If the assassination of John F. Kennedy was indeed part of a conspiracy, was anyone else involved in it? If anyone other than Oswald had a part in the conspiracy, it may have been Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby.

Two days after the assassination, Oswald was shot and killed. He was being transported from a press conference back to his jail cell when Jack Ruby suddenly "darted out" of the crowd and shot Oswald in the abdomen with a Colt .38 revolver. Oswald fell to the ground and quickly lost consciousness. He was pronounced dead 7 minutes later (President's Commission 17).

Although Ruby denied any connections to a conspiracy and claimed that he "killed Oswald in a temporary fit of depression and rage ((President's Commission 17)," he gave a much more interesting response while testifying before the Warren Commission in June of 1964. He frequently interrupted his testimony telling those who were listening that by simply speaking to them, he was putting his own life and his family's life in danger. Later on in his testimony he went on to say "Gentlemen, my life is in danger here. I want to tell the truth, and I can't tell it here. I can't tell it here. Gentlemen, unless you get me to Washington, you can't get a fair shake out of me (qtd. in Waggoner, 62)."

It has been speculated that Ruby may have been paid by someone to 'silence' Oswald, and he was afraid that he was next. But who could have done that, and who could have had the resources to do so? There are several possible answers to those two questions. One of them is the Mafia.

As author Sylvia Meagher said, "Muted in the (Warren) Report, but revealed in the Exhibits (the Warren Commission later on produced what a collection of testimonies called "Hearings and Exhibits"), are Ruby's ties with the underworld, gamblers and hoods, (and) narcotics traffic (qtd. in Waggoner 63)."

As a kid living in Chicago he ran errands for Al Capone, then went on to work for Paul Dorfman during the late 1930's. Ruby then moved to Dallas in the 1940's to open a Nightclub. At the same time the Chicago mafia decided to expand to Dallas (Waggoner 63).. It was later discovered that they planned on using his nightclub as a base for running some of their operations (Findings and Recommendations 149).

It should also be noted that before the assassination, he was in serious debt. He was $44,000 behind in income tax payments, and was also behind on payments for the building he rented for his nightclub. However, the day before the assassination Ruby suddenly appeared at a bank with pockets full of money and $3,000 was found on him and his car the day of his arrest.(Waggoner 65)?

If the Mafia ordered Jack Ruby to kill and Oswald to keep him quiet, then one would assume that Oswald was also hired by the Mafia to kill Kennedy. But why would the Mafia Kennedy dead? What did he ever do to them?

Well, for one thing, he and his brother, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, made stopping organized crime a major goal. The "Kennedy administration brought about the strongest effort against organized crime that had ever been coordinated by the Federal Government (Findings and Recommendations 161)." During the three years John F Kennedy was in office with his brother, Robert made entire sections of the Justice Department four times bigger and much more effective in gathering information and cracking down on time (Waggoner 16). From 1961 (the year of JFK's election) to 1963, the Justice Departments list of "known, active criminals" went from 40 to 2300, the number of racketeering charges increased 400%, and the numbers of "convictions obtained for offenses connected to organized crime" went from 63 to 288 (Waggoner 35).

The mafia certainly had the motivation to kill, and they did not hide it. This particular comment, spoken by Philadelphia thug Willie Weisberg and caught by FBI surveillance, is a typical comment heard when the subject of the Kennedy's comes up during a Mafia discussion:
"See what Kennedy done. With Kennedy, a guy should take a knife, like all them other guys, and stab and kill the [obscenity], where he is now. Somebody should kill the [obscenity], I mean it. This is true. Honest to God. It's about time to go. But I tell you something. I hope I git a week's notice, I'll kill. Right in the [obscenity] in the White House. Somebody's got to rid of this [obscenity] (Findings and Recommendations 165)."

Although the Kennedy's were on a crusade to erase every bit of organized crime from the United States, three men in particular were their prime targets.

