[hilbert42]

"But if there was nothing there, why did Jack Ruby kill him?"

I was a teenager living outside the US when I learned about JFK's assassination. It was a Saturday morning where I was and I remember it vividly more from the shock reaction of my parents than from the radio news report (I heard the news first and told them about it).

From that moment onwards the news coverage was intense. When Ruby shot Oswald we were struck with a sense of disbelief—even with my naïve sense of US politics, law enforcement, etc. the first things that came to mind were why would the seemingly sleazy Ruby want to shoot Oswald at all, second, how did US law enforcement let it actually happen. Either the US was in more chaos than the news was reporting and it was a free-for-all over there, or that Ruby's ulterior motive was more than just loyalty to the US/JFK.

I wasn't alone in thinking this, many were of this opinion and it was the first thing that came to our minds. I'd stress we'd formed that opinion within days if not hours of the news—that's well before any of the conspiracy theories or 'grassy knoll' stories emerged.