Of course, I have been told by a lot of people and undoubtedly a lot of
it was exaggerated that he was a Communist, and you have had people say
he was a Communist who might say I was a Communist, you know, if they
didn't agree with me on something, so I have absolutely no evidence
that he was a Communist of my own knowledge, I have heard a lot, of
course.
Mr. DULLES. What you are saying in this last answer relates to the
present time, not only the way your knowledge has----
Mr. WADE. At that time and up to the present.
Mr. DULLES. Rather than the day of assassination.
Mr. WADE. I have no evidence myself now that he was a Communist, or
ever was a Communist, and I never did see what evidence that they had
on him there gathered on him. I never saw any of the physical evidence
in the Oswald case other than one or two statements, and I think I
saw the gun while they were taking it out of there bringing it to
Washington, because I told them at that stage, they didn't want to take
it out, didn't want to let the FBI have it and I told them I thought
they ought to let them bring it on up here that night and get it back
the next night.
There was arguing over that. I am getting off, rambling around, but
their argument over that was they were still trying to identify the gun
through a pawn broker or something like that and the police wanted to
keep it but I said, "Let it go up there and they said they would have
it back the next afternoon."
Mr. RANKIN. Have you ever had any evidence that Oswald was involved
with anyone else in actually shooting the President?
Mr. WADE. Well, I will answer that the same way. I have absolutely no
evidence myself.
Now, of course, I might have some type of opinion or some connection
with reference to the Fair Play for Cuba and these letters that they
told me about. If that was so there may have been some connection or
may not, but I have no evidence myself on it.
Mr. RANKIN. Do you have any evidence as to whether Jack Ruby was
involved with anyone else in the killing of Oswald?
Mr. WADE. No, sir; I have no evidence on that. We have some and I think
you have them all, some 8 or 10 witnesses who have said they had seen
Ruby and Oswald together at various times.
Some of them were, I know one of them during the trial was a lawyer
there in Dallas, which I presume you all got his four-page statement,
said he heard them discussing killing Connally a week before then, came
out to my house and that had been sent to the FBI, and that was during
the trial, and I gave him a lie detector which showed that he didn't
have, this was a fanciful thing.
That, I can't think of his name, some of you all may know it, but he is
a lawyer there in Dallas.
Mr. RANKIN. You found that was not anything you could rely on.
Mr. WADE. I didn't use him as a witness and after giving him the
polygraph I was satisfied that he was imagining it. I think he was
sincere, I don't think he was trying--I don't think he was trying to be
a hero or anything. I think he really thought about it so much I think
he thought that it happened, but the polygraph indicated otherwise.
Mr. DULLES. Did you have any other evidence than the polygraph on this
point that he was not telling the truth or that this was a fiction?
Mr. WADE. No, but I didn't--but I did see a report where the FBI
interviewed the girl that was allegedly with him in Ruby's place in
October, and she didn't corroborate all of it. I think she did say he
was in there but I am not even sure of that. I didn't interview her but
I just read a report on it.
I read where they checked with the Department of Public Safety and
they did not, were not able to--he said he reported all this to the
Department of Public Safety, and I don't think they found any record of
him reporting it. It is very difficult to get him to come in to see me.
He didn't just walk in, this went on for a month, I kept hearing that
there was a certain person knew about it and I kept telling him to come
on and talk to me and he finally came out to my house late one night.
The reason I think he actually must have thought it was so, but--I
wasn't too interested in that theory of the case on this thing because
I had a theory on this Ruby case from the start because I, even before
you are going to get into some of these officers' testimony in a
minute, but when this happened I was going home from church, and my own
mind I said I believe that was Jack Ruby who shot him because from that
Friday night, and from my theory has been from that Friday night, when
he saw him there he made up his mind to kill him if he got a chance and
I have had that--I didn't even know about Dean's testimony which you
are going to hear today, I didn't know about his testimony until the
day before I put him on the stand because I had not been preparing the
evidence, I had been picking a jury for 2 weeks but that was my theory
from the start.
We had a waitress that I think you are all familiar with that was out
at B&B Cafe at 3 a.m. on the 22d who said she served Ruby and Oswald
there.
B&B Cafe on Oak Lane, I know you have got that, I have seen it
somewhere.
I don't think she was ever given a polygraph test. You have about four
homosexuals, I think that is probably the word, that have said they
have seen them together places. There was some indication that Ruby
was either bisexual or homosexual, but at least, I think they testified
to that in the trial, I think by mistake.
Belli asked the man, meant to ask him another word and says, he meant
to say homicidal tendencies and he said homosexual tendencies and his
one witness said yes, sir.
That is in the record which you will get of the trial, I guess.
Mr. RANKIN. I understood you to say when you came home from church,
after the killing of Oswald that you thought it was Ruby before you had
heard that it was Ruby.
Mr. WADE. You see, they announced Dallas businessman kills him.
Mr. RANKIN. Yes.
Mr. WADE. I took my family, I was in church with the family. I took
them on home and on the way down there they kept--they didn't say who
it was but this ran through my mind, a businessman.
I said that must be Jack Ruby the way he looked. He looked kind of wild
to me down there Friday night the way he was running everywhere, you
know, and I said to myself that must be him. I didn't tell my wife. You
can't prove that. It is one of those things, that was my theory that
he was likely the one. I couldn't, you know, out of a million people I
couldn't say he was the one but when they announced his name I will say
it didn't surprise me.
Mr. RANKIN. Mr. Chairman, what do you want to do about Mr. Carr?
Senator COOPER. Mr. Wade, can you name to the Commission the names of
the persons who told you or who stated in your presence that they had
seen Lee Oswald and Jack Ruby together?