-Caveat Lector- <A HREF="http://www.aci.net/kalliste/">The Home Page of J. Orlin Grabbe</A> ----- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Today's Lesson From FBI Secrets: An Agent's Expose by M. Wesley Swearingen >From September 1973 to September 1974 the [FBI] racial squad opened 1,800 phony cases on computerized lists stolen from organizations under investigation. I worked on some cases opened from a computerized list of names lifted from a [black] bag job on the American Nazi Party. The racial squad never figured out what the list of names meant, but we investigated nearly 2,000 individuals on that list, and some agents wrote reports to Washington claiming that these people were members of the American Nazi Party, when actually we did not know whether the list represented individuals who had bought a new car or had bought a magazine subscription. This is significant because those innocent individuals, who were recklessly reported as being members of the American Nazi Party by some incompetent FBI agent using an unidentified mailing list, will never be able to obtain a job with the U.S. or any state government, and they will never know why they were rejected for employment unless they request their file under the Freedom of Information Act. During that period the FBI opened cases on several thousand telephone numbers called by members of the Black Panther Party, including business establishments and public institutions, much the same way as I was ordered to do on the Weathermen in 1970. The FBI opened 129 cases based on the names from an address book taken from a black man who had been arrested by the LAPD on local charges. The FBI opened twenty-six fake cases from licenses numbers taken from cars parked near the area where a memorial was held on August 7, 1973, in remembrance of the martyrdom of Jonathan Jackson. . . . In contrast to what the GAO was told, the FBI had conducted a full-field investigation of every member of the Los Angeles chapter of the American Indian Movement based on copies of membership applications that were surreptitiously removed from the movement office in Los Angeles by an FBI informant. Because the FBI had a quota of five informants for every agent, many AIM members became fake informants, unbeknown to the AIM member. ----- Barbecued Children Congress to Investigate Government Responsibility for Waco Clinton: "Some religious fanatics murdered themselves." CONGRESS plans to investigate the 1993 siege at Waco, Texas, as evidence mounts that the government may have been responsible for the death of 80 cult members, including 25 children. The disclosure, after six years of denials, that incendiary tear gas canisters were fired into the Branch Davidian compound before it erupted in a fireball, and that members of the elite Delta Force, equivalent to the SAS, took part, have stoked suspicion of a whitewash. Gene Cullen, a former CIA officer, told the Dallas Morning News yesterday that Delta Force members told him they were "present, up front and close" during the siege, and had been on the tanks with which federal forces smashed through the compound. The Texas public safety department said it has evidence that may confirm this illegal military involvement. President Clinton did not sign a waiver allowing the army to join the action at Waco, and if soldiers participated without it, they broke the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act which bans military involvement in domestic law enforcement. Congressman Dan Burton, chairman of the House of Representatives oversight committee, has not yet announced hearings. But congressional sources say this is because he wants a lengthy period during which to sift evidence of a wide-ranging cover-up, rather than simply consider the admission that pyrotechnic canisters were fired. "We will be looking into all the evidence relevant to this case," Mr Burton's spokesman said. He would not confirm that this would include examination of infra-red surveillance tapes which appear to show the FBI shooting at Branch Davidians as they tried to escape. FBI eavesdroppers recorded Branch Davidians apparently discussing starting the fire, and arson experts say this seems to be what happened because the flames sprang up in three places simultaneously. But Congress may start picking holes in the Justice Department's account of the siege, just as survivors and relatives go to court this autumn to sue the government for the wrongful death of cult members. A Texas judge has rejected the government's request for summary dismissal of the case, ruling that there is enough evidence to go to trial on October 18. Janet Reno, the Attorney-General, admitted that, contrary to assurances given repeatedly for six years, the FBI did fire two pyrotechnic gas canisters on the last day of the 51-day siege. But she claims that they were fired at least four hours before the fire started and were directed not at the Davidians' house, but at