Mr. CADIGAN. By the Dallas police through our Dallas office.
Mr. DULLES. It was obtained after the assassination on that date?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes, sir; the night of November 22.
At the same time, on November 23, we had an agent come in from Chicago
with samples of paper from Klein's, with the possibility, it was
thought, that the paper sack----
Mr. DULLES. Identify Klein's just for the record.
Mr. CADIGAN. Klein's Sporting Goods Store in Chicago, from which the
Italian rifle was bought.
Mr. EISENBERG. That is Exhibit 139?
Mr. CADIGAN. Exhibit 139. The agent brought in these paper samples from
Klein's for comparison purposes, and the paper tape, this manila gummed
tape, had these knurl markings measuring 30 per inch.
Mr. EISENBERG. That is the gummed tape you obtained from Klein's?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes. It was not identical with this, but merely, you might
say, illustrate that the markings will differ depending on the wheel,
and if your wheel has 30 lines per inch and your other sample is 24
or 25 lines per inch, you know they didn't come from the same tape
dispenser.
Mr. EISENBERG. Mr. Cadigan, do these wheels differ as to their diameter
across the bearing surface, the length across the rolling knurled
surface?
Mr. CADIGAN. I imagine there would be a difference.
I have made no precise measurement but I imagine they vary within
tolerances of a quarter- or half-inch in width.
Mr. EISENBERG. Would the length of the lines produced on 142 be the
same--the paper bag--the same as the length of the lines produced on
677?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. DULLES. At what period in connection with the manufacture of the
paper are those lines put on or----
Mr. CADIGAN. These are put on after the paper is complete.
Mr. DULLES. After paper is completely manufactured?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes, sir; that is right.
Mr. DULLES. And put on by the dispensing machine?
Mr. CADIGAN. No; the individual buys gummed tape in rolls.
Mr. DULLES. Yes.
Mr. CADIGAN. Three-inch rolls or inch-and-a-half rolls. He then puts it
on a tape-dispensing machine.
Mr. DULLES. In his particular organization?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; or his factory or shipping department or wrapping
room.
Mr. DULLES. I understand.
Mr. CADIGAN. Once it is in that machine then that wheel will mark the
tape going through the dispenser just before it wets it and you paste
it down.
Mr. DULLES. Just before, generally just before it is used, then these
markings are put on by the dispensing machine.
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes, sir.
After examining the papers, comparing them visually and under the
microscope, I examined them under ultraviolet light. This is merely one
additional step.
Here again I found that both of them fluoresced the same way.
Mr. EISENBERG. Could you explain the meaning of that?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes. Paper, along with many substances, has the property
of absorbing or reflecting ultraviolet light rays differently. You can
take two samples of paper and put them under an ultraviolet light, and
they may appear to be the same or they may be markedly different.
Mr. EISENBERG. You mean even if they look the same under visual light?
Mr. CADIGAN. Visually they may look the same and yet under ultraviolet
light there may be very dramatic differences.
Mr. EISENBERG. What causes those differences?
Mr. CADIGAN. Well, the chemicals that are in the paper itself; I think
probably a very common example are the markings on shirts, so-called
invisible dyes which, visually, you do not see, but you put them under
ultraviolet light and the chemical is such that it glows brilliantly.
So, it is basically a chemical or chemicals in there, in this case, in
the paper being examined under the ultraviolet, which gives a certain
visual appearance, which you can say, it is the same or it is different.
In all of the observations and physical tests, that I made, I found
that for Exhibit 142, the bag, and the paper sample, Commission Exhibit
677, the results were the same.
Mr. EISENBERG. Can you just review those? That was the ultraviolet
light----
Mr. CADIGAN. Well, briefly, it would be the thickness of both the paper
and the tape, the color under various lighting conditions of both the
paper and the tape, the width of the tape, the knurled markings on the
surface of the tape, the texture of the fiber, the felting pattern. I
hadn't mentioned this before, but if you hold a piece of paper up to
the light, you see light and dark areas caused by the way the fibers
felt right at the beginning stages of paper manufacture.
There are light and dark areas, and these are called the felting
pattern. This is something that will vary depending on how the paper
is made, the thickness of the paper, the way that the fibers moved on
the papermaking machine, and here again I found that they were the same
for both the known sample, Commission Exhibit 677, and the paper bag,
Commission Exhibit 142.
Mr. EISENBERG. In all these cases, did you make the examination both of
the tape and the paper in each of the bag and the sample?
Mr. CADIGAN. Oh, yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. And they were all identical?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. You mentioned before the thickness. How did you measure
the thickness of the tape and paper?
Mr. CADIGAN. With a micrometer.
Mr. EISENBERG. How sensitive is it?
Mr. CADIGAN. It reads to four places.
Mr. EISENBERG. How sensitive?
Mr. CADIGAN. Four decimal places.
