FERRIE’S FATAL JFK FIASCO
By
Steve Erdmann
(Copyright 2015, Steve Erdmann - All Rights Reserved)
<Edted by Robert D. Morningstar>
“It is not light that we need, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.”
Frederick Douglass
Part I
Thunder and Lightning
Judyth Vary Baker knew David Ferrie as a man of many faces: a legal advisor for New Orleans Mafia Don, Carlos Marcello, an aircraft pilot for several Mafia families, CIA asset, a defrocked priest, anti-Castro adventurer, seducer of men and teenage boys, participant in an anti-Castro bioweapon plot, and a key to the JFK assassination.
“The Coup d’ Etat in 1963 took control of an inconvenient two-party system to run its self-protecting corporate agenda, with the CIA, FBI, banking interests and the military-industrial complex cooperating,” says Baker. “And when the Supreme Court recently ruled that corporations could, in essence, buy any and all political candidates through ‘donation,’ with no limit on what could be spent to influence votes, the American government became a prostitute whose services were purchased by the highest bidders.”
To order “DAVID FERRIE: Mafia Pilot, ...”. contact:
DAVID FERRIE: Mafia Pilot, participant in anti-Castro Bioweapon Plot, Friend of Lee Harvey Oswald and the Key to the JFK Assassination, Judyth Vary Baker, Trine Day LLC, P.O. Box 577, Walterville, Oregon, 97489, 1-800-556-2012, publisher@TrineDay.net, www.trineday.com, 2014, 521 pages, $24.95.
David Ferrie’s connections to the Military-Industrial-Complex began in early 1952 when he became involved in the New Orleans Civil Air Patrol. There, Ferrie began instructing cadets, often in summer encampments at the air force bases.
Ferrie became a CAP commander in 1953. Lee Harvey Oswald enrolled as a CAP cadet on July 27, 1955 (serial No. 084965).
Oswald attended meetings at Moisant CAP Squadron, Lakefront and Abita Spring, Louisiana.
Eddie Voebel, a friend of Oswald, said that Oswald “had been a cadet in Ferrie’s CAP squadron in 1955 and that he recalled Oswald attended a party at Ferrie’s then-home at 209 Vinet Street.”
Researcher Lee Farley mentioned that David Ferrie was instrumental in “grooming” Oswald and his consequential enlistment in the United States Marines. Ferrie told the local Marine Corps that Oswald would be good in the CIA because “he could keep his mouth shut.” (Page 73.)
THE HEATH CONNECTION
In 1953, David Ferrie developed an interest in philosophy and took a course at Tulane. Doctor Bob Heath had 120 psychiatric patients that used subcortical electrode stimulation at his clinic.
Heath conducted experiments at East Louisiana State Hospital at Jackson, along with associates from Tulane University. One of the fascinating persons who would drop by to visit was David Ferrie. In 1954, Ferrie began studying for a doctorate in psychology from the University of Phoenix (a university of “low esteem,” says Baker).
Ferrie spoke of the bringing “patients” to Heath’s office and, also, flying “sensitive” psychiatric data between Tulane’s psychology department and other hospitals and departments. CIA agents approached Heath to conduct human and animal tests of bulbocapnine.
The 1957 Inspector General Report said that “the knowledge that the agency is engaging in unethical and illicit activities would have serious repercussions in political and diplomatic circles.” The U.S Army funded a Tulane Electrical Brain stimulation program conducted by Dr. Robert Heath, and (according to Australian psychiatrist, Dr. Harry Bailey) used blacks because “they were everywhere and cheap experimental animals.”
In June-July, 1967, Ferrie wrote a thesis for his PhD in psychology about hypnotherapy and received his PhD in psychology.
FERRIE AND VOODOOISM
Baker says that Ferrie definitely was involved in a matrix of activities including his Civil Air Patrol activities, his job as a pilot at Eastern Airlines, pilot for mobster Carlos Marcello’s lawyers (and flying to Guatemala for Marcello), and, according to Victor Marchetti, “had in fact been employed by the CIA.” (Marchetti was Deputy Assistant to the CIA Director Richard Helms, page 82.)
Ferrie was additionally connected into the CIA’s MKULTRA (mind control) program through Doctor Bob Heath, but, additionally Dr. Alton Ochsner (one-time friend of Office of Strategic Services [OSS] Chief “Wild Bill” Donovan), and Dr. Mary Sherman (researcher into cancer).
