Doomed to Fail - Ep 30: I'M JACK RUBY YOU KNOW ME! - The story of Jack Ruby - Lee Harvey Oswald's killer

Episode Date: July 12, 2023

Next up! Taylor talks about the assassin of the assassin - Jack Ruby! It’s the wildest weekend in American History - JFK is shot on Friday just after noon - Lee Harvey Oswald goes on the run, kills a cop, gets caught, is beat up by cops, needs a sweater, and is shot by local strip club owner Jack Ruby Sunday morning - ON LIVE TV - less than 48 hours after JFK died. We seriously don’t know how America recovered from this. Who was Jack Ruby? Did he happen to be in the right place at the right time to do what the cops couldn’t do? How many others would have done the same thing if they had the opportunity? Most importantly, what did we lose by not being able to interrogate Lee Harvey Oswald, and what did we gain by years of conspiracy theories? Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doomedtofailpod/  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/doomedtofailpod  Youtube:  https://www.youtube.com/@doomedtofailpodEmail: [e-mail] Sources:The Trial of Jack Ruby: A Classic Study of Courtroom StrategiesKennedy’s avengerJack Ruby - WikipediaRubenstein v. State - WikipediaMelvin Belli - WikipediaFrederic Andrews Gibbs and the Assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy - PMCLast Podcast on the Left - JFK / Lee Harvey Oswald, Part IV: OSWALD!  Join our Founders Club on Patreon to get ad-free episodes for life! patreon.com/DoomedtoFailPodWe would love to hear from you! Please follow along! Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doomedtofailpod/  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/doomedtofailpod  Youtube:  https://www.youtube.com/@doomedtofailpod TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@doomed.to.fail.pod Email: [e-mail] 

In a matter of the people of the state of California, first is Hortonthal James Simpson, case number B.A. 097. And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you. Welcome to Dume to Fail. This is a new day. We did not just cut that last recording off and move on to a new recording. We're joined here by Taylor. We're going to be discussing a historical tale today about a red-flight relationship that went awry. how are you doing taylor i'm good um this is not about a relationship but it's about a person who failed are you still drinking 19 crimes yeah it's been three days and you're still drinking the same glass of wine could you imagine good for me if it was you said there's a thing one time that was like for sale on the internet and it was like this wine of cork can tell you if your

wine is old and i'm like what who drinks our wine that's low yeah seriously well adjusted people maybe I can't spell like then don't even bother yeah um normal thing to say totally fine cool well hi far this hi taylor okay uh you're drinking water you're gonna go to yoga um but i am drinking wine but if i were really in this story i might be drinking some whiskey because we're kind we're going back to the 1960s so it always feels like a whiskey and a cigarette kind of time you know no not cigarette cigar not like a um Is it backcat time? What's a cigarette in Madman?

Like the Palmals? Oh, Virginia Slums. Or whatever. Yeah. I just feel like you'd be, or Lucky Strikes. Oh, that's good. Oh, cigarettes. God.

Cigarettes are terrible. There's no cigarettes in this, but whatever. Okay. So, the other day, bars. I went to the library because the library has a book sale. And hardcover books are $1 each, or it's $4 for $3. So I bought a ton of books. I bought a bunch of Taylor Caldwell books.

She's like an author from like, I don't know, a while ago. She like wrote, I haven't read them yet, but I bought like nine of them because I remember seeing a Taylor Caldwell book and she's like the oldest Taylor woman I could like find. So I was like excited that she was like an older woman named Taylor. So I bought a bunch of those. But then I found this book that I learned later was out of print. And I read the first like 20 pages and I was like I'm never going to finish this in a week. So I rented a book on Libby, which is the audible, the not audible,

like audio book app from the library. So I wrote it a book and I listened to that instead, but I kind of looked in this book anyway. But anyway, I'm going to tell you about another trial of the century before all the other trials of the century. I'm going to hold my book up because I'm going to talk about the assassin of

the assassin, Mr. Jack Ruby. I love Jack Rubinstein. So this book I got to the library, The Trial of Jack Ruby, a classic study of courtroom strategies by John Kaplan and John R. Walt. And I immediately showed all my friends this picture because john r waltz is 35 in this picture i'm going to show it to you but can you see it i mean i can see him being 35 and i mean he's a real he's a real

he's a real 1967 35 yeah that's like that's like 35 when you live to 52 you know like you already had kids in college you know yeah but i'll share that but anyway this book is amazing it's out of print and i'm super excited um i also use my own personal copy of the warren report which I'm also holding up for you that I've highlighted, that I bought at a sale. And then the book that I read, the main one that I got from the library. I'm going to grab it. I just look a picture of it to make sure to tell you. It's by Dan Abrams.