Mr. EISENBERG. Is that one-hundredths?
Mr. CADIGAN. That would be one ten-thousandths.
Mr. EISENBERG. And they were identical in that measurement?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; I measured both the paper sack, Exhibit 142, and the
known paper sample, Exhibit 677, at 0.0057 inch, that is fifty-seven
ten-thousandths.
Mr. EISENBERG. Go ahead, Mr. Cadigan.
Mr. CADIGAN. Do you want me to discuss this replica sack yet?
Mr. EISENBERG. You mentioned a replica bag?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. Could you explain what that is?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; this is Commission Exhibit 364. It is a paper sack
similar to Commission Exhibit 142. It was made at the Texas School Book
Depository on December 1, 1963, by special agents of the FBI in Dallas
to show to prospective witnesses, because Commission's Exhibit 142 was
dark and stained from the latent fingerprint treatment and they thought
that this would--it wouldn't be fair to the witness to ask "Did you see
a bag like that?" So they went to the Texas School Book Depository and
constructed from paper and tape a similar bag.
Mr. EISENBERG. This was made December 1?
Mr. CADIGAN. December 1, of 1963.
Mr. EISENBERG. Or some 9 or 10 days after the assassination?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. Was the paper obtained from the same source?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; from the same room.
Mr. EISENBERG. The same room.
Did you examine this paper to see how it compared--that is, the paper
in the replica bag, which has already been admitted as Commission
Exhibit 364--to see how it compared with the paper in the bag found on
the sixth floor of the TSBD, which is Commission's Exhibit 142?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. What was your conclusion?
Mr. CADIGAN. That they were different in color, visual color,
felting--that is, the pattern that you see through transmitted light,
and they were different under ultraviolet light.
Mr. EISENBERG. So that these two papers, which were obtained within 9
or 10 days from the same source, could be distinguished by you?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. Have you brought an ultraviolet light source with you?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. Could you show the Commission the difference between the
three papers?
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. EISENBERG. Now, we have been unable to find a plug for this
ultraviolet machine, so we will temporarily or perhaps permanently
bypass this examination. But did you find that two of the papers look
the same under the ultraviolet and a third looked different when you
examined it under ultraviolet?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; that is correct.
Mr. EISENBERG. Which two were the identical and which was the different
one?
Mr. CADIGAN. Well--Commission Exhibit 142 and Commission Exhibit 677--I
observed them to have the same appearance under ultraviolet light, and
that appearance was different from Commission Exhibit 364.
Mr. DULLES. Can you identify these three exhibits, because otherwise I
think it will be very difficult to get into the record.
Mr. EISENBERG. Yes, sir; 142 being the bag found on the sixth floor of
the TSBD, 677 being the sample obtained that day from the shipping room
in the Texas School Depository, and 364 being a replica made some ten
days later out of paper obtained some 10 days later.
Did that complete your examination of the gross or physical
characteristics, as opposed to the microscopic characteristics?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; that in essence was the extent of the examination I
made at that time.
Mr. EISENBERG. Did you go on to examine for microscopic characteristics?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; I believe I mentioned that at the time I had examined
these papers under the microscope.
Mr. EISENBERG. You mentioned that at the time?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; earlier this morning.
Mr. EISENBERG. Yes.
Could you tell us what the results were of your examination under the
microscope?
Mr. CADIGAN. Again, I found that the paper sack found on the sixth
floor, Commission Exhibit 142, and the sample secured 11-22, Commission
Exhibit 677, had the same observable characteristics both under the
microscope and all the visual tests that I could conduct.
Mr. EISENBERG. Could you go into detail as to what you did see under
the microscope?
Mr. CADIGAN. Well, I think perhaps this photograph, I have an enlarged
photograph, one side being the----
Mr. DULLES. Which side is that?
Mr. EISENBERG. One side marked K-2, and the other Q-10?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; K-2 corresponds to the known paper sample 677.
Mr. EISENBERG. Obtained from the TSBD?
Mr. DULLES. What date?
Mr. CADIGAN. November 22.
Mr. DULLES. On the day of the assassination?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes. And the Q-10 marking is the same as the paper bag
found on the sixth floor, Commission Exhibit 142.
Mr. EISENBERG. Did you take this photograph or was it taken under your
supervision?
Mr. CADIGAN. I had it made.
Mr. EISENBERG. Mr. Chairman, may I have it in evidence?
Mr. DULLES. Admitted.
Mr. CADIGAN. I would like to point out this is only one phase of
the examination and this is a black-and-white photograph. In your
examination under the microscope you are looking at the surface and
memorizing everything about that surface your mind can retain by
putting the two pieces of paper together and studying them back and
forth. I don't wish to imply that that photograph represents all I can
see in a microscope, because it doesn't.
