Transcription
In 1989, Houston private investigator Joe West launched an independent investigation to find the true killers of President John F. Kennedy. After three years of disappointments and dead ends, financed at his own considerable expense, West received a tip from an unexpected source: an FBI agent who asked to remain nameless. The tip led Joe West to Joliet State Penitentiary and a prisoner named James E. Files. Files, who was serving time for shooting an Illinois police officer, was at first reluctant to talk. Slowly and meticulously, West established a relationship with Files through months of personal visits and detailed correspondence. Files began to reveal his participation in the JFK assassination. Files was nearing a full confession when West became ill and passed away in 1993.
It took 13 months after Joe West's death, but on March 22nd, 1994, associates of West videotaped an interview with Files. In the interview, Files admits to being one of the shooters on November 22nd, 1963. He also implicates organized crime members Charles Nicoletti, Johnny Roselli, and Sam Giancana. For the next two frustrating years, attempts were made to bring the interview to the public, which finally led this confession to us. We now present this document to you in its unedited form, exactly as it was taped. The breaks and the confessions occurred at the time of the taping; nothing has been altered. We now leave the judgment of James Z. Files and his confession in your hands.
We're ready. R. Please tell me your name. My name is James Files, and I changed my name basically at the end of 1963. For purposes of—uh—let me rephrase that. I took the name Files in 1963. My real name is James Sutton. Say that again. My real name is James Sutton, but I changed my name in late 1963 due to the fact that at that time I wished to get married and raise a family. And what is your name now? Today, I'm incarcerated; I'm under the name James Z. Files. I raised a family under that name, James Files. Did you change your names for any particular reason? To—I—P—I changed my name for a particular reason because I had been working with a radical Cuban group. Excuse me. What we wanted to do at that time was to protect my identity, so they wouldn't know who I really was when I got married. Because of my family life, I didn't want anyone to retaliate on the things that we were doing, and so I took on a different identity that was authorized to me through a government agency. Were you ever in the armed services? I was in the 82nd Airborne. I went in '59, 1959. State of entry, January; and in July 10th of 1959, I believe it was July 10th, we shipped out to L.A. I was 82nd Airborne. What were some of your duties? My duties at that time: we were working a special operations group to work with the Leosan Army in L.A. at that time, and I was there strictly as an advisor on training with small—small automatic weapons, setting detonators, explosives, mechanical ambushes; and there was just a handful of Americans there working with a Leosan militia at that time. How long did you serve there? I was there for approximately 14 months. I was in L.A. before I came home. You mentioned to me one time that you were in jeopardy of being court-martialed. Could you elaborate on that a little bit? Uh, I really don't wish to elaborate on that part of the court-martial. It had to do in the field, but not of—is there—was something that I did that the whole face with the Leosan Army? No problem. Could you tell me about how you first became involved in organized crime activities? I first became—it's a strange way to start out—but I was racing stock cars and driving at a local track, and Mr. Nicoletti had taken a shine to my driving. And he had watched me on several occasions, and he had asked me once if I would like to drive for him. One—him, and I took him out and test-drove his car that we just picked up, a brand new Ford, and he was pretty well pleased with my driving. And from then on, I became more like an assigned driver to him, and I did several drivings for him on a different job that he did. An up-and-coming figure with the organized crime, and he was known as one of the local hitmen. And as far as I'm concerned, he was the best there ever was, as far as I'm concerned. What Mafia Family did he work for? He was out of the Chicago Family. Uh, who would have been the boss of the Chicago Family at that time? Tony Accardo. That's before Giacona or after? Giancana. Tony Accardo headed it up, and then Giancana came after that. Giancana at that time was one of the underlings, I guess you might say. He was one of the top lieutenants at that point. Things were handed out in different branches and organized crimes, such as someone might handle the liquor licenses, someone would handle the loan sharking and the booking, and someone else would handle contracts for murder, for hire, or anything like that. James, where were you on November 22nd, 1963? On November 22nd, 1963, I was in Dealey Plaza. I arrived at Dealey Plaza shortly before 10:00 a.m. that morning. What was your reason for being there? My reason for being there at that point was to look the area over, and I had driven a vehicle down there and I had taken several weapons to Dallas, Texas. For what purpose did you do this? I did this for the sole purpose for the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Who instructed you to do this? James, tell me the story in your own words. The story started back—oh, roughly six months prior to that—when Mr. Nicoletti contacted me one evening, and I had met with him, and he instructed me that we was going to do a friend of mine. And it was more like a personal joke because uh, I had never liked J.F. Kennedy since the Challenge Bay Affair, which is known as the Bay of Pigs. Were you at the Bay of Pigs? No, I was not at the Bay of Pigs, but I had helped train several of the operatives that were involved in the Bay of Pigs. But uh, when you say help train them, what do you mean? I had trained them in what they call—we call it Gator Ridge back then. Some people refer to it as No Name Key; some people call it Assassin's Ridge. Who was in the Everglades down there in Florida, and uh, we worked solely with the Cubans at that time. We supplied them with weapons, and the weapons had come basically from uh, the government, from the CIA. They had been heavily involved in that, and at that time David Atlee Phillips was my controller. And uh, so I had never liked Kennedy since he had backed out on us. We didn't give him the firepower, and I felt that we'd been betrayed. But I had—at that point—I had never even considered killing anybody at all over the situation. But when Charles Nicoletti told me that we were going to do my friend, I thought they were referring to a local party in town, and I said, "Why?" I said, "What the hell did he do?" And he laughed. He says, "No, not him. He says, 'We're going to do John F. Kennedy, the president.'" And I was a little bit shocked at first, but I said, "Hey, fine, great. You don't matter to me," and uh, I was game for anything he wanted to do. And then we discussed it, and then he asked me what I thought about with Johnny Roselli working with us, and I told him, I said, "Hey, fine. I like Johnny. Got no problems there." So you knew John Roselli before that day? I knew John Roselli before that day. How did you meet him? I had met John Roselli in Miami and discussed a few things with him, and he had—I had met him through David Atlee Phillips, and David Atlee Phillips was uh, operative for the CIA. And uh, through time, everybody got to be fairly well good friends. But I grew up basically under Chuck's wing, Mr. Nicoletti's wing, and uh, Chuck told me what we were going to do. We first originally planned—planned—to do the assassination in Chicago, but a lot of people didn't like that idea, so then it was moved to—to another location. When you say "we" planned it, could you clarify? "We"—well, when I say "we," I was just with Mr. Nicoletti. Whatever he said to do, I would do. And uh, on—I say "we," I'm referring—like the only thing I did was just uh, drive the car, whatever that they needed me for. And Mr. Nicoletti had asked me then, at that point, when we decided not to do it in Chicago and was going to be moved to Dallas—when they—John—up—decided to go to Dallas a week in advance—I took the '63 Chevy that we had at that time, and I left and I went down a week early. I picked up the weapons and the storage bin that we had and uh, loaded them in the car with everything I thought that we might need, with a various assortment, and I left and I drove to Dallas. I stayed out at a place in Mesquite, Texas, and uh, once I got there, I'd call back and notified Mr. Nicoletti that I was there and on the scene. And the following day, Lee Harvey Oswald came by the motel where I was at. They had given him my location, and he took me out to a place somewhere southeast of Mesquite where I tested the weapons and calibrated the scopes on anything that might be needed. And he was with me for a few days in time there. We drove around so I would know all the streets