Morley v. CIA - The Battle Continues.....

[Peter Lemkin]

Jefferson Morley's Blog
Will the CIA obey the law?
July 20, 2009, 8:47AM

Last week, I did my part to hold the CIA accountable.

I filed my sixth (!) declaration in connection with Morley v. CIA, my ongoing lawsuit against the agency seeking records related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

My case is far removed from the House Intelligence Committee's investigation of the mysterious assassination program recently canceled by CIA director Leon Panetta. It has nothing to do with Attorney Eric Holder's controversial consideration of whether to prosecute CIA officers for illegal interrogation methods. It is irrelevant to what Rep Rush Holt (D.-NJ) has proposed: a congressional investigation of the CIA as "intense and comprehensive as the probe conducted more than 30 years ago -- in the wake of the Watergate scandal -- by a special committee headed by U.S. Sen. Frank Church, an Idaho Democrat." (Hat tip to Spencer.)

But my Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, now in its sixth year, is a microcosm of the same basic question facing the White House, Congress and the American public: can the CIA be made to obey the law?


In my experience, the answer is: not easily. In this latest submission to the court, I did not bother offer a JFK conspiracy theory because I don't have one. Rather, my bone-dry 28-page declaration refutes a number of CIA claims made in a sworn affidavit submitted last year to Judge Richard J. Leon last November.

Who was George Joannides and why does his story matter? At the time of Kennedy's murder in Dallas on November 22, 1963, Joannides, using the aliases of 'Howard' and 'Walter Newby,' served as the chief of the CIA's psychological warfare programs in Miami. His assignment was to mount covert operations to confuse and confound the government of Fidel Castro so as to hasten its overthrow.

Joannides's duties, according my declaration and declassified CIA records, included guiding and monitoring an anti-Castro student exile group which was harshly critical of JFK's Cuba policy. The group made headlines within hours of JFK's murder by denouncing accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald as a Castro supporter. The Warren Commission was not told of Joannides' involvement with the group. Fifteen years later, Joannides served as the agency's liaison to the congressional committee re-investigating JFK's assassination. Congress was not told of Joannides' actions in 1963. Joannides died in 1990, having never been questioned by investigators about his knowledge of Oswald's contacts with the group he handled.

(If you want to know the Joannides story in detail, read here, here and here, then watch this video where I explain how the CIA at first tried to disavow any knowledge of Joannides' actions in 1963 and then had to backtrack.)

The Joannides file, say a diverse group of JFK authors, are part of the assassination story and should be made public. For six years, the CIA has refused, alleging their release would harm "national security."

In the sworn affidavit, Delores Nelson, the agency's chief information officer, downplayed the CIA's and Joannides' connection to Oswald's anti-Castro antagonists in 1963. Nelson stated that Joannides did not file the standard monthly reports on the group, known as the Cuban Student Directorate, in 1963 because of funding reductions and "policy differences." In fact, I showed that senior CIA officials preserved funding for the group up until one week before Kennedy was killed and that Joannides' boss credited him having it under control at the time that the group used CIA funds to link Oswald to Castro.

Nelson's affidavit, I noted, had relied on two error-filled CIA memoranda written in 1998. Those memos served to conceal from a civilian review panel the full extent of Joannides' contacts with anti-Castro Cubans in the weeks and days before Kennedy was killed, according to Judge John Tunheim who chaired a civilian review panel that declassified thousands of JFK records in the 1990s. "We were lied to about Joannides for a long time," said Tunheim, former head of the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB).

The agency has 30 days to file a response to my declaration with Judge Leon. That response will be a useful measure of whether the CIA is responding to the spirit and letter of President Obama's executive order on the Freedom of Information Act.

[Dawn Meredith]

Thanks for the update Peter, it could not be more timely, given all the CIA news of late. And Morely's question "does the CIA have to obey the law?" is paramount to this entire case. From solving it, to having the cover-up made public, to the mockery of HSCA under Blakey's legal, ah...abilities and persuasions. He was predisposed to the foolish notion that the Mob did it -IF there was any conspiracy -and had no interest in looking at the CIA.
Let's hope THIS time a court rules correctly. (But I am also not holding my breath).

Dawn

[Tosh Plumlee]

They (CIA) have been lying on me and others for over 40 plus years now. Also have had me under surveillance many time through out the years via DoJ as well as CIA almost as long.

