James DiEugenio's 1999 Essay on the Rose Cheramie Story

[W. Niederhut]

       I thought that I had read about the Rose Cheramie story somewhere, and now I realize that it was in DiEugenio's book, The Assassinations, which was one of the first JFKA books I read several years ago.

Rose Cheramie: How She Predicted the JFK Assassination (kennedysandking.com)

 

 

Monday, 16 August 1999 20:05

Rose Cheramie: How She Predicted the JFK Assassination

Written by James DiEugenio

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Jim DiEugenio reports on his research into the Rose Cheramie story.

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From the July-August 1999 issue (Vol. 6 No. 5) of Probe

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On November 20, 1963, Lt. Francis Fruge of the Louisiana State Police received a phone call from Moosa Memorial Hospital in Eunice. A Mrs. Louise Guillory, the hospital administrator told him that there was an accident victim in the emergency ward. Guillory knew that Fruge worked the narcotics detail and she felt that the woman was under the influence of drugs.

Fruge immediately left for the hospital. When he got there he encountered a middle-aged white female sitting down in the waiting room outside emergency. There were no serious injuries; only bruises and abrasions. She was only partly coherent. But Moosa was a private hospital and since the woman seemed bereft of funds, Guillory had called Fruge to see what he could do to help. The woman identified herself to Fruge as Rose Cheramie.

Fruge had no choice at the time except to place Cheramie in the Eunice City Jail. He then went out to attend the Eunice Police Department's Annual Ball. About an hour later a police officer came over to the function and told Fruge that Cheramie was undergoing withdrawal symptoms. Fruge came back and, after recognizing the condition, called a local doctor, Dr. Derouin, from the coroner's office. Derouin administered a sedative via syringe to calm her down. The doctor then suggested that she be removed from the jail and taken to the state facility in Jackson. After Fruge agreed, Derouin called the facility at about midnight on the 20th and made arrangements for her delivery there. Afterwards, Fruge called Charity Hospital in Lafayette and ordered an ambulance for the transport to the hospital.

Fruge accompanied Cheramie to the hospital. And, according to his House Select Committee deposition, it was at this point that Rose began to relate her fascinating and astonishing tale. Calmed by the sedative, and according to Fruge, quite lucid, she began to respond to some routine questions with some quite unusual answers. She told him that she was en route from Florida to Dallas with two men who looked Cuban or Italian. The men told her that they were going to kill the president in Dallas in just a few days. Cheramie herself was not part of the plot but apparently the men were also part of a large dope ring with Rose since Cheramie's function was as a courier of funds for heroin which was to be dropped off to her by a seaman coming into the port of Galveston. She was to pick up the money for the drugs from a man who was holding her child. It seemed a quite intricate dope ring since she was then to transport the heroin to Mexico. The two men were supposed to accompany her to Mexico but the whole transaction got short-circuited on Highway 190 near Eunice. In the confines of a seedy bar called the Silver Slipper Lounge, Cheramie's two friends were met by a third party. Rose left with the two men she came with. But a short distance away from the bar, an argument apparently ensued. And although some have written that she was thrown out of the vehicle and hit by an oncoming car, according to Fruge, Rose said that the argument took place inside the Silver Slipper, and that the two men and the manager, Mac Manual, threw her out. While hitchhiking on the 190, she was hit by a car driven by one Frank Odom. It was Odom who then delivered her to Moosa. As Fruge so memorably recalled to Jonathan Blackmer of the HSCA, Cheramie summed up her itinerary in Dallas in the following manner: "She said she was going to, number one, pick up some money, pick up her baby, and to kill Kennedy." (p. 9 of Fruge's 4/18/78 deposition)

At the hospital, Cheramie again predicted the assassination. On November 22nd, several nurses were watching television with Cheramie. According to these witnesses, "…during the telecast moments before Kennedy was shot Rose Cheramie stated to them, ‘This is when it is going to happen' and at that moment Kennedy was assassinated. The nurses, in turn, told others of Cheramie's prognostication." (Memo of Frank Meloche to Louis Ivon, 5/22/67. Although the Dallas motorcade was not broadcast live on the major networks, the nurses were likely referring to the spot reports that circulated through local channels in the vicinity of the trip. Of course, the assassination itself was reported on by network television almost immediately after it happened.) Further, according to a psychiatrist there, Dr. Victor Weiss, Rose "…told him that she knew both Ruby and Oswald and had seen them sitting together on occasions at Ruby's club." (Ibid., 3/13/67) In fact, Fruge later confirmed the fact that she had worked as a stripper for Ruby. (Louisiana State Police report of 4/4/67.)

