HOSTY INTERVIEW 11/21/96 _________________________________________________________ Author's Note: What follows is the verbatim conversation between myself and James Hosty, last November, after his appearance at the ARRB Hearings at the National Archives during that time. There is a section, toward the end, where the tape ran out and because I didn't want Mr. Hosty to stop talking, I simply changed the tape while he answered and regretfully, lost some of the dialogue. I am grateful to Robert Hosty who put me in touch with his father for this interview, and for his help in editing nd clarifying some of the dialogue. __________________________________________________________ BOCHAN: First of all, before we get started talking about your book ASSIGNMENT: OSWALD, I was curious about your appearance at the recent ARRB Hearings this week. Do you have any news for us? Anything that might be interesting to report? HOSTY: Well, yes, they haven't been able to find some of the things that I wanted. I mentioned in the book about the Secret Service agent in charge of the research who testified that there are 18 items of derogatory information [about Oswald] spread through four agencies, and no one person had all the information. Apparently, all the different agencies were withholding from each other. That would be the Navy Intelligence, State Department, CIA and FBI. He said that no one person knew enough to bring it to the attention of the Secret Service. And if all of the information had been available to one person, then they would have looked at it. He said, 'I don't know what we would have done, but we would have looked at it.' Well now this is very clearly stated in the testimony of Robert Bouck, B-O-U-C-K, a Secret Service official in Vol. IV of the Warren Commission Hearings. He said to the Commissioners, 'You have there a list of 18 items.' Shortly after that, they went off the record. They had exhibits they were putting into the record and there were four numbers that have been skipped. The only thing you can draw from that is that this 18 items of derogatory information was one of those four numbers. And that there were three other items that were withheld. I figured they had gone into the secret part, you know, that wasn't to be revealed ... BOCHAN: Right. HOSTY: ... and so far they can't seem to find it which would indicate to me that its possible that the Commissioners might have gotten rid of the 18 items of information. Now you know that the State Department had a representative on the Commission; the CIA had a couple of representatives; and so did the military. I just wonder if they're trying to protect their former agencies by not showing that THEY were derelict in leaving the FBI holding the bag. BOCHAN: It's an interesting observation. HOSTY: Now that's conjecture - they're still trying to find it. Also, another thing, they can't seem to find the damage assessment that the Navy and/or Marine Corps would have conducted after Oswald defected to the Soviet Union. As you know, he was a radar operator in a top secret air base in Atsugi. BOCHAN: Yes. HOSTY: And they can't seem to find that. I know I was never shown that prior to the assassination. There was some talk, in my book ASSIGNMENT: OSWALD - now out in paperback, distributed by Little Brown and Arcade is the publisher. BOCHAN: Yes. HOSTY: Okay. Now in my book I talk about some of the things that Oswald did in Japan. That's when apparently he had his first contact with the local Communists. And that's when I think he probably was first approached by the Soviet Intelligence. Now none of that is available - it's disappeared or they just haven't been able to find it. So that is interesting. They definitely want to release everything they can. The only thing they're going to protect is the identity of viable informants, somebody who is still alive and still active ... BOCHAN: Right. HOSTY: ... to make sure somebody hasn't been revealed. And also they will not reveal any techniques or systems that are not known, you know, that we might be still using. BOCHAN: Right. HOSTY: You can see from the paper that although the so-called Cold War is supposed to be over, the Russians are still actively targeting the United States. BOCHAN: Isn't that something, what just happened [Nicholson's recent arrest for spying at CIA]? HOSTY: Yes. Right. In fact, Aldrich Ames was operated by the post-Communist Russians. Now there's this new one. So, when it comes to counter-intelligence, apparently the Cold War is not over. BOCHAN: Yeah, and the other thing that is interesting when looking at all of this in retrospect, is that even the intelligence agencies - the FBI, CIA - we're all human. We're not perfect. Mistakes were made. HOSTY: Well and also, I think it shows in my book, the bureaucratic turf, you know, shows how the Secret Service was so aloof and not even telling the FBI that President Kennedy was even coming to Dallas, let alone solicit our aid. BOCHAN: Very definitely - you point that out, I think, right at the beginning, you describe a meeting with Shanklin where he is pretty outraged that he had to find out that the President was coming to Dallas in the newspaper. HOSTY: Right. I mean, that's no way to run a railroad, as they say. And also, those 18 items of derogatory information will show that the CIA, the State Dept., the Navy Intelligence and/or Marine Intelligence were not apparently being totally cooperative, pre-assassination. BOCHAN: You had listed those 18 items in the book. HOSTY: That was my "best guess" based upon what had come out. Now, I might be wrong, there could be some other things that I don't know about. I just don't know. I would have thought that the Warren Commission should have asked me what I knew and when I knew it. BOCHAN: I was going to ask you about that, because I had just gone over your Warren Commission testimony late last night and early this morning, and I was surprised at some of the questions they didn't pursue. HOSTY: Right. BOCHAN: And I was going to ask you what your opinion was of the way they handled you, and the type questions they asked and didn't ask. HOSTY: It surprised me. My interview before the Warren Commission only lasted about two hours. Yet, as I said earlier, I just spent three days - three intensive days - before the review board, going over stuff that I knew. It was almost as if, 'we don't want to be confused with the facts, we've already got our mind made up.' BOCHAN: It appeared, at least Allen Dulles was confused over a couple of things. HOSTY: Oh yes, I was very surprised that he seemed to be 'non compos mentis.' And the other thing that gripes me, this testimony of BOUCK, was one week before my testimony. And it was the same staff people. That was an obvious question: 'what did you know and when did you know it?' And, maybe, Allen Dulles didn't want the CIA roughed up; maybe John Sherman Cooper didn't want his old State Dept. buddies roughed up; John J. McCloy, former assistant secretary of the Army, defense, I don't know, they didn't ask me about it. And nobody can find these 18 items. BOCHAN: What really inspired you to write this book and why now? HOSTY: Well my sons, Bob included who you know, my son Tom is my co-writer, would tell me that I have to get this down in writing. I would tell them orally through the years as these things came up, 'well that's not true, this is the way it was,' and they would tell me, 'well get it down [in writing] for posterity.' Also, they are now releasing these documents. You know, I have a document where the FBI reports an interview with Castro - one of our top undercover agents had an interview with Castro - in which Castro admitted that Oswald came to Mexico City and offered to kill Kennedy. BOCHAN: Yes, I saw that. HOSTY: Now that, see that's the sort of thing that Johnson was afraid would start World War III. And I have some other things in