I once tried to identify this motorcycle officer and through a process of elimination, came up with Bobby Joe Dale.
Report of an FBI interview with Jack Hardee December 26, 1963 at the Mobile Co. jail, Mobile AL. Hardee was incarcerated there in "federal custody" Hardee's wife also worked for Jack Ruby.
(23H373)
HARDEE also stated that the police officer whom LEE HARVEY OSWALD allegedly killed after he allegedly assassinated the President was a frequent visitor to Ruby's night club, along with another officer who was a motorcycle patrol in the Oaklawn section of Dallas. HARDEE stated from his observation there appeared to be a very close relationship between these three individuals.
I was curious if the motorcycle officer Harry Olsen and Jack Hardee mention could be the same person.
Ian Griggs in the Lancer Forum 1/30/03:
"DPD motorcycle officer Bobby Joe Dale (who rode in the motorcade) lived at 3615 Theatre Lane at this time. This was located in the Oak Lawn district of Dallas, close to the Lemmon Avenue/Turtle Creek Boulevard intersection. This is about three miles north of Dealey Plaza. Now it gets interesting. During the period leading up to 22nd November, Harry Olsen was also living there, I believe as Dale's lodger (when he wasn't spending his nights at Kathy Kay's apartment!)."
From Harry Olsen's testimony:
Mr SPECTER. Then what time did you go to Kay's house?
Mr OLSEN. When I got--when the motorcycle officer came and relieved me.
Mr SPECTER. About what time was that?
Mr OLSEN. Oh, 8; about 8.
I was curious to see if I could find what time Dale got off duty, so I started checking around.
...
Steve Thomas
<{POST_SNAPBACK}>
QUOTE:
Robin,
>And what is with the meeting at the garage with Ruby after the assassination. ?
Try to reconcile the accounts of Kathy Kay, Harry Olsen and Jack Ruby and determine how much time they spent in that car that evening.
It will make you dizzy.
...
So, Olsen was asked by the other officer to gaurd the house in his place because he had to ride in the motorcade. He would then come back and take over minding the house once the motorcade was over and he finished work.
Then when he arrives at the house, Olsen leaves him to it, and walks 4-blocks to Kays house with his leg in a plaster to pick up his car which he left there, but when asked why he didn't just drive it to the house he was gaurding he couldn't remember why, or the name of the cop who he had just been talking to at the house.
Clear as mud.
A couple of observations and a question or two:
Harry Olsen is lying about something that would by all accounts seem innocuous. The accounts of the meeting in the garage are difficult to reconcile because they are a "tangled web." On December 8, 1963, Olsen was interviewed by an FBI agent at Baylor Hospital after he'd been in a car crash and broke some ribs. He stated that Jack Ruby had been "no more upset than the average guy" when they'd met over the November 22-24 weekend. Five months later, Jack was "distraught."
Said meeting took place with four people: Olsen, "Kathy" Kay Coleman, Ruby and "Johnny" (or as he called him in his testimony before the HSCA, "one-armed Johnny"), the attendant whose last name Harry didn't know. The FBI found John P. Simpson in August 1964 and interviewed him. He said that while he knew all three of the others by sight, he did not know any of them well enough to be listening to or taking part in any conversation with them, and denied having done so when Harry said he did.
Simpson did, however, remember the event, and otherwise described it as did Olsen ... except that Olsen's version had Ruby approaching them, while Simpson's told of Kay calling out to Jack to get his attention.
Why do you suppose Harry Olsen changed his story, and included someone who wasn't a part of the conversation?
As to the "estate," in 1977, Harry changed the "elderly aunt" of another DPD officer to a "deceased person," and the motorcycle officer who asked him to fill in ("hired" him?) to an attorney. The "estate" was not "a large house," but rather a "dilapidated little place" that formed the "estate" of the deceased. He forgot, apparently, that a "friend" of the home's owner called to tell the "deceased" person that Kennedy had been shot, and that he had answered the phone.
The "estate" was "a couple of blocks from Stemmons Freeway" (Interstate 35E; actually named R.L. Thornton Expressway at that location) on 8th. Note that JD Tippit was asked where he was located ("Kiest and Bonnie View") before being told to move into central Oak Cliff. He was next asked his location, and he said he was at "Lancaster and 8th" eight minutes later.
The most direct route from Kiest and Bonnie View is north on Bonnie View to where it rounds a bend and becomes the eastern terminus of 8th, then continues across I-35 to Lancaster, about 3 blocks later (there is a 7-11 at that corner, where Kay bought Harry some lunch stuff). At the speed limit of 40 mph today, it takes 8-9 minutes to travel from Kiest at Bonnie View to 8th at Lancaster (depending upon how you hit the lights), suggesting that that's the way Tippit got there. Moreover, had he gone any other way, there would have been no reasonable route to 8th that he would've taken: it was just plain "off the beaten path" from any other direction.
What was Harry really doing at the "estate?"
I am curious about the "process of elimination" used to identify BJ Dale; can you expound on that some? Also note that, according to Polk's City Directory for 1963, Dale (occ: police off.) is listed at another address completely, and is NOT shown as residing at Theater St. I don't know where Lancer got that information, but will attempt to find out. I also have Dale's phone number and will endeavor to ask him at some point down the road.
There is more to Harry Olsen than meets the eye. One wonders why nobody less than the Chief of Police fired him: that seems such a minor personnel action - Olsen wasn't even a Sergeant - for the Chief himself to involve himself in. Yet, only five months after the fact, Harry "forgot" "what else was said" besides his sick leave being over-extended (NOT a valid reason for dismissal, by the way).
More later, and will add cites if I've got a moment ....
