Haggerty Vetoes Habighorst
Then came the second and final turning point in the trial. Jackson, Hardiman, and Parker had been good witnesses. The Zapruder film was shocking. Finck’s cross-examination was riveting. Garrison had actually recovered a bit from the Spiesel disaster. To try to clinch the case that Shaw was Bertrand, Garrison called to the stand policeman Aloysius Habighorst.98 When Shaw was first arrested in March of 1967, Habighorst had handled the booking. Before having him sign the fingerprint card, the officer had routinely asked if the defendant had ever used an alias. Apparently unsettled by his arrest, Shaw had replied “Clay Bertrand.” Habighorst typed this on the card and Shaw signed it. Alcock now wanted to admit both the card and the officer’s testimony as evidence into the trial. This seemed powerful, damning evidence because it came right out of Shaw’s mouth and hand. It would lend credence to Garrison’s claim that Shaw really had called Dean Andrews to defend Oswald, and that Andrews had indeed perjured himself to protect Shaw.
Aloysius Habighorst joined the police force at 21; he was a fifteen-year veteran when he appeared at the Shaw trial.99 In 1967, at the time of Shaw’s arrest, he had been receiving three letters of commendation a year for his work.100 He had been taking FBI classes in fingerprinting and would often take cards home with him to practice identification techniques.101 The day after he had booked Shaw, he and his wife, Elsie, were home watching television when they heard a news commentator mention Garrison’s contention that Shaw had used the alias Clay Bertrand. Habighorst jumped out of his chair and told his wife that that was just what Shaw had said to him the night before, at the routine booking procedure.102 He ran to his room and showed her the three copies of Shaw’s card, which listed the alias and had Shaw’s signature. The alias also appeared on the arrest record.103
Habighorst hardly knew Garrison when he went to him with the cards. Garrison realized how critical this was to his case, and, with witnesses disappearing right and left, he placed Habighorst under protective surveillance.104 Two days before he was to testify, a man called his house and asked Elsie if “Al” was there. She thought this odd, since all her husband’s friends called him by his boyhood nickname: “Hotsie.” The caller asked when he would be getting off work. She said it would be late that evening and asked if there was any message. The man said no. The next day, Mardi Gras, Garrison decided to take the surveillance off Habighorst since he would be with other officers guarding the parade. Unexpectedly, however, Habighorst was relieved early, and headed home. As he was driving, a yellow truck pulled out of an alley near his house and tried to ram him.105 Habighorst suffered facial lacerations in his attempt to avoid the truck.
Dymond would have had a tough time belittling Habighorst, given his performance record. He could hardly have attacked his character. Habighorst came from a religious family, and served still, on occasion, as an altar boy. He had once leapt into a river to rescue a drowning man. He was so well-regarded by his superiors he was used in training films.106 It would have been difficult for Dymond to convince the jury that Habighorst was perjuring himself to help Garrison or to harm Shaw.107
Consequently, he took a different tack. Dymond decided to challenge the admittance into evidence of both Habighorst’s testimony and the card. Haggerty excused the jury. Shaw took the stand and told the judge he had never told Habighorst he used an alias. He also said he had signed a blank card that was filled in later.108 Shaw’s attorneys at the time of the arrest, Sal Panzeca and Edward Wegmann, testified that neither was at Shaw’s side at the time of the booking.109 The defense argued that this violated the Miranda and Escobedo rules, which require police to inform a suspect of his rights to remain silent and to have an opportunity to consult with an attorney.110 Invoking Miranda was stretching things, since Shaw had already been read his rights before he was brought to the booking room.111 As for Escobedo, New Orleans police procedure has always required that a suspect’s counsel be nearby when routine booking was taking place, which was in fact the case at Shaw’s booking.112 This had been standard practice since before Miranda and Escobedo were decided by the Supreme Court.113
The prosecution’s protestations fell on deaf ears. Judge Haggerty would not allow the evidence. He held that Shaw’s constitutional rights were violated because his attorney was not standing right next to him during his fingerprinting. Habighorst had no right to ask Shaw if he used an alias without Panzeca or Wegmann in his presence.114 But the judge went further. He said, “If Officer Habighorst is telling the truth, and I seriously doubt it …”115
Alcock leaped out of his chair. His face was red, and his voice cracked with emotion. “Your Honor. Are you ruling on the credibility of Officer Habighorst?”
