This man in the photo is J.D. Tippit, a Dallas police officer, shot and killed by Lee Harvey Oswald. Most folks don’t know about him or how it happened, let alone the 18 witnesses who soon after perished under suspicious circumstances. More on that in my father’s column below.
Seems quite coincidental and serendipitous that a Kennedy article would materialize the same week another major development in the Kennedy assassination saga makes the news (odds?). Sirhan Sirhan, the Palestinian militant who executed Robert F. Kennedy for his spearheaded role to provide 50 fighter jets to Israel, has won the recommendation for parole on his 16th attempt. Incredibly, the Kennedy family’s opinions are mixed. We’ll see how that *goes.
Published November 8, 1988 in the Gainesville Times, Prof. Alex Taylor’s Crime Stories visits the enigma of President John F. Kennedy’s killing. More to follow …
TRANSCRIPT:
Swirling in the mystery of Kennedy
Ever hear of a man named Jacob Rubenstein? Not too many people have, but he may have held the clue to one of the greatest mysteries of the 20th century. On Jan. 3, 1967, Jacob died, supposedly of a blood clot in his lung. But before his life drained away, Jacob talked slowly to his brother, Earl Rubenstein, who taped the conversation.
Today, if you listen to the tape, you can hear Jacob state that he knew the man he killed three years and two months earlier would be in the corridor of the Dallas County Jail, but that he never went there specifically to kill him. He had gone there only after a bus forced him to make an illegal turn and suddenly he was inside the parking lot of the county jail. After that, everything was a blur until a swarm of officers had him on the floor of the jail.
Jacob’s death did not end the mystery, only adding fuel, for the more popular name was Jack Ruby, the man who killed Lee Harvey Oswald, President Kennedy’s assassin.
At 12:30 p.m. on Nov. 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was shot to death in Dallas, Texas, supposedly with a mail-order rifle belonging to an employee of the Texas School Book Depository, Lee Harvey Oswald. That Oswald shot Kennedy is a widely accepted fact. What has been so hotly contested is whether or not Oswald acted alone.
The Warren Commission, which investigated the assassination, concluded that Kennedy was probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy. Strangely, the death of Dallas policeman J. D. Tippit, also killed by Oswald, never received the attention of other witnesses or victims. In the three years following the Kennedy and Oswald murders, 18 key witnesses died. Two committed suicide, six were shot to death, three died in car accidents, one was killed by a karate chop to the neck, three suffered fatal heart attacks, and two died from natural causes and one had his throat slashed and bled to death.
The London Sunday Times hired an actuary to determine the mathematical probability of these events or strange deaths ever happening. He concluded the odds were 100,000 trillion to one that all of these witnesses to one specific event would die within that short time frame.
As a young police intelligence officer in 1963, I was on a security detail with the Kennedy entourage in Tampa just before he left for Dallas. Some day, I trust the world will know the real story behind his death.
Alex Taylor’s column on crime appears Tuesdays in The Times.
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About that
I suppose you’re all wondering what the Professor believes — a bottom line, conspiracies, official reports, and personal involvement considered (Don’t ask, TLDR and loosely connected!) —
“What does he think?”
Details and motives vary, but Det. Sgt. Alex Taylor (ret.) would sum it up simply as “It was the mob.”
No surprise; I’ll leave it there.
*Sirhan Sirhan, RFKJ’s assassin, was denied parole in 2021, to Gov. Newsom’s credit — reversing California Parole Board’s recommendation for his release. Sirhan was denied directly in 2023 by the CA Parole Board. Unlike a few in his family, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has been vigilant in is resolve for full transparency and justice, holding President Trump to his promise to release all classified documents in the case. By executive order, The National Archives made two substantial documents releases in April and June of 2025. Generally, no bombshells materialized from these documents, only additional details solidifying known narratives. Thing is, confirmation of full accounting is subjective at the very least. According to news reports, thousands of additional documents were later identified at FBI and CIA warehouses, despite claims of full submission. In light of this, conspiratorial claims will no-doubt persist.
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