Mr. HUBERT. I don’t want to put words in your mouth—if it’s not so,
tell me.
Mr. PAUL. Actually, it was on the spur of the moment that I did it, and
I learned right away it cost me money.
Mr. HUBERT. Did Eva object?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. Did any of his brothers or sisters object?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. And you actually operated it for approximately 2½ months?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. And then why did you close it?
Mr. PAUL. Well, maybe I would still be operating it—no, I wasn’t going
to operate it any more. I told Eva, “I’m going to give you the stock,”
and let her do whatever she wanted to with it, because I couldn’t
do it any more. The second thing is, I had a broken foot—I couldn’t
make it any more over there. I was only coming up once a week, and the
thing was shot, and then on the same day I decided to that, the liquor
control board closed it up. They didn’t close it up, they sent me a
notice that I can’t sell beer, so I might as well close it up.
Mr. HUBERT. And it hasn’t been opened since then?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. You paid the rent and all the bills during that time?
Mr. PAUL. When I was operating it?
Mr. HUBERT. Yes.
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. And you came out a deficit of about $3,000?
Mr. PAUL. At least—maybe more—I paid the Government $1,770.
Mr. HUBERT. What was that for?
Mr. PAUL. Back taxes.
Mr. HUBERT. Excise taxes?
Mr. PAUL. Yes; it was for September, November, October, December.
Mr. HUBERT. Is that excise tax?
Mr. PAUL. Excise tax—that’s the cabaret tax, they call it.
Mr. HUBERT. It doesn’t have anything to do with the social security or
withholding taxes?
Mr. PAUL. I paid them some of that too—there was only one person that
was getting paid—all the entertainers got their own—they don’t go under
social security.
Mr. HUBERT. They are self-employed?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you know a woman by the name of Bertha Cheek?
Mr. PAUL. What is her name?
Mr. HUBERT. Bertha Cheek.
Mr. PAUL. It doesn’t even ring a bell.
Mr. HUBERT. Did Ruby ever tell you that just towards the end, in a week
or two prior to the death of Oswald, that he was trying to borrow some
money from her, and get her interested in opening a new cabaret?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Or doing something to the Carousel?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir; that name don’t even ring a bell to me.
Mr. HUBERT. You don’t know her at all and he never mentioned her?
Mr. PAUL. Never.
Mr. HUBERT. Nor did he mention that he was trying to raise any money?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. I think perhaps you would be in as good a position as
anybody else to tell us some things about Jack’s personal life. As you
may know, there have been some rumors at least, that maybe Jack was a
homosexual?
Mr. PAUL. Oh, no—there was rumors?
Mr. HUBERT. Yes, you have heard the rumors?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. We would like your opinion on that subject.
Mr. PAUL. Oh, no—no, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. You knew the man a long time?
Mr. PAUL. A long time.
Mr. HUBERT. It is your opinion he was not a homosexual?
Mr. PAUL. Positively.
Mr. HUBERT. What was his relationship with women generally; do you know?
Mr. PAUL. Well, he liked women.
Mr. HUBERT. Did he have affairs with them?
Mr. PAUL. Yes—just different times, different women all the time.
Mr. HUBERT. Was he ever particularly attached to one?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Who was that?
Mr. PAUL. Let me remember that name again—mention some names, I can’t
think of the name.
Mr. HUBERT. Alice Nichols?
Mr. PAUL. Alice Nichols—yes, I think they were going around together
for about 10 or 11 years. I used to go out with them too.
Mr. HUBERT. What was his relationship to the girls who used to work in
his place, was it strictly a business relationship?
Mr. PAUL. With the girls—strictly business. He would like to make a
girl that would come up there, but not the girls that was working for
him.
Mr. HUBERT. You mean he wouldn’t try to date the strippers or
waitresses?
Mr. PAUL. No—we used to take them out for coffee after they got
through, but that’s all.
Mr. HUBERT. I would like to show you a picture, or rather several
pictures which have already been identified, and I’m not going to give
them a new identification number. I’m going to show you a group of
five pictures, exact copies of which have already been identified in
connection with the deposition of Andrew Armstrong, as Exhibits 5300 A
through F and ask you if it is not so that Jack Ruby appears in each
one of those pictures?
Mr. PAUL. Right.
Mr. HUBERT. Now, there are two girls in there?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. One has blonde hair and is wearing dark clothes and the
other is—has darker hair and is wearing a striped dress.
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Could you tell us who they are, referring first to the one
with the blonde hair with the black dress?
Mr. PAUL. Yes, that’s Kathy Kay.