Ferrie met Dr. Oschsner through Dr. Sherman, both cleared for work on a “Sensitive Position. (Page 97.)" Baker later learns that it is referred to as “The Project”: A cancer experiment, spear-headed by Oschsner, to develop a cancer serum as a bioweapon to be used against Fidel Castro.
In order to convince Baker of the reality of The Project, as government sponsored, she is introduced to a gruff detective and FBI/CIA asset, Guy Banister, who speaks at length of his clandestine contacts:
“Ferrie’s project was legitimate. Even the CIA was backing it, along with the city’s crime boss, Carlos Marcello,” says Baker. “Banister was quite serious.”
Banister’s Agency was involved, not only with Mary Sherman’s bioweapon project, but also the CIA, crime boss Carlos Marcello (because of the Intelligence alliances), and a spy ring against Castro and Communist activities (Banister was a former FBI agent [briefly, at his height in the Chicago FBI]). Banister continued to gather evidence against the corrupt New Orleans Police Department.
“When Dr. Sherman shows me a powerful new cancer developed over the past year, I am stunned by its vigor,” says Baker about 1963. “I agree to do what I can to stabilize the cancer and help transform it from a mouse cancer to one that will attack human tissues, only later will I realize that the cancer could be stolen and used to silence political enemies ‘forever.’”
Judyth Baker’s early career into cancer research and her connection with Dr. Alton Ochsner was amply illustrated in her book Me & Lee: How I Came to Know, Love and Lose Lee Harvey Oswald, TrineDay Publishers, 2010.)
New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison summarized an understanding about the “anti-Castro” Radical right situation, stated in Garrison’s November 22, 1967 Playboy Magazine interview: members of the paramilitary right, anti-Castro exiles, were extremely worried about Jack Kennedy’s policy of détente succeeding.
http://www.whale.to/b/jim_garrison_i.html
The CIA was involved in much of this intrigue in a “mixed bag” of Minutemen, Cuban exiles, other anti-Castro “adventurers” training for a “foray” into Cuba. Along with an assassination attempt on Fidel Castro—there was also the bioweapon Project of Mary Sherman. “David Ferrie, who operated on the ‘command’ level of the ultra-rightists, was deeply involved in this effort,” says Baker. (Page 224.)
BUGGING DEVICES
One of the earlier choices by Banister for someone to be Ferrie’s laboratory assistant was Michael Riconosciuto, “a young genius in electronics, biochemistry, chemistry and computers…”
For further information about Riconosciuto's place in the espionage web, see
The Octopus from Hell, Parts I and II
http://ufodigest.com/article/octopus-hell-0704
Riconosciuto may have aided Banister in various “bugging” operations, such as placing devices in Clay Shaw’s house in the summer of 1963; Riconosciuto was adept at installing “bugging devices” and electronic surveillance equipment.
Baker lists witnesses that saw Banister and Ferrie, such as Vernon Gerdes, Dr. Michael Kurtz, George Higgenbotham, Rick Bauer, William Gaudet, and Sergio Arcacha Smith (pages 240-242). “And, of course, Lee Harvey Oswald,” adds Baker.
Baker was concerned for the rapid expansion of the Ochsner-Sherman project. About August 1, 1963, Baker says: “…deep-freezing this new backup material suggests that we aren’t developing this biological weapon just for Castro. We are about to make this cancer truly immortal…the city is a hot bed of Cold War operations of all kinds. The Project has required massive funding. Only one entity could afford everything happening here in New Orleans.” (Pages 245-246.)
TRAINING FILM
One of the bits of evidence of Oswald’s participation into the CIA’s various escapades was the “training film” of anti-Castro infantry near Bedico Creek near Lake Pontchartrain, Louisiana in early September 1963.
The film was seen by several people such as Robert K. “Bob” Tannenbaum of the House Select Committee on Assassinations(HSCA), researchers Larry Hancock and Dick Russell, and Banister associate Delphine Roberts. Baker tells Erdmann, she also saw the film. The film showed, according to Tannenbaum, Antonio Veciana of Alpha 66, Guy Banister, David Atlee Phillips, Lee Oswald and David Ferrie (pages 253, 264).
http://www.history-matters.com/archive/contents/hsca/contents_hsca_report.htm
Baker spreads a trail of incidents and witnesses showing that Oswald, Ferrie, the CIA, FBI, and the Mob were intricately connected; we can only highlight a few points, but the reader is welcome to search out the further connections in the book.
