Warren Commission (12 of 26): Hearings Vol. XII (of 15)United States. Warren Commission
History
Warren Commission (12 of 26): Hearings Vol. XII (of 15)
United States. Warren Commission
Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald), 1917-1963 -- Assassination; Oswald, Lee Harvey
Mr. DECKER. Well, there may have been some on the street--I'm not so
sure of that--but what I mean, I cleared the port and kept them in this
room where they could only see him as he came by one door and by the
second door, and they were away from him a distance then. He was to be
in the carport and they were 20 or 25 feet back in the building.
Mr. HUBERT. You say you had them under lock and key, but they could see
out--could they see through windows?
Mr. DECKER. No; bars, they were barred doors.
Mr. HUBERT. Oh, I see.
Mr. DECKER. They were barred doors.
Mr. HUBERT. And you put all the press people out there?
Mr. DECKER. Yes, sir.
Mr. HUBERT. Did you check to see whether they were press people or not?
Mr. DECKER. All in all--I was under the impression that they were--that
the majority of them were press people. I don't think there was anybody
in that room that wasn't.
Mr. HUBERT. I mean, did you have any system of checking?
Mr. DECKER. No; I didn't personally check and search each one of them
because they had so darn much equipment--everybody had equipment--I
don't care who they were, and I had my officers mix and mingle with
them and knew most of them. You see, we got pretty well acquainted with
that press for 2 or 3 days there because they were continually in our
hair, you see.
Mr. HUBERT. All right, sir; go ahead.
Mr. DECKER. At the outside drive, or at the entrance to my carport--I
moved a couple of my men--four or five of my special men there to be
sure that it was clear when the man did arrive. I had been notified by
Curry that maybe they would bring him down in an armored car and I had
some other rumors--they would be bringing him in a car, and about that
time on those live TV cameras in that room, the flash came that shots
had been fired, that there was a riot on in the basement of the city
hall, and if you will pardon my French and you don't need to put this
in here, young lady, "We caught lightening in the jug in that room,"
sir. There is no question. They tried to crawl the walls, they tried to
tear down those barred doors, they tried to do everything to get out of
there and it looked like I would never get them out of the damn room.
Mr. HUBERT. You mean the ones you had locked up?
Mr. DECKER. The press--they were locked up and couldn't get out of
there with all of their equipment, so as I say, "We caught lightening
in the jug." There wasn't any question. Finally, I got the doors
open and they tore out on Main Street and out on Houston Street and
commandeered cars with cameras hanging on their backs, some of their
own equipment, back up Main Street. I lost the majority of them then
for a few minutes.
Mr. HUBERT. Have you been given any warning by the FBI that they had
received a message, or had the message been received, I think, by your
office, that some attempt would be made by a group to injure Oswald?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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