class="smcap">Jenner. You don't remember him being out of school entirely for about a year?

Mr. Voebel. No; that might have been over at Easton. It could have been over there, but I don't remember that at all.

Mr. Jenner. All right, go on with your story.

Mr. Voebel. Well, this program we had, that was a band concert, and we were listening to the band and I think this was when he revealed the plan for stealing this pistol from a place on Rampart Street.

Mr. Jenner. Did he seek to enlist you in that plan?

Mr. Voebel. No; not really, he just told me about it. He had observed a pistol in this window, this show window, on Rampart Street, and his plan was to steal it.

Mr. Jenner. It wasn't one of these collector's items?

Mr. Voebel. No; I don't think so. I can't remember the pistol, to tell you the truth, but I don't think it was a collector's piece. It was just a weapon. It might have been a Smith & Wesson. I think it was an automatic, but I don't remember. I really didn't pay too much attention to it.

Mr. Jenner. You actually saw the pistol in the window?

Mr. Voebel. Yes. To get back to my story, it was maybe the following week that I was up at his house, and he came out with a glasscutter and a box with this plastic pistol in it, and I think he had a plan as to how he was going to try to get in there and get this pistol.

Mr. Jenner. You mean in the Rampart Street store?

Mr. Voebel. Yes. Now, I don't remember if he was planning to use this plastic pistol in the robbery or not, or just to take it and cut the glass and break it out, and get the pistol that way. I don't think he was really sure even then how he wanted to do it, but finally he told me his complete plans and how he was going to cut the glass out of the window and everything, and I didn't know what to tell him, so he said, "Why don't you come over and look at this pistol and tell me what kind it is, and what you think of my plan?" So I said all right, and so we walked over there to this store and we looked at this pistol in the window, and like I said, I don't remember what kind it was.

He said, "Well, what do you think?" and I didn't know what to tell him. I didn't know how to talk him out of it, so then I happened to notice this band around the window, a metal tape that they use for burglar alarms, and I got to working on that idea in the hope that I could talk him out of trying it, and I told him, I said, "Well, I don't think that's a good idea, because if you cut that window, it might crack that tape, and the burglar alarm will go off," and I don't think he believed me, but I told him, "Let's go in the store and look at it from the inside," and so I convinced him that it would be too dangerous to try it, that this was a burglar alarm that would go off, and so anyway, he finally gave up the idea. There had been some jewel robberies on Canal Street and the way they were doing it was cutting a hole in the window, such as Lee planned to do. I remember reading about that, but anyway, he finally changed his mind about trying to rob the store, and that was the end of that.

Mr. Jenner. What kind of glasscutter was this that he showed you?

Mr. Voebel. Oh, it was just a real cheap one.

Mr. Jenner. This was a plate glass window, though, you say?

Mr. Voebel. Yes.

Mr. Jenner. It never occurred to you that he couldn't cut a plate glass window with a glass cutter?

Mr. Voebel. Not at that time; no. I didn't know anything about the cutting of glass anyway. I just thought he could do it, you know.

Mr. Jenner. Did you hear any more about that event afterwards?

Mr. Voebel. No; I think it just played out. I don't think he really wanted to go through with it, to tell you the truth. I think he was really looking for a way out. It was just some fantastic thing he got in his mind, and actually it never did amount to anything. I mean, it seemed to me like he just wanted me to discourage him to the point where he could back out of the whole thing, and he never went through with it, and I never heard anymore about it after that. Now that I look back on it, I think maybe he was just thinking along the lines that if he went through with it, that he would look big among the guys, you know, but I am just speculating on that, of course.

Mr. Jenner. Did you ever have any discussions with Lee about politics?

Mr. Voebel. No.

Mr. Jenner. I mean the politics in the pure sense.

Mr. Voebel. No; we didn't discuss that. We were too young, I guess, to be interested too much in politics at that time. I have read things about Lee having developed ideas as to Marxism and communism way back when he was a child, but I believe that's a lot of baloney.

Mr. Jenner. You and he never discussed anything like that, then?

Mr. Voebel. No; I am sure he had no interest in those things at that time, at least that I know of. Of course, we took courses like political science and courses like that, and he might have done a lot of reading and studying along that line at that time, but I don't even know that. I know we never discussed anything like that.

Mr. Jenner. Now at this time, his two brothers, they were in the service, I believe; is that right?

Mr. Voebel. Well, I don't know. He never did say. I know he did have two brothers, but I didn't know what they were doing.

Mr. Jenner. They weren't around for any of this playing darts or playing pool, or anything else that you and Lee participated in, were they?

Mr. Voebel. No, I never saw them. I never met them.

Mr. Jenner. Did you form an opinion as to the relationship between Lee and his mother?

Mr. Voebel. Well, I know it wasn't the type of relationship that you usually see between a mother and her children. I'm just giving you my opinion on that, now. I know that they weren't very close, as far as Lee was concerned, but of course she was always around, and I think she tried to take good care of him, but it was hard with a person like Lee to know what he was thinking or doing all the time.

I think Lee loved his mother and was concerned about her, but there was something lacking there that you usually see between a mother and her children, as far as I am concerned, but with the type man Lee was, I guess a lot of that is understandable. You just couldn't get through to him. He just wasn't communicative. He just didn't talk too much about anything.

Mr. Jenner. Was he curt as to his mother, that you observed? I mean, did he cut her off short in any way?

Mr. Voebel. Well, I noticed the normal resentment going on in him at that time, but I was the same way, and I remember seeing that in other kids at that time. Your mother might be telling you things that are normally good for you, but I think every child resents discipline to a certain extent. I know I did at that time, but as to Lee and his mother, I don't think there was anything violent between them, if you know what I mean but at the same time he wasn't what you would call a mamma's boy.

Mr.