John F. Kennedy assassination Dictabelt recording
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The John F. Kennedy assassination Dictabelt recording was a
Dictabelt The Dictabelt, in early years and much less commonly also called a Memobelt, is an analog audio recording medium commercially introduced by the American Dictaphone company in 1947. Having been intended for recording dictation and other speech fo ...
recording from a motorcycle police officer's radio microphone stuck in the open position that became a key piece of evidence cited by the
House Select Committee on Assassinations The United States House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) was established in 1976 to investigate the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1963 and 1968, respectively. The HSCA completed its i ...
(HSCA) in their conclusion that there was a conspiracy behind the
assassination of John F. Kennedy John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, was assassinated on Friday, November 22, 1963, at 12:30 p.m. CST in Dallas, Texas, while riding in a presidential motorcade through Dealey Plaza. Kennedy was in the vehicle with ...
on November 22, 1963. Made on a common Dictaphone-brand
dictation machine A dictation machine is a sound recording device most commonly used to record speech for playback or to be typed into print. It includes digital voice recorders and tape recorder. The name "Dictaphone" is a trademark of the company of the same n ...
that recorded sound in grooves pressed into a thin vinyl-plastic belt, the recording gained prominence among Kennedy assassination conspiracy theorists from 1978, in which the HSCA used it to conclude that there was a "high probability" that
Lee Harvey Oswald Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 – November 24, 1963) was a U.S. Marine veteran who assassinated John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, on November 22, 1963. Oswald was placed in juvenile detention at the age of 12 fo ...
did not act alone and that the Kennedy assassination was the result of a conspiracy. The recording was made from Dallas Police Radio Channel 1, which carried routine police radio traffic; Channel 2 was reserved for special events, such as the presidential
motorcade A motorcade, or autocade, is a procession of vehicles. Etymology The term ''motorcade'' was coined by Lyle Abbot (in 1912 or 1913 when he was automobile editor of the ''Arizona Republican''), and is formed after ''cavalcade'', playing off of ...
. The open-microphone portion of the recording lasts 5.5 minutes, and begins at about 12:29 p.m. local time, a minute before the assassination. Verbal time stamps were made periodically by the police radio dispatcher and can be heard on the recording.


