American former U.S. Marine who assassinated United States President John F. Kennedy on 22 November 1963 in Dallas, Texas. After serving in the Marines, where he became a Marxist, he defected to Russia in 1959 but returned to the U.S. in 1962 after becoming disillusioned with Russian life. He was shot to death by Jack Ruby on 24 November 1963 in Dallas at 12:30 PM CST.
An habitual truant at school, he underwent psychiatric study in New York at the age of 12. He had been diagnosed as emotionally disturbed as early as 1952. His mom denied that her teenager had any problems and refused to allow treatment. In 1956, while in the U.S. Marine Corps, Oswald was rated as a sharpshooter. Becoming a Marxist, in 1959 he defected to the U.S.S.R. where he married a Russian, Marina Prusakova two years later. Life in the Soviet Union left him discontented and in June 1962 he was allowed to return to the U.S. with his wife and baby daughter. He became an ardent supporter of Cuba’s Marxist president, Fidel Castro and talked to Marina of killing Richard Nixon and other public figures. On 6 April 1963, using his mail-order rifle, Oswald shot at and barely missed hitting retired Major-General Edwin Walker.
On 22 November 1963, after the assassination of President Kennedy, he was arrested and charged with the murder of Police Patrolman J.D. Tippet. At 1:30 A.M. on the 23rd, he was charged with the murder of the president. Oswald was never brought to trial. While leaving his holding cell in Dallas, being escorted through the basement of the Dallas police headquarters to a vehicle for transfer to the county jail he was shot to death by Jack Ruby on 24 November 1963 at 11:20 A.M. Jack Ruby (1911-1967; born Jacob Rubenstein), operator of the local Carousel nightclub, pushed forward through the crowd and shot once at Oswald hitting him in the left lower chest with the Colt .38 revolver. Major blood vessels, including the aorta and inferior vena cava, had been punctured and the loss of blood was rapid and extensive. After a tracheotomy and surgery to control the bleeding, Oswald was declared dead at 1:07 P.M. He was buried in an isolated section of Rose Hill Cemetery, Fort Worth, Texas, with only his widow, mother and brother attending.
Jack Ruby was convicted of Oswald’s murder on 14 March 1964 but the verdict was overturned on October 1966 on the grounds that Judge Joe B. Brown had permitted inadmissible evidence to be introduced into his trial. While a second trial was pending, Ruby was found to have cancer in his lungs, which spread to the lymph nodes and liver. Ruby died suddenly on 3 January 1967 at 10:30 A.M. when a blood clot traveled from his leg to his lungs. He was buried in Westlawn Cemetery, Chicago, Illinois.
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