Chapter XXIX: Part 29

Mr. GRIFFIN. How long before you arrived did Shore and Woodfield—how long before you arrived did they know you were coming? In other words, how many days elapsed between your conversation with Shore and your airplane trip out there?

Mr. RUBY. Gee, only a day or so, I think.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, had Shore mentioned Belli to you on the telephone in that first conversation?

Mr. RUBY. I think so, but I am not sure—I think so, but I am not sure, because I think in our conversation in the car that we had makes me think they mentioned it before now, because the conversation went like this: I must have mentioned before I haven’t heard of Belli. He says, “I know I haven’t mentioned Belli and I don’t want to push him too much,” but then they started to tell me how good he is, so we must have talked about him on the phone. My remark was, “But Mike, I never heard of him.”

So, anyhow, they said, the conversation got around that he is in town, and, “Would you care to see him?”

I says, “Well, I’ve got nothing to lose.”

In the meantime, they are telling me how great he is, of course.

Mr. HUBERT. Were you under the impression that they had asked Belli to come to Los Angeles?

Mr. RUBY. I don’t know.

Mr. HUBERT. Do you think it was a coincidence? Is there anything factual that happened that might suggest to you that——

Mr. RUBY. Yes; I think that they probably did. I shouldn’t say did, probably could have. I don’t want to make the statement that they did, because Woodfield later told me that Belli promised him that he would write Belli’s version of the trial or whatever you call it, for making the contact to represent my brother, words to that effect.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Woodfield said this?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. And you heard Woodfield say it or this is something that somebody else told you Woodfield said?

Mr. RUBY. No; I heard Woodfield say that.

Mr. HUBERT. Woodfield told that to you?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; sure.

Mr. GRIFFIN. When did he tell you that?

Mr. RUBY. That was later on when he learned—this was weeks later when he learned he wasn’t going to do the story. Somebody else—Belli brought in a fellow by the name of Al Moscow to do the story.

Mr. GRIFFIN. The story of your brother?

Mr. RUBY. No.

Mr. GRIFFIN. The story of Belli?

Mr. RUBY. Belli—Belli’s book on the trial.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, was this before——

Mr. RUBY. Wait, we have got to clarify something else. We are getting ahead of ourselves.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Let me just pinpoint time here. Was your conversation with Woodfield about Woodfield not being able to write the Belli story, did that conversation occur before, during, or after the trial of your brother?

Mr. RUBY. During, I would say.

Mr. GRIFFIN. You indicate by your tone of voice and your words that you are not certain as to when this took place. Could you try to think of what the surrounding circumstances were of this conversation and other things to pinpoint the time?

Mr. RUBY. It wasn’t after, I know. Whether or not it was before, it could have been just before, because I don’t remember when Al Moscow came down the first time.

Oh, well, we can know exactly. It was published all over the country that Belli had signed a contract to do a story on Jack Ruby and the trial and all that stuff, and it was all over the country, with Al Moscow to do the writing. So we can pinpoint that. I don’t remember the date.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, I took you off the track. Get back on your track.

Mr. RUBY. Where was I?

Mr. GRIFFIN. You said that we were skipping ahead, I think.

Mr. HUBERT. I think the last thing you were talking about before we diverted into these other aspects was that you said you had nothing to lose.

Mr. RUBY. Yes; that is right, so that evening we went to see Belli.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Where did you see Belli?

Mr. RUBY. In a home—a used home he had recently purchased in L.A.

Mr. HUBERT. Was an appointment made by them to see him?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; oh, yes. I think it was 7 o’clock, if I am not mistaken, that evening.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Where did they call Belli? Where was Belli when they called him to make the appointment.

Mr. RUBY. In L.A. from what they told me.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes; but do you know whether he was at his house or in an office or in a hotel or in a cocktail lounge or where he might have been?

Mr. RUBY. I don’t recall. I don’t remember.

Mr. HUBERT. Were you present when they called to make the appointment?

Mr. RUBY. I don’t remember that, either.

Mr. HUBERT. So we are at the point that you do go to see Belli.

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. HUBERT. I think this is a good breaking point for lunch.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Maybe.

(Whereupon, at 1:10 p.m., the proceeding was recessed.)

TESTIMONY OF EARL RUBY RESUMED

The proceeding reconvened at 2:30 p.m.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Let me state for the record that as we resume this deposition that I presume you understand that the oath you took this morning with Mr. Hubert and all the formalities which you went through still pertain to this hearing.

You are still under oath and we will continue in the same fashion that we did before.

If there are any questions about it why you are free to say anything.

We were talking, it seems to me, that we got you to the point where you had just met Mr. Belli.

Mr. RUBY. Belli, that is right.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, I wanted to confine your attention from here on in to certain narrow aspects of your dealings in Los Angeles, and that is your efforts to find financing for Jack’s trial and what the actual financing of the trial is.

