Kennedy Assassination

After the shots were fired, Roy Truly accompanied Police Officer T.L. Baker into the building. There they came upon Oswald, empty handed near a soft drink machine. Truly vouched for Oswald as an employee. Oswald bought a soda.

Around 12:40 p.m. CST Oswald boards a bus but then gets off; next he hails William Whatley's taxicab.

Back at the Texas School Book Depository police and Truly were doing a head count of employees. Oswald was missing.

Oswald makes a brief appearance at his rooming house at 1026 North Beckley in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. (His wife Marina lived elsewhere.) He was known there as O. H. Lee and was seen by the housekeeper, Earlene Roberts.

On the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository, Deputy Sheriff Luke Mooney finds a snipers nest. He sees 3 spent shells and a diagonal crease across one box which could be a rifle resting place. The Crime Lab was summoned.

The employees on the fifth floor confirmed that they had heard shots and even the shell casings drop above them.

Oswald's nest

Sniper's nest
Texas School Book Depository

Deputy Eugene Boone found the gun a short distance away, standing upright between two stacks of cartons. It was a World War II vintage, Italian military carbine called a Mannlicher-Carcano. The rifle had a four power scope bolted to it. There was one shell left in the chamber.

Lee Harvey Oswald was wandering around the streets with no discernable plan in mind.

Officer J.D. Tippit

Officer John D. Tippit was slowly patrolling the curbs in the area. Oswald loosely fit the assassin's description and so Tippit rolled down his window. A conversation ensued. Whatever was said, it didn't satisfy, so Tippit got out of his patrol car. Watching him from across the hood, Oswald allowed the officer to take two steps, then pulled the snub-nosed revolver from his pants and fired five times rapidly. The aim was deadly. Only one shot missed. The cop was hit in the middle of the forehead, the temple, and twice in the chest. Officer J.D. Tippit was dead within seconds at approximately 1:15 p.m.

As Oswald begins running, he is dropping empty shells and reloading new ones.

When he decides to sneak into the Texas Theatre, about 8 blocks from where Officer Tippit was shot, he is seen by Johnny Calvin Brewer who works at Hardy's Shoe Store across the street. Brewer has noticed Oswald acting suspiciously, especially as patrol cars pass looking for their man. Brewer gets theatre employees to contact the authorities.

Police quickly converge on the Texas Theatre. Oswald punches Officer Nick McDonald while grabbing the Smith and Wesson. Officers descent upon him, frantically trying to get the gun away from a cop killer.

Oswald was punched, possibly after he was handcuffed. He screams "police brutality." Later he tells police officials that he may have had it coming since he punched McDonald.

Eyewitnesses on the street claim Oswald was shouting that he wanted a lawyer and that he knew his rights. This would have been an element had a prosecution been necessary. He would repeat this again and again, but no attorney was ever summoned. While the Miranda ruling (Miranda v. Arizona, 1966) is still in the future, even in 1963 you had a right to counsel.

Among other things found in Oswald's pockets was a Selective Service card (draft card) in the name of Alex James Hidell.

Capt. Will Fritz, principle interrogator of
Lee Harvey Oswald

Once back at police headquarters, Oswald is questioned by Captain Will Fritz of Robbery and Homicide.

As with all of Oswald's interrogations, no tape recorder was used, no stenographer was present. This is a loss to history. In 1997, Frtiz's handwritten notes were discovered among some of his things and donated to the JFK Assassination Records Review Board . (Fritz died in 1984.) Earlier in 1997, the Board received the notes of FBI Agent James Hosty Jr. Together, they are the only written record of what transpired.

In all conversations with police, Secret Service and FBI, Oswald denied that he shot President Kennedy or owned a rifle. He said nothing derogatory about the President and claimed that a photo of him holding a rifle was a forgery, with his head was superimposed on someone else's body.

Lee Harvey Oswald
November 22, 1963

November 23, 1963

Several times over the next days, Oswald is available to the press. He always asserts his innocence, including uttering the now famous line, "I'm just a patsy.”

For reasons that are unclear, the Dallas Police Department never succeeds in managing the press. They are everywhere, spilling into hallways and crowding the officers.

Obviously the Dallas PD had an interest in demonstrating how quickly they could resolve a crime which had now severly embarrassed their community. Yet the practice of displaying the rifle, the suspect and other elements are at best, questionable.

Captain Fritz will say the case is "cinched," District Attorney Henry Wade boasted that he had “sent men to the electric chair with less evidence,” and after Oswald's death, Police Chief Jesse Curry will say the case is "closed."

History has rendered these proclamations optomistic to the point of absurdity. Yet it must be remembered the incredible pressure they were under with a world watching their actions. One might suppose that this scrutiny would make them meticulous in everything they did, but perhaps they were just overwhelmed by events.

At 7:10 p.m. Oswald was arraigned before Judge David Johnston for the murder of J.D. Tippit and later at 1:35 a.m. early on the 23rd, for the murder of John F. Kennedy.

More evidence would emerge on Saturday. It would be established he mail ordered a Mannlicher-Carcano rifle under the Hidell name.The cost $12.78. He wrote a letter to Governor Connally in 1962 asking that his undesirable discharge from the Marines be reconsidered. His print was on the rifle.

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Quantum LeapTV producer Donald P. Bellisario (JAG, Magnum P.I.) served with Lee Harvey Oswald in the Marines. Bellisario believes that Oswald was the assassin.

He wrote a 2 part story in the fifth season on his show Quantum Leap in which he had Sam Beckett leap into Lee Harvey Oswald. The episode drew on Bellisario's personal knowledge of Oswald and there is even a character, Sgt. Bellisario. The episode title is "Lee Harvey Oswald."

The Men Who Killed Kennedy
From the History Channel
6 parts, 5 hrs., 2 discs
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Image Of An Assassination:
A New Look At The Zapruder Film
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The The Missing Chapter provides a unique look into Lee Harvey Oswalds life in the Far East

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