Fruge had discounted Cheramie's earlier comments to him as drug-induced delusions. Or, as he said to Blackmer, "When she came out with the Kennedy business, I just said, wait a minute, wait a minute, something wrong here somewhere." (Fruge, HSCA deposition, p. 9) He further described her in this manner:

Now, bear in mind that she talked: she'd talk for awhile, looks like the shots would have effect on her again and she'd go in, you know, she'd just get numb, and after awhile she'd just start talking again. (Ibid.)

But apparently, at the time of the assassination Cheramie appeared fine. The word spread throughout the hospital that she had predicted Kennedy's murder in advance. Dr. Wayne Owen, who had been interning from LSU at the time, later told the Madison Capital Times that he and other interns were told of the plot in advance of the assassination. Amazingly, Cheramie even predicted the role of her former boss Jack Ruby because Owen was quoted as saying that one of the interns was told "…that one of the men involved in the plot was a man named Jack Rubinstein." (2/11/68) Owen said that they shrugged it off at the time. But when they learned that Rubinstein was Ruby they grew quite concerned. "We were all assured that something would be done about it by the FBI or someone. Yet we never heard anything." (Ibid.) In fact, Cheramie's association with Ruby was also revealed to Dr. Weiss. For in an interview with him after the assassination, Rose revealed that she had worked as a drug courier for Jack Ruby. (Memo of Frank Meloche to Jim Garrison, 2/23/67) In the same memo, there is further elaboration on this important point:

I believe she also mentioned that she worked in the night club for Ruby and that she was forced to go to Florida with another man whom she did not name to pick up a shipment of dope to take back to Dallas, that she didn't want to do this thing but she had a young child and that they would hurt her child if she didn't.

These comments are, of course, very revealing about Ruby's role in both an intricate drug smuggling scheme and, at the least, his probable acquaintance with men who either had knowledge of, or were actually involved in, the assassination. This is a major point in this story which we will return to later.

Although Fruge had discounted the Cheramie story on November 20th, the events of the 22nd made him a believer. Right after JFK's murder, Fruge "…called that hospital up in Jackson and told them by no way in the world to turn her loose until I could get my hands on her." (Fruge's HSCA deposition, p. 12.) So on November 25th, Fruge journeyed up to Jackson again to talk to Cheramie. This time he conducted a much more in-depth interview. Fruge found out that Cheramie had been traveling with the two men from Miami. He also found that the men seemed to be a part of the conspiracy rather than to be just aware of it. After the assassination, they were supposed to stop by a home in Dallas to pick up both around eight thousand dollars plus Rose's baby. From there Cheramie was supposed to check into the Rice Hotel in Houston under an assumed name. Houston is in close proximity to Galveston, the town from which the drugs were coming in from. From Houston, once the transaction was completed, the trio were headed for Mexico.

How reliable a witness was Cheramie? Extermely. Fruge decided to have the drug deal aspect of her story checked out by the state troopers and U. S. Customs. The officers confirmed the name of the seaman on board the correct ship coming into Galveston. The Customs people checked the Rice Hotel and the reservations had been made for her under an assumed name. The contact who had the money and her baby was checked and his name showed that he was an underworld, suspected narcotics dealer. Fruge checked Cheramie's baggage and found that one box had baby clothes and shoes inside.

