JFK & the Unspeakable: Why He Died & Why It Matters (135 page)

[
806
]. Kantor,
Ruby Cover-Up
, p. 333.

[
807
]. HSCA Testimony of Gordon Barton McLendon, May 24, 1978, p. 8. JFK Record Number 180-10076-10244.

[
808
]. Memorandum from Gordon McLendon and Fred Weintraub to Admiral Stansfield Turner, March 3, 1978. JFK Record Number 104-10105-10093.

[
809
]. McLendon testimony, pp. 56-57.

[
810
]. Ibid., p. 28.

[
811
]. Jim Garrison interview by Joe Manguno, “Was Jim Garrison Right After All?”
New Orleans Magazine
(June 1976), p. 29.

[
812
]. Kantor,
Ruby Cover-Up
, p. 89.

[
813
].
Warren Report
, pp. 335-37.

[
814
]. Kantor Exhibit No. 7,
WCH
, vol. 20, pp. 429-32. The Warren Commission also dismissed Wilma Mae Tice’s testimony that she, too, had seen Jack Ruby—“and if it wasn’t him it was his twin brother” (
WCH
, vol. 15, p. 391)—at Parkland Hospital that afternoon.
Warren Report
, p. 336.
WCH
, vol. 15, pp. 388-96. Warren Commission Exhibits 2290 and 2293,
WCH
, vol. 25, pp. 216-18, 224-26.

[
815
]. Jack White, an art director with a Dallas advertising agency in 1963, had not been a supporter of President Kennedy. However, White happened to be a friend of Seth Kantor. When he read the
Warren Report
on Kantor and Ruby, he said to himself, “That can’t be right. I know Seth. He wouldn’t lie, and he wouldn’t make anything up. He’s a very diligent journalist.” The Warren Commission’s decision to believe Ruby rather than Kantor was the first factor that inspired White to dig into the case. He has continued doing so for the rest of his life, particularly as a photo analyst. In the 1970s he became a photographic consultant to the House Select Committee on Assassinations. Author’s interview of Jack White, January 30, 1997.

[
816
]. Meagher,
Accessories after the Fact
, p. 397.

[
817
]. Ibid.
Warren Report
, p. 333.

[
818
].
WCH
, vol. 7, p. 87.

[
819
]. Earl Golz, “Man Believes He Saw Ruby at Scene of Oswald’s Arrest,”
Dallas Morning News
(March 11, 1979), p. 32A.

[
820
]. Ibid.

[
821
].
WCH
, vol. 7, p. 91.

[
822
]. “Man Believes He Saw Ruby,” p. 32A. Since he gave his interview to Earl Golz in 1979, George Applin has, like Julia Ann Mercer, kept an extremely low profile.

In its argument against Kantor’s story of seeing Ruby at Parkland Hospital, the
Warren Report
presented a chronology for Ruby that would also preclude his being present at Oswald’s arrest in the Texas Theater between 1:45 and 1:50 p.m.:

“Upon arriving at the Carousel Club shortly after 1:45 p.m., Ruby instructed Andrew Armstrong, the Carousel’s bartender, to notify employees that the club would be closed that night . . . At 1:51 p.m., Ruby telephoned Ralph Paul in Arlington, Tex., to say that he was going to close his clubs.”
Warren Report
, p. 337.

However, as Earl Golz pointed out, “neither the time of Ruby’s arrival nor a 1:51 p.m. call by Paul to Ruby is substantiated in Warren Commission testimony.” “Man Believes He Saw Ruby,” p. 32A. See Armstrong testimony, Ruby came in—“I don’t recall what time it was”—about 5 minutes after Armstrong heard someone announce that Kennedy was dead (thus some time later than 1:30 p.m.),
WCH
, vol. 13, pp. 330-33; Larry Crafard testimony, Ruby came in “about 2 or 2:30, something like that,”
WCH
, vol. 13, p. 452; Paul testimony, says he left work “a little after 2—and when I got home Jack called me and he said, ‘Did you hear what happened?’”
WCH
, vol. 14, p. 151.

“Crafard said Ruby didn’t tell Armstrong to notify performers that the club would be closed until 30 to 45 minutes after he arrived. When asked if Ruby made any phone calls, Crafard could recall only one call Ruby made to his sister.” “Man Believes He Saw Ruby,” p. 32A.
WCH
, vol. 13, pp. 453-54.

Golz repeatedly timed the trip from the hospital to the theater in heavy traffic, staying within the speed limit, and found it took no more than twelve minutes. “This would have permitted Ruby,” he wrote, “to travel from the hospital at about 1:30 p.m. to the theater at about 1:45 p.m. without speeding.

