Part 26

Mr. McCLOY. The first man who sealed the building was----

Mr. CURRY. I believe will be Inspector Sawyer.

Mr. McCLOY. Inspector Sawyer?

Mr. CURRY. I believe he would be the first to issue orders. I could be mistaken on that but as I recall he was the first officer.

Mr. DULLES. You did not give those orders yourself?

Mr. CURRY. No, sir; not myself.

Representative FORD. How many men participated in the search of the building?

Mr. CURRY. I would just have to guess but I would suggest probably 20 people.

Representative FORD. Did you check with those who went through this process?

Mr. CURRY. No; I didn't check with each individual officer.

Representative FORD. Did you get a report?

Mr. CURRY. I got a report from Inspector Sawyer, and also from Chief Lumpkin as to the manner in which it was searched.

Representative FORD. How long did it take them, do you have any idea?

Mr. CURRY. I believe they were, perhaps, maybe a couple of hours altogether, searching that building.

Representative FORD. Did they give you an oral or written report on what they found or didn't find?

Mr. CURRY. I believe there were some written reports made. I don't recall now.

Representative FORD. If there are written reports could we have them?

Mr. CURRY. I think----

Mr. RANKIN. Off the record.

(Discussion off the record.)

Representative FORD. Back on the record.

Are you familiar with any written report, Chief, on what transpired during the search of the building?

Mr. CURRY. Only what Deputy Chief Lumpkin in his report here in a chronological report that we made, and you have this, as best we could, after this occurred, the deputy chiefs and myself all sat down together went over this from the time we received notice that the President would visit Dallas until the shooting of Oswald, and step by step we tried to go through this as to what we did, and this is what we call a chronological report.

Representative FORD. If there is a report in anybody's files in the Dallas Police department on what transpired during this investigation of the building, there would be no reason why that report couldn't be made available?

Mr. CURRY. No, sir; if we have one it certainly would be made available.

Representative FORD. Will you check the files of the department and if there is a report available will you submit it to the Commission, please?

Mr. CURRY. Yes, sir; I was trying to.

Mr. RANKIN. Chief Curry, I think that your chronological report does not purport to go into the detail of how the search was made and so forth.

Mr. CURRY. No, sir; it just states in here how Chief Lumpkin, how he formed the search and it tells something about while he was there.

Mr. McCLOY. The chronological report part of our record yet?

Mr. BELIN. We have a chronological report, yes.

Mr. McCLOY. Is this the same one as the Chief is looking at?

Mr. RANKIN. We will check that.

Mr. DULLES. It is not yet an exhibit, is it?

Mr. RANKIN. No; we have, and we were discussing yesterday, a number of items in the form of affidavits and other evidence that we will have to introduce into the record of the Commission before we get through which has been examined by the staff and in some cases called to the Commission's attention but is not formally a matter of record and we will have to complete that before we can complete our report.

Mr. McCLOY. Is that the same chronological report that the Chief has?

Mr. CURRY. If it isn't I can leave you these copies but they were submitted to Attorney General Carr, two copies. This is what is in this report. "Upon arrival,"--this is Chief Lumpkin--"Upon arrival at the Texas School Book Depository we found Inspector Sawyer was in front of the building and with the assistance of other officers was in the process of detaining anyone or everyone who had any knowledge whatsoever of the shooting. This was discussed with Sawyer. We decided that we would get all persons in that category away from the crowd by sending them to Sheriff Decker's office"--which is about a half block from here--"at Main and Houston to be held for further interrogation. Homicide Detective Turner was sent to the sheriff's office to represent the homicide bureau of our department and interrogating these witnesses."

Mr. DULLES. That is where the sheriff's office was?

Mr. CURRY. Main and Houston, it runs.

"Detective Senkel was released back to Captain Fritz to assist in the investigation. He had come down. Sawyer had placed guards on the building to prevent anyone from going or coming. Sawyer organized a detail to check all persons and automobiles on the parking lot surrounding the Texas School Book Depository Building, taking their names, telephone numbers, addresses, places of employment, and later on in the afternoon those vehicles that were not taken out were checked by license number. Several of the U.S. Alcohol Tax units assisted in the search.