This is nothing new to me... In fact I have told you and others this for years now "The CIA is Lying about our crews and covering up their past deeds in behalf of the White House NSC. Its on the record all the way back to the Church Committee of the seventies and the Kerry Committee of the nineties. I was called the liar by the DoJ and the CIA and it was sent to anyone who asked on ran a check on me, for one. AND my house got firebombed in the 80's and CIA documents taken from the house before the fire department arrived. (later some of the documents showed up in a FOIA request to the FBI... How did they (FBI) get them?

"...
Judge: CIA committed fraud in eavesdropping case.,

By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer Nedra Pickler, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 59 mins ago

WASHINGTON – A federal judge has ruled that CIA officials committed fraud to protect a former covert agent against an eavesdropping lawsuit and is considering sanctioning as many as six who have worked at the agency, including former CIA Director George Tenet.
According to court documents unsealed Monday, U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth referred a CIA attorney, Jeffrey Yeates, for disciplinary action. Lamberth also denied the CIA's renewed efforts under the Obama administration to keep the case secret because of what he calls the agency's "diminished credibility" and the "twisted history" in the case.
The judge also criticized CIA Director Leon Panetta, saying he's given conflicting accounts about what should be revealed in the case. The ruling led to the unsealing Monday of more than 200 unclassified versions of classified filings in the 13-year-old case.
"The court does not give the government a high degree of deference because of its prior misrepresentations regarding the state secrets privilege in this case," Lamberth ruled.
The court case comes amid increased scrutiny and allegations of lying against the spy agency.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in May that she believes the CIA lied to her about its harsh interrogation program in 2002. Panetta said in June that the CIA had not notified Congress about a secret program to develop hit squads for al-Qaida terrorists. And Congress is investigating whether the agency broke the law by not informing lawmakers about that and other secret activities.
The eavesdropping lawsuit was brought by a former agent with the Drug Enforcement Agency, Richard Horn, who says his home in Rangoon, Burma, was illegally wiretapped by the CIA in 1993. He says Arthur Brown, the former CIA station chief in Burma, and Franklin Huddle Jr., the chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Burma, were trying to get him relocated because they disagreed with his work with Burmese officials on the country's drug trade.
The agency has not said in court filings whether or not it monitored Horn, but Horn claims he was monitored without lawful authority and in violation of his constitutional protection against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Horn says he became suspicious when he came back from a trip out of town to find his government-issued rectangular coffee table replaced with a round one.
Lamberth criticized Panetta for claiming at one point that the CIA's methods for conducting electronic surveillance are state secrets, even though the type of transmitter that Horn claims was used on his coffee table is unclassified and on display at Washington's Spy Museum.
Horn also points to a cable that Huddle sent to Washington quoting his private telephone conversation, which Lamberth labeled "highly suspicious."
Horn sued Brown and Huddle in 1994, seeking monetary damages for violations of his civil rights because of the alleged wiretapping.
Tenet filed an affidavit in 2000 asking that the case against Brown be dismissed because he was a covert agent whose identity was a state secret that must not be revealed in open court. Lamberth granted the CIA's request and threw out the case against Brown in 2004.
But Lamberth found out last year that Brown's cover had been lifted in 2002, even though the CIA continued to file legal documents saying his status was covert. The judge found that the CIA intentionally misled the court and reinstated the case against Brown.
The former acting CIA general counsel, John Rizzo, said in a court filing that the CIA's office of general counsel did not know Brown's cover status changed until 2005, three years after the fact. Rizzo said that one CIA attorney, Yeates, knew about the change but did not tell the court or his supervisors.
Brown disputes Rizzo's account. In a statement to the court, Brown says that he met personally with two other CIA attorneys, Robert J. Eatinger and John Radsan, in 2002, within a few months of the CIA rolling back his covert status and notified them of the agency's action.
While Lamberth referred Yeates for disciplinary action for intentionally misleading the court, he delayed action until he determines if others, including Rizzo, Eatinger, Radsan, Tenet and Brown himself, should face contempt charges or sanctions for failing to notify the court of Brown's change in status. He has given the five others a month to explain why they shouldn't be held responsible.
CIA spokesman George Little offered a brief response to the case, saying that the agency takes its obligation to the U.S. courts seriously. The CIA refused to confirm the employment status of the officials in the case. A spokesman for Tenet declined to comment.
___
Associated Press writer Pamela Hess contributed to this report.