The Associated Press
DALLAS (AP) - A police card bearing Jack Ruby’s nine fingerprints is among the items unexpectedly turned up in a drug raid on a Dallas apartment.
One of the fingerprint boxes is blank, reflecting Ruby’s missing left index finger, lost when it was bit off in a fight.
It’s unclear whether the prints were taken after the club owner shot accused presidential assassin Lee Harvey Oswald in the old police headquarters basement, or whether the fingerprint card was made in an earlier arrest.
Police found the card and other police-related memorabilia - including Bonnie and Clyde autopsy photos - in Michael Roppolo’s apartment in a raid on March 24, 2003.
Roppolo was convicted of drug possession in November last year and received a five-year probationary sentence.
He told authorities that a relative who used to work for the department gave the materials to him.
Items marked as trial evidence include photos of Ruby shooting Oswald and what appears to be a drawing of a map containing important assassination-related locations, such as Dealey Plaza and the street in Oak Cliff where Oswald was accused of shooting to death Officer J.D. Tippit hours after President John F. Kennedy’s assassination.
Police say the items related to the assassination of Kennedy appear to be authentic and apparently were taken from police archives several decades ago. They are to be included in a new police headquarters museum.
Police also found a photo inventory of Oswald’s belongings, which were seized from his rooming house on the day of the assassination. That picture features items such as shoes, a bar of Lux soap, Russian flash cards, black sunglasses, gloves and assorted clothing.
Another photo documents socialist propaganda found at the home where Oswald’s wife had stayed.