An FBI informant, Joe Hauser, in his assisting FBI wiretaps of mobster Marcello’s phone (161 reels of tape), told author John H. Davis that agent Hauser “personally knew Oswald.” (Page 265.)
Another witness was FBI agent Warren DeBrueys (pages 266-267). Orest Pena also said he saw Oswald with local chief Warren DeBrueys in August, 1963 (page 269).
ZOMBIE COLONIES
Baker speaks about prisoners from the Angola prison who were often used for “secret research” in a special Tulane University Research Unit at the East Louisiana State Hospital in Jackson.
“These experiments were supported by a grant from the Commonwealth Fund,” says Baker, “later identified as a CIA front.” (Comparative Effects of the Administration of Taraxein, d-LSD, Mescaline, and Psilocybin to Human Volunteers [Heath, Silva].)
If the patients survived, they are sent directly to the “zombie colonies” at Jackson State Hospital where “they wait to die and are buried in the Jackson graveyard so that security can be maintained and the truth about what was done to them completely covered.”
William Livesay, a prisoner at Angola, told Baker about his experiences with these experiments (page 275).
According to Baker, Lee Oswald was selected to make a trip to Mexico City to transport the biologically engineered materials that would eventually kill Castro of “natural causes,” which would actually be “lung cancer.” Prior to this venture, Oswald and Baker would continue to do blood tests at Jackson State Hospital.
INTERMEZZO
(The dark in the cellar)
INCIDENTS SURROUNDING JFK’S MURDER
The following are multiple tidbits that tend (in the opinion of Judyth Vary Baker and others) to support Baker’s Ferrie/Oswald scenario:
___Texas Theater Manager Butch Burroughs said that he sold Lee Oswald popcorn in the Texas Theater at the time officer Tippit was shot.
___David Ferrie carried with him a file, in which author Professor Joan Mellon said Ferrie referred to as “the Bomb,” along with a diagram in a “file,1963” portraying an automobile in an aerial view of Dealey Plaza…” (HSCA report of January 11, 1978). (Page 321.)
___An “Abort Team” was mentioned by Lee Oswald and William “Tosh” Plumlee (CIA contract pilot), and mentioned to author Jim Marrs.
___The infamous November 21, 1963 “party” at the oil baron Clint Murchison mansion in Dallas, Texas consisting of Richard Nixon, J. Edgar Hoover, H.L. Hunt, John Curington, George Brown (of Brown + Root), former Texas Republican Congressman Bruce Alger, and John J. McCloy (McCloy would be placed on the Warren Commission within the week).
Researchers Edgar Tatro and Harrison E. Livingstone confirmed Madeline Brown’s story (LBJ”s mistress), and wrote on September 3, 2014:
“The party happened.” (Pages 330, 331, 334.)
___The famous “Altgens photo” showed that when the first shot was heard, secret service agents did not look up at the 6th floor of the Book Depository but, rather, they looked ahead, or at the Texas Schoolbook Depository & Dal-Tex building.
“It is important that the photograph shows no agent looking up,” Baker says to Erdmann.
___James T. Tague was standing near the triple underpass and hit on the cheek by a piece of street curb struck by one of the assassin’s bullets, probably from the Dal-Tex building, not the Book Depository.
___The photos of Lee Oswald showing raised handcuffed wrists were his gesture to show newsmen that, to answer their questions, he was indeed handcuffed: It was not a “Communist salute.”
___Attorney Dean Andrews confessed that Oswald was just “a patsy,” adding: “I like to live. If they can get the President, they can crush me like a bug” (December 29, 1963). (Page 373.)
ADDITIONAL MYSTERY STRAINS
___Near the end of March, 1964, Betty Rubio, while working at the Lakefront Airport, saw Ferrie get out of a plane _ talk to Rubio _ and then go back to the plane and meet Clay Shaw. They talked for a while and then separated.
___Guy Banister was found naked and dead on June 6, 1964 from an alleged “heart attack.” His wife, Delphine Roberts, said that it was murder, but “it was made to look like a natural death.” “Anna Lewis said in a 2000 videotape: “He had a bullet in him, but they said it was a heart attack.”
___On or near July 11, 1965, David Ferrie was associated in flying individuals to Freemason Island. Matt Milligan of Trans-Gulf Seaplane Service identified photos of Andrew Blackmon and Clay Shaw.