concrete bunkers some distance away. She had no reason to believe "at this point" that the FBI was responsible for the deaths, but conceded: "I don't think it's very good for my credibility." Michael Caddell, the plaintiffs' lawyer, said: "I think what the government is doing is trying to get its story straight before all the evidence comes out." Jay Young, a chemical safety consultant, said that gas canisters fired hours earlier could have started the fire. "When you fire this device . . . you ignite a fuse, which burns until a certain time later, at which time the incendiary part is ignited, and burns with a very hot flame and causes the tear gas material to vaporise. These fuses . . . sometimes are delayed. It's possible that one of those incendiary tear gas devices had a fuse which malfunctioned and did not ignite the incendiary stuff for a long time." The belief that the Branch Davidians and their eccentric leader, David Koresh, were more or less mad, and government claims that the cultists fired the first shots, have meant that Waco's victims have received little sympathy. Directly after the fatal conflagration, Mr Clinton said: "Some religious fanatics murdered themselves." The London Telegraph, August 28, 1999 Money Laundering Gore Role in Russian Money Laundering Hey! Let's loan the Russians some more money. WASHINGTON - New revelations about Russian money laundering through a major U.S. bank have presented Vice President Al Gore with a potentially difficult campaign issue, and once again illustrated the pitfalls of running for the White House from the vice president's chair. A criminal investigation into charges that Russian mobsters and politicians may have laundered money - including diverted international aid funds - through accounts at the Bank of New York has revived a debate in Washington over whether the Clinton administration has given too much support to a Russian government known to be plagued by corruption. As the chairman of a joint commission on bilateral ties with former Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin - a role he once proudly embraced - Mr. Gore has been one of the targets of past attacks. Now, several of his opponents in the presidential race appear to sense a new opportunity in the issue. The Republican presidential candidate Steve Forbes said Thursday that Mr. Gore shares in the blame for the latest scandal. Foreign policy aides to Governor George W. Bush of Texas are arguing that the administration should have been more sensitive to the level of corruption in Moscow and that Mr. Gore too willingly accepted pledges of reform that were never carried out. The Gore team has responded quickly to the emerging issue, offering a detailed account of the vice president's conversations with Russian leaders about its crime problems. At the same time, aides have stressed that Mr. Gore had no idea federal investigators were looking into allegations that the Bank of New York laundered billions for Russian criminals, including some with close connections to the government of President Boris Yeltsin. ''With respect to stories about the Bank of New York, the vice president would not have been aware of it,'' said Leon Fuerth, Mr. Gore's top national security adviser. ''He learned of it reading the newspapers.'' Though no one has charged that Mr. Gore knew of the financial diversions, the money laundering scandal has tendrils that could run close to the vice president. One of the people who oversaw the New York accounts is married to the man who was Russia's representative to the International Monetary Fund from 1992 to 1995, at a time when the Clinton administration was deeply involved in IMF lending to Russia. Mr. Chernomyrdin, Mr. Gore's partner in the bilateral commission from 1993 until last year, was himself reportedly the target of allegations of corruption in a Central Intelligence Agency report to Mr. Gore in November 1998. Mr. Gore was said to have rejected that report. Consequently, after boasting for years about the vice president's unique role overseeing relations with Russia, Mr. Gore's advisers now find themselves shifting to the defensive about foreign policy credentials they hoped would be a campaign asset. There is also frustration in the Gore camp about his being held responsible by critics for Clinton administration policies made by others, as well as for alleged crimes in a foreign country. ''It is quite clear that people are going to try to turn this into an effort to assail what the vice president has been doing on foreign policy by attacking one of the things he's worked hardest at,'' said one Gore strategist. Mr. Forbes, who plans to talk regularly on the campaign trail about the Russian economic crisis, said Mr. Gore long ignored warning signs that the country was in grave trouble. ''It's long been in the papers that tens of millions of Russians are not being paid; it's long been known billions are being siphoned off,'' he said. ''This is