The Recollections of Dallas Police Chief Jesse Curry

[Jerry Freeman]

The Recollections of Jesse Curry [recompiled]
 Given months to prepare for his testimony, Chief Curry did rather poorly...

       

Mr. RANKIN....When did you learn of the arrest of Lee Harvey Oswald?
        Mr. CURRY - While I was out at Parkland Hospital.
        Mr. RANKIN - Do you know about what time that was, the day?
        Mr. CURRY - It was on the 22d and the best I recall it was around 1 o'clock or maybe a little after 1 o'clock.

    [The report of the Tippit shooting didn't get out until when exactly?? Horrible preparation there..Oswald wasn't even known about until much later after he was arrested and taken to jail @2:00 PM]
     

  Mr. RANKIN - How did that come to your attention?
        Mr. CURRY - Some of my officers came to me and said they had arrested a suspect. in the shooting of our Officer Tippit.
        Mr. RANKIN - What else did they say?
        Mr. CURRY - They also told me a little later, I believe, that he was a suspect also in the assassination of the President.
        Mr. RANKIN - What did you do then?
        Mr. CURRY - I didn't do anything at the time.

The President had only just been pronounced dead at 1:00
     

Mr. CURRY - And I returned to the city hall.
        Mr. DULLES - Did I understand correctly, how long were you at Love Field after the plane of the President left?
        Mr. CURRY - As I recall it was approximately an hour.
        Mr. DULLES - That is what I thought. [why did Dulles ask that?]
        Mr. CURRY - We waited there until the casket bearing the President, and then the cars bearing Mrs. Kennedy arrived, and it was, I would judge an hour perhaps.
        Mr. RANKIN - Then what did you do?
        Mr. CURRY - I returned to my office at city hall.
        Mr. RANKIN - Did you do anything about Lee Harvey Oswald at that time?
        Mr. CURRY - No  No. As I went into the city hall it was overrun with the news media.
        Mr. RANKIN - What did you do about that?
        Mr. CURRY - I didn't do anything.

       

  Mr. RANKIN - Did anyone of the police department give them permission [TV news cameras etc] to do this?
        Mr. CURRY - I noticed--well, I don't know who gave them permission because I wasn't there. When I returned they were up         
        there.
        Mr. RANKIN - Did you inquire about whether permission had been given?
        Mr. CURRY - No; I didn't.
        Mr. RANKIN - Did you have anything to do with the interrogation of Lee Harvey Oswald?
        Mr. CURRY - No, sir; I did not. I was in the office once or twice while he was being interrogated but I never asked him any   question myself.
        Mr. RANKIN - Do you know who did?
        Mr. CURRY - Captain Fritz principally interrogated him, I believe.
        Mr. RANKIN - Was that his responsibility?
        Mr. CURRY - Yes; it was. There were several people in the office. It seems to me we were violating every principle of interrogation, the method by which we had to interrogate.
        Mr. RANKIN - Will you explain to the Commission what you mean by that?
        Mr. CURRY - Ordinarily an interrogator in interrogating a suspect will have him in a quiet room alone or perhaps with one person there.
        Mr. RANKIN - Is that your regular practice?
        Mr. CURRY - That is the regular practice.
        Mr. RANKIN - Tell us how this was done?
        Mr. CURRY - This we had representatives from the Secret Service, we had representatives from the FBI, we had     representatives from the Ranger Force, and they were--and then one or two detectives from the homicide bureau. This was, well, it was just against all principles of good interrogation practice.
        Mr. RANKIN - By representatives can you tell us how many were from each of these agencies that you describe?
        Mr. CURRY - I can't be sure. I recall I believe two from the FBI, one or two, Inspector Kelley was there from Secret Service, and I believe another one of his men was there. There was one, I recall seeing one man from the Rangers. I don't recall who he was. I just remember now that there was one. Captain Fritz, and one or two of his detectives--this was in a small office.
        Mr. RANKIN - Did you do anything about this when you found out there were so many, did you give any instructions about it?
        Mr. CURRY - No; I didn't.

