Inexplicable Wounds made by Special Bullets

[Bob Prudhomme]

One of the interesting things about Dr. Robert R. Shaw's testimony to the WC, regarding his surgery on Connally's back wound, is that although he goes into great detail about his treatment of the wound, its size (1.5x.5 cm.) and its location, not once does he say whether the elliptical wound was orientated with the long axis of the wound vertical or horizontal. The vertical orientation accepted by the WC is shown below:



However, when FBI SA Robert A. Frazier testified to the WC about his examination of Connally's suit coat and shirt, he reported finding an elliptical hole in the armpit of the coat, at the rear, that had a long axis orientated on the horizontal; 90° out from the orientation of the wound, as presented to the WC. The matter was further complicated, years later, when Dr. Baden was allowed to view the scar on Connally's back, and reported seeing a horizontal scar 3 cm. in length, the length Shaw reported opening the entry wound up to during the operation.

As a vertical wound cannot be reconciled with a horizontal hole in a coat, we have to ask if the diagram above, supposedly approved by Dr. Shaw, is the one that was actually shown to Shaw while he was testifying. We also have to ask if the entry wound could have been that close to the shoulder blade and still allowed the bullet to follow the course it did across the right front corner of Connally's chest. Finally, we have to ask why anyone would take the trouble of moving the location of the entry wound, and how this would affect the vertical/horizontal orientation of this wound.

Let us quickly go over Connally's back wound again. As seen in the diagram, Connally was struck by a bullet in the back that entered and penetrated the latissimus dorsi muscle. It then struck the 5th rib a tangential or "slapping" blow at the mid axillary line and followed the course of the 5th rib downwards for 10 cm. (4 inches), stripping out much of the rib along the way, and sending shards of broken rib into Connally's pleural cavity and right lung. The bullet, travelling a right to left course along the outside of the rib, then left the rib and exited just below and medial to (to the left of) Connally's right nipple, leaving a 5 cm. (2 inch) exit wound.

As there is no question the wound track was from right to left at 20-40°, I am going to show that it was necessary for Connally to be turned a good distance to his right, in order for a bullet fired from behind the limo to have made this wound. I am also going to show that the location of the entrance wound, as shown in the WC diagram, would have made the wound track on the outside of the 5th rib impossible, and that, if the bullet had entered here, it would have gone directly into Connally's right lung.

Here is the basic problem:



The 5th rib can be seen as marked with a "5" and, coincidentally, where the "5" is situated is also where the bullet left Connally's 5th rib, on its way to exiting just to the left of the right nipple. Just to the right of the "5", in the diagram, the end of the rib can be seen joining onto a rib-like section drawn in blue. The rib bone actually ends at this joint, and the blue section is called the "costal cartilage".

Now, if we follow the 5th rib towards the back, we find a point, at the side of the ribcage, where the curve of the rib changes direction, and starts heading towards the backbone. This point is known as the "mid axillary line"



and it is here, at the mid axillary line, that Dr. Shaw testified the bullet first contacted the 5th rib. So, if we look again at the WC diagram, with the bullet entering the back and just missing the right shoulder blade, and then look again at the frontal view of the rib cage, showing the scapula (shoulder blade) behind the rib cage, it becomes apparent that a bullet striking Connally's back at the point claimed by the WC would have hit the 5th rib much further back than reported by Dr. Shaw, and also stood a very good chance of going right through the 5th rib, and entering the lung beneath it.

If it did just miss the shoulder blade, and it did strike the 5th rib at the mid axillary line, it would not be going the right direction to be able to follow the course of the 5th rib and exit just to the left of the right nipple, without making a severe turn to the left.

Should Connally have been turned to his right when hit in the back, the problem becomes worse if the entry wound remains just outside the scapula. With the rib cage rotated to the right, the 5th rib would now be presented squarely to the path of the bullet, and the bullet would go directly into the right lung.

I have to run and do some chores. I'll let you mull this over, and I'll continue tonight.