The Amazing Midnight Ride of Peter Lawford

According to our conspiracists authors, William Asher, Peter Lawford’s friend and a director employed by Lawford’s production company, testified that Peter telephoned the director sometime between 12:00 AM and 1:00 AM on August the 5th; and yet, the authors also referenced, in their timeline of events, Officer Lynn Franklin’s traffic stop, which allegedly transpired at 12:10 AM on Sunday the 5th. Obviously, if Peter was in a car speeding eastward on Olympic Boulevard at 12:10 AM, and he became embroiled in a traffic stop which consumed more than an hour, as we shall see, then Lawford must have called his friend and employee before 12:00 AM on August the 5th.

Moreover, according to Margolis and Buskin according to Abe Landau, when he and his wife arrived home at 11:45 PM after an evening out, they encountered several vehicles parked on Fifth Helena: Sgt Iannone’s police car, a limousine and the ambulance. Obviously, personal cars must have been present: Lawford’s Lincoln, one of the doctor’s automobiles, Otash’s automobile and possibly Arthur Jacob’s, unless he had arrived in the limo. In some reports, even a fire truck arrived at the scene and parked somewhere on the short and very narrow Fifth Helena Drive. Furthermore, according to Margolis and Buskin, sometime between 11:45 PM and 11:50 PM a veritable army of plainclothes police officers arrived at Fifth Helena to fabricate the artificial suicide scene, break Marilyn’s bedroom window and create the locked room story. So, beginning at approximately 12:00 AM, Peter Lawford must have accomplished several remarkable feats in order to meet Officer Franklin at 12:10 AM. He had to:

1.  Assist the principals at the scene move the pill bottles and Marilyn’s body to the main bedroom from the guest cottage;

2.  Extricate himself from the chaotic death scene and also extricate Dr. Ralph Greenson, who, at 11:45 PM, had just murdered Marilyn Monroe;

3.  Like an experienced stunt driver, maneuver his very large Lincoln Continental through and around all the vehicles crammed onto a very narrow Fifth Helena Drive;

4  Motor rapidly to his beachside mansion and collect a patiently waiting Attorney General of the United States;

5. Drive, with his new passenger, and Dr. Ralph Greenson, southeast along Palisades Beach Road and negotiate a few surface streets until he reached Olympic Boulevard;

6.  Once on Olympic, drop the Lincoln’s transmission into overdrive and virtually jet at 70 MPH, possibly even 80 MPH, along the boulevard, with his headlights off, until he drew the attention of Beverly Hills Police Officer Lynn Franklin, who stopped the speeding car at 12:10 AM as it approached Robertson Boulevard.

Remarkably enough, Pete Lawford, a very intoxicated Lawford by the way, according to Margolis and Buskin, accomplished all of the preceding within the time allotted of a mere ten minutes, even though, according to MapQuest, under normal conditions, the driving time from Marilyn’s hacienda to Lawford’s beachfront mansion is at least ten minutes; and the driving time from Lawford’s beachfront mansion to the intersection of Olympic and Robertson Boulevards is at least twenty minutes. According to my arithmetic, those minutes, when added together, total at least thirty, under normal conditions of course. Ol’ drunken Pete Lawford was either a Master of Legerdemain or he had his Lincoln equipped with one of those special Red Buttons like the automobiles driven by the Men In Black.

I could possibly categorize the preceding as bad Theater of the Absurd or a form of absurd and sad farce; but I will refrain from doing so. To contend that a drunken Peter Lawford’s amazing midnight ride, and his Herculean efforts to get Robert Kennedy to an awaiting helicopter, generated more problems and questions than it solved, qualifies as a massive understatement; and several of the problems and questions have already been noted and posed in Section 7; therefore, I will not dwell on them here.

Additionally, the midnight ride of Peter Lawford, Dr. Greenson and Robert Kennedy―if we accept that the ride actually happened―offers a curious impediment to not only believing, but also the plausibility of, Sgt Jack Clemmons’ testimony. According to him, Mrs. Murray testified that she telephoned Dr. Greenson, who was home at the time, around 12:00 AM; Greenson must have actually arrived at Fifth Helena, based on Sgt Clemmons testimony, approximately ten minutes later, sometime between 12:10 AM and 12:15 AM. That being the case, Peter Lawford and Dr. Greenson could not have been involved in a traffic stop ten miles removed from 12305 Fifth Helena at 12:10 AM. Accepting momentarily that Lawford departed from Fifth Helena on such a midnight ride, a more plausible timeline follows. Minimum time required to:

1.  Engage in musical cars and depart from Fifth Helena: 20 minutes;

2.  Reach his beachside mansion and collect Robert Kennedy: 10 minutes;

3.  Approach Robertson Blvd and encounter Officer Lynn Franklin: 30 minutes;

4.  Duration of traffic stop: 15 minutes;

5.  Return to his beachside mansion to a waiting helicopter: 30 minutes; and

6.  Return Dr. Greenson to either his home (or Fifth Helena Drive): 15 minutes.

According to my arithmetic, reaching Robertson Blvd would have consumed a total of sixty (60) minutes, minimum; therefore, the alleged encounter with Officer Lynn Franklin at Robertson Boulevard could not have occurred before 1:00 AM on August the 5th; and also according to my arithmetic, returning Dr. Greenson to his home or Fifth Helena would have consumed, yet again, a total of sixty (60) minutes, minimum; therefore, maneuvering the round trip would have consumed one-hundred and twenty (120) minutes, a full two hours, meaning that Dr. Greenson would not have arrived home until approximately 2:00 AM on August the 5th. That being the case, and it most certainly would have been, adhering to the timeline scenario created by Jay Margolis and Richard Buskin, Mrs. Murray could not have called and spoke to Dr. Greenson around 12:00 AM: he would have been in the white, speeding Lincoln with Peter Lawford and Robert Kennedy.

An Intrusion and the Next Door Neighbor