Mr. HUBERT. Who is the other one?
Mr. PAUL. This is Alice—somebody—I don’t know the second name anyway.
Mr. HUBERT. Alice Anderson?
Mr. PAUL. Yes—I never knew her second name. She worked there.
Mr. HUBERT. When did she work there?
Mr. PAUL. Alice was a waitress or a champagne girl, what you call them,
and she was the strip.
Mr. HUBERT. Yes, Kathy Kay was a strip?
Mr. PAUL. Kathy Kay was a strip.
Mr. HUBERT. How long had the girl that you identify as Alice, to wit,
the girl in those pictures with the striped dress, how long had she
been working at the club?
Mr. PAUL. Well, from the time he made a burlesque out of it, she used
to work a couple of weeks, a couple of months, then quit and come back
and work another couple of months or couple of weeks and then quit. She
was never a steady girl.
Mr. HUBERT. Is she married?
Mr. PAUL. I don’t think so.
Mr. HUBERT. Did he date her?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Well, are you positive or is it that you just don’t know?
Mr. PAUL. That I know of.
Mr. HUBERT. But I take it from the way you answered the question that
you knew him so well that you probably would have known it if he had?
Mr. PAUL. Yes—if he did I would have known.
Mr. HUBERT. He would tell you that?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. He told you about his affairs with women, is that right?
Mr. PAUL. No; not always—he told me about affairs he wanted to tell me
about, let’s put it that way.
Mr. HUBERT. Were there lots of them?
Mr. PAUL. Well, there were quite a few.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you know of a girl by the name of Joyce McDonald?
Mr. PAUL. Joyce?
Mr. HUBERT. I think her stage name was Joy Dale?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you recognize her in the photo I am now showing you?
Mr. PAUL. Oh, I recognize her.
Mr. HUBERT. This photograph has been identified in connection with the
deposition of Andrew Armstrong, as Exhibit 5301 A through E, and there
are five pictures here showing a man and two girls—Jack Ruby is the
man, of course; is that right?
Mr. PAUL. I guess.
Mr. HUBERT. And the girl on your right, as you look at the picture?
Mr. PAUL. I’m not seeing it.
Mr. HUBERT. I would like for you to identify both girls, but do so in
such a way that the record can show it—in other words, when you say,
“this” it won’t show up on the record, but when you say “this” you must
say the girl on the left-hand side of the picture as you are looking at
it—is that who you mean?
Mr. PAUL. Yes; that’s Dale.
Mr. HUBERT. That’s the girl called Joyce Day?
Mr. PAUL. Joy Dale.
Mr. HUBERT. That’s the one on the right-hand side of the picture?
Mr. PAUL. Yes; the one on the right-hand side is—what do you call her
again—that little girl up that went to court?
Mr. HUBERT. Little Lynn?
Mr. PAUL. Little Lynn.
Mr. HUBERT. That’s Karen Bennett, did you know her as that?
Mr. PAUL. No; I never knew her as that, all I knew her was Little Lynn.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you know what the relationship between this Dale girl
and Jack Ruby was that you have identified in Exhibit 5301 A through E,
the deposition of Andrew Armstrong?
Mr. PAUL. I don’t know what Andrew knew, but I know nothing about her.
I know she worked there—she was a stripper.
Mr. HUBERT. So far as you know, was there any romantic relationship or
sex relationship?
Mr. PAUL. I don’t know. I wouldn’t say “yes” and I wouldn’t say “no.”
Mr. HUBERT. You just don’t know?
Mr. PAUL. Anything I don’t know—I can’t say I know.
Mr. HUBERT. That’s absolutely correct. I am simply asking you because
you have been a friend a long time and as you said a moment ago, he
told you some of the things that he wanted you to know?
Mr. PAUL. Well; I don’t think he wanted me to know about any of the
girls that worked in the club, even if he did have affairs with
them—that would be—I probably would say something to him, but on the
outside, I know a lot of girls that he had affairs with.
Mr. HUBERT. I’m now going to show you a picture which has been
identified as one of the pictures in Exhibit 5303 A through M
deposition on Andrew Armstrong, a picture which shows a girl in a
bikini suit, a blond girl. There seems to be two sailors in the picture
and on the right-hand side of the picture as you look at it, there is
a rather large man in a white shirt with his left elbow leaning on the
stage, and I ask you if you know who the girl is, do you recognize her?
Mr. PAUL. That’s the same Kathy Kay.
Mr. HUBERT. That’s Kathy Kay?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Who is the man, the fat man, that I have referred to with
the white shirt, the very heavy man?
