Reclaiming History

by Vincent Bugliosi

  Warren answers that he has no appointment scheduled but he’ll tell the president what Ruby said when he sees him.

  Ruby: “How do you know if the facts I stated about everything I said…are the truth or not?”

  Warren responds that the polygraph test might answer that question.

  Ruby says that when Warren leaves town, “I am finished. My family is finished,” later repeating, “There was no conspiracy” and “All I want to do is tell the truth, and the only way you can know it is by the polygraph.”

  Warren: “That we will do for you.”486

  Warren would later say that Ruby was “clearly delusional” and refer to him as “the poor fellow,” adding, “I really felt sorry for him, very sorry for him.”487

  The next month, July 18, 1964, in Dallas, Ruby was administered the polygraph test he so fervently wanted by the polygraph expert from the FBI lab in Washington, Bell P. Herndon.*

  Completely apart from the issue of how accurate a polygraph test is, most lay people, as I imagine was the case with Ruby, believe it can detect a liar. No one asked Ruby to take a polygraph test, so the argument cannot be made that he went along with it because he felt he would look guilty if he refused. It was Ruby who insisted he be given the test, and although this is not conclusive, it very definitely is circumstantial evidence of his innocence on the issue of whether he knew Oswald and whether he acted alone. The following are among the questions Ruby was asked, in no discernible pattern, each of which concerns an issue one or more conspiracy theorists have raised: “Did you shoot Oswald because of any influence of the underworld?” (Ruby’s answer: “No”); “Did any long-distance calls which you made before the assassination of the president have anything to do with the assassination?” (“No”); “Did you know the Officer Tippit who was killed?” (“No”); “Did you ever meet with Oswald and Officer Tippit at your club?” (“No”); “Were you at the Parkland Hospital at any time on Friday?” (“No”); “Did you know Oswald before November 22, 1963?” (“No”); “Did you assist Oswald in the assassination?” (“No”); “Did you shoot Oswald to silence him?” (“No”); “Did you talk with any Dallas police officers on Sunday, November 24, prior to the shooting of Oswald?” (“No”); “Did you walk past the guard at the time Lieutenant Pierce’s car was parked on the ramp exit?” (“Yes”); “Were you on the sidewalk at the time Lieutenant Pierce’s car stopped on the ramp exit?” (“Yes”); “To your knowledge, did any of your friends or did you telephone the FBI in Dallas between 2 or 3 a.m. Sunday morning?” (“No”); “Is everything you told the Warren Commission the entire truth?” (“Yes”); “Was your trip to Cuba solely for pleasure?” (“Yes”); “Did you shoot Oswald in order to save Mrs. Kennedy the ordeal of a trial?” (“Yes”); “Did you first decide to kill Oswald on Sunday morning?” (“Yes”).488

  Herndon concluded that “based on the hypothesis that Ruby was mentally competent and sound, the charts could be interpreted…to indicate that there was no area of deception present with regard to his response to the relevant questions during the polygraph examination.”489

  Of course, the hypothesis of mental competence on Ruby’s part is a problematic one. Dr. William Beavers, who attended the polygraph session, later testified that he saw Ruby nine or ten times up to a month before the session, and concluded that Ruby was suffering from “psychotic depression” with evidence of “auditory hallucinations” and a “definite delusional system.” At the time of the polygraph test, he felt Ruby’s depression had diminished but he had become more delusional. Despite this, the psychiatrist said, “in the greater proportion of the time that he answered questions, I felt he was aware of the questions and that he understood them, and that he was giving answers based on an appreciation of reality.” However, he felt there was little question on the part of himself and three other psychiatrists who examined Ruby that Ruby was “mentally ill” and should be in a mental hospital, not a prison.490

  During the polygraph examination, as was always the situation with Ruby, there were the sadly humorous incidents. In one, Ruby asks his polygrapher (Herndon), “Do I sound like a man with an unsound mind to you?” and Herndon, instead of responding with the almost obligatory and civil “no,” says, “I’m not qualified to answer that question.” At another point Ruby asks Herndon, “Have I been evading any of your questions?” After Herndon says he’s been most cooperative, Ruby says, “But you can’t tell how I stand, can you?” When Herndon says it will take him time to analyze the charts back in Washington, Ruby asks if he “will still be around when the answers come back,” and he is assured he will.