Can you tell us, first of all, whether prior to seeing Belli, that day that you were in Los Angeles, you talked to Mr. Shore and Mr. Woodfield at all about the financing of the trial?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; I told them we had to raise money, and I told them Howard gave me a figure of anywhere from $25,000 to $50,000, and I asked them about how much they thought they could obtain from a story, and they said they couldn’t promise 50 but 30, 35, I think that was the figure that Woodfield used.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Would that be the gross figure or would that be what your brother would have ultimately had available from the entire sum for his defense?

Mr. RUBY. That was the figure, the net figure my brother would have left over after they took their commissions and percentage, and the agent’s fee and all of that.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How many people were to share in the proceeds from the sale, beside Jack?

Mr. RUBY. Woodfield, William Woodfield. Larry Shiller, the agent, and then they in turn said they would pay commissions to sales people.

I don’t know who those were, of course.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, this first day in Los Angeles——

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Prior to meeting Belli and your talk with them, did you discuss how long the article or biography would be and where it would be published and other details such as that?

Mr. RUBY. I don’t think so; not the first day.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, at the meeting at Mr. Belli’s house, did you discuss the biography of your brother?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What discussion took place there?

Mr. RUBY. Just the general discussion that Woodfield would do the writing of it. That is about all. And a figure did come up of how much could be raised through the story, through the selling of the story.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What was the speculation at that time?

Mr. RUBY. That is what I said, you know, the same figure.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How long did your meeting at Mr. Belli’s home last?

Mr. RUBY. I would say at least an hour.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How much of the time at Mr. Belli’s house was spent discussing the sale of the biography or the life story?

Mr. RUBY. Probably 10 minutes altogether.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, when you finished——

Mr. RUBY. Excuse me, would you want to know who else was present there?

Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes; I would.

Mr. RUBY. Sam Brody, one of his associates in L.A., another attorney, who was in the case for a while but if you will recall he stepped out, and Woodfield’s wife, yes, Woodfield’s wife, I don’t remember her name——

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was Mike Shore there?

Mr. RUBY. No: I don’t think so. No; I am quite sure he wasn’t.

Mr. GRIFFIN. When that meeting ended there, had there been an agreement——

Mr. RUBY. Excuse me a minute.

I am trying to think if Mike Shore was there. I don’t place him there. I am not sure he was there. I can’t say yes or no to that question.

Mr. GRIFFIN. He might have been there but you are not sure, is that your answer, or is your original answer that he wasn’t there still your best impression.

Mr. RUBY. If my recollection is correct, I think he just met Belli and then left. He had an appointment or something but I am not sure.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What was the conclusion of your talk at that point as to whether Belli would represent Jack.

Mr. RUBY. It wasn’t definite yet. We talked about lawyers and he mentioned what he thinks we ought to do, and psychiatrists we might need—and different things that—he mentioned he would bring in Tonahill. He worked with Tonahill before.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was that the first time Tonahill’s name was mentioned?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, did you remain in Los Angeles that night?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; I think I was there that night.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Were you there the next day?

Mr. RUBY. I think I left the next—about noon of the next day if I am not mistaken.

Mr. GRIFFIN. When you left Los Angeles what arrangements had been made with respect to the autobiography or the life story of Jack?

Mr. RUBY. Nothing really definite.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did Woodfield ultimately write the story that you are talking about?

Mr. RUBY. Yes, yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. And——

Mr. RUBY. He came down to Dallas later.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Where was that published, that story? Just tell us generally.

Mr. RUBY. Well, they offered it for sale to foreign countries, publications in foreign countries, and also here through the newspapers, through a sales organization that handles that, I think, out of New York.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was that life story serialized in a number of newspapers throughout the country?

Mr. RUBY. When you say serialized, I don’t understand what you mean.

Mr. GRIFFIN. It was published over a period of days.

Mr. RUBY. Yes, yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did it appear in any national magazines?

Mr. RUBY. No; not in the United States. I don’t think so.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you have some original discussion with Woodfield that it would appear, that he would try to sell it to a national magazine?

Mr. RUBY. Well, our agreement was that he would sell it—yes, that if he could sell it to a national magazine that he would.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you have any discussions with him about selling it to the Saturday Evening Post?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. When did that discussion take place?

Mr. RUBY. Not until later; probably down in Dallas when we met in Dallas later on.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How much did the Ruby defense ultimately realize from that newspaper article?

Mr. RUBY. The net?

Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.

Mr. RUBY. A little over $30,000.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you people get—did the Ruby defense also get contributions from people?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; but very little, very little.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Can you tell us approximately what the total of the contributions were?

Mr. RUBY. Contributions—are you speaking right up to today now or until the trial?

Mr. GRIFFIN. Not until the exact day. But do you have some figure as to what it was up to today? Roughly, what it is? I don’t ask you to be accurate to the penny.

Mr. RUBY. Well now, you see there are two funds, the story fund and a separate fund that a defense committee was trying to raise.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Well, the story fund comprises the $30,000.

Mr. RUBY. Separate; yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Is there anything else in that fund besides the $30,000, or did anything else go into it?

