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The Investigation

Crime Files

The Investigation

Before Lee Harvey Oswald was assassinated himself by Jack Ruby, he had told Secret Agents that he was a ‘patsy’ and had nothing to do with killing of the president or officer Tippit.The Warren Commission was initiated by President Lyndon B Johnson. It was established on 29th November 1963 to investigate the assassination. It concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald had acted alone in killing John F Kennedy. The findings have since been found controversial.The FBI was the first authority to complete an official investigation. On 9th December 1963, it issued a report to the Warren Commission stating that only three bullets were fired by Oswald during the assassination; that the first shot hit President Kennedy, the second shot hit Governor Connally, and the third shot hit Kennedy in the head, killing him.However, the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) concluded that four shots had been fired during the assassination of the president.The Warren Commission agreed with the FBI investigation that only three shots were fired, but disagreed with the FBI report on which shots hit Kennedy and which hit Governor Connally.To this day there is still a great deal of contention concerning why New Orleans DA Jim Garrison was convinced that businessman Clay Shaw, a respected liberal and popular local figure, who had been decorated for his war efforts, was the mastermind behind the plot to kill President Kennedy.Garrison’s contentious belief, which is supported by Oliver Stone’s 1991 movie ‘JFK’, stated that Clay Laverne Shaw was the same man as Clay Bertrand, a bisexual man who had been seen with Oswald and another man David Ferrie, and heard plotting to kill the president. Shaw, who had an impeccable war record but was a noted liberal, also happened to be a gay man. Garrison was convinced that he and Bertrand were the same and that Shaw was the main mastermind behind the assassination.