The Burglary

by Betty Medsger

  Speaking on behalf of the FBI and the Department of Justice that day, Rehnquist was combative in his opposition to the legislation Ervin proposed to protect Americans from such surveillance. Congress, Rehnquist insisted, must not restrict the government from collecting information about citizens. “Aide to Mitchell Opposes Any Curb on Surveillance” was the headline of the New York Times story on the hearing the next day. Rehnquist told the committee the department “will vigorously oppose any legislation which, whether by opening the door to unnecessary and unmanageable judicial supervision of such activities or otherwise, would effectively impair this extraordinarily important function of the Federal Government.”

  As Hoover wrestled that morning with how to find and secure the stolen Media documents and prevent them from ever becoming public, he could not have asked for more from Rehnquist. The future chief justice argued that “isolated imperfections” in surveillance and various forms of information collection should not be permitted “to obscure the fundamental necessity and importance of Federal information gathering, or the generally high level of performance in this area by the organizations involved,” the FBI key among them. There should be no legislative restrictions, Rehnquist insisted, for “self-discipline on the part of the executive branch will provide an answer to virtually all of the legitimate complaints against excesses of information gathering.”

  New York Times columnist Tom Wicker wrote two days later that Rehnquist’s claim that self-discipline by federal agencies adequately protected citizens from government intrusions on their rights should be viewed alongside Attorney General Mitchell’s recent claim that the executive branch had an unlimited right to use electronic surveillance on any person or organization without seeking permission of, or notifying, any court. It was clear, wrote Wicker, “they are asking us to set a goat to guard the cabbage patch.” Two weeks later, Americans would begin to learn what had happened as a result of relying on self-discipline by the FBI for a half century. They would learn about the goat’s feast.

  9

  FBI and Burglars in a Race

  DESPITE GETTING LITTLE or no sleep since the night before the burglary, most of the burglars took Davidon’s advice and went to work or school the next day. By seven o’clock that evening they were back at the farmhouse. There was a sense of urgency as they convened again as the Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI. There had been no news stories about the burglary. As far as any of them knew, it was still a secret. Their planned public announcement seemed to have failed. They assumed the silence was a calm before a storm and that they were in a race to analyze and distribute FBI files before that storm hit.

  Davidon arrived later than the others that evening. He was delayed by his phone interview with Washington Star columnist Mary McGrory about the Saturday meeting with Kissinger at the White House. Four days after the Media burglary, as the search for the burglars reached high gear, McGrory’s interview with Davidon, along with a photograph of him, was on the front page of the Star.

  For more than a week after the burglary, the burglars worked intensely as a cohesive group on thoroughly analyzing and organizing the files and preparing them for distribution. Under Davidon’s leadership, they had developed a plan for release of the files. Unlike their failed strategy for announcing why the burglary had taken place, their distribution plan was handled so competently that it seemed like something that might have been organized by the best minds at J. Walter Thompson, a public relations/marketing agency then known as one of the best strategic marketers of information in the world. Davidon wisely concluded that the files would get much more attention if they were sent to journalists in small sets in successive mailings instead of in one big mailing. To draw maximum attention to the content, he made sure that each set included documents of significant news value and a cover letter from the commission.

  Except for an unplanned ride to the city one day, the files were kept at the farm until the burglars were ready to copy them. They had agreed well before the burglary that it was important to review the files as far away from the city as possible, but at a place the burglars could travel to and from easily each day as they maintained double lives—normal life at work or school by day, commission life at the farm at night. They were grateful that Ron Durst was willing to stay at the farm and protect the documents full-time. But one day the pressure on him became too great. Alone in the house, he worried to the point of near panic about the possibility that law enforcement officers might arrive at any moment and discover him and the files. He felt compelled to take them and himself elsewhere. He loaded them in his car and drove to the city. Unfortunately, he went to Powelton Village, a section of Philadelphia where many members of the Resistance and some of the Media burglars lived. Because of its reputation as a neighborhood full of antiwar activists, the FBI had placed some Powelton residents—and eventually most of the neighborhood—under heavy surveillance almost immediately after the burglary. By the time Durst drove there, the neighborhood already was well on its way to becoming ground zero in the bureau’s search for the Media burglars. When he dropped in on a couple of friends and asked if he could store some documents in their home, he realized from their silence and the strained expressions on their faces that he had made a mistake and should get out of the area immediately. The neighborhood felt radioactive. He drove back to the farm realizing anew that the nice secluded house, lonely as it was, was definitely the preferred hiding place for the files.

