InThe Matter Of= Assassination Records Review Board Re: President John E Kennedy Deposition of RobertJ Groden July &I996 Miller- Reporting Company 507 C Street, N.E. Washington, DC 20002 (202) 54666666 Origitaul File 0702GRODASC, 167 Pages Min-U-Smp~ File m: 4140073227 Word Index included with this Min-U-Scrip&~ . Assassination Records Review +;ird Deposition of R&&t J.$iroden Re: President John F. Kennedy Juh &I996 Page 1 BEFORE THE Page 4 ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVtEW BOARD [II at the Review BoardAso present in the room is L In Re: [21Mr. Charles Mayn, who is affiliated with the PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY : Claymont, Delaware pi NationalArchives. Tuesday, Juty 2.1996 PI Mr. Groden, I would like to remind you, as The deposttiin of ROBERT J. GRODEN, cakd [51we discussed shortly before the deposition began, for examination by counsel for the Board in the aboveentltled matter, pursuant to notice. at the [61that this deposition is being conducted pursuant Wilmington Httton. 630 Naamarrs Road, Ctaymorrt. m both to the subpoena that was issued to you, as Delaware, convened at lo:12 am. belore Robert H. PI Haines. a notary public. when were present on well as being under the auspices of the federal behan Of the parties: PI perjury statute. It is important during the course Page 2 lq of the deposition that-. you tell the truth and the APPEARANCES: III whole truth, as you have sworn. On Behalt of the PtatntUt: Mr. Groden, do you mmemberthatIhave T. JEREMY GUNN. ESQ. 19 General Counsel 131 informed you that you are entitled to have counsel Assassinatiin Records Review Board 141 here to&y? 600 E Street, N.W., Second Floor Washington, D.C. 2O!&l IS] A: Yes. (202) 724-0033 IsI Q: And did you make the decision not to have ALSO PRESENT: 17jcounsel? * CHARLES W. MAYN, ESQ. U.S. Nattonal Archives lq A: Well, I certainly can’t afford counsel. LAURA DENK and DOUGLAS HORNE IS]So, even if1 wanted to, I couldn’t. Assassinatiin Records Review Board q Q: Mr. Groden, could you describe for me the CONTENTS MAMINATION BY COUNSEL FOR !I] general background you have in areas related to WtTNESS ARRB 9 photographic record related to the Kennedy L Robert Groden 3 GRODEN DEPOSITION EXHIBITS MARKED Page 5 37 ExhlbR No. 1 [II assassination? Exhbn No. 2 3s Exhbn No. 3 39 tz~ A: Well, President Kennedy was shot on my Exhlbll No. 4 60 [31eighteenth birthday, November 22nd, 1%3.And Exhi~t No. 5 126 [All exhhb retained by Mr. GUM.] f41smrdng with the early issues of Life magazine, I Page 3 ~slwas Fascinatedby the fact that the photographic dl PROCEEDINGS pq record did exist. Back in the beginning, we had no M Whereupon, m concept-nobody had any concept of how many parts pl ROBERTJ. GRODBN te] of the photographic record actuaIly existed. [4] was called for as a witness and, having been first (q duly sworn, was examined and testified as follows: PI And through the years, as time went by and PI EXAMINATION BY COUNSEL FOR THE lq more and more started to surface, being a m ASSASSINATION RECORDS REVIEW BOARD III photographer and being interested in photographic PI BY MR. GUNN: IZI images and the history of the case,I-as probably PI Q: Would you state your name for the record, 1101please? 131every other researcher in the case-wanted to IIll A: Robert Jacob Groden. 141 examine those items. But they were not available. 1121 Q: What is your address? ISI I had called up UPI, and asked to examine A: 212 Emily Lane: Boothwyn, Pennsylvania I131 iq the Nix and Muchmore filmsThey, of course, [14] 19061. 1151 Q: Mr. Groden, I am a representative of the II refused.They said they would charge $10,000 just 1161 AssassinationRecords Review Board. My name is 161to inspect the films-just to look at themAnd (171Jeremy Gunn. I am the general counsel and the L 1181associate director for research and analysis for 1q the Zapruder film was locked up in Life magazine’s IIS] the Review Board. q possessionAnd none of them were available to any 120) I’m accompanied here today by Laura Denk, !11researcher or any member of the public. PII who is a senior analyst with the Review Board, as WI well as by Douglas Home, who is a senior analyst Ql In 1%9, I started working for a 000002 Miller Reporting Company (202) 5466666 Min-U-Script@ (3) Page 1 - Page 5 uqos~uon of nooert J. Grodeq ~ssasstin Fords Review Board WY 291996 Re: President John F. Kennedy - Page 6 Page 6 * VI photographic-I’m sorry-motion picture