Warren Commission (07 of 26): Hearings Vol. VII (of 15)United States. Warren Commission
History
Warren Commission (07 of 26): Hearings Vol. VII (of 15)
United States. Warren Commission
Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald), 1917-1963 -- Assassination; Oswald, Lee Harvey
But as time went by in the afternoon, more and more people came in
until I would say about 6:45 or 7 o'clock that night, the night of
the 22d, when I left, there were some 70- or 80-odd reporters and
floodlights and two or three live cameras and several more cameras on
tripods, and out-of-town reporters, and local reporters, and everything
else, that officers were on duty and in uniform to keep the halls open
as much as possible.
And if you wanted to go from the elevator entrance on back toward
homicide or to any of the other detective offices, you had to drag your
way through TV cables and bodies of people, seesawing your course to
get through there.
Mr. BELIN. Now you have stated when we first started this deposition
that you had some background in either newspaper or radio or television?
Mr. HILL. Yes, sir.
I worked at the Herald both as a police reporter, as a newswriter,
and a radio-TV editor, and left there and went with WBAP as a member
of their Dallas Bureau, covering the, working out of an office in the
police station here in Dallas, and covering police news and all other
types of news also.
Mr. BELIN. Was there any request ever made to the press people to clear
the hall or clear the floor at all?
Mr. HILL. Not to my personal knowledge; no, sir. It could have been
made when I wasn't there, or it could have been made before I got
there, or after I left or while I was in an office or something, but I
don't know that a direct order was ever given to get everybody out.
Mr. BELIN. Could you tell us what general discussion there was among
the officers, the line officers, without quoting any names that might
embarrass anyone, about all of these people and paraphernalia there?
Mr. HILL. As to the situation, we commented that it was a bad thing
that we didn't have a space big enough to put everybody and make press
releases to them like they did in some of the eastern cities.
I think somebody brought up the fact that in New York you wouldn't do
what was done here because everybody had to go to one place and when
they got ready to tell you something, they would come in and make a
formal announcement, and if they wanted to throw it open for questions
they did, and if they didn't they would walk out.
There was commenting on the smallness of the space that we had to work
in and the inconvenience there, and the building, had it been Brooklyn,
it wouldn't have created as much congestion and all.
But there was a feeling of congeniality between the police and the
press, and I observed some of the officers that did have to go ask
somebody to move or get out of the way, or not block a door, or so, or
not block this, and the press was very nice about cooperating and doing
at that time what they were asked to do.
What happened Saturday and Sunday, I don't know. But it was rather
crowded, I will make that statement.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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