Jack Ruby: A Rosetta Stone of the JFK Assassination

[Walt Cakebread]

Why are you so hostile?  Now you are taking issue with trying to have a substantive conversation that does not involve personal insults etc.  This is an endless pattern.  Someone tries to have a sensible discussion about the case.  You interject a lot of nonsense and attack the poster to derail the discussion.  Repeat endlessly.   Now you are baiting a political discussion here?  Unreal.  It's unfortunate that folks trying to have a discussion about the JFK assassination have to put up with this including frequent personal attacks and use of profanity.

OK, Mr "Smith"..... Let's have a sensible discussion about Lee Oswald telling Captain Fritz that he was in the first floor lunchroom when the president passed by the TSBD.   And he told Fritz that he saw Junior Jarman and Harold Norman walke by the lunchroom as he sat there eating his lunch.   Jarman told the investigators that he and Norman had in fact walked by that 1st floor lunchroom at about 12:26.

Do you not believe that mr "Smith" ?.....

[Michael T. Griffith]

A few other facts we should keep in mind about Jack Ruby and his shooting of Oswald:

* Dallas police sergeant Patrick Dean, who was close to the city's Mob boss, Joe Civello, failed a lie detector test with regard to his reassignment of police guards away from the elevators and a door to a stairway next to the stairs just before Ruby shot Oswald.

* Former Dallas police officer Billy Grammer reported that on the night before Ruby killed Oswald, he received a call from Ruby at police headquarters warning that Oswald would be shot the following evening. Grammer said the caller did not identify himself, but that he was sure the voice was Jack Ruby's. Grammer said he was well acquainted with Ruby. Grammer further reported that Ruby seemed to be aware of all the plans to transfer Oswald on Sunday from police headquarters to the Dallas County Jail, that he knew about the decoy vehicle assignment, and was aware of the approximate time the transfer would occur.

* Two WC staffers wrote the following in an internal Commission memo:

In short, we believe that the possibility exists, based on evidence already available, that Ruby was involved in illegal dealings with Cuban elements who might have had contact with Oswald.

* According to an 11/25/63 Associated Press report, William Crowe, an entertainer who had performed at Ruby's Carousel Club, told an AP reporter he was "positive" he had seen Oswald in the club. Dallas Morning News reporter Kent Biffle said Crowe told him the same thing several days later.

* Karen Carlin, who had been a dancer at Ruby's club, told FBI agent Roger Warner on 11/24/63 that "she was under impression that Lee Oswald, Jack Ruby, and other individuals unknown to her, were involved in a plot to assassinate President Kennedy."

* Another Ruby dancer, Janet Conforto, told Dallas newsmen shortly after the assassination that she had seen Oswald in Ruby's club. Yet another Ruby dancer, Kathy Kay, told the Dallas Times Herald the same thing in 1975.

* Four Dallas deputy constables told the Dallas Morning News in 1976 that shortly after the assassination they examined a box of handwritten notes and other papers in the Dallas County Courthouse that linked Ruby to Oswald.

* In 1990 the Attorney General of Texas, Jim Mattox, announced that his mother had told him she once saw Ruby and Oswald eating dinner together in the restaurant where she worked.

[Michael T. Griffith]

A crucial issue is how Ruby got into the DPD basement. The WC claimed Ruby walked down the Main Street ramp to enter the basement. Of course, if Ruby entered the basement another way, someone on the inside would have had to help him do so, which is why lone-gunman theorists continue to cling to the WC's tale about Ruby's entering the basement.

But several witnesses who were at or near the Main Street ramp before the shooting insisted Ruby did not go down it. Indeed, the policeman who was on duty at the top of the ramp vehemently denied Ruby had walked down it. The policeman said that no one walked down the ramp, and he volunteered for and then passed a lie-detector test to prove his veracity.

The HSCA reexamined the matter and concluded the evidence strongly indicated Ruby did not use the Main Street ramp, that he must have gotten into the basement through another entrance, and that he received help in doing so. The committee noted the several witnesses who were near or at the ramp who insisted Ruby did not use that entrance.

In fact, one of the witnesses was a UPI reporter, Terrance McGarry. McGarry said that at least five minutes before Oswald was shot, he had stationed himself at the middle of the basement end of the Main Street ramp and that no one came down the ramp during that time. Another one of the witnesses was taxi driver Harry Tasker, who knew Ruby. Tasker was standing at the ramp's entrance and kept the ramp under constant observation. Tasker told the FBI that not only did he not see Ruby walk down the ramp, but that he did not see Ruby anywhere near the ramp.

And let's remember that Dallas police sergeant Patrick Dean failed a lie detector test regarding his reassignment of police guards away from the elevators and a door to a stairway next to the stairs just before Ruby shot Oswald.

Yet, to this day, lone-gunman theorists claim Ruby entered the basement by walking down the Main Street ramp. Why? Because they know that if Ruby got into the heavily guarded basement by a different route, this would mean he lied about how he entered the basement and that someone on the inside let him in. This, of course, would prove that Ruby's shooting of Oswald was not a spontaneous act but rather a premeditated killing to silence Oswald.

[Jim Hawthorn]

Yet, to this day, lone-gunman theorists claim Ruby entered the basement by walking down the Main Street ramp. Why? Because they know that if Ruby got into the heavily guarded basement by a different route, this would mean he lied about how he entered the basement and that someone on the inside let him in.

Ruby was apparently quite chummy with the guys down at the DPD. Because someone let him in doesn't mean that whoever did that was also part of the conspiracy.