CUBAN INFORMATION ARCHIVES




DOCUMENT  0354


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Loran "Skip" Hall
Interview December 20, 1974

KMPC/710
5858 Sunset Boulevard
Hollywood, California 90028
(213) 469-5341

9-25-76

Dear Mrs. Burke:

Excuse the brief delay in getting these materials to you, but some were difficult to locate.

All of the individuals cited are known to me.  Loran "Skip" Hall is a soldier-of-fortune and was indeed deeply involved in covert operations in connection with the Bay of Pigs.  He is also mentioned in the Warren report.

Harry Dean has indeed been involved in many of the groups and areas he claims, but I have not been able to tie down his alleged FBI informant status with complete certainty.  Paul Schrage on the other hand is a quality profile of a retired LAPD officer.

The whereabouts of all are known to me and all have assured me that they will divulge all to an official body.

Best regards,

Art Kevin - Investigative Reporter, KMPC

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TRANSCRIPT
Skip hall interview with KMPC investigative reporter Art Kevin: (Hall claims this incident occurred in Dallas, six months before the assassination of President Kennedy)

"I had a meeting set up with (name). Well, when I walked into the meeting, there was 4 other people in there besides (name) and myself.  There was someone introduced to me as a representative of (name), another was working for (name) and two other men (names) who were involved in a big trucking firm in Dallas, Texas.  It's my belief that it was the (name) trucking company.  Well, we were thinking about getting $50,000 together...that the 5 people, (name) and these other 4 would come up with $10,000 each and put the money into a pot and we'd use this money for the raids into Cuba and to try to get a fishing fleet going, so that we could use the fishing fleet as a line of communication and a line of logistics and the one stated; ‘Well hell, you can afford to finance it all yourself because you just bought another trucking outfit that makes you one of the largest trucking companies in the United States.'  And then he jumped up and stated; I'll put up $50,000 right now if all the rest of you will and we'll have Kennedy's god-damned head blowed off because with Johnson as President we know exactly where he stands because he's a Texan and will take care of Texans'."

In another part of the same interview, Hall admits to having been involved in at least one CIA-Mob meeting, wherein the mob was contacted to kill Fidel Castro.  He provided names of those involved to me.

-30-

Another man of interest is a Harry Dean.  Dean claims he was an FBI informant for a time, and in pursuance of duties for the agency, headed the "fair play for Cuba" committee, Chicago chapter.

Annually, he sends flowers to Lee Harvey Oswald's grave and says in essence, "There but for the grace of God Go I".  Dean claims to have knowledge of a former Cuban (Batista) intelligence officer who, prior to November 22, 1963, was recruiting a group to kill JFK.

He has transmitted the name and location of this individual to me.



ART KEVIN, KMPC RADIO, LOS ANGELES, DECEMBER 20, 1974 – WITH PAUL SHARAGA

KEVIN: "Interview with Paul Sharoga – 12/20/74, 7:00pm...Paul Sharage, you were a man who had a situation occur in the performance of your duty on the night that Robert Kennedy was murdered here in Los Angeles.  So, in your own words tell me what happened, roughly what time, and how it all came to pass.

SHARAGA: "Well, at the evening or the night of the occurrence, I was a sergeant assigned to Rampart Division...in the city of Los Angeles...and I was just adjacent to the rear driveway of the Ambassador Hotel parking lot, the rear parking lot, when the call come out, ah.  ‘Ambulance shooting,' at-ah, the address on Wilshire Boulevard of the Ambassador.  I think it's thirty-seven hundred or thirty-four hundred.  I don't recall at this time.  Ah, I immediate made a right turn up on to the parking lot, and-ah, I would estimate that at the scene and parked in less than three minutes from the incident of the shooting itself...less than thirty seconds from the time the call came out.

