Stuart Allen in his Plainfield, N.J., lab.The audiotape that forensic audio expert Stuart Allen analyzed was made by Terry Strubbe, a Kent State student who put a reel-to-reel tape recorder in his dorm window on May 4, 1970 to capture the sounds of the antiwar protest unfolding below.
Strubbe has kept the original in a bank vault. Allen, president and chief engineer of the Legal Services Group in Plainfield, N.J., worked with a copy obtained from Yale University's Kent State archives, where materials used in various investigations of the shootings are kept.
While examining the tape with his colleague Tom Owen for The Plain Dealer this spring to determine if a command for the Ohio National Guard to fire was audible, Allen said he heard a commotion that "didn't sound right" in a segment before the Guard gunfire.
When he re-analyzed and enhanced the section later, he picked up details of the yelling and what sounded like gunfire. He compared the acoustic signatures to his library of weapon sounds to determine that it was a .38-caliber revolver. He ruled out the possibility that the sounds were tear gas canisters being fired, by comparing them to earlier tape segments where the canisters are audible.
"It's a crack, indicative of a higher velocity," said Allen, who has decades of experience in government and law enforcement cases involving recorded evidence. He is confident "to a strong scientific certainty" about the altercation sounds and the pistol fire.
He said he can't determine whether there is any connection between the incident and the volley of Guard rifle fire that follows approximately 70 seconds later.
"I'm looking solely at the contents of the tape," Allen said. "To deduce a conclusion as to cause and effect, I'm not in a position to do that. This should go to the Department of Justice."
Allen will describe his findings Saturday as part of a live, weekendlong webcast "Kent State Truth Tribunal" organized by filmmaker Michael Moore and Laurel Krause, the sister of Kent State shooting victim Allison Krause. The event is from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at www.michaelmoore.com.