Jada Was with JFK in Fort Worth the Night Before His Assassination. Now, She’s in a Hurry to Leave Dallas before His Death.

26 Jada at Adolphus

Shortly after 12:00 noon, on November 22, 1963, Janet “Jada” Conforto was speeding along Lemon Avenue, trying to get out of Dallas as fast as she could. Jada, the former star attraction of Jack Ruby’s Carousel Club, was in such a hurry to leave Dallas she struck pedestrian Charles Burnes as he was crossing Lemmon Avenue. Burnes was taken to a clinic where he was examined and x-rayed for possible injuries. Jada, who was also taken to the clinic, was nearly hysterical and repeatedly cursed at Burnes for colliding with her 1963 Cadillac convertible.

After she calmed down, Jada was interviewed by security people at the clinic. She told them that she was employed at the Carousel Club (she was not working there at the time). They asked if they could get in touch with her later at the Club, and Jada said, “No, the Carousel Club would not be open on Friday evening.” She went on to say that she was in a hurry to get to New Orleans.

Jada then made a phone call to an unidentified man who arrived within minutes in another Cadillac and spirited her away.

The pedestrian, Charles Burnes thought Jada’s comment about the Carousel Club’s closing was a bit odd since Friday nights were normally one of the busiest nights of the week for strip clubs. Before he left the clinic, Burnes heard the news reports of President Kennedy’s shooting.

As it turned out, however, Jada’s frantic flight from Dallas wasn’t directly related to JFK’s assassination, beyond the fact it involved one of the shooters, “Milwaukee Phil” Alderisio. A few hours earlier, Jada had been at the Texas Hotel in Ft. Worth in the company of President Kennedy. Alderisio also was at the Texas Hotel, along with fellow mob hit-man Richard Caine. They were there to try to shoot JFK from a building across the street, but had to abort the mission and went to their back-up plan of shooting Kennedy in Dallas. Jada knew Alderisio from her days working for Carlos Marcello in the French Quarter of New Orleans.

Jada and Alderisio see each other outside the Texas Hotel in Ft. Worth. This alarms Jada, because she knows a deep, dark secret about Alderisio. She once walked into an office at a strip joint in New Orleans and caught Alderisio having sex with another man. Apparently, he is a closet homosexual. Knowing something such as that about a ruthless mobster like Aldirisio is dangerous, and Jada knows it. Fearing for her safety, Jada left New Orleans and moved to Dallas. Now, their paths cross in Ft. Worth.

In one of the many coincidences of the JFK assassination, they see each other again in Dallas a few hours later. Jada stops off at the main post office in the Terminal Annex Building on Houston Street near Dealey Plaza. Just as she’s coming out of the building, Alderisio and Crane are turning into the parking lot. When Jada sees Alderisio again, it does not seem like a coincidence to her.  Paranoia ensues, and Jada decides it’s time to get out of Dallas right now. She doesn’t even go back to her apartment, fleeing Dallas with literally the clothes on her back.