It is Kennedy's Avenger, assassination, conspiracy, and the forgotten trial of Jack Ruby. So, you ready? Love it. Okay. When I was growing up, there's some things that I knew about JFK, like, that I feel like everyone knows. And there's stuff that I learned later that I was like, why don't we learn that as well? I knew he was killed in Dallas. it was on video if there's like suspicious like grassy knoll the guy with the umbrella you know all that stuff

um and i knew that lee harvey oswald did it from the book depository from where his work that's what i knew stuff that i didn't know that i learned later that is so much more fun that makes it more fun is just like the tension in dallas about jfk's visit that he was in the car with the governor of texas john colony who was also shot he's in the hospital for you know a while with his injuries he survived also Lee Harvey Oswald killed a cop named JD Tippett that same day which I didn't know and also Lee Harvey Oswald had tried to kill Edwin Walker

and other politician a while before so he was like not brand new to this assassin thing and it also didn't know about Jack Ruby like I feel like I don't know why we don't know more about him but I didn't know about him until it wasn't one of the first things I learned. So real quick before we get too deep because I've been talking a lot

about this lately we're in we're on the same page that the Secret Service killed the entity, right? I think that they, like, helped, but I think, I think Lee Herbert Oswald did it. I mean, I think it was an accident. I think it was both. Okay. Okay.

I think Lee Haber Oswald did it the first, first, and then the Secret Service was, like, fumbling, hung over, and then they did it. And then they shot, yeah. But I don't think we have for Harvey Oswald didn't do it. I think he did. Yeah, he definitely took the first shot, the second shot, and then from a, legal perspective felony murder he's the reason why he's dead because he started

at the triggering events but like I do also think that the guy accidentally shot him in the back of the head from his secret superstar we talked about this a little bit in our Kennedy episode but I think it's I mean obviously like this is this is the conspiracy theory but in a lot of it is because of Jack Ruby it's kind of Jack Ruby's fault that we have this conspiracy

because we don't know what the fuck happened and we will never know but he um also like he was wearing a back brace Kennedy so like he moves in a way that's weird yeah that's true or than you would think So there's a whole bunch of stuff. But let's talk about Jack Ruby. Yes.

Jack Ruby, as you said, was born Jacob Leon Rubenstein on March 25th, 1911 in Chicago, Illinois. He grew up in a Jewish family, which is important later. He didn't get a lot of schooling. He was in foster care for a little bit of his youth. His mom was a schizophrenic and his dad was an alcoholic. So he kind of didn't have a chance. He had like a lot of like a rough childhood. He had a couple siblings.

He was like a punk kid. He was born 1911. So I feel like imagine him in like, 1920, Chicago being like 10 years old and being like, I'm Jack Ruby. I'll shine your shoes. I'll do that thing for you. But blah, like, you know, like a little bit of like a kid wanting to like be more than he was and wanting to like be popular and like kind of a little punk kid. He's not in school. He's just like around, you know. During World War II, he joined the Air Force. Everybody really liked him. He was a guy's guy, kind of a class clown. Maybe a little bit

annoying, you know, like maybe a little bit like trying too hard. Yeah, yeah. Try hard. You know what I mean? So after World War II. two, he moves to Dallas, and he runs some nightclubs with his sister. This is where he changed his name to Jack Ruby from Jacob Rubenstein. Yeah, because he wanted to be as Jewish, because being Jewish in the 1922 wasn't easy. Yeah, totally. Even post-World War II. I mean, America, we were terrible. So by now, it's 1963, and he runs two clubs. He runs a carousel club and the Vegas club. The Carousel Club in Dallas is kind of a strip joint. The Vegas is more of a and roll place probably had dancers you know he's like running adult clubs in Dallas yeah he continues

to be a guy's guy he gets in fights a lot at work like either kicking out patrons or fighting with other people that work there but afterwards he kind of doesn't remember or he like apologizes in like a weird way and he's like oh man it like it like clips on and off if that makes sense yeah i read that or i heard that he was actually like a pretty like pretty hot headed guy did yeah Was he actually called Sparky or was that just a joke that Henry made? I don't remember hearing that, but it could have been. It could have been. No, I don't know.

I don't think I heard that, but maybe he did. I did listen to the last podcast about that last episode of the JFK that mentioned Jack Ruby. But yeah, he feels like a sparky. You know, he says, I'm Jack Ruby all the time. You know, and he has a fedora. He has his little suit on. He's like, I'm Jack Ruby. He continues to be like a guy's guy.

He kind of fight with someone at work one time. And that person bit the tip of Jack Ruby's finger off. That's how it intense the fight was. So he like doesn't get in like zero fights. He doesn't make fights. There's a union that he's involved in. The American Guild of Variety artists, that's the union for his dancers.

So he like has some like skirmishes with them. He always wants to be a little more popular than he was. And he always kind of wants to be like a mafia bad guy. Yeah. You know, like that's part of the conspiracy and part of the like, who is Jack Ruby is like he was like tendententially around the mafia. But he's also like around the police. And he was also a wrong reporter.

He's also a brown group of people trying to find where you could, like, fit in and, like, have an influence. And there's, like, potential of the FBI had contacted him to be, like, can you help us and, like, report on the mob? Because he was, like, that kind of guy. Like, he didn't belong anywhere, but he was, like, in and out of different circles. Right. He put all his hand out cards for his club. I'd be like, hey, you can get in free to the Carousel Club tonight, you know? And he'd be like, I'm Jack Ruby.

