Monday 20 December 2010

Lee Harvey Oswald's coffin sells for $87,000

(AFP)

LOS ANGELES — The coffin in which Lee Harvey Oswald, the man charged with shooting president John F. Kennedy, was buried went under the hammer for over 87,000 dollars, the auction house which organized the sale said.

The pine coffin is partially water-damaged by the 18 years it spent in the ground before Oswald's body was exhumed in 1981 to lay to rest rumors that a lookalike Soviet agent was buried in his place.

The body -- confirmed as genuinely his -- was reburied in another casket, and the original was offered for sale for the first time Friday, by the Nate D Sanders auction house in Los Angeles.

A spokeswoman declined to reveal the identity of the purchaser who paid 87,468 dollars for the casket.

According to the Dallas News, the coffin was sold by Allen Baumgardner, a Fort Worth funeral home manager who had kept it after being present when Oswald's body was exhumed.

Oswald, charged with killing Kennedy on November 22, 1963, was himself shot two days later and buried on November 25, fueling conspiracy theories which still rage to this day.

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