The Bureau’s report of its first interview, four days after the assassination, stated that as Arnold waited outside the TSBD to see the president, she noticed Oswald just inside the building, close to the front door, at about 12:15.
In March 1964, J. Lee Rankin of the Warren Commission asked the FBI to interview every employee of the TSBD again, asking each of them an identical and very limited set of questions. In her second statement, Carolyn Arnold maintained that she did not leave the building until about 12:25.
My husband, Arnold Rowland[,] and I came to downtown Dallas today at approximately 12:10 PM to see the President in the motorcade. We are both students at Adamson High School, but my husband has been ill and neither of us went to school today in order to see the President. We had taken a position at the side entrance of the Sheriff's Office on Houston Street and were standing there talking. We talked about security measures for the President and had talked about the recent affair with Mr. Stevenson. Arnold told me to look up at the building which was the Texas Book Depository at two adjoining open windows, that there was a man up there holding a rifle and he must be a secret service man [sic]. I looked up and Arnold told me he had moved back, but I didn't see anything because I am very nearsighted and I didn't have my glasses on. We didn't think anything more of this and in about 15 minutes the President passed where we were standing and turned left onto Elm Street and started down towards the underpass when I heard a report and thought it was a backfire[,] then in a few seconds another report sounded and in another few seconds[,] the third report. We started running towards Elm Street and that is all I know.
Yesterday, November 23, 1963, I was standing on the terrace of the small park on Elm Street to watch the President's motorcade. The President's car had just come up in front of me when I heard a shot and saw the President slump down in the car and heard Mrs. Kennedy say, "Oh, no," then a second shot and then I hit the ground as I realized these were shots. Then all of the people started running up the terrace away from the President's car and I got up and started running also, not realizing what had happened. In just a few moments the President's car sped off and everyone was just running around towards the railroad tracks and I knew that they had somebody trapped up there. I imagine I stayed there 15 or 20 minutes and then went over on Houston Street to where I had my truck parked. I had just pulled away from the curb and was headed toward the Houston street viaduct [sic] when an automobile that had 3 men in it pulled away from the curb in a burst of speed, passing me on the right side, which was very dangerous at that point, then got in front of me, and it seemed then as an afterthought, slowed in a big hurry in front of me as though realizing they would be conspicuous in speeding. These three men were of slender build and seemed to be very excited in talking and motioning to each other. They went on across the Houston Street Viaduct and I turned off at Marsalis Street exit [sic] and they continued on going towards Zangs Blvd. They were in a 1961 or 1962 Chevrolet sedan, maroon in color. I [cross-out] don't believe I could identify these men, but I do believe I could identify the automobile if I saw it again.
Today at about 12:45 pm I was standing in a group of people on Elm Street near the west end of the concrete standard when the President's car turned left off Houston Street onto Elm Street. We were standing at the edge of the curb looking at the car as it was coming toward us and all of a sudden there was a noise, apparently gunshot [sic]. The President jumped up in his seat, and it looked like what I thought was a firecracker had went off and I thought he had realized it. It was just like an explosion and he was standing up. By this time he was directly in front of us and I was looking directly at him when he was hit in the side of the head. Then he fell back and Governor Connally was holding his middle section. Then we fell down on the grass as it seemed we were in direct path of fire. It looked like Mrs. Kennedy jumped on top of the President. He kinda [sic] fell back and it looked like she was holding him. Then the car sped away and everybody in that area had run upon [sic] top of that little mound. I thought the shot had come from the garden directly behind me, that it was on an elevation from where I was as I was right on the curb. I do not recall looking toward the Texas School Book Depository. I looked back in the vacinity [sic]
Today November 22, 1963 about 1:30 pm my sister-in-law and myself were lying down in our apartment. My sister-in-law is Jeanette Davis, we live in the same house in different apartments. We heard a shot and then another shot and ran to the side door at Patton Street. I saw the boy cutting across our yard and he was unloading his gun. We walked outside and a woman was hollering "he's dead, he's dead, he's shot". This woman told Jeanette to call the Police andshe did [sic]. I saw the officer that had been shot lying on Tenth street after Jeanette had called the police. Jeanette found a empty shell [sic] that the man had unloaded and gave it to the police. After the Police had left I found a empty shell [sic] in our yard. This is the same shell I gave to Detective Dhority [sic]. The man that was unloading the gun was the same man I saw tonight as number 2 man in a line up.
1.) Lee Harvey Oswald owned the rifle found on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository on Friday afternoon, November 22, 1963.
2.) Oswald owned the handgun that was shown to have been used in the murder of Dallas Police Officer J.D. Tippit.
Oswald was positively identified by witness Howard L. Brennan as the person firing a rifle at JFK on 11/22/63. .... And to believe that Brennan was "influenced" by TV and newspaper reports showing Oswald before Brennan positively identified LHO, we must remember that Brennan's INITIAL description of the killer very closely matched Oswald, given to police within minutes of the shooting (prior to 12:44 PM).
Marina Oswald admits to having taken pictures of Lee with these weapons on his person, which (all by itself) validates the "Backyard Photographs". But even if conspiracists wish to think that Marina is a liar, there's the fact that the HSCA [House Select Committee on Assassinations] panel of photo experts vouched for the backyard pictures (and the autopsy photos and X-rays, to boot). ....
Buell Wesley Frazier observed Oswald take a package into the Book Depository Building on the morning of November 22nd, 1963. .... Frazier said (via his 11/22/63 affidavit): "I saw him go in the back door at the Loading Dock of the building that we work in, and he still had the package under his arm."
Oswald's claim of "curtain rods" within the package cannot be supported at all. His room needed no curtains, nor rods, and no such rods were ever found in the TSBD or at his residence at 1026 N. Beckley Avenue in Oak Cliff.
Oswald was seen working on the Depository's sixth floor that morning. LHO even asked a co-worker (Charles Givens) to send an elevator back up to him on the sixth floor shortly before the assassination. This fact, of course, doesn't nearly prove Oswald was guilty of a crime; but what it does do is place him on the Death Floor (alone) a short time (approximately 35 minutes) before Kennedy's assassination. This fact, too, is a solid piece of often-overlooked or scoffed-at circumstantial evidence.
Oswald's palmprint [Warren Commission Exhibit #637] is found on his Mannlicher-Carcano rifle after the assassination. .... But, of course, this print is really just a "bonus" for the DPD in linking LHO to the weapon. Because even without it, it's glaringly obvious that the weapon was Oswald's.
9.) Not ONE SPECK of any bullets/bullet fragments/bullet shells OTHER THAN THOSE COMING FROM OSWALD'S 6.5-MILLIMETER MANNLICHER-CARCANO RIFLE were discovered anywhere in Dealey Plaza, the limousine, the TSBD, Parkland Hospital, or in the victims.