Here's a card. Like, that's kind of guy. Yeah, you like to be a man about town and like to. Exactly. Be important. he never marries he has a girlfriend for a while but they break up he never marries he lives with his sister for most of the time he lives in dallas but by 1963 he has a roommate so he's living with a dude the roommates he also has a bunch of dogs and he loves them like calls them his children

loves them cause one of them his wife not weird but like it's important to know that like jack ruby loves his dogs he's like a big dog person so he doesn't have like he has like a lot of siblings around the country that he calls, but he has his dogs that he, like, really lives with and loves. He's also at this time taking a drug called Preludin, which is an appetite suppressant, like a weight loss drug, and it's a smidge of methie. So it's, like, kind of like a speed to, like, make you not want to eat, you know? So he's a little bit hyped up on this drug. They had access to so much more effective drugs than we do now.

I know. I think it's still available, but I couldn't really understand the Wikipedia page, but. I mean, I shouldn't take it, but yeah. I mean, don't take it, yeah. Exactly. So, okay, he's taking that drug. Jack's been in trouble with the law a little bit, but, like, nothing big. Just, like, sometimes his alcohol license runs out or his clubs open too late or whatever, but nothing terrible.

He knows a lot of policemen. He knows the cops. He's also doing some, like, side things. Like, he's hustling these twist boards that are, like, a thing you stand on and, like, do the twist for, like, weight loss. Yeah. That's something I'd buy. And he also was trying to sell jeeps to Cuba. So I thought that might have been a communist.

Yeah, but like he wasn't a communist. He wasn't like in cahoots with Cuba. He was just trying to make a buck, you know. It sounds like he just wanted to like be in any spot that made him seem like he was an important man. And like, I'm part of like some spy thing. Exactly. I'm important. Yeah, exactly.

But another thing that we know about Jack Ruby is that Jack Ruby loved John F. Kennedy. He had a picture of him in the club, in his clubs, which, like, people used separate pictures of the president. It's a lot of his podcast more than, like, they do now. But still, he, like, really did, he did love Kennedy, especially in Texas where people weren't, you know, were pretty conservative and didn't love Kennedy, as we've said. And he, one thing he loved about JFK is, like, as another thing, I guess another thing that I knew about JFK earlier was that he was Catholic.

And I guess Biden's the second Catholic president, right? Yeah, that's a good point. And, but because it was Catholic, that was a huge deal. So, and he was also, like, very kind to, you. use. Like he didn't, he had no anti-Semitism in his platforms. And Jack Ruby saw that and really respected that. So he loved Kennedy as a president. So it's November, 1963. We're in Dallas. We're in Texas. Texas is rough. It's not Democrat country. Might be in Austin. It's, it's, so it's not Texas. It is specifically Dallas. Dallas is like this central hub of like just

every dip shit horrible inbred moron that you have in all of Texas just coalesce in one spot and it's still that way yeah that's where we are and we're gonna also I'm from Dallas so I'm allowed to say this that's true that's true

at first it's from Dallas so I'm going to go through some timelines and then we'll talk about the trial and some people involved in the trial but so JFK is visiting Dallas as we know they don't love him But he's there anyway. So right after noon, on November 22nd, 1963, also plug, don't watch the 112263 show on Hulu, but read the book, the Stephen King book, 112263, it's great. Stephen King wrote a book about JFK's assassination.

It's so good. Usually you have to read it. It's great. What's it again? 112263. It's just the date. It's not like a nonfiction book. it's a fiction book there's like magic in it that's real good okay noted okay so lehigh

harvey oswald shoots jfk chaos da da da da da while this is happening jack ruby is in the office of the dallas morning news putting in weekend ads for his clubs he had to go in in person to put in ads for his clubs to be in the paper he was visibly upset before knowing that jfk had been shot he was upset about the Weissman ad. Do you know what the Weissman ad is? No. So it is an ad that was put in the paper in Dallas before he got there. And before, I'm sorry, before JFK got there, that was sort of like, we don't want you here. Dallas doesn't want you here. Yeah. And so it was in the paper and Jack Ruby was upset because I don't know. I didn't read enough on like exactly who word have ever figured it out, but it sounded like a Jewish name. So Jack Ruby was like, they're going to blame Jews if anything bad

happens here in Dallas for JFK. So he was like upset. He was like, I want him here. You know, like I like him and was really like thinking about that in his head when this happened. So all of a sudden, the newsroom erupts into chaos, obviously, because they find out that the president's been shot. Jack is stunned. He just kind of sits there for a while. Can't believe that this has happened. Everybody is like kind of going crazy. They're running around, getting the news out across country, across the world. My parents were very young when it happened. But my dad, I was says my my uncle his uncle my great uncle was in Mexico on vacation and he was at a bar in Mexico and the bartender said your president's dead and my uncle was like he said was at a car

accident because that was like the thing you could think of like was it did the plane crash like what could have possibly happened you know like you just such a crazy thing to have happened so jfk shot rush to the hospital he dies lee harry oswald leaves the book depository long story short gets stopped by a cop, kills the cop, goes to a movie theater, gets caught. They know it's him. That's right. I thought he killed a cop in the movie theater, but I think I'm wrong, right? Yeah, it was like on the street.

