there, but I was being nosey and listening.
Mr. GRIFFIN. In other words, this man was off to the side 4 or 5 feet
distant from you, the distance from you to me?
Mrs. TICE. This man that I say was Jack Ruby was about 3 feet from me,
I guess, about as far as you are from me.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You could only see the side of his face, I take it?
Mrs. TICE. Jack Ruby’s?
Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes.
Mrs. TICE. No; I only saw--I could only see the side of this other
man’s face that walked up to him. Jack was standing right here, see,
this man that is called Jack. He was standing here like this, and I am
standing here.
Mr. GRIFFIN. We will have to indicate.
Mrs. TICE. He turned around when this man walked up here and hit him on
the shoulder and said, “How are you doing, Jack?”
Mr. GRIFFIN. Jack Ruby was ahead of you and initially had his back to
you, is that right?
Mrs. TICE. No; he wasn’t up ahead of me. He was more or less to the
side.
Mr. GRIFFIN. As you looked over, when did you first notice him, when
the man said hello to Jack?
Mrs. TICE. When I first noticed him was when this man walked up to him,
because I thought this was a detective or something, because he had a
suitcase.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was he standing in a crowd of people?
Mrs. TICE. Well, there was a, like I said, this lady that I turned
around and asked this, and people were coming and going.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How far were you from the main entrance of Parkland
Hospital? Which entrance of the hospital were you near?
Mrs. TICE. Down where you come off of Harry Hines. You come off here,
and then there is a paved parking thing.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Why don’t you draw a picture for us. Why don’t you take
this yellow sheet of paper and why don’t you draw Harry Hines Boulevard?
Mrs. TICE. OK; this is Harry Hines Boulevard, and right in here, this
is where the gate thing goes along. You pay to go in here and park. I
guess it’s got gate.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Mrs. Tice, we are trying, the reporter is trying to take
your words down and they don’t mean very much if you just talk about
this and that. I suggest that you draw on this sheet of paper, draw the
hospital and draw Harry Hines Boulevard, and then draw some more lines
to indicate where you were standing. Can you do that?
Mrs. TICE. I don’t know too much how the hospital looks over there. As
I came down this way, that is what I am trying to tell you--this is
Harry Hines.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You have drawn a line that you call Harry Hines Boulevard.
Mrs. TICE. OK; then you go in here, and there is a pay-parking thing.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where is the hospital?
Mrs. TICE. The hospital is right here. Right down here is the emergency
entrance.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where is the main entrance, do you know that?
Mrs. TICE. I guess that was the main entrance up there.
Mr. GRIFFIN. OK.
Mrs. TICE. But this is way I came.
Mr. GRIFFIN. There is a road that comes off Harry Hines Boulevard? What
direction is that from the hospital?
Mrs. TICE. There is a little hill that goes down here, and just before
you go through this emergency place, I guess that is an emergency
place, there is a lawn here, and this is where this bar is for the
grass. But there is another parking lot behind this pay thing, I guess.
I thought it was a pay thing, something left out of here, and I pulled
in this other one and parked in the second or third space.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You were in a parking lot that was between the emergency
entrance to the hospital and Harry Hines Boulevard, is that right? You
pulled into a parking lot that was between Harry Hines Boulevard and
the emergency entrance of the hospital, is that right?
Mrs. TICE. I don’t know how many places there is to park there, but
this first place was the one I got in, and I didn’t pay to get in here.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You went into a free parking space?
Mrs. TICE. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. And you parked your car?
Mrs. TICE. I parked my car.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Then where did you walk to?
Mrs. TICE. Then I came back out here and I walked down here.
Mr. GRIFFIN. So that you were standing in the oval in front of the
emergency entrance, is that right?
Mrs. TICE. I was standing right here by this fence.
Mr. GRIFFIN. The metal fence that separates the----
Mrs. TICE. This right here is where the police cars park and stuff. No;
that is over to the other side because that goes all the way around.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You are going to have to explain it in words, because the
lady can’t take this down. She can’t understand what we are talking
about.
Mrs. TICE. Well, all right. Right down here is this circle where you
go down into the emergency entrance, and this little bar here, it goes
across here where this grass is, and where I was standing was right
here on this grass, right here [pointing].
Mr. GRIFFIN. Will you mark an X where you were standing?
Mrs. TICE. This is me. And these other people were here, and this is
where Jack was standing, about 2 foot on this side of this fence.