Mr. EISENBERG. We understand that. May I have this, Mr. Reporter,
marked as 678.
(Commission Exhibit No. 678 was marked, and received in evidence.)
Mr. DULLES. That has already been admitted.
Mr. EISENBERG. Yes. Now, what is the magnification in this Exhibit 678?
Mr. CADIGAN. It is about 50 times enlarged.
Mr. EISENBERG. And had you treated the paper chemically before you made
this photograph?
Mr. CADIGAN. No.
Mr. EISENBERG. Can you tell us a little bit about that photograph and
what it shows?
Mr. CADIGAN. Well, actually all this shows is an enlarged area, a very
small area, I might point out. It merely shows the surface structure,
shows some of the fibers, and shows an imperfection. The dark line down
the center of the photograph is actually a fold in both papers, merely
to bring them close together so that they can be seen together.
But it gives you some idea of the surface texture, how the fibers lie
in there. In this instance you have two little imperfections in these
fiber bundles here, you can't see the brown-colored fibers that are
actually present.
Mr. DULLES. That imperfection, however, would not be repeated, would it?
Mr. CADIGAN. Oh, no; it is purely accidental.
Mr. DULLES. They are accidental.
Mr. CADIGAN. They are bundles of fibers in the paper itself.
Mr. EISENBERG. In your opinion were the two samples identical in the
characteristics shown in this photomicrograph?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; they have the same appearance.
Mr. EISENBERG. Did you also break down the papers to test them, to
determine the morphology of the fiber?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes. Subsequently, I ran a fiber analysis of the paper,
the known paper sample from the Texas School Book Depository,
Commission Exhibit 677, and the paper bag, Commission Exhibit 142, and
on the same day I had our spectrographic section run a spectrographic
test on these same papers.
Mr. DULLES. Do I understand correctly, though, you have testified that
a sample taken 10 days later was different--or approximately 10 days
later?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. Approximately 10 days.
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; this was a sample taken December 1. I could tell
that it was different from this sample, 677, taken on the day of the
assassination, and different from the bag, Exhibit 142.
Mr. DULLES. Do you happen to know whether another roll was put in the
machine between the 22d and the 1st of December?
Mr. CADIGAN. May we go off the record?
(Discussion off the record.)
Mr. EISENBERG. On the record.
Do you know whether the Dallas office of the FBI has attempted to make
a determination as to whether the replica paper bag, the paper in the
replica paper bag, prepared on December 1, Commission No. 364, was, or
may have been, or wasn't taken from the same roll as the replica piece
of paper or the sample piece of paper, Exhibit 677, which was obtained
from the Depository November 22?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. And can you tell us what you understand the results of
their investigation to have been?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes; they were unable to determine whether the paper from
the replica sack, Exhibit 364, came from the same roll or a different
roll as the known sample obtained November 22. Commission Exhibit 677.
I understand that in the fall, the Depository is busy, and could very
well have changed rolls, but no records are kept along that line.
Mr. DULLES. Changed rolls in that time, 10-day period?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes, sir. Actually there were 4 working days in that
period.
Mr. DULLES. Yes. But am I not correct that there probably or maybe
certainly, I would like to have your view on that, was no change in
the roll between the day before the assassination and the night of the
assassination, that is between paper bag, Exhibit No. 142, and the
specimen that was taken on the night of the day of the assassination?
Mr. CADIGAN. I can't tell you that, sir. I have no way of knowing,
because these papers are similar in all observable physical
characteristics, and they are different from a sample obtained on
December 1. I would suspect that this were true. But I can't----
Mr. DULLES. I realize that.
Mr. CADIGAN. I cannot make a positive statement on that.
Mr. EISENBERG. Have you any information as to whether the paper during
the period between November 22 and December 1 used in the TSBD--whether
it was the same or different rolls--would have come from the same
ultimate manufacturer?
Mr. CADIGAN. It is my understanding that they received a shipment of
58 rolls of paper that were shipped March 19, 1963, from the St. Regis
Paper Mill in Jacksonville. Fla., and which lasted them until January
of 1964. This would mean on an average, in a 9-month period, a little
more than six rolls a month.
Mr. EISENBERG. The inference would therefore be that if the--although
the papers in the replica bag obtained on December 1 and the paper in
the sample obtained on November 22 are distinguishable by you, they
came from the same manufacturer, and--is that correct?
Mr. CADIGAN. That is correct.
Mr. EISENBERG. And, therefore, that the state of your science is
such that you can distinguish even rolls of paper made by the same
manufacturer and assumedly made within a reasonably close time, is that
correct also?
Mr. CADIGAN. I don't know what period of time is involved here. But
I can distinguish at least in this case between paper from the same
shipment from the same mill.
Mr. EISENBERG. Could you proceed now to discuss the morphology of the
fiber as you examined it under a microscope?