Mr. RUBY. Well, I put in whatever donations my brother received in the jail I deposited. It was only—I don’t think it was $500 from there.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, other monies were given for the defense, though, were they not?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did they go into the defense committee fund? Did these other monies go into the defense committee fund?

Mr. RUBY. Well, they were used for paying the bills, if that is what you mean.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What I am trying to get at is, you say there are two funds, one fund is what you call the newspaper fund——

Mr. RUBY. Well, you see, that—the newspaper—was more or less Jack Ruby’s own fund. He authorized to write the story, and that was more or less his own fund.

Mr. GRIFFIN. I see.

Mr. RUBY. But this is a separate committee that was set up in Chicago, and they got several hundred dollars but we spent—well, on one ad we spent $200 for the ad and we got $205 back—to give you an idea. We kept using the money hoping to get more money in but it didn’t work out too well.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Can you tell us who the members of that defense committee are?

Mr. RUBY. Oh, yes. There is Michael Levin, a lawyer in Chicago, my brother Hyman Ruby, Rubenstein, and Barney Ross, Marty Eritt.

Then there is another one or two in there that I am not too familiar with. But they have got stationery. I don’t have it with me.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What efforts did they make to obtain funds?

Mr. RUBY. Well, they wrote some letters and they did advertising, as I told you. However, quite a few of the—quite a few—most of the newspapers wouldn’t take the ad. The Chicago papers wouldn’t take it. The Tribune, and the Sun-Times in Chicago wouldn’t take an ad for an appeal for funds for Jack Ruby.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Were you ever given any reasons?

Mr. RUBY. No; the answers were it is not their policy, and there was another reason, I can’t remember the exact words. I don’t recall. But Mike Levin did most of that, you know—the lawyer—he did most of the calling and he told me, but I don’t remember the exact words and I would rather not say—you know, if I am not sure of the exact words.

Mr. GRIFFIN. I don’t want you to say if you didn’t hear it.

Mr. RUBY. No.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you keep the records for that defense committee fund?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; most—yes; I would say yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you have those records here with you today?

Mr. RUBY. No; I gave them to an agent, though. I give them to an agent some time ago. I gave him a list of all the monies that came in, and I think I even gave him a list of who I paid it out to.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What is your best estimate of how much money came in altogether in the defense committee fund?

Mr. RUBY. Now you are not talking about the story—right?

Mr. GRIFFIN. That is right.

Mr. RUBY. From the defense committee fund between $1,500 and $2,000, altogether.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What were the expenses of the fund or is this—excuse me—is this $1,500 or $2,000—is that a net figure or a gross figure?

Mr. RUBY. That is a gross.

Mr. GRIFFIN. All right. After expenses, what was ultimately left for the application to the defense?

Mr. RUBY. I can’t give you an exact figure because I just can’t recall all of the expenses we had, because I just paid a bill last week, and I just don’t have it, but I would say we spent probably close to a thousand dollars, because one ad alone was close to $300, and the letter was another $300—is $600 already that I can think of. There were other, smaller expenses.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you know what the total expenses were that have been for the defense of your brother so far?

Mr. RUBY. In the low thirties. Of course, you must understand we are continually spending money, so I don’t have it.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Have you been given an estimate recently as to what the total expenses of the defense of your brother is going to be?

Mr. RUBY. An estimate?

Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.

Mr. RUBY. You mean if it goes to the Supreme Court and all that?

Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes; have you been given any estimate as to what the total expenses might be.

Mr. RUBY. No; I would say no. Just said it would run into a lot of money but no figure was ever actually quoted, except by Belli.

You see, he really didn’t, either. He just—I am trying to think what his statement was, now. No; he didn’t either, because at that time we weren’t talking about Supreme Court, we were only talking about—you know—the first trial.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What was his——

Mr. RUBY. He mentioned between $75,000 and $100,000.

Mr. GRIFFIN. As a total cost.

Mr. RUBY. Of the first trial. And that is now his fee and everything, when you are talking expenses. I am talking everything they wanted.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How much of a fee did he quote to you at that time?

Mr. RUBY. He was talking about $50,000, if I recall correctly.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did he quote it to you personally or is this a figure you have learned from somebody else?

Mr. RUBY. No; he quoted it to me.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now how much——

Mr. RUBY. In other words, it wasn’t a definite figure. He said it could be around, you know.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Have the costs of the investigation for the defense been paid to date?

Mr. RUBY. What do you mean by investigations?

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did the defense hire investigators?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. And have these investigators been paid for their work?

Mr. RUBY. Not completely.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you know——

Mr. RUBY. Well, there is a difference of opinion so——

Mr. GRIFFIN. Can you tell us how much has been paid and how much is claimed as to the total bill?

Mr. RUBY. Well, the original investigator that we had, I think, we paid him about $5,000 already, plus some expenses of a thousand dollars or so; I don’t remember the exact figures, and he claims we owe him $1,500.

Mr. GRIFFIN. More?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; and there is a little dispute about that.

Now, we have got a new investigator, I don’t know his name there. My sister hired him down there and she has given him several hundred dollars, I don’t know how much. I don’t know how much she gave him.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did Mr. Howard get any money?

