then end up pristine on a stretcher over there in Dallas."

Law: You don't believe in the single-bullet theory. Period.

Sibert: There is no way I will swallow that. They can't put enough sugar on it for me to bite it. That bullet was too low in the back.

Law: Where do you remember seeing it, exactly? Your partner, Frank O'Neill, if I remember right, credits you with finding the bullet hole in the back.

Sibert: Well, let me clarify that. When they had the body over at Parkland, they had a shoving match between the fellow who was going to do the autopsy' who said that the autopsy had to be clone in Texas-and they were going to do it there-and you had Kellerman telling them that he had orders from the Secret Service and also from Bobby Kennedy that it was going to be done in Washington. At Parkland, they never knew there was a bullet wound in the back. That body left there and they did not know about the bullet wound in the back. Then, Bethesda did not know there was a bullet wound where the tracheotomy was made. So that is a pathetic situation. It could have been handled if they had made a phone call. The smart thing to have done-if there hadn't been such animosity between the partners over there-put one of those Parkland doctors on Air Force One to come right into Bethesda and say, "Here's what we did." And the clothing should have come in with the body. But they held the clothing-they didn't even undo the tie over there at Parkland and there was a nick in the knot-and here you had this entrance or exit wound in the throat where the tracheotomy was.

O'Neill and Sibert are adamant that the single-bullet theory is wrong. "That's Arlen Specter's theory," O'Neill told me. It's quite evident from my conversations with them that they have no respect for the one-time assistant counsel to the Warren Commission, now Senator from Pennsylvania. When I questioned Jim Sibert about the single-bullet theory and Arlen Specter, he went as far as to say, "What a liar. I feel he got his orders from above - how far above I don't know." When I suggested to O'Neill that his description to the ARRB of President Kennedy's hands being "clenched" was possible confirmation of Thorburn's position, he took pains to tell me, "his hands were sort of clenched, put it that way. Yes, in other words, they weren't laying down flat - I don't know whether they tried to arrange his hands or not, but they were in a clenched position. Not fully clenched at all." The single-bullet theory is key to the "lone-nut" scenario. If, in fact, a bullet did not hit Kennedy in the back, come out his throat, hit Governor Connally in the back, exit his right chest, slam into his right wrist, breaking the bone and cutting the radial nerve, and then pierce his left thigh and fall out in remarkably pristine condition onto a stretcher at Parkland Hospital, then there was more than one assassin and, hence, conspiracy. The single-bullet theory is the linchpin of the government case against Lee Harvey Oswald. If the theory is false, the lone-assassin concept crumbles to dust.

Governor Connally said, "it is not conceivable to me that I could have been hit by the first bullet, and then I felt the blow from something which was obviously a bullet, which I assumed was a bullet, and I never heard the second shot - didn't hear it. I didn't hear but two shots. I think I heard the first shot and the third shot." To the end of his life Connally rejected the single-bullet theory. And Frank O'Neill said: "You go back to the veracity of the individuals who were eye witnesses - Governor Connally denied the single-bullet theory one hundred percent. He's an eyewitness. He's right there-this is the man who was there. He was the one who was hit. He should know what happened."

Darrell Tomlinson, who found the bullet at Parkland Hospital, refused to identify it as Warren Commission Exhibit 399 and insisted that the bullet he found came from neither Connally's nor Kennedy's stretcher." There is evidence that the bullet was actually on a stretcher used that day by little Ronald Fuller. The FBI report by Sibert and O'Neill stated, "a bullet entered a short distance... the end of the opening could be felt with a finger." At the Clay Shaw trial in 1969, Pierre Finck said, "The back wound's depth was the first fraction of an inch."

More metal remained in Connally's body, in the wrist and thigh wounds, than is missing from CE 399.

Surely this is enough evidence to damn the single-bullet theory!

There have also been interesting developments from the crime scene, perhaps the most important of which may seem like a no-brainer: The famous 26-second Zapruder home movie of JFK's murder contains original undoctored photographic imagery of the assassination. This authentication was deemed necessary by the Assassination Records Review Board, created by Congress to oversee the release of JFK records, because a vocal faction of JFK conspiracy theorists in the 1990s started claiming that the film had been surreptitiously altered to hide evidence of a conspiracy. (Their theory refuted, these conspiracy theorists abandoned the JFK field for greener pastures of 9/11 speculation.) However, this isn't to say that there aren't some legitimate and uncomfortable questions about assassination-related photographs.

