Capt William R Westbrook

First topic message reminder :

There seems to be extraordinarily sparse information on DPD Capt William R Westbrook.

He's an important figure in the events around the JFK assassination because he was present when the mystery wallet (allegedly one of Oswald's wallets) was found at the scene of the Tippit shooting by Sgt Kenneth Croy, and he was also at the scene when Oswald's jacket was discovered underneath a car.

Westbrook wasn't a patrol officer. He was in the Personnel Division of the DPD, he had a cushy desk job. Who ordered him to the Tippit scene? (And why was Bob Barrett along?)

One interesting thing about William Ralph Westbrook, is that he appears almost nowhere on Google. It's almost as if he didn't exist. The information in the Sneed book indicates that Westbrook "retired" from the DPD in 1966, and subsequently became an advisor to the Saigon police. It also claims he worked at Schepp's Dairy and as an investigator for Henry Wade (a position from which he also allegedly "retired"). The Sneed book claims he died in 1996. However I can't corroborate any of this with a simple google search.

First, I'd greatly appreciate linkage to any first-hand sources about Westbrook.

Second, I have a question. The DPD retirement records list an Anna F Westbrook as having passed away in 2011. Texas marriage records show a William R Westbrook marrying an Anna F Moore in 1992. Question: is this the same person?

Oh, Brian/nonsqtr/n00b/ballantine. I wouldn't come back here if I were you. If you do, you will be dealt with. 

Adios!

greg parker wrote:Well summarized, Richard. I've been trying to obtain info on Westbrook from outside the usual places. No luck. 

Does anyone know if there was a William, Jr? I did find something on a crooked cop in a different state who had the same name and would be the right age to be a son of...

This supposedly is a photo of Westbrook on page 26 of this book.
The Missing Chapter. by Jack Swike

I am not vouching for the author or his book. It's just something I ran across.

https://books.google.com/books?id=64ji-mF2oaAC&pg=PA26&lpg=PA26&dq="William+R.+Westbrook"&source=bl&ots=0xdb2t1bTz&sig=YT8bpNEzyNXWrzg4hG-pY_ooQI0&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjAu-KAtOLSAhWB6oMKHR-JADY4ChDoAQgmMAQ#v=onepage&q=%22William%20R.%20Westbrook%22&f=false

Steve Thomas

According to Ian Griggs' good article on Westbrook written sometime ago:

p2 When the Warren Commission published its 26 Volumes of Hearings, he even appeared in one of the Oswald arrest photographs! (6)

6 Warren Commission Hearings (26 Volumes), Hill (Gerald) Exhibit A (Photograph of Lee Harvey Oswald being subdued in the Texas Theatre). (20H 156)

(souce: http://jfk.hood.edu/Collection/Weisberg%20Subject%20Index%20Files/D%20Disk/Dallas%20Police/Item%2010.pdf)

Does anyone have access to this photograph? I've included the relevant quote as well as the "6" footnote.

I don't have page one,once I do I will add.

Thanks Bart.

Westbrook HSCA interview
https://drive.google.com/file/d/13eh_3pw_zw-lkbskZVazS-ChD1H5VQD8/view?usp=sharing

Edited One Time to add source for image
I have a photo of Westbrook standing together with David S Morales and 3 other unidentified individuals while in their Viet Nam assignment. Westbrook is on the far right. Morales is wearing the white shirt with a hat of some type. It is interesting to note how many key players in the JFK assassination were whisked away out of country after it was all over. Westbrook-Morales-Charles Frederick Rogers aka Frenchy. Can't help but to think it was planned like that to keep civilians and press people away from some of the actors involved and out of ear and eyesight of the general public. Like they were hiding them out until things died down. Source for image: https://tangodown63.com/u-s-intelligence-officers/

That is very interesting....wow. I mean to find a photo of the two together is pretty damned crazy. I can'[t help but to look at that photo and, knowing what I at least think I do about Westbrook's and Morales' pasts (Intel Officers to varying degrees) and wonder "have they worked together before.....". Can we ID the others in the photo?

