Hit List: An In-Depth Investigation Into the Mysterious Deaths of Witnesses to the JFK Assassination

by Richard Belzer

  F. Kennedy. Garrison would later claim that the motive for the assassination was anger over Kennedy’s attempts to obtain a peace settlement in both Cuba and Vietnam. Garrison also believed that Shaw, Banister and Ferrie had conspired to set up Oswald as a patsy in the JFK assassination.5

  So David Ferrie had some very strong linkage to the JFK assassination. Like Johnny Roselli, Jack Ruby, and Chauncey Holt, Ferrie traveled in two worlds at the same time. Ferrie was a trusted member of Organized Crime—he was actually Carlos Marcello’s private pilot. But at the exact same time, he was also deeply involved in actions and even specific missions on behalf of U.S. Intelligence, primarily in anti-Castro intelligence operations.

  1 Russell, On the Trail of the JFK Assassins, 106.

  2 Jim Garrison, On the Trail of the Assassins (Sheridan Square: 1988), 44.

  3 Ibid, 106.

  4 Garrison, On the Trail of the Assassins; Russell, The Man Who Knew Too Much.

  5 Wikipedia, “David Ferrie,” citing Garrison, On the Trail of the Assassins and Garrison, Playboy interview, accessed 4 Dec. 2012: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Ferrie

  It certainly appeared—to millions of suspicious-minded Americans, when it came to the crazy matters concerning the JFK assassination—that New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison was actually putting the pieces of the puzzle together and making sense of that intricate jigsaw puzzle as well:

  I have solid evidence indicating that Ruby, Ferrie, Oswald and others involved in this case were all paid by the CIA to perform certain functions: Ruby to smuggle arms for Cuban exile groups, Ferrie to train them and to fly counterrevolutionary secret missions to Cuba, and Oswald to establish himself so convincingly as a Marxist that he would win the trust of American left-wing groups and also have freedom to travel as a spy in Communist countries, particularly Cuba.1

  And Garrison was colorful about his characterizations in the process:

  We have evidence linking Ruby not only to anti-Castro exile activities but, as with almost everyone else involved in this case, to the CIA itself. Never forget that the CIA maintains a great variety of curious alliances it feels serve its purposes. It may be hard to imagine Ruby in a trench coat, but he seems to have been as good an employee of the CIA as he was a pimp for the Dallas cops.2

  So Americans—and the world—were suddenly paying close attention to what Garrison said about his investigation and its findings:

  . . . Ruby was up to his neck with the plotters. Our investigators have broken a code Oswald used and found Ruby’s private unlisted telephone number, as of 1963, written in Oswald’s notebook. The same coded number was found in the address book of another prominent figure in this case.3

  Garrison was one sharp character. Listen to his words, as he eloquently dispenses with some of the typical nonsense he used to receive—and nonsense that is still widely disseminated in various media formats in very obvious attempts to marginalize Garrison’s findings:

  First of all, let me dispose of this concept of the “temporarily deranged man.” This is a catchall term, employed whenever the real motive of a crime can’t be nailed down. In the overwhelming majority of instances, the actions of human beings are the direct consequences of discernible motives.

  1 JFK Lancer, “Jim Garrison’s Playboy Interview, Part Three,” accessed 10 Sept. 2012: http://www.jfklancer.com/Garrison4.html

  2 Ibid.

  3 Ibid.

  This is the fatal flaw of the Warren Report—its conclusion that the assassination of President Kennedy was the act of a temporarily deranged man, that the murder of Officer Tippit was equally meaningless and, finally, that Jack Ruby’s murder of Oswald was another act of a temporarily deranged individual. It is, of course, wildly improbable that all three acts were coincidentally the aberrant acts of temporarily deranged men— although it’s most convenient to view them as such, because that judgment obviates the necessity of relentlessly investigating the possibility of a conspiracy.1

  District Attorney Garrison’s legal logic was permeated with plain old common sense and the American people innately sensed it:

  In Jack Ruby’s case, his murder of Lee Oswald was the sanest act he ever committed; if Oswald had lived another day or so, he very probably would have named names, and Jack Ruby would have been convicted as a conspirator in the assassination plot. As it was, Ruby made the best of a bad situation by rubbing out Oswald in the Dallas city jail, since this act could be construed as an argument that he was “temporarily deranged.”2