Mr. RUBY. Oh, yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How much was he paid?

Mr. RUBY. I think we paid him, I am not sure of this figure though, $3,500.

Mr. GRIFFIN. And the remaining funds that have been paid, I take it, have been paid to Mr. Belli?

Mr. RUBY. Belli got, I think, $11,000, if I am not mistaken. Then we paid the doctors, I don’t know, $5,000 or $6,000, you know, the psychiatrists that came down, and some of my expenses came out, just my flight expenses and telephone calls, and who else now?

We gave Burleson some money, he has got, I think, about a thousand dollars that we gave him since the trial. He was supposed to get paid from Belli before. That is the reason we didn’t pay him. However, he claimed Belli never gave him anything. And we paid, like George Senator, the witness, our No. 1 witness, we had to give him money to live on because he was so, what shall I say the word for that, well, he lost his job and he was so upset he couldn’t, you know, he just couldn’t work.

And then we had to pay—he went home and I had to send him airplane fare to come back, you know, and there is——

Mr. GRIFFIN. How about Larry Crafard, did you pay him any money?

Mr. RUBY. Larry Crafard, I think we just gave him a few dollars, $5 maybe because he was broke when he was living on the road, he didn’t have a dime, so I think I gave him some money.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did Larry incidentally contact you any time while you were in Detroit?

Mr. RUBY. No, no; I wish he would have, because he hitchhiked all the way down there, and I was driving at the same time, but he didn’t know I lived there, and we——

Mr. GRIFFIN. How was he notified to come to the trial?

Mr. RUBY. I don’t know. If I remember correctly he came on his own. He just thought that when all this came out about, you know, Jack getting him to take that picture of Earl Warren, he had the camera or something, I forgot the full details myself, but he is the one who took the picture, right, if I am not mistaken, and he just thought he should come down to help Jack as much as he possibly could.

Could I go a little further?

Mr. GRIFFIN. I don’t really want to pry into this unless this is something you care to reveal.

Mr. RUBY. The most important thing is coming up now, I mean one of the most important things.

Mr. GRIFFIN. All right. I do want to reflect this—that I don’t want to push you into saying things, talking about subjects that you would rather not talk about, and I realize that this in one of them. Now, if you do want to say something about it why, of course, we would be happy to hear anything you want to say.

Mr. RUBY. Well, I returned home, I went from L.A. to Dallas, I talked to Jack, I talked to Howard. We hadn’t hired Belli yet. He was going to go down and see Jack, and talk to him before he decided to come in, you know, and take over the case.

I went back to Detroit and in a couple of days I get another call, I get a call, from Woodfield. He is very upset. He just heard some news that he thinks I must know. However, it is so confidential that he can’t even tell it to me over the phone. And I talk to Mike Shore and between us—they couldn’t tell me on the phone, I had better go back to California.

So, I go out there again. The story he tells me is that, in the meantime he is trying to make contacts, this is about a week later. He is trying to make contact to sell the story to the different publications, to the Saturday Evening Post, you know, and other publications, and somebody from the Saturday Evening Post called him, I think—now this is what he told me—and said that Tom Howard was up to the Saturday Evening Post office in Dallas offering for sale a picture of President Kennedy with a piece of his head shot off, and so I immediately, or as soon as I could, when I left them, I called my sister Eva in Dallas and I said, “Get a hold of the agent that has been talking—that has been taking—your story there and tell them about this so they can check into it.”

And then I went home, I flew back to Detroit.

By the time I got to Detroit they had tried to contact me to get some more information on the story. I mentioned this to Tom Howard and he denied it.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was his denial a flat denial?

Mr. RUBY. Yes, yes; you know, complete, and you know. However, I think it was the fellow at the Saturday Evening Post that said—now I have given all this to the special agents or, I think, the Treasury Department.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.

Mr. RUBY. The Saturday Evening Post man said, “Well, let them come in front of me in my office and deny it.”

But, of course, we never brought it to a head. But, anyhow, I don’t know what happened. They never told me, of course, as you know.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you recall the name of the Saturday Evening Post man in Dallas that Howard allegedly contacted.

Mr. RUBY. No; I did originally but I think I gave it to the agents.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you talk personally to this man from the Saturday Evening Post who claims he talked to Howard?

Mr. RUBY. No; Woodfield.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Somebody—you just reported that somebody said—“Let Howard come before me and deny it.”

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. I take it this was the Saturday Evening Post man who allegedly made that statement?

Mr. RUBY. Let me look in my book. Perhaps I have it.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What I am getting at is where did you get—who told you—that the Saturday Evening Post man said that?

Mr. RUBY. Woodfield.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Woodfield?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. So everything you know about this transaction between Howard and the Saturday Evening Post comes either from Woodfield or from Howard’s denial?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; right. I don’t have it. I may have it somewhere else in another book but I don’t have it here.

By the way, if you are asking about the finances, we still have bills of—altogether from what my sister tells me—of close to $10,000 that are unpaid now.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Is there any money left in either of the funds at this point?