Okay. Yeah. And then he'll do. That was O'Cliff. I remember that. It was an O'Cliff movie theater, which is now like a super justified part of town. But, yeah. So, Jack spends the rest of the day.

He cancels his ads for the club because, like, agree to agree. It's not great to have an ad for your strip club. on the weekend that the president's been shot or be like come here to relax things are fucked up you could go either way but he cancels his ads it closes his clubs his clubs for the weekend and he's in debt like jack owes money to a lot of different people he needs to have his businesses open but he closes them for the weekend just like out of respect and he's like really trying to like overly show respect and overly show remorse you know like um so he cancel those ads. He kind of runs around in kind of like a chaos. He calls everybody, everyone he knows.

He calls his siblings. He calls his friends. He calls his ex-girlfriend. He hasn't been with her in a while, but he calls her anyway because he's like needs to talk to someone. He can't believe this just happened. He can't believe it happened in Dallas. He's worried about Dallas. He's worried about like the future of the country. Like so many things are going through his head. He's kind of like, it's all spinning. And he's not the only one I imagine. You know? Yeah, of course. A president being killed is a huge deal. Yeah. So he goes to Temple. He's up very, very late. He tries to buy sandwiches for the police, but they don't, but they just ate. So he has all these sandwiches and he brings them to a radio station. He's just like driving around and like stopping in places and calling people and like a whole thing. He thinks he needs to do something, but he doesn't and he doesn't know what to do until he's trying different things. And there's nothing for him to do, but he just like wants to do something. So at 11.30 p.m. on that day, there's a press conference, and they bring Lee Harvey Oswald out to the press to show them. But Jack Ruby's there. He kind of walks in with some other reporters. He does a weird thing these two days where he, like, is like next to the press in a way. Like he's on the phone sometimes and like to the newspaper and gets the newspaper to talk to a judge and like does these things that like maybe they think that he's a reporter. Like this is where he's trying to kind of be a reporter. And he's standing. And he's standing. on a table with the full view of Lee Harvey Oswald and nothing happens. They take Lee

Harvey Oswald back in. This is still the 23rd and Jack Ruby goes home. So he on the 23rd or the next day he sends most of the day. Sorry, that was 22nd. Now it was the 23rd. The next day is pretty much the same. They remember him, his family and friends remember him calling everybody. He says specifically, I feel so awful for Jackie and the kids, which is totally fair. yeah you know he just like you can't believe this happened to like this perfect family but even that just belies the whole thing of like I want to feel important like I'm calling them Jackie and the kids as though like I matter to these people they give a fuck by my sympathy like so weird so he's kind of just like doing the same wandering thing that he did the day before

until about 1 30 a.m so he's up pretty late and I know all of this because the Warren report did like a a minute by minute of his life like that he's leading up to it. it. But on November 24th, it's Sunday. It's 9 a.m. and Jack Ruby wakes up in his apartment. He does some laundry. He talks to his cleaning lady, Eleanor Pitts, on the phone and schedules time for her to clean the apartment. So he, every intention of coming home talks to his cleaning lady. Now he is, so while Jack Ruby is talking to his cleaning lady, Lee Harvey Oswald has been interrogated by the police, He's been beat up. He has like a bruise on his forehead, all the things. He's set to be transferred to another jail at 10 a.m. That's what the press thinks. That's what everybody thinks. So at 10 a.m., he's going to be moved. And that's going to be like the big event. It's moving him. At 10.15 a.m., Jack Ruby's still at home. A dancer from one of his clubs, Karen Carlin, calls him and asks for her paycheck. She hasn't received it yet. He owes her $25. So he says, okay, I will wire you $25. So Jack Ruby gets on his car with one of his dogs, drives to Western Union in downtown Dallas, he waits in line. There's a line. He waits patiently in the line. He goes to the teller. He wires Karen $25. The receipt from his wire is timestamped at 11.17 a.m. Jack Ruby leaves Western Union, walks towards the police headquarters. As far as he knows, Lee Harvey Oswald, does

already gone. The news was reporting that he'd be gone at 10 a. So there was a whole thing. There was a decoy armored car. There was like another armored car. It like didn't work. They knew there was like danger. They finally get him going.

Lee Harvey Oswald was cold. He asked for a sweater. They gave him a couple options. He tried a couple on. He picked a black sweater. So he was like like timing couldn't have been predicted because like weird stuff was happening. Yeah.

So all this causes a delay. he's handcuffed to police officers. One of the police officers says to Lee Harvey Oswald, if someone shoots you, I hope there's a good a shot as you are, because he's handcuffed to him. So they start walking through the basement of the police headquarters. Jack Ruby goes into an open garage.

It was probably left open for police cars to go through. He gets in front of the crowd of reporters. And at 1121 a.m. And remember, his Western Union ticket was 11.17 a.m. So at 11.20. 21 a.m. on live TV, Jack Ruby shoots Lee Harvey Oswald in the stomach. The bullet ricochets through his body and he's rushed to the hospital. The same doctors who worked to save JFK less than 48 hours before worked on Lee Harvey Oswald and they could not save him and he died.

