Jack Ruby Trial: 1964

Newspeople were not surprised to see Ruby there. Nor were Dallas policemen when he turned up Friday evening and again on Saturday at the police station where the accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, was being held. They knew Ruby as a police buff who liked to hang around and hear what was happening on the police blotter. He often made financial contributions to police causes. As they worked through Saturday evening, he brought them sandwiches and helped out-of-town reporters identify key officers.

That Sunday morning, November 24, the police were ready to move Oswald to the county jail, a mile away. At 11:20, as millions of viewers glued to their TVs watched in amazement, Captain J. Will Fritz led two detectives escorting Oswald through a basement garage toward a car. Suddenly, Jack Ruby lunged from the mob of detectives and reporters and fired a handgun pointblank at Oswald's chest. Oswald died at 1:07 P.M.