Warren Commission (03 of 26): Hearings Vol. III (of 15)United States. Warren Commission
History
Warren Commission (03 of 26): Hearings Vol. III (of 15)
United States. Warren Commission
Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald), 1917-1963 -- Assassination; Oswald, Lee Harvey
Mrs. PAINE. No; I was not, though I don't think I defined my fears. I
sat down and said I couldn't sleep and he said, "I guess you are real
upset about going to the lawyer tomorrow."
He knew I had an appointment with my lawyer to discuss the possibility
of a divorce the next day, and that didn't happen to be what was
keeping me up that night, but I was indeed upset about the idea, and
it was thoughtful for him to think of it. But I let it rest there, and
we watched the story which he was interested in watching. And then I
excused myself and went to bed.
Mr. JENNER. What did you do ultimately with your draft of the letter
and the original?
Mrs. PAINE. The first appearance of an FBI person on the 23d of
November, I gave the original to them. The next day it probably was I
said I also had a copy and gave them that. I wanted to be shut of it.
Mr. JENNER. So I take it, Mrs. Paine, you did not deliver either the
original or the copy or call attention to the original or the copy
with respect to the FBI.
Mrs. PAINE. Prior.
Mr. JENNER. Prior to the 23d did you say?
Mrs. PAINE. That is right.
Mr. JENNER. And what led you to hold onto this rather provocative
document?
Mrs. PAINE. It is a rather provocative document. It provoked my doubts
about this fellow's normalcy more than it provoked thoughts that this
was the talk of an agent reporting in. But I wasn't sure.
I of course made no--I didn't know him to be a violent person, had
no thought that he had this trait, possibility in him, absolutely no
connection with the President's coming. If I had, hindsight is so
much better, I would certainly have called the FBI's attention to it.
Supposing that I had?
Mr. JENNER. If the FBI had returned, Mrs. Paine, as you indicated
during the course of your meeting with the FBI November 1, would you
have disclosed this document to the FBI?
Mrs. PAINE. Oh, I certainly think so. This was not something I was at
all comfortable in having even.
Mr. JENNER. Were you expecting the FBI to return?
Mrs. PAINE. I did expect them to come back. As I say, I had said that
Lee was here on weekends and so forth. It might have been a good time
to give them this document. But as far as I knew, and I know now
certainly, they had not seen him and they were still interested in
seeing him.
Representative FORD. How did you copy the note?
Mrs. PAINE. Handwritten.
Representative FORD. Handwritten?
Mrs. PAINE. I perhaps should put in here that Lee told me, and I
only reconstructed this a few weeks ago, that he went, after I gave
him--from the first visit of the FBI agent I took down the agent's name
and the number that is in the telephone book to call the FBI, and I
gave this to Lee the weekend he came.
Mr. JENNER. You gave it to Lee?
Mrs. PAINE. I gave it to Lee.
Mr. JENNER. What weekend was that?
Mrs. PAINE. I am told that came out on the 1st of November, so that
would have been the weekend of the 2d, the next day.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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