I mean, I'm fine with it. I know. Well, I'm not fine with it because now we don't know what happened. All we can do is speculate. But think of how much awesome fanfic has been created because we have to speculate. I did just plug that Stephen King book. You're not wrong. There you go. Yeah, fine. I mean it wrong. Did you ever see, did you have watched Mad Men? No, never got into that one. So it's, it's like the 50s and 60s. And in the episodes in the 60s, you know that JFK's assassination is coming because, so he gets killed on a Friday. And one of the, um, not Don Draper, the main guy, who you would know, but another guy that works there, his daughter's getting married on the 23rd. So you know, like a week before.

before, you're like, oh, fuck, you know, her wedding is like, and it's terrible and like, you know, 20 people come out of 200, you know, and they're all in the morning, but they do it anyway and all these things. But, um, Don Draper's wife, Betty is watching TV and she's sitting in her living room, like smoking a cigarette, obviously. And the nanny, this like black woman who's watching your two kids comes in, like with the kids. And it happens live on TV. You know, everyone in the country saw Jack Reed be killed, the Harvey Oswald. And Betty starts screaming. she's like what is going on like what's happening what's happening and then like her and the nanny like sit down together which was like the first time they ever like you know we're at the same

level in the show for like all the reasons but they were just like what's going on could you imagine those three days i just like live tv the the president gets shot live tv the president's assassin gets shot didn't uh didn't one of the cops or somebody screamed jack no because they like saw they knew what he was about potentially yeah we'll talk about about what people thought they heard people yell. Someone did potentially yell, Jack, you son of a bitch, don't do it. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. So Jack is arrested. And this is why we have conspiracy theory. It's like I was just saying, like, we will never hear from Lee Harvey Oswald. We'll never know, which is super frustrating. Cool, because we have

with conspiracy theories, but also like, frustrating. Jack Ruby's in jail for a few months. In March, 1964, Jack Ruby goes on trial for the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald. The question is, is Dallas on trial? Is Texas on trial? What do we even do here? Like, how can you possibly have a fair trial for someone who murdered someone on live TV? I feel like those are questions that Oprah will be asking. I know, you're a lawyer.

You tell me. Like, so it's, that's, you know, like, that's the question. Like, the people in Dallas are like, we don't want to be seen as a place with, like, vigilante justice, but also, like, people, probably it would have happened anyways because like because okay so that the guy killed the president of united states do you try him there right and there's all sorts of weird laws and things that like don't that like i won't dig into but like jiff his body technically should have been autopsied in dallas but it wasn't but even though like it because linden johnson was like let's get the

fuck out of here and want to like get into the business of being president and like move on you know but then also like there's you know there wasn't some things weren't federal in like weird ways so it's definitely going to be in Texas so also the world is in chaos by now we've kind of like not moved on but like Vietnam is about to start you know and during the same time that the papers are reporting on Jack Ruby's trial Robert McNamara who we talked about last episode because he worked at Ford was announcing in the newspaper that we're about to start Vietnam so like it's a lot of yeah the world's going topsy jervi. Yeah. So we're in this trial for Jack Ruby. The key players from the legal side, Melvin Belli is Jack Ruby's attorney. He's actually the second one that they picked. It was like a

whole process to get an attorney for him. The Ruby family had to sell their story. So they sold their story like in advance to get money to pay for a lawyer. Melvin Belli is not from Texas. He's from California. He's very flashy. He loves to like walk around. This is the time where everybody's watching Perry Mason, you know, and, like, that's the kind of lawyer they're, like, expecting, like a TV lawyer. And so Melvin Beli is very much that. Yes. Like, he wants to walk around. The judge hates it, makes him sit down all the time. It doesn't like it. He just, he's like, you know, he wants people to draw charts and he wants to bring

in props. And the judge is like, absolutely not. Joe Tonahill is the Dallas attorney who assisted Belli. Also, Phil Berluson is that team. The prosecution is led by William F. Alexander, Dallas County District Attorney and Henry M. Wade Assistant District Attorney. The jury itself is both men and women after it's finalized. They did a whole bunch of stuff like who would want the death penalty, who wouldn't, how much did you see, what could you possibly know, things like that. The jurors had a fucking rotten deal. They stayed in a jail cell that was open.

So they didn't even get a hotel. They stayed in a jail cell that was left open. They were paid $8 a day but charged. one dollar per meal so like barely not anything they weren't a lot of visitors they had to travel around in groups you know like that makes sense but one of the jurors his brother-in-law died they didn't tell him until after because of Texas law at the time there were no alternate jurors so like if this jury didn't complete the thing they have to start over again yeah yeah so they really had to like keep his jury like laser focused the judge joe b brown like i said is very texas he reminds me of the judge in

my cousin Vinnie. Oh, God. Yeah, that's Herman. Yeah, Herman Munster. Yeah. Like, he's very much like, this is my courtroom and did or die. Even though he never used a gavel. That was like one of his shticks.

