CIA Director Told RFK There Were Two Shooters

[Peter Lemkin]

August 30, 1970, Dallas - Death of Mr. Z.
I presume he was given an already altered copy - or two.

While by no means exhaustive, a tracing of the 'official' Z-film disposition and other
relevant facts of historical interest appears in order. Circa 24 November 1963,
Zapruder agreed to a $150,000 purchase price for television and movie rights
plus royalties. The first $25,000 was donated to Dallas police officer J. D. Tippit's
widow. Tippit had been murdered on the same day as JFK, and allegedly
by Oswald [2].
Interestingly, actual copyright of the original Z-film itself was not registered until
15 May 1967, by Time, Inc., the parent company of Life magazine [3]. On
6 March 1975, Geraldo Rivera showed Groden's Z-film version for the first time
on national television on his Good Night America talk show [4]. In April of 1975,
Time transferred the copyright back to the Zapruder family [5], purportedly
through assignment that reserved to Time unlimited non-exclusive print rights
to Zapruder frames [6]. On 13 July 1998, a digitized Z-film produced by MPI
Home Video debuted as a documentary [7].
On 1 August 1998, Z-film ownership was officially transferred to NARA [8]. On
3 August 1999, a Department of Justice special arbitration panel headed by
Philadelphia lawyer and former federal judge Arlin Adams and also composed of
former Department of Justice official Walter Dellinger and Kenneth Feinberg, a
Washington DC lawyer and law professor, announced that it had determined
eminent domain compensation to the Zapruder family (without copyright purchase)
to be $16 million plus interest, describing the film as "a unique historical
item of unprecedented worth" [9].
While the Arbitration Agreement states that "[n]othing in this Arbitration Agreement
alters LMH's right to fully enforce its Copyright" [10], that does not in itself
imbue by law a valid copyright if none existed by law at the time of said
Agreement, which it is argued herein that it did not. The provision might just as
Mike Pincher 3 Zapruder Film Copyright
ASSASSINATION RESEARCH / Vol. 3 No. 2 © Copyright 2005 Mike Pincher
well have more artfully read, "nothing in this Arbitration Agreement alters
LMH's right, be there any, to fully enforce whatever copyright enforcement
rights it may have". Eminent domain rights were at issue and nothing more. As
will be described later, the Archivist no longer treats the Z-film as though there
were copyright rights that remain to be respected.
Dellinger disagreed with the settlement figure, saying it was "simply too large an
amount". He purportedly would have assigned its value between $3 million and
$5 million [11]. While the panel said it reached its decision on 6 July 1999, that
was coincidentally the same tragic day that the airplane carrying JFK Jr. and
his wife crashed off Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts, killing them both, so
the announcement had been postponed in deference to the Kennedy family [12].
Jeff West, director of the Sixth Floor Museum (converted from the infamous
Texas School Book Depository in Dealey Plaza in Dallas, the assassination situs),
was quoted as saying the $16 million purchase price, plus interest, was a
"good, fair price for the family and the government" [13].
On 30 December 1999, the copyright to the Z-film was donated by the Zapruder
family, along with various artifacts, to the Sixth Floor Museum [14].