  And in a situation that could rise to the dignity of a sick skit or cartoon, Dallas assistant district attorney Bill Alexander, the prosecutor who had asked for and gotten a sentence of death against Ruby so he could “fry” Ruby at Huntsville, Texas, was one of ten people in the room, and the one whom Ruby was the friendliest with. Ruby actually asked Alexander’s assistance in helping to frame the questions, and at one point had a private three-minute conference with him, the two of them referring to each other throughout the several-hour session as “Jack” and “Bill.” At another point, Ruby says to his own lawyer, Joe Tonahill, “Joe, I’d appreciate it if you weren’t in the room. Can I ask you to leave, Joe?…I prefer Bill to you.”

  Tonahill responds, “Let the record show that Mr. Ruby says he prefers Bill Alexander being here,…who is the assistant district attorney who asked that a jury give him the death sentence, to myself, who asked the jury to acquit him, his attorney.”491

  The pitiable Jack Ruby depicted on these pages is the same Jack Ruby whom conspiracy theorists throughout the years have consistently referred to as an important criminal associate of the national syndicate, the Mafia, and someone whom the Mafia ultimately chose to silence Oswald and extricate it from its biggest problem ever. Just a few examples from the conspiracy community: “Ruby was a pivotal contact man for criminal activity in Dallas” and was “closely connected to the mob.”492 “Ruby had known all along what he had to do: silence Lee Harvey Oswald forever…In the Mafia, if you are ordered to kill someone, and you refuse to carry out the order, you pay for your refusal with your life.”493 “Jack Ruby was a Mafia operative…Oswald was shot [by Ruby] to silence him.”494 “Jack Ruby…handled syndicate interests in Dallas.”495 “The murder of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby had all of the earmarks of a gangland slaying.”496 “Ruby had been Chicago’s ‘man in Dallas’ for years, running strip joints, gambling rackets, and narcotics for the Outfit…As the person representing the Outfit in Dallas, the task had quite naturally fallen to Ruby to silence Oswald.”497 Alleging that the Mafia was behind Kennedy’s murder, author David Scheim says that “the star of Oswald’s murder contract was the long-time Dallas mobster and police fixer, Jack Ruby.”498

  It is very noteworthy that without exception, not one of these conspiracy theorists knew or had ever met Jack Ruby. Without our even resorting to his family and roommate, all of whom think the suggestion of Ruby being connected to the mob is ridiculous, those who knew him, unanimously and without exception, think the notion of his being connected to the Mafia, and then killing Oswald for them, is nothing short of laughable.

  As we have seen, Ruby wasn’t a member or even an associate of organized crime. To supplement what has already been written in the biography of Ruby, Ruby’s roots were in Chicago, and few knew more about the mob in Chicago than Lenny Patrick, the “Jewish capo” of the Chicago mob suspected of being behind many of the “Outfit’s” murders in Chicago. Right after Ruby killed Oswald, the late William Roemer, the senior FBI agent assigned to investigate organized crime in Chicago, contacted Patrick, whom he had hounded for years. Patrick, Roemer said, “was a very personable guy, except that he had killed six people.” Roemer said that Patrick was not a mob informant for the FBI, but Roemer added, “I had done a big favor for Lenny, so I could talk to him.” Patrick told Roemer that he knew Ruby and that Ruby wasn’t a part of organized crime i
n Chicago, going on to call Ruby unstable and unreliable. Of course, if the mob had Ruby kill Kennedy, Patrick couldn’t be expected to tell Roemer the truth. But Roemer knew Patrick well and said that what Patrick told him “was convincing” to him.499

  Jack Clark, an investigative consultant for the Chicago Police Department, told ABC in 2003, “I knew Sparky in the 40s and 50s. He was in all the gymnasiums with all the boxers. It was well known that Jack Ruby was meshuga—that Jack wasn’t playing with a full deck. He was a nice guy, but he just wasn’t playing with a full deck.” As to whether he had ties with organized crime in Chicago, Clark said, “The Chicago mob had nothing to do with Jack Ruby. Jack Ruby was working with the rag-tag guys, on the street, downtown Chicago. Some of them were bookmakers. They were just guys who made a buck through their wit or charm. But they were not gangsters.”500

