[Sample B: Approval/Signature Sheet] - George Mason University

scandal and his covert CIA past. The strategy worked and in February 6, 1985 a Florida
jury found for the defendant Liberty Lobby against the plaintiff, E. Howard Hunt. Lane
quoted the forewoman of the jury as saying the panel reached its verdict because “The
evidence was clear…The CIA had killed President Kennedy.” 587 Lane claimed the
verdict received little attention in the news media, which he steadfastly accused of
supporting the Warren Commission and not giving the critics a fair hearing.
In advancing his theory of CIA complicity in the assassination, Lane offered his
own version of the peace thesis as the motive to kill Kennedy. He wrote, “The Cold War
was receding. Kennedy had negotiated a test ban treaty with the Russians,” he “began to
consider a deal with Fidel Castro,” and he was planning to deescalate the war in
Vietnam. 588 The CIA allegedly opposed these moves and feared Kennedy was
determined to reorganize the intelligence agency after he won a second term in 1964.
Lane also provided some biographical information about how he became involved
in researching the Kennedy assassination and trying to defend Oswald in the court of
public opinion. Lane was a young, reform Democrat in New York, who won a seat in the
State assembly in a battle against the Tammany Hall political machine. He served only
briefly and became a defense attorney for poor and minority clients. After Oswald was
killed in police custody, Lane wrote a brief on behalf of the slain alleged assassin. In this
defense brief published in the National Guardian in December 19, 1963, Lane castigated
the media and Texas authorities for assuming Oswald’s guilty. He wrote, “In all
587 Plausible Denial, 322.
588 Plausible Denial, 104.
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