Motorcade route change?
Posted: Thu Jul 08, 2010 4:33 pm
There is a lot of discussion going on wether the motorcade was changed from Main street to Houston and Elm. The anti-conpiricists use the fact that James Files is adament on the route change, as a point against his credibility, as they maintain the route was never changed. Maybe we could examine if the route was changed or not, and if so when? 1994 interview: Roselli...I'm going to say somewhere shortly around 7:00 that morning, maybe a few minutes past seven...and I picked up Johnny Roselli and we drove from the Dallas Cabana to Ft. Worth, Texas to a pancake house(12) they had there just off the major highway. We went there to meet someone...I did not know who we was meeting...But he had already told me...Johnny Roselli said we was going to meet a man by the name of Jack Ruby...that he had some things that we had to pick up. When we got there, Johnny Roselli told me he said...I'm going to go in and sit in a booth...he says you wait and come in later...he said sit somewhere else where you can keep an eye on me...in case something goes wrong, I want you to cover my backside. So I positioned myself..after Johnny Roselli went in...I sit at the counter...ordered a cup of coffee and sit there and waited. This real heavy set gentlemen came in and he went over and he knew Johnny Roselli I assume cause they shook hands, they talked for a minute and they sit down in the booth together. They passed over, I'm gonna say probably a 5 x 9 envelope...manilla envelope that had some material in it, at that point. After a couple of minutes, he got up, they shook hands, he left. I went out into the parking lot, made sure the air was clear, started the car up, pulled up by the door, Johnny Roselli come out and got in the car. I never met Jack Ruby, never said hello or anything. Johnny Roselli got in the car with me and we started back to Dallas. He opened the envelope up and there was identification in there for Secret Service people and we had a map in there of the exact motorcade route that would take it through Dealey Plaza. Johnny Roselli said well they only made one change.(13) That was when he informed me they was coming off of Main Street on to Elm or on to Houston there...they made the zig-zag, the little turn that they should have never made. But when they made that, it was the only change in it. I drove him back to the Dallas Cabana, he went upstairs and I waited for Mr. Nicoletti to come down. Mr. Nicoletti came down and got in the car with me and we drove to Dealey Plaza. 2003 interview:J – Okay. So tell us about the trip over to Fort worth.JF – The trip over to Fort Worth. Well, I didn’t know we were going to Fort Worth. He told me he had directions and I don’t know if he had ever been there before or not, but we went to Fort Worth, I remember the exit was like University Avenue or University Boulevard, it was named University, that’s all I know. I know it was on the south side and then sitting on the west side of that street. Just a couple of blocks off there, the pancake house. Fairly new one. J – It’s still there!JF – Well, I didn’t know it’s still there, but they make good pancakes, I know that. That’s where I had my first Belgian waffle. (Fort Worth is quite some distance from downtown Dallas and James Files has no clue why the meeting with Jack Ruby had to take place there, but it is quite understandable that Johnny Roselli did not want to be seen with Jack Ruby in Dallas where Ruby was a well known figure. )W – Why did you go all the way to Fort Worth?JF – Excuse me, I 've got to clarify one thing: I didn’t have a Belgian waffle that morning. I had the Belgian waffle there a few years later. But that morning when I got there, Johnny Roselli went there to meet somebody by the name of Jack Ruby. I had never known Jack Ruby, nothing about him. When I got there and pulled in the parking lot, Johnny Roselli told me: Let me go in first, see where I’m going to sit, come in and position yourself. And he asked me: Are you carrying? And I said: Yeah, I’m carrying. He said: Good! When I sit down, where I am sitting at, I don’t know what may transpire. He said: Something could go wrong. Be very alert! Keep my backside covered! I won’t be in your line of fire. And I said: Okay, I pick an open field of fire. Where ever I figure I can handle it. I said: Go sit down and I’ll come in position myself. Johnny Roselli went in and they had like, you can call it a booth, a table, there wasn’t anything before it or nothing, but he sat down in that. And I went (inaudible) right behind him. I positioned myself at the counter, ordered a cup of coffee, I was served and sat there. And then I sit there and I watch and saw a short stocky built man come in, walked over, Johnny got up, they shook hands, they sit down, they talked for a couple of minutes. I see him take like a half-size, like a legal envelope, but only half that size, out of his jacket and he laid it and pushed it across the table to Johnny Roselli. He got up, they shook hands, this man left, Johnny waited maybe two minutes. Johnny looked at me, I got up, I walked out the restaurant, made sure the area was clear, nobody outside in the parking lot, I went over and got in the car, started up and pulled up by the door, Johnny Roselli walked out, got in the car and we drove away.J – Did you ask him or did you find out in some way what was in the envelope?JF- On the way back to Dallas, Johnny and me was driving down the road, he didn’t open the envelope right away. We got almost up to, I think it’s Arlington, it’s about halfway there. I’m saying halfway, could be less one way or the other, it ‘s been a long time for me. But we were right about Arlington and Johnny opened the envelope, takes the stuff out and is looking at it. While he is looking at it, he noticed I am watching over while I am driving, and he ‘s got them little black wallets, like half-size, like identification wallets. And he opened them up and there is identification plates in them and there’s badges on them. At that point I didn’t know what the identification on it was. Because he is sitting there and looking at it, and I’m not going to lean over and I’m not going to say: Give me one of those!, or anything like that. I wait, when he wants me to know, he will tell me. And then he opened up a piece of paper and he unfolded it. And there has been a lot of discrepancy over this part now. But Johnny Roselli said: They only made one change in the route. W – That was the motorcade?JF – It was a map of Dealey Plaza, the motorcade route. When he looked at it, for Dealey Plaza, he said they have only made one alter, one change in it. He said: That’s all. And I said: What’s that? And he said: They are going to go down Elm Street. They’re going to stop and make a detour, coming around this little street here. And he held it up and I kinda glanced over but I didn’t get a chance to look at it real good at that point. But I had already reconned the area so I knew what he was talking about. And I know that everybody says: They had the motorcade in the newspaper, weeks and months ahead of time. Sure they did. But they didn’t have that one change. And if anybody wants to show somebody a newspaper clip, anybody check real close, because the original route they were not coming down Elm Street there. On that little detour, where they had the slowdown.(Wim: The little detour that James Files talks about is a zig-zag turn over Houston Street and then onto Elm Street. Such a sharp turn where the presidential limousine has to slow down considerably, is in violation with Secret Service regulations. This detour was in fact published in newspapers on Tuesday 19 November, but it is possible that the original plan for the motorcade route was to go straight over Main Street. The change over Elm Street appears to have been made prior to that tuesday.)J – Had you heard prior to that, when they got to Dealey Plaza, that they would just continue straight on Main Street? Was that the idea?JF – The original plan was that we would be shooting at a fast moving target. And Nicoletti had no military experience and I already had advised him that he would have to shoot high and the target would be running away from him. That he would have to shoot above the head. And we were going for a headshot, I told him “it’s going to be hard for you to hit him from there”. We ‘re getting a little bit ahead though. Before we got into this part ..J – Yeah, let’s go back ..JF – Because Chuck hadn’t got to Dallas that week. He only came in, I hadn’t seen him that morning. I had not seen Chuck in person until I went with Johnny Roselli to Fort Worth and come back. Johnny Roselli got out of the car and went upstairs, Charles Nicoletti came down. Mr. Nicoletti got into the car with me and we drove to Dealey Plaza.