 So from what can be gathered here is that on the day of the assassination of JFK and in his own city... Chief of Dallas Police Jesse Edward Curry on Nov 22, 1963..just basically stood around and did nothing. He was the only prime official that did not take part in interrogating his own suspect... Didn't even know who was in his own office.. He didn't even order a tape recording so that he could examine an interview with a guy he accused of killing the President of the United States. 
                                                                                       

[Tom Scully]

... He didn't even order a tape recording so that he could examine an interview with a guy he accused of killing the President of the United States.  [/i][/size]
                                                                                       

Neither did the FBI. You might actually be bolstering the argument that Ruby took everyone by surprise, or
else if they expected LHO was down to his last 36 hours, DPD or FBI might have scurried over to Radio Shack
to buy an audio recorder to record the words of the DMW (dead man, walking).

Curry talked like a CT, at least during his book tour....

[Tom Scully]

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/testimony/fritz1.htm
Testimony Of J. W. Fritz

...Mr. BALL. What about the interview itself?
Mr. FRITZ. Now the interview itself inside, of course, we did have a lot of people in the office there to be interviewing a man. It is much better, and you can keep a man's attention and his thoughts on what you are talking to him about better I think if there are not more than two or three people.
But in a case of this nature as bad as this case was, we certainly couldn't tell the Secret Service and the FBI we didn't want them to work on it because they would have the same interest we would have, they would want to do anything they could do, so we, of course, invited them in too but it did make a pretty big crowd.
Mr. BALL. Did you have any tape recorder?
Mr. FRITZ. No, sir; I don't have a tape recorder. We need one, if we had one at this time we could have handled these conversations far better.
Mr. BALL. The Dallas Police Department doesn't have one?
Mr. FRITZ. No, sir; I have requested one several times but so far they haven't gotten me one.
Mr. BALL. And you had quite a few interruptions, too, during the questioning, didn't you?
Mr. FRITZ. Yes, sir; we had quite a lot of interruptions. I wish we had had--- under the circumstances, I don't think there is much that could have been done because I saw it as it was there and I don't think there was a lot that could have been done other than move that crowd out of there, but I think it would have been more apt to get a confession out of it or get more true facts from him if I could have got him to sit down and quietly talked with him....

Once you discover that the bulk of the details are contradictory, you should be less inclined to form strong opinions,
except  that too many who have testified regarding the JFK Assassination or have written books, seem to be FoS.

....      There was no tape recording of the interrogation or stenographer or anyone taking notes. That was the way that Fritz operated. The interrogation itself was rather informal with Captain Fritz being in charge. He would ask Oswald various questions and pull out different things such as the map with the X?s on it and the card that had been taken out of Oswald?s billfold that had A.J. Hidell on it and things like that. Then he would say, ?Well, Sorrels, do you have anything you want to ask him?? But Kelley and Sorrels had very little to ask; they didn?t have the documentation that I had. We were free to ask or interject anything we wanted. Of course, we were all experienced interrogators, and when you went to trial in those days, especially in federal court, you had to show any notes you took to the defense. So they got to look at every note that you had against their client. But we old-time investigators would just do it by memory. I could still quote nearly every word that boy said to this day and that?s been over twenty years ago. That?s the way I was trained to interrogate anybody, and so was Fritz. If they?re telling the truth, you?d talk to them by the hour, and if they couldn?t tell it the same way twice or a third time, or a tenth time, you?d catch them because you?d know exactly what he had said the first time. You didn?t need notes; you didn?t need a secretary or a stenographer. Of course, you do now, but back then you really had to use your own wits to convict people.
      At the time, I spent half the time in federal court, and especially through usage, I always had a good memory. You had to have to get through medical and dental school and work eight hours a days as I did. I would take post office schemes that took an ordinary person 30 to 60 days to learn; I?d learn it in five or six and make a 100 on the test which included 1,000 or 1,200 different addresses. Much of my work dealt with memory, and memory is just training: repetition, do it and practice.