But like, yeah. So first the defense wants to move the trial out of Dallas because is it possible for even get a fair trial there? You know, everyone's riled up about it. They get a fair trial anywhere. Anywhere. Everyone's taking it to like the Philippines. Like, I don't know where you take you.

Like, yeah. There's no way. Like I said, my great uncle was in Mexico and they knew. immediately, you know, like everyone knew immediately within an hour of the world knew. It was in the 60s. So the trial was not moved. It stayed in Dallas. The prosecution did not do an opening statement, so the defense could not. So they weren't able to open it up. The trial was not televised. It could have been. Just a few years ago, the Nuremberg trials had been televised. So there was like a precedent for having things like at least being able to see inside of a

courtroom, but the judge Brown said no. So the defense, here's a they said that's some character stuff to say about about jack ruby he had a chance to shoot lee harvey oswald at that press conference like i was saying he's on the table he was really close to him he probably had his gun with him because it's dallas everybody had a gun right right exactly he didn't he didn't kill him then he called his dogs his kids and he left one of his dogs in the car so like that's not something that you would do if you intended to never return right Like you, yeah, like you would never leave Luna in a car if you thought you weren't coming back. No.

When you think about your dogs at that level, like you plan every moment of the day around their, like, safety and security. Yeah, exactly. So what the defense did is they pled guilty by reason of temporary insanity. They didn't allow Jack Ruby to testify in his own behalf, but because people had just started to hear about pleading the fifth. And there were some things on TV about like some gangsters pleading the fifth and like people that aren't to incriminate themselves. It was a weird time to be like, if someone doesn't testify on their own defense, like are they automatically guilty? Like no one, it was kind of weird, but he did not testify. So here's what they blamed. They blamed epilepsy, which is also what we blamed with Van Gogh, as well. Van Gogh, people believe that he had temporal lobe epilepsy. So that was like the thing that like made him like kind of go crazy, like just in his mind, not have seizures, but in his mind. And another only in your mind epilepsy that they,

said that Jack Ruby had was psychomotor epilepsy. So in this form of person suffer as episodes of strange behavior. He may pluck out his clothes, pull pictures from the wall or books from shelves. And then I'd explain some of the things that he did were like, he would get really angry and then not remember. Yeah. You know, and they get in big fights and then have them just like, oh, we're fine. You know, like two seconds later. So their strategy was that he was in like a fugue state when this was happening.

He doesn't remember. if you look at the video I mean like frame by frame which they did you can see that Jack Ruby's hand keeps pulling the trigger so he like didn't he said that he didn't remember doing it and like so he was kind of like in a thing of just like doing it

he other stuff that people like you were saying that they heard people say like the guy said Jack you son of a bitch don't do it some of the witnesses said they heard him say you all know me I'm Jack Ruby that's what like you're like guys I'm Jack Ruby like he thought maybe he'd be a hero you know yeah that that was always my assumption was i'm going to do this thing and then everybody's

going to be like you're welcome because so much of us and you know this guy the personality of like i'm important people know me like i'm like it's like you know this is probably another one of those yeah i'm juby i'm ruminstein exactly and they also some people heard him say i meant to shoot him three times uh i hope the son of a bitch is dead and you killed my president you rat i don't think he said That's cool. She'll call people rats more often. And then they also heard him say, somebody had to do it. The police wouldn't do it, you know?

So he just thought he would, like, jump in and do something like everybody wanted to do. But he didn't remember. And the witnesses are all unreliable, like always. You know, they all remember different things. So their written testimony is different than what they say in the courtroom, which is different from what they remember of the day of. Yeah. Yeah.

He thought he was going to be, this was going to exalt him in some way. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. because I'm sure there were like you just said like why the fuck not there's millions of people who were like I would love to fucking kill Oswald yeah killer president you know like sure like they think he's a comedy he's a Russian all the things so they're like you know everyone's mad but this is America you're not supposed to do that essentially so here's a fun tidbit that I didn't know until I was reading about this this week is that during the trial so the trials in the Dallas courthouse the courthouse is like a multi-story building that had just been built so and Dallas was, like, super proud of it. It had, like, the courtroom, jail cells. The top floor had a hanging room. So it'd hang people on the top floor, which feels weird.

I feel like huge hang people on the ground. It feels uniquely Dallas. I'll give it something to that. But during the trial, there was a prison escape and the seven prisoners escaped from the jail. Yeah, it's not super fun. The New York Times headline is Dallas amused by escape at jail. Fifth fugitive is recaptured. Twelve deputies are suspended.

The guy who actually had orchestrated the escape. He, I can't remember, I didn't write down all those things, but he made a gun out of soap and, like, other things that he found don't look really realistic. And that's how they all got out. Did Dillinger do that? Maybe. I don't know. It sounds super fun. It sounds like you could do in the 20s, maybe not in the 60s.

