A Dark Day In Dallas

Vengeance

Oswald vigorously denied any involvement in the killings of either JD Tippit or the President. However, his palm print was found underneath the furniture on the Carcano, and the eyewitnesses tying him to the Tippit shooting were compelling. Two days after the murders, Oswald was being transferred from the Dallas Police headquarters to the County jail under heavy police escort.

Local nightclub owner and mobster Jack Ruby was a frequent visitor to police HQ. His presence aroused little suspicion. It has actually been postulated that Ruby might have been welcome for having habitually supplied loose women to some of the cops.

Without warning, Ruby lunged forward, shoved his Colt Cobra .38-caliber pocket revolver into Oswald’s belly and fired. That single round perforated Oswald’s stomach, spleen, aorta, inferior vena cava, kidney, liver and diaphragm. It ultimately stopped on the far side against his 11th rib. Oswald bled out in short order.

Ruby paid $62.50 for the Colt Cobra on January 19th, 1960 at Ray’s Sporting Goods in Dallas. A cop buddy named Joe Cody had recommended he get the gun given the large amounts of cash he handled in the course of running his strip joint, the Carousel Club.
Cody actually bought the gun for his mobster buddy as a straw purchaser because cops did not have to pay tax on firearms purchases. Cody and Ruby subsequently exchanged both the money and the gun outside the shop. Having the cop buy the piece saved Ruby $18.

Ruby was immediately arrested. He claimed he spontaneously shot Oswald to “save Mrs. Kennedy the discomfiture of coming back to trial.” Ruby subsequently developed disseminated cancer while in prison and died in 1967 at age 55. His actions and subsequent death have provided fodder for countless conspiracy theories.

Ruby’s snub-nosed Cobra was stock save for its curious aluminum hammer shroud. The shroud still allowed the hammer to be manually cocked but did make the gun much less likely to snag on loose clothing. There followed a 24-year legal fight over ownership of the weapon. In 1991 the gun was sold at auction for $220,000. The new owner sold fired bullets out of it for $1,000 apiece to fund his favorite charities. The pistol was confiscated by Capitol Hill police after being carried in D.C. illegally but was finally returned after yet another long legal battle. The owner subsequently sold it yet again, but I was unable to locate a reliable price.