Mr. GRIFFIN. I see. Were you facing toward the emergency entrance, or
which direction were you facing?
Mrs. TICE. We were looking down there to see what was happening.
Mr. GRIFFIN. So Jack actually was a little bit in front of you?
Mrs. TICE. Yes; I guess.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Would you put an R where Ruby was?
(Mrs. Tice marks.)
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, a man walked up to him and tapped him on the shoulder?
Mrs. TICE. The man came right down this way, over this way and slapped
him on the shoulder and asked him how he was doing.
Mr. GRIFFIN. And at that point Jack turned around?
Mrs. TICE. At that point Jack turned around and started talking to him.
At the time, he was facing right toward me.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where was the other man? Was he standing between you and
Jack?
Mrs. TICE. No; the other man was standing right here, and Jack was
standing here, because he turned around to see who slapped him on the
shoulder.
Mr. GRIFFIN. I am going to mark this with an R for Ruby, and I am going
to put W for Wilma, and I am going to leave the M you put there for the
other man.
Mrs. TICE. OK.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When was the next time you thought about this incident?
Mrs. TICE. I didn’t think about it any more.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Well, the next time you thought about it, of course, was
whenever the children said that was when Oswald got shot?
Mrs. TICE. That is the next time I thought about it. I mean, other than
just what I hear on the news, and I got tired of hearing it.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you tell your husband?
Mrs. TICE. That I went down there; no.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you tell anybody else that you had been there and seen
that man, seen Jack Ruby?
Mrs. TICE. Yes; I talked to Eva about it.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you talk to any of your friends about it?
Mrs. TICE. I don’t think so; no. I don’t think I did, because I
wouldn’t want my husband to get hold of me being out there. I guess I
made mention to somebody about him wanting to give somebody a kidney,
him wanting to give Governor Connally, one day, and then going up and
killing somebody.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you remember who you told that to?
Mrs. TICE. No.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you have anything else that you would like to tell us
about this?
Mrs. TICE. Well, except whenever I turned, well, this Ruby went on
down this way, and this man here, when this man walked away, and this
one here went on down toward this curb here, then I turned around and
I looked at my watch and I left, because my children were coming home
from school.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You left shortly after you saw this man, this Ruby man?
Mrs. TICE. I was home at 3 o’clock.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long a time elapsed between the time you saw Ruby and
when you left the hospital?
Mrs. TICE. I don’t know, but it takes me approximately 15 minutes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. As soon as that man left, Ruby, did you go home?
Mrs. TICE. I just moseyed. I didn’t take off at a running hop or
anything, but I kept looking and I didn’t see nothing.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you wait as long as an hour after you saw Ruby before
you left?
Mrs. TICE. No.
Mr. GRIFFIN. As long as a half-hour?
Mrs. TICE. No; whenever I started to get out, there was cars coming in
there, and I guess it probably took me 5 minutes to get out of that
parking lot, by the time I walked back up to here and got back in the
car.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What is your best estimate of when you got home?
Mrs. TICE. Well, the children got home from school at 3 o’clock or
2:45. They get out 10 minutes till 3. I was home at 3 o’clock; I was
home when the children got there. Well, it may have been 5 or 10
minutes after 3, because I was there before the children came in.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long were you there before the children arrived?
Mrs. TICE. I just got there, but I was home.
Mr. GRIFFIN. I am going to mark this diagram which you have drawn
here--I am going to put this emergency entrance up where you have
indicated it was, and I am going to mark this “Wilma Tice Deposition,
July 24, 1964, Exhibit No. 1”.
Mrs. TICE. Well, now, you know Eva told me she says, “Well, but Wilma,
you could be mistaken, because you know people look different on
television than they do in person.” I said, “Yes, I realize that is
true.”
Mr. GRIFFIN. You think you might be mistaken, or don’t you?
Mrs. TICE. No; I said I thought it was either him or his twin brother.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You still feel that way?
Mrs. TICE. I still feel that way.
Mr. GRIFFIN. But you have only seen him on television?
Mrs. TICE. That’s right, and that time out there is the only time I
have ever seen him.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about pictures in the newspaper, do they look the same
as what you remember the man looked like at Parkland Hospital?
Mrs. TICE. They didn’t look as much like him as the one that Eva or
Eileen brought to the house and showed to me. I mean, looked more like
him.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, Mrs. Tice, I only ask you if you will sign this
exhibit with your signature.
