Mr. DULLES. It must have been Saturday night, wasn't it?
Mr. WADE. No; that was Friday night.
Mr. DULLES. Friday night.
Mr. WADE. And I told him, and then I got a call, since this happened, I
talked to Jim Bowie, my first assistant who had talked to, somebody had
called him, my phone had been busy and Barefoot Sanders, I talked to
him, and he--they all told that they were concerned about their having
received calls from Washington and somewhere else, and I told them
that there wasn't any such crime in Texas, I didn't know where it came
from, and that is what prompted me to go down and take the complaint,
otherwise I never would have gone down to the police station.
Mr. RANKIN. Did you say anything about whether you had evidence to
support such a complaint of a conspiracy?
Mr. WADE. Mr. Rankin, I don't know what evidence we have, we had at
that time and actually don't know yet what all the evidence was.
I never did see, I was told they had a lot of Fair Play for Cuba
propaganda or correspondence on Oswald, and letters from the Communist
Party, and it was probably exaggerated to me.
I was told this. I have never seen any of that personally. Never saw
any of it that night. But whether he was a Communist or whether he
wasn't, had nothing to do with solving the problem at hand, the filing
of the charge.
I also was very, I wasn't sure I was going to take a complaint, and a
justice of the peace will take a complaint lots of times because he
doesn't have to try it. I knew I would have to try this case and that
prompted me to go down and see what kind of evidence they had.
Mr. RANKIN. Will you tell us what you mean by taking a complaint under
your law.
Mr. WADE. Well, a complaint is a blank form that you fill out in the
name, by the authority of the State of Texas, and so forth, which I
don't have here, but it charged, it charges a certain person with
committing a crime, and it is filed in the justice court.
The law permits the district attorney or any of his assistants to swear
the witness to the charge. The only place we sign it is over on the
left, I believe sworn to and subscribed to before me, this is the blank
day of blank, Henry Wade, district attorney.
Over on the right the complainant signs the complaint. We mean when we
say take or accept a complaint is when we swear the witness and we draw
it up ourselves and word it and take it.
Mr. RANKIN. Is that what you did in the Oswald-Ruby case?
Mr. WADE. Yes, sir; we did that. Now, as a practical matter that is not
really filing the complaints. The complaint is not really legally filed
until a justice of the peace takes it and records it on his docket.
Now, it goes to the justice of the peace court to clear the whole thing
up and his purpose, he has--the law says you shall take him immediately
before a magistrate, which is the justice of the peace.
The courts have held that it is not necessary in Texas, but there
is a statute that says that, and then he--his purpose is to hold an
examining trial to see whether it is a bailable case or not.
Then he sends it to the grand jury and the grand jury hears it and
returns an indictment or a no bill and then it is in a certain court
set with a docket number and then it is ours to try.
Does that answer some of the questions?
(At this point, Senator Cooper returned to the hearing room.)
Mr. RANKIN. Which route did you follow in regard to the Oswald case?
Mr. WADE. The same route. I accepted the complaint on him in the
homicide department, and gave it to David Johnston, the justice of the
peace who was there incidentally, or there in the homicide department.
But I didn't actually type it up. I don't know who actually typed it
up, somebody typed it up, but we file about a 100 a year, murders "did
with malice aforethought."
It was a straight murder indictment, murder with malice charge, and
that was the procedure we followed in the Oswald case.
Mr. RANKIN. Why did you not include in that complaint a charge of an
international conspiracy?
Mr. WADE. Well, it is just like I said, it is surplusage to begin with.
You don't need it. If you allege it you have to prove it. The U.S.
attorney and the attorney general had called me and said that if it
wasn't absolutely necessary they thought it shouldn't be done, and---
Mr. RANKIN. By the "attorney general" who do you mean?
Mr. WADE. Mr. Carr. And actually it is never done. I mean, you see
that got clear, apparently you had the press writing that up, radio or
whoever was saying that was--had no idea about what murder was.
Now, to write in there, assume he was, assume we could prove he was,
a Communist, which I wasn't able to prove because all I heard was he
had some literature there on him and had been in Russia, but assume I
knew he was a Communist, can I prove it, I still wouldn't have alleged
it because it is subject actually to be removed from the indictment
because it is surplusage, you know, and all a murder indictment, the
only thing that a murder indictment varies on is the method of what
they used, did kill John Doe by shooting him with a gun or by stabbing
him or by drowning him in water or how, the manner and means is the
only thing that varies in a murder indictment, all other wordage is the
same. Does that clear that up?
(Discussion off the record.)
Senator COOPER. As I understand it, under Texas law there is no crime
which is denominated under the term "international conspiracy."
Mr. WADE. No, sir.
Senator COOPER. I assume that conspiracy is a crime in Texas, isn't it,
conspiracy to commit a crime?
Mr. WADE. Conspiracy is a crime. It is a joining together of a group,
your conspiracy where they enter into an agreement to commit a crime,
and that is usually the one is indicted as a conspirator, the one who
doesn't participate in the crime.
Senator COOPER. My point is, though, that conspiracy is a crime under
Texas law?
Mr. WADE. Yes, sir; conspiracy to commit murder is a crime.
Senator COOPER. Yes.
Let me ask this question.
Mr. WADE. Yes, sir.
Senator COOPER. As I understand it then, one of the reasons that no
warrant of indictment was rendered upon, touching upon an international
conspiracy is that there is just no such crime in Texas as an
international conspiracy?
Mr. WADE. There was no such crime. If it was any such crime it would be
a Federal rather than a State offense. If there is such crime as being
a part of an international conspiracy it would deal with treason rather
than murder, I would think.
But there is no such thing as being a part of any organization that
makes that it is a crime to commit murder. This was a straight murder
charge.
If we would have had four or five co-conspirators who conspired with
him, planned the thing and could prove it we would have. That would
have been a conspiracy to, conspiracy to commit murder.
Senator COOPER. But conspiracy is not essential to the crime, to
describe the person accused as belonging to any organization?
Mr. WADE. No, sir; it is not necessary and it is entirely what they
call surplusage.
Senator COOPER. Now the last question, was there any evidence brought
to you or any evidence of which you had knowledge upon which you could
base an indictment or a warrant for conspiracy to commit murder in this
case?
Mr. WADE. No, sir; you mean parties other than Oswald?
Senator COOPER. Yes.
Mr. WADE. No. I might say on that score, to clear that up, I haven't
seen any evidence along that line. I haven't even seen any of the
correspondence that they had, allegedly had with the Communist Party
here in New York or the Fair Play for Cuba, I haven't seen his little
black book where he is supposed to have had the Russian Embassy's
telephone numbers in it which I am sure you all have gone into it.