Testimony of Roy Schaeffer

CHAIRMAN TUNHEIM: Could you spell your name for the record?

MR. SCHAEFFER: Okay, it is S-c-h-a-e-f-f-e-r.

CHAIRMAN TUNHEIM: Thank you.

MR. SCHAEFFER: I am the person Hal Verb mentioned, I am the person who replaced Oswald after he left El Toro in 1960. He left in 1959, and I joined his unit. So I did have a crypt clearance. I don't want to get into that.

Basically, what I would like to mention is, I am a private probably an assassination buff more or less. In 1986, I contacted Jim Garrison, and before he died he had sent -- well, when he got the Zapruder film down at the trial on '66, he ran off 100 copies. Sometime in 1989, you know, I received a copy from him, and then I have been researching using a copy of the 100 that was made.

Now what I had found then at first, you know, I am interested in this flawed editing of the Zapruder film, and I wondered, Zapruder said that he had set his camera on a film speed of 24, and so over the years it got me thinking. In 1963, I worked for the Dayton Daily News, and Hess & Eisenhart was the company that rebuilt the Presidential Limousine, so I had gone down there with a fellow reporter because I had like a scientific background.

Okay, so anyway what was unique about that time was the emergency lights on the Presidential car. Now the lights were interesting in one aspect, they blinked, they would blink on one side and then on the other. So one problem I had in -- so I know there was a constant blink rate. Now, I have taken a lot of eight millimeter film. In other words, if something has a constant blink rate and you are photographing it through, like Zapruder, that Bell & Howell camera, then it would show a constant rate.

In other words, if it found that the blink rate was .41 seconds, so it would show a rate of nine blinks in the film. Now what I had submitted, I believe you have that record I gave to Mr. Gunn, I plotted from 133 to 238, and the pattern does not show up that way. So I am suggesting, you know, to yourselves that that proves that alterations was done to the Zapruder film.

Also on the night of the assassination, what I believe, the film -- in other words, Zapruder took the film to the Kodak lab in Dallas. Now I have some film expertise. I served a six-year government sponsored apprenticeship in film, and that had what they call a 14K process. This 14K process is how they developed Kodachrome. It is quite complicated. At that time, the only place that had that process was here in Dallas next to Love Field, and that was at the Dallas Eastman-Kodak lab.

From my information on the Max B. Phillips minimal, I think Paul Halp talked about that on Commission Exhibit 450, that it shows that the Zapruder film, and I believe three copies were flown to Washington the night of the assassination, I believe they were taken into -- they had five hours from my timetable. I worked with a Dr. James Fetzer on this, and also Mike Pinser, he is an attorney. So any way, I interjected on that, but anyway I lost my place when I said that. Could you help me? I lost my place.

DR. HALL: You were saying only the Dallas Eastman-Kodak lab.

MR. SCHAEFFER: Okay. So anyway, it is a very complicated process, and it takes about 45 seconds, so it is called the K-14 but the 14K process because it is what they call a subtractive process. It is a reversal film that like comes into a color transparency after it is developed. So, in other words, I believe that they took the original film to the National Interpretation Lab and at that point they altered it down to approximately 18 frames per second. Like I say, in 1960 -- so what I am saying is that I believe Frame Z-133 to 238 is where they altered that.

Now the way I found that out was, I personally had the film and I went through and I plotted each blinking light per frame, and that is how I derived that the film was altered. Unless you have the actual film, you can't -- there is no way you can determine that.

So that is pretty much what I had to say. I thank you for your time.

CHAIRMAN TUNHEIM: Any questions for Mr. Schaeffer?

DR. NELSON: I have one. You say you replaced Oswald, that is to say you took over all of his functions, his job?

MR. SCHAEFFER: That's correct.

DR. NELSON: Which were? What was the job assignment?

MR. SCHAEFFER: We worked at TACC, Tactical Air Control Center, basically, and it was basically tracking IFF boxes. In other words Strategic Air Command, and then they had like IFF boxes. And then they would set those in the morning, and then your crypt orders would come down from Washington, and they were like Zulu Time Rated, 24-hour time, and then there was what you call authentifications. So that is what a person that has crypt does.

So our job was, when the planes left the United States through the EDACs area was to clear them and plot them, and so that was basically what our job function was there at El Toro, and I am sure Oswald did the same thing.

MR. MARWELL: Mr. Chairman, in fact, Mr. Smith had signed up earlier.

CHAIRMAN TUNHEIM: Thank you, Mr. Schaeffer, we appreciate your help.

MR. SCHAEFFER: Thank you.