  In fact, to many millions, Garrison’s eloquence was only surpassed by his logic:

  I do find it interesting that Jack Ruby died of cancer a few weeks after his conviction for murder had been overruled in appeals court and he was ordered to stand trial outside of Dallas—thus allowing him to speak freely if he so desired. I would also note that there was little hesitancy in killing Lee Harvey Oswald in order to prevent him from talking, so there is no reason to suspect that any more consideration would have been shown Jack Ruby if he had posed a threat to the architects of the conspiracy.3

  The odd thing, as Garrison noted, is that if Ferrie’s death had actually been natural, as the coroner concluded, then why was there a suicide note? In fact, there were two notes.

  Then, Garrison also famously stated, with some well-aimed sarcasm:

  I suppose it could just be a weird coincidence that the night Ferrie penned two suicide notes, he died of natural causes.4

  So the self-proclaimed “conspiracy debunkers” had some work cut out for themselves and really had to go to work on those points. In the process, what they effectively “debunked” was the possibility that Ferrie had actually died from suicide. John

  McAdams wrote:

  1 Ibid.

  2 JFK Lancer, “Jim Garrison’s Playboy Interview, Part Three,” accessed 10 Sept. 2012: http://www.jfklancer.com/Garrison4.html

  3 Ibid.

  4 Ibid.

  So, did Ferrie commit suicide? The last person to see him alive, George Lardner, Jr., reported him to be in good spirits. And several people who talked to him in the last week of his life reported that, in spite of his health problems, he was in a combative mood, intent on fighting Garrison’s charges against him. Indeed, he was preparing to sue Garrison.

  But one key piece of evidence was discovered by Blackburst in Garrison’s own files. A bottle of Proloid tablets was found in Ferrie’s apartment after his death, and it had seven tablets left in it. Why wouldn’t somebody intent on suicide take the whole bottle?

  Most likely, Garrison simply lucked out when Ferrie died the natural death the autopsy results showed.1

  Aside from the observation that John McAdams has a pretty twisted notion of what “luck” would be to a man like District Attorney Jim Garrison, it also makes it apparent that Ferrie’s death was probably not suicide or accident.

  So what was it? A natural death from too much pressure, as some, even the medical examiner, suggested?2 It was widely reported that Ferrie left behind two typed notes that “suggested suicide.” But did they?

  Both of those notes were typed, undated, and unsigned.3 And, as Mr. McAdams correctly pointed out, the notes do not appear to actually be suicide notes. They appear, instead, to be two notes written by a man who knew he was leaving this world—they were more the words of a man who was making his final statements; of words that he wanted left behind.

  One note to his best friend started out: “When you read this I will be quite dead and no answer will be possible.”4 It ended with the words: “As you sowed, so shall you reap.”5 The other letter started out: “To leave this life, to me, is a sweet prospect.”6 Then it complained about the justice system and ended “All the state needs is ‘evidence to support a conviction.’ If this is justice, then justice be damned.” The letters can be accessed in their entirety online.7

  So they, indeed, do not appear to actually be notes regarding a planned suicide. However, Mr. McAdams uses that point to refute Jim Garrison’s claim,
which was simply regarding the possibility that Ferrie, as Mr. McAdams puts it, “had killed himself to escape prosecution.”8 That’s very interesting, but not at all what’s actually important. And, in the process of trying to prove Garrison wrong, the case for things amiss in the field of foul play is actually expanded.