BC_II wrote:That is very interesting....wow. I mean to find a photo of the two together is pretty damned crazy. I can'[t help but to look at that photo and, knowing what I at least think I do about Westbrook's and Morales' pasts (Intel Officers to varying degrees) and wonder "have they worked together before.....". Can we ID the others in the photo?

Hey BC,

The guy on the left? I cannot for the life of me place his name but I will never forget his face. He ended up on TV wearing a spiffy suit and tie and was some kind of a government official during the Iran-Contra Reagan stuff. I have looked and looked and looked, but I cannot find a pic of him during that time. I know I have seen him on TV before though. Maybe during the Iran-Contra hearings? But I know I have seen his face before during that time period and he was on TV wearing a dapper US government suit. It's his face that I remember the most, and it was most definitely him on TV. I'll keep working him to see what comes up.

BC_II wrote:That is very interesting....wow. I mean to find a photo of the two together is pretty damned crazy. I can'[t help but to look at that photo and, knowing what I at least think I do about Westbrook's and Morales' pasts (Intel Officers to varying degrees) and wonder "have they worked together before.....". Can we ID the others in the photo?

Hey BC,

The guy standing next to Westbrook in the camo covies, I am probably wrong, but he looks like an Anti Castro Cuban to me. That face, I think I have seen it somewhere before. Perhaps Weisberg/Garrison files? I am sure I have seen him before though. I will keep digging on this guy too.

There's quite a lengthy list of JFK assassination persons of interest ending up in Viet Nam. Shackley-Morales-Westbrook-Charles Frederick Rogers, there are many others, but those off the top of my head ring a bell.

I guess with Shackley's Operation Phoenix going on, good, hardened, trained and trustworthy killers were a precious commodity. I had compiled a lengthy list of those who went to Viet Nam after the JFK assassination, but I no longer have it. Maybe I will crank that project up one more time and post on it in the near future.

Peace

Thanks to Malcolm Blunt

From Blunty's Lair...

I encountered and had quite a talk with a man I now believe was Westbrook, in or just outside of Tulsa, ca. 1982-1983. I ran a window cleaning business in Tulsa 1982-1985. At one point I started service of a new customer which was a sort of a hamburger franchise sit-down fast-food place. It was not Burger King or one of the national chains but as I recall a regional chain with a name I don't remember. The building had the three-sided glass "fishbowl" look. There was a new owner who had just taken over and I had a good talk with him, first about business but then about the JFK assassination. He told me he was retired from the Dallas police department and was there in 1963 when the JFK assassination happened and knew all the people involved in the department. He had been some mid-level rank, more important than a simple basic police officer. Now he owned this burger restaurant which as I recall was just off a freeway exit just outside of Tulsa to the north and east (I remember driving north and east from my location in south Tulsa). I may even have my old route books somewhere in storage still with that customer record.  

Naturally I was fascinated and asked him questions and he was happy to talk--all growing out of my being there to clean his windows, which as I recall I did maybe a couple times more but then notified him I was dropping it from my route because it was too far out of my area (nothing wrong with him as a customer), and I had no further contact or knowledge of him. Unfortunately I was not knowledgeable of the details of the JFK assassination such that some of what he told me may be lost or forgotten by now, but he said a lot of interesting and entertaining things and I will tell what I do remember. Of course he told me his name at the time but the name meant nothing to me and I do not remember now the name he told me then. But in more recent times as I became more familiar with names of many Dallas police officers in researching the JFK assassination I wondered: who was that retired mid-level-rank career Dallas police officer who was in the DPD in Nov 1963 whom I had met and had that interesting talk with that time in Tulsa? I did quite a few google searches looking for an obituary or something that might identify a career Dallas police officer of the right time who had retired to Tulsa, but never came up with anything. Then recently I happened to see the obituary of retired DPD Captain William Westbrook of Tahlequah, Oklahoma, which is in rural Oklahama about 60-70 miles east of Tulsa. As I checked it out I was stunned (for by now I was familiar with reading of Westbrook such as in Hasan Yusef's articles on the Tippit case). It dawned on me that that was who it must have been--it was Westbrook who was my old window cleaning customer!

