I had previously mentioned hearing that in her book, 'You Can't Tell the People', Georgina Bruni claimed that following my publication of those original witness statements, for the first time ever, Penniston alleged that his was a bogus fabrication.
Strictly, in her book, Bruni wrote:
"Copies of the statements came directly to me from the old CAUS files in the United States. They are published here in the witness files, and are explained in their entirety for the first time".
Published here for the first time... really?
It's just that we seem to have an extraordinary coincidence.
When I published the statements, I gave each one a specific heading:
Bruni was evidently thinking along the same lines:
The first is Bruni's, the second, my own, which long predates Bruni's book:
Fred Buran (no rank listed)
81st Security Police Squadron
A typed (signed) statement on an official USAF 1169 Statement of Witness form, dated 2 January 1981.
Fred A Buran
81st Security Police Squadron
Typed on USAF form 1169 "Statement of Witness", dated 2 January 1981
Master Sergeant J. D. Chandler
81st Security Police Squadron
A typed (signed) statement on an official USAF 1169 Statement of Witness form, dated 2 January 1981.
Master-Sergeant J. D. Chandler
81st Security Police Squadron
Typed on USAF form 1169 "Statement of Witness", dated 2 January 1981
Airman First Class John F. Burroughs
81st Security Police Squadron
A handwritten statement on plain paper (signed) and undated.
Airman First Class John Burroughs
81st Security Police Squadron
Hand-written and undated
Staff Sergeant Jim Penniston
81st Security Police Squadron
A typed statement on plain paper (unsigned and undated) with a cover page.
Staff-Sergeant Jim Penniston
81st Security Police Squadron
Typed and undated
(End)
Bruni continues:
"Penniston and Cabansag have since denied that they typed their statements. It seems apparent that Halt’s secretary, or anyone from Halt’s office, did not type them either because apart from the bad spelling and typing errors the typewriters used were not as sophisticated as the one used to type out Halt’s memorandum a
week later. This probably means that the statements were not typed in Halt’s office, but were prepared earlier. It must also be noted that the witnesses did not have easy access to these facilities. The typewriter used to type Cabansag’s
statement is also a different one than that used to type Penniston’s. Whoever typed these statements made sure there were enough errors to make it look like the witnesses, who it must be remembered were not adept at using these
machines, did them. In fact, police personnel always used notebooks. However, Chandler’s and Buran’s statements appear to have been typed on the same machine, the only one that was handwritten was Burroughs’.Assuming Penniston’s and Cabansag’s typed statements are bogus, then whoever was responsible for them must have had a good reason for going to all
that trouble. They appear to be a clever combination of fact coupled with a fair amount of disinformation. A typical exercise carried out by covert agencies in
order to confuse the truth? I discussed the matter with Charles Halt, explaining that Penniston and Cabansag deny they were responsible for the statements and
it was imperative that I have his comments. Halt suggested, but could not be certain, that the witnesses may have had the statements with them when they
turned up to see him because they were not typed in his office".
The case presented by Bruni and fed to readers is essentially that which was dealt with in my post #943:
(Start)
"I have discovered related case evidence, which could not be more specific.
This is an exact quote from a lengthy interview Penniston gave to AJS (Salley) Rayl and published in OMNI magazine (1997):
"Also, an Air Force Form 1569, an accident and complaint report, was filled out...".
Not only does Burroughs confirm being familiar with the
statements, he even recalls when they were released.
"As far as the lighthouse goes the statements that everybody made such a big deal about were first made available by Col Halt
during the filming of Unsolved Mysteries".
If those pivotal, original witness statements had not gathered
dust for so many years, this critical breakthrough could have been made long ago".
(End)
Bruni's mandatory 'cover up' assertions go beyond this and
include some hand-written notes on the documents. I have mentioned these annotations before, yet never published them in full as some of the remarks are too personal.
In a public forum posting, Bruni declared to myself:
"For your information Halt had denied he wrote the notes, so much for knowing so much!".
My reply was straightforward:
(Start)
"I know this much... I can prove the notes _were_ in fact written
by Halt.
It's not that difficult to do so and there was a blatant clue which Bruni should perhaps have spotted. It's claimed she also obtained the same file. If so, then it contains a letter dated 23, January 1987, written by Halt and addressed to 'Dear Larry' - 'UFO' researcher Larry Fawcett.
As this letter is hand-written, we can easily verify if the handwriting matches those notes on the statements. The first striking hint is that both are written entirely in capitals. The second, immediate clue is that Halt, in his letter, refers to the names of three witnesses for whom we have statements. As their names are also mentioned in the statement notes, we can therefore make a direct, significant handwriting comparison.
As we would expect, the handwriting does match and other words common to both the letter and statement also exhibit the same, distinctive hand-writing style - see:
Proving this is stating the obvious. The contents of those notes could only conceivably have been written by Halt.
Although John Burroughs believes the testimonies were first made available for 'Unsolved Mysteries', broadcast on 18 September, 1991, much of the CAUS material relates to an earlier documentary about the UFO story - a CNN special feature. As I explained in 'Resolving Rendlesham', the follow-up to 'Rendlesham Unravelled' and published during August 1988:
"On Cabansag's statement, Halt writes that he discussed his
thoughts about Cabansag with Chuck DeCaro of CNN. DeCaro
investigated the case for CNN in early 1985 and this would imply that Halt's comments were not added until then, five years after the event, at the earliest and by which time the 'Rendlesham forest UFO landing' had become something of a celebrated affair".
[End of Extract]
Possibly Halt's copies of the statements were initially provided to CNN.
Aside from expressing his confidence in the reliability of our witnesses, Halt's notes actually maintain the 'UFO' incident was significant and suggest that Buran, Cabansag and Chandler might all 'talk' if approached correctly.
So where was any rationalised 'cover up' supposed to exist in the
first place?
Whether Halt ever denied making these notes, or perhaps there has been some misunderstanding about a question he was asked, or the
answer he gave, I don't know and it's not my concern.
However, as the facts were easily available, we could perhaps have been spared these unnecessary publicised accusations by some
elementary detective work.
If needed, further clues to the statements' authenticity are the covering letter which accompanies Chandler's deposition and the covering page with Penniston's, marked 'FOR LT COL HALT EYES
ONLY'. Penniston also attached a number of sketches.
Additionally, Halt discussed these statements with Salley Rayl and specifically referred to their content.
(END)
As to why Penniston would allegedly deny typing that statement, one can only surmise.
Might his stated admission, "When we got within a 50 meter distance... This is the closest point that I was near the object at any point"... have been somewhat problematic...?
This, therefore, to set the record straight.