  1 John McAdams’ The Kennedy Assassination Pages, “David Ferrie’s ‘Suicide Notes,’” accessed 3 Dec. 2012: http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/death10.htm

  2 Ibid.

  3 Wikipedia, “David Ferrie”

  4 John McAdams, “David Ferrie’s ‘Suicide Notes’”

  5 Ibid.

  6 Ibid.

  7 John McAdams’ The Kennedy Assassination Pages, “David Ferrie’s ‘Suicide Notes,’” accessed 3 Dec. 2012: http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/death10.htm

  8 Ibid.

  The conspiracy “refuters” also inadvertently rule out an accidental death, as well as suicide, by pointing out that the drug Proloid, found in Ferrie’s apartment, “is too slow-acting to have killed Ferrie between the time he was last seen alive (by journalist George Lardner, Jr.) and the time he was found dead.”1

  And while it is true that the New Orleans Coroner, Nichols Chetta, eventually concluded that Ferrie died of a cerebral hemorrhage—technically what is known as a “Berry Aneurysm,” which could, in simple terms, just be called a stroke—take note that the story does not end there. Not everyone believed that just because Ferrie had died of a stroke meant that he had not been murdered, and among that “not everyone” was none other than the Managing Director of the Metropolitan Crime Commission of New

  1 Ibid.

  The Portentous Prose and Proclamations

  of David William Ferrie

  If it’s extremely noteworthy that upon closer examination of the contents of those two notes, they do not sound like a man planning to commit suicide, then it would seem to not only refute Garrison, but to confirm Ferrie’s own words and fears. It’s very important to remember exactly what Ferrie said. After Ferrie was publicly named as an accused conspirator in the JFK assassination by the New Orleans District Attorney’s office, Ferrie exploded at Jim Garrison’s aide, Lou Ivon. Ferrie’s exact words were the following:

  You know what this news story does to me, don’t you? I’m a dead man. From here on, believe me, I’m a dead man.1

  Now, notice the similar sentiments in the words in Ferrie’s two letters found in his apartment:

  When you read this I will be quite dead and no answer will be possible.2

  Keep in mind that Ferrie worked arm-in-arm with Mafia Godfather Carlos Marcello; he knew the machinations of the Mob, knew what they did to people who had to be eliminated, and had just seen one person whom he knew—Jack Ruby—do precisely that to another person whom he knew—Lee Harvey Oswald:

  It doesn’t take a genius to surmise from all this that Ferrie knew his days were numbered—and a very low number, at that.

  1 Garrison, On the Trail of the Assassins, 138.

  2 John McAdams, “David Ferrie’s ‘Suicide Notes’”

  Orleans, Aaron Kohn, who still believed that Ferrie was murdered.1 We think people should be pretty interested in his opinion, too.

  Another witness related to the JFK assassination explained in a video interview how the specific type of cerebral hemorrhage from which Ferrie died can be intentionally inflicted; the assassin pierces the roof of the mouth with a smooth object like a nail file, leaving very little evidence of the tear.2 The interview can be seen online at:

  http://jfkmurdersolved.com/film/ferrie.wmv

  Conclusion

  Unsolved—Possible assassination

  FURTHER RESEARCH

  On the Trail of the JFK Assassins, Dick Russell, 2008, Skyhorse Publishing

  The Man Who Knew Too Much, Dick Russell, 2003, Carroll & Graf

  Me & Lee: How I Came to Know, Love and Lose Lee Harvey Oswald, Judyth Vary Baker, 2001, TrineDay

  Dr. Mary’s Monkey: How the unsolved murder of a doctor, a secret laboratory in New Orleans and cancer-causing monkey viruses are linked to Lee Harvey Oswald, the JFK assassination and emerging global epidemics, Edward T. Haslam, 2007, TrineDay

  Wim Dankbaar, “Judyth Vary Baker,” JFK Murder Solved: http://www.jfkmurdersolved

  .com/judyth.htm

  “DAVID FERRIE: WHY HE IS IMPORTANT IN THE KENNEDY ASSASSINATION—AND EFFORTS BEING MADE TO HIDE IT,” Judyth Vary Baker, April 6, 2011, James Fetzer: Exposing Falsehoods and Revealing Truths: http://jamesfetzer.blogspot

  .com/2011/04/david-ferrie-why-he-is-important-in.html

  “The Mystery of David Ferrie,” John S. Craig, July, 1995, Fair Play Magazine: http://acorn.net/jfkplace/09/fb.back_issues/05th_Issue/ferrie.html

  1 John S. Craig, “The Mystery of David Ferrie,” July, 1995, Fair Play Magazine: http://acorn.net/jfkplace/09/fb.back_issues/05th_Issue/ferrie.html

