The three tramps figure prominently in the Garrison story. He was obsessed with them - and was determined to find out who they were.
So, as you read my new book, On The Trail of Delusion, you will find story after story about the tramps.
- Garrison went on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and showed one of the pictures of the tramps. But, there's more to the story. Garrison fabricated what happened on that show in his book, "On The Trail of the Assassins." Check out Chapter 2 - A Beautiful Mind?
- Garrison believed they weren't tramps and that the men in uniform were not Dallas police officers.
- The tramps were investigated by the HSCA. The photographic panel found that "all three men are shabbily dressed, befitting their apparent status as vagrants." They noted that one of the tramps, "from his battered fedora to his worn-out shoes, has managed to achieve a sartorial effect similar to what one would expect had he been fired from a cannon through a Salvation Army thrift shop."
- It emerged in 1993 that the three tramps were exactly that - the Dallas City Council released its JFK assassination files. Arrest records were found for the three tramps - their names were Harold Doyle, John Gedney, and Gus Abrams. Two of the tramps were still alive and they confirmed that they were the ones pictured.
- Everytime Garrison found a new suspect - he thought they were one of the tramps. For instance, he believed that Edgar Eugene Bradley was one of the tramps. You can read the whole story about Bradley in Chapter 14 - Edgar Eugene Bradley Was a Tramp.
- Then he believed that Fred Crisman was one of the tramps. Crisman was a con man who lived on the west coast - and Garrison believed he was a major conspirator. I have the complete story on Fred Crisman in several chapters in my book.
- One witness that conspiracy authors like a lot is Leander D'avy. He worked at a bar/restaurant in New Orleans. He claimed one day to go in to pick up a check and went into a back room, and he saw the three tramps with Lee Harvey Oswald and David Ferrie.
Part of the reason Garrison went down the tramp rabbit hole was because of conspiracy theorists like Richard Sprague. He convinced Garrison of the importance of the tramps, and he was always identifying one of Garrison's suspects in the pictures.
Of course, even Oliver Stone went into the tramps. And, the real Mr. X of his film JFK believed that in one of the tramp photos, you can make out General Edward Lansdale - whom Prouty believed was a conspirator.
That whole embarrassing story is in my book.