(Mrs. Tice signs.)
Mr. GRIFFIN. I want to ask one other question. That is, there was a
newspaper report that you received a threat of some sort before you
came here. Do you know anything about that?
Mrs. TICE. Do I know anything about it?
Mr. GRIFFIN. Yes; did you receive a threat before coming here?
Mrs. TICE. Well, I don’t know if it was a threat or I don’t know now--I
don’t know what you are talking about. Are you talking about when I was
barricaded in the house?
Mr. GRIFFIN. No; I don’t know about that. I was just informed by
somebody here in this U.S. attorney’s office that one of the daily
newspapers here had carried an article that you had been threatened. Do
you know anything about that?
Mrs. TICE. They said that I had been threatened, but what the paper
said is not what--I got a telephone call, and some man told me on the
telephone that it would pay me to keep my mouth shut.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you recognize the voice on the telephone?
Mrs. TICE. I never heard that voice before in my life, that I know of.
Mr. GRIFFIN. At the time you got that telephone call, did your husband
know that you were supposed to come to testify?
Mrs. TICE. Yes; he knew I got this letter Sunday. He was coming home
with the children. He went down to pick up the children at Sunday
School and brought them home and was just coming in whenever I signed
for the letter, and the postman handed me the letter when he walked up
to the door.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When did you receive the telephone call?
Mrs. TICE. Well, now, I think it was Monday or Tuesday; but I have been
so confused because I was up all day and all that night and the next
day, and some of the FBI and some of the police said it was Wednesday,
but I believe it was Monday.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did your husband, when you got that letter from the
President’s Commission, ask you why you were supposed to testify?
Mrs. TICE. Yes; he did.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you tell him?
Mrs. TICE. No; he accused me of having worked for Jack Ruby at one
time. He says, “I know you have known him before. You probably worked
for him before you and I were married.” And he is so unreasonable, and
he is just--my husband is kind of jealous, and you can’t hardly talk to
him. So I just figured, well, I wouldn’t say anything to him, because
he just goes into a rage.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Well, I don’t have any other questions of you and I
appreciate your coming here. I don’t know whether you have anything
more that you would want to add. I think you probably told us
everything there is to tell us.
Mrs. TICE. Well, that is all I know. And as far as the phone calls, the
rest of them didn’t say anything. They just hung up.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you get more than one phone call?
Mrs. TICE. Yes, sir; I got several phone calls that were just--whenever
I wouldn’t answer the phone any more, and our little niece had been
there, and she is 14 and I would tell her to answer the telephone, and
she answered the telephone, and they would hang up.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Well, I want to thank you again very much for coming. I
hope we haven’t inconvenienced you any further.
TESTIMONY OF WANDA YVONNE HELMICK
The testimony of Wanda Yvonne Helmick was taken at 4 p.m., on July 24,
1964, in the office of the U.S. attorney, 301 Post Office Building,
Bryan and Ervay Streets, Dallas, Tex., by Mr. Burt W. Griffin,
assistant counsel of the President’s Commission.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Let me introduce myself again. I am Burt Griffin, and I am
a member of the general counsel’s staff of the President’s Commission
on the Assassination of President Kennedy.
It is our practice to have a few preliminaries here in which I explain
to you what the Commission is all about, and what we are going to do.
Then we will administer the oath and I will talk to you.
This President’s Commission, as you probably know, was set up in
November 1963, as a result of an Executive order of President Johnson
and the joint resolution of Congress, and under these two official
acts, we have been directed to investigate and to evaluate and
report back to President Johnson on all the facts that relate to the
assassination of President Kennedy and the death of Lee Oswald.
We have asked you to come here today because I understand you have some
information that might pertain to Jack Ruby.
Now, under the rules and regulations of the Commission, I have been
designated to take your testimony, and I might tell you that the rules
do provide that before you are asked to testify, you shall receive 3
days’ notice in writing in advance before you come here.
I will ask you right now if you received a letter from us and when you
did receive it.
Mrs. HELMICK. I received it yesterday.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Then we haven’t complied. Well, let me ask you if you are
willing to go ahead and give us your testimony without having had the 3
days’ written notice?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Thank you. Do you have any questions that you want to ask
me before I ask you questions?
Mrs. HELMICK. No.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Would you raise your right hand and I will administer the
oath to you.
Do you solemnly swear that the testimony you are about to give, will be
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?
Mrs. HELMICK. I do.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Would you give us your name, please?
