Ex-officer fears ‘setup' Ruby link attributed to alleged ‘harassment' by Earl Golz, Dallas Morning News

              VOLUME III NUMBER 9 APRIL 22, 1979
Ex-officer fears 'setup'
Ruby link altrihuled to a//r<rr(/ *harassin*'iit^ March 25.1974
By EARL GOLZ
Former Dallas police officer Patrick T Dean fears a
"setup" by the House Assassinations Committee to
blame him for letting Jack Ruby, j friend of Deans,
into the city hall basement when Ruby shoi Lee Har­vey
Oswald.
Dean, in charge of security in the basement.
claims he was so "harassed" by committee investiga­tors
before the committee's term expired lust Decem­ber
that he lost 20 pounds and was hospitahzed with u
"nerve condition "
"Ami . don't think I've heard the last (if it," the
Tyler risident said "1 think I'll be hearing from
another ,.i;ency of the federal government (the U.S.
Departn < i T of Justice)."
The :;,riittee didn't address itself to the Ruby-
Osv^ .1 in a [ireliminary report in December but
IS t',\| • . ^ 1.U du so in a final summary ol findings at
the fhu ci! April.
The committee's report staled organized crime
figures may have been involved in a conspiracy to
assassinate President John F. Kennedy in 1963. Ruby's
organized crime ties have been well documented by
private researchers in the past six years, and Dean
freely admits he was a good friend of Ruby's before
and after Oswald's shooting.
Dean also is worried committee investigators may
try to incriminate him because he was a friend of Joe
Civello, Dallas Mafia figure who died several years
ago.
CrVELLO. WHO WAS acquainted with Ruby,
invited Dean to dinner in Dallas shortly after Civello
was arrested with other Mafia leaders at the famous
Apalachin, N.Y., meeting in 1957.
Civello reported back the developments at Apala­chin
to Carlos Marcello, a Mafia chieftain in New
Orleans who is a central figure in the committee's
investigation of the assassination.
Committee investigators learned Dean took a
foiygraph examination in 1964 in connection with his
role in the city hall basement and his relationship
with Ruby.
They say Dean has acknowledged he "fiJiled" the
lie test but they cannot find any of the written results
of the examination by police polygraph operator Paul
L. Bentley.
Dean told The News he wrote all 16 questions to be
asked of him — including the last one, which slated:
"Are you deliberately withholding any information
regarding the Ruby-Oswald incidentl'"
"That particular day I was nervous and hyperten
sive," Dean said, "so I flunked it Or rather it was
inconclusive."
Bentley. who retired from the police force U
years ago. said "there definitely were written results'
of Dean's test on file witn tne police in 1964. even il
they were inconclusive. Committee investigators
asked him several months ago about the results, he
said, "and I just don't recall exactly how Dean's came
out."
DEAN, 46, WAS a police sergeant until 1973, when
he retired on a disability pension alter incurring inju­ries
in an auto accident. He was in a coma for 21 days
and suffered some brain damage but appears to have
recovered fully.
Dr. William L. Hall of Dallas recommended fur­ther
hospitalization Jan. 16, noting Dean has had "a
nervous irritability and insomnia and inability to per­form
productive labor of any sort" since the assa.ssmu-tion.
The physician said Dean has "a chronic anxiety
state and tension."
Dean refused to answer interrogatories Irom the
committee last November, saying committee members
would have to subpoena him to Washington. He said
Melvin Belli, the lead attorney for Ruby during his
murder trial, agreed to represent him if he were
subpoenaed.
A subpoena never arrived and the committee
went out of business in December The panel's prelim­inary
report stated a probable conspiracy resulted in
the assassination and recommended the investigation
be continued by the justice department
When Dean refused to answer any of the 53 ques­tions
in the commillees niu-rrDgatorRs he .said com­mittee
investigator ,-\lbert Maxwell tokl liim "1 leel
we should inform you that we ha\e 20(1 pages ol
declassified material, all of which concerns you "
"1 took It as a tlireat " Dean said "Tliuls the last I
heard from them "
G. Robert Blakey. chief counsel lur the committee,
said last week he regrets that "Mr. Dean feels this
way. It is our intention to treat every v^itiiess fairly "
THE INTERROGATORIES, Dean believes, are accu
satory. They dwell on such issues as the reassignment
of policemen from the city hall basement to traffic
patrols outside within an hour before Oswald was to
be transferred from the city jail to the county jail.
One question was: "Were any men originally
assigned to security within the basement reassigned
to outside traffic duties'" Another asked "If so, were
you concerned, as an officer involved with the secur­ity
of the basement, that basement security would be
affected?"
Dean said he never was told by his superiors that
an unidentified man had called FBI offices early on
the morning Oswald was to be transferred to the
county jail and said he would be killed.
Dean was the initial source for Ruby's story that