the hallway when the phone rang and I forget whether I picked up the
phone or Mary picked up the phone. You see Ann doesn’t answer the phone
because she doesn’t get many calls. Her son is on the west coast, so
we, Mary and I, pick up the phone. It was like an atomic bomb hitting
the top of the house and everything caved in on you, like a disaster.
It is just unbelievable. If a family has incorrigibles where they get
into trouble and you get them out of jail, and the family is used to
it, you know, you feel OK. But we never had anything like that in our
lives, nothing. We are not accustomed to such things. We all work for a
living, some of us work very hard. We are not the notorious type, we
don’t care for no publicity. We all have pretty good personalities. My
customers still laugh at my corny stories I tell them the year before.
I don’t have to impress anybody. We don’t go for none of that big shot
stuff.
So, when this thing hit us, you people can’t imagine, and then the
phone started to ring. It kept ringing from that Sunday morning from
reporters, and newspaper people from all over the country, and it just
didn’t stop. We didn’t know what to say. It was just sickening. We had
no answer for them.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you have occasion to go to Dallas at any time in the
fall of--before the President was assassinated?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you go to Dallas afterward?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When did you go?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Just before Christmas, let’s say December 23, 24, and
25. No; on Christmas day I was on the road so I probably was there for
2 or 3 days around that period.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, did you know any of Jack’s friends in Dallas?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No; because I wasn’t familiar with Dallas.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you know Ralph Paul?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I met him later.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Had you known him before then?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Never even heard of the name.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about George Senator?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Never heard the name.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you have anything to do with raising money for the
defense?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Tell us what you had to do with that.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Here is a copy of, almost like this that we placed in
certain newspapers.
Mr. GRIFFIN. I will simply read this into the record. You have handed
me a sheet of paper on which is printed in capital letters on the first
line, “Appeal for Fair Play.” And on the second line “Save Jack Ruby”
with three exclamation marks after it. Then in lowercase letters with
the initial capitals “Funds for his Defense Needed” on one line. “Send
your Contributions to:” on the next line, and then in all caps under
that “Jack Ruby Defense Fund Committee,” then with initial caps and
lowercase letters “P.O. Box 5226, Chicago 80, Illinois.”
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Right.
Mr. GRIFFIN. That is an advertisement you say you ran?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. They ran it in several newspapers. One was the New York
Times, I believe. It was rather unsuccessful, rather unsuccessful. But
here is one we sent out 2,000 letters and we lost $200 out of it. We
got $5 back.
Mr. GRIFFIN. This is a copy of a letter on the stationery headed “Jack
Ruby Appeal Committee”.
Now, do you want this stationery?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. You can have it. Just keep it. Keep this, too, so you
will have it for your records.
Mr. GRIFFIN. All right. Let me mark the “Appeal for Fair Play”
advertisement as “Washington, D.C., deposition of Hyman Rubenstein,
June 5, 1964, Exhibit No. 1,” and let me ask you if you will sign it.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Down here?
Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. All right.
(Hyman Rubenstein Exhibit No. 1 was marked for identification.)
Mr. GRIFFIN. And the next piece of paper, the letter on Jack Ruby
Appeal Committee stationery I am going to mark “Washington, D.C.,
deposition of Hyman Rubenstein, June 5, 1964, Exhibit No. 2,” and ask
you if you will sign this also.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Sure. I have got “Hy Rubenstein.”
Mr. GRIFFIN. That is all right.
(Hyman Rubenstein Exhibit No. 2 was marked for identification.)
Mr. GRIFFIN. All right.
Now, Exhibit No. 2 is a letter addressed to “Dear Friend” dated April
30, 1964, and signed by Michael Levin, Chairman of the Jack Ruby Appeal
Committee.
Members of the committee listed on the left-hand side are Michael
Levin, Chairman, Marty Eritt, Blanca Fortgang, Elmer Gertz, Ann
Osborne, Barney Ross.
