Jim Leavelle, Dallas Detective Cuffed to Oswald Dies at 99
Dallas Police Detective Jim Leavelle, who was handcuffed to Lee Harvey Oswald when Oswald was shot by Jack Ruby, has died at the age of 99.
Several sources close to the family have confirmed that Leavelle died while on a trip to Colorado on Thursday.
Leavelle was honored by the Dallas police department in 2013 for his work.
The department's Detective of the Year Award now carries Leavelle's name.
Oswald was killed by Ruby, a nightclub owner, on Nov. 24, 1963, on live television. Oswald was in custody in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy two days earlier.
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He was also a Pearl Harbor survivor.
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In an interview with author Joseph McBride, Leavelle said he had different views on the murder of President Kennedy and Tippit, describing the president's assassination as "no different than a south Dallas nigger killing...it was just another murder inside the city limits of Dallas. I’ve handled hundreds of them." Leavelle told McBride about Tippit, "What some people don’t realize is that when a police officer gets killed, that takes precedence over the shooting of the president, because that’s close to home."
Still,
for Pearl Harbor.
We had the TV on all the time after the news that the president had been shot. I went in the kitchen and told my mother and I remember that she held on to the counter, said she just couldn't take anymore. The entire country was traumatized back then. And I learned the word "grimace," since they kept repeating it in their descriptions of Oswald. 
with my parents and the minister announced that Oswald had been shot and killed, there was a loud gasp from everyone in the church. We all wondered what other awful thing would happen next.
I was in elementary school at the time and was one of the first to hear that the president had been shot. The teacher let my reading group go to the school library alone as long as we walked in a line and remained quiet in the halls. Turns out the gym teacher had a free period and had turned on his radio - and heard the awful news about President Kennedy. He ran to the nearest classroom and told the 6th grade teacher who then ran and told the school librarian - and that's when we heard. We ran back to the classroom (which was at the farthest end of the hall), told our teacher who then ran out and that's when all hell broke loose. They set us home immediately - but I can still remember all us kids gathered in the school gym waiting for the school buses to arrive. I remember how scared everyone was.
My mother had already heard from a neighbor and we were glued to the TV for the next few days. And, like you said, we kept wondering what tragic event was going to occur next. Scary times.