Mr. CADIGAN. Well, I might state briefly what a fiber analysis is. We
put samples of paper back into their, you might say, original state, in
the form of fiber suspension.
You cook samples of paper for a couple of minutes in weak sodium
hydroxide solution. Then you wash it, add water and shake it
vigorously, and you get a suspension of fibers in the water. Samples
of those fibers are put on glass slides and are stained by various
reagents.
Then you examine them under a high-power comparison microscope or a
binocular microscope under approximately 120 times magnification. In
this particular case I used two different stains.
First a malachite green stain. This merely determines if there are
any unbleached fibers, or if they are all bleached. I found that on
both Commission Exhibit 677, the paper sample obtained on November 22,
and the paper sack, Commission Exhibit 142, that they are almost 100
percent unbleached fibers.
Then I stained other samples, with a stain known as Herzberg stain. It
is an iodine-iodide stain, which will distinguish between rag fibers,
chemical wood fibers, and ground wood fibers by different coloring. The
chemical wood is stained blue, rag fibers are stained red, ground wood
stained yellow.
I made and studied specimens or slides of fibers from Commission
Exhibit 677, the known sample, and from Commission Exhibit 142, the
paper sack, to see if the fiber composition is similar. What that means
is, is this chemical wood, is it coniferous or deciduous, are there any
rag fibers in there or are there any ground wood fibers in there, and
I found here the fiber composition was similar and essentially it is a
coniferous woodlike pine. There were a few stray rag fibers, which I
think were probably accidental, and a few stray ground wood fragments
in there.
Mr. DULLES. Let me get clearly what is similar, that is the paper bag,
Exhibit----
Mr. CADIGAN. 142; the paper comprising that sack and the paper
comprising the known sample obtained November 22, Exhibit 677.
Mr. DULLES. Right.
Mr. CADIGAN. The papers I also found were similar in fiber composition,
therefore, in addition to the visual characteristics, microscopic and
UV characteristics.
Mr. EISENBERG. "UV" being ultraviolet?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes, sir. Then I had a spectrographic examination made of
the paper from the sack, 142, and the known sample secured November 22,
Commission Exhibit 677.
Spectrographic tests involve, of course, burning the substance and
capturing the light on a photographic plate to determine what metallic
ions are present. This was done by our spectrographic section, and
again the paper of Commission Exhibit 677, the paper sample, secured
November 22, was found to be similar spectrographically to the paper of
the sack, Commission Exhibit 142.
Now, these were additional tests, the original examinations, under
visual and ultraviolet light were made by me on November 23, 1963.
Fiber analysis and the spectrographic examination were conducted on
March 25, 1964.
Mr. EISENBERG. Have you now reviewed all the points in which you
compared the paper sack obtained from the TSBD, Exhibit 142, and the
known sample obtained on November 22, Exhibit 677?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. Did you find any points of nonidentity?
Mr. CADIGAN. No; I found none.
Mr. EISENBERG. They were identical on every point on which you measured
them?
Mr. CADIGAN. Yes.
Mr. EISENBERG. Mr. Cadigan, did you notice when you looked at the bag
whether there were--that is the bag found on the sixth floor, Exhibit
142--whether it had any bulges or unusual creases?
Mr. CADIGAN. I was also requested at that time to examine the bag
to determine if there were any significant markings or scratches or
abrasions or anything by which it could be associated with the rifle,
Commission Exhibit 139, that is, could I find any markings that I could
tie to that rifle.
Mr. EISENBERG. Yes?
Mr. CADIGAN. And I couldn't find any such markings.
Mr. EISENBERG. Now, was there an absence of markings which would be
inconsistent with the rifle having been carried in the bag?
Mr. CADIGAN. No; I don't see--actually, I don't know the condition of
the rifle. If it were in fact contained in this bag, it could have
been wrapped in cloth or just the metal parts wrapped in a thick layer
of cloth, or if the gun was in the bag, perhaps it wasn't moved too
much. I did observe some scratch marks and abrasions but was unable
to associate them with this gun. The scratch marks in the paper could
come from any place. They could have come from many places. There were
no marks on this bag that I could say were caused by that rifle or any
other rifle or any other given instrument.
Mr. EISENBERG. Was there any absence of markings or absence of bulges
or absence of creases which would cause you to say that the rifle was
not carried in the paper bag?
Mr. CADIGAN. No.
Mr. EISENBERG. That is whether it had been wrapped or not wrapped?
Mr. CADIGAN. That is something I can't say.
Mr. DULLES. Would the scratches indicate there was a hard object inside
the bag, as distinct from a soft object that would make no abrasions or
scratches?
Mr. CADIGAN. Well, if you were to characterize it that way, yes. I mean
there were a few scratches here. What caused them, I can't say. A hard
object; yes. Whether that hard object was part of a gun----
Mr. DULLES. I understand.