Who is Blanca Fortgang?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I don’t know, probably a friend of Mike Levin.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Who is Elmer Gertz?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Also the fellow who got the letter up and the ad up, a
friend of Mike Levin.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Who is Ann Osborne?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I don’t know who she is. I think she is the one who got
the letter out and got the list of names that was submitted to Mike
Levin, the 2,000 names that cost us $200.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now were Fortgang, Gertz, and Osborne friends of your
brother, did they know Jack?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No. I am almost positive that not one of those people
even know Jack.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about Mike, Michael Levin.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Mike is our family lawyer. Mike knew Jack ever since he
was a kid.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about Marty Eritt?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Marty Eritt I told you they probably went to school
together and probably knew each other on the West Side.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Barney Ross?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Barney Ross he has known all his life.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What was your connection with the Jack Ruby Appeal
Committee?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. It was hard to get members names. A lot of people,
business people, don’t want to put their names on this kind of a
committee. So I used my name, I said, “Mike, go ahead and use my name.”
I had nothing to hide and nothing to be ashamed of. We needed money.
Those trials are expensive, gentlemen.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Who was handling the funds for the defense?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Earl.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about the money that was raised by the Jack Ruby
Appeal Committee? Did Earl have anything to do with that?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Earl.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you have anything to do with the raising of funds
other than this letter and this advertisement?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Nothing outside of these two.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When was the first time that you talked with your brother
Jack after the shooting?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I think it was down in Dallas. I believe it was down in
Dallas when I was down there.
Mr. GRIFFIN. That was December sometime?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes, sir, either the 22d or the 23d of December is as
close as I can get to it.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you recall seeing him on that occasion?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you recall how long you talked to him?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Quite a while. I think I was there with Eva, and who
else was down there, Sammy.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Can you tell us what you said to him and what he said?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. What did we talk about: Something about, this is the
gist of it if I can remember right because I walked away thinking about
it to myself that he loved the President and something happened to him,
that he don’t remember exactly what it was, and all that I remembered
is the last time when he was down at the Western Union office when he
wired that dancer of his $25 that she needed for room rent and I says,
“What else, Jack?” And he said, “That is all I can remember.”
Then he mentioned something about the policemen down in Dallas. He said
they lied. He said, “I didn’t say any of those things.”
Mr. GRIFFIN. That would have been after the trial that he mentioned
that to you. I am talking about conversations he had before the trial.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Oh, that is right, yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you remember that meeting?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Well, there wasn’t much to say. First of all they have
a little piece of glass that big that you can see him through.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You are indicating about 6 by 6.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. It is hard to talk to people through a piece of glass
like that. You have got a barrier between you. He looked good. Jack
looked good, but he didn’t act right. He looked disturbed to me.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What about him, what did you see that----
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. He wasn’t our Jack 100 percent. There was something
bothering him.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You don’t know?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I don’t know. I am not a psychiatrist. I can’t figure
the man out. We knew it wasn’t right. We thought it was the environment
in the jail, maybe he was mistreated.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Are you talking about the time you saw him before
the--before Christmas?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What did he say or what indications did you see about his
face or mannerisms?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Something like “What are they keeping me here for, what
have they got me in here for?”
Half sentences. He asked me if I called certain people and here I
haven’t even known any people. He gave me a list of names to call and
I tried to write them down, you know, quick and I didn’t know nobody.
I didn’t want to argue with him. I didn’t want to aggravate his
situation. I didn’t want to disturb him any more than I had to and he
gave me names, called off names, I said I will get in touch with them.
