MELODRAMA IN NEW ORLEANS—V What The Witnesses Will Say

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31908, 8 February 1969, Page 17

MELODRAMA IN NEW ORLEANS—V What The Witnesses Will Say

(By

HUGH AYNESWORTH)

NEW ORLEANS.

District Attorney Jim Garrison said he would probably subpoena 40 to 50 witnesses for the conspiracy trial of Clay Shaw. That sounds like a lot of witnesses to testify about an incident or incidents that happened in 1963, particularly after a massive investigation by several federal agencies failed to find any semblance of conspiracy in the John F. Kennedy murder case.

Garrison could call 100 witnesses if he had to. At least that number have come forth with “information” and “testimony” that would help make Shaw seem very guilty.

One of Garrison’s biggest problems is knowing which witnesses to use. Almost all of them are prepared to testify to separate plots, meetings in different towns at different times, even different characters starring in the dark scenario. Alleged Bribe For instance, a former gubernatorial candidate in Louisiana—he is also a former preacher and former convict—puts Shaw together with Jack Ruby and Lee Oswald in a Baton Rouge hotel room in September of 1963. In fact, claims this witness, the three of them all went into the bathroom (his) together and talked about “getting him.” The witness thought they meant him, he told Garrison, until he Heard one of them say, “He’s got to come down from Washington.” He also says he knew Shawj as “Alton Barnard” and that I Shaw once gave him $6000,1 when he was a gubernatorial' candidate, to “keep talkin’ against Kennedy.” Up in. Clinton, Louisiana, an unemployed former convict swore to Garrison that during the summer of 1963 he was sitting. in front of a barber shop when all of a sudden up drove a black Cadillac and parked. In the car, he said, were Shaw, Ferrie, Oswald and a former F. 8.1. man and private investigator, Guy Banister. Garrison won’t have to worry himself about whether to believe this man’s story or not, for several months ago the witness committed suicide in the Clinton gaol. But a New Orleans postman claims he recalls delivering mail for “Clay Bertrand”—the alias Garrison claims Shaw used—to a Chartres Street address (where a friend of Shaw’s lives who owns a black Cadillac). Meeting With Shaw A laboratory technician at the University of California, Berkeley, advises that he was with Clay Shaw on November 21 or November 22, 1963, in the laboratory stockroom. He said several other employees dropped in to meet Shaw, who was introduced as Clay Bertram. On one occasion, claims this witness, Shaw slipped and said his name was “Clem Bertram.” but quickly caught himself and changed it to “Clay.” Several citizens of Clinton will say that Shaw and Ferrie were together in Clinton in mid-1963. Some saw - Oswald, some didn’t. A former receptionist at a state hospital in Jackson, Louisiana, claims she saw Oswald as he came to apply fOr a job at the hospital, also in mid-1963. A Jackson barber claims he sent Oswald to a state legislator to get help in getting a job at that hospital. Both saw a woman in an old car parked outside. A man arrested 30 times in Dallas since 1957 tells Garrison that he overheard a plot in Jack Ruby’s Carousel Club—in which Shaw, Ferrie, police officer J. D. Tippit and Oswald joined Ruby. He was visiting a stripper friend, claims this one, and “they didn’t pay any attention to me.”

A vocalist at a French Quarter night club will tell that she Saw Oswald in her audience in September of 1963 and that they got into a slight argument. A hostess in a hospitality suite in New Orleans says she saw Shaw sign his name. “Clay Bertrand,” in her guest book in December, 1966. At least a dozen witnesses —none of whom came forward in the first three years after the assassination—have placed Shaw with Ferrie, Oswald with Shaw or all three together. Some of the dates named can be accounted for by Shaw, who often made trips across country for speaking engagements and other business — but some, obviously, are “open dates.” One attorney close to Gar-

risen claims the D.A. stopped giving polygraph tests when 14 straight witnesses "failed." Garrison denied this, but added, “So what? They don’t prove nothin’.” Just for the record, every one of Garrison’s adversaries who has taken a polygraph test outside New Orleans—

Eugene Bradley in Los Angeles, Gordon Novel in Maryland, Sergio Arcacha in Dallas and William Gurvich in Chicago—has passed on every aspect of his test. In every instance, Garrison’s case, was said to be of no merit. Two former Garrison pals (Gurvich and Novel) accused the D.A. of criminal actions pertaining to the probe. In both instances, leading United States polygraph experts concluded the two wene telling the truth. Gurvich, in fact, was to have been the defence's top witness, and Garrison was so frightened of him that he stood ready to do anything to keep the case from coming to trial. As recently as January 19, Garrison swore to fight for an indefinite delay “all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary." No wonder. Gurvich had been Garrison’s chief investigator for six months, and when he left he took Garrison’s master file with him. The former investigator has said publicly—and on television—that Garrison had no case, that witnesses manufactured stories to suit and that the D.A. had ordered independent reporters arrested and beaten. What changed Garrison’s mind? A sudden haemorrhaged ulcer in Gurvich's stomach that put him on the operating table on January 20. With Gurvich unable to testify for at least six weeks. Garrison turned around within hours and announced that he would proceed with the trial. Not all of Garrison’s trouble has come from witnesses—he has created some himself. In a fine rhetorical attempt to picture the vastness of the conspiracy, Big Jim allowed that Oswald, far from being the lone assassin, didn’t even fire a gun that fateful afternoon in Dallas. Mountains of testimony dispute this claim, but Garrison is stuck with it. It is expected to be a particular an-

I noyance to him because he i must prove an “overt act”' ' by one of the “conspirators” : who attended that secret ; meeting that so many witnesses were privy to. The most ' obvious “overt act” was > Oswald’s, but Garrison has i pulled this prop out from ■ under himself.

Another booboo is Garrison's insistence that the assassin got away through the Dallas sewers. The problem is that most of the sewers beneath Dealey Plaza are only 15 inches in diameter, leading to a search for what reporters have called “the mini-midget.” (Even the Justice Department has fumbled the ball in this crazy case. The former Attorney-General, Mr Ramsey Clark, disclosed expansively that the F. 8.1. had cleared Clay Shaw in 1963, when the truth of the matter—as J. Edgar Hoover subsequently announced—was that Shaw was never even important enough to be among the thousands of persons investigated.) Though Garrison has received a good press for the most part, some reporters and some publications had good links with the probe in its earliest weeks and felt that Garrison didn't have enough evidence even to arrest Shaw, let alone add several further indictments and charges in the ensuing months. For these reporters, covering the Garrison investigation has been anything but fun. Some have been charged with public bribery for talking to “witnesses” about their testimony in the preliminary hearing. Others have received threatening telephone calls—even outside Louisiana. Some even have been threatened with contempt of court, perjury, etc. Garrison ordered at least two reporters arrested and beaten. I The Garrison probe that started just two years ago, thus, has already touched thousands of people. And while it appears that the case is now climaxing with the conspiracy trial of Clay Shaw, it seems that it will be a good while before the whole bizarre melodrama is completely played out.—Copyright, “Newsweek Feature Service.”

(Concluded)