The testimony of Harold R. Fuqua was taken at 3:55 p.m., on April 1,
1964, in the office of the U.S. attorney, 301 Post Office Building,
Bryan and Ervay Streets, Dallas, Tex., by Mr. Leon D. Hubert, Jr.,
assistant counsel of the President’s Commission.
Mr. HUBERT. This is a deposition of Harold Fuqua [spelling] F-u-q-u-a.
Mr. Fuqua, my name is Leon Hubert. I am a member of the advisory
staff of the General Counsel of the President’s Commission. Under the
provisions of the Executive Order 11130, dated November 29, 1963, Joint
Resolution of Congress No. 137, and the rules of procedure adopted
by the Commission in conformance with that Executive order and joint
resolution, I have been authorized to take a sworn deposition from you.
I state to you now that the general nature of the Commission’s inquiry
is to ascertain, evaluate, and report upon the facts relating to the
assassination of President Kennedy and the subsequent violent death of
Lee Harvey Oswald. In particular, as to you, Mr. Fuqua, the nature of
the inquiry today is to determine what facts you know about the death
of Oswald and any other pertinent facts you may know about the general
inquiry.
Now, I think, Mr. Fuqua, that you have appeared here today by--as
a result of an informal request made to the Dallas Public Works
Department for whom you work, and I wish to advise you that under the
rules of the Commission you would normally be entitled to a 3-day
written notice before the taking of this deposition, but the rules of
the Commission also provide that a witness may waive that 3-day notice
if he wishes to do so, and I ask you now if you are willing to have
your deposition taken now and therefore willing to waive the 3-day
written notice?
Mr. FUQUA. I’m ready now, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. All right. Will you stand and raise your right hand. Do you
solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
truth, so help you God?
Mr. FUQUA. I do.
Mr. HUBERT. Will you state your full name?
Mr. FUQUA. Harold Rogers Fuqua.
Mr. HUBERT. And your age?
Mr. FUQUA. Thirty.
Mr. HUBERT. And where do you live, sir?
Mr. FUQUA. 4338 Penelope, Dallas.
Mr. HUBERT. What is your occupation?
Mr. FUQUA. Parking attendant, basement of city hall.
Mr. HUBERT. What?
Mr. FUQUA. Parking attendant in the basement of the city hall.
Mr. HUBERT. How long have you been so employed?
Mr. FUQUA. By the city of Dallas?
Mr. HUBERT. Yes.
Mr. FUQUA. About 6 years.
Mr. HUBERT. Now, were you on duty on the morning of November 24, 1963?
Mr. FUQUA. Yes, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. When you say you were on duty, that means you were on duty
in the parking area of the basement?
Mr. FUQUA. Right.
Mr. HUBERT. That basement is partially under the city hall, and
partially under the police building, is that correct?
Mr. FUQUA. No, sir; it is under the municipal part of it. The parking
basement, because it is right beside the jail part.
Mr. HUBERT. In other words, the parking area in the basement is really
under the municipal building?
Mr. FUQUA. That is the way I would think of it.
Mr. HUBERT. And, what--it is all connected up by the two ramps?
Mr. FUQUA. Right.
Mr. HUBERT. That go up to Main Street and Commerce Street?
Mr. FUQUA. Right.
Mr. HUBERT. Also a sort of a corridor that goes into the jail office,
isn’t that correct?
Mr. FUQUA. Yes, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Your duties, normally, are just to assist in parking of
cars down there?
Mr. FUQUA. Right, and make sure that the right people--in other words,
we have people that come down each day to maybe want to park and go get
a prisoner out of jail or pay their water bill. We don’t permit that.
Mr. HUBERT. In other words, that parking area is used for employees of
the city and the municipal building, as well as for police automobiles?
Mr. FUQUA. Right.
Mr. HUBERT. Just not a public parking lot?
Mr. FUQUA. Right.
Mr. HUBERT. And that is your job, to keep them from parking down there?
Mr. FUQUA. Yes; and to assist, too.
Mr. HUBERT. And to assist getting cars out when people come for them?
Mr. FUQUA. Right.
Mr. HUBERT. Now, on the morning of November 24, do you recall being
put out of the basement area, I guess you might call it, along with
Alfreadia Riggs and others?
Mr. FUQUA. Yes, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Tell us what happened.
Mr. FUQUA. You said tell you what happened?
Mr. HUBERT. Yes; tell us what happened.
Mr. FUQUA. All right, we were standing along and watching on, and then
we went back and sit down over there, you know, at the telephone down
where the elevator goes up into the municipal building.
Mr. HUBERT. That is the service elevator?
Mr. FUQUA. Right, and captain and sergeant came over and said--well,
said, “I hate to run you off your job”--said, “--but we’d rather for
nobody but news reporters and police officers be down here.” At that
time they were making a search through the basement there.
Mr. HUBERT. What time was that about?
Mr. FUQUA. About 9:30, somewhere about like that.
Mr. HUBERT. Then what happened next?
Mr. FUQUA. We all loaded on the elevator and went up to the first floor.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you go up with Mr. Pierce or did you come up a little
later?
Mr. FUQUA. Seemed to me that we all went up together, or maybe I went
up--I don’t know. I know that he made a trip down back. It might have
been that I didn’t go up with Mr. Pierce. I don’t----
Mr. HUBERT. And came up a little later?
Mr. FUQUA. Right.
Mr. HUBERT. Was it much later?
Mr. FUQUA. Not too much later, because the time the captain told me he
had rather for us to go.
Mr. HUBERT. All right, you went up to the first floor of the municipal
building then?
Mr. FUQUA. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. And that would have been about 9:30, or a quarter of 10:00?
Mr. FUQUA. About 9:30, something like that.
Mr. HUBERT. What happened after that?
Mr. FUQUA. We all were watching the action that was going on out on
Commerce Street side and there was a lot of people standing out on the
sidewalk with a--those officers were trying to keep them on the far
side of the street, on the south side of the street rather than the
north side, and when anybody would pass along there to try to maybe
enter the building, they would ask them for some type--would appear to
me that they would ask--were asking for some type of credentials or
something.
Mr. HUBERT. How long did you stay there watching them?
Mr. FUQUA. I guess must have been stayed there--seemed like to me 30
minutes or more stayed there watching them.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you leave?
Mr. FUQUA. Yes, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Where did you go?
Mr. FUQUA. Riggs and I left together and said, “Let’s see if we can’t
go down and watch it on television,” see, so, we went out to the
alleyway onto Main Street and walked back, came up the street and went
around there by the ramp there, and came on around and came in from the
Harwood side, and went down through the basement to the locker room to
watch it on television. There was one fellow down there, he said that
he didn’t think it would be on television, probably reruns would be on
television, so, we came back up, and just about the time we came back
up into the basement, that is--I guess that is when we heard the shot
and the scrambling. We went on, and we went into the records building,
which is right down from the jail office there.
Mr. HUBERT. When you came down in the basement, you don’t mean you came
into the ramps, or the parking area?
Mr. FUQUA. No.
Mr. HUBERT. You were there by the records room then?
Mr. FUQUA. Yes; on around right from the Harwood side.
Mr. HUBERT. How did you get out of the municipal building, sir?