  2 Wim Dankbaar, “JFK Murder Solved,” accessed 14 Sept 2012: http:jfkmurdersolved.com/film/ferrie.wmv

  Victim

  Rolando “El Tigre” Masferrer, Major Cuban Exile Resistance Leader based in South Florida

  Cause of Death

  Dynamite-bombed in car

  Official Verdict

  Unsolved murder

  Actual Circumstances

  Like Jimmy Hoffa, Masferrer definitely had involvement in the JFK assassination, but was also involved in a lot of dirty deals with the Mafia. So he was clearly assassinated in a highly professional job, but the question is, by whom?

  31

  Rolando

  Masferrer,

  October 5, 1975

  To give you an idea of this guy’s clout, “El Tigre” financed a private army in support of Batista, the Cuban dictator who preceded Castro. The army was known as “Los Tigres”; which Masferrer was named after.

  As author Dick Russell once observed, Masferrer was a powerful and ruthless anti-Castro leader among the Cuban “government in exile” fighting from ninety miles away in its Florida base of operations:

  Nicknamed “The Tiger” after his ruthless private army of the Batista era, Masferrer was an ex-Cuban senator and newspaper publisher who

  reportedly fled the island with as much as $10 million.

  “A guy who could slit your throat and smile while doing it,” said one U.S. Senate aide.1

  Colonel William C. Bishop was the senior military liaison to the Executive Action Assassination Program, and no stranger to some of the most dangerous killers on the planet—so it’s noteworthy that he considered “El Tigre” right up there with the worst of the worst and as a man to be reckoned with. He described him as the “key bagman” for Alpha 66, an extremely violent anti-Castro movement; with strong ties to the Mafia via Trafficante’s Mob people in Florida and elsewhere; and he also made this interesting connection:

  He also had different ties with Jimmy Hoffa. As far back as 1962, I think. But Rolando, from time to time when it came to large sums of money, had sticky fingers. I think that’s why he was killed, eventually. Either that, or the Kennedy assassination. Because he knew about it.2

  Colonel Bishop clearly confirmed that two of the participants in the JFK assassination were Rolando Masferrer and Tony Varona. And in an interview with Dick Russell, he elaborated on how the Kennedy Administration’s Cuba policies had infuriated the anti-Castro Cubans:

  You take Tony Varona and Rolando Masferrer to name but two—and there were many, many more—when serious talk began to happen about the possibility of assassinating Kennedy.3

  In an obviously professional operation, Masferrer was assassinated when dynamite exploded in his car.

  Rolando Masferrer, another Cuban exile employed by the CIA, was blown to bits when his car exploded on October 5, 1975. Masferrer had worked with “plumbers” Hunt, Sturgis, and Barker.

  1 Russell, The Man Who Knew Too Much, 333.

  2 Russell, The Man Who Knew Too Much, 333.

  3 Russell, The Man Who Knew Too Much, 333.

  According to Miss Brussell:1


  He would have been investigated for his activities in connection with assassination attempts on foreign leaders, had he not been killed.2

  Military Intelligence operative Richard Case Nagell provided us with a picture of how it all fits together. Nagell described how Masferrer was:

  • One of the individuals he was assigned to investigate;

  • One of the individuals with known links to the JFK assassination;

  • How he shared ties with other subjects of this book.

  I conducted inquiries relative to “dissident” members of several Cuban refugee groups based in the United States; I checked out an alleged connection between a Miami resident named Eladio del Valle and New Orleans CIA informant Sergio Arcacha-Smith; I investigated an associate of the now deceased right-wing extremist David W. Ferrie of New Orleans . . . I conducted a surveillance on a man, said to have been an ex-CIA employee, observed talking to leader Manuel Artime and former Cuban senator/racketeer Rolando Masferrer.3

  Dick Russell knew the significance of those statements when Nagell voiced them:

  All of these people were prominent names in exile-related activities. All of them have also surfaced before—as having been involved in CIA-backed attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro, or even rumored connections to the assassination of President Kennedy.4

  Conclusion

  Assassination: Probable link to victim’s knowledge of JFK assassination, but possibly Mafia retaliation killing as well.