Q. What is your opinion, based upon the expertise that you have acquired in these 18 years at the Edgewood Arsenal in wound ballistics, with respect to the question of the direction from which the bullet came that struck the President in the head?
A. Well, the President in 313, the head appears to have moved slightly forward from the previous frame. Now, I say appears, because unless you measured this precisely you don’t know. But it appears to have moved slightly.
And this would not be inconsistent with the momentum of the bullet being transferred to the head. Whereas I said a bullet cannot knock a person down or move a body in any violent way, it could conceivably move the head a little bit. We fired at human skulls filled with gelatin sitting on the table, and they would roll off the table. And this apparent side movement of the head is in the correct direction if the bullet came from the book depository.
Q. That is, from the rear of the President?
A. From the rear of the President.
Q. Now, then, what can you tell us with respect to the subsequent action of the President’s head and body after that initial apparent slight movement forward?
A. There could be two reasons for it. One reason, there is a jet of blood and brain material from the head, some bone seemed to fly up in the air, but the bulk of it appears to fly forward and maybe slightly to the right. This gives an indication that that is possibly in the direction that the bullet exited from the skull.
Q. Now, was there any movement of the President’s head and body associated with that?
A. That material going in that direction would have a tendency as a result of this jet effect to push the head in the other direction. This was demonstrated by Louis Alvarez in California several years ago by shooting melons. When you could get a jet of honeydew melon going out the front, the melon would roll toward the gun, showing that there is some movement from this jet effect.