and not know—running into any dead-end streets if anything went wrong and we had to flee from the area. So Lee Oswald spent time with you. He knew while you were there. You knew why he was there. Lee Harvey Oswald knew that I was there, but I never told him why I was there. He would just come over and told to stay with me and to help me out and assist me in any way that he could. Lee Harvey Oswald and I never discussed the assassination of John F. Kennedy. I discussed that with no one because my part of it—I had no part of the assassination at that time. All I did was go down, take the car down, take the weapons down, clean the weapons, calibrate the scopes, make sure everything was functioning properly, and then know the immediate area surrounding Dealey Plaza back to the expressways and the other local highways that could be used as an extraction point to uh, to leave Dallas in case something should go wrong at that point. I had no involvement at all in the assassination outside of that—just doing my little job that I had to do. Could you give me the exact chronology of what happened from the time uh, you arrived in Dallas? You've already said that you would—out—you tested some guns and things. Take me back to maybe November 21st, the day before, and just in your own words, tell me what happened from November 21st, 1963, till the night of November 22nd, 1963. If we go back uh, November 21st, I had everything pretty well set up on my end of it, as far as knowing the area, knowing the streets, memorizing a lot of the major points there in the intersection, crossing railroad tracks and trestles and things. I had the weapons prepared and ready to go. I had those installed in the car where I wanted them. Everything had been calibrated; all ammunition had been set ready to use. And I got a good night's sleep that night. And the following morning, I got up early and I went to the Dallas Cabana Hotel to pick up John Roselli. And I'm going to say somewhere shortly around 7:00 that morning, maybe a few minutes past 7, and I picked up Johnny Roselli, and we drove from the Dallas Cabana to Fort Worth, Texas, to a pancake house they had there just off the major highway. And we went there to meet someone. I did not know who we were meeting, but he had already told me—Johnny Roselli said—we were going to meet a man by the name of Jack Ruby that he had some things that we had to pick up. And when we got there, John Roselli told me, he said, "I'm going to go in and sit in the booth. He says, 'You wait and come in later.' He said, 'Sit somewhere else where you can keep an eye on me. If something goes wrong, I want you to cover my backside.'" So I positioned myself—after Johnny Roselli went in—I sat at the counter, ordered a cup of coffee, and sat there and waited. This heavy-set gentleman came in, and he went over—and he knew Johnny Roselli, I assume—they shook hands, they talked for a minute and sat down in the booth together, and they passed over—oh, I'm going to say probably uh, a 5x9 envelope, a vanilla envelope that has material in it. At that—that point, after a couple of minutes, he got up, they shook hands, he left. I went out into the parking lot, made sure the air was clear, started the car up, pulled up by the door. Johnny Roselli came out and got in the car. I never met Jack Ruby, never said hello or anything. And Johnny Roselli got in the car with me, and we started back to Dallas. He opened the envelope up, and there was uh, identification in there for Secret Service people, and we had a map in there of the Secret Service route that would take it through Dealey Plaza. And Johnny Roselli said, "Well, they only made one change, and that was when they informed me that they were coming off of uh, Main Street onto Elm—or onto Houston there. They made the zigzag, the little turn that they should have never made. But when they made that—that was the only change in it." I drove him back to the Dallas Cabana. He went upstairs, and I waited for Mr. Nicoletti to come down. Mr. Nicoletti came down and got in the car with me, and we drove to Dealey Plaza. And we got to Dealey Plaza shortly before 10:00, and from there we parked the car. It had been drizzling rain that morning; it's kind of a cool morning out. I parked the car Dealey side—the TSBD building. Mr. Nicoletti and I got out, and we walked up and down the complete area of Dealey Plaza. We covered every corner, walked by the buildings, looked over several different things, and we were just talking, having casual talk about one thing or another—the weather and everything. And at about 10:30, Mr. Nicoletti asked me how I would feel in supporting him and backing him up on this, and he told me I wouldn't fire unless it became extremely necessary. And I told Mr. Nicoletti, I said, "Yes," I said, "I'd be honored to do anything to back you up." And he asked me, he says, "Where would you—" he said, "Before it goes outside, if you were to be outside here," he said, "Where would you position yourself out in Dealey Plaza?" And I told him, I said, "Well," I said, "I'm looking everything over, and from walking around the week that I've been down here," I said, "I think I would choose up there behind the tree, behind that—on the high ridge by the knoll up there." And he says, "Why there?" I said, "Well, I've got the railroad yard back up in there. We've got a parking lot there. I've got a place to where I could stash whatever I would need," I said, "and I can pass off as a sub-office worker in the railroad yard for the time being until that time comes, and nobody would really pay any attention to me." And he asked me then, he says, he says, "Where do you think it'd be the best place for me?" I said, "Well," I said, "I think the TSBD building, with the new change in it," I said, "I think the TSBD building over there—building—would give you the best vantage point there." And he said, "I think so too." So we took a walk over, went through the parking lot over by the tracks, walked around through there, and he seemed pretty well pleased with that. And then at that point we—oh, was about 11:10—he asked me what weapon I would choose to use over there, and I told him, I said, "I would like to use the Fireball." He says, "Why—why that one?" He said, "You've only got one shot." And I said, "One shot's all I'm going to get anyway, if I wait until the last moment of fire," and I may not fire, I said, "and it's easy to conceal. I carry it in the briefcase, and nobody pays any attention to me. It's easier to walk away from there," and that's exactly what we did at that point. And shortly before noon, we went back to the vehicle. I took the briefcase out and turned my jacket inside out. I went back into the yard—the railroad yard there—I secured the briefcase, and then I hung out back there, and I walked down on the grass, and all I looked things over. Nobody paid any attention; people were gathering. And shortly before the motorcade came, I went back up there and started securing myself in a better position so I'd be able to reach the attache case at that point—the briefcase, excuse me—and uh, I knew once that I opened the uh, briefcase up, pull a weapon out, nobody's going to be looking at me. The motorcade would be coming, making his first turn, and I wouldn't have to uh, remove the Fireball from the briefcase until approximately they made the turn on down Elm Street there, and I would have plenty of time at that point. And at that point, when they started proceeding down Elm Street, shots started being fired from behind, and I assumed that it was Mr. Nicoletti because he was the one that was in the building, and I knew that Johnny Roselli was there. And uh, I remember the shots ringing out, and even though the president was being hit with the rounds, I was considering a miss because I knew that we were going for a head shot on the president. And I had known—he had been hit in the body, but I didn't know what part at that time. And I seen the body lurch, and I saw the body lurch again. I heard another shot that missed, and we were supposed to hit no one but Conley—I mean, no one but Mr. Kennedy. And I guess Governor Connelly got hit with one of the rounds at that point, and I wasn't even sure that—because I was keeping Kennedy as best I could in the scope on the Fireball. And when I got to the point where I thought it would be the last field of fire, I zeroed in to the left side of the head there that I had—because if I waited any longer than Jackie would have been in the line of fire, and I'd been instructed for nothing to happen to her. And at that moment, I figured this is my last chance for a shot, and he still had not been hit in the head. So as I fired that round, Mr. Nicoletti and I had fired approximately at the same time as the head started forward, then it went backwards. And when I would have to say that his shell struck approximately 1/1000 of a second ahead of mine—maybe that's what started pushing the head forward, which caused me to miss in the left eye. And I came in on the left side of the temple, and at that point, through the scope, I witnessed everything—matter and skull—being