16-01-2018, 06:26 PM
Croy was already at the scene having arrived as "They were loading [Tippit] in the ambulance." The official sequence lists Callaway as a helper, then making an inexplicable call on Tippit's radio, finally grabbing Tippit's gun and joining Scoggins in pursuit of the fugitive.
According to With Malice Holmes & Wheless arrived at the scene shortly after Scoggins & Callaway left:
Meanwhile Croy talked to a witness while Callaway busied himself about the scene:
Mr. GRIFFIN. What did you do when you got there?
Mr. CROY. Got me a witness.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Who did you get ahold of?
Mr. CROY. It was a woman standing across the street from me. I don't recall her name. She gave me her name at that time.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What did she tell you?
Mr. CROY. She told me that she saw Tippit get out of the car, and I don't recall, I think she said he stepped back a couple of foot and shot him and then ran. She was pretty hysterical at that particular time.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did she tell you where she first saw Oswald?
Mr. CROY. I don't recall whether she did or not. There was, as I recall, there was 2 people who saw it. No; 3. A man in a, taxicab driver. However, she was the main eyewitness, as far as I could make out. She saw the actual shooting.
This must be Mrs. Markham, but complications quickly set in. In a refreshing departure from vagueness & incoherence Croy gave direct answers to several plain questions in straightforward declarative English.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long did you talk with her?
Mr. CROY. Oh, a good 5 or 10 minutes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Were there any other officers there with you when you were talking with her?
Mr. CROY. Yes; and no. I talked to her, and then they talked to her, and then I talked to her, and just after I located a witness, the squad did get there.
Mr. GRIFFIN. This conversation all took place near the scene of the Tippit killing?
Mr. CROY. Leaning up against his car.
XII p.201
Croy probably leaned against the left rear fender, avoiding the blood-stained area at the left front, and there was no point served by going around the car to the right side with his "pretty hysterical" witness. Several conclusions leap out:
So who was the mysterious eyewitness that misidentified either Scoggins or Callaway as "the man who shot the officer," whose existence was previously unknown & unsuspected? She even eluded the ratiocinative acumen of master sleuth Moriarty (unless Tatum wore a dress). And how did Croy fail to see a citizen run off with a dead cop's gun lifted from a car he was leaning against?
No clear answers here, and WM does not supply any, does not even address the difficulties except to blather over everything:
No, he didn't. His WC testimony states precisely what he did, and mutilating "Got me a witness" into "immersed himself in the gathering crowd" is a pitiful distortion, but the problem is acute. The only hope to make the scenario work is by reordering the events sequentially, but this is anathema to WR.
Extensions to the original scenario are stuck with harsh constraints. They must maintain backward compatibility while being shoehorned into an impossibly tight time frame, constantly running up against continuity issues with inevitable violations.
As to what actually happened with Tippit's service revolver -- best bet is Sergeant Hill. It's hard to imagine toy Sergeant Croy not raising an objection to anyone but a real cop taking it. This does not necessarily eliminate Holmes & Wheless from the larger scene, although the two car chase scenario is ridiculous, ditto the mock shootout on a side street near Beckley described in WM. Possibly they met up at the sheriff's substation, "they" being Hill, Scoggins, Holmes & Wheless. Callaway was not on board.
According to With Malice Holmes & Wheless arrived at the scene shortly after Scoggins & Callaway left:
Holmes and Wheless were returning to Oak Cliff after a company meeting at Fair Park, when they heard Bowley's frantic call over the police radio. Wheless immediately recognized the address that Bowley gave - 404 E. Tenth - and realized they were just a few blocks away. When the two men pulled up a woman, in near hysterics ran up to the car and told them that "the man who shot the officer had got in a taxi and took off."
The two men could see the cab she was gesturing toward in the next block, turning south off Tenth onto Crawford. Holmes didn't hesitate. He floored the accelerator and tore after the taxi cab.
Meanwhile Croy talked to a witness while Callaway busied himself about the scene:
Mr. GRIFFIN. What did you do when you got there?
Mr. CROY. Got me a witness.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Who did you get ahold of?
Mr. CROY. It was a woman standing across the street from me. I don't recall her name. She gave me her name at that time.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What did she tell you?
Mr. CROY. She told me that she saw Tippit get out of the car, and I don't recall, I think she said he stepped back a couple of foot and shot him and then ran. She was pretty hysterical at that particular time.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did she tell you where she first saw Oswald?
Mr. CROY. I don't recall whether she did or not. There was, as I recall, there was 2 people who saw it. No; 3. A man in a, taxicab driver. However, she was the main eyewitness, as far as I could make out. She saw the actual shooting.
This must be Mrs. Markham, but complications quickly set in. In a refreshing departure from vagueness & incoherence Croy gave direct answers to several plain questions in straightforward declarative English.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long did you talk with her?
Mr. CROY. Oh, a good 5 or 10 minutes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Were there any other officers there with you when you were talking with her?
Mr. CROY. Yes; and no. I talked to her, and then they talked to her, and then I talked to her, and just after I located a witness, the squad did get there.
Mr. GRIFFIN. This conversation all took place near the scene of the Tippit killing?
Mr. CROY. Leaning up against his car.
XII p.201
Croy probably leaned against the left rear fender, avoiding the blood-stained area at the left front, and there was no point served by going around the car to the right side with his "pretty hysterical" witness. Several conclusions leap out:
1. There must have been two simultaneously hysterical women at the scene.
2. Croy failed to observe anything Callaway did right under his nose. He missed the radio call, the gun grab and the outspoken effort to mount a pursuit force.
3. Croy also missed the actual departure of the cab, the "near hysterics" of the H & W woman and the departure of H & W.
So who was the mysterious eyewitness that misidentified either Scoggins or Callaway as "the man who shot the officer," whose existence was previously unknown & unsuspected? She even eluded the ratiocinative acumen of master sleuth Moriarty (unless Tatum wore a dress). And how did Croy fail to see a citizen run off with a dead cop's gun lifted from a car he was leaning against?
No clear answers here, and WM does not supply any, does not even address the difficulties except to blather over everything:
It's easy to see how it could have happened, considering that Officer Croy had driven to the scene in his own car and had immersed himself in the gathering crowd immediately upon his arrival.
No, he didn't. His WC testimony states precisely what he did, and mutilating "Got me a witness" into "immersed himself in the gathering crowd" is a pitiful distortion, but the problem is acute. The only hope to make the scenario work is by reordering the events sequentially, but this is anathema to WR.
Extensions to the original scenario are stuck with harsh constraints. They must maintain backward compatibility while being shoehorned into an impossibly tight time frame, constantly running up against continuity issues with inevitable violations.
As to what actually happened with Tippit's service revolver -- best bet is Sergeant Hill. It's hard to imagine toy Sergeant Croy not raising an objection to anyone but a real cop taking it. This does not necessarily eliminate Holmes & Wheless from the larger scene, although the two car chase scenario is ridiculous, ditto the mock shootout on a side street near Beckley described in WM. Possibly they met up at the sheriff's substation, "they" being Hill, Scoggins, Holmes & Wheless. Callaway was not on board.