Gordon Arnold
|
|
Gordon Arnold (August 14, 1941-October 15, 1997) is a man who claimed to be a witness to the John F. Kennedy assassination.
Arnold served three years in the United States Army, after enlisting in 1963. After being discharged from the Army, he married (one living son as of 2004) and Arnold became employed with the Dallas Department of Consumer Affairs in Dallas, Texas.
In 1978 Arnold first publicly claimed to have been a witness to the 1963 assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dealey Plaza in Dallas. He claimed that minutes before the assassination he was twice approached by a business suited CIA or Secret Service agent who demanded he move away from behind the picket fence of the Dealey Plaza north grassy knoll. He claimed he moved just south of the picket fence and then filmed the assassination with a movie camera from a few feet north of a 3.3' high cement retaining wall on the grassy knoll, and that a bullet passed extremely close to his left ear, then he dove to the ground. Arnold said that very soon after the end of the attack a man armed with a revolver and dressed in a Dallas police uniform kicked him while Arnold was still laying on the ground then demanded his movie film while another man armed with a rifle and also dressed in a Dallas police uniform and wearing yellow lense tinted "shooter's glasses" stood closeby crying, shaking, and waving his rifle around. Arnold claimed he gave the revolver armed policeman his movie camera, the policeman removed the film, then returned the camera to Arnold (now with the policeman's fresh fingerprints).
Three days later Arnold said he reported for his pre-assassination-scheduled transfer to the U.S. Army's Fort Wainwright in Alaska.
Despite his claims being made public some five months before the House Select Committee on Assassinations investigation ended, the HSCA, which did learn of his claims, decided not to interview him.
After 1978 Arnold provided his claims to only a few assassination researchers and book authors. Some persons claim that Arnold has not been found in any of the photographs or films of the assassination. No witnesses ever reported seeing him, including Abraham Zapruder and his assistant standing very near where Arnold claimed to be, but who were focused on watching the President. Some researchers claim to have photographically enhanced his U.S. Army uniformed image in a polaroid photograph taken by Mary Moorman during the assassination, while others claim this is actually the theorized "badge Man" or simply just a tree or shadow.
Arnold elaborated on his claims in the 1988 documentary The Men Who Killed Kennedy and in a 1989 interview with the Dealey Plaza Sixth Floor Museum. The transcript of that 1989 interview was eventually made available to the public in 2004.
External links
- Gordon Arnold's Claims Summarized (http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/arnold1.htm)
- Post Attack Photos Do Not Timestamp Gordon Arnold's Claims (http://members.aol.com:/droberdeau/JFK/BONDphotosTIMESTAMPINGarnold.html)
- Gordon Arnold Interview Claims (and additions) in 1989 (http://members.aol.com/droberdeau/JFK/additionalGORDONarnoldCLAIMS.html)