Peering over his spectacles, Haggerty replied, “No jurors are present.”
“But you are passing on the credibility of a witness before the press and the entire world.”
“I don’t care,” Haggerty responded. “The whole world can hear that I do not believe Officer Habighorst. I do not believe Officer Habighorst.”
“I demand a mistrial,” Alcock shouted. “A judge’s unsolicited comment on evidence …”
“Denied,” said Haggerty. “I rule this evidence is inadmissible before the jury.”
Alcock did not file for a mistrial. Instead he tried to get a twenty-four-hour stay of the judge’s ruling from the State Supreme Court. The motion was denied.116 The next day he asked Haggerty to reconsider the ruling. Haggerty refused.117
If the defense had made a wish list before the trial, they could not have asked for a better witness than Spiesel or a better ruling than Haggerty’s exclusion of Habighorst’s testimony. Indeed, the judge had now deprived the prosecution of their best hope of linking Shaw to a conspiracy. The jury would not get to pass on the credibility of the officer. The judge had already done so.
Dymond’s defense case included Dean Andrews and James Phelan. Andrews changed his testimony yet another time to say that there was no such person as Clay Bertrand. It had all been a figment of his imagination. Alcock was not allowed to bring up Andrews’s perjury conviction directly because of the pending appeal,118 although the defense later mentioned it.
Phelan had been cooperating with Sheridan, Aynesworth, and Shaw’s attorneys almost since he arrived in New Orleans. It was only natural that the journalist was happy to testify for Shaw. Phelan was used to attack both Russo’s testimony and Sciambra’s memorandum of his first interview with Russo in Baton Rouge.119 But after Dymond took him through his paces, Alcock showed him the obstacle course. Phelan had been on local television, the Sterns’ WDSU, and stated that he had a taped interview with Perry Russo in which he contradicted his original Baton Rouge statements to Sciambra. Alcock asked him if he did, indeed, have such a tape. He replied he did not. Alcock then asked him if his statement on television was a lie. Phelan replied diffidently, “If you wish to call it that.”120
Alcock then asked Phelan about his visit to Russo before he had submitted his Saturday Evening Post story. He asked how long he had been with Russo at that time, and Phelan replied more than two hours. Alcock asked him why the very last thing they discussed, literally as he was walking out the door, was the Sciambra memorandum. Phelan said that once he got going, Russo was a talkative young man.121 But, Alcock asked, if Russo had not mentioned any meeting at Ferrie’s apartment, why did he leave that fact out of his article? Phelan replied it was because of space limitations.122 When Alcock asked Phelan if he had tried to convince Russo that Shaw was really Banister, Phelan agreed. Alcock then asked if Phelan had ever seen Banister. He had not. Then how did he know what the now dead Banister had looked like? Phelan replied that Banister had been described to him by Sheridan.123
What should have been a bombshell went off right after Phelan stepped down, but it was so subtle that almost no one noticed. Alcock seemed to be tiring and was unable to take advantage of it. The self-confident, clever Phelan had once told author James Kirkwood that Garrison did not have a bad ca
se without Russo. But Garrison needed Russo because he “is the only man on this planet who puts Dave Ferrie and Oswald together, the only one.”124
This was false on its face. There were witnesses who had seen the pair together in New Orleans from 1956 to 1963. But grant that Phelan believed it. Right after he stepped off the witness stand, the defense called Mrs. Jessie Garner. She had been Oswald’s landlady in the summer of 1963 in New Orleans. The defense had called her to say that she had only seen Oswald clean-shaven and neatly dressed. Her testimony was supposed to rebut Russo’s testimony that, at Ferrie’s party, Leon Oswald had been whiskered and scruffy in appearance. She was shown some photos of Oswald, and with these photos there was a picture of Ferrie. Surprised, she quietly and unexpectedly said that she knew “that man” too. She spoke so softly that almost no one heard her utter the sentence.125 She added that he was at her house shortly after the assassination.