First on the security of the identification: he seemed slightly on the heavy side but it was a strong-build heavy, and he might have been maybe 6' or so. I actually think I remember him telling me he was a Captain, but am not quite certain of that, but he was someone of some importance in his rank. According to his obituary he retired from the Dallas police department but returned to work "as a special investigator for the Dallas County district attorney's office from 1970 to 1983". Presumably 1983 was when he relocated to Oklahoma, east of Tulsa. The timeline fits, it looks to me like it was him, and I have not been able to identify any other possible name or identification that fits. So, I think it was Westbrook.

Anyway, here is what I do remember of what the retired Dallas officer who I think was Westbrook talked about that day.

-- he was quite animated talking of the assassination and of police work in Dallas. He was cheerful and friendly to me. He wanted to emphasize to me that there was no conspiracy as a lot of people thought (I may have tentatively asked him a question or two based on popular stories in the press). He said, "Oswald really killed Kennedy" and "Ruby really acted on impulse", and talked colorfully about how people (JFK assassination researchers) could be so misguided and get things wrong. He mentioned some issue of a paper record of Oswald having the wrong height or something that had been made a big issue and gave some example to illustrate (which I do not recall) that made the mistake just routine and ordinary, not significant as conspiracy-minded people thought. 

-- one of the points about Ruby shooting Oswald on impulse was Sheba the dog. He mentioned that and how Ruby just loved Sheba his dog. In fact he told me some time before the assassination (maybe a long time before) he had personally found a lost, stray dog, and either he had put an ad to try to connect it to its owner, or maybe he had responded to an ad put by the dog's owner, I forget, but it was Ruby's dog Sheba! He told me that Ruby had driven to his house to retrieve Sheba and was just profusely grateful to get Sheba back. I had the impression from that story that he did not know Ruby before then. I have not found any verification of this Sheba story with respect to Captain Westbrook, but that is what he told me that day in Tulsa.

-- I checked the Westbrook interview in Larry Sneed's No More Silence to see if there were any points of contact in the stories told there with what I remember him telling me in Tulsa, and I do not remember him telling me any of the specific stories there. He could well have told me some things which I have forgotten in the passage of time. But there is ONE connection that did stand out to me from reading the interview in Sneed which I do remember: a similarity in view toward police brutality. He told me several entertaining "police humor" stories. He spoke of some computer program that the Dallas Police department had gotten that tracks crime by locations so well (here he was speaking of some time later than 1963) that, he told me (the exaggeration was for effect and humor) police could practically predict the day and hour of the day and exactly where the next store would get robbed in a neighborhood, so to speak. That led him into what he thought was a hilarious story, police humor. I may have details garbled but this was the gist of it: there had been a police shooting of some young men in the act of the young men robbing a store. There was an investigation and it ended up in court. The police report, he told me, read dryly and according to protocol, here he recited how the police version of the incident went. Responded, saw suspects acting suspiciously, gave proper warning, suspects failed to heed, blah blah blah, forced to respond with fire, blah blah blah. Very much by the book. But, he lit up with delight explaining, the three robbers had a different version, which he obviously thought was closer to the truth of what happened, which he found hilarious. The robbers' version, told in court, was that they came in the store after hours and after it was closed (this took place around Easter or Christmas) and then the robbers said police had jumped out saying "Happy Easter!" (or "Merry Christmas") while opening fire without ANY warning. Cracked him up. Police humor.

Here is Captain Westbrook in the Sneed book:

"At that time, Oswald had a mark on his forehead. Some have made claims about police brutality in the arrest, and I think police brutality had a place in that particular incident. Of course, it wouldn't be in front of witnesses. There had just been a President of the United States shot down and then an officer killed in cold blood without even getting his gun out. I don't think there could be any such thing as police brutality to a mad dog like that! Maybe, but I just couldn't see it. The way I understood it, he drove up beside Oswald, parked his car at the side of the curb, got out, and walked around the front and was killed right at the front fender with his gun still in his holster. And a person like that is going to holler police brutality!"

