Charles Briggs, a retired CIA official who assisted the Sixth Floor Museum in Dallas as a researcher and writer, once submitted a “dishonest” sworn affidavit in a high-profile arms smuggling case in Texas, according to a federal judge.
Briggs, who died November 4, served the CIA as a private contractor while assisting in the creation of the Sixth Floor Museum in Dallas in 1986. The Museum, which commemorates the assassination of President Kennedy, consistently endorses the official theory that one man, alone and unaided, caused Kennedy’s death. The Museum’s exhibits do not depict or make mention of the long-running debate about the causes of JFK’s assassination, and the Museum’s bookstore carries few books by JFK scholars who dispute the official theory.
Briggs’s veracity was called into question by federal Judge Lynn Hughes in 2003 when she heard the appeal of former CIA operative Edwin Wilson, convicted of selling explosives to Libya in 1983.
In an affidavit filed during Wilson’s trial in the early 1980s, Briggs asserted that the CIA had not asked Wilson “to perform or provide any services, directly or indirectly.” On appeal Wilson was able to produce records of at least 40 occasions where he worked for the agency after his retirement
Hughes threw out Wilson’s conviction saying his efforts to defend himself had been “contradicted by a dishonest agency memorandum.”
“Hughes found that federal prosecutors knew that Wilson had maintained close personal and professional ties to the agency, but nevertheless introduced a false affidavit from a top agency official, Charles A. Briggs,” the Baltimore Sun reported in 2003.
According to a Nov. 6 obituary in the Washington Post, Briggs was working as a U.S. intelligence contractor when he assisted the Museum.
“After retiring in 1986, he was called back in to serve the intelligence community as a private contractor with a combined total of 60 years. A notable contribution was serving as liaison for the creation of the Sixth Floor Museum in Dallas, TX dedicated to the JFK Assassination.”
In response to a JFK Facts query about Briggs’s role in the creation of museum, spokesperson Megan Bryant wrote in email:
“The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza was saddened to learn of the passing of Charles A. Briggs, Sr. In the late 1980s, Mr. Briggs, during his retirement, worked part-time for about a year in the Washington, D.C. offices of noted museum exhibition design specialists, Robert Staples and Barbara Fahs Charles, as a researcher and writer. A well-respected member of the Staples & Charles team, Briggs along with his research partner, Abigail Porter, assisted in the development of The Sixth Floor exhibition, John F. Kennedy and the Memory of a Nation. Briggs contributions are still evident and continue to be appreciated by Museum visitors today.”
Stop lying about my Grandfather. Charles Briggs was an incredible and honorable man, and my hero.
Charles Briggs was my great uncle and I stand by his integrity as well
Join the dots and you will find on a staggering scale the CIA employing well honed strategies to undermine any possibility the United States, or the world for that matter, would ever learn of the events that took place before, during, and after JFK’s assassination.
We need to question why the CIA did not want us to know the events; why we were not to know about Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby and the cast of many others; and why our institutions of executive office fail to lift the cover on this shameful conduct.
Who hired Mr. Briggs to consult with the Sixth Floor Museum organizers?
To get a better perspective on Mr. Wilson; there is summary & source information on Wikipedia, NYT Obituary, and Spartacus- Educational. In a word: CIA =’s duplicity.
This just adds more fuel to the idea that the CIA for undetermined reasons is obsessed with shaping and controlling the narrative of the Kennedy assassination
Anyone who has read extensively on the case of Edwin P. Wilson, as I have, will understand the gravity of Briggs’s false affidavit in the false imprisonment of an innocent man. Edwin P. Wilson was incarcerated for 22 years because the CIA and the System it represents lied.
Charles Briggs’participation in this venal charade is especially egregious. Anyone making apologia for this underhanded thug should be roundly reviled.
\\][//
Edwin Wilson was convicted of attempted murder. That conviction was not overturned.
“Edwin Wilson was convicted of attempted murder. That conviction was not overturned.”~Photon
And this has exactly what relevance to the issue of the CIA lying in their denials that he was working on their behalf?
\\][//
Sorry but Ed Wilson was neither a nice, nor an innocent man.
He sold a few tons of C4 explosives to the Libyans, even though Ghaddafi had nothing to do directly.
But that is a huge amount of explosives that was distributed throughout the Middle East , Africa and Europe.
Somehow, Ahmed Jibril got a hold of a few hundred pounds.