blown out to the back of the limousine. Everyone on television watching saw Jackie Kennedy crawl out there to get it, and I watched her hold on a hand to crawl back in the car. And I put the uh, Fireball back into the briefcase and closed it up, and I'd pull my jacket off, reverse my jacket so I would have—instead of a plaid—well, I would have the gray—like a dress jacket, more or less. And I put a cap on my head, and I had to walk away carrying a briefcase. How did you exit the plaza? When I exited the plaza, I walked to the edge of the stockade fence. I did not walk down the steps. I walked back over across the grass to the dead-end street that ends there by the parking lot, and I proceeded to uh—believe that's Houston—cross Houston, one of the TSBD parking lots. And when I got into the car, Mr. Nicoletti was already in the car, and so was Johnny Roselli. I got in the car and drove away. What happened to the shell casing that you fired at John Kennedy? The shell casing that I fired at John Kennedy—when I took it out of the weapon—it's one of those moments when you feel like you're above everything else, and I guess I was a little bit cocky with it all. I took the casing; I put it in my mouth while I put another casing—cartridge—into that one before putting it into the case. And as I started to leave, I took the casing and I bit down on the casing—the leave teeth marks on it. And then I set the casing—as a symbol—right on top of the stockade fence, which I know I should have never done, but I did that. And over the years, through other people, I have left certain trademarks along the way. But the casing was—my—had teeth marks on it, and no one knew it was teeth marks until recently, in 1994, and they just had that examined to find out that it was teeth marks on there. But I left that more or less as a signature—of my calling card, your trade, you might say. My trade. How did John Roselli and Charles Nicoletti get into the TSBD building? That I could not say, but I would believe they went through the front door. And we had a side door that they would be exiting from. And I had parked this—this burgundy-colored Chevrolet there—the '63 that I was driving—I parked that into the lot there. But when they entered the TSBD building, I was not there. I was beyond sight, back into the railroad yard at that point. Are you sure they were in that TSBD building? I'm positive, 'cause I had the car parked there. They were going to come out through the door and put their weap—well, Johnny Roselli had no weapon. Charles Nicoletti was the one that carried the rifle in there, and that had been secured, and he put that back into the trunk of the vehicle. And I knew that—wasn't the trunk—because it was still there when I got the motorcade—took it out—'cause that was the plan was for him to come back, put his in the trunk. I would have the briefcase; I would slide it under the steering wheel. Johnny Roselli was sitting in the back seat. Charles Nicoletti was sitting in the right front passenger seat. I opened the door; they got in and drove out. As I came out of the parking lot, I made a right-hand turn onto Houston Street. Where did you go after that? After that, I went—I don't remember just how many blocks I proceeded ahead, but I—oh, maybe five or six blocks ahead to a major street. I took a left, went up a few more blocks by the expressway where there's an intersection there, underpass. They had a gas station there. They had another car waiting there for them. They got out of that—out of the vehicle I was in. They walked across the parking lot. I never saw which way they went. I turned from there, made a right, and I headed back out to Mesquite, and I went back to the hotel, pulled into the parking lot, parked my vehicle there, secured it, went to the room that I already had—run—that I've been in all week. At that point, I went in to clean—to strip myself, to shower. I used the hot wax to remove any residue from the skin pores. And when I finished with the details I had to do there, I waited until it was dusk—dark time—then I went out. I removed all the gun cases that had been put back into the car, brought everything into the unit, cleaned those, secured everything. And later, after midnight, when there was no activity, I went back out. I had pulled the back seat in the car, and I put the weapons back in behind the seat where they were—belong—where we had a compartment for them. I went back in, went to sleep, waited till daylight, and then I drove from there back to uh, the southern part of Illinois, old Route 66 there, and stayed overnight there, then drove the rest of the way the next day into Chicago, 'cause I'd been instructed—in the beginning when I went to Texas—not to be driving at nighttime, not to be pulled over by any police officers, not to speed, and only travel during daylight hours, so there'd be no questions asked. And I had always been good at following orders. And I used the same procedure going home. Just—just stop for a second for these people here. In the beginning, I couldn't get nothing done. They were all down on me 'cause a cop got shot, and my guitar was—[Music]. Okay, R. How much money were you paid for your participation on November 22nd, 1963? Well, the money that I received for that job in Dallas—I'd never asked for a specified amount. I'd never even asked for any money. I was just told to do it with Mr. Nicoletti. But I had received $30,000 a short period thereafter. I remember there was two or three weeks went by, maybe a month even, before I met him one evening. He gave me an envelope, and I asked him, I said, "What's this for?" And he said, "This is for down in Texas. He said, 'You did excellent.'" The only thing he did—he criticized me once. He asked me—he says—when I left the plaza that day and got in the car with him—he says, "Don't you think you overreacted?" And I says, "What do you mean?" He says, "Maybe you shot too fast because I know they didn't want a shot coming in the front. They tried to put everything from the back side." I'm pretty—and I told him at that point, I said, "What's my last chance for the option? I said, 'If I didn't fire at that point, I couldn't fire without endangering Jackie.'" Jimmy—Joe West's notes and in Don Irving's interview notes with you, and in what you told me before, you told me you received 15,000. 15,000? You just said 30. I just said 30. How much did you receive all total? It was 30. I didn't want to say—I'm telling you the truth. I got $30,000. In the first—first part, I cut it in half in the beginning to 15 because it was an awful lot of money back then, and I didn't really think it mattered that much, and I didn't really plan to tell what money I'd got—to—I didn't—until I talked to Joe on that. But the total figure was 30. Okay, I just want to clarify that. Clarify everything now. We've been playing—the only difference you've ever told me—right there. Well, in the beginning, I said 15 because I didn't think it mattered that much what the amount was. But since we've been playing square ball with everything else and I've given you everything that I have, I'm not going to go back on that part. I'm just going to give you the actual figure, and that's what it was. And I never received no more, no less. The next money I received after that was for something else that we had done. But like I say, as far as I know, that's what the money I received was for—Dallas—when they gave me that envelope, because I never took checks. He gave me cash, and I usually got money every other week from him just for local work around town. When did you first meet Lee Harvey Oswald? Excuse me. I first met Lee Harvey Oswald and uh, God, it's back in early '63. We were running weapons down to—I believe it was '63—we were running guns down there when I first met him. And I met him through David Atlee Phillips. And Lee Harvey Oswald and I had never been friends at that point or anything. We became more friends than we—in Dallas—together. But I had met him down there in New Orleans and outside of New Orleans in a little town, I believe it was called Clinton down there. They had been taking down some semi-automatic uh, uh, .45 caliber per guns. They were made—I believe—by Knoxville Arms at that time. Am I to understand that Lee Harvey Oswald was working for the CIA? Lee Harvey Oswald had the same control—same controller—that I had—David Atlee Phillips—because David Atlee Phillips introduced me to him. And so that means that you have worked for the CIA also? I had involvement with the CIA, yes. Can you talk about any of that? I don't wish to touch base with the CIA. And I think some of the people that you have dealt with—you recently found confirming uh, proof of what I have told you through their knowledge and what they found out about the CIA. But I don't want to touch base or get back into the—say—operations because it doesn't pertain to a lot of this other stuff. Did the CIA have anything to do with what happened in Dallas in '63? Excuse me, the CIA—someone—and government organizations had a heavy hand in it because they supplied Secret Service identification for different people. I