  Luis Kutner, a Chicago lawyer who knew Ruby from Ruby’s Chicago days, before Ruby moved to Dallas, told investigators for the HSCA that Ruby was “the type of person who was always seeking out someone who was in the limelight” and that “Jack Ruby had no connection with organized crime other than his mouth.”501

  Janet Conforto (“Jada”), Ruby’s headline stripper at the Carousel, had all types of problems with Ruby over the high wages she was supposed to receive, but, as noted earlier, acknowledged that she was unaware of any association he had with members of the underworld, though she said he’d like to say, “I know all the boys,” an apparent reference to racketeers.502 If you were trying to prove Ruby’s connection to organized crime, how much could you deposit in the bank with that type of remark, particularly from a braggart like Ruby, who, after one short conversation with DA Henry Wade at police headquarters on the night of the assassination, was telling people later in the evening that Wade was his “friend.” But of course Ruby, particularly because he came from the wrong side of the tracks in Chicago and operated a strip joint in Dallas, did know members of the mob, like Dallas mob boss Joe Civello. But again, so did Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Sammy Davis. It means nothing at all. The only thing that means anything is whether he was a mobster himself. And Ruby was not. In fact, former Ruby prosecutor Bill Alexander says Ruby “wasn’t even a common criminal. He didn’t steal. He didn’t pimp. He wasn’t a drunk. Jack wasn’t a lawbreaker.”503

  During the HSCA testimony of Jack Revill, a detective in charge of the criminal intelligence section of the Dallas Police Department at the time of the assassination, counsel asked, “Did you have any knowledge of Jack Ruby’s associations with any gamblers or anyone else involved with illegal activity?”

  Revill: “Jack Ruby was the type of person who would have been acquainted with persons involved in gambling activities and other criminal activities, but as far as Jack Ruby being actively engaged or a member of any groups, no, nothing to indicate this.”

  Question: “What was your personal impression of Jack Ruby?”

  Revill: “Jack Ruby was a buffoon. He liked the limelight. He was highly volatile. He liked to be recognized with people, and I would say this to this committee: if Jack Ruby was a member of organized crime, then the personnel director of organized crime should be replaced.”504

  Bert Shipp, the assistant news director for Dallas’s WFAA-TV (Channel 8) around the time of the assassination, knew Ruby well and had a similar assessment: “The Mafia wouldn’t have trusted Jack Ruby to take change to the bank…I’ve talked to two guys that were pretty high up in [local organized crime], and they laugh when you talk to them about Jack Ruby…being part of the mob, the Mafia.”505 In other words, the mob didn’t get to be as successful as it was by trusting someone like Jack Ruby.*

  Hugh Aynesworth, a Dallas Morning News reporter at the time of the assassination who had more firsthand knowledge about the participants in the assassination drama than any other reporter, and writes about them well in his book, JFK: Breaking the News, knew Ruby because he’d see him around town whenever anything was happening. “My goodness,” Aynesworth said, “I even saw him at a restaurant fire, a police raid. How he’d find out about these things, I don’t know, but he’d be there.” At the suggestion that Ruby was a member of organized crime, Aynesworth laughs. “Mafia guys aren’t talkers,” he says. “Ruby, if he found out anything he thought was important, he’d tell someone else about it within one block. Jack was the type of guy, if he was at a fire, he’d run two or three blocks to tell people there was a fire.”506 Aynesworth sums up Ruby this way: “Jack Ruby was the quintessential wannabe but never-was.” He was “full of big stories, bigger dreams and lusty braggadocio.”507

  If Ruby’s sieve-like mouth made him someone the mob wouldn’t conspire to bird-watch with, he “made up for it,” as the expression goes, by being so volatile and emotional. As a friend of Ruby’s, one who had known him for over fifteen years, said, he couldn’t “plan anything in advance” because he “couldn’t concentrate on one topic for more than five minutes.”508

  Rabbi Hillel E. Silverman, who knew Ruby and his sister Eva for about ten years prior to the assassination and visited him two or three times a week when Ruby was in custody, described Ruby as a “simple and shallow, yet eccentric and unbalanced man” of little intelligence and education. “I think I know Jack Ruby well enough to say,” Silverman said, “that he was not a member of any organized criminal element, and I find it inconceivable that he conspired with anyone to kill Oswald,” adding that he felt confident that Ruby’s decision to kill Oswald was a “spur-of-the-moment act.”509