Guess where part of the explosive turned up? PANAM 103 !
He was railroaded by the same agency that made him rich, but he was guilty of crimes against humanity. 20 tons of C4 must have killed thousands of people over the years. I guess he was burned by his own cigar.
I am not excusing the CIA rogue Elements, they have caused more American deaths than all the terrorists combined.
I think Garry Mack was leaning in the direction of conspiracy. I am sure i saw a documentry The men who killed Kennedy” back in 1988, and he came up with the Badge theory from from Mary mooremans picture of JFK being hit with the last bullet.
That was Gary Shaw.
No, it indeed was Gary Mack. Gary Mack and the evolution of a JFK conspiracy theorist | @dallasnews http://share.d-news.co/wgkOkwU
So he has ties to Frank Terpil and Ed Wilson also how do these guys pass the Top Secret background checks?
This is truly sad. First Alan Dulles , then Joannides , now Mr.Briggs. A visceral dislike for the CIA leads CTers to make totally unsubstantiated claims and what would be libelous charges if the victims were alive.The fact that there isn’t a single shred of evidence linking any of these individual to the Assassination apparently has no bearing on those who believe that there must be. It is one thing to believe in conspiracies based on genuine evidence, misinterpreted or inaccurate as may be. It is entirely different to drag the reputation of innocent honorable people through the mud with completely unproven claims simply because they worked for an agency that helped prevent World War III.
I don’t understand why Ruth Paine doesn’t sue the accusers who claim that she was a a CIA asset who was part of the plot to kill JFK. Probably because of the extreme difficulty proving a libel case. Probably because any lawyer could make a case that she is a public figure. But most likely because she is unaware of the slander in the first place.
Photon,
In order to prove “slander” it is first necessary to prove that the allegations being called slander are not so. From what we know of Ruth Paine, that would be an impossible task.
\\][//
Unsubstantiated claims? “innocent honorable people”? David Morales: “We got that son of a bitch didn’t we”. David Phillips role in Mexico City, for which he was promoted. His walking out on the HSCA because he couldn’t stand the heat. “Helped prevent WWIII”? Why did they create the Bay of Pigs, which if successful or if the US intervened would most likely have led to Soviet intervention with a nuclear attack?
“helped prevent WWIII”?
Should I file that next to the CIA’s claim that torture thwarted terror attacks?
If you’re going to take shots at Conspiracy Theories you should avoid making claims which can’t be proven
[Photon:]
“A visceral dislike for the CIA leads CTers to make ”
==================
False!
I like the CIA, I respect the CIA, I admire the CIA, I wish I could have the CIA be the godfather of my children (if I had any). My love for the CIA has no bounds.
I am convinced that most young people inside the Agency are as eager as all the CTs for the truth to be finally revealed. They are, after all, patriots who love their country. A far cry from the handful of coward and traitors that preceded them: William King Harvey, Allen Dulles, David Atlee Phillips, David Sanchez, Frank Sturgis, etc.
That will be the only way for the healing to begin. What we had in 1963 was the worst rupture of the trust that The People should have for our institutions. The indispensable mutual respect was lost. I would place the fracture up there with the Civil War. Something similar occurred in post 1945 Germany.
I am of the opinion that the fall of the steel curtain would have been a perfect opportunity for the government to come clean.
We missed the opportunity with the HSCA as well.
This is what we must communicate to our leaders in no uncertain terms:
WE ARE READY FOR THE TRUTH
We are big boys and girls. We can handle it.
” Steel Curtain”?
I didn’t know that you are a Steelers fan.But if that is an example of your grasp of history it is easy to see why you would have the misconceptions that you do, particularly labeling true patriots as ” cowards and traitors”.
I would be most grateful Photon if you could provide some detail on what the ‘true patriots’ ( William King Harvey, Allen Dulles, David Atlee Phillips, David Sanchez, Frank Sturgis) were doing in late 1963 to serve the great democracy of the United States.
More honorable CIA alumni: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/11/10/found-after-35-years-cia-s-fugitive-banker.html
Anthony Martin, thanks for the link, yet another example of the criminal intent of the Secret Services, and the way they cover up for each other no matter the offences committed. The FBI would not even cooperate with Australian authorities to investigate these characters (all of whom had secret service backgrounds/links) who were engaged in breaking Australian laws, and fraudulently releasing Australians of their money.