"The only caution I have in the photographic record concerns the JFK autopsy material," says Richard Trask, a photo archivist in Danvers, Massachusetts who has the world's biggest collection of JFK assassination imagery, and has written two books on the subject. "That is an area that always makes me pause. What was happening during the autopsy if there was a cover-up or just incompetence, I don't know. It is the only area of the JFK story that I have some doubts about."

As well he should. The JFK medical evidence is worse than a mess -- it is a documented national scandal that awaits decent news coverage. The new evidence shows beyond a reasonable doubt that the photographic record of Kennedy's autopsy has been tampered with by persons unknown. The sworn testimony and records developed by the Assassination Records Review Board in the late 1990s allow no other conclusion.

Among the key post-Stone revelations in the JFK medical evidence:

Autopsy photographs of Kennedy's body are missing from government archives, according to sworn testimony from doctors and medical technicians involved in the autopsy. The origins of other autopsy photos in the collection cannot be determined.

Two FBI agents who took notes during the autopsy gave detailed sworn testimonies rejecting the so-called single bullet theory which girds the official story that Oswald alone killed Kennedy.

Dr. James Humes, the chief pathologist at JFK's autopsy, admitted under oath that he destroyed a first draft of his autopsy report. Humes had previously only admitted to destroying his original notes.

Dr. Gary Aguilar, a San Francisco ophthalmologist who has written about the autopsy, is emphatic. "The medical evidence is really stark evidence of a cover-up in my view," he says. "The story is so extraordinary that it is hard for some people, especially in mainstream media organizations, to come to grips with it. There's just no doubt that there were very strange things going on around the president's body that weekend."

Sounds like a paranoid fantasy? More than a few of the people who participated in the JFK autopsy have sworn to it.

Saundra Kay Spencer was a technician at the Navy's photographic laboratory in Washington. She developed the JFK autopsy photos on the weekend after Kennedy's death. She kept her oath of secrecy for 34 years. When she spoke to the ARRB in 1997, Spencer displayed the efficiency of a career military woman. She was well prepared with a sharp memory for the details of her involvement in the amazing events of November 22-24, 1963. Her testimony, after reviewing all the JFK autopsy photographs in the National Archives, was unequivocal. "The views [of JFK's body] we produced at the [Naval] Photographic Center are not included [in the current autopsy collection]," she said. "Between those photographs and the ones we did, there had to be some massive cosmetic things done to the President's body."

FBI agent Francis O'Neill was present during the autopsy and took notes. In 1997, he also viewed the photographs. Referring to an autopsy photograph showing the wound in the back of Kennedy's head, O'Neill said, "This looks like it's been doctored in some way. I specifically do not recall those -- I mean, being that clean or that fixed up. To me, it looks like these pictures have been. . . . It would appear to me that there was a -- more of a massive wound. . ." O'Neill emphasized he was not saying the autopsy photographs themselves had been doctored but that the wounds themselves had been cleaned up before the photograph was taken.

James Sibert, another FBI agent present at the autopsy, had a similar reaction to the photos. "I don't recall anything like this at all during the autopsy," he said under oath. "There was much -- well, the wound was more pronounced. And it looks like it could have been reconstructed or something, as compared with what my recollection was."

What both men were objecting to was the lack of a big hole in the back of JFK's head which would be somewhat indicative of a so-called blowout wound caused by a shot from the front.

The retired FBI agents were especially scathing about the single bullet theory positing that one bullet caused seven non-fatal wounds in Kennedy and [Texas] Governor Connally and emerged largely undamaged on a hospital stretcher.

They took notes on the autopsy as Dr. Humes examined Kennedy's body. Both said the autopsies concluded the bullet that hit Kennedy in his back had not transited his body. But chief pathologist Humes took another view in his autopsy report, writing that the bullet had emerged from Kennedy's throat and gone on to strike Governor Connally. But Humes's credibility is undermined by the ARRB's discovery that he destroyed not only his notes, but also his first draft of the autopsy report without ever revealing its contents or even existence.

Sibert later told a JFK researcher of the single bullet theory: "It's magic, not medicine."