Reclaiming History

by Vincent Bugliosi

A: His attorney received many of those.

  Q: In fact, he hired an agent to handle book and show business offers he anticipated would come his way?

  A: He made inquiries.

  Q: And he tried to get the operator of radio station KLIF in Dallas to publicize what he had done as the act of a national patriot, is that correct?

  A: That is correct.

  Q: Around the time of the assassination, Ruby was having a lot of trouble with two of his competitors, Abe and Barney Weinstein, who were staging amateur nights and cutting into Ruby’s attendance at his club; and he was trying to get the union, the American Guild of Variety Artists, to stop the Weinsteins, and AGVA—that’s the union—was not complying?

  A: That’s correct.

  Q: So Ruby was making calls to people to help him, is that correct?

  A: Well, I understand he was making those calls, yes.

  Q: Well, his call to Barney Baker was to ask Baker for help with AGVA?

  A: That’s what Barney Baker said.

  Q: Are you aware that the House Select Committee on Assassination investigated these same phone calls that you testified to on direct examination and concluded, “Testimony to the committee supported the conclusion that Ruby’s phone calls were by and large related to his labor troubles.” Is that correct?

  A: Yes, that’s correct.

  Q: You’re also aware that after a very comprehensive examination of Ruby’s financial records, the House Select Committee uncovered no evidence that Ruby or members of his family profited from the killing of Oswald in any way, are you not?

  A: I’m aware of that, yes.

  On direct examination, Spence had established through Kantor that “Ruby was in bad trouble with the IRS and had been for some time, and his debt had come to a little more than $39,000.” Spence then asked, “And do you know what money Ruby had just before the shooting?” Kantor said, “Well, on the afternoon of the shooting of President Kennedy, he turned up at his bank, the Merchants State Bank in Dallas, and a vice president of the bank, a William Cox, noted that Ruby was holding $7,000 in cash in his hands while he was standing in the line at the teller’s cage. However, Mr. Ruby put none of this in his account.” Spence dropped the matter at this point and went on to other questions.

  Continuing my cross-examination of Kantor:

  Q: Now, about Ruby having a lot of cash on him on the day of the assassination—Seth, you’ve been honest with me over the phone—do you feel you painted an accurate picture for the jury on the significance of the money he had that day?

  A: Well, I interviewed the vice president of the bank, and that’s what he told me.

  Q: To save time, because I don’t think you painted quite the picture that you wanted to, on page 62 of your book you say, “‘Jack always carried a large roll of cash,’ remembers Bill Cox, then the loan officer of the bank. ‘He would just come into the bank to make change for the club,’ said Cox, who vividly remembers Ruby standing in line at a teller’s cage on the afternoon of November 22, after Kennedy was slain. ‘Jack was standing there crying and he had about $7,000 in cash on him on the day of the assassination. He and I talked and I warned him that he’d be knocked in the head one day carrying all that cash on him. I was concerned because it was common for Ruby to walk in and out of the bank with large amounts of money on him. Armed bandits watch patterns like that.’”*

  Q: Do you think you conveyed that picture to the jury on direct examination?

  A: Well, if you’re helping me, I appreciate it.

  Q: Mr. Kantor, are you implying to this jury that by Ruby saying in his testimony before the Warren Commission that he had something to say and wanted to go to Washington, that he was referring to a conspiracy? Are you implying that to this jury?

  A: I hope that I’m implying that Jack Ruby was maintaining that he had more information to reveal, yes.

  Q: How could you possibly say that, Mr. Kantor, when in the same identical testimony of Mr. Ruby before the Warren Commission, he specifically and expressly said that no one else was involved with him. Let me read you his testimony on this point, Mr. Kantor. Pages 198 to 199, volume 5: “I never spoke to anyone about attempting to do anything. No subversive organization gave me any idea. No underworld person made any effort to contact me. It all happened that Sunday morning.” Correct?

  A: Those are his words. Yes. I understand, yes.