there about what the Cubans were doing and so forth, but, this was a very touchy situation. We had just come through the Cuban Missile Crisis - we almost went to war then, I know that for a fact. And I've talked to fellow agents who were Navy pilots at the time and they said they were scrambling and heading for Cuba right after Kennedy was killed. BOCHAN: Oh you are anticipating my next question. That was one of the more fascinating passages in the book, for me, in fact, you do describe on the day of the assassination, we had armed war planes flying toward Cuba. HOSTY: Right, yes, I talked to the guys that were doing it. They later became agents. And they told me about it. See, a lot of what I had, I picked up a lot from scuttlebutt from other agents like what had gone down in Mexico City; how the CIA agents were ready to mutiny because they were told to call off the investigation ... this sort of thing you pick up that the public is never going to hear. They'll tell me things that they won't tell an outsider. BOCHAN: I just found the paragraph in the book. Here it is: At about the same time as Oswald's arrest and identification, I learned after the assassination from two independent sources, fully armed warplanes were sent screaming toward Cuba. Just before they entered Cuban airspace, they were hastily called back. With the launching of warplanes, the entire U.S. military went on alert. The Pentagon ordered us to Defense Condition 3, more commonly known as Def Con 3 - the equivalent of loading and locking your weapon, and then placing your finger on the trigger. The power cells within Washington were in a panic. HOSTY: Right, now, I have read where the Russians saw this, that we had gone into an alert, and Kruschev was on the hot line and said, 'what's going on?' -- the Russians were not on alert -- so that's what makes me think they were not involved. BOCHAN: I'm going to try and bring this to the start of the day of 11/22/63 as it is in the book, and try and follow along, if I could ... HOSTY: Sure. BOCHAN: Okay, so Shanklin is talking to you guys at this morning meeting and he's upset that he is learning about the Kennedy visit through the newspaper. HOSTY: Right. BOCHAN: Did it strike you as odd that the Secret Service wouldn't ask you for your help? HOSTY: Yes and no. There's inter-service rivalry between different law enforcement agencies. The Secret Service in Dallas in particular, had always been stand-offish, so it really didn't surprise me. Just like Shanklin said, 'well I thought they should have at least told us.' Now they didn't ask us for help so I guess they felt, well, why should we tell them anything? Now they never came to us and asked 'what do you know?' or 'here's the parade route,' 'now, do you have anybody along this parade route?' Now I might add that there were other people that were known Communists that worked along the parade route that the police knew about, and they weren't taken into custody. See, nobody ... the Secret Service did not do like a lot of people think - take people into custody or put them under surveillance. They basically had been running a bluff for years and getting away with it. They just hoped for the best and drove down the street. And then Kennedy himself made things impossible for them by not letting them ride on the car with him. If they had been riding on the running board like they wanted, the man on the right rear would have blocked Oswald's line of fire. BOCHAN: Yes, as a matter of fact, I think it is in a report that Kennedy wanted the bubble top off and he wanted to be as close to the people as he could be. HOSTY: And he didn't, you know the Secret Service agents were hanging along in the car behind him, not on the car he was in. BOCHAN: Yeah, you can clearly see that in the Zapruder film. HOSTY: See today, the president never rides in an open car anymore. He rides in an enclosed, armor-proof car. And they don't give the route, except maybe during the inauguration, but see nobody knows for sure what route they're taking. BOCHAN: It does say in the book that you had read about the parade route in the newspaper the night before, but didn't pay too much close attention ... HOSTY: I assumed they had everything under control. I mean, they hadn't asked us - the only thing they wanted us to tell them was, had anybody made any direct threat. That's the only thing the Secret Service could and would do anything on: if a person made a direct threat. Now, if they had known what he had said to the Cubans down in Mexico City, when he made the direct threat, then they could have done something. BOCHAN: I see. HOSTY: That's the only thing at that time the Secret Service could have done. BOCHAN: You do mention though, that you hand delivered a report of a possible threat by a Klan member. HOSTY: Right: he did, he made the remark that when Kennedy came to town, 'we're gonna have a little reception for him' is the way he put it. It's kind of an oblique threat - not a real threat - but sort of borderline, so I thought they ought to look into it. Another good example is Squeaky Fromme who tried to kill President Ford, made the remark that, 'I think I'll go down and test the system.' Well, the Secret Service was notified, they interviewed her, turned her loose, and she went out and still shot at the President. So, see what I mean? They have very limited ability to prevent people in the crowd. BOCHAN: Interesting too, that after the shooting, you write in your book, that you return to the office, and apparently you were in charge of a lot of the right-wing .... HOSTY: Right. That was my primary assignment. BOCHAN: Right. And that is what led you to suspect and go to your list of radical right wing individuals, and then you describe Howe coming in during this time, and telling you that 'they just arrested a guy named Lee Oswald' and ... HOSTY: Of course he knew who Lee Oswald was too, he was a supervisor and knew the case. BOCHAN: Right, and 'they're booking him for killing the police officer in Oak Cliff - Officer's name was Tippit.' And then you describe in your book that: It took me only a second or two to shift from the extreme right wing to Lee Oswald. Lee Oswald was a Communist who had defected to the Soviet Union and returned three years later with a Russian wife, Marina. I had an active file on both Oswalds, who were both considered espionage risks. I had learned on November 1 that Oswald worked at one of the Texas school book depository buildings in Dallas. I remembered thinking Tippit's and Kennedy's killings were related, and then it hit me like a load of bricks. "That's him! Ken, that must be him. Oswald has to be the one who shot Kennedy!" Oswald was the son of a bitch who shot the president. We had a bead on the assassin. Can you describe that reversal? Can you help us understand that? HOSTY: Well, that's very simple. The police officer was killed in a very quiet residential neighborhood shortly after the president was killed and when we heard that, we immediately thought there was a connection. We knew that the gunman had gotten out of the building and there was a description out for him. And then here comes a policeman who gets shot in broad daylight, in a quiet residential neighborhood. There had to be a connection. And here's Oswald now, picked up, and remember we knew by this time that the shots had come from the building where he worked. BOCHAN: Right. HOSTY: So, and here he's out of work, he's away from the building and he shoots a policeman. The thing is starting to add up. Now, that wasn't enough to file on him right then, but that sure made him number one suspect. BOCHAN: Yeah, in your mind it, it ... HOSTY: In everybody's mind. BOCHAN: Hmmm? HOSTY: In a police mind. Because I think when - and in the public's mind - because when the police supposedly said, when they arrested him, 'kill the president will ya?' And same thing with