"At that time Lumpkin entered the building and instructed that it be completely sealed off and that no one be allowed to leave or enter."

This probably was some, I would say, some 30 or 40 minutes after the original shots were fired. He had gone on to Parkland Hospital to me and I told him there to return to assist in the handling of this matter.

Mr. McCLOY. In your judgment is that the first sealing off of the building that took place?

Mr. CURRY. No; I think Inspector Sawyer, when he arrived he took some steps to seal off the building.

Mr. RANKIN. You have already testified about Inspector Sawyer and you said you thought he was about 10 or 12 blocks away.

Mr. CURRY. I believe so. I believe he was about at Main and Akard Streets which would be about 10 blocks away when he heard of this incident occurring and he immediately went down there.

Mr. DULLES. And the first order to seal off was given some 10 minutes, I think you testified, in that neighborhood?

Mr. CURRY. To the best of my knowledge.

Mr. DULLES. After the assassination?

Mr. CURRY. Yes.

Mr. RANKIN. You don't know just what he did about sealing the building, did you?

Mr. CURRY. No, sir; I don't. I imagine he placed men on the front and back doors and asked them not to let anyone come or go without finding out who they were.

Mr. DULLES. Who would know that fact as to when that order was given, that would be Sawyer?

Mr. RANKIN. Officer Sawyer would be the one who would really know that fact?

Mr. CURRY. I believe so.

Mr. RANKIN. And whatever he would say about it you think would be correct?

Mr. CURRY. I do. Because we already have a deposition from him that tells about the sealing of the building, and it was not done immediately when he came.

Representative FORD. Would it be appropriate at this time to put that deposition in the record at this point?

Mr. RANKIN. I wonder if it would be satisfactory to the Commission, in view of the inquiry by Commissioner Ford, if we would, the staff would, tender at this point the portion of the deposition that relates to how the building was sealed, and then have a reference to this point in the place where it is offered in evidence in regular course.

Representative FORD. That would be satisfactory to me as far as the particular point we are discussing at the moment.

Mr. RANKIN. We will do that then.

Now, Chief, would you tell us the next thing that you know of that happened about the search for the assassin, after the search of the depository building that you described?

Mr. CURRY. The next thing I can tell you about, I remained out, as I say, at Love Field until the planes departed. I went back to the office.

Mr. DULLES. At about what time would you place that?

Mr. CURRY. I believe it was about 4 o'clock I believe when I returned to the office.

Mr. DULLES. It was 4 o'clock when you returned to the office from Love Field?

Mr. CURRY. I believe so, I am not positive.

When I arrived they were in the process of, Captain Fritz and his men, were in the process of investigating this murder of Tippit and also the assassination of the President.

Mr. RANKIN. Did you make an inquiry in regard to the progress?

Mr. CURRY. I think I did. I asked him how he was coming along and he said they were making good progress.

Mr. RANKIN. Then what happened after that?

Mr. CURRY. They had had a couple of showups with Oswald so witnesses could attempt to identify him.

Mr. RANKIN. Do you know whether they had gone out to Beckley Street to the place where he had stayed?

Mr. CURRY. I understood they had and I understood they went back the next day.

Mr. RANKIN. What do you mean by a showup?

Mr. CURRY. Well, it is customary when you have suspects in a crime where you have witnesses, that they be taken into a room and allowed, the witnesses, to observe them in the presence of other people.

Mr. RANKIN. You have a room for this purpose?

Mr. CURRY. Yes, sir; we do.

Mr. RANKIN. Will you describe briefly what that room is like?

Mr. CURRY. It is a police assemblyroom where we hold our regular rollcalls. They have a stage whereby prisoners are brought up on this stage.

Mr. RANKIN. How large is the room?

Mr. CURRY. The room, I would say, is perhaps 50 feet long and 20 feet wide.

Mr. RANKIN. Who was allowed in the room at the time of this showup?

Mr. CURRY. Presumably only the news media and police officers. I have been told that Jack Ruby was seen in this showuproom also.