  Q: All right. Page 204 of his testimony: “I am as innocent regarding any conspiracy as any of you gentlemen in the room.” Page 212: “There was no conspiracy.” So we know, Mr. Kantor, that when Jack Ruby was talking to the chief justice about going to Washington, he had to have been talking about something other than a conspiracy?

  A: I don’t agree with that, sir.

  Q: So, in other words, you think he’s telling the chief justice, “Chief Justice, I acted alone. No one was involved with me. Please take my word. But I want to go to Washington to tell you that someone else was involved?”

  A: Well, I believe that that is quite possible. For one thing, one of his early attorneys, a man named Joe Tonahill, from Jasper, Texas, told me that he was positive that the room was bugged, that Ruby’s words were being carried elsewhere, and that it was not a safe place for Ruby to be.

  Q: Tonahill didn’t know that, but he suspected the room was bugged?

  A: That’s correct.

  Q: But if by Ruby saying he wanted to go to Washington he meant he was going to implicate some conspirators, and the conspirators would obviously know what he meant, then Ruby would not have been safe in Dallas either, is that correct?

  A: I’m not sure that he felt safe in Dallas as it was.

  Q: Yet he died of natural causes over two years later. Is that correct?

  A: Yes, sir.

  Q: Did Mr. Ruby ever say or imply why he wanted to go to Washington and see the president? Did he ever say why to anyone?

  A: No, he didn’t say he wanted to see the president.

  I proceeded to read Ruby’s testimony about the John Birch Society. I then read this from his testimony: “And I wish that our president, Lyndon Johnson, would have delved deeper into the situation, hear me, not to accept just circumstantial facts about my guilt or innocence. I want to say this to you. The Jewish people are being exterminated at this moment. Consequently, a whole new form of government is going to take over our country, and I know I won’t live to see you another time. It may not be too late, whatever happens, if our President Lyndon Johnson knew the truth from me. But if I am eliminated, there won’t be any way of knowing.”

  Q: Isn’t it clear, Mr. Kantor, that in Mr. Ruby’s scrambled and deteriorating mind, he felt the John Birch Society was accusing him of being involved in the murder of President Kennedy, and because of it, the Jewish people were being exterminated, and he wanted to go to Washington and tell the president himself to stop this genocide. Isn’t that kind of obvious from this?

  A: That comes across, yes.

  Q: But you forgot about that?

  A: My own question is no. [sic]

  Q: I want to read a quote from your book, Mr. Kantor, and then ask you if you meant these words. “Ruby was, as his mother had been, an incessant talker. He was brash and mercurial and never would have been trusted with knowledge of any plot to silence Oswald that would cause him to wind up in the arms of the police.” I take it you meant those words?

  A: I meant them.

  Kantor went on to say that if the mob had approached Ruby to kill Oswald, Ruby “would have bragged about it” to others.

  My allotted time had run out, but there was no need to ask any further questions anyway.545

  Since I couldn’t have gotten more out of Kantor than if I had called him as a prosecution witness,* Spence, to mitigate the damage done by his own witness’s answers on cross, started his redirect examination of Kantor:

  Q: Well, you are probably the politest witness we’ve had, and I give you that. And I appreciate that. But the jury may have been misled by your answers, b
ecause what you were being read was a series of questions, a series of statements out of your book that weren’t in context, isn’t that true?

  A: That’s correct.546

  But how can you take out of context, for just one example, Kantor saying that Ruby “never would have been trusted” by the mob to kill Oswald for them?

  You know, if we knew only one thing about Jack Ruby—that on the night of the assassination and into the early morning hours of the next day, Saturday, he was tied up for hours trying to deliver sandwiches to the police and employees of a radio station who were working into the night—we would know that he was not planning, at the behest of the mob, to kill Oswald the following day.† But since the majority of Americans do not know this fact, as well as a great number of other facts that make the notion of Ruby killing Oswald for the mob too silly for words, many will continue to think that “Ruby silenced Oswald for the mob.”

