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Billy Sol Estes was a close associate and neighbor of president Lyndon B. Johnson in Texas prior to president John F. Kennedy's election. The nature of their relationship after Johnson became president is less clear. Estes was convicted in 1962 of fraud for swindling millions of dollars from the government. Estes served time in prison for pursing a scheme involving government cotton allotments and subsidies paid on fictitious machinery grants. The trial was covered by the press at the time.
While Estes was convicted and served jail time, his conviction was later overturned by the United States Supreme Court (Estes v. Texas, 381 U.S. 532 (1965)). His appeal hinged upon the fact that television cameras and other media were allowed in the courtroom and this deprived him of a fair trial. He prevailed by a narrow 5-4 vote. The Estes trial was cited by CNN when it wished to put cameras in the chambers of the Supreme Court during the aftermath of the 2000 presidential election.
Getting a case before the Supreme Court is difficult no matter how interesting the question of law. This naturally leads to speculation that Lyndon Johnson's relationship to Estes might have somehow contributed to his getting a hearing with the highest court in the land when many others obviously did not get that opportunity. The speculation regarding their relationship doesn't end there, partly due to actions allegedly taken by Estes himself.
All sources agree that Estes never said anything about Johnson’s involvement in various conspiracies while in prison. His silence was beneficial to LBJ's political career even if his later accusations had turned out to have been a complete fabrication. Some, therefore, characterize Estes as a patriot of sorts for not trying to bring the president down. Others put a more sinister and self-preserving spin on his actions.
After his release from jail and LBJ's death, Estes allegedly began making allegations regarding president Johnson. According to the authors of "The Men who Killed Kennedy", he claimed to have funneled millions of dollars into LBJ's pockets from the cotton allotment scam. More significantly, he implicated Johnson as a co-conspirator to several murders including Johnson's own sister and president Kennedy. He claimed to be a coconspirator himself to at least one of these murders, that of Henry Marshall.
Marshall was found on his Texas farm in 1961, shot five times with a .22 rifle. Strangely, in light of the way he died, it was officially ruled a suicide. Billy Sol Estes later named Malcolm Wallace as the shooter. Mr. Estes represented to the FBI that Mr. Wallace had murdered not only Henry Marshall, but also several other people including president John F. Kennedy with the full knowledge of Lyndon B. Johnson. His story was allegedly that Marshall was the shooter from the grassy knoll.
Estes agreed to provide some kind of proof to the FBI of his allegations, and the FBI proffered immunity in exchange, but ultimately Estes refused to produce whatever evidence he may have had. The FBI was ostensibly not amused.
The veracity of much of this story has not been verified, and probably never will be, but it throws considerable fuel on the fire of conspiracy theorists. This is particularly true with respect to the assassination of president Kennedy, one of the most frequent targets of conspiracy theory.
