No More Silence: An Oral History of the Assassination of President Kennedy

Rio S. Pierce

RIO SAM PIERCE Lieutenant, Patrol Division Dallas Police Department "I didn't see Jack Ruby at the top ofthe ramp. I believe that if he had been standing there that I would have recognized him because I knew him. In fact, I'd probably known Jack Ruby eight or ten years at that time... " Born in Turkey, Texas, and raised in Littlefield, Rio Pierce entered the United States Marine Corps during the Second World War and served with distinction in the South Pacific. He joined the Dallas Police Department in 1946 and gained the reputation of his colleagues as being a tough but fair policeman. Most of my career was spent in the Patrol Division with some of it being in Special Operations, Tactical Section. I was off duty the day of the assassination and spent the day here at the farm in Ennis. That Sunday, the 24th, since I was working days, I came in at about 7:00 A.M. My orders were to secure the basement for the transfer of Oswald which meant to put men at all entrances and exits and not to allow anybody except authorized personnel in there. By authorized personnel, to me that meant anybody with a press card because the basement was full of people. I would estimate there were as many as a hundred people down there. It was the most I'd ever seen in the basement at one time. The layout of the basement was such that you had a ramp leading down into the basement coming off Main Street and an RIO SAM PIERCE, POLICE LIEUTENANT 437 exit ramp leading out onto Commerce. The ramps were fairly steep and narrow with just enough room for a car and maybe a person to walk beside a car. You could drive straight through by going down the ramp from Main and driving up the ramp onto Commerce. Then there was an entrance in to the basement of City Hall that went to the jail office. There was a hallway, then the jail office was just off that wall. When I arrived that morning, of course, we made our detail first. In other words, we made our assignments. I'm rather fuzzy on what time we went to the basement, but there were people down there at the time. There weren't that many at first, but eventually, they began coming from inside City Hall out into the basement because City Hall was full of reporters from all over the nation. In my opinion, there should have been more control. I'm not for suppressing news, but I think it needs to be done in an orderly manner so that business can be carried on without being interrupted by reporters. They were all over the building! I was aware that they posed a potential problem! We could have cleared them out, but if they had the sanction of the chief, which they did, then they're going to be there. And I'm sure the chief had orders from the city councilor whoever as to how to handle the situation. These people in the basement all had press cards or were authorized to be there. They were either officers or the press, or at least they were supposed to be. I didn't talk to any of the press. It was my understanding that they had all been told what time that Oswald would be transferred. I believe ten o'clock in the morning was the time mentioned by Chief Curry. Then they began congregating in the basement. The ramp was full of people with as many as you could cram in there, all of them having their cameras and all of their equipment. They were just outside the entrance into City Hall. I thought the basement itself was secure, but I was a little uneasy about the people that were coming out from City Hall because I did not have control of what was in City Hall. It was just that basement area that I had control of. When I looked at the people out on Commerce Street, apparently everybody knew which way the prisoner was going to go. There were lots of people out there! There were a lot on Main Street, too, but most of them 438 NO MORE SILENCE seemed to know that the exit was going to be on Commerce Street because that was...