don't know who used it, but I saw the identification that day and that morning of the assassination. But David Atlee Phillips had given me the Remington Fireball at that time—back then—but not specifically for Kennedy. He had given me that weapon, and it had been used prior to the assassination of John F. Kennedy when we had done some other work, and I had used it. I believe it was the third time—for Kennedy—would have been the third one. Was it used a few times since then? But at that point, I know a lot of people that—see—knew that Kennedy was going to be assassinated, but whether they had planned it or ordered it or not, I have no idea. Who ordered his assassination? When you were in Dealey Plaza, did you see any other people there that you recognized that may have been involved with the mob or either with the CIA? Yes, I did. I saw Frank Sturgis, and at one point I'm going to say he was probably no more than 40 or 50 feet away. And again, later when I looked at him when I was—brother—from the yard, I was about 40 yards from him, maybe 35 yards away, and I scanned the crowd. I saw him; he was still there at the time of the assassination. And uh, I was looking at him through a three-power scope also. I scanned the crowd to see if he was still there, and he was there. Anyone else that you recognized? You told me at one time it looked like old home week. Excuse me. Could we—that sure did. Did you see anybody else there you recognize? Yes, he had uh, Eugene Braden. He was there. James Braen—some people referred to him as—but I know him as Eugene Braden. Why was he there? That I have no idea. I never talked to the man there, never discussed anything with the man, but I know that he had been there with Johnny Roselli and with Charles Nicoletti because he was at the uh, Dallas Cabana that morning, and he'd been out front talking to John Roselli when I pulled up in the Chevrolet. Why was Sturgis there? I have no idea. I never discussed anything with Sturgis, but I knew him very well, and I know it was him. Did you ever see Sturgis with Nicoletti or Roselli, or was he involved in planning in any way or anything? As far as I know, Frank Sturgis had no involvement in the planning, and I had never seen him speak with Mr. Nicoletti or Johnny Roselli that morning, although Sturgis did know John Roselli, but they weren't together that morning to my knowledge. Did you know Lee Harvey Oswald was on that sixth floor? Jimmy—no, I did not know he was on the sixth floor. You got to say it. I did not know Lee Harve—I did not know that Lee Harvey Oswald was on the sixth floor of the Book Depository that morning. I wasn't even sure he was in the building or anywhere around because I had not seen Lee Harvey Oswald that day. Did Nicoletti or Roselli ever tell you that Oswald was part of "quote unquote" the hit? Uh, Chuck told me that Lee Harvey Oswald was going to show me around the area down there, and that's why he had—that someone had got a hold of Lee Harvey Oswald and told him where I was at—at the Mesquite Hotel over there in Mesquite—and he had showed up there the second day I was in town. But like I say, Lee Harvey Oswald and I never discussed anything about the assassination, even though I assume we both knew what was happening, but we never discussed it. Uh, is there anything you can tell me about the death of Officer J.D. Tippit? I do not wish to touch base on that. I have no comment on that. Do you know who killed him? Yes, I do. Is the man still alive? The man that killed J.D. Tippit is still alive. He was alive as of three years ago. I haven't talked to him in the past three years, but Lee Harvey Oswald did not kill J.D. Tippit because the man that killed the police officer that afternoon had come by my hotel and told me, he said, "Things got messed up today," he said, "and I killed a cop." And my remarks to that was, "Well, you did what you had to do," and he left shortly thereafter. So then there was one other person that was part of the team other than you and Nicoletti? The person I'm referring to now was not a part of the team to assassinate John F. Kennedy. This—as far as I know—his job would have been to kill Lee Harvey Oswald, from what I understood—without asking any direct questions because I did not want to know what anyone else was doing. All I wanted to know was what my assignment was, what I was to do, and the less I know about other people, the better off I am, 'cause I didn't want very many people knowing who I was or what I'm doing. Would you have known who would have given him orders to kill Officer Tippit? No, I would not, because that contract would have come from a different source. Did you see Jack Ruby in that plaza that day? Yes, Jack Ruby was in the plaza that day. Where was he at? At one point he was standing on the same side with his back to me from the grassy knoll, down close to the sidewalk. But I didn't watch other people in the plaza that day. I scanned the crowd. I just seen a few faces, but I was solely concentrated for the few moments that I had the weapon out, looking through the scope. I was concentrating on the primary target, and when that was over with, I wasn't looking behind me to see who was coming or who was running. And I remember when the shots had been fired, it was all over—nobody—nobody responded immediately. I don't care how fast to say the police acted. People were stopped; they were stunned, including the police officers and the police officer on the motorcycles. They took them—I'm going to say—maybe 10 seconds before they even responded to what was happening. It's like everybody was waiting for someone to tell them what to do. And at that point, I started to walk away. There had been a couple of people in the vicinity that I was in—I'm going to say probably 15 yards in front of me, close to the edge of the fence where I was at, and I was about 15 feet from the
A single-shot bow-action pistol, a scope mounted on it. And it was a pistol that was actually way ahead of its time. If just to see one, I don't know if they're going to show you a picture of one or not, but it is a very beautiful handgun. And one of the most elite pistols I believe ever manufactured. Although a lot of your people like .44 Magnums and everything else in .357s, at this point I prefer a smaller caliber for something like that. Because at 100 yards a gun is very effective. 'Cuz most people take a pistol to be only good for 30, 40 feet, and something that you would use in a room.
But a Remington Fireball is more of a modified, cut-down rifle. It shoots a regular .222 shell; it's a lot longer than your average .22 round that you put into a .22 rifle. And it's a special casing, and you could not fire this in a .22 rifle, .22 or .22 caliber. But now, correct me if I'm wrong, the Remington Fireball XP-100 will fire both .221s and .222s. Yes, they will. It takes some sort of modification though to fire .222s. What exactly does it take? The barrel had to be reinforced; if you didn't have the barrel reinforced, the barrel would, could possibly blow up in your face. Did you shoot a regular shell in it, or was it some sort of loaded or modified shell? Or I shot a .222 with a Mercury load on it. We used the Mercury load. The .222 was designed to fragment on impact, but what a lot of people didn't realize at that time, 'cuz the gun was still in early production and didn't go on sale to the public until 1963, but the .222 had a habit: it would ricochet if it didn't get a direct hit. And we couldn't afford to have something ricochet, so that was why a friend of mine had made special rounds for me at that time. And I had taken six rounds with me down there, and wherever you hit, if you got any type of bone structure, the round would fragment and explode. And the round would be traveling at approximately about 3,100 feet per second, which meant you would get penetration then explosion. Without the Mercury loading, I did not get a hit; there's a strong possibility that would ricochet, and I would not have time to reload and fire a second shot.
Who gave you the orders to shoot J.F. Kennedy? Charles Nicoletti, that morning at 10:30. And we didn't know if I was going to shoot him or not; I was only there, his backup, in case something went wrong or they missed. Do you know where Mr. Nicoletti got his orders? He got his orders from Sam Giancana. Would you have any idea what Mr. Giancana got his orders, or if he even got an order? I would have no knowledge of that whatsoever. Would Tony Accardo have been involved if Sam Giancana handed something out? I would say yes, that Mr. Tony Accardo had to be involved. Would any of the other families have been involved, or do you have any way of knowing? I have no way of knowing, but I don't believe this is something that Mr. Giancana would engineer on his own, so word had to come from somebody who approached those people. I have no knowledge; I could only go back to the point of Mr. Nicoletti, Johnny Roselli, and myself at that point, and Lee Harvey Oswald on his part, showing me around the area, uh, letting me know the major roads there and where I could go out and test fire a weapon.