the public when they took him out of the theatre they were yelling and trying to lynch him almost, and everybody assumed that it was connected with the president's shooting. BOCHAN: Interesting that you mention that. Recently, when they brought out McVeigh (from the Oklahoma City bombing) from the jail and into the public during a transfer, in a similar fashion to Oswald's transfer, it reminded me of the potential for trouble. It was like we never learn our lesson from history. HOSTY: They did get him out, I don't know, they had him surrounded a little bit better. But, they had to get him out. BOCHAN: Yeah, I was watching that on CNN and I thought to myself, 'here we go again.' HOSTY: Yeah. BOCHAN: You know, I thought, 'someone's gonna try and take revenge right then and there.' HOSTY: Yup, right. And see, eventually Ruby did shoot Oswald. BOCHAN: In your book, you also describe the shock you initially felt when you saw your name and license number in Oswald's notebook. HOSTY: Well I was a little bit, but then I knew exactly how it got there. You see, I had given my name and phone number to Ruth Paine. I told her to give me a call if she could find out Oswald's address. Now I want to add at this time: everyone seems to think that I was trying to interview Oswald. I couldn't interview Oswald without explicit permission from the CIA. And, they weren't about to give it and I wasn't about to ask for it. I was *not* trying to interview Oswald. He had been interviewed three times by other agents unsuccessfully, so I didn't think that interviewing him was the thing to do. But I was trying to develop Mrs. Paine as a source, if you will, on the Oswalds, and so I said, 'here, if you hear anything more, give me a call,' which was sort of a standard procedure. BOCHAN: Right. When you describe the other agents who had already interviewed Oswald, are you speaking of Fain? HOSTY: Fain twice, and he had two different guys with him at two different times, and Jack Quigley in New Orleans. BOCHAN: It seems that a lot of people, when discussing the case on the Internet and so forth, don't find it unusual at all for the FBI or CIA or any of our intelligence people to have had an interest in someone like Oswald because, after all, this was the height of the Cold War ... HOSTY: Right. BOCHAN: ... and he had defected to the Soviet Union, and it would be expected that we'd want to keep an eye on him. HOSTY: Right. BOCHAN: So, for anyone to think it unusual for the FBI, as an example, to have had an interest in Oswald ... HOSTY: They also had an interest in Marina, too. You know, in the book, I show that she isn't a sweet innocent little peasant girl that people think she is. BOCHAN: No. She seemed to give you guys a run for your money, but of course, she also described you guys being rough on her. HOSTY: Well of course, we were not rough on her after the assassination. She was one of these 'in your face copper' type women. You know, after the assassination, the Secret Service interpreter started advising her of her rights, and before he could get it out of his mouth, she started advising *him* of her rights. (Laughter.) But I mean, she was no dummy. Unlike the average person, she knew the difference between the Secret Service and the FBI. BOCHAN: Really? HOSTY: Yes, and she played one agency off against the other. BOCHAN: So, she knew early on about this rivalry between one agency against the other, and played one off against the other? HOSTY: Yes, right. You know a lot of people thought, well, the Secret Service and FBI, aren't they the same? Until the Kennedy assassination, they weren't really clear on it. But here's this supposedly sweet, innocent peasant girl who is not supposed to know anything, and *she* knew it. BOCHAN: One of the incredible passages in the book was your mentioning that Officer Barrett found Oswald's wallet at the site of the Tippit slaying. HOSTY: Yes, you know that they have found newsreels, tv shots taken that day, at the Tippit scene, showing the police looking at a wallet and showing Barrett in the background. BOCHAN: Really? HOSTY: Yes. Now they have not been able to identity positively - they have looked at the wallet in the Archives - and they can't make an identification ... it's very similar ... but there was a wallet at the scene; it shows the police looking at a wallet, and holding Officer Tippit's revolver. Now, there was a wallet there and Barret was there. BOCHAN: Now that's very interesting because as you may know, Paul Bentley ... HOSTY: I know he does. Unless there were two wallets. But Barret insists that Westbrook asked him, 'did he know a "Lee Oswald" or a "AJ Hidell"?' And he says he asked him there at the scene. And that proves that Barrett was at the scene at it proves that they were looking at a wallet. BOCHAN: Why do you suppose that this wasn't announced back then? I mean that would have cemented things as far as Oswald being at the Tippit murder scene ... HOSTY: I know. Well, as Barrett said, after Oswald was killed, the whole thing became moot. And a, they had a slam dunk case on him anyway, they had five witnesses who said they saw Oswald shoot Tippit. I know there was one witness that the buffs talks about that came on the scene several minutes later, and said that she saw two people leaving ... BOCHAN: Oh, was that Acquilla Clemons? HOSTY: Right. Well the ones that she saw leaving were the taxi cab driver and the used car salesman that took Tippit's pistol and went looking for Oswald. You know they came over, got his gun, and tried to chase him down but lost him. BOCHAN: It's interesting because you know, had this been made public back then, that Oswald's wallet and identification was right there at the Tippit scene, that would have ended the speculation right there. HOSTY: Well of course there was no speculation while Oswald was alive. There were five witnesses that saw him do it. And he was tracked down and they picked him out of a line-up, so there's no question ... and he was arrested with his pistol, and then he tried to shoot another police officer when he was arrested, so then I mean, that's not the act of an innocent person. BOCHAN: Many people point that out. HOSTY: And he did not, at any time during interrogation by the police and FBI, state that he was a "patsy." That was to the press only. BOCHAN: His "public persona" so to speak? HOSTY: Right. Now he took that persona as he was led out of the movie theatre. People were yelling to lynch him and he was yelling, "police brutality, police brutality!" He was trying to turn the people against the police. BOCHAN: Right, so he seemed to know how he was coming across to an audience ... HOSTY: Right. BOCHAN: You know, on this wallet issue though, I don't know if you've ever heard of George O'Toole and his book THE ASSASSINATION TAPES, concerning his work with the PSE (Psychological Stress Evaluator) exams in determining truth through the voice stress of an individual. HOSTY: Yes, and I have also known analysts who are also experts and have read his stuff and give the exact opposite interpretation of what he says. BOCHAN: On the PSE? HOSTY: Yes, that's right, a friend of mine who was also a voice analyzer, told me that, 'no, that's not what that says, this is what it says,' so, I mean you and I can look at squiggly lines and he's an expert and he can tell us anything he wants and we have to believe him. And then another expert can tell us, 'no, that's not right' but, anyway, go ahead. BOCHAN: Well, he implies that the reason there might have been some confusion over the wallet issue, is because during the immediate aftermath of the assassination, apparently Army Intelligence was feeding the FBI the information on the AJ Hidell/Oswald identification card ... HOSTY: You know what they were feeding us? Information we had given them. The Army is not operational in the United States. But under the delineation