Who’s linking Briggs to the assassination but you? It could’ve been as simple as, “Briggs, get down to Dallas and make sure the museum doesn’t go tying us to the assassination in any way. You know how those crazy CTers are.”
As far as Joannides, I’ll believe you want to be involved in a honest debate if you didn’t make such disingenuous statements.
It’s obvious from the evidence that the CIA wanted the very existence of Joannides and his relationship with the DRE to DISAPPEAR and STAY DISAPPEARED forever. Against the expressed intent of every investigation or archive release, meaning against the will of the people.
I never see your outrage regarding their proven, demonstrated obstruction in this case. Which is the main reason for the well-founded suspicion of the agency and a cast of CIA characters from the time.
Again, they could clear everything up by releasing all relevant files. But I believe your position is to support the CIA to not release on grounds of “national security,” as defined by the very agency who has lied all this time.
For those reasons, I find it hard to believe you’re a true patriot or seeker of the truth. I think you’re an interloper for your own reasons or somebody else’s.
photon, Let’s put this in some context. Can you tell us who hired Mr. Briggs to consult the Sixth Floor Museum organizers? The Staples/Charles firm, Conover Hunt, and or Lindalyn Adams, a self-described Republican mover and shaker in Dallas, who says that when she learned that Kennedy had defeated Nixon she felt physically ill, thinking ‘I don’t know what our country’s going to do with this young man”, and who in spite of the great irony that his November 22, 1963 parade route passed near her home she did not witness his motorcade?
We are assured however that the museum has always been in good hands because, and I quote: “It is important to bring dignity to a site in which the president of the United States was murdered,” — Lindalyn Bennett Adams
http://www.dallasnews.com/news/jfk50/reflect/20131117-for-3-decades-lindalyn-adams-has-preserved-jfks-memory-in-dallas.ece
‘The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza began in quiet, informal discussions. One of the most significant involved the unlikely trio of a Republican socialite and community leader, a noted Hollywood film producer, and Judson Shook, the director of public works for Dallas County. . . . {Shook said in 1992} “I wish that the public could experience …. your imagination could easily be carried away . . . and everything was a deep contrast . . . everything was in . . . DEEP SHADOWS’. (emphasis mine) — Stephen Fagin, “Assassination and Commemoration”
Those following Linda Minor’s in depth research into the history of DH Byrd, the owner of the building at 411 Elm known as the Texas School Book Depository, will recall that Byrd’s wealth was tied to his forebear’s business success in Cape Girardeau, MO.
http://quixoticjoust.blogspot.com/2015/09/how-dh-byrds-uncle-and-cousin-met-gh.html
In a stroke of pure irony, Judson Shook – a key figure in the evolution of the museum at 411 Elm – was married to Elaine Smith who was born in Byrd’s family ancestral hometown, Cape Girardeau in the 1926.
“Elaine Claire Smith Shook, 86, born March 18, 1926 . . .in Cape Girardeau, MO, passed away peacefully . . . preceded in death by her husband . . LT COL C. Judson Shook, Jr., . . . former Director of Transportation for the City of Richardson and Director of Public Works for Dallas County, during which time he was responsible for salvaging the Texas School Book Depository for Dallas County, which is now the Sixth Floor Museum.” – – legacy obituary
To complete this ironic vignette, Rush Limbaugh Sr. was a prominent banker in Cape Girardeau, MO for decades, and his son Rush Jr. was born in the town. Rush Sr. was on the board of Kentucky Central – a banking entity that in 1968 purchased Rio Grande National Life Insurance of Dallas, the employer of the alleged ‘umbrella man’, Louis Steven Witt who on 11.22.63 walked 8 blocks to Byrd’s 411 Elm Street where he positioned himself within feet of the freeway sign that serves as a marker of the assassination in video footage and photographs of the tragedy.
“You mean to tell me, Rush, you think the modern era of liberalism began with the assassination of JFK?” Yes, it did. I’ll give you a brief summary of why. We know — the evidence is conclusive — that JFK was killed by a communist, Lee Harvey Oswald. He was not killed by the right wing. He was not killed by extremists in Dallas or in the South or anywhere else in this country. He was killed by a communist with ties to Cuba. Lee Harvey Oswald was an avowed socialist and communist . . . So in order to create the Camelot myth and to establish Kennedy as this mythical King Arthur-type character and his administration as Camelot, there was a calculated decision among opinion leaders of the day to blame America for it, to blame American cultural decay, American extremism — John Birch right-wingerism and so forth. And that’s the birth of the modern era of liberalism, blaming America. America got the blame for killing Kennedy, not an avowed communist, because they just couldn’t abide that. There’s substantiation for this, and I’ll bring it to you we get back. – – Rush Limbaugh
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2015/10/19/how_the_jfk_assassination_ushered_in_the_era_of_modern_liberalism
Rush Limbaugh??