Fruge flew Cheramie from Louisiana to Houston on Tuesday, the 26th. In the back seat of the small Sesna 180, a newspaper was lying between them. One of the headlines read to the effect that "investigators or something had not been able to establish a relationship between Jack Ruby and Lee Harvey Oswald." (Fruge's HSCA deposition p. 19) When Cheramie read this headline, she started to giggle. She then added, "Them two queer sons-of-a-bitches. They've been shacking up for years." (Ibid.) She added that she knew this to be true from her experience of working for Ruby. Fruge then had his superior call up Captain Will Fritz of the Dallas Police to relay what an important witness Cheramie could be in his investigation. Fruge related what followed next:

Colonel Morgan called Captain Fritz up from Dallas and told him what we had, the information that we had, that we had a person that had given us this information. And of course there again it was an old friend, and there was a little conversation. But anyway, when Colonel Morgan hung up, he turned around and told us they don't want her. They're not interested.

Fruge then asked Cheramie if she wished to try telling her tale to the FBI. She declined. She did not wish to involve herself further. With this, the Cheramie investigation was now halted. Rose was released and Fruge went back to Louisiana. So, just four days after the assassination, with an extremely and provably credible witness alive, with her potentially explosive testimony able to be checked out, the Cheramie testimony was now escorted out to pasture. Eyewitness testimony that Ruby knew Oswald, that Ruby was somehow involved in an international drug circle, that two Latins were aware of and perhaps involved in a plot to kill Kennedy, and that Ruby probably knew the men; this incredible lead – ;the type investigators pine for – ;was being shunted aside by Fritz. It would stay offstage until Jim Garrison began to poke into the Kennedy case years later.

...

The rest of this article can be found in The Assassinations, edited by Jim DiEugenio and Lisa Pease.

[Bill Brown]

 

Among conspiracy theorists, the story has been considered quite credible since 1979, when an account by investigator Patricia Orr was published by the House Select Committee reviewing the JFK assassination (HSCA). This account was based primarily on the HSCA interviews of Francis Frugé and Victor Weiss, a doctor at the Jackson hospital.

The problem is that in accounts given by Frugé and Weiss to the New Orleans District Attorney's Office over a decade earlier, in 1967, there is no indication that Cherami had made any statements about the assassination prior to the time it occurred.

On the contrary, several 1967 accounts by Frugé state only that, following Cherami's November 26 release from the Jackson hospital, Cherami informed Frugé that she had worked for Ruby as a stripper, that Ruby and Oswald had been in Ruby's club together, and that the two were "good friends" and "bed partners.

 

https://www.jfk-online.com/jfk100cher.html

 

[W. Niederhut]

1 hour ago, Bill Brown said:

 

Among conspiracy theorists, the story has been considered quite credible since 1979, when an account by investigator Patricia Orr was published by the House Select Committee reviewing the JFK assassination (HSCA). This account was based primarily on the HSCA interviews of Francis Frugé and Victor Weiss, a doctor at the Jackson hospital.

The problem is that in accounts given by Frugé and Weiss to the New Orleans District Attorney's Office over a decade earlier, in 1967, there is no indication that Cherami had made any statements about the assassination prior to the time it occurred.

On the contrary, several 1967 accounts by Frugé state only that, following Cherami's November 26 release from the Jackson hospital, Cherami informed Frugé that she had worked for Ruby as a stripper, that Ruby and Oswald had been in Ruby's club together, and that the two were "good friends" and "bed partners.

 

https://www.jfk-online.com/jfk100cher.html

 

I recall reading some things on David Reitzes' website several years ago, when I first started to delve into the JFK assassination research.

It didn't take long to realize that he was a fraud-- a purveyor of JFKA disinformation, like John McAdams.

[Bill Brown]

6 hours ago, W. Niederhut said:

I recall reading some things on David Reitzes' website several years ago, when I first started to delve into the JFK assassination research.

It didn't take long to realize that he was a fraud-- a purveyor of JFKA disinformation, like John McAdams.

 

Nonsense.

Why not go to the website, pick out a couple of Reitzes' claims and show them to be disinformation and/or fraudulent?  But you won't.

https://www.jfk-online.com/jfk100menu.html

 

[W. Niederhut]

15 minutes ago, Bill Brown said:

 

Nonsense.