agreement, we have to give them copies of all of our reports. All he was doing was giving them newspaper articles and stuff that we had already given them. BOCHAN: I'd like to quote from a newspaper article that appeared in The Washington Post, and get your comment on it, if I might. The article appeared on December 10, 1977, and discusses the role that Army Intelligence played in the immediate aftermath of the assassination: The FBI records show the Army's 112th Army Intelligence Group at San Antonio was alertly supplying solid leads to Oswald's turbulent past within two hours after Oswald's arrest in November, 1963. Intelligence agent Lt. Col. Robert E. Jones was on the phone informing the FBI of Oswald's desertion to the Soviet Union, his marriage to a Russian woman and his pro-Castro Cuban activities in New Orleans. All the Army had to go on in that short time was the fact that an identification card in Oswald's wallet when he was captured bore the fictitious name "Alex Hidell." Jones and other intelligence agents swiftly connected this with an "A. J. Hidell" known to have distributed pro-Castro pamphlets in New Orleans. From there, the links were made to Oswald through the FBI and the Army's files. In the wake of the destruction of the Pentagon files, the Army intelligence agents on that day may never get full credit for their work. HOSTY: All they were doing was giving us our own information, so that's ridiculous. They conduct no investigation. They had newspaper articles and reports from the FBI. I believe there was some stuff that the Navy had concerning his Marine Corps record. But they had no original information. BOCHAN: What about Robert E. Jones, mentioned in the article? HOSTY: Now he was the Colonel in charge of the unit. Now they had a branch office in Dallas and I guess that the records that they had gotten from us were kept in San Antonio, but, he was just feeding back our stuff to us. I mean, so they had no original information. They had never conducted an investigation on Oswald - they couldn't because Oswald was a civilian. BOCHAN: One of the things Bob mentioned to me, was that at your ARRB hearings, a mention was made that they had located one of these Army Intelligence people. HOSTY: Yes, Ed Coyle. BOCHAN: Oh, was it Coyle? HOSTY: Yes, and also located Powell. You know a lot of the buffs try to say that I was talking to Powell on the morning of the assassination. And Powell shows up at the book depository. I guess I sent him down to tell Oswald to shoot at Kennedy or something. But, at any rate, yes they've located both Powell and Coyle. BOCHAN: Really? That's great. Are they going to question them? HOSTY: Well I'm sure they are. BOCHAN: Moving along in the book, you briefly discuss Silvia Odio who is, and as Bob has probably told you, the subject of a big controversy currently on the Internet. HOSTY: Yes. BOCHAN: How did you come to interview her? HOSTY: I was given a lead that Bob had, less than a month after the assassination, sometime in December, and the lead was that somebody from her place of employment, had said that she had had a fit of hysteria and that she knew something about the assassination, and that we had better talk to her. So we, Bardwell, Odum and myself went out and interviewed her. Now we had a difficult time with it because her English wasn't too good, and I don't speak Spanish. Odum spoke a little Spanish, so we had a kind of rough interview. She was a very reluctant witness - she didn't want to talk to us. It wasn't her idea. One of her people that she worked with called and said, 'you better come talk to her, she's getting hysterical.' So we talked to her and she told us this story about these three people, and we wrote it up. I think she said they were going back to Miami or Puerto Rico, so she told the organization they were with. And so we sent the information down to Miami to follow up and try and locate these three people. She thought one of them was Oswald. Now I might tell you this, that, after the assassination, all sorts of people came forward and thought they saw Oswald taking rifle practice; trying to buy a car and driving in a reckless manner; getting his gun sight fixed ... all sorts of things like that. These are people who are trying to be helpful. But when you see a picture of somebody in the paper, like Oswald splashed all over the paper, then you look at it and say, 'you know, I wonder if he was that guy I saw six weeks ago?' And, so it was something like that. I think Silvia Odio claimed that she saw this guy with two Latin types in, late September wasn't it? BOCHAN: Yes, late September. HOSTY: Yeah, see now we're into November where two months later, she sees his picture and says, 'hmmm, I wonder if that could be him,' and, 'that's going to implicate the Cuban exile community and this is going to hurt it all,' and so she kept it to herself. And then had a fit of hysteria over it. And then reluctantly told us about it. Now, I believe that she believes that she saw Oswald. But I'm convinced that the story that we finally came up with about Seymour, is who she saw who looked somewhat like Oswald. Now Loran Hall, not Leon, but Loran Hall was the one that said yes, we were up there. Now we can prove that Loran Hall and I forget the other two guys' names were in Dallas at the time. I think they were arrested or stopped or questioned or something. So they were definitely there. BOCHAN: Yeah, Seymour and Howard. HOSTY: Howard! That's the other one. And, after Loran Hall told us this, Seymour and Howard jumped all over him because see, what he in effect had done, he had told us that Seymour had committed a violation of law. It is a violation to threaten to kill the president. And the Secret Service could have arrested him. So they put pressure on him and he changed his story. Now, Loran Hall then went into hiding - he was fearful of his life. BOCHAN: Yes, I'm looking at an FBI report dated October 1964, and Hall basically denies ever even having contact with Odio. HOSTY: The second time. No, the first time he said he did. BOCHAN: Oh? HOSTY: Then after pressure from Seymour and Howard, he changed his mind. Then he went into hiding. No, he said yes, and we can prove that they were in Dallas at the time. You got to remember too, that the Cubans like anybody else, would say that 'well you Gringos all look alike.' I think that she saw somebody that looked like Oswald, two months after the fact, she said, 'oh that guy who threatened to kill Kennedy,' and 'that's him! That's him!' We had all sorts of leads like that. If all the people said they saw Oswald, turned out to be Oswald, there wouldn't have been a "double" - there would have been a hundred Oswalds running around. BOCHAN: And that would have really presented problems. HOSTY: He was sort of an ordinary looking fella, in a way, ordinary height and weight, long thin face, and people just, after the fact, they're not good witnesses unless they get in and see him before there's a lot of publicity. They brought the witnesses in to the line-up, you know the witnesses to the Tippit killing, and they had them go in right up that same day, to get their opinion. BOCHAN: Did you ever speak to Lucille Connell as well? HOSTY: Lucille Connell? BOCHAN: Yeah, Silvia Odio's ex-best friend. HOSTY: I didn't talk to her. They showed me that report and apparently she called and gave an entirely different story that Odio said that she'd seen Oswald hanging around some of the Cuban meetings. BOCHAN: Right. HOSTY: No, I never got that. That was given to somebody else. See, this was a major case and we had about a hundred agents working. BOCHAN: Right. One of the things that I noticed you checked out, was the Oswald sighting by Edwin Steig. HOSTY: Yes. He was the one that told me that he'd seen Oswald sitting in the back of a meeting. Now this would be consistent with what Oswald did in New