◆ SpookStack

Baty SAID the man changed his: sAasenZosenteld, a formersBixming- story from ‘‘not knowing” to “not want- ing to talk about it."" Then, the man's wife picked up the phone extension, Barry said, and told her husband the reporter was trying to pin something on him. Barry said after ‘that, “the conversation deteriorated,” and the man wouldn't talk any more about the incident. The man, described by Barry as “a gad-about political figure in Georgia,” later died from an apparent space heat- er accident in his home. Miami police said the informer, Willie Sommerset, died of natural causes. : In 1967, two Birmingham policemen went to Miami and listened to the con- versation a week after its existence was reported. They returned and filed a one- Page memo in which they concluded there was no proof the Klansman men- tioned in the tape had anything to do withthe church bombing. Besides, they didn’t know where the man was, they’ ‘ reported. BUT LAST WEEK Birmingham po- lice asked for and received a copy of the conversation from Miami police. Capt. Jack LeGrand confirmed Birmingham police now have the tape and are study- ing it a The tape was made nine days before Kennedy came to Miami Nov. 18, 1963, * to give a speech at the Orange Bowl, a speech in which he promised to return the Cuban Bay of Pigs brigade flag to Cuban soil fotlowing the ill-fated Bay of Pigsinvasion gf Apsil 961. After listening to the tape, Miami po- : lice insisted Kennedy take a helicopter to a spot near the Orange Bow! rather than go by motorcade as planned. In the tape, the states’ rights advo- cate speaks of “a young ex-Marine who ; Feally knows his business,” who was “in town” and was well-known in Chattanooga, Nashville and New Or- } Jeans, and who knew the Klan. THE MAN said the try to get Kenne- , dy in Miami ‘‘is just a trial run,” and * admitted, “It'll be a hard proposition to gethim. The man also talked of how “‘it's in the works” to get King, calling him, “the Brown Bomber,”’ and the men talked about where King lived in Atlan- ta. Further, the man on the tape said the Klansman told him the Birmingham ham fire marshal who was the first investigator to reach the scene after the church was bombed Sept. 15, 1963, said the bombing was a dynamite explosion. He sald he—and as far as he knows— federal officials who sifted the debris, did not come up with any bomb parts, but he sald he could tell it was a dyna- mite explosion because of the odor. Knowledge of the Miami tape came to light when Sommerset told Barry of its existence. He and Sommerset went over the taped conversation and Barry reported the stoxyomte” at that time the FBI had practically nocomment about the tape. The Miami tape leaves unanswered questions. Was information about the tape real- ly turned over to the Warren Commis- sion as the FBI claims? What evalua- ‘ tion did the FBI make of the incident? Was the incident really a case of a serious threat against the life of a presi- dent? . Was it just wild talk in the night or wasthere something to it? tie i