NOVA: Cold Case JFK

The 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy has fueled dark rumors of conspiracies for decades. Now, 50 years later, what can modern science tell us about the shooting in Dallas—and the investigations that followed? NOVA and a team of foremost experts employ exclusive tests and sophisticated new technology to reconstruct and review the evidence in "Cold Case JFK," which premiered on November 13, 2013 on PBS.

Courtesy of Photograph by Cecil Stoughton, White House, in the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum, Boston

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The revolver used by Jack Ruby to assassinate Lee Harvey Oswald during a press conference in Dallas following the assassination of President Kennedy. The initials scratched into the surface of the revolver are those of the arresting officer.

Courtesy of © CORBIS

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A Western 38 Special stamp marks a bullet used in forensics tests during the Kennedy assassination investigation. The bullet was submitted as evidence to the House Select Committee in the late 1970s when the investigation was reopened.

Courtesy of © CORBIS

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Photographs and documents, confiscated by the FBI as evidence, from houses where Lee Harvey Oswald was living at the time of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Courtesy of © CORBIS

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Forensic pathologist and neuropathologist Dr. Peter Cummings led a team from Boston University in creating an experimental 3D virtual reconstruction of JFK’s skull for NOVA for the first time ever to help determine the entry point of the gunshot wound to President Kennedy’s head.

Courtesy of Gregory Mahoney

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Forensic pathologist and neuropathologist Dr. Peter Cummings led a team from Boston University in creating an experimental 3D virtual reconstruction of JFK’s skull for NOVA for the first time ever to help determine the entry point of the gunshot wound to President Kennedy’s head.

Courtesy of Gregory Mahoney

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Greg Mahoney, Peter Cummings and James Pokines looking at monitor with image of skull model.

Courtesy of WGBH

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Copies of JFK autopsy photos.

Courtesy of WGBH

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Using 3D laser technology, NOVA creates a virtual scan of the crime scene at Dealey Plaza in Dallas to analyze and measure the multiple trajectories if gunshots were fired from various vantage points--including the Book Depository and the Grassy Knoll.

Courtesy of Tony Grissim, Michael Haag, Mike McCormick

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President John F. Kennedy's Casket Lying in State.

Courtesy of Courtesy of Abbie Rowe. White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum, Boston

In "Cold Case JFK," NOVA follows a unique group of experts trying to unravel the lingering mysteries of the Kennedy assassination. What should have been a homicide investigator’s best-case scenario—a crime that occurred in broad daylight in front of hundreds of witnesses—instead became a foren- sics nightmare in a case plagued by a mishandled crime scene, a controversial autopsy, and a prime suspect gunned down while in police custody.

NOVA combines cutting edge technology and contemporary scientific techniques with archival footage and expert interviews to recreate the crime and the Warren Commission’s investigation--examining the shooting, the assassination scene, the medical information and wounds, and the evidence found on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository.

The film features several exclusive elements: For the first time since the original investigation by the FBI laboratory, forensic scientists trained and experienced in both firearms identification and shooting scene reconstruction review and evaluate the ballistics evidence in the JFK assassination. These experts apply new technology, not available until recently, to this historic crime.

To execute the forensic tests, NOVA calls on several leading experts—including father and son firearms experts Lucien and Michael Haag; private investigator Josiah Thompson; medical examiner and forensic neuropathologist Peter Cummings; laser scanning specialist Tony Grissim; legendary newsman, Jim Lehrer, and historian and leading JFK assassination expert, John McAdams.

The most controversial aspect of the Warren Report is the “single bullet theory,” which says that one shot wounded both President John Kennedy and Governor John Connally, causing seven separate wounds in the two men.

The bullet which the Warren Commission claimed did all this damage was discovered on a gurney at Parkland Hospital, looking virtually pristine, leading critics to deride it as “the magic bullet.” Yet the single bullet theory is essential to the Warren conclusion that Oswald acted alone.

To test the single bullet theory, the film travels to a shooting range in New Mexico where criminalists Lucien and Michael Haag, experts in firearms and ballistics, reconstruct the shooting. The Doppler radar used by the father and son duo is a technology so new and unique that even the FBI and BATF forensic laboratories do not yet possess it.

The Haags are convinced that the only hope of understanding what really happened in the assassination lies in reexamining the physical evidence: the weapon, the bullets and the wounds. They have studied Oswald’s rifle and discovered that both the gun and the ammunition it uses have some extremely unusual properties-–documented with high-speed video and shooting tests--which may shed new light on the controversial single bullet theory.

The Haags also pursue the question of whether there was a second shooter who fired from the grassy knoll, as the 1979 House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded. Working with laser scanning expert Tony Grissim, they use state-of-the-art 3D laser scanning to build a three-dimensional virtual model of Dealey Plaza. With this model, accurate to the millimeter, they can evaluate any and all possible trajectories and determine what shooting positions were – or were not – possible.

Renowned JFK assassination expert and professor John McAdams weighs in on the findings of the original Warren Commission, the deficiencies of the medical and autopsy evidence, and the lack of understanding on the part of the Kennedy camp on the need for a forensic autopsy at the time.

Veteran investigator Josiah Thompson also studies the most famous “eye witness” account of that day: the 8mm Zapruder film—perhaps the best known “home movie” in history—which captures the shooting and wounds sustained by both the president and the Texas governor as their motorcade rides through Dealey Plaza in downtown Dallas.

The assassination of President John F. Kennedy was a defining moment in our nation’s history and one that continues to perplex us. It was also the murder of a man. A half-century later, the shooting remains controversial to a majority of the public that doubts the Warren Commission findings that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.

In "Cold Case JFK," NOVA shows viewers the importance of re-examining the evidence of prior eras using the technology and tools of today to try to unlock the secrets of the past and yield important new insights.