Has anybody paid you any money for this interview? J-- nobody has paid me any money for this interview, and I have asked for nothing. Why are you telling all of this? Why are you coming forth with this after 30 years? And the beginning with this, Mr. Joe West, he got a lead on me and came to me; he wrote me first. He wrote me a letter. I had denied any knowledge of it; told him he had me mistaken with someone else. And they had been calling the institution; the counselor came one day while I was on visit and, uh, wanted me to call somebody on the phone. I told him, I'm here 365 days a year, don't bother me while I am on my visit; they can talk to me some other time, or you can talk to me anytime you want to because I'm locked up here. And the following day they come, got me out of my cell and said they wanted me to call Mr. West. And at that point I called Mr. West, and I told him at that time, I said, "Mr. West, you have approximately 3 minutes to convince me why I should even talk to you." That's exactly what you said, and those are my exact words. I heard the tape, and Mr. West started talking to me on the phone, and he started touching personal points, and the phone calls in the prison are all recorded. And I stopped him; I said, "Well, stop." I said, "Mr. West, if you wish to see me or talk to me, come see me. I don't want to talk on the phone no more." Mr. West immediately therefore came to visit me. The first day, him and I sat and we talked basically about weather, sports, about a lot of other things, because I had refused to discuss the Kennedy assassination with him. He came back the second day. I felt more comfortable with him, and he explained to me he was getting the case reopened, and he was taking it back to trial; that he wanted JFK's body exhumed; he had the petition for exhuming the body, and and he wanted to have me subpoenaed to testify in court if he could get the trial or get the case reopened. And, excuse me, good break, about to die. Yeah, okay. At this point I told him, I said, if he could get me immunity, I said, "I can't talk about it for the simple reason I'll be facing criminal charges." And he told me that he had an excellent attorney, and what they would do is they would try to proceed to get me immunity so that I could come forth and talk if I was subpoenaed. And at that point we sat and we talked for a while, and I finally, I agreed that I would testify and come forward if they got me the immunity. Things didn't go accordingly as planned, and, uh, I don't know how to say a lot of it, but the government went around the proper parties, and, uh, we had, they came to visit me, and we had a situation that I don't want to touch base on at this time. And, uh, my life has already been threatened over this whole mess, and, uh, I'm giving this tape right now, and I don't want to be identified at this time, but I'm not coming forward for any patriotic causes, but I'm coming forward on it because of Mr. Joe West himself.
Who threatened you, Jimmy? I have been threatened by both organized crime and by the government. Can you identify the people of the government that threatened you? I wouldn't do that because I've never given up anyone in my life, and I won't start now. If they wish to kill me, then I have to accept the faith that comes with it, but I will not finger-point anyone or anything like that at this time. Has the FBI been here to visit you? Yes, the FBI was here to visit me, and the FBI has tried to discredit me on a lot of things. But people that you have conversed with that has things, and I've given you information, not to put anybody in prison. I've given you information on Special Operations that was carried out by the government that no one could have possibly known about outside the agency itself. And I believe that you have corroborated my story on several different aspects. Do you know anything about the death of David Ferrie? Yes, I do, but at this time I do not wish to discuss that. Yeah, what-- I'll move that mic over just about six inches. Which way you want to go, to the left? My breath is getting heavy. Move, stand if you would like that, just stay here. More we start talking, when we start talking about people dying, we're start talking about murder, and we're talking about a crime that has no statute of limitations on it, and as long as I have no immunity, there's not much that I can say about David Ferrie or a couple of other parties that I have been asked about. Well, it obviously, you know who killed David Ferrie. Obviously, yes, I do know who killed David Ferrie. He died of a severe brain hemorrhage, but the severe brain hemorrhage was brought on in a specific way, and if they were to examine, they would find out. And I've already stated at one point where the tear in the tissue became after the superior brain hemorrhage. And I waited for somebody to confirm that I'm working-- What's your really inner feelings about all this, J-- as a person, as a human being? As a person, as a human being, I just want everybody to forget about me, put it all behind me. I'm sorry anybody ever caught up with me or found out who I was or that what my involvement was.
Why did you open up to Joe West? Joe West is the type of person, you have to meet him and talk with him to really understand the man, but he's somebody that, just somebody that you like and you respect, and you're willing to do what you can to help them. And I've given Mr. West more than I've ever given anyone else in my life, and why I don't really understand, except he's just that type of person. He is a magnetism about him. Joe is a great man; he was-- I know I'm short time, but the time that I've known him, I felt like I knew him all my life. And there was only two other men in my life that I really treasured, valued. One was Mr. Nicoletti, and the other man is still alive, and I can't use his name, but he's in his 80s, but he's a wonderful man, and I would do anything either one of those men ever asked me to do. And when I say anything, I mean anything and everything. Do you have any remarks about what happened in Dallas in November of '63? It's hard to have remorse for something that has been done for so long ago, and at that time everyone felt was right. And if I didn't like someone, how could I have remorse for someone that I didn't like? So you felt personally that Mr. Kennedy should have been taken out? Well, I felt that way, along, but my reasons were, uh, specifically because of the Bay of Pigs. But me and a lot of other Cubans felt that way because we felt betrayed by John Kennedy, by John F. Kennedy. We had airborne waiting to go in; we had battle wagons ready, and they got no support whatsoever; they got slaughtered; they went to prison; they were captured; they were killed; they were punished, tortured. That's because Mr. Kennedy wouldn't, the president wouldn't give his word to go, and all he had to do is give the authorization, and the Cuban deal was all over with; it was ours, but he took it. Promise; he had the power to say yes or no, and he said no. He blew it.
Did you ever know a man Richard Helms? Yes, I did; deputy director of the CIA. Did you ever know a man named Allen Dulles? I never-- I knew who he is, but I never met him personally. Did you ever know Antonio Veciana? Yes, I did; I consider him to be a good friend of mine. And to my knowledge, Antonio Veciana was not involved in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Whether he had knowledge or not, I do not know, but I know he was heavily involved with the CIA and many other operations; certain groups from the old White Hand all the way through Alpha 66 to the different groups we had. Was Mr. Helms involved? Mr. Helms knew about the organizations, but Mr. Helms gave me no directions direct from that; all my directives came from David Atlee Phillips, because David Atlee Phillips was my controller. I understand that it's, it's a serious question, and I know you've already answered it once, but I, I just want to try to say it again: Do you have any knowledge at all of the CIA participating in the hit on Kennedy? The CIA never once told me that they were going to kill Kennedy; I never heard it from David Atlee Phillips or anyone else. Do you know how Charles Nicoletti got to Dallas? I do not know how Charles Nicoletti got there, said for flying on commercial airlines. Johnny Roselli flew, and I know specifically on a MATS Airline, because he told me on what kind of airline. MATS-- Military Air Transport Service is what it stands for; we call it MATS. Could you give me a full sentence on that, Johnny? Okay. Johnny Roselli, the morning we were going to Fort Worth, he told me, he said, "I was in Washington yesterday," he said, "I got lucky." I said, "What do you mean lucky?" He said, "I caught a MATS flight out." Well, for people who don't understand MATS, that's Military Air Transport Service; was a military flight. And allegedly, like I said, I don't know who flew the plane, Johnny told me he was on, but he said he was being flown in by the CIA; he said they flew him there, and basically that's all I know of. And whether they had a flag going there or not, I don't know what that was all about. I never had knowledge, and I never asked people what they're doing or where they've been or any questions. I've always lived my life believing in silence; I plead not knowing what the other man is doing. If you're doing something wrong, don't come tell me what you're doing because I don't want to know, in case you have a problem later. And I live that way here in prison. I have prisoners come up and tell me, "We've got this coming, and we got that." I told them, "Man, I don't, I don't want to know part of it; I don't want to know what you're doing; don't tell me, 'cuz if you get snitched off, I don't want you thinking it's me." I recall that you mentioned, you want to take a pause and mix some water a second? Okay. I'm going to ask you about that package, and I'm going, you let the-- anytime you're ready, uh, tell me in your own words about the package that Mr. Nicoletti gave you.