House Select Committee on Assassinations

In December 1978, the
House Select Committee on Assassinations The United States House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) was established in 1976 to investigate the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1963 and 1968, respectively. The HSCA completed its i ...
(HSCA) had prepared a draft of its final report, concluding that
Lee Harvey Oswald Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 – November 24, 1963) was a U.S. Marine veteran who assassinated John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, on November 22, 1963. Oswald was placed in juvenile detention at the age of 12 fo ...
had acted alone in the assassination. However, after evidence from the Dictabelt recording was made available, the HSCA quickly reversed its conclusion and declared that a second gunman had fired the third of four shots heard. HSCA chief counsel
G. Robert Blakey George Robert Blakey (born January 7, 1936) is an United States, American Attorneys in the United States, attorney and law professor. He is best known for his work in connection with drafting the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Ac ...
later said, "If the acoustics come out that we made a mistake somewhere, I think that would end it." Despite serious criticism of the scientific evidence and the HSCA's conclusions, speculation regarding both the Dictabelt and the possibility of a second gunman persisted. Investigators compared "impulse patterns" (suspected gunshots and associated echos) on the Dictabelt to 1978 test recordings of
Carcano Carcano is the frequently used name for a series of Italian bolt-action, magazine-fed, repeating military rifles and carbines. Introduced in 1891, this rifle was chambered for the rimless 6.5×52mm Carcano round (''Cartuccia Modello 1895''). It ...
rifles fired in
Dealey Plaza Dealey Plaza is a city park in the West End Historic District of downtown Dallas, Texas. It is sometimes called the "birthplace of Dallas". It was also the location of the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963; 30 minutes after the shooting ...
from the sixth floor of the
Texas School Book Depository The Texas School Book Depository, now known as the Dallas County Administration Building, is a seven-floor building facing Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas. The building was Lee Harvey Oswald's vantage point during the assassination of United Sta ...
and from a stockade fence on the grassy knoll forward and to the right of the location of the presidential limousine. On this basis, the acoustics firm of
Bolt, Beranek and Newman Raytheon BBN (originally Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc.) is an American research and development company, based next to Fresh Pond in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. In 1966, the Franklin Institute awarded the firm the Frank P. Brown ...
concluded that impulse patterns 1, 2, and 4 were shots fired from the Depository, and that there was a 50% chance that impulse pattern 3 was a shot fired from the grassy knoll. Acoustics analysts Mark Weiss and Ernest Aschkenasy of
Queens College Queens College (QC) is a public college in the Queens borough of New York City. It is part of the City University of New York system. Its 80-acre campus is primarily located in Flushing, Queens. It has a student body representing more than 170 ...
reviewed the BBN data and concluded that "with the probability of 95% or better, there was indeed a shot fired from the grassy knoll." Dr. James E. Barger of Bolt, Beranek, and Newman (BBN) testified to the HSCA that his statistical analysis of the impulse patterns captured on the Dallas police recordings showed that the motorcycle with the open microphone was about "120 to 138 feet" behind the presidential limousine at the time the first shot was fired. When the HSCA asked Weiss about the location of the motorcycle with the open microphone—"Would you consider that to be an essential ingredient in the ultimate conclusion of your analysis?"— Weiss answered, "It is an essential component of it, because, if you do not put the motorcycle in the place that it is —the initial point of where it was receiving the ound of the gunfire€”, and if you do not move it at the velocity at which it is being moved on paper in this re-creation, you do not get a good, tight pattern that compares very well with the observed impulses on the police tape recording." Using an amateur film shot of the motorcade, the HSCA concluded that the recording originated from the motorcycle of police officer H. B. McLain, who later testified before the committee that his microphone was usually stuck in the open position. However, McLain did not hear the actual recording until after his testimony, and upon hearing it, he adamantly denied that the recording came from his motorcycle. He said that the other sounds on the recording did not match any of his movements. Sirens are not heard on the recording until over two minutes after what is supposed to be the sound of the shooting; even though, McLain accompanied the motorcade to
Parkland Hospital Parkland often refers to a park. Parkland or Parklands may also refer to: Geography * Aspen parkland, a biome transitional between prairie and boreal forest (taiga) * Landscaped parkland, a managed rural area associated with European country hous ...
immediately after the shooting, with sirens blaring the whole time. When the sirens are heard on the Dictabelt recording, they rise and recede in pitch (i.e., the
Doppler effect The Doppler effect or Doppler shift (or simply Doppler, when in context) is the change in frequency of a wave in relation to an observer who is moving relative to the wave source. It is named after the Austrian physicist Christian Doppler, who d ...
) and volume, as if they are passing by. McLain also said that the engine sound was clearly from a three-wheeled motorcycle, not the two-wheeler that he drove. "There's no comparison to the two sounds," he said. Other audio discrepancies also exist. Crowd noise is not heard on the Dictabelt recording, despite the sounds generated from the many onlookers along Dallas's Main Street and in Dealey Plaza (crowd noises can be heard on at least ten channel-2 transmissions from the motorcade). Someone is heard whistling a tune about a minute after the assassination. No one actually heard gunshots on the recording. The only evidence that HSCA had for a second shooter was the Dictabelt sound recording. Four of the twelve HSCA members dissented to the HSCA's conclusion of conspiracy based on the acoustic findings, and a fifth thought a further study of the acoustic evidence was "necessary". Dissenting members of the committee included
Congressmen A Member of Congress (MOC) is a person who has been appointed or elected and inducted into an official body called a congress, typically to represent a particular constituency in a legislature. The term member of parliament (MP) is an equivalen ...
Samuel L. Devine Samuel Leeper Devine (December 21, 1915 – June 27, 1997) was an American politician of the Republican Party who served in the United States House of Representatives as Representative of the 12th congressional district of Ohio from January 3, 1 ...
, Robert W. Edgar, and
Harold S. Sawyer Harold Samuel Sawyer (March 21, 1920 – April 2, 2003) was an American attorney and politician from the U.S. state of Michigan. Born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, Sawyer represented Michigan's 5th congressional district in the United ...
. Responding to a question asking how he would handle the Committee's report if he were at the
Justice Department A justice ministry, ministry of justice, or department of justice is a ministry or other government agency in charge of the administration of justice. The ministry or department is often headed by a minister of justice (minister for justice in a ...
, Sawyer replied: "I'd file it in a
circular file A waste container, also known as a dustbin, garbage can, and trash can is a type of container that is usually made out of metal or plastic. The words "rubbish", "basket" and "bin" are more common in British English usage; "trash" and "can" a ...
."