Why not go to the website, pick out a couple of Reitzes' claims and show them to be disinformation and/or fraudulent?  But you won't.

https://www.jfk-online.com/jfk100menu.html

 

Be careful what you ask for, Bill... 🤡

David Reitzes Meets Michael Shermer: Send In the Clowns (kennedysandking.com)

 

[Ron Bulman]

 

[Ron Bulman]

1 hour ago, Ron Bulman said:

 

I wish the forum's resident film expert was looking in.  I remembered the song but not what film this is from and it's not identified in the youtube link. 

[Joe Bauer]

7 hours ago, W. Niederhut said:

Be careful what you ask for, Bill... 🤡

David Reitzes Meets Michael Shermer: Send In the Clowns (kennedysandking.com)

 

BINGO!  WN.

[W. Niederhut]

5 hours ago, Joe Bauer said:

BINGO!  WN.

Joe,

     When I first discovered the Education Forum, in about 2015 or 2016, I realized that it was a rare, special place on the internet where researchers like John Simkin, James DiEugenio, Joseph McBride, Larry Hancock, Vince Palamara, and others were writing about the true history of the JFK assassination.

      It was a striking contrast to the numerous disinformation sites on the internet that I had perused-- e.g., John McAdams, David Reitzes, and the usual mainstream media Lone Nut narratives.  The disinformation sites always appeared at the top of my JFKA Google searches in those days.

      Of course, it took a while for me to gradually distinguish the writings of the accurate, honest historians from the CIA propagandists.

      What concerns me now is that we seem to have a cadre of Education Forum members promoting disinformation.

      Whether they are being funded or doing this for free, based on ignorance and lack of discernment, is unclear to me.

      When the question of government-funded disinformation arises, there is always a wild hue-and-cry of moral indignation from the guys who promote disinformation here-- accompanied by outrage that a "moderator" would dare to raise the question!

      So, I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they are simply ignorant.

      

Edited Saturday at 04:25 PM by W. Niederhut

[Bill Brown]

On 10/4/2024 at 11:25 PM, W. Niederhut said:

Be careful what you ask for, Bill... 🤡

David Reitzes Meets Michael Shermer: Send In the Clowns (kennedysandking.com)

 

 

No.

That's only DiEugenio propaganda.

I'm asking you for an example of something Reitzes got wrong on that website.  Posting tripe from DiEugenio doesn't cut it.  Care to use your own words?

Your above post reminds of me of when the Chicago Tribune mistakenly claimed that Dewey defeated Truman.

 

Edited Monday at 11:33 PM by Bill Brown

[Ron Bulman]

8 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

Posting tripe from DiEugenio doesn't cut it.

Calling another members work tripe could be taken as a direct insult of the member.

[Robert Morrow]

On 10/5/2024 at 11:22 AM, W. Niederhut said:

Joe,

     When I first discovered the Education Forum, in about 2015 or 2016, I realized that it was a rare, special place on the internet where researchers like John Simkin, James DiEugenio, Joseph McBride, Larry Hancock, Vince Palamara, and others were writing about the true history of the JFK assassination.

      It was a striking contrast to the numerous disinformation sites on the internet that I had perused-- e.g., John McAdams, David Reitzes, and the usual mainstream media Lone Nut narratives.  The disinformation sites always appeared at the top of my JFKA Google searches in those days.

      Of course, it took a while for me to gradually distinguish the writings of the accurate, honest historians from the CIA propagandists.

      What concerns me now is that we seem to have a cadre of Education Forum members promoting disinformation.

      Whether they are being funded or doing this for free, based on ignorance and lack of discernment, is unclear to me.

      When the question of government-funded disinformation arises, there is always a wild hue-and-cry of moral indignation from the guys who promote disinformation here-- accompanied by outrage that a "moderator" would dare to raise the question!

      So, I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they are simply ignorant.

      

Jim DiEugenio, Larry Hancock and Vince Palamara all discount the role of LYNDON JOHNSON in the JFK assassination.

So is that the accurate and "true history" of the JFK assassination? From where I sit that is like saying the Chicago Bulls of the 1990s were a pretty good basketball team but who was Michael Jordan?