After this, after many, many years, several years, we started having a small problem; things were arising, and we had the, uh, Senate Intelligence Committee was calling people back, the Warren Commission, everybody had been involved in a lot of things, and we're getting a lot of static. And to this point I'd kept myself totally obsolete, local, out of the highlight, the spotlight. The only two people that knew I was in Dealey Plaza that day for sure was Johnny Roselli and Charles Nicoletti. Why do you think that is? Well, we never went around telling people what we done. If we went out and we did something, or we popped somebody, or made a hit on them, whatever you call it, uh, we didn't go sit around the tavern and brag about it; we didn't go down to the local restaurant and talk about what we'd done. Far as, as, as Sam Giancana knew, Lee Harvey Oswald was the man who did the shooting; that's all he knew. He knew that he was there, and whether he knew Johnny Roselli was there or not, I don't know, but I would say yes, he knew Johnny Roselli was there. Start that sentence with: The only thing Sam Giancana knew, as far as I know, the only thing that Sam Giancana knew for Dealey Plaza that day was, uh, the part Charles Nicoletti and Johnny Roselli, because Sam Giancana had never discussed it with me, only Charles Nicoletti and Johnny Roselli, and I admit to that point, because we kept a very tight circle, and we always thought the less people know, the better off we are, the safer we are. And as the years went by, Sam got killed, I believe in, uh, June of 1975. Sam Giancana, he was killed at his home in '75. Charles Nicoletti, excuse me, Johnny Roselli was next; he was killed, I believe, I don't remember the exact date, but I know it was September, I believe, of, uh, '76. And Charles Nicoletti, I remember that date because him and I were very, very close, and he wasn't supposed to go out that night unless I was with him, but he was killed at a restaurant in the west suburbs of Chicago, at a place called The Golden Horns, and he was executed there that night, and that was on March 29th of 1977. Do you know anything about what happened to those three, who might have done it? Well, on who killed those men, and I do not know who the actual man was that killed Johnny Roselli or Charles Nicoletti, but the night that Sam Giancana was killed, I know that Johnny Roselli was in town that night, and I know that him and Sam Giancana were very close, and I figured he was probably the only one that could get into his house that time in the morning that Sam would let him in. But to say he specifically killed him, I can't say that because I don't really know, 'cuz it was never admitted to me, but I know Sam left, and, or, excuse me, Johnny left and went back to Miami. But anyway, after Sam was dead, Johnny was dead, I didn't know who killed Charles Nicoletti, and if I had have known, I would have went after them myself. So that knowledge never became known to me. But right before Chuck was killed, we knew that there was a problem, and I'd been riding constantly with him and staying in his companionship, more or less as his bodyguard, watching on anyone that we went to meet. And I would usually carry two .45s with me, and I keep a windbreaker across my lap with each gun laying in my lap, with a hand on each one. And we'd been very, very careful. And approximately 2 weeks before his death, he had given me a package and told me, he says, "Put this away; keep," he said, "Someday you might need this," he said, "There may be people looking for it," he said, "Do not let this fall into the wrong hands." Well, I took the package and I put it and wrapped it into cheesecloth and put some plastic around it and put it in a little metal box, and I went out and I buried it, put it where no one would find it, and I'd left it there after his execution. And he was killed on March 29th of '77. I'm going to estimate it's probably between a week and a half to 2 1/2 weeks right thereafter; I don't know the exact date. That I was leaving one of our local clubs where we had card games going and making book and everything and it all shortly past midnight, I guess 1:00 in the morning, as I walked out, as I was abducted and I was gassed and thrown into a vehicle and taken away, and I'd been interrogated for roughly, I don't know, maybe a day, a day and a half, whatever it was, 2 days even, I'm not even sure how long they had me at that point, because when I came out of it I was in pretty bad shape, but I had went through a very rough interrogation, and I knew it wasn't the Outfit that did it, because there was any doubt there, they would have killed me. So I figured it had to be a government agency; they had picked me up and they wanted the notes and the books and the diary of Charles Nicoletti. And I never gave it to them, and I was thrown from a car, left, my legs and hands still bound behind me. I was picked up at one of the suburban towns just west of Chicago, and the police recovered me, took me in, and then that family been notified and they wanted to take me to the hospital, and I didn't want to go to the hospital, and I went home. And I had my right-hand man come over at that point and stay like at the house with me, 'cuz I couldn't even get up and walk to the bathroom; he had to pick me up and carry me anywhere I went; that's how badly bad shape I was in. And at this point my wife had already thought that I was dead, so I had everybody else in town when I had been picked up and carried away that way. And as soon as I was able, I got up and made sure I wasn't being followed or watched by anyone; I went and I dug the package up. The package that was there, there was identification for Secret Service in that package; there was his personal diary that he had made a lot of notes on things that people that had been killed over the years, and there was also the map that Johnny Roselli and I had received that morning in Fort Worth, and the man that was supposed to be Jack Ruby when we had met over there, and he had gotten that package; that map was there, and I destroyed that at that time because I knew then that somebody was really effing wanting it.
But you kept Nicoletti's diary? Yes, I still got them. Can you tell me anything about its contents at this-- No, I won't get into that because we're getting about an organized crime, and I will not do anything to hurt anybody anywhere in that branch. This way, the only thing I'm seeing here is Charles Nicoletti is now dead, so it's Johnny Roselli and Sam Giancana; I can cause them no harm, but I will never ever put a man in prison; I would not give anyone up right now for my own freedom, and that's how I stand, and that is how I will live by it, and I will die by that standard. Jimmy, you lived around death and crime all your life; how do you feel about death? How do I feel about death? To me, it's just another new adventure. Don't get me wrong; I'm in no hurry to die. When the time comes though, I will accept it. And I've looked at death several times in my life. I have had people from the Outfit, the police officers, put guns to my head and threaten to kill me, and I've looked them in the eye, told them, "Shoot," and a couple of them I told them they didn't have the balls to shoot. And a couple of local cops, they came to my home one night and surrounded my house, took me out after working me over severely in the front yard, took me down to the railway tracks before they took me to the station house, took me to the rail tracks, backs, drove me out of the squad car, handcuffed, put a gun on my head and told me, "You piece of-- we're not taking you in, and we're going to kill you." And I told him, "You ain't got the balls to do it." Obviously they did, and they didn't; they took me on in. My wife was waiting at the precinct station; the lawyers were there, and I was released approximately 45 minutes later. Jimmy, is there anything else that you want to say from your heart about what has occurred in your life and particularly about November of '63; anything you want to add or you want to say personal? No, I've lived a good life; did a lot of things, more than probably any hundred men has. I've lived my life, and I can't look back and say, "Well, I would change this or I would change that," because I wouldn't. When people see this interview on television, what do you think people will think? Most of them, I don't think they'll believe me. How do we know it's true? There's no way to really prove it, except like I say, some of the people you have corroborated a lot of the things that I have told you; you've had people cooperated and everything I've told you so far, it's been there; it could be backed up and checked in the files from the CIA to the FBI. And I want to clarify one thing: I've given you nothing on organized crime, on anything they've ever done, and I will never do that, and I am not a member of organized crime. I have never been a member, but I've had a lot of close associates with organized crime.