The biggest fraud money can buy? Please don’t insult this audience.
You have to be extremely indoctrinated to outer Rush, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, Rachel Maddow or anybody from CNN.
The biggest problem that the American people have is IGNORANCE. It is your number one Enemy.
You trust shills and crooks produced by the deep state and Intel services. Add some misguided patriotism and you end up with modern USA deep state domination.
Photon,
If Allen Dulles is innocent of anything, you will be the next president of these United States.
I, too, would listen to you a little more if you would drop this CIA is innocent crap.
“Helped prevent WW2?”
Yep, financing the Nazis helped prevent it, my dear friend.
“I don’t understand why Ruth Paine doesn’t sue the accusers who claim that she was a a CIA asset . . .”
Well, Paul, she doubtless follows the Golden Rule in these matters that Alger Hiss would have been wise to heed: Never launch a slander/libel suit against someone who’s telling the truth about you.
You really can blow that hot air. You’re a veritable Sahara dust storm!
Another possible reason why she doesn’t sue for libel is that she knows she would be extensively questioned by an experienced trial attorney in an oral deposition, under oath and under penalty of perjury, as would lots of other people.
So a little old lady who helped murder the President would be afraid of perjury?
More likely she is unaware of the slander heaped on her by members of the ” research” community. The number of followers of this blog is probably less than six figures-and this site is by far the best of the bunch.If she ever got wind of what they are saying about her over at the Education Forum she would be able to collect a sizable amout.
Well, why don’t you contact her then?
BTW, when Robert Oswald went to the Paine residence to help his sister-in-law and nieces (the youngest of which he hadn’t known about prior to 11/22/63), he took one look at Ruth Paine and got Marina and the girls as far from her as he could. According to a number of writers covering the assassination, she seemed to be trying to draw a great deal of attention to herself. Even if innocent of any wrongdoing in the JFK assassination, or of being snitch for the cops/FBI/et al., she seems to have been a self-aggrandizing busybody, and a general PITA who people found at best annoying.
Allen Dulles was neither “innocent” nor “honorable.” Even if one assumes that he had nothing to do with the JFK assassination, he was one of the least admirable men in American history. He worked to exonerate Nazi war criminals, presided over any number of illegal and immoral programs as head of the CIA, overthrew or tried to overthrow democratic governments around the world, and evidently believed that he and his goons had the right to assassinate foreign leaders. Far from “preventing World War III,” his agency very nearly caused it.
In many instances, it seemed Dulles and his brother John Foster were perfectly happy to provoke WWIII. The notion that either were of service to this nation and its citizens is dubious in the extreme. At best, they attained some short-term successes (Guatelmala, Iran) that turned into long-run disasters that poisoned this country’s reputation with tens of millions of people worldwide.
Charles Briggs assisted the Sixth Floor Museum in Texas as a (CIA) researcher and writer – another attempt by the agency to contaminate any efforts at finding/presenting the truth about JFK’s assassination.
Charles Briggs was a traitor to the truth – not a champion for the memory of JFK – nor a character among characters we could entrust with the office of Sixth Floor Museum.
I thought Mack did NOT believe in the lone gunman? Here it sounds as though you feel he was in on the cover as well… Anyone know Mack’s position firsthand
. Interesting…
[Rob:]
I thought Mack did NOT believe in the lone gunman?”
================
Rob, you have a lot of catching up to do in this aspect. Two people are considered the biggest turncoats: Gary Mack, after being appointed museum curator and Edward Jay Epstein, after being given personal, intimate access to James Jesus Angleton.
Gary Mack:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Glqv1xYpZ78
[Minute 15:]
[Rob:]
I thought Mack did NOT believe in the lone gunman?”
================
As long as we are dealing with the topic of credibility and people who have crossed the wide schism that defines this polarized debate, this fellow qualifies for some sort of record:
http://goo.gl/G4HBD0
[Click into “Full Video” and “Media Reactions”]
Can anybody mention an author/researcher who has gone in the other direction, morphing from LN to CT? Offhand, I cannot think of anybody.