So, I doubt this will shed light on anything substantial related to the issues people work on here with Captain Westbrook, but just tell this for what it is worth or human interest.

First on the security of the identification: he seemed slightly on the heavy side but it was a strong-build heavy, and he might have been maybe 6' or so. I actually think I remember him telling me he was a Captain, 

Greg, have you checked the photos on this thread purportedly of Westbrook? I won't vouch for any of them since mislabeled photos is another issue with this case. However we once had a relative of Westbrook join when e were at a different site and that person did not complain that any photos were not of William.

The only one where he is a "strong built" heavy" is the photo Steve Thomas linked to that allegedly shows his enlistment photo. Problem with that one is, he is only around 5' 9" in that.

The one showing him later in life depict a slim to medium build.

As for relocating to Tulsa in 1983 when he left Wade's office... he was 66 by then. I'd say he more than likely left to retire.

He said, "Oswald really killed Kennedy" and "Ruby really acted on impulse", and talked colorfully about how people (JFK assassination researchers) could be so misguided and get things wrong.

Of course he did, What is going to say? We framed Oswald and then coerced Ruby into killing him because he refused to confess and we had no rel case to go to trial with?

He mentioned some issue of a paper record of Oswald having the wrong height or something that had been made a big issue and gave some example to illustrate (which I do not recall)

Well, that is interesting. Especially since the differently noted height of Oswald was never an issue until Armstrong and Jack White made it one in the 1990s. It may have been raised though in obscure books before that, and may have also been raised as an issue during Oswald's 1983 second autopsy. 

 that made the mistake just routine and ordinary, not significant as conspiracy-minded people thought. 

If anyone knows about mistakes vs "mistakes", it is Dallas police.

-- one of the points about Ruby shooting Oswald on impulse was Sheba the dog. He mentioned that and how Ruby just loved Sheba his dog.

Digging into this story years ago of Ruby leaving Sheba in the car, it became clear it was an apocryphal story that served to further show Ruby acted spontaneously. It never happened. Sheba was at the club with the other dogs.  There was no minimum sentence for murder in Texas. One of the things used to convince Ruby to do the job was that he would have an alibi for being in the area and that it would all look like he acted on impulse. That, and a "noble" motive would pave the way for a light sentence, after which he could resume at the clubs and become a celebrity. All a lie - and Ruby knew it - but they had things over him that made him pliable.

greg_parker wrote:

First on the security of the identification: he seemed slightly on the heavy side but it was a strong-build heavy, and he might have been maybe 6' or so. I actually think I remember him telling me he was a Captain, 

Greg, have you checked the photos on this thread purportedly of Westbrook? I won't vouch for any of them since mislabeled photos is another issue with this case. However we once had a relative of Westbrook join when e were at a different site and that person did not complain that any photos were not of William.

The only one where he is a "strong built" heavy" is the photo Steve Thomas linked to that allegedly shows his enlistment photo. Problem with that one is, he is only around 5' 9" in that.

The one showing him later in life depict a slim to medium build.

As for relocating to Tulsa in 1983 when he left Wade's office... he was 66 by then. I'd say he more than likely left to retire.

He said, "Oswald really killed Kennedy" and "Ruby really acted on impulse", and talked colorfully about how people (JFK assassination researchers) could be so misguided and get things wrong.

Of course he did, What is going to say? We framed Oswald and then coerced Ruby into killing him because he refused to confess and we had no rel case to go to trial with?

He mentioned some issue of a paper record of Oswald having the wrong height or something that had been made a big issue and gave some example to illustrate (which I do not recall)

Well, that is interesting. Especially since the differently noted height of Oswald was never an issue until Armstrong and Jack White made it one in the 1990s. It may have been raised though in obscure books before that, and may have also been raised as an issue during Oswald's 1983 second autopsy. 

 that made the mistake just routine and ordinary, not significant as conspiracy-minded people thought. 

If anyone knows about mistakes vs "mistakes", it is Dallas police.

-- one of the points about Ruby shooting Oswald on impulse was Sheba the dog. He mentioned that and how Ruby just loved Sheba his dog.