Where were you born? Excuse me, cut, just let it roll. Okay. I was born January 1942, Alabama. You're a Southern boy. Southern boy, but I was taken from there at a very early age, and I grew up as a child on the streets of Chicago, and I love Chicago. I grew up in, in an all-Italian community. When we first moved in, I was the only kid on the block that couldn't speak Italian; everybody spoke Italian; hardly anybody spoke English. But I ran with them; we finally started communicating, and I would live in their homes with them, eating stuff that I had never even seen or heard of, and they would come to my house and eat things that they had never heard of, such things as black-eyed peas, cornbread, biscuits, redeye gravy, and things like that, you know what I mean? I love the pizza and I love the pasta, the meatballs and everything; I thought it was great. So it was something that we shared, and we all got along good. In the beginning we didn't get along, but after they beat me up a few times and found out that I couldn't be discouraged and I kept running back to them, we finally got to all be good friends, and we grew up together. And as a child, as a kid, I don't think I probably more than 10 or 11 years old, I remember on Saturday mornings I'd be sitting out in front of the deli, and one of the old-time gangsters used to come along, a great man, come up in this big old black Cadillac, and me and my little Italian friend, we'd be out there with, be shining the hubcaps on his car and wiping it down with our big towels, and then he'd come out; he usually throw us a $5 bill, and back then that was a lot of money, and we thought we were really somebody just because we knew those people. And as we grew up and we started getting into more trouble ourselves, is that how you more or less got involved in working with them? That's how more or less people knew that when I got caught, I didn't tell on nobody, and I had a good name for being stand-up around the time, even early as a kid growing up, as a teenager, while driving fast cars, riding motorcycles; I had my first car, I think I was just turning 14.
Did Charles Nicoletti know your background in warfare and in shooting? And yes, he did. Say it by starting with Charles-- Charles Nicoletti knew of my background; he watched me around town; his time passed by running around in my cars and stuff; he knew I'd been into the service; he knew I was familiar with weapons. And I came back from L.A.; I did 90 days in the hospital being evaluated, and the day I walked out of there, I was recruited by David Atlee Phillips; showed up that day as I walked out of the hospital. And my first assignment with the agency was after I had been shooting in L.A. and made my mark there; they thought that I could be of use to the agency at that point, and I was training some Cubans at that time; that's when I first got involved at Chanos Bay, the Bay of Pigs. And after all that blew up and went down and everybody got their face dirty, and the CIA got dirty in the Bay of Pigs and things, I was home for a while, and, uh, I started racing stock cars, and Mr. Nicoletti took a shine to me; he'd watch me race cars, and you know, I was up and coming, knew my involving weapons, but he wasn't concerned about my weapons in the beginning; he was only concerned about my driving ability. And I admired him, and to me, he walked on water; I got to tell you, I loved the man; he was one of the two greatest men I ever knew. What kind of guy was he? He was very well-spoken, well-mannered, quiet; he didn't swear; there was no profanity in the man; I probably only heard him swear maybe twice in my whole life, and that was at the FBI; they had us under surveillance at a couple different times. And, uh, he was very, he was very quiet, but he was also very deadly; it's like a rattlesnake; you might save without the rattles, and you never knew when he was going to strike. What kind of guy was Roselli? Roselli was, uh, he was flashy, did a lot of talking; he talked too much; they used to bother me, but he was one of those guys, he liked the flash; he flashed the money; he dressed nice. Mr. Nicoletti dressed nice also, but Mr. Nicoletti did not flash in the same style that Johnny Roselli did; there's much difference, just night and day; Johnny was loud, boisterous with everything. What kind of guy was Sam Giancana? Sam Giancana was a wonderful, lovable old man; there was quiet, anybody's grandfather; I mean, he was great, but boy, if you got him riled up, it's like with a little interior bulldogs getting a hold of you; he could just tear you up; he was good; I respected him a lot and everything else, but I didn't, Sam Giancana, I didn't work for him; he never gave me no orders, never told me to do anything; the only ones I took orders from was from two people; one was Charles Nicoletti, and like I see, the other man is still alive, and I want to identify him.
What kind of guy was David Atlee Phillips? David Atlee Phillips was a cool character, uh, very good-natured, uh, I guess I put him through a lot of paces because I couldn't understand his way of thinking in the beginning, but he used to tell me at that time that he could kill more people with a typewriter than I could kill with a machine gun running around trying to shoot everybody in the world. And I couldn't believe that; I couldn't understand it. And as time went by and me knowing David Phillips and starting to listen after he grabbed me, shook me around a couple times, he got me to pay attention to what he was saying, and I got to thinking, I realized the man was right; that there's more to things than running around with a gun; there's your psychological warfare and what you can do with a piece of paper, writing a newspaper article and confusing people in different countries, and even here; I mean, it's just, uh, people believe what they read, more or less, basically becomes out in the newspaper, and now that they hear it on TV, they really get into it. What kind of guy was Lee Harvey Oswald? Lee Harvey Oswald; everybody plays him up to be a nut job and everything else, but the man was very intelligent, had a very high IQ; he was very quiet, self-centered. Lee Harvey Oswald was not a boaster; he was not a party man; he didn't run around drinking or cavorting or none of those things; Lee Harvey Oswald led a very close and self-secluded life. And, uh, for people, a lot of times what they say they've said about him is totally untrue. What do you think his part was in Dealey Plaza that day, Jimmy? I think his plot was to, uh, plant evidence to mislead everybody, and I don't believe that Lee Harvey Oswald had any inkling that his life was in danger whatsoever. How many shots you think he fired? Lee Harvey Oswald never shot anybody; had to fire from that sixth floor, according to the trajectory. Was there anybody else up there with him, or do you know? As far as I know, there's nobody up there; I did not even know Lee Harvey Oswald was up there. And now when you're standing in a place like that, it's hard to tell where the noise is coming from; you've got echoes, you've got all these people, excuse me, your sound is being muffled, uh, but at this point I don't even know Lee Harvey Oswald is in the Texas School Book Depository building there; I have no even knowledge of that at that point; the last time I saw him was the day before. How do you know he didn't fire a shot? I just don't believe he would. Lee Harvey Oswald, as much as they proclaimed him to be an assassin, a killer, I don't believe he was even in the Marine Corps. He had a small scar above his left eye; he got hit with a rifle stock; he took a small scar and there, but, uh, Lee Harvey Oswald wasn't the type of person to run around and kill anybody. Did you ever notice if he was left-handed or right-handed? I never paid that much attention to it; he never fired a weapon around me, and we never sat down, we never wrote any letters together. When he drove, they say he couldn't drive, but Lee Harvey Oswald could drive; he didn't have a driver's license, maybe, but the man could drive; how he drove military trucks even. And let's face it, anybody working, anybody that has been working at one of the, uh, America's spy bases, especially like in Japan, like where he was at, there's no way this country is going to give them a visa to go anywhere even near Russia. And they photograph every man going in and out of the embassies in Mexico; all your embassies are watched; we watch them; they watch us, back then, yesterday, even today; they've never stopped watching each other; nobody runs into, uh, other embassies without being spotted right away; they're under constant surveillance. And if you've had a top-secret security clearance like Lee Harvey Oswald did, you just don't jump on a plane and fly off to a foreign country, especially to come to this country, unless somebody's engineered and set it up for you to go, to give this information. My Lee Harvey Oswald went to Russia; I'll never know. And personally, I never asked him. When I knew him, I had, they used to have an old saying: "Curiosity killed the cat." All my life I've never been curious; I've never asked people who they're dealing with or what they've done.