Criticism

Richard E. Sprague, an expert on photographic evidence of the assassination and a consultant to the HSCA, noted that the amateur film the HSCA relied on showed that there was no motorcycle between those riding alongside the rear of the presidential limousine and H.B. McLain's motorcycle, and that other films showed McLain's motorcycle was actually 250 feet behind the presidential limousine when the first shot was fired, not 120 to 138 feet. There was also no motorcycle anywhere near the target area. Adult magazine ''
Gallery Gallery or The Gallery may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Art gallery ** Contemporary art gallery Music * Gallery (band), an American soft rock band of the 1970s Albums * ''Gallery'' (Elaiza album), 2014 album * ''Gallery'' (Gr ...
'' published a pull-out laminated cardboard recording (like those on the back of Cereal boxes) of the Dictabelt recording in its July 1979 issue. Assassination researcher Steve Barber repeatedly listened to that recording and heard the words "Hold everything secure until the homicide and other investigators can get there" at the point where the HSCA had concluded the assassination shots were recorded. However, those words were spoken by Sheriff Bill Decker about 90 seconds after the assassination, so the shots could not be when the HSCA claimed. The
FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...
's Technical Services Division studied the acoustical data and issued a report on December 1, 1980 (dated November 19, 1980). The FBI report concluded that the HSCA failed to prove that there were gunshots on the recording and also failed to prove that the recording was made in Dealey Plaza. In fact, using the techniques of the previous investigators, the FBI matched a gunshot recorded in Greensboro, NC in 1979 with the sound that was supposedly a shot from the grassy knoll – purportedly suggesting that the initial investigation's methods were invalid.


National Academy of Sciences

After the FBI disputed the validity of the acoustic evidence, the
Justice Department A justice ministry, ministry of justice, or department of justice is a ministry or other government agency in charge of the administration of justice. The ministry or department is often headed by a minister of justice (minister for justice in a ...
paid for a review by the
National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...
, an organization operating with a Title 36 congressional charter. On May 14, 1982, the panel of experts chaired by
Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
's
Norman Ramsey Norman Foster Ramsey Jr. (August 27, 1915 – November 4, 2011) was an American physicist who was awarded the 1989 Nobel Prize in Physics, for the invention of the separated oscillatory field method, which had important applications in the const ...
, released the results of their study. The NAS panel unanimously concluded that:
The acoustic analyses do not demonstrate that there was a grassy knoll shot, and in particular there is no acoustic basis for the claim of 95% probability of such a shot.
The acoustic impulses attributed to gunshots were recorded about one minute after the President had been shot and the motorcade had been instructed to go to the hospital.
Therefore, reliable acoustic data do not support a conclusion that there was a second gunman."
According to Ramsey, noises on the Dictabelt were "probably static".
Louis Stokes Louis Stokes (February 23, 1925 – August 18, 2015) was an American attorney, civil rights pioneer and politician. He served 15 terms in the United States House of Representatives – representing the east side of Cleveland – and was the firs ...
, a member of the
United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the Lower house, lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the United States Senate, Senate being ...
who chaired the HSCA, commented that the report "raised new and serious questions about our conclusions that need to be resolved." Dr. Barger, the HSCA's acoustics expert, when asked about this discovery and the NAS analysis, replied,
Barber discovered a very weak spoken phrase on the DPD Dictabelt recording that is heard at about the time of the sound impulses we concluded were probably caused by the fourth shot. The NAS Committee has shown to our satisfaction that this phrase has the same origin as the same phrase heard also on the Audograph recording. The Audograph recording was originally made from the channel 2 radio. The common phrase is heard on channel 2 about a minute after the assassination would appear, from the context, to have taken place. Therefore, it would seem . . . that the sounds that we connected with gunfire were made about a minute after the assassination shots were fired. Upon reading the NAS report, we did a brief analysis of the Audograph dub that was made by the NAS Committee and loaned to us by them. We found some enigmatic features of this recording that occur at about the time that individuals react to the assassination. Therefore, we have doubt about the time synchronization of events on that recording, and so we doubt that the Barber hypothesis is proven. The NAS Committee did not examine the several items of evidence that corroborated our original findings, so that we still agree with the House Select Committee on Assassinations conclusion that our findings were corroborated
An analysis published in the March 2001 issue of ''
Science & Justice ''Science & Justice'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal of forensics published by Elsevier on behalf of the Forensic Science Society and the International Society for Forensic Genetics. The journal was established in 1960 as the ''Journal o ...
'' by Dr. Donald B. Thomas used a different radio transmission synchronization to put forth the claim that the National Academy of Sciences panel was in error. Thomas' conclusion, very similar to the HSCA conclusion, was that the gunshot impulses were real to a 96.3% certainty. Thomas presented additional details and support in the November 2001 and September and November 2002 issues. Commenting on Thomas's study, G. Robert Blakey said: "This is an honest, careful scientific examination of everything we did, with all the appropriate statistical checks." In 2005, Thomas' conclusions were rebutted in the same journal. Ralph Linsker and several members of the original NAS team, (
Richard Garwin Richard Lawrence Garwin (born April 19, 1928) is an American physicist, best known as the author of the first hydrogen bomb design. In 1978, Garwin was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering for contributing to the application ...
,
Herman Chernoff Herman Chernoff (born July 1, 1923) is an American applied mathematician, statistician and physicist. He was formerly a professor at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Stanford, and MIT, currently emeritus at Harvard University. Early life ...
,
Paul Horowitz Paul Horowitz (born 1942) is an American physicist and electrical engineer, known primarily for his work in electronics design, as well as for his role in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (see SETI). Biography At age 8, Horowitz ac ...
, and Ramsey) reanalyzed the timings of the recordings and reaffirmed in an article in ''Science & Justice'' the earlier conclusion of the NAS report that the alleged shot sounds were recorded approximately one minute after the assassination.