“The 3.2-mile trip from the Texas Theatre, at 231 W. Jefferson, to the former site of the Carousel Club, at 1312½ Commerce took from 9 to 9½ minutes at an average speed of 30 mph. This would have given Ruby time to drive from the theater to his club in time to call his sister in Chicago at 2:05 p.m.” Ibid.

[
823
]. Ronald L. Jenkins, KBOX Radio reporter, and police detectives A. M. Eberhardt and Roy E. Standifer all said they saw Ruby on the third floor of DPD headquarters early Friday evening. Both Eberhardt and Standifer, who had known Ruby for years, spoke with him at the time.
WCH
Exhibit 2254,
WCH
, vol. 25, pp. 178-79; vol. 13, pp. 187-88; vol. 15, pp. 616-18.
Harvey & Lee
, p. 896. However, Ruby himself denied being at police headquarters before late that night, and the Warren Commission once again accepted Ruby’s word over that of the witnesses arrayed against him.
Warren Report
, p. 338. As John Armstrong observes, “The Commission’s finding allowed them to conclude that Ruby’s murder of Oswald was not premeditated.”
Harvey & Lee
, p. 896.

[
824
]. From audiotape made by Vic Robertson, Dallas radio station WFAA, late December 1963; Robertson (Victor) Exhibit No. 2,
WCH
, vol. 21, p. 312.

[
825
]. FBI interview of UPI photographer Pete Fisher,
WCH
Exhibit 2253;
WCH
, vol. 25, p. 177.

[
826
]. Kantor,
Ruby Cover-Up
, p. 101. Jack Ruby’s attorney, Tom Howard, also stated on November 24, 1963, to reporter Lonnie Hudkins of the
Houston Post
that Ruby had the gun with him on Friday night. Howard later confirmed this statement by phone to the
Houston Post
. Commission Exhibit No. 2003,
WCH
, vol. 24, pp. 364-65.

[
827
]. William Walter, February 27, 1978, HSCA interview; Mellen,
Farewell to Justice
, p. 349; Summers,
Conspiracy
, pp. 282-83.

[
828
].
WCH
, vol. 4, p. 437.

[
829
]. Anthony Summers,
Not in Your Lifetime
(New York: Marlowe, 1998), p. 101. Lee Harvey Oswald’s U-2 base was Camp Atsugi. Thomas Arthur Vallee’s U-2 base was Camp Otsu. Both Camp Atsugi and Camp Otsu were parts of the CIA’s Joint Technical Advisory Group (JTAG). Oswald’s and Vallee’s Marine units provided U-2 support. Ibid. Philip H. Melanson,
Spy Saga: Lee Harvey Oswald and U.S. Intelligence
(New York: Praeger, 1990), p. 8. Edwin Black, “The Plot to Kill JFK in Chicago Nov. 2, 1963,”
Chicago Independent
(November 1975), p. 5.

[
830
]. Author’s interview of Mary Vallee-Portillo, August 14, 2004.

[
831
]. Golz, “Was Oswald in Window?” p. 13A.

[
832
]. Craig,
When They Kill a President
, p. 9.

[
833
]. Ibid., p. 13 (emphasis added to both Fritz’s and Oswald’s statements).

[
834
]. Ibid.

[
835
]. Capt. J. W. Fritz, “Interrogation of Lee Harvey Oswald,”
Warren Report
, pp. 608-9.

[
836
]. Seth Kantor’s notebook cites Oswald saying, “I’m just a patsy,” at 7:55 p.m., November 22, 1963. Kantor Exhibit 3,
WCH
, vol. 20, p. 366.

[
837
]. On Oswald’s persistent efforts to reach lawyer John Abt, see Bishop,
Day Kennedy Was Shot,
pp. 259-60, 343, 393, 470, 523, 553, 569.

[
838
]. Ibid., p. 596. Also Manchester,
Death of a President,
p. 489. On Friday night, November 22, 1963, Gregory Lee Olds, president of the Dallas Civil Liberties Union, in a phone conversation with Captain Will Fritz, was told “that Oswald had been given the opportunity [of legal counsel] and declined.” When Olds and three other ACLU representatives then went to Dallas Police headquarters, Captain King, assistant to the chief of police, “assured us that Oswald had not made any requests for counsel.”
WCH
, vol. 7, p. 323.

H. Louis Nichols, president of the Dallas Bar Association, was allowed to meet with Oswald in his jail cell late Saturday afternoon. Oswald told Nichols that he wanted to be represented by John Abt or an ACLU member. Nichols said that he did not know any ACLU members. He asked if Oswald wanted him or the Dallas Bar Association to get him an attorney. Oswald said he would wait until he could see Abt, an ACLU attorney, or at least someone who believed in his innocence. He said that Nichols “might come back next week.” Ibid., p. 329.