      Eventually I got to where I could go into federal court maybe six months after I?d interviewed somebody without a note of any kind and quote every detail of that conversation or confession of what took place or who did what. It was just training. You practiced at it and developed a memory.
      With traveling all the time and staying in motels all over the country, whenever I?d go to bed at night, before going to sleep, I?d say,. ?Well, let?s see, I got up this morning and got out on the left side of the bed, put on my left sock first, then my right, then I went to the bathroom, came back, put on my trousers, then went back and shaved.? I could tell you exactly what I ate for breakfast, what the girl looked like that waited on me. ?When I got in my car, I went off to my right and the light was red and had to wait a minute.? I could tell you what every light was all day long everywhere, every little detail. By keeping in practice by just reviewing what I did that day, it was just like I had written it all out, and I?ve done that for years.
      Though I never tested him, Captain Fritz could have done the same thing. He was a Texan who was crude and had farmerish ways and mannerisms, but as far as I was concerned he was really an outstanding criminal investigator. Fritz abhorred publicity, wanted to get the job done, send the guy to the penitentiary and go on to the next one. He was the pride of the Dallas Police Department; no one need ever sell him short, no matter what the press did. I don?t think this case got the best of him. He was just like me; he just got too old for the job and thought it was time to quit. As far as I know, there was no pressure on him, though there was a lot of criticism, ?the stupid Dallas police,? and that sort of thing. Curry, on the other hand, being chief of police, owed his job to public relations. As far as I know, that was the only cross between the two....

https://www.amazon.com/No-More-Silence-Assassination-President/dp/1574411489/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=sneed+no+more+silence&qid=1550555619&s=books&sr=1-1-spell
No More Silence: An Oral History of the Assassination of President Kennedy  by Larry A. Sneed

[Walt Cakebread]

The Recollections of Jesse Curry [recompiled]
 Given months to prepare for his testimony, Chief Curry did rather poorly...

            [The report of the Tippit shooting didn't get out until when exactly?? Horrible preparation there..Oswald wasn't even known about until much later after he was arrested and taken to jail @2:00 PM]
       
The President had only just been pronounced dead at 1:00
             
 So from what can be gathered here is that on the day of the assassination of JFK and in his own city... Chief of Dallas Police Jesse Edward Curry on Nov 22, 1963..just basically stood around and did nothing. He was the only prime official that did not take part in interrogating his own suspect... Didn't even know who was in his own office.. He didn't even order a tape recording so that he could examine an interview with a guy he accused of killing the President of the United States. 
                                                                                       

Oswald wasn't even known about until much later after he was arrested and taken to jail @2:00 PM]

Captain Fritz who was the man responsible for interrogating Lee didn't know his identity until after 2:30..... But J.Edgar Hoover knew his identity when he was dragged from the theater at 1:50 pm.

Chief of Dallas Police Jesse Edward Curry on Nov 22, 1963..just basically stood around and did nothing.

Curry was too busy conniving with LBJ........

[John Iacoletti]

I don't think that Fritz wanted his "legendary interrogation methods" to be documented on tape.

[Jerry Freeman]

 

Once you discover that the bulk of the details are contradictory, you should be less inclined to form strong opinions,
except  that too many who have testified regarding the JFK Assassination or have written books, seem to be FoS.

Then he [Fritz?] would say, ?Well, Sorrels, do you have anything you want to ask him?? But  Kelley and Sorrels had very little to ask; they didn?t have the documentation that I [Fritz?] had. We were free to ask or interject anything we wanted. Of course, we were all experienced interrogators, and when you went to trial in those days, especially in federal court, you had to show any notes you took to the defense. So they got to look at every note that you had against their client. But we old-time investigators would just do it by memory.

I don't know half the time there [in that post] who or what is being quoted. Anyway rather moot as in the Oswald case, no one was worried about turning over notes that they took to "the defense". "Opinions"? ...by his own admission, Currey was a do nothing cop.