Mr. RANKIN. About what time of the day was that?

Mr. CURRY. As I recall, this was fairly late Friday night, I believe.

Mr. RANKIN. Do you know who was there to try to identify Lee Oswald?

Mr. CURRY. No, I don't. The news media, a number of them, had continued to say, "Let us see him. What are you doing to him? How does he look?"

I think one broadcaster that I had heard or someone had told me about, said that Lee Harvey Oswald is in custody of the police department, and that something about he looked all right when he went in there, they wouldn't guarantee how he would look after he had been in custody of the Dallas police for a couple of hours, which intimated to me that when I heard this that they thought we were mistreating the prisoner.

Mr. RANKIN. Did you do anything about that?

Mr. CURRY. I offered then at that time--they wanted to see him and they wanted to know why they couldn't see him and I said we had no objection to anybody seeing him.

And when he was being moved down the hall to go back up in the jail they would crowd on him and we just had to surround him by officers to get to take him to the jail elevator to take him back upstairs, to let him rest from the interrogation.

Mr. RANKIN. And this showup, how many people attended?

Mr. CURRY. I would think perhaps 75 people. I am just making an estimate. I told them if they would not try to overrun the prisoner and not try to interrogate him we would bring him to the showup room. There was--this, thinking also that these newspaper people had been all over Love Field, and had been down at the assassination scene, and we didn't know but what some of them might recognize him as being present, they might have seen him around some of these places.

Now, Mr. Wade, the district attorney, was present, at this time and his assistant was present, and as I recall, I asked Mr. Wade, I said, "Do you think this will be all right?" And he said, "I don't see anything wrong with it."

Mr. RANKIN. Did you find out where Jack Ruby was during this showup?

Mr. CURRY. I didn't know Jack Ruby. Actually the first time I saw Jack Ruby to know Jack Ruby was in a bond hearing or I believe it was a bond hearing, and I recognized him sitting at counsel's table.

The impression has been given that a great many of the Dallas Police Department knew Jack Ruby.

Mr. RANKIN. What is the fact in that regard?

Mr. CURRY. The fact of that as far as I know there are a very small percentage of the Dallas Police Department that knows Jack Ruby.

Mr. RANKIN. Did you make an inquiry to find out?

Mr. CURRY. Yes; I did, yes, sir. And so far as I know most of the men who knew Jack Ruby are men who were assigned to the vice squad of the police department or who had worked the radio patrol district where he had places and in the course----

Mr. RANKIN. How many men would that be?

Mr. CURRY. I am guessing, perhaps 25 men. This is merely a guess on my part.

Mr. RANKIN. How large is your police force?

Mr. CURRY. Approximately 1,200. I would say 1,175 people. I would say less, I believe less than 50 people knew him. From what I have found out since then that he is the type that if he saw a policeman, or he came to his place of business he would probably run up and make himself acquainted with him.

I also have learned since this time he tried to ingratiate himself with any of the news media or any of the reporters who had anything to do, he was always constantly trying to get publicity for his clubs or for himself.

Mr. RANKIN. Now, at this showup, is there some screen between the person in custody?

Mr. CURRY. There is a time--there wasn't at this time.

Mr. RANKIN. Why not?

Mr. CURRY. No particular reason. They just, a lot of the news media say they didn't think they could see him up there or couldn't get pictures of him up there and we brought him in there in front of the screen and kept him there as I recall only about 4 or 5 minutes and shoving up close to him and taking shots of him and took him upstairs and I believe the district attorney and his assistant stayed down and perhaps talked to the news media for several minutes.

But we took Harvey Oswald back upstairs and I think I went back to my office.

Mr. DULLES. This was the evening of Friday, was it not?

Mr. CURRY. I believe so, sir.

Mr. DULLES. Did you say Ruby was present that evening?

Mr. CURRY. I have understood he was. But to my own knowledge, I wouldn't have known him because I didn't know him.

Mr. McCLOY. You said you first saw Ruby when?

Mr. CURRY. In a trial. I believe it was for a bond hearing where they were attempting to get bond for him. And I saw him sitting at a counsel table and recognized him from pictures I had seen of him in the paper.

