Report of the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy

Treatment of Oswald in Custody

The focal point of activity during Oswald’s detention was the third floor of the Police and Courts Building, which housed the Dallas Police Department’s main offices. Public elevators opened into a lobby at the midpoint of a 140-foot corridor running the length of the floor. At one end were the offices of Chief of Police Jesse E. Curry and his immediate subordinates, and at the other end was a small pressroom. Between them lay other police offices, including those of the major detective bureaus, with the homicide and robbery bureau—headed by Capt. J. Will Fritz—located between the pressroom and the lobby. Commission Exhibit No. 2175 illustrates this layout.

Chronology

Oswald arrived at the police department around 2 p.m. on Friday and was held in the third-floor offices of the homicide and robbery bureau until Captain Fritz returned from the Texas School Book Depository. About 15–20 minutes later he entered Fritz’ office for his first interrogation. Between approximately 4:05 p.m. and shortly after midnight he underwent two lineups, was searched (five cartridges were found), was arraigned before Justice of the Peace David L. Johnston for the murder of Patrolman Tippit at 7:10 p.m., provided fingerprints, palmprints, and a paraffin test, and at 11:26 p.m. was charged with the murder of President Kennedy. Around midnight he appeared briefly before the press in the basement, was placed in a maximum security cell on the fifth floor near an empty cell on each side and a guard, and was arraigned at about 1:30 a.m. on Saturday for the President’s murder. On Saturday he was questioned twice in Fritz’ office, received visits from his wife and mother and his brother Robert, tried unsuccessfully to reach attorney John Abt by phone, underwent another lineup, gave fingernail scrapings and hair samples, and spoke briefly with Dallas Bar Association president H. Louis Nichols, who offered him a lawyer but was declined. On Sunday morning he was signed out of jail at 9:30 a.m., taken to Fritz’ office for a final interrogation, departed for transfer at about 11:15 a.m., and was shot at 11:21 a.m.; he was pronounced dead at Parkland Hospital at 1:07 p.m.