www.mattkprovideo.com/2025/06/05/14030/

One claim that conspiracists often make about the Kennedy Assassination is that a second person was spotted on the sixth floor of the Texas School  Book Depository minutes before the shooting proof, they claim, of a conspiracy

I’m Paul Brandus, author of Countdown to Dallas, and just minutes before the shooting there was indeed a second person on the sixth floor just steps from Lee Harvey Oswald and his sniper’s perch.

but this does not mean there was a conspiracy

Here now the rest of the story:

Around 5 minutes to 12 the Kennedy motorcade was underway headed for downtown Dallas.

At the depository, employees excited that the President would soon pass by, knocked off early for lunch.

as he was heading downstairs one  employee Bonnie Ray Williams said he saw Oswald 

at the depository employees excited that the president would soon pass by knocked off early for lunch
as he was heading downstairs one employee Bonnie Ray Williams said he saw Oswald on the fifth or sixth floor he wasn’t sure which
but moments later another employee Charles Given went to the sixth floor to get his cigarettes
there he saw Oswald
they had a brief conversation

Given said “Aren’t you going downstairs it’s near lunchtime.”
Oswald “No sir.”
Given left now minutes after that brief encounter Bonnie Ray Williams also returned to the sixth floor
“why?”
“To watch the presidential motorcade.”

At the time everyone was talking like they was going to watch from the sixth floor
Williams testified and while he waited for his buddies Williams ate his lunch a chicken sandwich and bottle of Dr pepper
he remembers sitting in front of the third or fourth window
Williams recalled quote “I couldn’t see too much of the sixth floor because the books at this time were stacked so high if there was anyone else up there on the sixth floor,”
Williams neither saw nor heard anyone
now here’s where it gets interesting
down on Houston Street a young man Arnold Roland was standing with his wife Barbara
looking around his eyes drifted up to the sixth floor of the depository
there in the corner window he saw a man holding a rifle with a telescopic site
roland assumed that this was a Secret Service agent there to protect the president
so it never occurred to him to point this man out to a nearby police officer
but Oswald was not the only person Roland saw on the sixth floor
his wandering eye also saw what he described as ” a colored man a few windows away”
this was Bonnie Ray Williams eating his lunch
now the other guys that he was going to watch the parade with
James Garman and Harold Norman were their names
had earlier been down on the sidewalk but decided the view would be better from the fifth floor of the depository
why the fifth floor?
because the sixth floor here shown that day was a jungle of boxes
by now as Garman recalled it’s between 12:20 and 12:25 just minutes before the assassination they were soon joined by Williams who had finished his lunch
leaving this greasy bag and empty soda bottle near the window
bonnie Ray Williams had been so close to Oswald while he ate that police and the media later thought the garbage had been Oswald’s
a month after the assassination this book published by United Press International and American Heritage repeated this mistake writing
in the caption quote “The sniper had dined on fried chicken and pop while waiting patiently to shoot the president.”
One report said “Wrong.”
But it does show just how close how tantalizingly close Bonnie Ray Williams sat to the man who was about to murder the president
this proximity helps explain why two other men on the street here at the southwest corner of Houston and Elm saw Oswald sitting perfectly still
their names Bob Edwards and Ronald Fiser
moments before the motorcade appeared Edwards spotting Oswald told Fiser quote “Look at that guy there in that window he looks like he’s uncomfortable.”
Were words to that effect
fischer chimed in quote “This man held my attention for 10 or 15 seconds all the time I watched him he never moved his head he never moved anything just was there transfixed
he looked to be 22 or 24 years old.”
It’s likely that Oswald who was 24 never moved because Bonnie Ray Williams as we’ve established was just feet away eating his lunch
meanwhile Oswald was also seen by yet another man who sat here tantalizingly close to the window his name was Howard Brennan
here’s Brennan at that spot in a recreation of November 22nd
he saw Oswald in the sixth floor window right above James Gar Harold Norman and Bonnie Ray Williams
who had by now joined his buddies on the fifth floor
“I saw this man on the sixth floor,” Brennan later testified he added “There was no other person on that floor that ever came to the window that I noticed there were people on the next floor down which is the fifth floor colored guys.”
The time frame here is about 12:22 which lines up with the Williams testimony
Brennan could give exact times because from his vantage point he could see the big clock the famous Hertz sign that in 1963 stood on the roof of the depository
now let’s go back to Ronald Fiser about 30 seconds before the shooting
30 seconds fischer looked up again an affidavit he gave to Dallas police that very day said
“I looked up at the window and noticed that he seemed to be laying down or in a funny position anyway because all I could see was his head.”
When the presidential car turned left onto Elm Street there was but one person on the sixth floor here in the southeast corner window not two as some conspirators have alleged
and now you know the rest of the story
more stories on the assassination and the events leading up to it in my latest book
Countdown to Dallas
available everywhere books are sold
there’s also a Countdown to Dallas podcast produced by Evergreen Podcasting that is also available everywhere