Lee Oswald, Cubans and the House on Harlandale P1

Lee Oswald, Cubans and the House on Harlandale – Part I

3126 Harlendale Ave., Oak Cliff, Dallas, Texas 

By JEFF MEEK / Voice correspondent

Posted Apr 14, 2020 at 12:01 AM

   https://www.whitehalljournal.com/news/20200414/lee-oswald-cubans-and-house-on-harlandale---part-i

Did Oswald have escape plans?

There are many opinions as to who assassinated President John F. Kennedy on Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. Did Lee Harvey Oswald do it alone? Was Oswald working with others, wittingly or unwittingly? Who could have aided in the murder? Was the CIA, the Mafia, anti-Castro Cubans, Fidel Castro, LBJ, or Russia involved? Each of those theories has a following.

Now 56 years later it’s not likely we will ever know for sure. A “smoking gun” document spelling out what happened very likely does not, and never did, exist. But there are tentacles that reach out from Oswald in many directions – CIA, Mafia, Cubans are the most likely culprits.

The 1979 report from the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) contradicted the 1964 Warren Report, saying there was likely a conspiracy to assassinate President Kennedy, that there was a 95% or better chance that a 4th shot was fired that day and that individuals associated with organized crime and anti-Castro Cubans may have been involved. Their study also showed that the Dallas Police Department withheld relevant information from the Warren Commission, as did the CIA and the FBI. And 15 years later it was learned the CIA did the same thing to the HSCA, and continues to withhold documents even today.

A point of interest has resurfaced again of late; that being a Nov. 23, 1963, report made by Dallas County Sheriff’s Department Deputy E.R. “Buddy” Walthers. In his report to Dallas County Sheriff Bill Decker, Walthers said that “at a house at 3128 Harlandale, some Cubans had been having meetings on the weekends and were possibly connected with the ‘Freedom for Cuba Party,’ of which Oswald was a member.” 

Walthers got the name wrong. Oswald was a self-proclaimed member of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee (FPCC), which he set up while in New Orleans in the summer of 1963.

He added that an informant told him on Nov. 26, “that sometime between 7 days before Kennedy was shot and the day after he was shot, these Cubans moved from this house. My informant stated that subject Oswald had been to this house before.”

Walthers did not say who his informant was, but many years later in a little-known book by Eric R. Tagg, titled, “Brush with History: A Day in the Life of E.R. Walthers,” he identified the informant to the extent that Tagg said Walthers was told this information by his mother-in-law, who is unnamed in the book. How could she possibly know?

Because she lived on Harlandale. The book states, “It seems that she had been noticing the comings-and-goings of a group of Cubans on her block that gathered often for political meetings in the house at 3126 Harlandale.” Tagg got much of his information directly from the Walthers family.

Doing research on Ancestry.com and Find a Grave.com, I learned that Walthers’ mother-in-law was Lillian Robinson, who died in 2017. I contacted Tagg to confirm this, which he did. He told me that Walthers was contacted the evening of the assassination, saying Oswald had been at the Harlandale house in the prior weeks and month. She recognized Oswald when he was shown on television.

Robinson was not the only one with information on the Harlandale house. According to Dick Russell’s book, “The Man Who Knew Too Much,” Texas reporter Lonnie Hudkins, along with former “Look” magazine senior editor, T. George Harris, had found people in the Little Cuba area of Dallas that said Oswald and others had attended a nighttime party at Harlandale on Nov. 20.

Walthers discovered the house was rented by Manuel Rodriguez Orcarberro, a leader of the violent anti-Castro organization called Alpha 66. It has been suggested by a few sources that Orcarberro was mistaken for Oswald, but looking at photos of Orcarberro on the internet, one sees they do not at all look alike.

The book says Walthers also learned that members of the Student Revolutionary Directorate (DRE) also participated in the meetings. Federal documents show that the DRE was being funded by the CIA up to $51,000 a month in 1963. Not only that, but it is known that when Oswald was in New Orleans in August 1963, he visited and later got into a “fight” (likely a staged event – Oswald wrote to the head of the FPCC, Vincent Lee, on Aug. 1 about a street demonstration/fight, but the fight didn’t take place until days later on Aug. 9) with Carlos Bringuier, leader of DRE in that city. DRE also contacted CIA at that time and later did so, on several occasions during the 1967 ill-fated Garrison probe in New Orleans that indicted Clay Shaw for conspiracy to murder JFK.

The CIA case officer for DRE was George E. Joannides. Years later when the HSCA was investigating the assassination in the 1970s, the CIA brought Joannides out of retirement to be the CIA liaison with the Committee. Only later did HSCA Chief Counsel G. Robert Blakey and others on the committee learn that the man (Joannides) supposedly helping the Committee to communicate with CIA was the same man that supervised DRE activities in 1963, thus hiding information from the committee he was supposed to be helping. Alpha 66 was also on CIA’s radar and was used for raids against Cuba. FPCC was also being watched.

Walthers’ Nov. 23 report also states that he spoke with the head of the Dallas Secret Service, Forrest V. Sorrels, about his discovery. There is a Secret Service report dated April 24, 1964, from Sorrels to J. Lee Rankin, General Counsel to the Warren Commission. The report has information about Orcarberro, but there is no mention of the Harlandale house.

The FBI also looked at Orcarberro. Agent Wallace R. Heitman filed a May 26, 1964 report. The report says he will be re-contacting CIA (which means he had already been in touch with CIA) for additional information. The report adds that Orcarberro was known to be violently anti-Kennedy, was “president of the Dallas unit of the organization, Second National Front of Escambray (SNFE) – Operation Alpha 66 – People’s Revolutionary Movement (MRP).”

He voluntarily interviewed with Heitman on Feb. 10 and May 20, 1964, giving information on SNFE and stated he was a Kennedy admirer. Another report says he registered as an alien in Dallas on Sept. 6, 1963, and was at that time living at 1208 Hudseth Street. And, the report says, “He advised meetings are held on a regular bi-weekly basis. He stated members in attendance vary in number with a maximum of approximately 20. He said these meetings are almost always held in the home of Jorge Salazar, residence, 3126 Harlandale, Dallas,” thus a 3rd reference to the Harlandale house, absolutely confirming what Walthers was told the day after the assassination.

A Nov. 24, 1963, document says that SNFE member Eloy Gutierrez Menoyo commented on Nov. 21, 1963 that “something very big would happen soon that would advance the Cuban cause,” that likely being Kennedy’s death and an invasion of Cuba, if U.S. investigators could be convinced that Cuba/Castro was behind the assassination.

And there is another mention of Orcarberro concerning the purchase of guns from Dallas gun dealer John Thomas Mason, who was being watched by (Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Bureau) ATF during Nov. 1963, and arrested by Frank Ellsworth on Nov. 21, for possession of dynamite. Mason was one of only two dealers found during a telephone canvas that sold Mannlicher-Carcano rifles, which is what Oswald allegedly owned and was found on the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository. Ellsworth was summoned to Dallas Police Headquarters after Oswald was captured in the Texas Theater. Why, I’m not sure, but while there he thought he was looking at Mason, who supposedly looked just like Oswald.

And there is an FBI document from Heitman dated June 28, 1965, about Alpha 66 that shows Orcarberro was a Potential Security Informant for the FBI.

So where does all this lead? See Part II in the next issue of the Hot Springs Village Voice. All footnotes/documentation for this 2-part article can be found in the online version.