Orleans. Remember, he was sort of spying on the right wingers. In fact, we had a reliable witness by the name of Michael Paine who knew Oswald well. You see, somebody that knows somebody, who's been around them a lot, makes a much better witness. And Michael Paine and another friend of his were with Oswald at an American Civil Liberties Union meeting, I think at the end of October. And Oswald got up and told the people at the ACLU meeting how he had been spying on General Walker's group, at these open meetings. So Oswald was sort of an amateur spy, you might say, checking on the Cuban exiles and checking on the Walker group by going to their open meetings. So, that would be consistent with what he did in New Orleans. BOCHAN: That's interesting. Interesting too that you followed-up on this event by talking to Sarah Castillo who, apparently, kept some sort of a roster at the meeting that Edwin Steig talks about, and she said there was no "Oswald" signed-in, and that she didn't recall seeing him there. HOSTY: Well, he wouldn't have used his real name, see. I mean, either that, or he never signed the roster. Or, it was not Oswald but somebody who looked like him. I mean another look-alike. BOCHAN: Well, that's what I was about to suggest .... HOSTY: Remember his picture is all over the paper now. And any law enforcement officer will tell you that somebody that comes forward after major publicity like that, you know, like 'about two months ago, I saw this guy in South Dakota,' I mean, that's the kind of leads we were getting. You know up in Chicago, there was a guy that looks a little bit like Ruby. We had a woman come in, and she bought a copy of LIFE magazine and it showed President Kennedy and Dave Powers at the Orange Bowl on January 1, 1961 - this was before Jack Kennedy was sworn in as president. And the captain of it was, words to the effect, 'he won't be able to do this much longer - be out in the public like this.' And there's a guy turning around looking at him in the picture, and another guy on the other side of him looking at him and this woman said, 'see, that's Lee Oswald, and that's Jack Ruby ... They were plotting even then to get Kennedy.' So, the only thing that you could say about it for certain was that this one guy had a long thin face and dark hair, and the other guy had a round face and dark hair. But she was so certain that she had a link between Ruby and Oswald. BOCHAN: You know I had written an article about how the La Fontaines treated Odio in their new book and that is originally how I came to know your son, Bob. He contacted me about an item in that article which dealt with how the FBI first heard of Odio, and I sent the documents I used for that article, along to Bob, in the hope he would let you take a look at them. Basically, the document contains Lucille Connell's recollections of how, on 11/24/63, as she was speaking on the phone to a friend of hers, a Mrs. Pick, as the televisions were running in the background, and as they lead Oswald out of the police station, boom, Jack Ruby shoots him on live tv. Connell relays that Mrs. Pick then exclaimed, 'oh my god, that's Jack Ruby and he was in our law office last week requesting that a power of attorney be drawn up for his sister.' Later that day, Connell was speaking to another friend, Marcella Insua who taught Spanish to youngsters, and relayed the conversation with Pick. Subsequently, while teaching Spanish to some students that night, Insua mentioned the Ruby remarks made by Pick and this found its way to the FBI as one of the students later mentioned the incident to a relative who was with the FBI. Later the FBI comes knocking on Insua's door and subsequently, comes calling on Lucille Connell for her story ... and that is how they eventually came to Odio. Connell mentions that she was surprised that even after telling the FBI all this, that this incident was never mentioned in the Warren Report, i.e. her conversation with Mrs. Pick and the comments about Ruby seeking power of attorney for his sister before the assassination. HOSTY: Well, of course, they gave it to the Warren Commission, they were given everything we had. They put in what they wanted to put in. That was up to them. Just like any editor will edit out what they want to edit out. They got everything that we did, so that was up to the Warren Commission. I guess they didn't consider it significant. BOCHAN: Apparently not. HOSTY: Well, I mean, it really isn't. So, he was getting power of attorney for his sister, I mean, so what? BOCHAN: Well ... HOSTY: Well he was going to go over and shoot the president and wanted power of attorney for his sister, is that what the La Fontaines are trying to say? BOCHAN: No, I think what they were proposing was that Ruby's shooting of Oswald was a premeditated murder. HOSTY: Well, I don't think so. Matter of fact, if he had lived, and by the way, did you know he was never convicted? BOCHAN: No I didn't know that - I knew the case was going to be appealed. HOSTY: Yeah, and the appeal overturned the conviction. He was awaiting retrial. The reason the thing was reversed, there were two: 1) the judge should have changed venue, just as they did in Oklahoma City. He should have changed venue, and 2) he should not have used the statements against Ruby that he made. Not only did the police and the DA's office not advise Ruby of his rights, but the DA's office said, 'now Jack, this is off the record,' and proceeded to ask him ' now how did you get into the basement?' BOCHAN: Right. That was a concern that everyone had. HOSTY: Well, we know how he got in the basement: he walked in. BOCHAN: Down the ramp? HOSTY: Yeah, he came right down the ramp. We had witnesses. But the police department doesn't want to admit that. So the FBI basically said, 'okay, if that's what they want to say, let them say it - it's immaterial.' But we have witnesses who saw him come in. And I think most police today will admit that he just walked in. He had complete reign, and also, ten minutes after 10:00, see Oswald was supposed to be moved at 10 minutes after 10:00. I mean, he was supposed to have been moved at 10:00, according to the Chief of Police. At ten minutes after 10:00, Ruby was still home in bed. BOCHAN: It almost does seem like it could have been a spur of the moment thing. HOSTY: It was. When Oswald came out, he had a smart alecky smirk on his face and Ruby said that's what set him off. Ruby could have killed him Friday night - what's the point of waiting 48 hours, if you're gonna do it, do it now. Also, what's the point of somebody silencing someone, then you can have that second person lead you back to the conspirators? I mean they haven't improved their situation at all, if there was a conspiracy. Follow me? BOCHAN: Yeah I do. HOSTY: Therefore, it was not premeditated. Ruby had complete run of the police station all weekend - he could have done it anytime he wanted. BOCHAN: Well, yes, there's that picture of him in the back of the room during that midnight press conference. HOSTY: Yeah, right. BOCHAN: You know what's interesting though, if we accept the official version of the JFK assassination, then we have to accept that there were two lone nuts in Dallas on that weekend: Ruby as lone nut and Oswald as lone nut. HOSTY: Believe me, believe me, there were a lot of nuts in Dallas. You may quote me on that. If we had picked up and watched everybody who had reason or wanted to kill Kennedy, we would've had to hire half the people in Dallas to watch the other half. It was a hotbed of right-wing extremists, and there was all sorts of murder-mouthing going on all around Dallas. Like William Seymour - that was typical murder-mouthing that you heard all the time -- in fact, I heard a policeman say that! BOCHAN: Is that right? HOSTY: Yeah, 'I think I'll borrow a high powered rifle, Chief, and go down and shoot the president.' So, I mean, that's a