A BBC reporter was overheard on the phone saying, I'm not drunk and I'm not kidding. There's been a jail break. You'll talk so much funer back then. So, so fun that that happened. I think they eventually call the guys and whatever. So that happens during the trial. the prosecution was like this was murder Jack Ruby did it I guess he was sad but he did it and he planned to do it you know and the defense is like he didn't think of all the chances think of that Western Union line even the fact that that that woman needed money from him like he wouldn't have been there he was at home doing laundry like it all is just like happenstance he happened to be there one of the the defense brought a bunch of doctors that talked about EEGs for the first time which is like brain waves later a scan the like I think the original scan, a Ruby's brain would be sold for $776 at auction.

And like his gun was sold for like $50,000, the bullets, people bought all that shit. If I had the money, I'll for sure by that. Yeah. So one of the foremost researchers on epilepsy and on the human brain, Frederick Gibbs, did say, quote, I have determined that Jack Ruby has a rare form of epilepsy. That's a form of seizures, but the type which afflicts one half of one percent of all epilepsies and it has a very distinctive epilatory pattern. So he said like he did it. Like he has epilepsy. He definitely like could have done this in this like fugue state. There were witnesses for

Jack's character. They were like he was so sad. He talked about Jackie and the kids the whole time. He was just like upset, you know, um, the whole thing. So they have tons of witnesses, the police. There's back and forth on their testimony on their written statements. Um, the closing day of the trial goes until one o'clock in the morning. Everyone's exhausted, but the judge is like, I'm about to lose his jury. They're going to freak out on me if they don't stay here any longer, you know? Yeah. There's no alternate closing statements. You know, the lawyers are part of their closing statements. They like wish they were better. But it was one in the morning. Yeah, what you do do? You know? So people do judge Belai, Jack Ruby's lawyer for not trying anything else. He went for all or

nothing. He said it's temporary insanity. Let him off or nothing. He didn't give any options for like, maybe it was like this kind of murder or this kind of blah blah or like whatever it is because there were some where it could have been maybe he would have gotten eight years in jail you know like but he went all or nothing he murdered somebody on live television I mean I don't know how he yeah but he was saying he did it because he was you know sick and emotional the next day of the jury met they didn't have a foreman yet they voted for the foreman the day that they made their decision they picked a guy who was in the bathroom which is hilarious they're like Cool, let's vote while he's out of the room.

Oh, great, he's a foreman. So they deliberated for two and a half hours. Do you know what the verdict was? Guilty. And what was the punishment? It had to be life, right? It was death. Oh, yeah, death, okay.

Well, yeah, that makes sense. Belsai lose this his fucking mind. The court goes nuts. He yells, this is the victory for bigotry, and he screams at Texas. And he screams at the law, and he screams at everyone. Everyone's yelling. Everyone, his family's crying. everyone's yelling. It's chaos. Jack is taken away and he goes to jail. While he's in jail,

they work on his appeal because he didn't have a fair trial because he had a crazy lawyer and it was in Dallas. Jack Ruby is slowly actually kind of going crazy while he's in all he's in jail, as you would, I imagine. He imagines he thinks that thousands of Jews are being punished for what he did. And he imagines they can hear them being murdered on the floor below him. So he's like hallucinating he tries to die by suicide a bunch he like grabs a light while standing in water he tries to hang himself he's really worried for his family what he really really wants is like take a lie detector and tell his story because he feels like he wasn't able to do that in his first trial yeah um did you know that the guy who invented the lie detector also invented wonder woman no it's so weird i know it's so

random so i just put that in there too but so he eventually does meet with the warren commission So the Warren Commission is like the commission to look into the death of JFK. They give him the lie detector. They do interview him and talk to him again and again. He says, you just kind of hear my story. You don't understand it. I just want it to be good for Jackie and the kids. Like, you know, this is something to keep saying to make it sound.

Like, he's a hero in his, like, the carrier is right. Eventually, his verdict is thrown out and he's granted a retrial. After this, everybody's written a book. George Brown wrote a book because his lawyer wrote a book. you know, Jack Ruby had like, he didn't think he ever wrote his book, but like people wrote books. But now it's 1967 and he's about to have his retrial. And he starts to feel kind of sick. He goes to the doctor.

He has all the cancers. Yeah. He has lung cancer, liver cancer. He's riddled with cancer. Jack Ruby dies of an embolism on January 3rd, 1967 in the same hospital that JFK and Lee Harvey Oswald died in in Dallas. Weird. And that's it. He never got retried.

He never got the opportunity. He probably would have been in jail forever, maybe not death. But I think while I understand being so angry and so sad and so confused during that time, like it must have been just like otherworldly confusing into the right person who's of the right state of mind, whether it's epilepsy or it's the loneliness or it's the schizophrenia and his family or it's whatever it is that like makes this person be like, I need to do this because no one else will. Any other opportunity because he was like a guy's guy.

It was in there. I knew everybody. I think he was just a loser who wanted to be important and wanted to feel like he was a somebody. Yeah. Or he was hired by the government to kill him. Or it's a conspiracy. There's some things that are like, people are like, oh, I saw Lee Harvey in Jack Ruby's club and they were whispering. You know, you're like, I don't know.

