This decision upholds a municipal court decision that protected First Amendment rights in Dealey Plaza, a designated national historical site, and will not be further appealed. This paves the way for a federal suit to secure these rights and for COPA’s claim that our annual Moment of Silence in Dealey Plaza is also protected free speech and should be allowed to be held at 12:30 pm on the Grassy Knoll as planned. Court rules Dallas must allow conspiracy vendors at Dealey Plaza by BRAD WATSON WFAA Channel 8, Dallas, TX March 5, 2013 http://www.wfaa.com/jfk/Court-rules-for-JFK-conspiracy-vendor-at-Dealey-Plaza-against-city-195439101.html (The case was decided by Judge Kristin Wade, of the Dallas County Criminal Court of Appeals.) DALLAS — An appellate court ruled Tuesday that the city of Dallas must stop an enforcement effort against JFK conspiracy vendors selling materials at Dealey Plaza ahead of the 50th anniversary of Kennedy’s assassination. The Dallas County Criminal Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Robert Groden, a longtime conspiracy theorist and vendor who was arrested in 2010 for selling merchandise in Dealey Plaza. The appellate court upheld a lower court’s decision to toss the city’s case out. “It’s a matter of free speech, it’s a First Amendment issue,” Groden…

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By Robert Wilonsky rwilonsky@dallasnews.com 9 15 0 2 Robert Groden (right) and his colleague Marshal Evans sit near the infamous stockade fence at the Dealey Plaza “grassy knoll” as they wait for tourists on July 8, 2010. (G.J. McCarthy/Staff photographer) For close to two decades the city of Dallas and Robert Groden have been at odds over his right to set up a table at Dealey Plaza from which he sells his DVDs, magazines and books insisting John Kennedy was killed by a cast of co-conspirators. For now, at least, that battle has come to an end: As noted below, in recent days a Dallas County Criminal Court of Appeals upheld a municipal court judge’s December 2010 decision to toss out the city’s case against Groden, who never left Dealey Plaza despite dozens of arrests and even more warnings. But the case is far from closed. In June 2010 Groden filed a federal suit against the city that alleged, among other things, malicious prosecution. That case was put on hold while the city and Groden duked it out elsewhere.“But now that we have this ruling, we can look ahead to federal court,” says Groden, who served as the staff photographic…

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Recent article by Jim Schutze, Dallas Observer.  I am going to include this snippet here, then the entire article below. “Obviously you know and I know that the assassination has attracted the attention of lots of eccentric people, even crazy people. They can be irritating, and I think I’m guilty of having expressed that irritation by making fun of some of them here in the past. COPA is not crazy people. If anything, the dedicated scholars and investigators of COPA and some other study groups are the monks who have kept scholarship alive on these questions over long decades of derision and even aggressive attack like the behavior of the City of Dallas. If there is a body of knowledge out there now capable of responding to your own personal curiosity about these questions, it exists today only because of the work of COPA and some other groups and individuals.” To: Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Dear Mr. Kennedy: You and your sister, Rory, appeared here in Dallas a few days ago as part of the run-up to this city’s observance of the 50th anniversary of the murder of your uncle, President John F. Kennedy, in Dealey Plaza in Dallas on…

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By Edmund DeMarche, Published January 02, 2013, | FoxNews.com A Washington-based group that has long questioned the official version of John F. Kennedy’s assassination says the city of Dallas is trampling its rights by barring it from Dealey Plaza for this year’s 50th anniversary of the murder of the nation’s 35th president. The Coalition on Political Assassinations has gathered every year since 1994 at the site where Kennedy was killed by a sniper on Nov. 22, 1963. The group typically observes a  moment of silence and members often give speeches. But this year it was denied a permit, the group’s director told FoxNews.com. “It’s ironic that the city wants to celebrate JFK’s life — and not his death — at the very place where he was assassinated,” John Judge, the executive director of the group, said. “They are afraid of the thousands of people that will come to the site to commemorate his death and call for the truth.” The annual gatherings were first loosely organized by journalist Penn Jones, who was one of the earliest skeptics of the official explanation of the assassination. Judge was a friend of Jones, who died in 1998. “When he died, I promised him…

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By Ana Campoy, Wall Street Journal…. Dallas-Officials in the city where President John F. Kennedy was gunned down Nov. 22, 1963, want to observe the 50th anniversary of that day with a celebration of his life. The city plans a ceremony that would include readings from Kennedy speeches by historian David McCullough and military jets flying over Dealey Plaza, where the 35th president was shot. John Judge says Dallas is preventing conspiracy theorists a permit to gather at Dealey Plaza, the assassination site. But some who believe the assassination was a conspiracy involving high-ranking U.S. officials say their views shouldn’t be excluded from the commemoration. “It’s absurd to move the discussion of his death to another moment,” said John Judge, executive director of the Coalition on Political Assassinations, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit that studies 1960s murders of public figures. “Our First Amendment rights are being violated.”  Mr. Judge, 65 years old, said conspiracy-theory proponents have gathered at Dealey Plaza every Nov. 22 since 1964. Next year, he added, will be the first that Dallas hasn’t granted a permit for the meeting, which usually involves a moment of silence and a few speeches. He said the city should move its ceremony…

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by Bill Kelly, JFKcountercoup, Monday, November 26, 2012 http://jfkcountercoup.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-great-jfk-assassination-scavanger.html ARE MORE RECORDS OUT THERE? Discovering and Recovering Missing JFK Assassination Records The Great JFK Scavenger Hunt is On! What gems of the missing and secret Family Jewels are still out there, in a basement file, in a box in a garage or attic or suitcase under a bed or in a closet? Maybe its owner has died and it has been passed on to unknowing relatives who don’t even know its there? Not real gems, but historical documents, records and artifacts related to the assassination of President Kennedy. It is quite apparent that with the discovery of the previously unknown Clifton copy of the Air Force One transmission tapes and the acknowledgement by former Secret Service agent Gerald Blaine that he had copies of the Tampa advance reports that were said to have been destroyed, some historical records have escaped destruction and there are still significant government records related to the assassination of President Kennedy that are still “out there.”

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 By Rodger Jones/Editorial Writer, rmjones@dallasnews.com, 3:40 pm on December 7, 2012 Robert Groden, in Dealey Plaza, on Dec. 7, 2012. Photo by Rodger Jones Recall that City Hall and Mayor Mike Rawlings’ special committee on the 50th anniversary of JFK’s assassination plan to restrict access to Dealey Plaza next Nov. 22 for a short commemoration ceremony. It may not be all that neat and tidy. Expect a lawsuit, says prominent JFK assassination expert Robert Groden, a regular at Dealey Plaza, who will insist on his right to be there that day. “We’ve been here for 49 years, and for 49 years the city didn’t care. Now all of a sudden, the city cares,” he said.I chatted with Groden today during a walk over to Dealey Plaza to look at the restoration work being done on the structures there. Groden was set up at a table with his books and recordings, as he often is. Groden is steeped in JFK-ology like few others. He was a consultant to the Stokes commission, which re-opened the investigation in the 1970s. He testified before the commission. He was a consultant to Oliver Stone’s film JFK. You can look up his website, at jfkmurder.com. For…

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