  After the burglars finished organizing the files and cover letters, it was time for what they thought would be the easiest part of the post-burglary aspects of their work: copying the documents. Instead, to their great surprise, copying the documents was the most threatening aspect of anything they did, from the beginning of planning the burglary to distributing the files. They had what seemed like a very workable plan for making the thousands of copies they needed. Before the burglary, Durst bought a used tabletop Xerox copier at a very low price and set it up at the farm. They thought they were going to have a completely self-contained operation there: read, analyze, copy, package for mailing. None of them recalls years later how much the copier cost. Whatever it was, they agree it was too much. The copier was worthless. It operated so slowly that copying a document was like watching grass grow. This was not acceptable for people racing to copy and distribute documents before the FBI found them. In addition to copying slowly, much of the time the copier simply didn’t work. Copies were so light it was nearly impossible to read them, and the ink had a foul odor—distinctive qualities that would be very helpful to FBI agents trying to trace copies to their source.

  What to do? By the time they were ready to copy files, the burglars were well aware that a massive search for them was under way. Under the circumstances, it was of course not feasible to arrange for Xerox repair service at either the farm or at a Xerox repair center. Besides, the copier seemed to be beyond repair. This unexpected situation presented them with two problems that needed to be solved immediately: where to copy the files and how to get rid of the smelly, malfunctioning copier. They realized that though it was of no value to them, the copier could become a significant piece of evidence for the FBI. They found an easy solution to that problem. The philosophy professor who had turned down Davidon’s invitation to be part of the group wanted to know if he could help them in any way. How was he at deep-sixing copy machines? He took on the job. He later told Davidon that on a weekend visit to friends in Ohio, he buried the copier deep in his host’s densely cluttered garage. As he described the copier’s resting place to Davidon later, it was one of those garages overflowing with what looked like a family’s lifetime of discarded papers and old belongings. It seemed like a perfect place to conceal a fugitive copier. As far as is known, it never was discovered by anyone and may still be buried in that Ohio garage.

  Once the burglars were rid of the copier, they made a decision that would bedevil them—and the FBI and the Xerox Corporation—for several months. Davidon and
John Raines each took portions of the documents and copied them at their respective campus offices. Throughout this process—from casing through burglary, working at the farmhouse with documents, copying documents, and handling envelopes—the burglars continued to be very strict about wearing gloves. Davidon and Raines did so now as they stood for many hours at campus copiers near their offices copying and collating stacks of documents, separating them into precise groups. They copied files on a Sunday when colleagues and janitors were unlikely to be there and wonder why they were doing so much copying, not to mention why they were wearing gloves as they copied page after page. As far as they knew, no one saw them as they endlessly copied FBI files on overheated machines.

  AS THE BURGLARS COPIED and fretted about distributing the documents as soon as possible, agents searched. From J. Edgar Hoover’s perspective, the investigation was going badly. The “UNSUB” woman had not been identified, despite the fact that agents working the case continued to show the police artist’s drawing of her to other agents, police officers, and countless other people they thought might be able to identify her. No one had. By a week after the burglary, lock-picking tools still had not been found in or near the Media office. FBI lab personnel were unable to identify precisely what tools were used on the locks. A locksmith brought in to evaluate the damaged locks offered no real help but offered high praise for the unknown lock picker. In his report he noted, “Lock obviously manipulated by person highly skilled in working with locks.” Keith Forsyth chuckled many years later when he learned how highly his work had been regarded.

  As the investigation continued, some top FBI officials in Philadelphia and Washington focused on determining which documents had been stolen. The task wasn’t easy, but it was necessary in order for them to assess what damage would be done to the FBI if any of the documents became public. Simultaneously, the director kept insisting that the documents must be found and never become public. He was especially concerned about informers being identified. In a memo to a long list of field office supervisors around the country, he repeated his original demand: “This investigation must be given preferred investigative attention and all leads handled expeditiously.”