violation of law to say that, but they weren't enforcing it until after Kennedy was killed. And then they did arrest some people for saying it, but, I guess, 'freedom of speech' and all that, you got a right to say anything you want. BOCHAN: In your book, and in your Warren Commission testimony I believe, you described Oswald's excited nature when you walked in and introduced yourself. HOSTY: Yeah, he said, 'oh, so you're Hosty, you're the one that's been harassing my wife.' Now three police officers and the other agent will testify to that, and that he had never met me before: 'Oh, so you're Hosty, you're the one that's been bothering my wife.' BOCHAN: What was your impression of his general demeanor, I know that you wrote he said words to the effect, 'I'll fix you and the FBI,' or something like that. HOSTY: Yeah, after he calmed down after that outburst, he was very careful about what he would say. He answered what he wanted to answer, and when things got sticky, he'd just back off and not say anything. And the most significant thing we got out of him, I think, was when I asked him about Mexico City. He denied it, but the double take that he did, when I asked him about Mexico City - you could tell that he was definitely alarmed. BOCHAN: Well and that's the other interesting part to this whole puzzle, isn't it, the Mexico City trip. HOSTY: Yeah. Of course, if there was a conspiracy, that is where it was. BOCHAN: Well that was some of the other dynamite you put in your book. Didn't you spring that on the HSCA, when they were questioning you? HOSTY: That's why they wouldn't let me testify. BOCHAN: You kind of sprung it on them ... HOSTY: Well, yes, I brought it out when I went up there and then they sent me home and never would let me testify. Of course, in all fairness, the Cold War was still going on. And the Warren Commission - I don't know if you know this, but President Ford recently came out and made a statement (I wish I had this when I was writing the book because I would have used it) but he recently said that "We" (meaning the Warren Commission) "We told the truth, we just didn't tell the whole truth." BOCHAN: Really? HOSTY: Yes. BOCHAN: Well, you know, that kind of ties in with what you wrote in your book as well. You wrote, on page 247: I believe history will be kind to President Johnson, the Warren Commission, the FBI, the CIA, and all the other parties involved in perhaps the greatest cover-up this nation has experienced. The bottom line is that the correct guilty party was identified and this nation's peace was preserved. In 1963, those were the two most important things. Unfortunately, a consequence of these decisions was the sacrifice of the U.S. government's credibility. The people know their government has lied to them, held back something momentous regarding the assassination. Even if the cover-up was well intended from an international viewpoint, the fact remains that the people of the United States - We the People - were lied to and betrayed. When a government - any government - makes a willful decision to lie, or obfuscate what the elected leaders know to be the truth, a momentary political objective may have been served. But by the same token, a basic underpinning of the democratic process has been destroyed. Sadly, many Americans today have no faith in anything a governmental official tells them. And that probably includes me. It is time to disclose the truth, no matter how ugly. America is ready for it. The risks are minimal. It is time for our nation's collective soul to find an inner peace with President Kennedy's tragic assassination. BOCHAN: What are they covering up? HOSTY: About the possibility that Castro was involved. Of course now that's coming out. See they're coming out with all of this information about how Oswald told the Castro people that he'd kill Kennedy. BOCHAN: I think you point to Luisa Calderon in your book on this. HOSTY: Yes, saying that a Cuban Intelligence agent saying it was going to happen. And Castro will not let anyone talk to her. You know, the House Assassination Committee did sort of an investigation, went and talked to people, I thought they did a kind of a childish investigation. Of course they had their mind made up that Castro was a "nice fella" so you're not going to get much out of that one. But, they were not allowed to talk to her. They were allowed to talk to AMLASH. Now here's another thing: AMLASH. BOCHAN: Yes. HOSTY: He's now been released. Castro shoots people who are guilty of black-marketing ... Yet, here's a man who supposedly was going to try to kill him. And he let's him go. He's now living as a free man in Spain. What does that tell you? That whole thing was a set-up. BOCHAN: Interesting. So you believe Castro was behind this? HOSTY: No, I didn't say that. I said he might have been. I think that is definitely what motivated Oswald. Oswald was motivated by a desire to impress Castro. See, Castro threatened Kennedy, okay? BOCHAN: Yes. HOSTY: And Oswald goes down to Mexico City and said, "I'll kill him." And goes back and actually does it. Now you can't prove a conspiracy there. The Castro people say 'well we thought he was just popping off' - sort of like William Seymour popping off to Silvia Odio. BOCHAN: Well yes, and you mentioned that the Red Bird Airport had a bus line that stopped in Oak Cliff - the neighborhood where Oswald rushed to after the assassination. HOSTY: And also, here's a plane that flies into Mexico City, see, this is what the CIA was working on hot and heavy, and were ordered to stop. Now the Church Committee came out with a lot of stuff that was very interesting. They had a 166 page report, and 60 pages disappeared, were pulled back and never were revealed to the public. Hopefully they'll be revealed now. See they pointed out a lot of this and the factor of Castro possibly being involved. And don't forget that Raoul Castro made the remark that 'If I thought they were trying to kill my brother, I wouldn't hesitate to reply in kind.' BOCHAN: True. HOSTY: And if AMLASH was telling them what was going on with the CIA, wouldn't that have been cause enough? BOCHAN: Maybe. HOSTY: Now that doesn't prove anything, now of course, we still haven't settled our scores with Castro. BOCHAN: Well that's the other aspect of this thing too ... HOSTY: I wonder if this is one of the reasons that we haven't? BOCHAN: Well that's what is on the minds of a lot of people. You know, why not trade with Cuba? What is the problem? HOSTY: Remember the newsman Chris Matthews? BOCHAN: Sure. HOSTY: I think he was an aide to one of the Kennedys, maybe Bobby Kennedy. And he's now a newsman. And they were talking about recognizing Castro or something like that, and he piped up and said, 'well I'm not so sure that he wasn't involved in the Kennedy assassination. I don't think we ought to.' BOCHAN: Is that right? Well, you've got to wonder what it is ... somebody is withholding something here. HOSTY: I think that could be it and maybe this is the time to bring it out, and try to thrash it out. The Cold War is over now, and I don't think we would invade Cuba now and certainly Russia is not going to come to the aid of Cuba now like in '63, if we did. BOCHAN: That's true, they have enough problems of their own right now. HOSTY: Right, but I think this is the time that the review committee will be releasing all this stuff. Hopefully, they'll be releasing the other 60 pages of the Church Committee Report and some of the other things I've been talking about. BOCHAN: Two obligatory questions that always come up, and you're probably tired of answering them, but I'll ask anyway. One, the so-called Oswald note that you were told to destroy, by Shanklin. I think you wrote in your book that if you could do it all over again, you would not have listened to Shanklin, yes? HOSTY: Yes. He told me to destroy another communication which I