Mr. RUBY. No; I have been putting it off.

I mean, Burleson insists he wants some money so I have been sending him out of my personal account.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How soon after your brother shot Oswald did you see him?

Mr. RUBY. I think it was about at least a week.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Well——

Mr. RUBY. I am not sure. Because I made so many trips there. I was down there about seven or eight times.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was it before you went to Los Angeles to see Mike Shore?

Mr. RUBY. No; I think I made it on the way back. I went to Los Angeles first, the first trip, and then on the way back I went to Dallas.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How much time did you spend with Jack on this first visit?

Mr. RUBY. Well, they only let you talk about 20 minutes or a half hour at the most.

Mr. GRIFFIN. When is the last time you have seen him?

Mr. RUBY. The last time I saw him was—I was there at the verdict, you know.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Have you seen him since the verdict?

Mr. RUBY. Yes, oh, yes; I stayed there for at least several days, anyhow, and I saw him every day at least once.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Have you seen him since then?

Mr. RUBY. No, no; since I came back, since that trip, I haven’t been back.

Mr. GRIFFIN. All right. Did you notice any change in your brother’s mental and physical condition between the first time that you saw him in Dallas and the last time that you saw him in Dallas?

Mr. RUBY. Oh, yes; definitely. Physically he lost about 30 pounds, and you know, his face was drawn and his eyes sunken, and in addition to that he was despondent, of course, and you couldn’t—he would have to repeat questions or ask questions from him more than once to get a reply. It just didn’t seem to register all the time.

Even Belli mentioned that he couldn’t get across to Jack all the time, and Burleson mentioned to me several times that Jack is off his rocker. This was, you know——

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was this after the verdict or before?

Mr. RUBY. No; before. He says, “Your brother is off his rocker. He has got himself involved with all the Jews all over the world and he doesn’t know what he is talking about,” but my brother did know what he was talking about. It was Burleson who didn’t understand. Because in order to understand—it is a Jewish problem—and most Jews would understand it.

Burleson, not being familiar with this, it just went over his head. I didn’t even think of it then but he kept telling me, “Your brother has got himself all mixed up with all the Jews all over the world and he is off his rocker.” That was the statement he made several times to me.

Mr. GRIFFIN. I would like to explore this with you at some length if you don’t mind.

Mr. RUBY. That is why I brought this with me. I have all of this in here.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Let me try to ask you some questions first and then we will get into the papers that you have brought. You say there was a disagreement, that you disagreed with Burleson’s appraisal of your brother’s involvement with the Jewish question.

Mr. RUBY. He couldn’t explain it. So, really, I didn’t understand it myself. I didn’t know what he was talking about at the time.

Mr. GRIFFIN. You subsequently did come to learn what he was talking about, I take it?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; it wasn’t until somebody brought it to my attention, really.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What was brought to your attention—what particular facts?

Mr. RUBY. Well, the fact it seemed that Jack in digging down into his past, he had an obsession about the Jewish people, and he always went out of his way to show people that Jews are not bad people, you know, because you know they have been persecuted over the years, and that is one of the reasons he brought the policemen at the station sandwiches and went out of his way to bring them cheesecakes and he was in debt to me for thousands of dollars, yet he never sent me any money but he always had money to give more or less or lend to these other people, almost all non-Jews to show them that a Jew would help them out.

A policeman became a father and was short on money, he would lend him a couple of hundred, never got it back, never got anything back.

Another friend he ran into needed a car to get a job—lent him a few hundred.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you know—can you give us the names of some of these people?

Mr. RUBY. No; but my sister has them down there. I don’t have it. But I know of these instances, and he read all these books on the Jewish problem, the persecution of the Jews, going all the way back.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How do you know that?

Mr. RUBY. I know from my sister. He lived with my sister and she told me, and he told me—both.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Is this Eva?

Mr. RUBY. Eva; yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Jack has told you that he read books on the Jewish problems?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; he even went to lectures on it, the synagogue, they had movies of the killings of the Jews in Germany. He went to all of these, things of that sort.

Mr. GRIFFIN. I don’t know if Mr. Hubert has covered this or not, but do you recall an episode or a period back before World War II when Jack showed some concern about the Jewish problem, about the treatment of the Jews?

Mr. RUBY. Before World War II?

Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.

Mr. RUBY. You mean—well, he was in Chicago in the early thirties, they had the Nazi Bund meetings and Jack was always one to go and see if he could help break them up.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you go on any of these groups?

Mr. RUBY. No, no.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Well——

Mr. RUBY. He was about 4 years older than I am.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Over what period of time was Jack involved in trying to break up these Bund meetings?

Mr. RUBY. In the early thirties there, I don’t remember.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you remember any other people who participated with him in those?

Mr. RUBY. No; I don’t know their names.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was this a group of people or would Jack go alone?

Mr. RUBY. No, no; it was a group. But I don’t know the other names.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was it any sort of organized group? Was there an organization that he belonged to?