Later on when I went out with Eva, I said, “Who are these people I am
supposed to call?” She says, “Forget about it. He gives me the same
thing, people I am supposed to see and call to help him.” I didn’t
know. And he wanted us to get every lawyer in the State of Texas. “Did
you call this guy? Did you call Percy Foreman and did you call him?” I
didn’t know anybody. We didn’t know who to call. We were strangers in
Texas. We were never in trouble before.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did he ask you to call people other than lawyers?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. His personal friends, his personal friends. I think
some owed him some money, no names were mentioned that Eva didn’t
know. She knew all the names he mentioned. That is why she told me to
forget about it. She probably had already contacted them. Friends in
Dallas, personal people who were either very dear friends of his and
club members. And he was worried more about the dogs than he was about
anybody else.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was the occasion that you went down to see him before
Christmas, was that at the time of the bail bond hearing? Do you
remember the hearings?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I don’t remember what the hearing was but I was down
there.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you go down there for a hearing in December?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I don’t remember. I think it was a bail bond hearing.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You say he was more concerned about the dogs?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Than anything else?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes, sir; worried about his dogs. I figured that was
odd. Here is a man incarcerated, in prison for a shooting and here he
is worried about his dogs and that didn’t make any sense to me.
You know, there was no logic there. I can understand how a man can be
in love with a dog or dogs but why bring it up at a time like that.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You indicated to me that you saw him during the trial or
after the trial?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Oh, yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How many times did you see him in the course of the trial?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Wait a minute. In the course of the trial, I couldn’t
see him in the courtroom but we saw him in the evening, I think--I
think we were allowed to see him in the evening, I think. I am not
sure. I don’t want to make a statement I am going to be responsible for
because I can’t--I think we saw him in the evening. Yes; I think we saw
him in the evening, after the trial. I think the hours were from 7:30
to 8:30 and the sheriff was very nice. He let all of us go up one time,
the family.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Were you allowed in his jail cell?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Oh, no; outside, through that little piece of glass
only.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Would you describe that cell? Is there any other, is it
possible to see out other than through that glass?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. See what out?
Mr. GRIFFIN. If you are inside were there any other windows, could you
look in through the glass and see windows or anything in that cell?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No; it is inside. It is inside the center. It is one of
these rooms that are inside, see. It is a separate room. It is not his
room. It is like a visiting room that they bring him in from another
part of the building into this particular room.
Mr. GRIFFIN. So you didn’t see the cell that he was in?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. His own personal cell?
Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Are you able to see anything of the prisoner other than
through this glass, this 6-inch glass?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Just about up to here is all you can see.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You are indicating about the middle of your chest.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. That is all.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Is there anything you want to tell us about the
conversations you had with him?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. In general, how he is feeling, how he is getting along.
How is the food. The sheriff told us that “Any time he doesn’t like
to eat the stuff we give him,” and this was also $20 left downstairs
for him someplace so that Jack could order what he wanted but nobody
was allowed to bring in any food or candy from the outside, only the
sheriff.
Mr. GRIFFIN. But there was money left downstairs for him?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Oh, yes; we would do that for a stranger. It is our
brother.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Has he been supplied, has money been made available to him
throughout his incarceration?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. He received quite a bit of money from people who send
it in to him, you know voluntarily, telegrams, letters, money, money
orders. He got money from all over the country. One country in Europe
invited him to come over as a guest.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you see the letter of the invitation?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I think we have the letter home.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What country was that?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I think Rhodesia.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Has the family, however, provided sort of a weekly
allowance for Jack?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. We could always see that Jack would get whatever he
needs. They don’t allow too much in there in the first place.
Mr. GRIFFIN. But you indicated he was left, at least while you were
down there during the trial he was left, enough money so that he could
order meals from the outside.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. If he wanted it, naturally.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about before the trial, was he given money for that
purpose?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I don’t know. I think he had money because he was
getting donations all the time in letters.
Mr. GRIFFIN. I see.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Telegrams by the hundreds.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How did he feel about those letters and telegrams?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. He felt pretty good that he didn’t fight the case
alone. He felt like he had help.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What did he think the cause was?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Of course, there was always cranks who didn’t agree
with what he did. We don’t agree with what he did, either. You don’t
avenge a wrong with another wrong but I told the television people
this, and I am going to tell it to you. Chances are this was a hundred
million people. If they were down in Dallas at the same time Jack was,
if they had a gun in their hand they probably would have done the
same thing. I don’t say they would have, probably. Just one of those
incidents. May I add something?
Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Jack left a Western Union office at 11:17, stamped by
his receipt from the money order that he mailed to Fort Worth. The maid
knocked on his door at 8 o’clock that morning to clean up his room.
Jack says, “Come back at 2 o’clock.” Which meant he wanted to sleep.
The girl called him at 10 o’clock from Fort Worth, about there, Jack
got up, took his dog, Sheba, drove down to the Western Union, wired $25
to this, I can’t think of her name.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Little Lynn?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Little Lynn.
He saw the commotion about 450 feet down, and he wanted to know what
was going on and he just happened to be there, and it was figured
out 6 more seconds Jack would have missed the whole thing, if he had
hesitated, because they were walking Oswald from the station to the
wagon.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you talk to Jack at all about his activities prior to
the shooting and how he got in?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No, no; we didn’t even mention anything like that. We
weren’t concerned with what happened before. We were worried, we were
wondering and worried why, and the only answer I can give you is he
must have blacked out. You just black out and you do things like that.
It is like punching somebody in the nose and then you feel sorry for it
later.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Perhaps this would be a good time for you, unless you want
to break for lunch now----
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I don’t care. Can I add something to this?
Mr. GRIFFIN. I would like to ask you if we can go on here maybe we can
finish up.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. In an hour?
Mr. GRIFFIN. Less than that. Why don’t you take an opportunity now to
tell us what you would like to tell us that I haven’t covered in the
questioning.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. May I add how a person can possibly shoot a guy like
Oswald, may I give you an example?
Mr. GRIFFIN. Certainly.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. A player is sitting on the football bench, a sub. A man
on the opposite team is running with the ball. The player gets off the
bench and tackles the guy with the ball. What do you call the instinct,
compulsion. That is the same situation with Jack. How do you account
for it. You don’t know. He had no business getting off that bench. He
is not even playing in the game any more than Jack had any business
being in that station. That is my answer why Jack did it. May I add
this?
Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. That police department is using Jack as a scapegoat
for their mistakes. Anything--they have nobody else to blame it on,
Jack Ruby. “You were responsible for the whole deal.” They are blaming
everything on him, and that is one of the reasons why these policemen
lied to save their own skins.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Which policemen?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. All five that testified. Jack never said those things.
He told me he never said those things about going to shoot him three
times. No man tells you he is going to shoot a person three times. And
then about him saying that the Jews are cowards and he stuck up for the
Jews.
Jack is not that type of a guy because he doesn’t talk about those
things. Sure he is a Jew but you don’t go out telling the world about
it.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you recall the things that Jack specifically denied
when he talked to you about those policemen’s testimony?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes, sir.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Tell us which ones they were?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. All of them. He said--Jack did not talk to any of the
policemen at all. He said he didn’t say anything like that at all
to them. He don’t even recall mentioning anything that those five
policemen testified that he talked to them about, anything like that.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did he mention those specific things or did he just talk
generally about it?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Just generally.
Mr. GRIFFIN. So when you mentioned, for example, you said something
about the Jewish motivation or whatever it was.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Yes; I don’t think Jack would talk like that to a
businessman.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did Jack mention that particular topic to you?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No, no, no.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about the shooting the three times, did he mention
that particular incident?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No: but he said he would never discuss those things in
general.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Go ahead.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. That television man who was downstairs taking movies of
the thing, he made--he was testifying on the stand that at 10:25 and at
10:35 Jack came over and asked him twice when they were going to bring
out Oswald. If he was 11:17 in the Western Union and got up to mail the
money to this Little Lynn what would he be doing down at the station at
10:25. And who would dare walk into a police station with 30 policemen
in front of television and radio reporters and shoot anybody unless you
blacked out. The man must be crazy to do that.