JACK RUBY → “MK-ULTRA VICTIM”
According to Jack Ruby's brother, Earl Ruby, in HSCA testimony, and writer Greg Parker, Jack Ruby’s “cancer” was possibly “artificially induced.”
Dr. Louis Jolyon “Jolly” West
Baker outlines that Dr. Louis Jolyon West had been cleared at Top Secret for his work on MK-ULTRA.
“CIA documents show that grants were given to Dr. West for studies,” says Baker, “entitled, ‘Psychophysiological Studies of Hypnosis and Suggestibility’ and 'Studies of Dissociative States'.’’ West had examined Jack Ruby in his jail cell (page 387).
Also read Colin Ross MD:
“One such example that Ross writes about is Dr. Louis Jolyon West. While Dr. West’s curriculum vitae doesn’t mention that he received Top Secret clearance from the CIA as the contractor on MK-ULTRA Subproject 43, CIA documents show that grants were given to Dr. West for studies entitled, Psychophysiological Studies of Hypnosis and Suggestibility and Studies of Dissociative States.” (http://solpotes.blogspot.com/2009_09_01_archive.html.)
FURTHER ATTEMPTED MURDERS
David Ferrie had worked as a pilot for Al Crouch’s Saturn Aviation and flight school in November, 1966. Ferrie was fired on February 7, 1967, and would have been the pilot for a cross-country flight, but Crouch asked another pilot, “Bob,” instead.
Bob’s wife, J.G, spoke coincidentally to Baker sometime in 2013 about the crash of the 7th of 1967 in Slidell. According to J.G, Ferrie was fired “because Crouch was scared to death.” Crouch needed a pilot right away and J.G’s husband was selected. The crash was blamed on pilot error for not properly fueling the plane, but “Bob” had a receipt that proved he had refueled.
“From his unique perspective, Bob, trapped as he was in the plane,” says Baker, “could see that the fuel tank had been punctured.” (Pages 393-394.)
David Ferrie, at times, says Baker, suffered mentally for his guilt over his bisexuality (and the fact that it prevented him from becoming a priest); sometimes Ferrie would torture and whip himself (pages 255-260). The image that came to mind to this writer, was the semblance to the fictional Opus Dei character (the albino) Silas or Simon, in Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, who would whip himself mercilessly.
Ferrie began his last days by hiding out in the Airport’s pilots’ lounge and rest-overnight area, from about February 8 to 16, 1967.
Student Bruce Nolan said of Ferrie:
“One day in early 1967, I arrived for a lesson and found Ferries limped over a desk, crippled by a blazing headache. He could not fly. He could barely open one eye. I shoveled him into my car. He asked to be taken to his home on Louisiana Avenue Parkway. I got him to the porch and watched him scuffle inside.” (Nolan never saw him again).
The news media, at that time, was busy covering Jim Garrison’s investigation along with an occasional story written about Ferrie. In an interview with Garrison investigators on February 18, 1967, Ferrie voiced great skepticism of the single-bullet theory.
The famed group photo of Lee Oswald with his CAP squadron in 1967 was “no longer on display on the living room wall, along with other CAP group photos.” Other evidence of Lee Oswald knowing David Ferrie had disappeared.
Ferrie’s interview given to Garrison investigators while he stayed at the Fontainebleau Motor Hotel eventually vanished. Ferrie vanished from the hotel on February 19, 1967.
Ferrie called Raymond Broshears, former roommate, to report his fear of being killed, saying:
“No matter what happens to me, I won’t commit suicide.” (February 20, 1967.)
“A secret report generated by the FBI on May 22, 1968,” says Baker, “confirms that Garrison planned to arrest Ochsner, a Reilly coffee executive, and others associated with the New Orleans Project.” (Page 415.)
DOCTOR MINYARD’S REPORT
The body of Ferrie was found deceased about 11:50 a.m. on February 22, 1967 by Jimmy Johnson. The coroner’s staff arrived at 12:30 p.m. Three suspicious “suicide notes” were eventually found. Frank Minyard theorized that “it was a murder because of contusions to the mouth“
"Dr. Minyard says David Ferrie was murdered.” (Page 435.)
On February 23, 1967, Eladio Ceferino del Valle, ex-Cuban congressman, associate of David Ferrie (Baker says there is some evidence of association), and an anti-Castro activist, was found dead in his automobile in Miami: beaten, tortured, and shot in the chest. Eladio Valle and Ferrie flew “anti-Castro sorties” in the past, as well as ha