Digging into this story years ago of Ruby leaving Sheba in the car, it became clear it was an apocryphal story that served to further show Ruby acted spontaneously. It never happened. Sheba was at the club with the other dogs.  There was no minimum sentence for murder in Texas. One of the things used to convince Ruby to do the job was that he would have an alibi for being in the area and that it would all look like he acted on impulse. That, and a "noble" motive would pave the way for a light sentence, after which he could resume at the clubs and become a celebrity. All a lie - and Ruby knew it - but they had things over him that made him pliable.

It was so long ago, but on the photo, from my distant memory the man in uniform, on the right, of the photo looks very much like the shape and face appearance of the man I talked to, from my memory, though of course the man I talked to was older. The other photo in Vietnam does not ring a bell (but it was so long ago I cannot exclude). On height I do not remember the man I talked to being taller than me (I am 6'2"), which I think I would have remembered, and 6' was a guess. 5'9" could be just as well. On height my best report would be 90% confidence that he was less than 6'2", but I do not remember him as being strikingly short either. So, 5'9" would work.

On Ruby and Sheba the dog, I am sure Ruby's killing of Oswald was a hit and not impulse. The way I figured it Ruby took Sheba with him on purpose, leaving the doors unlocked (but the money locked in the trunk), so that after the shooting and certain arrest, that others would find Sheba in the car easily and quickly and Sheba would be cared for at that point. This would provide for more immediate and reliable care for Sheba than if he had left Sheba at home when he left to do the shooting of Oswald. Therefore the "Sheba objection" that others cite as opposed to Ruby planning the shooting of Oswald, seems to me consistent with it. I also noted with interest discovering a reference in documents to Ruby ordering from California(?) some crates or arrangements to be made for shipping dogs, in the weeks prior to the assassination.

greg_parker wrote:

First on the security of the identification: he seemed slightly on the heavy side but it was a strong-build heavy, and he might have been maybe 6' or so. I actually think I remember him telling me he was a Captain, 

Greg, have you checked the photos on this thread purportedly of Westbrook? I won't vouch for any of them since mislabeled photos is another issue with this case. However we once had a relative of Westbrook join when e were at a different site and that person did not complain that any photos were not of William.

The only one where he is a "strong built" heavy" is the photo Steve Thomas linked to that allegedly shows his enlistment photo. Problem with that one is, he is only around 5' 9" in that.

I did not realize until now but I believe the photo in the Steve Thomas link shows Westbrook's height to be 5'11", not 5'9", if you recheck. 

I don't think the identification--of the retired Dallas Police department officer who was there in Nov. 1963 that I encountered in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1982-1983--as Westbrook is certain, only possible at this point in the absence of falsification. The two details that could verify or falsify this identification would be the Sheba the dog returned to Ruby story, and ownership of a hamburger restaurant either in northeast Tulsa or northeast close to Tulsa, in 1982 or 1983. This last could be verified up or down from a family member, which could settle the point either yes or no. It is trivia in the sense that it adds no useful information shedding light on existing questions that I can see. Just a possible slight personal brush with this fading history.

It also occurs to me: the mention of the retired DPD person with whom I talked finding and returning the lost dog to Ruby (and I vaguely recall he could have said it was his wife who may have actually placed the ad to find the dog's owner, though I recall his description of himself being present when Ruby showed up and was so grateful to be reunited with Sheba) ... might logically indicate Westbrook (if so) lived not too far from Ruby (within range of a dog wandering and becoming lost), in other words in Oak Cliff. 

However according to the Warren Commission interview of Westbrook of April 6, 1964, Westbrook gives two addresses as where he lives and says "I live at both of them". One is 7642 Daingerfield Drive, Dallas, which is a few miles southeast of downtown Dallas and not in the vicinity of Oak Cliff (which is southwest of downtown). The other is "Route 2, Quinton", no state given. However there is no Quinton, Texas, but there is a Quinton, Oklahoma, located ca. 80 miles southwest of Tahlequah, Okla. his location at time of death. According to the Sneed book Westbrook did not retire from the Dallas police department until 1966, so it is odd that Westbrook says he lives also in a city in Oklahoma at the same time he is employed with DPD in Dallas. (Maybe he lived in Dallas but claimed the Oklahoma address as a residence for some legal purpose, based on weekend trips? Unclear.) A lost dog of Ruby found by Westbrook's family does not quite make sense with Westbrook living miles away from Ruby though.

