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The Plot to Kill the President Hardcover – January 1, 1981

by George Robert Blakey (Author)

4.1 32 ratings

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Maintaining that John Kennedy was assassinated in a conspiracy to end investigation of organized crime, Blakey and Billings explore the men and motives that led to the president's murder

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Times Books; First Edition (January 1, 1981)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 428 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0812909291
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0812909296
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.9 pounds

Best Sellers Rank: #604,775 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #26,756 in Social Sciences (Books)

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4.1 32 ratings

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Richard N. Billings
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TK

Written by one who knows

Reviewed in the United States on February 15, 2023

Verified Purchase

Detailed, believable. Everyone should read this book to understand the power of the mob. Written by one who was there on the House Select Committee on Assassinations. All the other conspiracy stuff out there is fluff.

One person found this helpful

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Dr. Ray Cannata, author Rooted: The Apostles' Creed

Defense of a small conspiracy by House chief counsel

Reviewed in the United States on July 28, 2012

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Blakey is well positioned to write this work. He was the chief counsel for the House Select Committee on Assassinations (which built on the work of the Warren Commission and new information to conclude in the 1970s that there was a 95% likelihood of a second gunman). Blakely had written the actual RICO Act, the most important legal tool against the organized crime. He was a tenured full professor of law at Cornell and Notre Dame. This was no crackpot.

He does not believe in any Oliver Stone style grand conspiracy -- no FBI, CIA, Cuban, military plot. Though he does find evidence that some govt groups had a strong interest in covering up conspiracy after the fact. The conspirator, to Blakely, was simple -- a small group in the New Orleans mafia who assisted Oswald.

I read Posner's anti-conspiracy book at the same time as Blakely's, and truly tried to keep an open mind. While I remain unsure, I have to say that Blakey made a pretty strong case. There are just too many facts pointing toward a small conspiracy. For many of these a second gunman, and help from the Mafia, seems the most likely (if not usually the ONLY) explanation. Posner and others can show very possible explanations for each, but what are the odds that ALL of these facts are not a result of a conspiracy?

So we have all the connections between Ferrie and Oswald. We have Ferrie's very strong ties to Carlos Marcel.. We have a mafia figure bailing Oswald out of jail. We have Ruby spending the summer in Cuba. We have the audio indicating two gunmen. We have 2 out of 5 medical examiners believing to their graves that there were entry wounds from two directions. We have the body motions of JFK in the film. We have the well dressed hobos in the train car on the grassy knoll. We have mafia witnesses sure Marcel. is involved. We have Ruby killing Oswald. We have Ruby's NOLA phone calls and NOLA mob ties. We have the near impossibility of Oswald getting all those shots off in 7 seconds with a branch obscuring for 2 of those seconds. etc etc etc Is it most likely that the NONE of those factors are as conspiratorial as they appear?

Well, I still don't know. But its hard to dismiss Blakey's work.

My one criticism -- the book spends more time reporting the history of the House Select Committee that Blakely managed, and the politics and budget of that committee, than most readers will want. If he had confined his discussion to just sifting the evidence, the book could have been shorter and more focused.

9 people found this helpful

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D_M_G

Lots of good information here - but Blakey came to one hell of a bad conclusion

Reviewed in the United States on March 19, 2016

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Lots of good information here - but Blakey came to one hell of a bad conclusion. What else can you say? The idea that Oswald was simply working for gangsters is laughable considering all we know about him today. That said though, that the information in this book is pretty vital. It is well written and throughly researched. Blakey certainly had a close look at the evidence and much here is very revealing (especially the information about Jack Ruby and his mafia connections).

3 people found this helpful

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Dr T

VERY DETAILED WORK

Reviewed in the United States on September 10, 2023

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This is a very detailed treatment of the factors which make the case for mob involvement in the assassination. In an effort to be thorough, a lot of minutia was cover making it a tedious read. There were no unsubstantiated claims and the subject was dealt with in a way which gave the reader more than enough information to make a reasonable evaluation without being sensational. Don't expect it to be a fun read to be finished in a day or two. Curious that you don't find it in many public libraries.

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Dick N.

Another INVALUABLE Resource about Who REALLY Killed John Kennedy

Reviewed in the United States on March 27, 2016

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This is the single most comprehensive FOLLOW-THROUGH to the questions raised - and kept alive - by Mark Lane's criticism of the woefully inadequate "Warren Commission" obfuscation. Blakey and co-author Billings were the Chief Counsel and chief technical investigator, respectively, of the SECOND official U.S. investigation into the assassination of John Kennedy. This book is a documentation of the investigation conducted under their supervision, and of what it's key findings were.

I must add that it is not a COMPLETE documentation of everything found in that regard - as limitations placed on them in terms of resources and time didn't allow them to cover EVERYTHING ...but they did an outstanding job, considering. Other investigators picked up where they left off, and ...over time ...provided further documentation elsewhere to completely fill in the picture of who REALLY murdered John Kennedy ...and who were the forces ...in OUR government and the so-called "news media" ...who did more to HIDE the truth than to uncover it.

There is no one, single complete source for it all - but "the truth" can be found in no more than 10 or 12 places ...IF one knows where and how to look, and keeps digging.

6 people found this helpful

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Jennifer Mitchell

Plot to Kill the President Reading!

Reviewed in the United States on December 23, 2020

Excellent read!

A long story weak on specifics

Reviewed in the United States on December 2, 2013

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Although providing a lot of background on the various theories regarding the assassination of JFK, the conclusions offered here are very light on specifics. It's basically that, because JFK slept with some women that were procured via his mob "connections" (i.e., he was pals with Frank Sinatra), he had "crossed the line" and was therefore fair game for a hit. Nothing more specific than that. Not recommended.

6 people found this helpful

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Clint D. Johnson

A Good One!

Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2015

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A very thoughtful analysis of an investigation, that was conducted with many constraints. I believe more investigation in some areas could have produced more evidence.

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Top reviews from other countries

Paul C Vinton

A missed opportunity

Reviewed in Australia on September 12, 2023

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Blakey was brought in to the HSCA for one purpose - to put an end to the real investigation that Sprague had intended and to make sure make sure it didn't veer into areas it wasn't supposed to. In this he was successful. Had the acoustic evidence not indicated a conspiracy, he would have just rubber stamped the Warren commission findings. When that wasn’t possible he went to plan B - blame the Mob. This book is the dribble that results. He now says that he “can’t believe the CIA lied to me” - yeah right!

R. M. Dury

The Plot to kill the President

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 20, 2010

Verified Purchase

With a lifelong interest in The American Mafia, I approached this book with some trepidation. Whilst I do like 'in depth' analysis - 400 pages does stretch the topic slightly. I admire Blakey & Billings for their dogged search for the so called 'truth'. However they skated over the fact that the lethal coup-de-grace was fired from the front. Although the book was admirably well researched it repeatedly went over ground covered in previous chapters and therefore could have been 200 hundred pages. I often tell people how I have studied the American Mafia and that Johnny Roselli (an accomplished marksman) fired that fatal shot from the storm drain on Elm Street. Johnny Roselli confessed as such to Bill Bonanno when they served time together in 1971 (see page 302 of 'Bound by Honour' by Bill Bonanno). Whilst the book by Blakey & Billings disperses some of the 'Conspiracy' theories, I would have thought that they would have been a little bit bolder an expressed a difinitive opinion.