I for one, don't think Rose Cheramie had any legitimate foreknowledge of the JFK assassination. I put her in the same category with Joseph Milteer - her prognostications of the JFK assassination were a lucky throw of the dart. John F. Kennedy himself was saying someone could easily kill me with a rifle from an elevated position in a building.

Anyone with a brain in 1963 knew that if John Kennedy went to Dallas the possibility of "problems" was a real possibility. That is why going to Dallas was put on and put off of JFK's trip schedule so many times. There were and absolute torrent of people warning John Kennedy and his entourage NOT to go to Dallas -- Adlai Stevenson just being ONE of many, many people who expressed concerns about the hard right wing atmosphere of "Dallas 1963."

Silvia Odio (who apparently is still alive today - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silvia_Odio ) is yet another person who I don't put much stock in. I don't think she ever saw Lee Harvey Oswald because I think Oswald was down in Mexico City at that time being set up and framed by U.S. intelligence so he would make a great patsy for the JFK assassination.

I think her identification of Oswald at her home was COMPLETELY MISTAKEN and I don't think anti-Castro Cubans were using Odio to set up Oswald. That is because I don't think low level CIA-connected anti-Castro Cubans were involved in the pre-JFK assassination framing of Oswald. I think it went up higher on the food chain than some of the "mechanics" in the JFK assassination who did not have access to government files with Marguerite Oswald's physical description of her son as "5 feet 10 inches tall, 165 pounds" which was indeed used to frame Oswald a lot more than supposedly putting Oswald on the doorstep of Silvia Odio in Dallas when he really was down in Mexico City (see Oleg Nechiporenko who saw him there).

Furthermore, there are people on Education Forum who posit that the RFK assassination was a conspiracy and not done by a very aggrieved Palestinian Sirhan Sirhan. I will put that in the category of MISINFORMATION because I have never seen anything legit in all my years of being marinated in the "conspiracy community" that shows that to be the case. You yourself have recommended Lisa Pease's book on the RFK assassination as some sort of definitive account. Is that the book where Pease says SIRHAN SIRHAN'S GUN WAS LOADED WITH BLANKS AND HE IN FACT SHOT NO ONE THAT DAY?

That just seems UTTERLY RIDICULOUS in the extreme. If I were the "CIA" and I were trying to murder Robert Kennedy the absolute LAST THING I would do would have some patsy running around on the scene WITH BLANKS IN HIS GUN.

Lyndon Johnson himself (who btw did not murder Robert Kennedy although he was joyously happy to see him dead dead dead) was not a big believer in unleashing an assassin to murder someone with BLANKS IN HIS GUN.

Pease's theory - on this point - is ridiculous.

What I am getting at is things you "think" are 100% true and credible might just be MISINFORMATION - and you might accidentally be repeating someone else's DISINFORMATION.

This is why I like having the Lone Nutters around here. There are so many "conspiracy theorists" saying stupid things about the JFK assassination that it is nice to have a few Lone Nutters helping to blow up those balloons.

Furthermore, I can wipe the floor like a wet mop with any Lone Nutter in a debate on the JFK assassination. I notice they spend so much time going after JIM GARRISON and OLIVER STONE that they have a very soft underbelly when it comes to denying the "Truth" of Lyndon Johnson's critical role in the JFK assassination. Note: celebrated moron/ignorant jackass Vincent Bugliosi and flawed journalist Gerald Posner spend a microscopic amount of time debunking the role of LBJ in the JFK assassination while there is such a powerful case to make for his involvement.

Jim Garrison and Oliver Stone never figured out what happened in the JFK assassination. Both men pushed the BIG CANARD that the JFK assassination was about JFK not wanting to prosecute the Vietnam War. No, that is not what it was about. Do you really think those anti-Castro Cuban operatives at ground level were killing JFK because of his VIETNAM policy? I don't. I think Gen. Edward Lansdale was involved (denied by "expert" Larry Hancock) because he was in a rage over his own demotion and the murder of his good friend Ngo Dinh Diem in a JFK-approved coup in Vietnam. Bernardo De Torres divebombed into the Jim Garrison investigation and did everything he could to blow it up and subvert it. Was that because maybe his friends who killed JFK were mad about Vietnam policy? https://spartacus-educational.com/JFKtorres.htm (No, I don't think De Torres visited Sivia Odio...)

