<image: Jack Ruby in police custody – November 24, 1963>
We’ve avoided reporting about Jack Ruby since we started this website. We’ve covered all the relevant WC witnesses on this website targeting the Dallas Radical Right for the JFK Assassination. The name of Jack Ruby never came up because I’m convinced that Ruby knew nothing about the JFK Assassination – and he merely guessed that General Walker and the John Birch Society were at root.
I say he guessed right (because he lived right there in Dallas and knew the political dynamics), but he had no direct evidence – no direct knowledge. The only reason that Ruby killed Lee Harvey Oswald (LHO) I say, is because his close friends in the Dallas Police Department (DPD) pushed him to do it.
I say the specific police that did this were Ruby’s longtime friends in Dallas. Ruby was known to treat Dallas police extra well in his nightclubs, and some of those friends were closer than others.
Also, I’ve read that a number Dallas police were also members of the Dallas Minutemen, organized under General Walker. The Minutemen nationwide were quite secret, so they wouldn’t have admitted this to Jack Ruby – but they had other ways of persuasion.
After all, Jack was an emotional guy, and there was plenty of talk about lynching LHO in Dallas that weekend.
I suspect that these rogue policemen feigned outrage at this “cop killer” and demanded “justice.” They feigned heartbreak for Jackie Kennedy who would need to return to Dallas for LHO’s trial. They probably promised Ruby that he would get off with a slap on the wrist. Or maybe he would even become a national hero! He would at least become a local, Dallas hero – at least to them.
They didn’t need to resort to blackmail, although they knew about the bordellos that Ruby was maintaining for the mob in Dallas. They just put emotional pressure on this mob guy – the frustrated hit man – and they were successful.
Why do I write Ruby off so quickly? It’s because a fellow citizen of Dallas, a newspaper man, Seth Kantor, who said he knew Jack Ruby pretty well, and he dove into the story and wrote a book entitled, “Who Was Jack Ruby?” (1978). Kantor convinced me that Jack Ruby was mostly clueless.
Sure, when Ruby testified personally to Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren on the morning of June 7, 1964, there was this famous, brief exchange:
Mr. RUBY: At this moment, Lee Harvey Oswald isn’t guilty of committing the crime of assassinating President Kennedy. Jack Ruby is. How can I fight that, Chief Justice Warren?
Chief Justice WARREN: Well now, I want to say, Mr. Ruby, that as far as this Commission is concerned, there is no implication of that in what we are doing...That I can assure you.
Mr. RUBY: All right, there is a certain organization here...Chief Justice Warren, if it takes my life at this moment to say it, and Bill Decker said be a man and say it, there is a John Birch Society right now in activity, and Edwin Walker is one of the top men of this organization. Take it for what it is worth, Chief Justice Warren. Unfortunately for me, for me giving the people the opportunity to get in power, because of the act I committed, has put a lot of people in jeopardy with their lives...Don’t register with you, does it?
Chief Justice WARREN. No; I don’t understand that.
I say that Jack Ruby guessed right, but it was only a politically informed guess, since Ruby was a mobster type, and would never be trusted with sensitive information by anybody.
Seth Kantor’s book is a page-turner. He delved into Ruby’s mobster past. He examined Dallas police files about Ruby. As a long-time Dallas newsman Kantor knew lots of Dallas stories and lots of Dallas rumors.
For example, the story that Ruby was a gun runner for anti-Castro Cubans, which fizzled over one bagful of guns delivered to Lewis McWillie, and one visit with Santos Traficante in a Cuban jail cell.
Kantor carefully followed the stories about psychiatrists visiting Jack Ruby. He carefully reviewed Ruby’s lie detector test results. He reviewed Ruby’s telephone records.
Kantor wanted to know how an armed civilian could be at the DPD station and mingle among policemen while a known cop-killer and suspected Presidential assassin was being transferred to County Jail. It made Kantor suspicious. Reporting on the relationship between Jack Ruby and Dallas policemen, Kantor wrote:
“There is no doubt that Ruby was protected by certain police in Dallas. His rap sheet showed he was arrested 9 times in 16 years. These included charges that Ruby was operating an illegal after-hours saloon – a serious enough offense to shut him down. But no serious charges ever stuck.” (Kantor, 1978, p. 109)
Books about Dallas crime told about two high-class bordellos in Dallas, with streams running through the well-covered backyards. Ruby ran these places but didn’t own them. They were for high rollers. So, Ruby had defenders.