Further analysis

The
United States Department of Justice The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the United States government tasked with the enforcement of federal law and administration of justice in the United State ...
reviewed the HSCA report and the National Academy of Science's study of the sound evidence. It reported to the Judiciary Committee on March 28, 1988, and rebuked the HSCA's conclusion of a probable conspiracy. In 2003, an independent researcher named Michael O'Dell reported that both the National Academy and Dr. Thomas had used incorrect timelines because they assumed the Dictabelt ran continuously. When corrected, these showed the impulses happened too late to be the real shots even with Thomas's alternative synchronization. In addition, he pointed out that the claim of a 95% or higher probability of a shot from the
grassy knoll Dealey Plaza is a city park in the West End Historic District of downtown Dallas, Texas. It is sometimes called the "birthplace of Dallas". It was also the location of the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963; 30 minutes after the shooting ...
was logically incorrect. It was a 5% chance of finding a match in random noise and did not consider other possible causes. A November 2003 analysis paid for by the cable television channel
Court TV Court TV is an American digital broadcast network and former cable television channel. It was originally launched in 1991 with a focus on crime-themed programs such as true crime documentary series, legal analysis talk shows, and live news cove ...
concluded that the putative gunshot impulses did not match test gunshot recordings fired in Dealey Plaza any better than random noise. In December 2003, Thomas responded by pointing out what he claimed were errors in the November 2003 Court TV analysis. However, in 2005, five acoustic experts (Linsker, Garwin, Chernoff, Horowitz, and Ramsey) reinvestigated the acoustic recordings and noted several errors made by Thomas. In 2013, Professor Larry J. Sabato, Ph.D. commissioned a study on the Dictabelt recording using more modern analytical techniques. The report concluded that the recording did not contain sounds of the assassination gunfire and that it would be of "doubtful utility" as evidence to prove or disprove a conspiracy. 90% of Dealey Plaza spectators reported to have heard 3 shots or less.