nothing new, and yet they keep shoveling billions of IMF money into a government that misuses it and into a government that doesn't pay its workers.'' Mr. Fuerth said that Mr. Gore never met the Russian who represented Moscow at the IMF and had long pressed Russian leaders to reform. The subject of organized crime in Russia ''has come up on a number of occasions'' through the bilateral commission, he said, noting that Mr. Gore ''went out of his way to make sure the Russians participated'' in a global conference on crime and corruption held late February at the State Department. Specifically, Mr. Fuerth said that last month Mr. Gore urged then Prime Minister Sergei Stepashin to accept IMF demands to submit to an extensive audit before receiving any more financial aid. International Herald Tribune, August 28, 1999 Money Laundering BONY Fires Employee in Money Laundering Scandal Lucy Edwards failed to cooperate, they said The Bank of New York yesterday sacked a key figure in the investigation into allegations that billions of dollars in criminal proceeds were laundered through its accounts by Russian organised crime. Lucy Edwards, a vice president of the bank who was placed on leave last week, was fired for gross misconduct, violations of the bank's internal policies, falsification of bank records and a failure to co-operate with inquiries, people familiar with the matter said. Ms Edwards worked in the London office of the Bank of New York and reported to Natasha Gurfinkel Kagalovsky, her supervisor, who is also suspended pending the result of the probe. On Thursday, Ms Kagalovsky maintained her innocence through her lawyer. Lawyers for Ms Edwards said they were making no statement on her behalf. Neither the bank nor either of the two employees has been accused of any wrong-doing by legal authorities. Last week officers of the UK's national crime squad raided the central London home of Ms Edwards searching for clues into the case. Ms Edwards' husband, Peter Berlin, who along with his wife is Russian-born, was the sole director and shareholder in Benex Worldwide. Transactions involving Benex's accounts at the Bank of New York are at the heart of the money laundering investigation. Meanwhile, Jim Leach, chairman of the banking committee of the US House of Representatives, yesterday called for a moratorium on lending to Russia by the International Monetary Fund unless safeguards are put in place to prevent the money from being stolen. His remarks followed newspaper reports that IMF money may have been among the funds channelled through accounts in the Bank of New York and now under investigation. Mr Leach said yesterday: "Unless and until firm methodologies for safeguarding funds are established, a moratorium ought to be put into place on IMF lending to Russia." The next $640m tranche of a $4.5bn IMF loan for Russia is due in September. In a report to be released next week, the IMF defends its lending practices to Russia, saying: "There is no evidence that any of the IMF's money was stolen or otherwise diverted." The Fund has been hurt in the past by allegations that its loans to Russia were mis-used or even siphoned off by well connected insiders. The Financial Times, August 28, 1999 Copper Market Phelps Dodge Launches Hostile Takeover Bid for Two Rivals Asarco and Cyprus Amax Phelps Dodge, the US copper producer, yesterday told Asarco and Cyprus Amax that terms which they had suggested for an agreed three-way merger were "so unreasonable that [the] sincerity is questionable". Instead, it proceeded to launch hostile bids for the two companies yesterday afternoon, using the share exchange ratios which it had suggested a week earlier. Phelps also made filings designed to start its proxy fight against the Asarco-Cyprus deal. The Phelps offer filed yesterday values Asarco at around $1bn and Cyprus at $1.7bn. The terms mooted by the target companies as an acceptable basis for an agreed deal would raise these values to around $1.2bn and $2.1bn respectively. In a letter to the chairmen of the two mining companies, which are planning their own two-way merger, Phelps said that it would still be happy to "sit down and negotiate" a deal, but that the share swap ratios proposed by Asarco and Cyprus "seem to be premised on the flawed assumption that since your combined production would be comparable to Phelps Dodge's, you should be valued at the same level as Phelps Dodge". This, it claimed, failed to take into account a superior management record at Phelps and higher shareholder returns there. Phelps also threatened to walk away if Asarco-Cyprus went ahead with their own deal. "Should you proceed to complete your two-way merger, you will proceed alone because we will withdraw our substantial premium proposal and will not bid further," wrote Douglas Yearley, Phelps chairman. The Financial Times, August 28, 1999 ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. 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