Guy Banister
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William Guy Banister (March 7, 1901–June 6, 1964) was a private investigator alleged by New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison to have been involved in the Assassination of John F. Kennedy.
Banister was born in Monroe, Louisiana. After studying at the Louisiana State University, he joined the Monroe Police Department.
In 1934, Banister joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He was present at the death of John Dillinger. Originally based in Indianapolis, he later moved to New York City where he was involved in the investigation of the American Communist Party. J. Edgar Hoover was impressed by Banister's work and in 1938 he was promoted to run the FBI unit in Butte, Montana. He also served in Oklahoma City, Minneapolis and Chicago before he retired from the FBI in 1954.
Banister moved to Louisiana and in January 1955 became Assistant Superintendent of the New Orleans Police Department, where he was given the task of investigating organized crime and corruption within the police force. It later emerged that he was also involved in looking at the role that left-wing political activists were playing in the struggle for black civil rights in New Orleans.
In March 1957, he was suspended after pulling a gun in public in a bar. His suspension ended in June, but when he refused to be transferred to the N.O.P.D.'s Planning Department, he was dismissed from the force. After leaving the New Orleans Police Department he established his own private detective agency, Guy Banister Associates.
In 1963 Banister and David Ferrie began working for a lawyer named G. Wray Gill and his client, Carlos Marcello. This involved attempts to block Marcello's deportation to Guatemala.
On 9th August, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald distributed leaflets that supported Fidel Castro and his communist government in Cuba. On these leaflets was the address 544 Camp Street, New Orleans. From October 1961 to February 1962, this had been the address of the Cuban Revolutionary Council, an anti-Castro group. Around the corner from 544 Camp Street, located in the same structure but with a different entrance, was 531 Lafayette Street, which housed the detective agency run by Guy Banister. This caused Garrison to suspect that Oswald had been involved in a right-wing conspiracy to kill Kennedy.
On the afternoon of November 22, 1963, Banister and Jack Martin went drinking together. On their return to Banister's office, the two men argued about a missing file. Banister became so angry that he drew his Magnum revolver and struck Martin with it several times. Martin was treated at Charity Hospital.
Over the next few days Martin told authorities and reporters that David Ferrie had been involved in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. He claimed that Ferrie knew Lee Harvey Oswald from their days in the New Orleans Civil Air Patrol and had given him lessons on how to use a rifle with a telescopic sight.
This information eventually reached Jim Garrison, the district attorney of New Orleans, who, in 1966, interviewed Martin about the accusations. Martin claimed that during the summer of 1963 Banister and David Ferrie were involved in something very sinister with a group of Cuban exiles.
Garrison now became convinced that a group of right-wing activists, including Banister, David Ferrie, and Clay Shaw, were involved in a conspiracy with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to kill John F. Kennedy. Garrison claimed this was in retaliation for Kennedy's attempts to obtain peace settlements in both Cuba and Vietnam.
Guy Banister died of coronary thrombosis on June 6, 1964.
[edit] Popular Media
Guy Banister appears as a character in James Ellroy's 1995 novel American Tabloid. Banister also is a character in Oliver Stone's 1991 movie JFK where he is portrayed by actor Edward Asner. He is also central to the plot of Don DeLillo's novel Libra.