  If the reader will be forbearing and indulge me my use of facetiousness about a serious subject to illuminate some very substantive points all supported by the known evidence, what follows is the type of conversation, with one variation or another, that would have had to have taken place if organized crime had actually sent a representative to ask Ruby to silence Oswald for them.

  Vito: Jack, I’ve got a little job for you. The boys want you to whack Oswald. You know, silence him.

  Jack: Vito, to tell you the truth, I’ve been thinking that someone should kill that scum. But geez, Vito, you want me to do it?

  Vito: Yeah, Jack. That’s what the guys want.

  Jack: Okay, Vito, okay,…Vito?

  Vito: Yeah, Jack?

  Jack: I was just thinking…

  Vito: Jack, you know you’ve never been too good at that, but what are you thinking, Jack?

  Jack: Well, I really hate that no-good creep Oswald, and he deserves to die, but why do the guys want to whack him? Aren’t they happy about what he did? I mean, with JFK’s kid brother going after them big-time, I don’t know, but it seems to me all of you should love him, because with JFK gone, you might get Bobby off your back.

  Vito: Jack, you’re even more stupid than you look. Why in the hell would we want you to whack Oswald and silence him if Oswald hadn’t whacked Kennedy for us? If he had nothing to tell the feds about us, what would there be to silence? Oswald’s a nut, and the guys are terrified he’ll crack or something and point the finger at them, so we have to silence him.

  Jack: Vito, the mob had President Kennedy killed?…That’s terrible. Just, just terrible. I, I don’t want to say it because I’ve always looked way up to you guys, but that’s the most terrible thing I could ever imagine. Just awful. I, I can’t say I appreciate it. I tell you that.

  Vito: Jack, we had no choice. At one time we liked the guy, but after he let that little bastard brother of his run wild against us, we ended up hating him.

  Jack: You may have hated him, but I loved President Kennedy. He was a big hero to me. I’ve been crying like a baby over it.

  Vito: Jack, I don’t want to hear your damn sob stories. The boys want you to do the job, okay?

  Jack: Vito, I’d love to kill that little worm. I mean, somebody’s gotta do it. But the fact it’s in my mind that I’m doing it for the people who had JFK killed, someone I loved, I don’t know, it’s kinda like a different story.

  Vito: Jack, I got the solution to the problem.

  Jack: What, Vito?

  Vito: Just put it out of your mind…er, head, that we had JFK rubbed out. That way you won’t be bothered by it. You can kill that fruitcake Oswald for yourself, not for us.

  Jack: Geez, Vito, that’s really a good idea. How does a guy come up with clever thinking like that? Thanks, Vito.

  Vito: Fuhgedaboudit, Jack. Anything for an old pal.

  Jack: When do you want me to do it, Vito?

  Vito: The sooner the better. The nutcase could talk at any time.

  Jack: Okay, Vito, okay…Vito, one last question.

  Vito: What is it, Jack?

  Jack: I hate to sound selfish, but what’s in it for me? I mean, the Dallas police will arrest me for murder, probably even kill me on the spot.

  Vito: Jack, you are being selfish. Think of the boys, Jack, think of the boys, not yourself.

  Jack: I’m trying, Vito, but it’s hard to do. I tell you that. They might kill me, Vito.

  Vito: Jack, they’re not going to kill you. The first thing they’ll do is be all over you like flies on manure. By the time they draw their guns, there’ll be ten cops already on top of you, and if they shot you then, they might accidentally shoot one of their own.

  Jack: Yeah, I can see what you mean, Vito. But even if they don’t kill me, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life behind bars.

  Vito: Jack, c’mon. After a few months, the guys will spring you.

  Jack: Is that a promise, Vito?

  Vito: Jack, you have my word.

  Jack: Okay, Vito, okay.

  Vito: Jack?

  Jack: Yeah, Vito?

  Vito: One last thing before I go. We have to make sure, real, real sure, that Oswald is killed, in fact, right on the spot. We can’t afford to have him last for even a minute. So make sure you don’t aim at his head. In fact, don’t even aim at his heart. Shoot him in the belly, Jack. That’s the quickest way by far to kill him right on the spot.

