Report of the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy

第四章

This chapter covers evidence linking Lee Harvey Oswald to the sixth-floor window of the Texas School Book Depository from which the assassination shots were fired, including forensic identification evaluations, pre-assassination presence testimony, recovered physical evidence, and eyewitness accounts of the shooter.

Fingerprint and Palmprint Identification Assessment

The Commission assessed the probative value of fingerprint and palmprint identifications found on cartons at the sixth-floor sniper’s nest. It ruled out the possibility that other warehouse employees or law enforcement personnel who handled the cartons left the identifiable prints, as no other employees except Oswald left identifiable marks on the cartons. Combined with the freshness of one print and the presence of Oswald’s prints on two of the four cartons and the paper bag, the Commission assigned probative value to the identifications to support the conclusion that Oswald was present at the firing window, though the prints do not confirm the exact time he was there.

Oswald’s Pre-Assassination Sixth Floor Presence

The chapter includes testimony and evidence confirming Lee Harvey Oswald was present on the Depository sixth floor approximately 35 minutes before the assassination, tying him to the sniper’s nest location prior to the shooting.

Charles Givens’ Oswald Sighting Testimony

Charles Givens, the last known Depository employee to see Oswald inside the building before the assassination, testified that on the morning of November 22, he saw Oswald standing on the fifth floor as his elevator passed while the floor-laying crew descended from the sixth floor around 11:45 a.m. When Givens returned to the sixth floor around 11:55 a.m. to retrieve his cigarettes, he observed Oswald carrying a clipboard walking from the southeast corner of the sixth floor toward the elevator. Oswald instructed Givens to close the west elevator gate when he went downstairs, and the west elevator was no longer present on the first floor when Givens arrived. No Depository employees are documented to have seen Oswald again until after the shooting.