Mr. DULLES. This is some time before the assassination?

Mr. McCLOY. This is the trial incident to the trial of Ruby, as I understand it?

Mr. DULLES. You had not seen him before?

Mr. CURRY. No, sir.

Mr. McCLOY. It was a bond hearing incident to the trial?

Mr. CURRY. If I had seen him I wouldn't have known him.

Mr. McCLOY. I don't want to again interrupt but I don't know whether we have passed by all of the questions you wanted to ask the chief in regard to the motorcade and the time of the assassination.

I thought maybe we might ask him whether or what was his estimate of the speed of the motorcade, for example.

Mr. RANKIN. We haven't covered that period because of the way we started, and I think we could go back, Chief, if you will, to, say, at the point the motorcade left Main Street and started down Houston, and then down Elm up to the time of the shots.

Will you describe that, where you and what the motorcade consisted of?

Mr. CURRY. Yes, sir; I was--there was a pilot car ahead of us with Deputy Chief Lumpkin that was perhaps two or three blocks ahead of us and had been preceding us all the way from Love Field to see that the route was open and reporting back by radio to us, and this was for the purpose, if we had any wrecks or congestion to where it looked like the motorcade could be stopped that we could change our routes and get around them and also to let us know how the crowd was.

He had been preceding us all this way. There has been some question as to why this motorcade would not proceed on down Main Street.

Mr. RANKIN. Will you explain that to the Commission?

Mr. CURRY. Yes, sir; I can. I will make another diagram here, if you wish me to.

Mr. RANKIN. Mr. McCloy asked about whether the chronological report that Chief Curry was examining during part of his testimony was available to the Commission. We have now searched the Commission files and we find that a copy of that exact report has been available to the Commission and we have it here. It is a Commission document----

Mr. REDLICH. It is in Commission Document 81.1.

Representative FORD. Will this report be made a part of the record?

Mr. RANKIN. We haven't decided that question but we will examine it and report to the Commission later if it is not made a part of the record, why we recommend that it not be. It may very well be amongst the documents that would be made part of the record in regular course when we examine all of the material for that purpose. Is that a satisfactory handling of it?

Representative FORD. I think it is. I haven't had an opportunity to examine it. But if it is a part of the record, I suspect it ought to be made a part at this point since it has been referred to by the testimony of the chief. But it is something that could be discussed later, and if it should be, it could be put into the record at this point.

Mr. RANKIN. I would like to ask leave of the Chairman then to examine it with greater care after the testimony of the chief is taken and be able to make it a part of the record at this point unless I report back to the Commission that for some reason it would not be desirable.

Mr. DULLES. That would be we would proceed in regard to this chronological report we would proceed in the same way as we have suggested we would with regard to the other depositions that were taken in Dallas.

Mr. RANKIN. Except my offer before, Mr. Chairman, was that the portion of the deposition that would relate to the matters described, that is the sealing of the building, would, in fact, be incorporated into this record at that point. And that the balance of it would be offered at some later date as a part of the record of the Commission.

Here I wanted to reserve the question as to whether it should be a part of the record because of my desire first to examine it in detail and see if there is any reason why it should not and then report back to the Commission.

Mr. DULLES. You will report back to the Commission. It will not be excluded unless you so report to the Commission.

Mr. RANKIN. That is right.

Mr. DULLES. And the reason therefor?

Mr. CURRY. This sketch.

Mr. RANKIN. Will you mark that sketch you have just made Exhibit 702 please, and 703?

(Commission Exhibits Nos. 702 and 703 were marked for identification.)

Mr. CURRY. In the diagram, 702, Exhibit 702, the motorcade was going west on Main Street, there is a triple underpass there. There are three streets and they converge into one wide street down through a triple underpass, what we call a triple underpass.

Mr. RANKIN. Where you are talking about the underpass is that underpass on Main Street?

