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William
E. Kelly, Jr. was born in 1951, the son of Camden Police Detective William
E. Kelly. He followed the news reports and read the articles and
books on the assassination of President Kennedy and majored in history
at the University of Dayton, Ohio, School of Education, where he did his
thesis on the Bay of Pigs. After graduation he taught history and became
a freelance journalist and author of regional history books "300
Years at the Point" and "Birth of the Birdie," a history
of golf.
Kelly became personally involved in original JFK assassination research
in 1977 after publication of Peter Noyes' book "Legacy of
Doubt," which reported on the activities of Jim Braden, a suspect
taken into custody at the scene of the crime.
Reading that Braden had been arrested in mob related activities in
Camden, N.J. in 1948, but the Camden PD refused to released the arrest
record, he obtained the file and shared it with other researchers and
investigators, including former Philadelphia prosecutor and then chief
counsel of the House Select Committe on Assassination Richard Sprague.
When the HSCA records were locked away, Kelly formed the Committee for
an Open Archives (COA) with his college associate John Judge, lobbying
extensively for the JFK Assassination Records Act, which was passed in
1992. With Judge, Peter Dale Scott, John Newman, Jim Lesar, Bill Turner,
Jerry Rose, Jim DiEugenio and others, he was an original founder of the
Coaliton on Political Assassinations (COPA), and made presentations at
COPA conferences on the Collins Radio Connections, the North American
Newspaper Alliance (NANA) and the NORAD stand down on 9/11. With Judge,
he also assisted the 9/11 Citizen's Watch, which monitored the work of
the 9/11 Commission.
As of 2005 Mr. Kelly was attempting to petition federal prosecutors in
Texas, Louisiana and DC to convene a special federal grand jury to
review the evidence and determine if any individuals can be indicted for
crimes related to the assassination of President Kennedy.
Besides
the abovementioned books, William E. Kelly has written many articles for
newspapers, regional and national magazines, and has a wonderful
website, KellysCafe.
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