Yeah, right. The fact that most posters on this site consider the CIA a prime suspect in the assassination, and that they have lied and obstructed justice in this case for years, we shouldn’t be concerned about a CIA jumping in to “help” design the Sixth Floor Museum.
For me, it falls perfectly in line with every other outrageous thing they’ve done the past 50+ years with regards to this case. They obviously wanted to control the message.
Happy to have them open all their relevant files from the era to clear things up.
Love the tears Photon, your assertion regarding “all accounts” is false on its face. The judge was not viewing a false affidavit and misleading the Court as honorable. Nor is it “mean-spirited unfounded speculation.” It’s just a fact.
I hope that the Briggs family is unaware of this site. It is amazing that the mere mention of “CIA” and “Sixth Floor Museum” in the same obituary can set off a litany of character assassination and mean-spirited unfounded speculation for a man who by all accounts honorably served his country, community and family.
This type of thing does the ” research” community no credit.
Paul, what part of lying to a federal tribunal don’t you understand?
Mr. Briggs lied to a federal judge about the CIA’s connections to Mr. Wilson, resulting in his probably needless aquittal.
The Agency has a habit of lying, in case you haven’t noticed.
Mr. Joannedes, for one, comes to mind.
And, to use Photon parlance, have you ever been to the Sixth Floor museum? Have you seen the exhibits and the bookstore?
Have you ever met the late Gary Mack, former curator?
I have, and they all are, or were, shills for the Agency’s big lie about the “Big Event” (Howard Hunt’s phrase, not mine).
Pity poor Mr. Briggs’ “character assassination;” President Kennedy had to experience a more permanent kind of assassination. The Agency’s connections to that crime are beyond serious dispute. Thanks to Jeff Morley for uncovering much of them. I think we can allow a little character assassination under the circumstances.
Ed, additionally: What part of
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
doesn’t Photon understand?
Photon, your assertion regarding “all accounts” is false on its face. The judge was not viewing a false affidavit and misleading the Court as honorable. Nor is it “mean-spirited unfounded speculation.” It’s just a fact.
The case of Edwin Paul Wilson is instructive for anyone who doubts that the US Government would knowingly use false evidence to obtain a conviction and that a Court of Appeals would affirm such a conviction based on those lies. To summarize Wilson’s case, Wilson was a CIA operative whom the CIA used in 1977 to sell then Libyan dictator Quadaffy some 20 tons of the plastic explosive C-4 and to provide US experts to train the Libyans to conceal the explosives as such things as lamps, radios, and ashtrays. To put 20 tons of C-4 into perspective, that amount could be used to bring down at least 20,000 jumbo jets.
Unfortunately for Wilson, he got caught in these US Government sponsored illegal acts and his case went to trial. Wilson’s defense was that he was only carrying out the orders of the CIA. A critical part of the trial is that the prosecution obtained and introduced an affidavit signed by CIA Director Briggs and certified by CIA chief counsel Stanley Sporkin, who would go on to become a US district court judge. That affidavit effectively stated that Wilson was not directly or indirectly connected to the CIA at the time the crimes were committed. But the affidavit was a lie, and the jury specifically relied on that affidavit to find Wilson guilty. Wilson was convicted in 1983 and was sentenced to jail. Wilson appealed to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, but Wilson’s conviction was affirmed even though the Court knew that the defendant presented evidence indicating that affidavit consisted of lies and the US Government refused to provide evidence confirming the truth of the defendants’ pleas.
About 20 years after Wilson’s conviction, the US District Court for the Southern District of Texas overturned his conviction in 2003, based on additional evidence that Wilson’s legal team managed to obtain. Judge Lynn Hughes’ opinion is worth reading if only to gain some insight into the CIA’s operations and how the US Government can and does lie. Judge Hughes puts it more mildly: “This opinion refers only to the part of the record that the government has reluctantly agreed may be made public. It does not attempt to recount even that limited range of data in its entirety; the governmental deceit mentioned here is illustrative—not exhaustive.”
https://www.fas.org/sgp/jud/wilson102703.pdf
As a final note to Wilson’s case, after he successfully overturned his conviction, he filed a civil lawsuit against Charles Briggs and seven former prosecutors, two of whom were then district court judges. As you might guess, Wilson’s civil lawsuit was dismissed — on the grounds that all eight defendants had immunity governing their otherwise illegal actions.