Mr. GRIFFIN. This one episode about the police officers’ testimony is
apparently something that sticks in your mind. How many conversations
did you have with Jack about the policemen’s testimony?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Didn’t have hardly any. We don’t talk about those
things, what happened at the trial. We didn’t want to relive the trial.
We didn’t want to relive the shooting even.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When did you first hear about, when did you first hear
Jack deny that he had said the things that the policemen testified to?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. It either could have been in December or it could have
been right, at one of the nights of the trial. I don’t remember which.
I don’t know when those statements were made. It could have been after
the trial. Because that is when the FBI took the report, too, I think.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Who else was present?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Eva and Earl.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Sam?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Sam might have been present at another time but I don’t
think he was present at that particular time. It could have been. I
don’t remember, you know when you have got problems on your head that
are heavy, you don’t pick out, pinpoint different things. Nobody is
that good.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Well, do you recall, can you form a visual image in your
own mind of going up there and seeing Jack on the occasion that he
talked about the police officers’ testimony?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. No; because we saw him often. We saw him many times, we
saw him in the evening during the trial and after the trial we saw him
in the afternoon and evening both. So there was a lot of visits made
between myself and also other members of the family.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about anything else about Jack, that might have caused
Jack to do this. Do you have any other things you want to tell us about
that?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I believe I have mentioned the most important things
and gave you gentlemen some good examples. Yes; you didn’t ask me what
led up to this thing, how come?
Mr. GRIFFIN. That is what I am asking you now.
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Did you know he went out at 3 o’clock in the morning
with George Senator and Larry Crafard, the kid that watched the
nightclub, at nighttime and took tickets for Jack, Jack charged $2 a
ticket to get into his club. It was no bums’ hangout. It was a classy
joint. So Larry used to take the tickets and also sleep there at
nighttime. Jack got up to go at 3 o’clock in the morning one time,
and this was told to me by both, George Senator and Larry, they went
out and they took a picture of a great big billboard, “Impeach Earl
Warren,” the pictures and camera were in the car that Jack was going to
use as evidence when the city policemen confiscated his car, you can
make a note of this, they took the camera, they took the pictures, they
took his adding machine, and they took his spare tire. What a bunch of
characters down there.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What has become of that?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. We would like to know. They took his diamond ring, they
took a very good wristwatch.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Have you asked for that?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. And his blue suit he wore when he shot Oswald, we would
like to have that all back, and his gun.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Have you asked for it?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. I think they have but they haven’t had any success.
If Jack cannot have the gun, then we would like to submit it to the
Smithsonian Institution or in his library.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Kennedy’s Library?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. That is right. Because Jack bought the gun legitimately
in a Dallas store under his name. And also when he walked into that
newspaper office, and there was a big black border around, a full page
ad signed by somebody by the name of Weissman, Jack didn’t like that.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When did you hear about that?
Mr. RUBENSTEIN. Eva told me this. Eva says, “You know, Jack came here
one day showing me all this thing and I couldn’t believe it.”
You know, when a person reads a paper you don’t always pay attention.
It was addressed not to the President of the United States. I
understand the ad was addressed to Mr. Kennedy with grievances, signed
by the committee. With a post office and box number in Dallas, with
a black border around a full-page ad. When Jack was changing the ad
of his closing dates of the club the minute the President got shot in
the newspapers, he got ahold of someone in the newspaper office, as I
understand it, and that man will have to testify, and Jack said to him,
“Do you have to accept an ad like this? Is business that bad? The other
newspapers in town didn’t take it.” Then he went over Saturday morning
to the post office and got ahold of one of the clerks and he says, “Can
you tell me who belongs to this post office box number,” and the clerk
says, “We can’t tell you that.”
Mr. GRIFFIN. Hyman, what do you think is the significance of Jack’s
concern with the ad and with the “Impeach Earl Warren” sign?