In the aftermath of the assassination, many government agents had come to her home. But Ferrie was also there. When she realized he was not an agent, she asked him to leave. Incredibly, the prosecution did not press this issue. Alcock did not even mention it until his summation, and then he made almost nothing of it. But several researchers did talk to Mrs. Garner afterwards. She said that Ferrie had returned to search for his library card.126 He thought he had given it to Oswald and wanted to retrieve it from his room. Right then, two months after Oswald had left town and immediately after the assassination. So much for Phelan’s assurance that “no one on the planet” could put Oswald and Ferrie together. No one except Ferrie himself.
The last defense witness was Shaw himself. He did not have to take the stand, but his attorneys had a good feeling about his performance and the way the trial was proceeding. They wanted a complete vindication, for Shaw to deny all charges and to paint the Garrison case as a slimy sham motivated by the basest political and personal opportunism. A motive so reckless and a DA so driven by the lust for power that he would wreck the life and reputation of a completely innocent citizen.
Shaw did just that. He denied ever knowing Oswald or Ferrie. He denied attending any meeting at Ferrie’s apartment. He denied using an alias. He denied ever working with the CIA. He even denied the Clinton trip. He said he was a believer in what Jack Kennedy stood for and harbored no ill feeling toward him.127
The last to testify were rebuttal witnesses, called by both sides to counter specific testimony already presented. The most important rebuttal testimony in Garrison’s favor was delivered by Mr. and Mrs. Nicholas Tadin. They had called the DA after reading that Shaw denied ever knowing David Ferrie. Both testified that in the summer of 1964, they had taken their sixteen-year-old son to Lakefront Airport, to get a flying lesson from Ferrie. Mr. Tadin stated that previously he had seen Clay Shaw around town and knew from the papers who he was. When he and his wife brought their son to the airport, he saw Ferrie emerge from the hangar door with a tall, white-haired man. As they got closer, he recognized the second man as Shaw. As Shaw walked off, Tadin asked Ferrie if he had a new student. “No,” he replied. “He’s a friend of mine, Clay Shaw. He’s in charge of the International Trade Mart.”128 His wife testified to the same incident. She also knew who Shaw was. The last question Alcock asked Matilda Tadin was, “Are you telling the truth?” The woman immediately snapped, “Of course I’m telling the truth.”129
The trial was now over. Closing arguments were presented. Alcock tried to counter Dymond’s admission from Russo that the discussion at Ferrie’s had the characteristics of a “bull session.” Alcock stated that the “bull session” was carried out precisely on November 22: Oswald was in Dealey Plaza, Shaw had an alibi on the West Coast, and Ferrie made his trip to Texas in case he was needed as a getaway pilot.130 Alcock also accused Shaw of lying in the face of the number and credibility of the Clinton witnesses.131 Oser went through the impossibility of any single person performing the feat of marksmanship achieved during the assassination. He insisted that there must have been at least three assassins in Dealey Plaza. And that, he concluded, brought us to a conspiracy and David Ferrie’s “triangulation of fire” concept at the meeting at his apartment.132
Dymond cast doubt on all the prosecution witnesses, even the Tadins and the people from Clinton. He said it was ludicrous to think that someone as well-known as Shaw would really attempt to use an alias. He added that much of Garrison’s entire theory came from the mind of Dean Andrews, who had only once told the truth. And that was when on the stand in this case. Could they really convict Shaw on such questionable testimony? 133
Garrison spoke last and bitterly attacked the testimony of Frazier and Finck to illustrate what a colossal fraud the Warren Report was. He tried to get the jury to be courageous enough to overrule the experts and the Report and to begin to tell the truth about the assassination.134
The four summations began at about 2:30 p.m. Friday afternoon, February 28. They ended about 11:30 p.m. that night.135 The judge charged the jury and they went in to deliberate. The jurors asked the two alternates to vote and leave their ballots with a deputy. Interestingly, they both voted guilty.136 The jurors who counted did not see it that way. In an hour, a not-guilty verdict was returned. Thus ended the only trial ever conducted for the murder of John F. Kennedy.