I don't think that's true. The only part of the explanation that would make any sense to me is like he was literally hired by the government to kill him. movies are like they knew he had cancel already and was like we'll wipe out all your debts and you're going to die in a few years anyways it doesn't matter at least now you'll be famous yeah i don't think i think that's wishful thinking you know but i also there's also another quote i think it's in the war report where he's like can you believe that some nobody is known history for killing the president you know who's who said that jack ruby about lee harvey oswald oh so maybe he was a little bit like well i'm a nobody

you know and like how do i get to be besides having a cool podcast how do i get people to remember me forever oh he said he said it's hard to realize that a complete nothing a zero like that could kill a man like president kennedy you know such a weirdo yeah because the only other time i can think of somebody killing somebody on life he was that dad and killed that guy who like kidnapped his son remember that was in like in a courtroom no they i forgot i don't know the It's been a long time since I've seen it, but like he, the guy kidnapped the son, took him to a different state, and then the police found out where he was, they arrested him, they're walking him through the airport, and the dad of that kid, pretend like he was off a pay phone, and then when he walked past him, turn around and shot him in the head. I think I do remember that. In that case, the jury was like, I mean, it was filmed.

It was like, yes, you absolutely fucking blew this guy's brains out. right on live television it was you for sure that did that and also we're not gonna press we're gonna it was during altercation like we you did it for the reason everybody else would do it but in this case you shouldn't do that the whole point of america is that you have a fair trial but also like yes also yeah we're totally cool that if you do but like it'll be one thing of jackie had shot lee oswald right yeah but if some random nobody like it's just weird sleuth he's like i'm doing this for you jackie and she was just like i don't want to know you i don't want to know you i want nothing to do with this exactly never come back to dallas please yeah i wonder if she ever did i doubt it

cool well i know you have to go but i have a little bit of ending listener mail for this email let's do it oh well my first one was the mixed reaction on our split episodes just shared their last our last half that i heard it take it or leave it or uh you guys wouldn't seem excited about this so i kind of like it now i don't know let's do what happens Anyway, and then also I wanted to mention Brad, my cousin Brad's email about Elon Busk to you. Yeah, yeah. You brought up some good points about that I couldn't bring up in the moment about Elon Musk. And I wanted to know if you wanted to talk about those.

Would you like to talk about those? So it feels, so I need to go to my yoga thing. And it feels like we could probably talk about that for like 20 years. Brad, I really appreciate the letter. Brad, I really appreciate the letter. Like there was things that I actually texted Taylor about afterwards because I just didn't even know what those theories were. the Ukraine one or the pro-Russia one and the ancient aliens one were the two that just totally threw me for a loop and we actually never squared away the pro-Russia one I don't think but anyways maybe we can save that for next week

yeah there's a lot to talk about it's it's not it's not cut and dry so I'm excited to talk about more but thank you Brad who also went to Tokyo and ate that perpetual broth so and should we I also brought up with Taylor that I brought another idea for a podcast for us, which is a podcast that I'm tentatively titling, change my mind about, dot, dot, dot. And then every week, we have a topic that we'll throw out there that me and Taylor will debate our perspectives on. And I don't know if that would be interesting to people.

If it would be, let us know because now that we split the podcast up, the time suck of doing it is actually way, I don't know what it's like for you, Taylor, but for me it's like been way better because it's like, I can do like two hours of editing once, and I can do two hours again later. Whereas like beforehand, it was like half a Sunday was just editing. And so this kind of helps a little bit on that front.

But I don't know. I know the time is short. Yeah. And I think, well, I think our point is like we're in our bubbles, you know. And like everyone means well. But if you're stuck in a bubble, like, what do you know and what don't you know? So we could like tell much of that or shit. I get told things by people on the left and people on the right that are stated as pure

unadulterated facts and it absolutely still to this day and forever always will blow my mind it's like somebody i hear all the time and that's why i was just like so weird like why does that person feel like that's true and why do they think i think it's true and it happens on both sides i was like it would be so interesting to have like a breakdown of that echo chamber anyways i do i do miss i miss being around people who care about politics because i feel like i right now i'm like with me my husband but like my work is not politically based at all so like shit happens in the world and i'm like anyone freaking out and they're like no and i'm like oh my god and that's the thing i've also realized now now that i'm pushing like what 11 years or something in politics i'm like

you you get you just stop thinking that intently intensely when when you're like oh i know the guys for making the decisions to do the things that are happening it's like it's like it doesn't impact you as much i'm not impact you it doesn't like weigh on you and i don't know I think I have a different perspective on it and maybe it's interesting because like it's like the consequences versus the people like I read a quote by Michelle Obama where she was like well I can go to all these like big dinners with all these famous people because when I get there I'm like you guys aren't that smart essentially you know like making these decisions and you have this aura of you of being like amazing but when I get there I'm like I mean all right but the but the ramifications I think are huge anyway go to yoga everyone please follow us on social doomed to feel a pod like and like and share tell your friends send us suggestions we'd love to be more international um i'd love to be more diverse and the stories that we tell so anything oh my god oh no my book just fell ah but anything that is a failure relationship invention person anything tell us human consciousness well tell it back to you in a fun way it was

Lord. Okay, everyone, have a great week. We're going to be fine. Namaste.