James Farrell Marrs Jr December 5 1943 August 2 2017 was an American newspaper journalist and New York Times bestselling author of books and articles on a wide range of alleged coverups and conspiracies Marrs was a prominent figure in the JFK assassination conspiracy theories community and his 1989 book Crossfire was a source for Oliver Stones 1991 film JFK He wrote books asserting the existence of government conspiracies regarding aliens 911 telepathy and secret societies He began his career as a news reporter in the DallasFort WorthArlington metroplex and taught a class on the assassination of John F Kennedy at University of Texas at Arlington for 30 years Marrs was a member of the Scholars for 911 Truth Source Wikipedia