Mr. RUBY. No; I don’t think it was an organization. It just was several Jewish fellows and I don’t think they had an organization of any kind. Just when they learned that meetings were taking place, they would go there and try to break them up.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Was Jack ever arrested in connection with any of those?

Mr. RUBY. Not as far as I know, because he has no arrest along those lines at all.

In fact, the only violation he has, from what I could gather, was being open after hours, and carrying concealed weapons which, from what I understand, they don’t need a permit in Dallas, you know, when he carried large sums of money.

Other than that—you must understand I was away from him, practically from the time he went to Dallas until the incident. I only saw him for short periods of time.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you ever hear of the Dave Miller gang?

Mr. RUBY. Oh, yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What was the Dave Miller gang?

Mr. RUBY. Well, I read about them in the paper. I was just a school kid then, but that was a gang that hung around Dave Miller’s fight gymnasium, that is all I can remember. But I know something like that existed.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How did they get newspaper publicity?

Mr. RUBY. I don’t know.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did Jack have anything to do with those people?

Mr. RUBY. He used to hang around Dave Miller’s gym but he was Barney Ross’ follower like, and I think Barney Ross trained there and so he was very close with him.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Well now, this group that was referred to as the Dave Miller gang.

Mr. RUBY. Dave Miller was a referee.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Dave Miller was a referee?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; Davy Miller was a referee in Chicago for many years.

Mr. GRIFFIN. And he ran a gymnasium?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; to train the fighters.

Mr. GRIFFIN. And did Dave Miller have a following of some sort?

Mr. RUBY. Well, I would say it was—there was a restaurant downstairs and it was a hangout. He owned the restaurant and the gym, and he was a referee so the fighters hung around there and other people came around to see the fighters, so it was a general hangout for people of that type.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did the Dave Miller gang have anything to do with these efforts to break up the Bund meetings?

Mr. RUBY. I think so, but I don’t have any concrete evidence. I think they did.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Would you go ahead and tell us—let me ask you this, rather. You say that your awareness of your brother’s, what we’ll call involvement with his Jewish background or his position in society as a person of Jewish background, was brought to your attention by someone else. Who brought this to your attention?

Mr. RUBY. No; what was brought to my attention, I knew he was also interested in the Jewish problem, but I didn’t think it entered into this picture because I didn’t—this article here that was drawn up by Sol Dann, who through his daughter, a friend of the family, became interested in it because he could see what was in the background, and he studied all the things and he got some information from me and he talked to my brother, my sister and the psychiatrists on the case, and the more he talked to them the more he could see that this was an obsession with my brother, who probably didn’t realize it was as great an obsession as it actually was, and that is probably one of the reasons why Belli mentioned to me on a few occasions, “I can’t get across to your brother. I don’t have a client.”

He says, “I have a patient, not a client.”

He mentioned that to me several times. He says, “I can’t get through to your brother.”

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did he give any specific indications?

Mr. RUBY. No; I didn’t go any further either, because I thought Belli was such a great lawyer. I say—I don’t even remember what I said, I just—then he had psychiatrists, when the psychiatrist would interview my brother he would talk to him afterward, and if ever I asked, I mean, what they say, he says, “Well, they claim he is sick, he has got this”—I don’t know the medical terms he used, you know, and so on and so forth, and, “We have a good case, he is definitely sick,” and all that, but the real problem. I mean the obsession itself, I don’t think that even registered with Belli or the other psychiatrists, because as far as I know—because it was never mentioned at the trial, and the psychiatrists never mentioned it to us, and we didn’t think to tell it to them, because we didn’t know if it had any importance or not, but we find now in talking to the psychiatrists that it is of great importance and it was probably one of the factors in his thinking the way he did.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What about Mr. Burleson—did he tell you during this period, when you didn’t understand what he was talking about—what did he tell you about Jack?

Mr. RUBY. Well, he was aloof from us. That was the big problem with that trial.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Let me say, Mr. Ruby, I don’t want to, I am not asking you to comment on the way Mr. Burleson conducted himself, but I am trying to find out what it was he said to you about Jack which you didn’t comprehend at the time.

Mr. RUBY. He said he is getting himself involved with all the Jews all over the world on an international scale—“He is off his rocker”—that was one of his——

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did he specify any of the things Jack was talking about?

Mr. RUBY. No; he used to say, “Jews all over the world, on an international scale,” that was his expression several times and then, of course, he stated, “He is off his rocker.”

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did Mr. Burleson tell you this sort of thing before the trial, or only after the trial?

Mr. RUBY. Before and during, I would say.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Right.

Mr. RUBY. And not so much after, because after we were disgusted, I will tell you that.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How long before the trial did Mr. Burleson begin to call these problems about involvement with Jews.

Mr. RUBY. Right after he got involved. Because he lived in Dallas, and he talked to my brother more so than anyone else because he lives there and right after he got into the case, not a few days later, he says, you know, made the statement again, “That your brother has got himself involved with all the Jews on an international scale and he is off his rocker, he doesn’t know what he is talking about.”

