Former Secret Service agent describes JFK assassination in new detail

For the first time, former Secret Service agent Paul Landis is describing what he saw when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated, and claims he's the person who found the "magic bullet" that is the mystery at the root of many conspiracy theories surrounding the president's death. He shares his story with NBC's Gadi Schwartz.

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[d.archerofficial]

The one thing we can take away from this is that a lot of law enforcement officials destroyed this murder investigation.

[PeterJames]

if you want to stop crime scene tampering why do you remove a bullet from the car and then surreptitiously put it on a stretcher without explanation. maybe it's true, and maybe he didn't have a bad intention. But bad decision.

[robertbrissie]

I count FIVE shots. One MISS, which caused concrete fragments to hit James Tague, one THROAT shot through the front windshield, one BACK shot which did not penetrate, a shot that hit Connelly and caused all of the damage to his body, and of course the Kennedy Head shot, which I believe originated from the front. That's five shots and that means that a conspiracy was in play that day.

[Bonsse]

This guy is admitting to tampering with evidence and deciding what Jackie should or should not see. Sheer incompetence.

[dlit]

The Secret Service was probably part of the conspiracy that day. When the motorcade left Love Field, one of their men was ordered off the back of JFK's limo. He can be seen, in a video, raising his arms in consternation about the unexplained decision to remove him from the standing post on the rear bumper. Also, there were supposed to be motorcycle cops riding alongside JFK on both sides of the limo, , as part of his protection. When questioned about why those officers weren't there, some Secret Service guy said JFK had asked those officers not be there so people would have a better chance to see him. But the Secret Service later admitted that JFK's attitude toward their protection strategies was always to agree with whatever security formation they wanted. So they were lying.

[Exiles]

Something doesn't smell right here...Landis was a trained Secret Service agent who knew better than to sheepishly slip such important evidence on to a stretcher...He would have given it to his supervisor and explained where he found it...I not only find this totally unbelievable but also find his saying he never heard or saw anything about the assassination or that bullet over the last 60 years to be laughable...Landis could have been charged with obstructing the investigation and failing to perform his duties and suffered serious consequences, so it just isn't believable that he would handle such evidence that way or no one would see him dropping that bullet on the stretcher...What rotten journalism the NBC host practices by failing to register that once Landis disproves the Magic Bullet that therefore Landis' claim that the 3 shells prove Oswald did it is invalid because the scenario now requires a 4th bullet...

[scottkeating]

Old guy is just repeating the government message. Obviously still very scared.

[doubleseven]

"Rolled from the gurney to the other" - yes, the magic bullet AGAIN does magic.

[ijvgxqr]

Too much evidence was lost, destroyed, and ignored in this case for me to accept the official explanation. This just adds another layer of confusion.

[AnthonyOMulligan-yvcg]

It wasn't an Assassination, it was a Coup.

[Whitey-su]

I'm sorry for being so graphic, I don't buy the one shooter theory. I'm an experienced hunter and I've never seen an animals organs or tissues blow backwards when it was shot. The President's brain, if shot from the rear, would have splattered all over Governor Connally and his wife, not all over the rear of the limo. Mrs. Kennedy was seen and has stated that she crawled up on the rear of the limo to retrieve pieces of her husbands' brain. That shot had to have been from the front, thus proving there were at least two shooters. The bullet that was found by the Presidents' side, if it had been any of the bullets that struck either The President or governor Connally would have been deformed by the impact, which is what bullets are designed to do. I'm sorry, but the evidence screams conspiracy/cover-up.

[omnizen]

This story just does not add up: a Secret Service Agent with a bullet with rifling marks does not responsibly hold on to the bullet and turn it in to proper chain of command authority? Anyone with training in police work would know the rifling (striping?) would most definitely tie the bullet to whatever gun fired it. An essential piece of evidence that should have been tagged and identified with the time and location where it was found and the name of the person who found it and turned it in.

Better yet, the bullet should have been left where it was located on the limousine, for fingerprinting, (and today DNA testing), as well as ballistic trajectory analysis.