KEVIN: "Would this be at the front of rear of –"

SHARAGE: "No, this was on the upper level rear parking lot, which would be the rear of the hotel  that exits out on to 8th Street.  The-ah...first thing that came to my attention, of course, was the-ah...mass confusion...ah...people running in all directions...Ah...An older couple...probably in their fifties...fifties to sixties...ah, came running toward me and I stopped them and asked what what had happened...and-ah they related that they were outside one of ____ to the Embassy Room, when a young couple in their early twenties...came running out...This couple seemed to be in a state of glee, shouting, ‘We shot him!...shot him!  We killed him!'  The woman then stated that she asked the young ____ "Who-who did you shoot?!'  Or ‘Who was shot?! And the young lady replied, "Kennedy! We shot him! We killed him!' – The only description I could get of this couple were that they were in their early twenties...The woman was with a polka-dot dress...Ah, neither of the older couple could furnish any additional information, ah, in that they were quite hysterical at the time, and it was difficult for them to talk."

KEVIN: "Did you take this information down on your notepad then, or just hear it and retain it for later notes?

SHAGARA: "I...immediately took it down on my notepad – ah, which was a little-ah notebook that I kept in my pocket...and immediately, broadcast...out over the air, what had happened...I informed communications that I was setting up command post in the area, requested they broadcast the description of the suspects as given to me..."

KEVIN: "Would the suspects have crossed your path then prior to your getting to the scene and bumping into this elderly couple?"

SHARAGA: "I have no way of knowing...The-ah hotel exits-ah on Wilshire Boulevard and on 8th Street and...I have no idea of what way...the suspects went.  The old couple didn't indicate which direction they took."

KEVIN: "Did you get their name?"

SHAGARA: "I did at the time...ah, for the life of me I can't recall it now, but I recorded it and gave the name to...ah, the investigating detectives, Rampar

Page 2
SHAGARA: detectives, Sergeant Bill Jordon.  As best I can recall, it was a name like Bernstein...but I...Sorry I can't recall any more.

KEVIN: "They, you indicated, were somewhat hysterical as they retold that story to you.

SHARAGE: "Quite hysterical.  Quite hysterical."

KEVIN: "You don't think that they mistook the words that they relayed to yu they heard that is to say in their hysteria, thought they heard, two people, a man and a woman in t heir early twenties shouting "We've shot him!' but rather ‘He's been shot!'  You know, ‘He-we've' - that sort of things."

SHARAGE: "In my evaluation of the situation, based upon the experience of twenty years as a peace officer in this city...I would say, that because of the spontaniety of their answers...that-ah...there's no question in my mind that as to the veracity of it."

KEVIN: "Just in case notes are lost, as sometimes they do become lost, mislaid, misplaced, that sort of thing, to the best of your recollection, Paul, can you describe this elderly couple – what you thing their name is, in the hopes they are listening and if they hear this, they'll know it was they."

SHARAGA: "The couple, as best I can describe them, appeared to be an elderly Jewish couple, the woman about five-foot-two...and stocky.  Not extremely heavy, but just-just stocky...The man about the same height, maybe an inch or two taller and as I recall, thin hair to balding...but I can't recall any further."

KEVIN: "Did they have accents – Jewish accents?"

SHARAGA: "I can't recall. I can't recall.  I don't believe so."

KEVIN: "In the event they are listening, we would obviously want them to contact us here, and just further corroborate your own recollections of that night.  I say corroborate, Paul, because interestingly, as you and I had discussed prior to actually taping this interview, there is no record to indicate anywhere in SUS or in the trial of Sirhan, himself, that this report did eminate from you at the time of the incident itself.  Now, again, we don't know why at this point that has come to pass, but did you file a formal report, and what has happened to your notes?"

SHAGARA: "I filed...an initial report after the-ah...command post closed down, or after I closed the command post down, secured the area...left a detail of security personnel to guard the floor of the hotel the Kennedy family had taken over...or was using...better expression...ah...I then proceeded to Ramparts Station, where I dictated verbally to the Captain's secretary...ah-the report...and this report was dictated immediately after the-the-ah command post.  I believe it lasted about thirteen hours, and the dictation roughly off and on for about eight or nine hours."

KEVIN: "Do you remember her name, the Captain's secretary?  First name, even?"

SHARAGA: "No, I don't."

KEVIN: "And the Captain was who at that time?"

SHARAGA: "Floyd Phillips.  F-yes, Floyd Phillips."

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