And to be truthful to you I didn’t understand his statement. It didn’t register with me because they kept saying, Belli said, “Your brother is sick. I have got a patient on my hands, you know. I am trying to take care of your brother, and I can’t get across to him.”

And my brother, I know, he had many fights because of the Jewish question, of being called, you know, names, referring to his Jewish parents and all that stuff, and, of course, I have been through it myself but he more so, and he fought more about it.

He was always quick tempered and just couldn’t take it.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What other fights did he get involved in because of the Jewish question?

Mr. RUBY. Many fights. I know on several occasions he came home once with his suit full of blood from downtown.

He was downtown Chicago. I said, “What happened?”

He said, “Somebody called me a dirty Jew or something like that.”

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you know who he fought with on that occasion?

Mr. RUBY. No, no; there are many instances that my older brothers and sisters know of because I was younger, 4 years younger and in his teens, early teens, I didn’t go with him because 4 years makes a big difference, and I went my way and he went his way.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How old was Jack at the time that you saw him with this suit full of blood?

Mr. RUBY. This goes back now, if I recall in 1946, I think, 1946.

Mr. GRIFFIN. This was after he got out of the service?

Mr. RUBY. Yes, yes; he told me he had several fights in the service regarding this. He told me he had fights with a professional heavyweight in the service because he said something about the Jews.

My brother was so Jewish conscious that it didn’t make any difference whether he said, swore at him for being a Jew or he swore at somebody else a half a block away. He would get in there and fight right away, you know, unless they apologized and what have you. And he—so this, checking into it from what the psychiatrists tell me, he went out of his way to show the gentiles that in their thinking that all the Jews are no good or money grabbers or what have you, here was a nice guy that went out of his way—and didn’t have the money—to help anybody he could.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you have any examples of this from the period that you worked with him at Earl Products?

Mr. RUBY. Well, this——

Mr. GRIFFIN. Let’s just focus on that for a while.

Mr. RUBY. He was with me only a short period.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What examples do you have from that period?

Mr. RUBY. I know from Earl Products is when he had that fight.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What else?

Mr. RUBY. That I know of. Other instances, I can’t think of because as I said he went around with an older group of fellows than I did. We didn’t run around together. And not only that, I was married then, and you know he has been a bachelor all his life so he went to places——

Mr. GRIFFIN. You traveled with him, didn’t you in the early forties you traveled with Jack, didn’t you?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; a little bit.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, look back on that experience, if you can, do you remember any episodes from that?

Mr. RUBY. Actually, you must understand I didn’t travel with him. I only met him every weekend. He traveled by himself, and I traveled by myself, and we got together on weekends and then we would only see each other Friday night and then he would go on.

And we traveled through the East mostly.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Mr. Ruby, you have brought certain papers with you, and Mr. Hubert is now in the room, and I want to bring him up to date a little bit on where we are, and we have been talking sometime about your brother’s obsession, as I think you call it, with his position in society as a person of Jewish background, and you indicated to me that you really only fully became aware of this problem since your brother shot Oswald, but that you have thought about it considerably since then, and that you have brought with you certain papers in connection with it.

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. I wonder first if you can first identify a paper in your hand, if you will identify that paper, and I will give it an exhibit number.

Mr. RUBY. What would you call this——

Mr. GRIFFIN. You are handing me——

Mr. RUBY. This document.

Mr. GRIFFIN. A document that consists of 30 typewritten pages purporting to have been prepared by a man named Sol Dann, 1820 David Stott Building, Detroit 26, Mich. This is a Xerox copy and on the first page I am going to write your name “Earl Ruby Deposition, June 3, 1964, Exhibit No. 1” and I will ask you if you will state for the record what that is.

(Earl Ruby Exhibit No. 1 was marked for identification.)

Mr. RUBY. Well, this I would like to get into the record if I can.

Mr. GRIFFIN. What is Exhibit No. 1 and then I will mark this other thing that you gave me.

Mr. RUBY. This is only what I want to state.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Exhibit No. 1, tell us what that is. In a general fashion tell us what that consists of.

Mr. RUBY. Well, this is as was stated, prepared by Mr. Dann as to why or one of the reasons, that Ruby, that is Jack Ruby, shot Oswald.

Mr. GRIFFIN. All right. Now, you have also handed me a handwritten penciled set of papers consisting of three pages.

Mr. RUBY. I was going to read that, is that all right?

Mr. GRIFFIN. Certainly.

Mr. RUBY. That was my intention if it is all right with you.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you have a statement you would like to make for the record?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. All right, go ahead then.

Mr. RUBY. I am filing this document with you because it explains why I need the help of the United States, and more especially, your help.

My brother, Jack, was deprived, and is presently being deprived, of his constitutional and civil rights. The hatred and bigotry in Dallas, Tex., resulted in the assassination of our President. It almost cost the lives of our present President, Mr. Johnson, and others.

With all the protection that this Government could give it could not guard against and prevent the assassination.

My family and myself are unable to cope with that situation and it may result in my brother’s death.