didn't. Looking back, I probably should've just hidden the thing and then brought it out later when we needed it. BOCHAN: It seems too, that the receptionist had a different recollection than you did of what that note said. HOSTY: Well, she has a certain recollection and I do. You know, Shanklin doesn't really deny giving the order - he said 'I can't remember it.' And he said 'if the note had been what Nanny Lee Fenner said, I would have definitely remembered it. But if it had been what Hosty and Howe said, I might not have remembered it.' BOCHAN: Well, yes, because she said it was a threat to blow up the FBI building ... HOSTY: Yes. And also she claims that she showed it to the assistant agent in charge, Clark, and he looked at it and said, 'oh there's nothing to it.' Now if it had been a threat like that, would he have said that? BOCHAN: Probably not. HOSTY: So there's three people now that, of course she was, well, I'm trying to be charitable. She was heavily medicated at the time she made the statement. She was taking a lot of morphine based medicines and that will make you hallucinate. BOCHAN: You know, I can understand the C-Y-A mentality, if that's what it was when Shanklin didn't even want to see the note, but I don't understand what was so bad about it if all it said was to 'stop bothering my wife and if you want to talk to me, come and see me directly.' HOSTY: Well, if you tell this to an FBI agent, they'll immediately understand. You have to understand Hoover. Hoover would be "embarrassed" and that's the worst thing you can do. You can be right, but you have to look right. What the problem was was that maybe they had not told Hoover that we had an ongoing investigation of Oswald. Because when he talked to Johnson, he told Johnson that we had an investigation of Oswald when he returned from Russia, but did say that we had an "on going" investigation. See, we had what was known as a "pending" investigation. They were fearful that critics would say, 'well, you were dealing with Oswald at the time, why didn't you notify the Secret Service?' All sorts of stuff would come up and so Hoover would be "embarrassed." Even though, there was nothing to it, that's the way he was, it was really to keep Hoover from finding out about it. And as I point out in the book, we found out that Hoover did find out about it after the fact, and didn't do anything. BOCHAN: The second question that everyone asks, deals with the matter Lieutenant Revill claims you told him in the Dallas Police parking garage, going up the stairs. In all the confusion after Oswald's arrest, he says that you told him that the FBI knew all along that Oswald was capable of assassinating the President but never dreamed he would actually do it - or words to that effect. HOSTY: Well see, now, that was his paraphrasing me not quoting me, using his words and putting down what he thought I meant. But what I said was what I knew at 3:00 p.m., that he had shot Tippit. See, he didn't know that Oswald had shot Tippit. BOCHAN: That was another interesting aspect to the whole episode as it seemed he didn't know ... HOSTY: Yes, he didn't know that Tippit had been shot and he didn't know that Oswald had worked in that building. Of course he knew that the rifle had been found there, and that the shots had come from that building. But what he told me was that 'we're looking for a guy named Lee,' see, he didn't even have his last name. 'The guy named Lee is missing and we ought to go and pick him up,' see, he thought that Lee was his last name, he didn't know. But he didn't know that Tippit had been killed - I had to tell him. And it was based on the Tippit killing that I thought Oswald was guilty. He took what I said, and in all the excitement, paraphrased it, and made it sound like I knew at 12:30 what I knew at 3:00. See, I was telling him what I knew at 3:00 - not at 12:30. BOCHAN: You describe the look of disbelief in his face as you were talking to him, because apparently, you knew more than he did. HOSTY: Oh certainly. See he had been at the book depository, searching at the book depository. BOCHAN: Have you had a chance yet to read the La Fontaine book? HOSTY: Not really, I kind of perused it. I understand that it is ridiculous, for instance, they've got me having Oswald order the rifle. BOCHAN: Yes, I was going to ask you about that, I was wondering how you reacted to that. HOSTY: That is ridiculous. I didn't even reopen the case on Oswald until the end of March. Oswald's case was closed. I don't know - what is their basis for saying that, do you know? BOCHAN: Well, the say that Oswald was an FBI informant ... HOSTY: Well of course I put in the book that Ruby was an informant. BOCHAN: Yes, and many people don't know that, but they claim that Oswald always seemed to be doing something at the behest of the FBI ... HOSTY: But what is their proof of that? BOCHAN: There is none, that I can see. HOSTY: I can make up all sorts of stories too - maybe I ought to write a book and say that the La Fontaines were behind it. I mean, basically, that is what they have done. BOCHAN: Well, they really do speculate a lot. HOSTY: Oswald didn't order the rifle in February, but I didn't re-open the case on Oswald until March 25. BOCHAN: Well, they've got you running Oswald. Let's see, I'll read exactly what they said: The Mannlicher-Carcano, found in the Texas School Book Depository following the assassination, was ordered under the name A. Hidell on March 12, 1963, the day after agentJames Hosty located Oswald on Neely Street in Dallas with the assistance of an informant in the postal inspector's office. The gun was sent parcel post from Klein's Sporting Goods of Chicago to a box rented to Oswald, who supposedly had a photograph of a phony ID card in the name of Hidell in his wallet at the time of his arrest. HOSTY: Well of course, at that time, I was out to interview Marina, and I didn't go out there until later, it wasn't on March 12 - I think it was on March 25, but that doesn't mean just because I located her that I talked to him. BOCHAN: Oh, here we go, here they no longer speculate, but state as fact: The evidence is now overwhelming that Oswald was an FBI informant on weapons and Cuban exiles for the J. Edgar Hoover Bureau. Specifically, New Orleans SA Warren deBrueys and Dallas agent James Hosty became Oswald's runners following the ex-Marine's return from Russia. An entry in Oswald's notebook, recovered from his room at 1026 N. Beckley and subsequently covered up by the FBI, has never been satisfactorily explained as anything but his record of meeting with Hosty (chapter 8). The Marxist-leaning Oswald's compatible FBI "assignments" consisted of tracking right-wing gunrunning activities, including, surprisingly, those of maverick ex-agent and Cuban exile collaborator Banister. Finally, new evidence described in this book supports former FBI employee William Walter's claim that Oswald was an FBI informant on the DRE arms cache in Louisiana July 31, 1963. HOSTY: But what is their proof? This is all speculation... [At this point the tape ends and a new one is started.] BOCHAN: How is your book doing? You said that it just went into paperback, so it must be doing fairly well. HOSTY: Yeah, the hardback, but it's now going to paperback starting this month, so I don't know how it'll do in paperback. BOCHAN: Well, it is an interesting read that I would recommend to anyone who is interested in hearing from someone who was directly involved in the assassination investigation. HOSTY: Of course, I'm not dealing in speculation - I am dealing with facts. BOCHAN: Yes, but some of your observations, in my opinion, are startling. For example, when you talk about this being possibly the biggest cover-up of all time by the government, that the truth should come out no matter how ugly ... HOSTY: Well yes, I think at the time, it was a good thing. Otherwise, you and I would