As for Seth Kantor, his lasting place in history will be as a witness for the Warren Commission about Jack Ruby – because he was ultimately considered to be untruthful. It happened like this.
On the day of the JFK Assassination, at Parkland Hospital, reporter Seth Kantor was on the beat, preparing to be admitted upstairs with his press pass. Then somebody tugged at his coat. “Seth!” the voice exclaimed. Kantor looked. It was Jack Ruby, happy to see a familiar face. Let’s read his WC testimony.
Mr. GRIFFIN: Now, can you tell us what happened when you saw Ruby – when you encountered Ruby at Parkland Hospital, what the encounter consisted of?
Mr. KANTOR: Yes; I apparently walked right past him, because the first I was aware of Jack Ruby was that as I was walking, I was stopped momentarily by a tug on the back of my jacket. And I turned and saw Jack Ruby standing there. He had his hand extended...I thought, well, there is Jack Ruby...It seemed just perfectly normal to see Jack Ruby standing there, because he was a known goer to events....And I took his hand and shook hands with him. He called me by name...I said, “Hello, Jack”...
Mr. GRIFFIN: I see. Go ahead.
Mr. KANTOR: ...And he said, “Isn’t this a terrible thing?” I said, “Yes”; but I also knew it was no time for small talk, and I was most anxious to continue on up the stairway, because I was standing right at the base of the stairway ...And he had quite a look of consternation on his face. He looked emotional – which also seemed fitting enough for Jack Ruby. But he asked me, curiously enough, he said, “Should I close my places for the next 3 nights, do you think?” And I said, “Yes, I think that is a good idea.” And I excused myself. And he said he understood, and I went on . And that was the sum total of it.
Now, that seems like a boring bit of WC testimony – except that it became a big deal for those who insisted that Jack Ruby was in Dealey Plaza at that exact moment. Worse still, when questioned by officials after killing LHO, Jack Ruby denied greeting Seth Kantor at Parkland Hospital.
That was enough for many folks – they decided Seth Kantor made it all up. But why? Kantor had nothing to gain from such a story. So, Kantor asked the opposite question, and suggested the answer.
“What would make Jack Ruby seek out a news reporter he knew at the hospital on Friday, and then deny, after Sunday, having been there? It’s because Ruby was not involved in a plot to kill anyone on Friday, but by Sunday he was.” (Kantor, 1978, p. 41)
Throughout his book Kantor suspected the complicity of rogue members of the Dallas Police force in the behavior of Jack Ruby on Sunday, November 24, 1963. Ruby was well-known by many policemen on the Dallas Police Force, yet Chief Jesse Curry claimed that only a tiny few knew Ruby, and mainly on police business.
But how did Jack Ruby get into the DPD basement only minutes before LHO was being transferred? Kantor wondered – if, and only if, there was any conspiracy involving Jack Ruby to kill LHO, then some Dallas policemen had to be in on it.
This is because it was less than two minutes from the time that Ruby was in the Western Union office across the street to the moment he shot LHO in the DPD basement.
Seth Kantor interviewed several Dallas police and their Chief Jesse Curry, whose only comment was that “it just seemed like an act of God that Ruby got in there.” (Kantor, 1978, p. 69)
That remark didn’t set well with Seth Kantor. So, he carefully reviewed the results of Jack Ruby’s lie detector test for the Warren Commission. There were four questions:
1. Did any foreign influence cause you to shoot Oswald?
2. Did you shoot Oswald because of any influence by the Underworld?
3. Did you shoot Oswald because of a Labor Union influence?
4. Did any Dallas police influence you to shoot Oswald?
Ruby answered “no” to the first three questions and passed the lie detector screening – because he was never asked the fourth question (Kantor, 1978, p. 181).
Kantor ended his book with the recognition that both LHO and Jack Ruby both claimed – separately, at the end – that they had been set up.
Thank you,
--Paul
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