What do you feel about your place in history? I don't even want to be remembered in history. Why? For what? I'm nobody; who am I? I'm nobody special. I did a lot of work. The man who killed John F. Kennedy, not necessarily; I hit him in the front; he was shot in the back also; I was just one of the two men. But other figures have been killed; other political people in other countries have been killed; we've had gangsters killed in this country; I never chose the people to be killed; somebody else elected John F. Kennedy to be killed, whether it was a politician to be killed or whether it was a mob figure to be killed; I never chose the figures; somebody else said they were wrong, said they did wrong; just followed the orders. To me it was like taking out the garbage. That's a good line. Did you think, or have you ever thought about the fact that if you hadn't fired that shot that Oswald may still be alive? Or tipic-- or does it matter to you? That doesn't matter to me, but I, as far as that goes, if I hadn't fired the shot, Kennedy would have been killed anyway, because the last shot from Nicoletti caught him in the basically the left side of the skull in the back to push the head forward, so basically speaking, he would have been killed either way. But I had waited till the last possible second to fire for me before Jack Kennedy would become in the line of fire. If I don't take it at this point, I'm losing my last chance to fire, then I don't fire at all. And then if Nicoletti hadn't fired, and neither one of us fired, he might have lived
It. If you look back, and you investigate a lot of our history, you're going to find out a lot of our great causes were instigated by S itself, and we covered it up and made it look like we were being infringed upon, by our rights, on humanitarian purposes and freedom and democracy. And so, when you wave that banner—and all my life I believed in Mother Rala, in the American way of life and freedom and democracy—but things over the years, especially in the early '70s, started changing my way of thinking a lot on things. Because I've seen how people were being abused and mistreated and being assassinated, only because they knew something, not because they had their wrong politics or they were trying to endanger this country. Excuse me. And uh, religion has killed more people than all the wars we've ever had. People die every day in the name of religion. They started out that way in the beginning, and it's still that way; nothing has ever changed. CU everybody wants to say one person's religion is better than the other one. And the Irish fighting each other over there, the the Muslims, the Serbs, the Co Asians—you name it—there's always somebody wanting to kill somebody over their religion, over their God. And yet they say there's only one God, but I don't want to elaborate on the Bible or get into that; it only creates too many other things going, and at least one product to another product. But I try to stay away from religion; I try to stay away from history as much as possible. The only interest to me of history is if I was going into another country, or if I was going to do something, I wanted to read about them. I know about their culture; I want to know what their beliefs were. And I wasn't interested in the beginning of their time; I only want to know about the last 10, 15, 20 years of how their government had been run, and what their politics were. That's all I was interested in; or what religion was the strongest religion in that country, and how I could deal with that situation. Because I could learn more from knowing that country than from everybody telling me what everybody thought about it.
Jimmy, if—if today was it's November 22nd, 1963, and you were standing in Dealey Plaza right now, would you kill the president again? If I was under orders, or if I had been asked to assist, I would do just like I always did; I would follow orders. I never disobeyed an order. All right, pause. I think we may have it. I think we wrap. I can't think—as far as John F. Kennedy goes, the president—even though he was the president—today everybody tells us what a great man he was. But back then, and I was there, and I was seeing the things that were happening from the Cuban Missile Crisis and everything else, nobody really liked Kennedy back then that I could find. Everybody I talked to didn't like him. Like I say, I had my own personal reasons for the Bay of Pigs, but yet other people in the military, to the Secret Service, to the FBI—everybody—I mean, even the people around him, even his own staff—because he was, like I say, I won't get into all his bad habits, but boy, I know nobody liked the man. But yet today they tell us what a great man he was, but that's only history, and only because he was President of the United States. And nobody likes to admit that we made a mistake.
Did you, or any of your friends—Nic Roselli and one—know about Marilyn Monroe and John Kennedy? I don't know if they knew or not. I never asked. And again, it's—of course, there are other people involved, such as Marilyn Monroe and all those other stories that people have told. Uh, we sat around, and we went somewhere once. Mr. Nicoletti and I had done something that was history, that was yesterday. We never talked about it thereafter; it was never brought up again. But that's how he wanted it, and with his training and his beliefs, and like I say, I wanted to follow in his footsteps, because I believed in this man so much. I worshiped this man at that time. You talk about God; he was my guy back then. Like I say, he walked on water. Did Nicoletti work for the mob and the CIA too, on different occasions? Mr. Nicoletti was strictly organized crime. As far as the CIA goes, Johnny Roselli was the lion between the mob and the CIA, and Nicoletti had talked with him a few times. But this is where I got—Nicoletti killed, I believe, was in—when he started talking with the CIA or the Secret Service or whoever had talked to him, and he was being called back. Because I think they killed him the day before he was to appear at the uh, New Intelligence Hearing Committee, or whatever it was they had going, because somebody was afraid he was going to talk. And it broke my heart afterwards when somebody told me that Mr. Nicoletti had talked and that he was dirty, because I found it hard to believe. And I always felt if Mr. Nicoletti was dirty, and if he had been giving people up, I felt he would have given the diary up; he could have made a deal for his own life and for security and protection, and he didn't. He died, and we knew that he was in great trouble at that time. I didn't really understand the depth of it, because I did not believe that the man would give anybody up. Now, I don't know who killed Mr. Nicoletti. I don't know whether the organized crime family did it, or I don't know whether the government killed him. I have no knowledge of who killed him. Like I say, if I had known, believe me, I would have been hunting them down, and I would have died trying to get the people that got Mr. Nicoletti. So the US government will kill people. Definitely say it: the US government will kill people. That's stuff in it; there's no problems; there are no questions. He's not the only one they killed. But like I say, if they killed Nicoletti, I don't know for sure; I don't know who killed him. But if I did know, I would have put an all-out effort. And there's only one thing in my life I have ever feared, and that was failure to complete an operation that I had started on. And like I said, when I say I loved Mr. Nicoletti—not as a man and a woman—but I loved him as a protégé, as a father, as a brother, or whatever. But to me, like I said, he was my guy; he walked on water.
When you were walking out of Dealey Plaza, from behind that fence, did anybody try to stop you, or anybody ask you anything, or did anybody see your gun? Did anybody say anything to you as I was leaving Dealey Plaza? Nobody tried to stop me. There were two police officers within probably 20, 25 feet of me that had been stopped by somebody posing as Secret Service agents. I could hear part of the conversation. I did not look back over my shoulder; I did not run; I didn't stand around; I just carried a natural gait and proceeded to exit. That's just like a businessman walking away from lunch.
R, can you think of anything else you want to add, brother? The three organized crime figures implicated by James E. Files as co-conspirators in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy met with the following fates: On June 19th, 1975, Sam Giancana, who was to be transported to Washington, D.C. to testify before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence five days later, was shot to death in his home. In 1976, Johnny Roselli gave top-secret testimony before the committee. Shortly afterwards, and before he could be called in for a second appearance, he was brutally murdered in Miami. Roselli's murder prompted the formation of the U.S. House Select Committee on Assassinations. In 1977, the committee announced it would call in Charles Nicoletti. Nicoletti was murdered shortly after the committee's announcement, on March 29th, 1979. The House committee concluded that President Kennedy's death was probably the result of a conspiracy. James E. Files continues to serve the remainder of his 50-year sentence for shooting a policeman in Joliet, Illinois. As of this publication, he must serve a remaining 43 years. The FBI has officially dismissed File's confession as non-credible.