As Gordon Novel later testified, when Shaw was acquitted, his lifestyle greatly improved. For instance, he went from driving a seven-year-old Lincoln to leasing a brand new super luxurious Continental Mark III for which he did not have to lay out a down payment.137
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Garrison Must Be Destroyed
“This thing, I have to do all the way. They’ll have to kill me so stop me.”
—Garrison to author Paris Flammonde
The first business day after the verdict, March 3, 1969, Garrison filed perjury charges against Shaw for denying that he ever knew Ferrie or Oswald. In light of the Clinton witnesses and the Tadins, Garrison seemed to have a good case. And in fact, by looking over the DA’s briefs for the perjury action, Garrison had learned his lesson. He was now going to throw every witness he had on this point against Shaw. The total number was over ten.1 Shaw’s lawyers tried to go before state court judge Malcolm O’Hara to get the charges thrown out. This did not work. The judge set a trial date for January 18, 1970.2 The Wegmanns continued to appeal the charges through each and every possible avenue. This delayed the trial for a full year.3
While this was ongoing, the other side continued their covert defense of Shaw. In August of 1969, the mass circulation magazine Look, ran a long article entitled “The Persecution of Clay Shaw.” This piece appears to be a joint operation between Hoover and Cartha DeLoach in Washington, and locally, Aaron Kohn and Bill Gurvich. The information in the article is essentially all the phony Mafia smears that David Chandler and Aaron Kohn had manufactured and utilized to tar Garrison. The photographs accompanying the article were taken by Bill Gurvich.4 The man who officially received the byline for the article, but who really served as a figleaf for Kohn and Gurvich, was Warren Rogers. This could not be known at the time of publication. But Rogers, like Phelan and Sandy Smith, was a reliable asset of the FBI. That is he could be contacted to do favors for them when called upon. The public did not know this until the 1979 posthumous publication of William Sullivan’s book about the FBI called The Bureau. Sullivan had been a top echelon officer in the FBI for many years. In his book there is a chapter entitled “Flacking for the Bureau.” Listed as one of the reporters who would often write articles with information fed to them by the FBI was Warren Rogers.5 In addition to the FBI, the CIA was also on the ready. Headquarters in Langley wanted to remove the teletype machine from the local station after the trial was over and Shaw had been acquitted. But Hunter Leake requested that the communications keystone stay in New Orleans until after the Shaw perjury trial was complete. Leake got his request fulfilled.6
After having been in receipt of Garrison’s briefing papers for the perjury trial, Shaw’s atto
rneys finally tried for a temporary restraining order to stop Garrison’s case from proceeding. This was initially denied. But then, on January 18, 1971, the day the state trial was to begin, a motion for emergency relief was granted.7 This was unusual because the federal judiciary does not often intervene in state prosecutions.8 But Shaw’s lawyers wrote that Shaw would suffer “grave and irreparable injury” as the result of the state perjury case which had been brought in “bad faith” and “in furtherance of Garrison’s scheme of harassment and intimidation.” A hearing on whether or not to grant the preliminary injunction was set for January 25, 1971. Just one week after the state trial was to begin. In other words, Shaw’s lawyers needed almost no preparation time for the new venue and the new hearing. Which they likely had been preparing for in advance. Since they had an intimation that they would be successful in switching the venue.
Destiny Betrayed: JFK, Cuba, & the Garrison Case Page 46