Digital restoration

In 2003,
ABC News ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include Breakfast television, morning ...
aired the results of its investigation on a program called ''
Peter Jennings Reporting ''Peter Jennings Reporting'' was a continuing series of documentaries produced and hosted by ABC News anchor Peter Jennings that aired on ABC. Many of these documentaries were produced by Jennings's production company, PJ Productions, and are cu ...
: The Kennedy Assassination: Beyond Conspiracy.'' Based on computer diagrams and recreations done by Dale K. Myers, it concluded that the sound recordings on the Dictabelt could not have come from Dealey Plaza, and that Dallas Police Officer H.B. McLain was correct in his assertions that he had not yet entered Dealey Plaza at the time of the assassination. In the March 2005 issue of ''
Reader's Digest ''Reader's Digest'' is an American general-interest family magazine, published ten times a year. Formerly based in Chappaqua, New York, it is now headquartered in midtown Manhattan. The magazine was founded in 1922 by DeWitt Wallace and his wi ...
'', it was reported that Carl Haber and Vitaliy Fadeyev were assigned with the task of digitally restoring Dictabelt 10 by Leslie Waffen from the National Archives. Their method consisted of using sensors to map the microscopic contours of the tracks of old sound recordings without having to play them using a stylus, which would further degrade the sound. Dictabelt 10 was worn from countless playings and cracked due to improper storage. By 2010 digital restoration of the Dictabelt seemed a more distant prospect, with both funding and final approval for the project unlikely to be secured in the near future.


Possible origins

Left unanswered by the professional analyses was the question of whose open microphone captured the sounds recorded on the Dictabelt, if not Officer H.B. McLain. Jim Bowles, a Dallas police dispatcher supervisor in November 1963, and later Dallas County Sheriff, believes it originated from a particular officer on a three-wheeled motorcycle stationed at the Dallas Trade Mart, the original destination of President Kennedy's motorcade, along the same
freeway A controlled-access highway is a type of highway that has been designed for high-speed vehicular traffic, with all traffic flow—ingress and egress—regulated. Common English terms are freeway, motorway and expressway. Other similar terms ...
to
Parkland Hospital Parkland often refers to a park. Parkland or Parklands may also refer to: Geography * Aspen parkland, a biome transitional between prairie and boreal forest (taiga) * Landscaped parkland, a managed rural area associated with European country hous ...
, which would account for the sound of sirens rushing by. McLain himself believes that it was from a different officer on a three-wheeler near the Trade Mart, who was known for his whistling. When interviewed by author
Vincent Bugliosi Vincent T. Bugliosi Jr. (; August 18, 1934 – June 6, 2015) was an American prosecutor and author who served as Deputy District Attorney for the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office between 1964 and 1972. He became best known for s ...
, the officer acknowledged that his microphone could have been stuck in the open position (he did not recall hearing any transmissions for several minutes), and could later have become unstuck after he followed the motorcade to Parkland Hospital.Vincent Bugliosi, ''Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy'', 2007, , endnotes pp. 184–190.


Further reading

*Stokes, Louis (Chairman, House Select Committee on Assassinations). (29 March 1979)
Report of the Select Committee on Assassinations of the U.S. House of Representatives
*Ramsey, Norman F. (Chairman, Committee on Ballistic Acoustics, National Academy of Sciences). (1982)

* (pp. 238–242, unraveling of acoustic evidence in JFK conspiracy finding) *Thomas, Donald B. (14 June 2000)
Echo correlation analysis and the acoustic evidence in the Kennedy assassination revisited.
''Science & Justice 2001'' 41, 21-32. *Thomas, Donald B. (17 November 2001)

*Thomas, Donald B. (September 2002)

*Thomas, Donald B. (23 November 2002)

*O'Dell, Michael. (2003)
The acoustic evidence in the Kennedy assassination
*Berkovitz, Robert. (19 November 2003)
Searching For Historic Noise: A Study of a Sound Recording Made on the Day of the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy
*Thomas, Donald B. (December 2003)

*National Research Council, Washington, DC 198

*March 2005 Reader's Digest articl
"Can technology settle the Lone Gunman controversy in the JFK assassination?"
* Sturdivan, Larry M., ''The JFK Myths: A Scientific Investigation of the Kennedy Assassination'', 2005, . *
Bugliosi, Vincent Vincent T. Bugliosi Jr. (; August 18, 1934 – June 6, 2015) was an American prosecutor and author who served as Deputy District Attorney for the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office between 1964 and 1972. He became best known for su ...
, ''Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy'', 2007, Norton. . * Belin, David W., ''Final Disclosure: The Full Truth About the Assassination of President Kennedy'', 1988, Macmillan, .


References

{{John F. Kennedy assassination Assassination of John F. Kennedy Sound recording