Edited Oct 29, 2020, to remove a proposal that Westbrook in plain clothes who left with other uniformed officers by the rear of the theatre where Oswald was arrested was misunderstood by witnesses to be the alleged "second arrested Oswald". As Greg Parker correctly says in the next post, that was George Applin, a patron in the theatre.

The mystery about the person taken out the back was always just another false mystery from over-zealous conspiracy advocates.

The person taken out the back was witness George Applin.

Mr. BALL - Later did you go down to the police station and make a statement?
Mr. APPLIN - Yes, sir; I did.
Mr. BALL - When?
Mr. APPLIN - Well, it was after--I guess after they got everybody's name. I rode down with three officers.
Mr. BALL - That same day, did you?
Mr. APPLIN - Yes, sir.
Mr. BALL - You didn't go back to the picture show?
Mr. APPLIN - Yes, sir; I did. There was a patrolman that carried me back out and I was going to see the rest of it, but I never did get back in time to.

Greg P. your Applin identity makes the best sense and must be correct--brilliant solution! Of the two witnesses cited who saw the alleged "second Oswald arrested"--Bernard Haire from the outside and Butch Burroughs from the inside--Burroughs said the second man "looked almost like Oswald" (interview by James Douglass, _JFK and the Unspeakable_, pp. 293 and 460-61 n. 449). In checking Applin's Warren Commission testimony I see Applin was age 22 which is compatible with looking similar to Oswald. Also, both witnesses saw what looked to them like an arrest, which does not agree with any known person other than Applin. 

Burroughs says he saw the second one handcuffed. Burroughs is not confusing the second one with Oswald since Burroughs tells of distinctly seeing two, not one, men taken away handcuffed, Oswald and then a few minutes later another who looked similar to Oswald, with Haire seeing the second one coming out in police custody out the back. Yet there is no arrest record or testimony from Dallas police officers as to a second arrest. 

That Applin was taken out by police and put into a police car and taken downtown for questioning is a matter of record. Burrough's claim of seeing this second person--Applin--taken away handcuffed could be true, despite Applin not being charged with a crime or record of an arrest. Apparently handcuffing can be done by police of persons not under arrest in the legal sense, surprising as that sounds (https://www.quora.com/Is-it-legal-for-the-police-to-handcuff-you-if-you-are-not-yet-placed-under-arrest-or-if-there-is-no-evidence-to-justify-an-arrest?share=1).  

The police, not having yet figured out who was involved with what, may have considered Applin a suspect and/or possible material witness and decided to handcuff him and take him downtown for questioning, but after questioning decided he was cleared, and he was released without record of an arrest or charges filed. 

As you say, the way this alleged "second Oswald arrest" has been hyped is "just another false mystery". It was Applin, who, not by coincidence, does not recall seeing any other second person detained and led out by police other than himself. Others saw a second person led away under detention by police, but Applin did not, because that person was he.

Hi -- First time posting. May not have right pew. Does anyone have docs re Pinky Westbrook's supposed assignment for CIA in Saigon training VN secret police? MB Young

MB Young wrote:Hi -- First time posting. May not have right pew. Does anyone have docs re Pinky Westbrook's supposed assignment for CIA in Saigon training VN secret police? MB Young

Not sure where such documents would be, but the assignment was confirmed to us by Captain Westbrook's son at a previous version of this forum.

According to Ralph, Jr. his father applied for the job and got it based on qualifications and experience gained with the Dallas Police force.

http://www.prayer-man.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/rokc%20forum/www.reopenkennedycase.org/apps/forums/topics/show/13102710-addendum-to-my-essay-on-westbrook.html

I am W R Westbrook's only son and I am willing to respond to questions if there are any.