Mr. CURRY. It is just west of Houston Street and runs parallel with Houston Street. And Main Street--now Houston Street runs in a north-south direction, Main Street, Elm Street, and Commerce Street the three principal streets that empty into this triple underpass are east-west, Elm Street is a one-way street west, Commerce is one-way east, Main Street is a two-way street going east and west. We had----

Mr. RANKIN. You were going to explain why you couldn't continue right down Main.

Mr. CURRY. We would--we left the parade route up to the host committee. They chose the route, asking that we go down Main Street, and then we would go on to what is known as the triple, through the triple underpass onto Stemmons Expressway. It was necessary to get on this expressway to get to the Trade Mart, the building where the dinner or luncheon would be held.

But had we proceeded on down Main Street, we could not have gotten onto Stemmons Expressway unless we had had public works to come in and remove some curbing and build some barricades over it.

So, in talking with the Secret Service people they suggested we come to Main Street to Elm Street, turn one block north and turn back west and go through the triple underpass on the Elm Street side and at this place Elm Street is two-way.

So that was the reason that it was necessary to take this motorcade one block north, and then turn west again in order that we could get on the triple, through the triple underpass onto the Stemmons Expressway without coming down and removing some curbing or building over the curbing and disturbing the regular flow of traffic.

Mr. RANKIN. Was there any consideration given prior to establishing the parade route to removing this curbing and going----

Mr. CURRY. No, sir; nothing was said about it at all. In fact, when they were choosing the routes for this parade, we left it entirely up to the host committee and to the Secret Service.

They asked us what we thought about certain routes. We told them what we thought would be the most direct routes, and they chose to come through the downtown area, I think for the purpose they wanted the President to see as much of the people as possible and wanted the people to have an opportunity to see him.

Mr. RANKIN. Going to the Trade Mart building would be assumed that you would go by the Texas Depository Building?

Mr. CURRY. If we went on Stemmons Expressway and that is the way they wanted to go. The only other way we could have gone. We could have continued down Main Street passed through the underpass about a block past there to Industrial Boulevard and then we would have gone Industrial Boulevard and made an entrance from the Trade Mart, from the north side of the Trade Mart there. But it was decided with the Secret Service people that we would go Main to Houston, Houston to Elm, Elm through to triple underpass onto the expressway and the expressway to the Trade Mart where they would come off and had parking facilities reserved and had a security setup.

Mr. RANKIN. Will you describe the cars of the----

Mr. McCLOY. Just before that, how far before November 22 was that route decided on?

Mr. CURRY. Approximately 2 days or so, I believe. That is in this chronological record.

Mr. DULLES. When was this route published?

Mr. McCLOY. That route was published.

Mr. CURRY. It was published perhaps 2 days before, a day or two before.

Mr. RANKIN. Is the Elm Street route a shorter route than to go by Industrial Boulevard?

Mr. CURRY. It's a more scenic route. The Stemmons Expressway was and it was easier to travel, traffic is easier to control on it, it is a 10-lane highway, and the Industrial Highway is heavily traveled by commercial vehicles and goes through a commercial section of the industrial area. And there was a more scenic route and traffic was more--a freer flow of traffic anyway.

Mr. RANKIN. Were you involved in the discussion about the choice of route?

Mr. CURRY. Not particularly. Chief Batchelor, my assistant chief, and Chief Lunday. I discussed this some with the Secret Service Agent Sorrels, and Lawson in a staff meeting at city hall.

Mr. RANKIN. What was that discussion?

Mr. CURRY. Well, we, when I say we, I mean my staff and I, we told them what we thought would be the most direct route.

Mr. RANKIN. What did you say that would have been?

Mr. CURRY. It would have been to come into Lemmon Avenue, to Central Expressway if they were coming through town and over that route.

Now, if they were going directly to the Trade Mart it would have been to come in Lemmon to Inwood Road and down Inwood to Hines, and Hines to Industrial and Industrial into--but this would not have taken them through the downtown area.

Mr. RANKIN. Then if they were going to go through the downtown area what did you say about the route that should be taken for that?

Mr. CURRY. This was probably the most direct route that they chose except they could have come in what we term the Central Expressway to Main Street, and then west on Main Street right down the route that was taken.