  Jack: Okay, Vito, anything you say.

  Vito: Thanks, Jack. We’ll owe you one…Oh, Jack?

  Jack: Yeah, Vito?

  Vito: I forgot to ask. You ever fire a pistol at anyone before?

  Jack: No, Vito, but I’ve always packed one just in case.

  Vito: Just to help you out, Jack, you pull the trigger with your middle finger.

  Jack: Gee thanks, Vito. I didn’t know that.

  Jack Duffy, a longtime student of the assassination and a Fort Worth attorney, immediately spotted the absurdity of the notion that a hit man for the mob would not shoot Oswald in the head, or at least his heart, when he was right next to Oswald and it would have been so easy for him to do so. Because Ruby actually shot Oswald in the stomach (see photo section), Oswald’s dying wasn’t a sure thing. In fact, he survived for almost two hours after the shooting. Indeed, Dr. Malcolm Perry, who worked on Oswald, told the Warren Commission that despite the severity of Oswald’s injuries, he and his assistants “were very close, I think, to winning the battle…At one point, once we controlled the hemorrhage and once I had control of the aorta and was able to stop the bleeding [in] that area, I actually felt we had a very good chance.”547

  And unbelievably, a close-up enlargement of Ruby’s right hand at the time of the shooting shows that Ruby, the big mob hit man, pulled the trigger with his middle finger, not the more natural, and reliable right index finger. His lawyer, Melvin Belli, was convinced this was a sure symptom of a psychiatric problem.548

  The above conversation between Ruby and Vito, the reader might say, is silly. But it’s not nearly as silly and far-out as Mafia chieftains deciding to get Jack Ruby, of all people, to commit the second most important murder in their history for them, the most important being, if you’re a conspiracy theorist, their murder of Kennedy.

  Organized Crime

  One of the two principal groups (the other being the CIA)* whom conspiracy theorists have accused of being behind the assassination is organized crime, popularly referred to as the Mafia or Cosa Nostra, loosely translated as “Our Thing.” Most organized-crime scholars considered the word Mafia† as referring to Italian members of major organized-crime “families” in America whose ancestors came from Italy. In the beginning, having only one Italian parent was not enough for membership in the Mafia. Also, it has been written that if a person (or his parents) didn’t come from the specific Italian island or region of Sicily, he could do business and break bread with the Mafia, but he couldn’t become a member, and the ancestry of all Mafia members in the early years was Sicilian. Mafia don Joseph Masseria, himself from Sicily, first opened the doors of the
American Mafia to non-Sicilian Italians in 1919, though only at the lower level. Thereafter, many came from other regions, particularly the adjacent southern region of Calabria. And years later, even the Masseria limitation was erased, perhaps the most prominent examples being Vito Genovese, who in the 1950s was the boss of one of New York’s biggest Mafia families and who came from a village near Naples in the southern region of Campania, where the Mafia is called Camorra, and Frank Costello (Francesco Castiglia), one of the most powerful mafioso ever, and a rival of Genovese’s, who came from a small village in Calabria.1

  But in the early years, no Mafia don could have roots anywhere other than Sicily. Indeed, the biggest and most powerful Italian mobster of all, even exceeding Charles “Lucky” Luciano, was Chicago’s Al (short for Alphonse) Capone, who ruled Chicago in the 1920s like no other gangster ever ruled any American city. Capone was helped by the estimated $15 million in payoffs he made annually to city and state officials, including the Chicago Police Department, for protection. “Scarface Al,” who once noted, “You can go further with a kind word and a gun than with a kind word alone,” was born in Brooklyn of parents who immigrated from Naples, not the island of Sicily, and he always wanted to be a Mafia boss. But as mob historian Frederic Sondern has written, “He couldn’t because he was a Neapolitan.” The irony is that Capone was so big he could designate who the Mafia boss would be in Chicago (e.g., Antonio Lombardo), but couldn’t (at least in those days) be that person himself.2*