that morning shift come on?

Chief Batchelor. At 7 o'clock.

Mr. Griffin. Chief, would you take this diagram and mark on there the time that you believe you saw that camera?

Chief Batchelor. [Marks.]

Mr. Griffin. I am marking this, "Dallas, Tex., Chief Batchelor, March 23, 1964, Deposition Exhibit No. 5000."

As you walked into the building and went up to the third floor, did you see anybody in the garage area or along the ramp or near the record room other than police department employees?

Chief Batchelor. No, sir.

Mr. Griffin. Now, what happened when you got up to the third floor? What did you do?

Chief Batchelor. I went to my office. I don't remember exactly what I did. Chief Curry came in very shortly after that, and I went into this office and we started discussing the possibility of moving the prisoner.

Mr. Griffin. Now will you try to remember who else was in the office with Chief Curry when you walked in?

Chief Batchelor. No one.

Mr. Griffin. Did anybody come in after you?

Chief Batchelor. Stevenson came in a little bit later.

Mr. Griffin. How much later, would you say?

Chief Batchelor. Oh, 2 or 3 minutes later, if I remember.

Mr. Griffin. Did anybody else come in after that during this conversation?

Chief Batchelor. I don't recall that they did. I don't believe there was.

Mr. Griffin. Did Chief Lunday come in?

Chief Batchelor. No. Chief Lunday didn't come down until later in the morning, I believe.

Mr. Griffin. Did Captain Talbert join you?

Chief Batchelor. No.

Mr. Griffin. Was Captain Talbert still on duty when you arrived at the police department?

Chief Batchelor. Captain Talbert was on duty that morning. He came on at 7 o'clock.

Mr. Griffin. Talbert came on at 7, but as I understand it, Talbert called you at your home about 6:30. How did that happen?

Chief Batchelor. Well, he is a platoon commander, and a platoon commander comes down early before the rest of the men to get his detail, and he had gotten this information from the night commander. The information came into them before they came on duty, and someone had tried to call Chief Curry. When they came down, they told me about it and I called them and I told them to send a squad by and wake Chief Curry up and tell him.

Mr. Griffin. What platoon was Talbert in charge of?

Chief Batchelor. The second platoon that month.

Mr. Griffin. By "platoon," what do you mean?

Chief Batchelor. The first platoon is the night platoon that comes on theoretically at midnight. It actually comes on at 11 o'clock the preceding day and it goes to 7 o'clock the next morning.

Mr. Griffin. What area does a platoon man?

Chief Batchelor. It mans the city. This is a uniform platoon. We have three substations and they change the same way. The substations are under the platoon commander, and each of the substations has a lieutenant in charge of the substation who accounts to the platoon commander, who is a captain.

Mr. Griffin. Tell me if my understanding is right, that Talbert at this point had operational responsibility for all the men throughout the city?

Chief Batchelor. That's right.

Mr. Griffin. Sort of like the executive officer on a ship or something?

Chief Batchelor. That's right.

Mr. Griffin. Tell us what your conversation was with Chief Curry up in his office when you first went in?

Chief Batchelor. I asked him, I believe, if he had called Sheriff Decker.

Mr. Griffin. What did he say?

Chief Batchelor. He said, no, he hadn't, but he was fixing to do that. And he did do it. He picked up the phone and called Sheriff Decker.

This was—I got down around 9 o'clock—I mean around 8 o'clock, correction—and it must have been somewhere around 8:30 or 8:45 when he called Decker.

Mr. Griffin. How long did you talk with him before he called Sheriff Decker?

Chief Batchelor. Just a few minutes. He called Sheriff Decker, and Decker said—and I was hearing only one side of the conversation, but I gathered that Decker had told him he thought he was going to move the prisoner. Curry said, "Well, if you want us to, we will." So he said, "I think you've got more manpower than we have. You move him if you will."

Then we had discussed this threat that had been received and——

Mr. Griffin. You and——

Chief Batchelor. Curry.

Mr. Griffin. Did Curry mention the threat to Decker in the telephone conversation?

Chief Batchelor. I just don't remember whether he did or not. I would think reasonably that he did, but I don't remember.

Mr. Griffin. When Chief Curry talked with Decker, did he make any mention of what time Oswald would be moved?

Chief Batchelor. He didn't set any definite time. He told him that Captain Fritz wanted to question Oswald again that morning, and that when he got through, they would be ready to move him, and he thought this would be sometime after 10 o'clock.