  Elmer Gertz, one of Ruby’s main appellate lawyers who succeeded in securing a reversal of Ruby’s death sentence for murdering Oswald, and later wrote a book, Moment of Madness: The People vs. Jack Ruby, referred to Ruby as “an undisciplined man-child,” and says, “Ruby was a compulsive talker,” and “if he were involved in a conspiracy, in five minutes the whole world would know it.”510

  Emmett Colvin, another of Ruby’s criminal appellate lawyers, said the notion that Ruby was a hit man for organized crime when he killed Oswald was “ludicrous. Jack Ruby was a pitiful man. Having practiced law since 1942, I am well aware of the characteristics of a hit man. These are cold, calculating people. This cannot be equated to Jack Ruby.”511

  Bill Alexander, who we know prosecuted Ruby for Oswald’s murder, had known Jack for years, though he had never socialized with him. He said, “It’s funny that I’d be in a position of defending Ruby, but Ruby has been maligned and besmirched for years with these mob allegations by people who are just not in possession of the facts.” He told me that in all his years as a part of Dallas law enforcement, “I never heard anyone say that Ruby had any association with organized crime, or was involved in any kind of organized criminal activity. I can tell you that with all the scrutiny he was under because of the clubs he was operating, if he’d have been involved with the mob or doing anything bad, Dallas police intelligence would have picked up on it.” When I asked Alexander about the age-old assertion that the mob got Ruby to silence Oswald for them, Alexander, who rarely laughs, couldn’t resist laughing. “The mob,” he said, “would not have let Ruby within five miles of one of their meetings because he was an extroverted blabbermouth.”512

  Tony Zoppi, for years the entertainment columnist for the Dallas Morning News, who knew Ruby very well and said, “We were really good friends,” also laughs at the notion that Ruby was connected to organized crime. “It is so ludicrous to believe that Ruby was part of the mob. The conspiracy theorists want to believe everybody but those who really knew him.”513

  As indicated earlier, who could have possibly known Jack Ruby, warts and all, as much as the cocktail waitresses and strippers at his club who worked with him and were exposed to his personality seven nights a week? “Jack’s girls” both loved and hated him, with a lot more love than hate. Two of his strippers, Diana Hunter and Alice Anderson, speaking for themselves as well as, they knew, for the others, wrote, “We believe we knew Jack Ruby better than anybody else, including all those experts who
tried so hard to analyze him from the day he committed his notorious crime until the day he died more than three years afterward…And we’re as sure as we can be that Jack Ruby…was not part of any conspiracy.”514

  In addition, those on the wrong side of the law in Dallas referred to Jack as a “fink”515 because he gave information to the Dallas Police Department on criminal activity he learned about. Dallas police detective Joe Cody, who used to ice-skate with Ruby from time to time, said that Ruby was “very cooperative” with the Dallas Police Department, and on “several cases” passed on information “that resulted in arrests.”516 “People in Dallas…knew Ruby was a snitch,” Zoppi says. “The word was on the street that you couldn’t trust him because he was telling the cops everything. You have to be crazy to think anybody would have trusted Ruby to be part of the mob.”517

  Seth Kantor, author of The Ruby Cover-Up, writes, “Ruby was an informer on every different police level there was. He fed tips to…the Dallas police force regularly. He met in Dallas with two Chicago detectives to provide them information less than three months before the Kennedy assassination.”518

  Indeed, and please get this, during the Kefauver Committee hearings (named after its chairman, U.S. Senator Estes Kefauver from Tennessee) investigating organized crime in 1950, Ruby actually contacted his lawyer friend from Chicago, Luis Kutner, who had become a staff attorney for the Kefauver Committee, and volunteered to testify as a witness against the mob. And although he was unable to furnish the Senate committee with any information of real value, he traveled to Chicago from Dallas when the committee was there and met with Rudolph Halley, who was the chief counsel for the committee, and George Robinson, one of his investigators.519 With Ruby’s background of wanting to testify against the mob, to think it would come to him after Oswald killed Kennedy and say, “Jack, we got a little job for you,” is high humor.