Mrs. HELMICK. Wanda Yvonne Helmick, or Wanda Sweat Helmick.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where do you live now?
Mrs. HELMICK. 902 Bagley, Apartment 3.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where is that located in Dallas?
Mrs. HELMICK. In Arcadia Park in Dallas.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Is it Mrs. or Miss?
Mrs. HELMICK. Mrs.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When were you born, Mrs. Helmick?
Mrs. HELMICK. March 16, 1945.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Were you working for a man named Ralph Paul?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Back in November of 1963?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When did you begin to work for Mr. Paul?
Mrs. HELMICK. I believe it was in November that I started to work for
him. I don’t remember the exact day.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long did you work for him altogether?
Mrs. HELMICK. I was employed with him for 3 weeks.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When did you leave his employment?
Mrs. HELMICK. I don’t know.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What was your job?
Mrs. HELMICK. Carhop.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What hours did you work?
Mrs. HELMICK. I worked from 10 till 6, I think, or from 10 to 5.
Mr. GRIFFIN. 10 in the morning till 5 at night?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was this every day of the week?
Mrs. HELMICK. I had one day off. I don’t remember which one it was.
Mr. GRIFFIN. I mean, did you always work those hours or did you ever
work in the evening?
Mrs. HELMICK. I always worked those hours.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, you have talked to the FBI and have indicated that
you overheard a telephone conversation that you believed took place
between Jack Ruby and Ralph Paul?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. When was it that you heard that telephone conversation?
Mrs. HELMICK. It was the night before Oswald was shot.
Mr. GRIFFIN. The night before?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What time of day or night would that have been?
Mrs. HELMICK. Well, I believe it was around 8 or 9 o’clock. I am not
for sure what time it was. My husband, he wasn’t supposed to pick me
up. Another girl was supposed to pick up and take me over to her house
so he would pick me up, but she didn’t show up, and he came after me
about 9 o’clock, I guess it was. Rather late at night, I know that
much. And this conversation took place after dark. I don’t know what
time it was.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Were you working at that time?
Mrs. HELMICK. No; I was off of work. I had been off work about 3 or 4
hours.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where were you sitting at the time you heard this
telephone conversation?
Mrs. HELMICK. In the front booth.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was this at the Bull Pen Drive-In?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. I want to ask you to take a pencil here and a piece of
paper and draw us a diagram of the inside of that Bull Pen Drive-In and
show us on the diagram where you were seated and where the telephone
was and so forth.
Mrs. HELMICK (drawing). This is where the booth was.
Mr. GRIFFIN. First of all, what have you drawn on there?
Mrs. HELMICK. This is where the telephone is.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where is the room? Would you draw the outline of the whole
room first? Where are the walls of the room?
Mrs. HELMICK. This is the walls and then there is a little something
that blocks between two rooms.
Mr. GRIFFIN. A partition of some sort?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes; a partition. And the booths are sitting next to it
like this.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Is there a door to this room?
Mrs. HELMICK. No. There is a door coming into the whole thing from the
front.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where is the door? Do you want to mark the door in there?
Mrs. HELMICK. This is the door. This opens into, and it opens onto the
place where you pay as you go out.
Mr. GRIFFIN. The counter? Cashier? Where is the cashier?
Mrs. HELMICK. The cashier stands in behind this.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you want to write cashier in there?
Mrs. HELMICK. (Writes).
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now up in the upper left-hand corner of this diagram you
have drawn a rectangle and you have written the words telephone and
cashier. It is rectangular, some sort of enclosed area?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes; it is.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How do you get back into that enclosed area?
Mrs. HELMICK. There is a little open door like thing. It doesn’t have a
door in front of it. It is just an opening that you can walk behind the
counter where all the trays sit for the carhops and everything.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where is that located? Can you mark it on the diagram?
Mrs. HELMICK. (Marks).
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, is the telephone that you have marked on there, which
is behind the enclosed area, is that a public telephone, or a pay
telephone?
Mrs. HELMICK. It is a pay telephone.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Are there any other telephones in there?
Mrs. HELMICK. No; there is not any other telephones there. I suppose
that this booth is about anywhere from 3 to 6 feet away from the
telephone.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You were seated in the booth?
Mrs. HELMICK. I was seated sitting in the first seat.
Mr. GRIFFIN. You want to mark yourself there? Put an “X” there where
you were seated.
