Mr. PAUL. No; I operated that until February.
Mr. HUBERT. Of what year?
Mr. PAUL. Of 1957.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you sell that, then?
Mr. PAUL. I sold it to Chris Semos.
Mr. HUBERT. You sold the whole thing to him?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you take a note from him?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. I notice that in your income tax returns for some later
years you show interest received from Chris Semos of about $250 a
month; is that interest on that note?
Mr. PAUL. No; it’s $125 a month for seven years, that includes $100 a
month payments and $25 interest.
Mr. HUBERT. I beg your pardon—that’s what I meant to say.
Mr. PAUL. That’s $250 a year—and one time it was $250 because he
wouldn’t pay 2 months.
Mr. HUBERT. The interest you show as received, I said $250 a month, I
meant to say it was $250 a year.
Mr. PAUL. That’s right, $250 altogether, and one year he didn’t pay
full so it was only $250.
Mr. HUBERT. Is that loan paid out now?
Mr. PAUL. Yes, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. So, in February of 1957 you didn’t have any business
connections?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Sir?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir. I went into partners with Jack Ruby’s brother, Sam,
and in a little ice cream place. We opened up April 25, 1957, and
closed it—we didn’t close, we gave the lease away so they wouldn’t
hold us responsible for the lease, and we lost some money because the
fixtures that we bought was more.
Mr. HUBERT. How long did you operate that?
Mr. PAUL. May, June, and July.
Mr. HUBERT. Just a few months?
Mr. PAUL. We saw it didn’t make, so there was no use in wasting time.
Mr. HUBERT. What was your next business venture then?
Mr. PAUL. Next, I didn’t go in business, I was helping Jack Ruby in the
Vegas Club from August until the following year—May.
Mr. HUBERT. August of what year?
Mr. PAUL. August 1957, to May 1958.
Mr. HUBERT. You were with Ruby, you say, at the Vegas Club?
Mr. PAUL. Yes; I just was helping him.
Mr. HUBERT. You mean on a salary?
Mr. PAUL. Well, no—it wasn’t really a salary. I helped him out on
Friday and Saturday.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you receive any compensation at all?
Mr. PAUL. Well, the only compensation I received he owed me some money,
he paid me back.
Mr. HUBERT. Well, perhaps at that point then we should go back to—so
that you may tell us when you first met Jack Ruby.
Mr. PAUL. Like I said over here, it was one of these improvised
meetings that you meet somebody that comes over to you and introduces
himself.
Mr. HUBERT. When was it, about; do you know?
Mr. PAUL. 1958.
Mr. HUBERT. In 1958?
Mr. PAUL. I mean, in 1948.
Mr. HUBERT. In 1948?
Mr. PAUL. Those years fly back so fast, 1948. That’s the year I was up
to the Sky Club yet.
Mr. HUBERT. And he simply came over and introduced himself to you?
Mr. PAUL. Yes; he says, “I’m Jack Ruby. I own the Silver Spur.” I don’t
think it was known as the Silver Spur, but I can’t recall the name
it was known then. It keeps on running in my mind that it wasn’t the
Silver Spur—it was another name, but I can’t remember it.
Mr. HUBERT. Was it the Singapore?
Mr. PAUL. That’s it.
Mr. HUBERT. It was the Singapore?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. And he told you he was the owner of the Singapore?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. And subsequently that became the Silver Spur.
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you have any business connections with Ruby at all
until he got to owe you some money?
Mr. PAUL. Well, I’ll tell you the whole thing—the whole story.
Mr. HUBERT. Yes; that’s best—that’s the best way to do it.
Mr. PAUL. Well, one day he came in with a friend of his—he’s now
deceased.
Mr. HUBERT. If you could fix the time and place—as you go—it would be
helpful, and I know it’s a long time ago but perhaps we will have to
take an approximation.
Mr. PAUL. Maybe it was 1949 or 1950 or 1951, I can’t remember those
years, and he asked me for a loan.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you remember what the friend’s name was? The one that he
came in with?
Mr. PAUL. He’s now deceased, but it was Marty Gimpel.
Mr. HUBERT. And the two of them came to you?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. And wanted to borrow some money?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. How much was it they wanted to borrow?
Mr. PAUL. $2,000.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you lend it to them?
Mr. PAUL. He said to me, “I’ve got a show, I want to buy the Bob Wills
Ranch House”—did you get this one in there any place—he said, “I’ve got
to show it,” and he says, “All I want to do is show them that I’ve got
the money and I’ll give it back to you the following day.” Well, not
that I knew the guy so much, but you know, you can’t turn people down
like that if he wants to pay me the next day, so I loaned him $2,000.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you get a note?
Mr. PAUL. No; he was going to pay me back the next day. Well, the next
day didn’t come. Subsequently he roped me in for $3,700.
Mr. HUBERT. You mean—more?
Mr. PAUL. With the $2,000—$3,700 altogether.
Mr. HUBERT. Making $1,700 more?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Now, why don’t you just tell us in your own words just how
this relationship developed and so forth?
Mr. PAUL. It’s silly but true, and when I tell it, it’s really funny.
The next time he comes he says, “They didn’t think it enough money
to show for the place, I’ve got to show them $3,000,” so I gave him
another $1,000.
Mr. HUBERT. That would have been just a few days after?
Mr. PAUL. Yes—that’s 2 days afterwards. Instead of the next day
coming—he came 2 days and he says, “This is it positively—I’ve just got
to show them the money.” Well, he didn’t come around that Saturday,
and subsequently he came around and he said he had to use the money to
get into the business there. What do you do with a person—you’re just
stuck. You can’t do nothing until then—you can’t do nothing with them.
That went on for a couple of months, and now, listen to this: One day,
on a Friday—that’s how the other $700 is going to come in—on a Friday
he comes in and he says, “If I don’t get the money to buy beer, I’ve
got to close it down.” Well, you’ve got to think—you’re already stuck
with $3,000—that’s how the payments came when I was with him at the
Vegas Club—you understand me?
Mr. HUBERT. Yes; so, you gave him another $700 on that occasion?
Mr. PAUL. Yes; but when he sold the Silver Spur at that time, he gave
me money back, because I have the note on the Silver Spur. He gave me
the note on the Silver Spur for the money, so in order to release the
note, he gave me $1,000.
Mr. HUBERT. Now, that’s a different transaction from the $3,700; is it?
Mr. PAUL. That’s from the $3,700. You see, I took a note afterwards,
when he went bankrupt—when he went with the Bob Wills Ranch House, he
gave me a note on the Silver Spur.
Mr. HUBERT. For what amount?
Mr. PAUL. For the $3,700.
Mr. HUBERT. Up to that time you didn’t have a note, but when the Ranch
House folded——
Mr. PAUL. Folded—it didn’t fold, his partner bought him out—the two of
them—he couldn’t—he didn’t get any money out of it anyway.
Mr. HUBERT. Then, he went into the Silver Spur?
Mr. PAUL. No; he was in the Silver Spur before.
Mr. HUBERT. He was in the Silver Spur already?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. He was in both?
Mr. PAUL. Yes; he was in both.
Mr. HUBERT. So, you got him to give you a note to show the $3,700?
Mr. PAUL. But when he sold it, I think he sold it for $2,200, or
$2,700, but he had to pay so many people that he gave me a thousand.