Of course in 1963, he did not have a mobile phone to call for backup to cordon off the limousine from the surging crowd at Parkland Hospital, so maybe it makes sense that he would pick up belongings and evidence that might otherwise have disappeared.

Furthermore, the bullet as seen in the Exhibit photo does not in any way appear deformed from impact, . . . which raises all kinds of questions.

And then, why did Agent Landis not pick up the “2 bright brass bullet fragments” (8:59) “on the seat, ” "one of them, like my pinky finger, it was kind of mushroomed", . . . IN ADDITION to the "intact, . . . fully . . ., bullet, " (9:14) seen "where the cushioning met the trunk of the car" that he did pick up, put in his pocket, and later placed on the gurney?

So, according to this eyewitness, there were at least 2 bullets, which the NBC moderator did not acknowledge.

Like everything in the minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years that followed, the Kennedy Assassination was a whirlwind of confusion, cacophony, and unreliable investigation.

[RitaMarkham-rqoi]

That was one of the darkest, saddest days in my life! I was 17 years old and a senior in High School!

[DanC-golc]

You can not be serious ... At 16:15 Landis says "I saw a bullet and wanted to preserve it, and make sure it did not get lost." So what does he do ?? He just lays it on a stretcher without telling a soul, having no clue who might find it, and leaves. HEY - how about giving it to Roy Kellerman the Secret Service Agent in charge that day and then showing him EXACTLY where you found it ?? Then he keeps silent about it for 60 years, even though it ends up being (somehow) found on Connolly's stretcher. I 100% believe Clint Hill, who not only was the most attuned person in Dealey Plaza that day, but has been the most honest, transparent, reliable and haunted witness since Nov. 22, 1963.

Clint Hill wrote a very good books about 10 years ago in which he contacted EVERY Secret Service agent on the JFK detail asking for their accounts and recollections but Landis says he was never even contacted. BS. Then Landis makes the even more ludicrous claim that he merely found the bullet QUOTE "just lying where the seam on the back seat meets the middle of the trunk, and it's uhh where they would have attached the bubbletop." So that is on TOP of the back seat.

So now JFK researchers who question that the spent "magic bullet" had been likely to have fallen out of Connolly's wrist and ended up on his stretcher - is going to instead try to imagine this same bullet (not pristine in any way to begin with, base is completely oval) went IN Kennedy's back but then just fell out BEHIND him. And what convenient timing for this new money-maker of a Book --- 2 months before the 60th anniversary of that horrible day.

[ResistTheNonsense]

It could not be possible for the bullet to make a hole in Kennedy's back and then fall back to that location with no evidence of any material on it. If it actually was there and Pauls story is true then it would make more sense for it to be a plant by someone else who wanted a bullet with the Carcano marks on it to be found. Maybe Clint put it there? :)

[danieladammonte]

The clip ends with him saying he believes in the lone gunman theory, what!? What was the point of that!?

[andymark]

It also shocks me that so many involved have never read the Warren Commision Report, or studied any information available.

[hukabuktx]

Yes. That really clears up everything. Pathetic.

[dlit]

This man's statement that he believes it was Oswald, acting alone, could simply be fear. In the weeks after the assassination, people in Dallas became aware that some of those who had a piece of information that contradicted the official story of it being the "lone nut" Oswald were being found dead, their deaths poorly staged as suicides, but looking like murders in reality. In the next 15 years, many people who knew things about the assassination that didn't go along with the government's version died under "mysterious" circumstances. It's possible that he waited all these years to tell his story for the same reason.

[blaise]

My spiddy senses are tingling listening to this guy. Lets see if I got this right, he takes it upon himself to tamper with evidence at a crime scene (the bullet). He says he's concerned about the safety of the bullet (getting lost) yet he leaves it on the presidents gurney unattended and doesn't report to anybody what he did?!? And what's up with the cigarette lighter he also removes from the crime scene, finder's keepers?!? Nope, something is not right with this guy in my humble opinion.