Mrs. HELMICK. Right here.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was anybody sitting there with you?
Mrs. HELMICK. There was people sitting there. Rose and a man I can’t
remember who was sitting beside me, and I believe Toyo.
Mr. GRIFFIN. First of all, what is Rose’s last name?
Mrs. HELMICK. I don’t know.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did she work at the drive-in?
Mrs. HELMICK. She has been working there for about 7 years before I
came.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Is she still working there to your knowledge?
Mrs. HELMICK. The last time I was there, which was about 6 months ago,
she was still there.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you know where she lives?
Mrs. HELMICK. No.
Mr. GRIFFIN. And there was somebody that you called Toyo?
Mrs. HELMICK. She was a Japanese woman.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Is she still working there?
Mrs. HELMICK. To my knowledge, she is.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was that her first name or her last name?
Mrs. HELMICK. That was her first name.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you know what her last name was?
Mrs. HELMICK. I don’t have no idea. It was an American name. I know
where she lives.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Where does she live?
Mrs. HELMICK. I believe it is 10th Street. Let’s see, it’s behind
Taylor Super Market in Grand Prairie.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Grand Prairie?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was the cashier present at that time?
Mrs. HELMICK. Yes.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Who was the cashier?
Mrs. HELMICK. She was Rose.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, what happened? Will you tell us what happened?
Mrs. HELMICK. Well, we were sitting there gossiping about something, I
don’t remember what, but we was teasing or aggravating Johnnie--well,
Paul you call him.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was Ralph Paul sitting there at the booth with you?
Mrs. HELMICK. No, he was behind the counter, and Rose got up and went
back there to do something, and she started talking to him, and the
telephone rang, and she said, “It is for you. It is Jack.”
So he took the phone and he had been talking quite a while, and he said
something. He either said, “Are you crazy? A gun?” or something like
that, or he said something about a gun.
Then he said, “Are you crazy?” But he did say something about a gun,
and he asked him if he was crazy.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long did he talk on this telephone call?
Mrs. HELMICK. He just talked for about 5 minutes, I guess. It wasn’t
very long.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you hear anything else that was said in the telephone
conversation?
Mrs. HELMICK. He said something about either he had a date with Tammi
or Jack had a date with Tammi, and Jack wanted to talk to Ralph, and
that is all I know.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Now, after you heard that conversation, did you talk with
any of the other employees about that?
Mrs. HELMICK. No.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you know if any of the other people who were seated in
that booth also heard that conversation?
Mrs. HELMICK. They were sitting close enough to hear it, and there
wasn’t anything else being said at the time, because after Rose got up
and went over to talk to Johnny, we didn’t talk very much, and it was
real quiet after she left. Nobody was saying anything.
Mr. GRIFFIN. What did Ralph do after receiving that telephone call?
Mrs. HELMICK. Well, it wasn’t very long, I guess 15 or 20 minutes until
he left.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did he tell you why he left?
Mrs. HELMICK. No. He told Rose, but he didn’t tell us.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you hear him tell Rose? Did you see him talking to
Rose?
Mrs. HELMICK. He said, “I will see you tomorrow.” That is all I heard.
He said that in sort of a loud voice, but other than that, he was
talking sort of low.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long had you talked with Ralph that evening?
Mrs. HELMICK. Well, I hadn’t really talked to Ralph that evening. He
just told me, well, that morning he told me where everything was, and
other than that, I didn’t talk to him.
Mr. GRIFFIN. But you said you had been sitting at the booth talking to
him.
Mrs. HELMICK. Rose and Bonnie and Toyo and this man, he is a tall man,
I don’t remember his name, but they were all teasing him, and I didn’t
know him that well.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Were you sitting there or listening to the conversation?
Mrs. HELMICK. I was listening to them.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Was there anything about Ralph that indicated that he was
ill or wasn’t feeling well?
Mrs. HELMICK. No. There was nothing said that made him sound ill.
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long did you work at the Bull Pen Drive-In after this
telephone call on Saturday night?
Mrs. HELMICK. I worked until about a week after Thanksgiving.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did you hear any conversation around the Bull Pen which
would indicate that anybody had any advance information that Jack might
do what he did?
Mrs. HELMICK. Now the next day after we had heard it on the radio, he
was popping off about this telephone call that he had that night, and
he told us that he talked to Jack and that they had talked about a gun,
and that he had it in a dresser drawer or something like that, and that
he didn’t tell what he was going to do with it.