  This paper has attracted interest around the world from the media (both TV
and newspapers). In addition, we have received letters, emails and telephone
calls. One of our favorites was a voicemail message asking us to return a call
to Australia at which point we would learn who really killed JFK. We welcome
the opportunity to respond to the letter to the editor from Mr. Fiorentino. Mr.
Fiorentino claims that our ``statement relating to the likelihood of a second
assassin based on the premise of three or more separate bullets is demonstrably
false.'' In response we would like to simply quote from page 327 of Gerald
Posner's book Case Closed, one of the most well known works supporting the
single assassin theory: ``If Connally was hit by another bullet, it had to be
fired from a second shooter, since the Warren Commission's own reconstructions
showed that Oswald could not have operated the bolt and refired in 1.4
seconds.'' Mr. Fiorentino also claims that the ``second fatal flaw is the use
of a rather uncomplicated formula based on Bayes Theorem.'' Let $E$ denote the
evidence and $T$ denote the theory that there were just two bullets (and hence
a single shooter). We used Bayes Theorem to hypothetically calculate $P(T|E)$
from $P(E|T)$ and the prior probability $P(T)$. In order to make $P(T|E)$ ten
times more likely than $P(\bar{T}|E)$, the ratio of the prior probabilities
[i.e., $P(T) / P(\bar{T})$] would have to be greater than 15. Thus, we again
conclude that this casts serious doubt on Dr. Guinn's conclusion that the
evidence supported just two bullets. Sadly, this is far from the first time
that probability has been misunderstood and/or misapplied in a case of public
interest. A notable British example is the Clark case. See Nobles and Schiff
(2005) for details. Finally, we welcome and, in fact, encourage members of the
scientific community to provide alternative analyses of the data.
