(6 of 9)
Connally has insisted that he could not have been hit by the same bullet that struck Kennedy's neck. He testified he heard a shot, turned to his right to look at Kennedy, could not see him, and began turning back toward his left before he was hit. The commission lawyers believe that Connally, like so many witnesses to the events, was mistaken. He may have heard a shot before he was hit, they say, but perhaps it was the shot that missed both men. They note that Connally did not even know he had been hit in the wrist and thigh until he awoke from surgery the next day.
Most viewers of the Zapruder film are bothered by two questions that it seems to pose: 1) Why does Connally take so long to show signs of pain if, indeed, he had been hit at almost the same instant as Kennedy? 2) Why, if Kennedy was struck from the rear, does his body move sharply back? The commission's experts explain Connally's delayed reaction (at most, 1.5 seconds) as a quite plausible nervous-system occurrence. He also clings to his hat, despite a wrist wound; the experts contend that his muscles tightened.
Lattimer, again, has done grisly but practical experiments on Kennedy's head movements. As do other analysts, he notes that the head momentarily moved forward in one frame of the film before jolting more noticeably backward. Lattimer and his sons have fired the Oswald-type gun and ammunition into the rear of human skulls packed with gelatin. He has films to show that in each case the skulls toppled backward off their stands, never forward. Similar tests were conducted with melons by Physicist Luis Alvarez of the University of California, with the same results. Though neither had expected this movement, they theorized that the escape of material through the larger exit wounds in these tests had a jetlike effect that propelled the melons and skulls to the rear.
Critics of the single-bullet theory also dwell on the relatively undamaged condition of the bullet recovered near Connally's stretcher at Parkland Hospital. They marvel sarcastically at all of the wounds this bullet is supposed to have inflicted, while remaining so "pristine." The bullet is only slightly flattened at its rear, with a mere 2 to 2.5 grains of its soft lead core missing.
Ballistics experts have fired this type of bullet through 25 in. of tough elmwood and 47 in. of pine—and it has come to rest similarly intact (on the other hand, it has also been fired through cotton wadding and emerged misshapen). Lattimer has cut up two grains of this bullet's lead core and found they would yield 41 fragments—more than found in Connally's wounds. No one has estimated the weight of the metal X-rayed in or recovered from Connally at more than two grains. Thus, although this bullet is surprisingly undamaged, its condition does not mean it could not have hit both men.
Still, many of the critics insist that Oswald was not a good enough shot to have hit Kennedy twice with a cheap rifle. They contend that it was a difficult shot. In fact, the longest shot was 265.3 ft. from the sixth-floor window. To Oswald, peering through a four-power scope on his rifle, it looked like only about 22 yards. His target, moreover, was moving slowly and in a straight line away from him, rather than laterally.