As pointed out in this document, my brother, Jack, is being made the scapegoat of this horrible situation. I, therefore, need, and respectfully request, your assistance in order that those guilty of this atrocity, either because of their acts or omission, gross negligence, or commission shall not go unpunished or undisciplined.

I don’t think that my brother, who had nothing to do with the assassination of the President, should be the only one punished. My family as well as myself have almost exhausted all of our resources in an effort to protect my brother’s civil rights, but now I am calling upon you for the help we need.

That is it.

Mr. HUBERT. I suggest you put the document in the record as well.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you mind, Mr. Ruby, if we would put that in the record?

Mr. RUBY. No; this I didn’t use.

Mr. GRIFFIN. I will mark the three pages from what you have just read.

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. I have marked them “Earl Ruby Deposition, June 3, 1964, Exhibit No. 2,” and that is on the first page. I think on the second page I will write Exhibit No. 2, and on the third page I will write Exhibit No. 2.

I will ask you if we may keep this and include this as part of our permanent record.

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Let me hand you Exhibit No. 2 and ask you if you will sign it on the first page and initial each of the other pages.

(Earl Ruby Exhibit No. 2 was marked for identification.)

Mr. HUBERT. Mr. Ruby, may I ask, this is addressed to whom, this Exhibit No. 2, which you actually read into the record. Who are you addressing it to?

Mr. RUBY. To the Commission.

Mr. HUBERT. To the Commission. It is your desire that we see that the members of the Commission receive that document, is that correct?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. HUBERT. That is to say both your letter and the attachment?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; both.

Mr. HUBERT. I notice that Exhibit No. 1 which is the long one of 30 pages, has the name Sol Dann.

Mr. RUBY. Sol Dann.

Mr. HUBERT. I also notice he didn’t sign it. Did he actually prepare it?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; he did.

Mr. HUBERT. Have you read it?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. HUBERT. Do you concur in what he says then?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. HUBERT. Is there any reason why he didn’t sign it?

Mr. RUBY. No; I didn’t even notice it, to be honest with you.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Let me ask Mr. Ruby, I will hand him back Exhibit No. 1, and ask you if you will simply sign that on the first page, so we may have it properly marked for the record.

Mr. HUBERT. Let me ask you about Exhibit No. 2. This is in pencil?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; I didn’t think that you would want it so I, of course, didn’t——

Mr. HUBERT. When did you write this Exhibit No. 2?

Mr. RUBY. Yesterday.

Mr. HUBERT. It is your own handwriting?

Mr. RUBY. Yes, yes.

Mr. HUBERT. All right.

I will have photostats made of this.

Mr. RUBY. If it doesn’t take, I can rewrite it in ink in 5 or 10 minutes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Let me ask you some questions to get the background of this document which we have marked here as Exhibit No. 1.

First of all, would you tell us how you happened to know Mr. Dann?

Mr. RUBY. His daughter teaches Hebrew in the school where my daughter attends, and his daughter impressed on him, after several conversations to contact me, and see what he could do to help us because he has been very active in helping I should say, the minority groups of any organization.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Can you tell us what Mr. Dann does for a living?

Mr. RUBY. He is an attorney.

Mr. GRIFFIN. In Detroit?

Mr. RUBY. Yes.

Mr. GRIFFIN. How old a man is Mr. Dann?

Mr. RUBY. I would say 55. That is a guess, of course.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you know Mr. Dann before his daughter talked with you about——

Mr. RUBY. His daughter didn’t talk with me. She talked with him and finally convinced him to contact me and see what he could do to help us.

Mr. GRIFFIN. When did Mr. Dann first contact you?

Mr. RUBY. Shortly after the verdict was passed.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, do you know what efforts Mr. Dann made after talking with you, to talk with other people in order to prepare this document?

Mr. RUBY. Yes; he talked with many other people, the psychiatrists, he talked with Dr. West. He talked with Dr. Smith, the chief counsel, he talked, with Mr. Charles Bellows, the consultant on the case.

He talked to a psychiatrist by the name of Tanay in Detroit, and he mentioned several other people but I don’t recall their names.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Can you——

Mr. RUBY. Excuse me; he also talked to my brother in Dallas, Sam.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you say he talked with your brother Jack?

Mr. RUBY. No; he talked to Eva. But he talked to Dr. West and Dr. Smith and Bellows who spent a lot of time with Jack, of course, altogether.

Mr. GRIFFIN. You indicated to Mr. Hubert that this Exhibit No. 1 had been read by you and that it generally reflected your views.

Mr. RUBY. Yes; yes, sir.

Mr. GRIFFIN. Can you tell us in your own words generally what is set forth in Exhibit No. 1?

Mr. RUBY. Well, it goes into, it explains Jack’s thinking along the Jewish problem, and his obsession and his love of President Kennedy, his going out of the way to try to be an exceptionally good guy by helping gentiles as much as he possibly could, and in any way he could. It also explains happenings at the trial. The withholding of evidence by District Attorney Henry Wade that should have been presented to the court. That my brother had received psychiatric help when he was 10 years old and none of the family knew it except the FBI, who had turned this information over to Wade.