I forget to mention JEFFERSON MORLEY - yet another supposedly acclaimed JFK assassination researcher who discounts the role of Lyndon Johnson in the JFK assassination. Morley has made some important contributions and he is right about some things and wrong about some things but that is a pretty gigantic MISS. Morley told me on Twitter (X) that he admires Lyndon Johnson. As if LBJ had any option of not supporting civil rights bills after he had just murdered JFK. If LBJ had done that he was not going to be the 1964 Democratic presidential nominee.

What I am getting at is you and your JFK researcher idols may not be the best people to be identifying "misinformation" or "disinformation" or even "flat out lying" when it comes to the JFK assassination.

I think Education Forum should be a place where people lay out their cases in all the many debates and sub debates on the JFK assassination. Then the readers can decide what they think is credible.

Normally, I will say something like "Go check out Gil Jesus' web page or YouTube channel. He covers that topic there."

 

 

 

 

 

Edited yesterday at 05:18 AM by Robert Morrow

[Larry Hancock]

Robert, just to be clear, in SWHT I devote two chapters to discussing a scenario regarding how LBJ was potentially co-opted and given a minimal pre-assassination  message that his huge pending Congressional investigation problem (supported by JFK and RFK) was going to go away - but he best be prepared to manage the situation and ensure no through conspiracy investigation.

I detail the scandal, the specific Baker related information Roselli had on Johnson which would have sealed Johnson's fate in Congress and how Roselli would have gotten the word to Johnson.  I also micro detail the day by day chronology of Johnson's activities related to that including the dramatic change in Johnson's behavior in October.

As with most things I can't prove it, its speculation - but I believe the most coherent way to explain most of Johnson's actions including his high pressure and immediate move to ensure there was not real criminal investigation of conspiracy.   Hard to believe I spent so much time doing that and apparently nobody reads it...

 

 

[Greg Doudna]

Larry, that is interesting. Assume there were those interrelationships around an assassination plot. A question is who is Mr Big in such a plot? Not witting co-conspirators with motives of their own who go along, but what individual is the mover and decider of the thing. This is one of the appeals of Morrows argument. LBJ would at least be plausible for a Mr Big.

Someone told me things run this way, four layers to any organized activity. There is Mr Big; A Man With A Plan; suits; boots. 

That’s how things get done in organized ways. 

LBJ at least fits as a plausible Mr Big. If he wasnt, who. CIA ops did foreign assassinations but that’s on behalf of the US. Can’t see anyone in the bureaucracy including CIA being a Mr Big decider not subject to someone higher. A mob boss could be a Mr Big but then has to be explained why the US govt would not bring the wrath of God down on them. Castro, same objection. If he was the Mr Big no way the US wouldn’t have gone after him like bin Laden and gotten him, but that didn’t happen. 

It sounds oversimplified, almost too simple, to have LBJ be the Mr Big but some of the alternatives seem to have greater problems and LBJ would check the boxes for a Mr Big type. 

What’s the short succinct rebuttal to that? (If so.) 

Edited 19 hours ago by Greg Doudna

[Larry Hancock]

I'm afraid I was unclear, the scenario I lay out is one in which LBJ was compromised and managed to ensure no effective conspiracy investigation occurred.  That was his only role.  He was compromised by the same nexus of individuals - Roselli/Harvey/Morales who instigating the operational side of the attack in Dallas. He willingly cooperated, happy to have saved his career and reputation from a Congressional inquiry that was posed to gut him. Indeed his primary concerns the night of the assassination were demonstrably political and of how to neuter what had been coming to a head in Congress.

I'd be happy to discuss the details I lay out in several chapters of SWHT in terms of he he likely was compromised and how he carried out his tasking, but you really need to read that first.  Sorry, I put  years into that, not starting fresh again...grin.  And for that matter I decided to check his actions again as to whether they and the national security response was anomalous, that was the genesis of all the work that went into Surprise Attack.