be sitting in a cave somewhere out in Montana some place saying, 'yeah we told everybody, we were honest, but look - we got blown up.' I mean, what do you want - do you want to start an atomic war? BOCHAN: A lot of younger people today who weren't even around back then don't realize how close we came, I guess ... HOSTY: The Cuban Missile Crisis? We almost went to war then. BOCHAN: You know now that these tapes are being released of Kennedy's meetings with his advisors and so forth, we find that he was right in not listening to the hawks that wanted to go in to Cuba during that period. We know now that the Soviet military personnel on Cuban soil had authorization to use those nuclear weapons if necessary -- something we did not know then in 1962. Can you imagine if Kennedy had not listened, and invaded? In retrospect, he was absolutely correct not to invade Cuba. HOSTY: Yeah. See, if they had told the public the whole truth about the assassination then, after the Cuban Missile Crisis, there would have been overwhelming pressure to invade Cuba. BOCHAN: And of course, that is a theory about why there has been a cover up. HOSTY: Well Bobby Kennedy went along with the cover up. His own brother. BOCHAN: He felt so guilty about his brother being assassinated ... HOSTY: Right, because he knew they were trying to get Castro. BOCHAN: There is also speculation that there was to be another invasion ... HOSTY: An inside coup - see, that's where AMLASH fit in. There was going to be an inside coup - some of Castro's own people were going to get rid of him because of the Cuban Missile Crisis and then get rid of the Russians. BOCHAN: Weren't some of Castro's own people upset with the Soviets being in Cuba? HOSTY: Right - including AMLASH. BOCHAN: I think you mention this in your book. HOSTY: And AMLASH had a big following of his own. Maybe that's why Castro didn't shoot him. BOCHAN: That's an interesting speculation. HOSTY: But I think he doubled him. That's what I think - and that's the general feeling. When you catch somebody like that, you don't arrest them, what you do is you double them and then you use them. BOCHAN: Well, it's always been my pet theory that our own intelligence agents were double-crossed in this whole thing ... by someone. The way all these documents were destroyed after the assassination, and the way everyone backed away from acknowledging Oswald, and so many false leads, etc., it just seemed that there was more going on here than "CYA." For instance, maybe you heard about Hoover's conversation with LBJ during the assassination weekend, where he describes some confusion over whether or not it was Oswald's voice on a taped intercept in Mexico City -- Hoover tells LBJ that his men listened to the tape and determined that it was not Oswald in the Soviet Embassy. HOSTY: Okay, now, they went into that with me in detail. BOCHAN: Did they? HOSTY: Yes. That is not true. They later corrected that. They had brought some stuff up from Mexico City and they showed us photographs of this false Oswald. I was the one that was interviewed, myself and two other agents, and we were shown a picture and we said, 'No, that's not Oswald.' We were shown a picture, not a voice recording, and they later corrected that and said it was pictures only, not a voice recording. BOCHAN: The CIA has always maintained that they erased and reused the tapes between 6-12 days after they were transcribed and had none available of Oswald, yet, two of the Warren Commission attorneys (Slawson and Coleman) went down to Mexico City in April of 1964 and they said that they were played a tape by none other than Win Scott - the Chief of Station for CIA in Mexico City. HOSTY: Yeah, right. BOCHAN: So, apparently, not all the tapes were erased. HOSTY: Well I don't know, now that's all going to come out. But I know that they went into detail on that. I would have been the one, myself and two other agents, one of whom is now deceased, that would have listened to any tape - and we did not listen to any tapes. BOCHAN: Interesting. HOSTY: See now, there was an embarrassment to Hoover: here he was giving the President false information. In the confusion that was relayed, third and fourth hand, they said well we showed them the pictures - and then the "pictures" became "pictures and recordings" by the time Hoover got it. There was some stuff brought up from Mexico City by lawyer/ Congressman Rudd, he was assistant legal attache, but I always heard that it was the transcripts of the tapes, not the tapes themselves. BOCHAN: I have some documents that I will be sending to your son Robert, some handwritten notes concerning these tapes, asking about these tapes, and the embarrassment they noted when these questions were asked. This whole thing about Mexico City, the cameras not working that weekend, the tapes being erased, all the confusion and story changing .... HOSTY: Well see, all that is going to come out. They are going to release all of that. In fact we got a bunch of all that stuff about the CIA and Mexico City while we were before the hearing board. BOCHAN: Oh good, then we can all look forward to that when it is released? HOSTY: Yes, it's going to be put out. But I think what happened, is, they used the tapes over after they were transcribed. I don't think they were simply erased to cover up what was on them or anything - they made transcripts of them. Now there was another tape of Oswald down there in Mexico City that survived, that was of poor quality, therefore it couldn't of been in Dallas for us to listen to. Hoover erred when he told Johnson that, and it was probably 4th hand by the time it got to Hoover. BOCHAN: You know, after all this time, the 33 years that have passed, and all these documents that are being released and so forth, has this affected your conviction at all about Oswald's guilt? Have you ever wavered on that? HOSTY: Of course not, why should I? Most people like the La Fontaines, make up things. I can spot these things, they're all falsehoods. Who was it that said, that Greek philosopher, 'you can prove any falsehood if you start with a false premise.' All of them have false premises. As soon as you spot the false premise, you just forget about it. See, they're all trying to sell books. I think what happens is, people get their favorite bogey man, and then they go out and try and prove that their bogey man did it. And then they twist the evidence to do that, and if they don't have the evidence, they make it up. BOCHAN: Were you ever personally offended when you found out that the Warren Commission was not told of the CIA/Mafia assassination plots against Castro? HOSTY: They were! BOCHAN: They were told? HOSTY: Of course they were. Allen Dulles was on the Commission, wasn't he? BOCHAN: Yes. HOSTY: Alright, forget about it then. Remember what Gerald Ford said about 'we told the truth, we just didn't tell the whole truth' ? BOCHAN: Yeah ... he always emphasized the word "found" ... 'we never FOUND any evidence of a conspiracy. HOSTY: Yes, they didn't look for it. You don't find something if you don't look for it. I mean they didn't want to find it. Remember what the assistant director of the CIA said: 'If we implicate the Cuban government, then we have to take action that we're not prepared to take.' Assistant Secretary of Defense said that 'the United States government not only has the right but the obligation to lie if it means the prevention of an atomic war.' BOCHAN: Didn't you mention in your book that right after the assassination, Cuba was preparing for some kind of a confrontation while at the same time, the Soviet Union was not? HOSTY: We got that from a defector, yes. They started destroying files and all that bit; they got rid of papers and people started scurrying in. BOCHAN: Well Mr. Hosty, I thank you very much for your time, and best of luck with the book now in paperback. HOSTY: Thank you [end]