---
alias:
- Bill Gurvich
category: JFK Assassination
created: 2026-09-21
location: New Orleans, Louisiana
summary: New Orleans private detective who joined Jim Garrison's Kennedy investigation
  in December 1966, resigned in June 1967 calling it a fraudulent, criminal act, and
  took two boxes of its files to Clay Shaw's lawyers.
tags:
- Person
- WilliamGurvich
- JimGarrison
- ClayShaw
- PrivateInvestigators
- NewOrleans
updated: 2026-09-21
---

William Gurvich was "Executive Director of an established detective agency in [New Orleans](/places/new-orleans/)." District Attorney [Jim Garrison](/people/jim-garrison/) asked for his help in the Kennedy assassination investigation "on or about December 23, 1966." He worked on it for about six months and resigned on June 27, 1967, stating his belief that "the investigation was a 'fraudulent, criminal act.'" A federal judge who heard him in 1971 called him "an experienced investigator whom this court believed."[^1]

After leaving Garrison he turned his files over to the lawyers of the defendant, [Clay Shaw](/people/clay-shaw/). About two boxes of the papers of Shaw's attorney [Edward Wegmann](/people/edward-wegmann/), now in the Kennedy collection at the National Archives, are described as "Investigative Files of William Gurvich, Investigator for the District Attorney of the City of New Orleans." They include a stenographic record of his interviews with the defense in the summer of 1967. [Joseph Oster](/people/joseph-oster/), who had worked for [Guy Banister](/people/guy-banister/), named Gurvich in 1996 among those who might have taken Banister's files after his death.[^2][^3]

[^1]: Shaw v. Garrison, 328 F. Supp. 390 (E.D. La. 1971), affirmed, 467 F.2d 113 (5th Cir. 1972).
[^2]: National Archives and Records Administration, finding aid to the Papers of Edward F. Wegmann, John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection; DiEugenio, James. "The Wegmann Files," *Probe,* vol. 4, no. 4, May-June 1997.
[^3]: Golrick, Philip D. Memorandum to David G. Marwell, "Phone Conversation with Joseph Oster," January 19, 1996, Assassination Records Review Board electronic files.