Mr. PAUL. This one over here?
Mr. HUBERT. Yes.
Mr. PAUL. I don’t know.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you ever see him there?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. You never did?
Mr. PAUL. No—there isn’t a familiar face in there. What is he supposed
to be? No answers [laughing].
Mr. HUBERT. I will show you now two pictures that have been previously
identified as Exhibit 5304 A and B in connection with the deposition
of Andrew Armstrong, the first one showing a girl serving a man who is
seated, and there is apparently a boy in the background, and I ask you
if you can identify that place, first of all, is that the Carousel?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you recognize the place at all?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you know who the girl is who is in the stripper suit?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you know who the man is, sitting down at the table?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you know who that bartender is standing at the back?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you know a man by the name of Mickey Ryan?
Mr. PAUL. No—I might have heard the name but I never knew a guy with a
name like that.
Mr. HUBERT. You don’t recognize the man at the bar?
Mr. PAUL. No—it’s not in the Carousel, that’s for sure. The Carousel
had no cloths on the tables.
Mr. HUBERT. Nor did it have a bar?
Mr. PAUL. It had a bar.
Mr. HUBERT. I mean, not for liquor.
Mr. PAUL. No; that’s right—that looks like a private club.
Mr. HUBERT. Were you familiar with the notebooks and memo books that
Ruby kept?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you ever see them at all?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. I think that one of the girls in the club had a boy friend
named Tommy, do you know who that was—Tommy?
Mr. PAUL. The only real boy friends that I can give you the name of and
she got married to the boy recently.
Mr. HUBERT. Who was that?
Mr. PAUL. He was in the police department, but I can’t think of his
name. He made her give up the business and they got married and went to
California, but you know, talking about boy friends, those girls have
boy friends all the time—they are different boy friends—you never know
which one is which. I can’t remember one name from another.
Mr. HUBERT. Well, here’s what I wanted to get at—after you took over
the club, you apparently hired someone to collect the cover charge at
the front?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. He was a gray-haired man, I’m told?
Mr. PAUL. No, it was Leo Torti.
Mr. HUBERT. [Spelling] T-o-r-t-i?
Mr. PAUL. Yes, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. You didn’t have a gray-haired man there?
Mr. PAUL. No, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Where did you get him, had he been there before?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. He had worked there before?
Mr. PAUL. Well, he didn’t actually work, he used to help Eva, and when
Eva closed that place down he came to help there, but he never got paid
for anything—just, I took him home and I took him out for a bite to eat.
Mr. HUBERT. How old a man would he have been?
Mr. PAUL. Forty or forty something—he isn’t gray. I’m the only gray man
that was there.
Mr. HUBERT. There was no gray man who was on the door collecting?
Mr. PAUL. No.
Mr. HUBERT. Did Eva close up the Vegas?
Mr. PAUL. Yes, she closed it up and then she sold it.
Mr. HUBERT. When—before the Carousel was closed up?
Mr. PAUL. Oh, yes, she closed it up right after New Year’s.
Mr. HUBERT. Right after Ruby was put in jail?
Mr. PAUL. No, right after New Year’s.
Mr. HUBERT. You mean she sold it?
Mr. PAUL. She sold it.
Mr. HUBERT. Whom did she sell it to?
Mr. PAUL. She sold it to two men and a woman that formed a corporation
and bought it. It’s still called the Vegas Club—they’ve got it in the
paper “under new management—Vegas Club.” I don’t even know who they are.
Mr. HUBERT. Now, I handed you at the beginning of the deposition, or
even before the deposition began, a number of sheets of paper, the
first group numbering nine pages, purporting to be a report of an
interview of you by the FBI agents Lish [spelling] L-i-s-h and Barratt
[spelling] B-a-r-r-a-t-t, relating to an interview with you on November
24, 1963, running, as I said, for nine pages.
For the purpose of identification, I am marking the first page as
follows: “Dallas, Texas, April 15, 1964, Exhibit 5319, Deposition of
Ralph Paul,” and I am putting my name on the first page, and also
writing my initials on the lower right-hand corner of every one of the
other pages.
Now, I ask you if you have had an opportunity to read that document,
now identified as Exhibit 5319?
Mr. PAUL. What do you mean?
Mr. HUBERT. Have you had a chance to read it?
Mr. PAUL. Yes.
Mr. HUBERT. Does it represent the truth as far as you know?
Mr. PAUL. As far as I know.
Mr. HUBERT. Are there any corrections you want to make or errors you
want to correct in it?