optical 111time because of the degree of blowup. PI effects house in NewYork City, called EFX PI And it is my impression that they made d PI Unlimited. Over a period of several months, my PI several negatives for Life magazine.They did not 141 employer and I discovered that we had a mutual 141 keep any of the negativesAl they had was one ISIinterest in the Kennedy assassinationas a historic [SItest print that had come back. ISI investigation. [q Q: Just so I’m clear here.There were m And after sevetzl months, he had showed me m several-it was your understanding that there were PI that he had been, in fact, employed by Life ISIseveral negatives made fromthe original-camera-original [sl magazine-byTime-Life, Incorporated to blow up the M Zapruderfilm? 1i01original eight millimeter Glm of the assassination 101 A: Right. On the roll itself, it said “third 1111to 35 millimeter, with the object being a 111take”.Onthisparticularprint,itsaid’third 1121documentary that Time-Life was considering doing. 121take”. So,I assumethat they made at least three MI Q: Could I interrupt you the& for a moment? ISI negatives. probably at different exposures, to get 1741 A: sure. 141 the best exposure. 1151 Q: What was the name of the person for whom ISI Q: And would it be fair to say that you have rfq you worked at EFX Unlimited? iq never seen any ofthe originals taken directly from P71 A: His name was MOWeitzman.And he showed 171the camera-original Zapruder fil@ [MI me the copy that he had kept-the mechanic’s copy rel A: I have seen the Secret Service copy.The ~91 that was left over from the work that they had done 191HSCA people told me that it was the Secret i201tothefilm. zq Service’s original duplicate copy. p11 Q: If I can interrupt you again. 211 Q: Okay. PI A: Sure. zq A: Let’s see.Anyway, Mr. Weitzman showed me d Page 7 Page 9 III Q: Was the mechanic’s copy a 35 millimeter? [II the film-hand-he1d.A 21-second film in n A: Yes, it was. rz~35 millimeter is virmally impossible to project. PI Q: And was that a positive or a negative? PI It’s very, very difficult, and goes by very, very PI A: Positive. [41quickly.The original film was shot at 18.3 frames PI Q: Was it your understanding that that 35 m per secondAnd all 35 millimeter projectors play 1s)millimeter positive was taken-or copied directly [q back at 24. So, it would play back at about a m from the original, or was there an intermediary m thirdtoahalfagainasf&tasitwasoriginally PI step? lq taken. A: There would be a negative involved. PI PI Anyway, Mr. We&man granted me accessto m Q: So,the mechanic’s copy would have a been iq the print, to make optical effects copies.What I [I 11a second generation. Would that be fair to say? 111did is, I stabilized the -The original (121 A: That’s correct. It would be- It was a 121Zapruder film is very shaky. WI test print from the copies that they had made from 131 You know,Abraham Zapruder was an older ~141 the original.At that time no one, to my 141 man. He had vertigo. He had to be held up by his IISI knowledge, had ever taken an eight millimeter 151secretary, Marilyn, to keep him from falling over. [iq film-an original, regular eight millimeter f&n 16) So,the President, in successive frames, [VI and blown it up to 35 millimeter. 17)would appear all over the fihn.And it made it WI They had described the steps that they ‘181virtually impossible for anybody to examine what [lq went through, in order to make it-how involved it rq was going on. BYIwasThey had to take the bellows off the camera, m What I did is, I stabilized it. I zoomed d ~$1extend it beyond its usual range, refocus it, and 211 in, as close as I could get; and I re-photographed pq shoot it in the dark at a very, very long exposure ZI the Glm one frame at a time, and repositioned the Page 6 - Page 9 (4) Miss-U-Scripi~ Miller Reporting Company (202) 546-6666 Deposition of Robert J. Groden . Af+ssinati.onRecords~ewBoar~ Ret P&&dent-Jqhn 7. Kennedy,.. JufyW996 - Page 10 Page 12 111President, so that he was now rock steady in the 111 the mind to perceive what’s going on in the film. L 121center of the image. Now, for the first time, you r21 So, by double framing it, I slowed it down to half p] could actually see what was happening to him. r31 speed.And, therefore, it’s as if the car were I41 The eye didn’t have to travel all over the b41 going slower, and the mind can more easily grasp rq screen, because by the time you got to where he was [q what’s going on.