The first was Jimmy Hoffa. Hoffa was the leader of the American International Brotherhood of Teamsters, a powerful labor union for truckers and warehouse workers. They are important to America's economy, and being the leader of a group of truckers and warehouse workers gave Hoffa an enormous amount of power (Waggoner 53).

He openly admitted to being friends with Mafia bosses Carlos Marcello and Santos Trafficante (Waggoner 53). As the Kennedy's uncovered more information about his connections with organized crime, they tried to prosecute and even went out of their way to embarrass him. This supposedly led to him having a "deep, personal hatred" towards the two (Waggoner 54).

The second of the Kennedy's three major targets was Carlos Marcello, an extremely powerful mafia boss who basically controlled activities in New Orleans, but was powerful enough to have his influence spread elsewhere. He was not a legal resident of the United States and no one had dared anger him by trying to have him deported. However, Robert Kennedy did not waste any time (Waggoner 55). RFK ordered him to be flown to Guatemala in 1961, but he came right back in 1963 (Waggoner 56). The deportation of Marcello only added insult to injury. Marcello had "an intense dislike for Robert Kennedy because of these actions, claiming that he had been illegally 'kidnaped' by Government agents during the deportation (Findings and Recommendations 169)."

Last but not least was Santos Trafficante, who was basically in the same position as Marcello. Trafficante was the "head of Miami's lucrative organized crime market." He also had a personal grudge against the Kennedy's because of the way they treated his friends, Marcello and Hoffa. According to Cuban exile Jose Aleman, Trafficante had said to him "Have you seen how his (President Kennedy's) brother is hitting Hoffa? . . . Mark my words, this man Kennedy is in trouble, and he will get what is coming to him (Waggoner 60)."

The Federal Government learned in September of 1962 that Jimmy Hoffa and Teamster lieutenant Edward Partin had discussed the possibility of killing Robert Kennedy. Hoffa even had even come up with a rough plan of how the event would plan out. RFK would be shot while riding in a convertible in the South by a lone gunman "equipped with a rifle with a telescopic sight (Findings and Recommendations 176)." Since both JFK and RFK were already unpopular in the South, that would only make it easier for Hoffa to slip through the cracks while someone else got the blame.

Carlos Marcello also had dreams of ending the "Kennedy problem." However, his target was John Kennedy, not Robert. Although RFK was the most troublesome of the two brothers, Marcello came to the conclusion that killing JFK would be the most beneficial plan. He spoke of how "the dog will keep biting you if you only cut off it's tail," but by removing the dog's head, "the entire dog would die (Waggoner 58)." In other words, killing the president's brother would only bring a furious John Kennedy down on them. But by killing the president, Robert Kennedy would be much less powerful than before. After JFK's assassination, Marcello was heard saying "Bobby Kennedy's just another lawyer now (qtd. Waggoner 58)."

If the Mafia did order the assassination of the President, why would they choose Oswald as their man? It probably had to do with the Mafia's connections to Oswald's family. Charles Murret surved as a "surrogate father" throughout much of Oswald's childhood, and was during a part of his life associated with several men affilated with Marcello and his crime organzition. Oswald's mother, Marguerite Oswald, was "acquainted with several men associated with lieutenants in the Marcello organization." It was also discovered that the man who had arranged bail for Oswald following his arrest in August 1963 for a minor street disturbance was had ties with the Marcello organization (Findigns and Recommendations, 170).

Despite what various mafia members have said and what has been uncovered about their hatred of the Kennedy brothers, there is still no hard evidence that shows they had a part in the killing of John Kennedy. "That organized crime had the motive, opportunity and means to kill the President cannot be questioned. Whether it did so is another matter (Findings and Recommendations 161)."

Another group that some speculate may have played a part in a conspiracy is the Secret Service. The Secret Service is the government agency charged with protecting the president, and President Kennedy's assassination "was the first and only such crime since the Secret Service was assigned responsibility for full-time protection of the President in 1901, as a result of the assassination of William McKinley (Findings and Recommendations 227)."

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