Torbitt Document
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🗓️ Event
Contents 8
| Date | 1970 |
|---|---|
| People | John F. Kennedy |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 73 |
| Year | 1970 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1970 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 5 |
The Torbitt Document, formally titled Nomenclature of an Assassination Cabal, is a manuscript written in 1970 under the pseudonym "William Torbitt" that claims President John F. Kennedy's assassination was organised by a "fascist cabal" working through a Swiss company, Permindex. It is regarded as unreliable.[1][2]
Authorship
The author claimed to be a lawyer in the southwestern United States. Journalist Jim Marrs said the writer was David Copeland, a lawyer from Waco, Texas, whom he met in the 1970s, and that Copeland said his information came from one Secret Service agent and one FBI agent.[1]
Claims
The document names Permindex, with five front organisations, as the engineer of the assassination. It describes a "Defense Industrial Security Command" (DISC), supposedly organised by J. Edgar Hoover with William Sullivan as his chief assistant, and lists Clay Shaw, Guy Banister, David Ferrie, Lee Harvey Oswald and Jack Ruby among its agents, with Canadian lawyer Louis Bloomfield in charge. It also lists a NASA security division headed by Wernher von Braun among Permindex's components, and claims the same group planned the killings of Martin Luther King and Robert F. Kennedy.[1]
UFO connections
According to the testimony, the document described the security command as running counterintelligence and protection for advanced aerospace programs. The idea that a hidden security apparatus protected secret projects has fed into later UFO theories about who guards crash-retrieval programs.[1][3]
Assessment
Historians and assassination researchers regard the Torbitt Document as unreliable. Writer Robin Ramsay argued it was disinformation, possibly written to undermine New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison's inquiry, noting that its citations were unverifiable or did not support its claims; Marrs believed Copeland sincerely held the theory but may have been misled. Permindex was a real company that came under suspicion in Italy and France.[1][4]
People and topics
- John F. Kennedy — 35th U.S. president, named in disputed MJ-12 memos.
- Federal Bureau of Investigation — The U.S. federal police agency, which helped check flying disc reports from 1947 to 1950.
- NASA — The U.S. civilian space agency, created in 1958.
- Unidentified flying object — An object in the sky that can't be identified; the older term for UAP.
- Crash retrieval — The alleged recovery of crashed non-human craft by governments.
On the Timeline
- Chilean destroyer encounter (1969) (24 October 1969) — A Chilean informant says a navy destroyer was approached by six objects, one larger than the ship.
- Project Skylite (5 April 1970) — McDonnell Douglas papers describe Project Skylite, a failed effort to copy UAP behavior.
See every 1970 event on the UAP Timeline →
References
- "The Torbitt Document", Spartacus Educational · spartacus-educational.com · archived copy
- "The Torbitt Document" (text), blog archive · the-torbitt-document.blogspot.com · archived copy
- "The Torbitt Document", Omega Report (archived) · geocities.ws · archived copy
- Fred Litwin, "Was Permindex involved in plotting the assassination of French President Charles de Gaulle?", On the Trail of Delusion · onthetrailofdelusion.com · archived copy
- whale.to · whale.to · archived copy
Further reading
- UFO files — FBI Vault · vault.fbi.gov · archived copy
- UFO documents — CIA Reading Room · cia.gov · archived copy
This page was last edited on 29 October 2026. Articles are written in our own words from the sources listed under References; disputed claims are attributed to the people who made them.
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