  During the first week of the investigation, reports from field offices included these:

  • From Boston: Michael Kenney, editorial writer at the Boston Globe, received an announcement of the burglary and did not give agents original envelopes or copies of files he received. His articles, an agent wrote, indicate that “he has antiwar and anti-draft opinions. If efforts fail to get Kenney to hand over originals he received, will issue subpoena to Kenney to produce originals before grand jury.” A March 13 memo repeated the plan to subpoena Kenney but noted that agents probably would be able to get documents from “friendly” Philadelphia newspapers. Kenney was later named a suspect in the case.

  • From Newark: A possible suspect was found by the Red Bank, New Jersey, FBI office: a long-haired person sitting in a car near the office.

  • From New Haven: The names of four persons were submitted as possible suspects “due to their adherence to views inimical to FBI and U.S. Government.”

  • From New York: A report said that John Peter Grady, key suspect and presumed to be the leader of the Media group, “keeps irregular hours and difficult to know when he will be home.…All logical informants and sources of the New York office are being contacted in this matter, however, to date with negative results.”

  • From Washington, D.C.: On orders from the director, bureau files were checked for all the people who had signed a letter to President Nixon in an advertisement that ran in the Washington Post on June 25, 1969: “Mr. President: End the war now.” It had been placed in the paper by the End the War Now Ad Hoc Committee, based in Silver Spring, Maryland.

  • From Indianapolis: The field office checked on the whereabouts on March 8 of a man from Bloomington, Indiana, who agents there thought might do such a thing.

  • From New York: Agents investigated a man from New Paltz who on November 8, 1968, had sent a portion of his draft card to the Department of Justice.

  The 33,698-page investigative record of the burglary conveys the impression that FBI officials in Washington and Philadelphia, beginning with Hoover, were frantic but not focused as they issued orders and reviewed findings. Consequently, ideas for new lines of investigation easily sparked new interest and swiftly diverted investigators’ attention in new directions and away from earlier lines of investigation. Lines of investigation appear to have been both pursued and abandoned without justification for the shifts. Distraction, rather than analysis and insight, seemed to be the key driver during the early, most intense months of the investigation.

  At first, the overriding assumption was that the burglary was done by people from the Catholic peace movement. Immediately, though, the field of possible suspects was expanded to include practically anyone who either looked inappropriate, according to FBI standards, or was known to have antiwar opinions. Those two descriptions covered a substantial portion of the population at that time. As the names of potential suspects flowed in from around the country, it did indeed seem as though any long-haired person, “hippie-looking” person, or known antiwar protester qualified to be considered a MEDBURG suspect. One insignificant tip led to the sudden investigation of communes throughout the Philadelphia area. The manpower employed by the bureau to investigate MEDBURG—approximately two hundred agents at the peak—was great, and so was the wasted energy.

  The sense of urgency in the bureau increased as every lab report on fingerprints, as well as on the palm print on the cabinet by the door—the print that gave the Media agents hope for an early arrest that first morning—came back from the FBI lab negative. To the investigators’ great disappointment, all prints found in the Media office were those of FBI agents.

  Agents questioned people who lived and worked in the immediate area of the office. They questioned more than once the people who lived above the FBI office. In the end, none of those interviews produced useful information. Other futile early efforts reported:

  • On March 12, the Friday after the burglary, there was a “canvas [sic] of motels within five-mile radius of RA, canvas of taverns, restaurants and drug stores in Media area having employees and customers in area late night hours.” During this canvas, agents apparently again did not notice that Davidon, an early suspect, had rented a room on March 8 in his own name.

  • Records of rental car agencies in the area were reviewed but FBI agents did not discover that Davidon had rented a car from a local agency the day before the burglary.

  • Owners of cars parked on streets near the office on the morning of the break-in were identified and “backgrounds secured. None identified as being connected with militant groups.”

  • Thirty-five post office employees on duty 2 p.m. to 11 p.m., March 8, contacted, and one all-night service station personnel interviewed.

  • Contract employees of the company that managed the building where FBI office located were interviewed.

  • Clients in community welfare office adjacent to Media Resident Agency up to 9 p.m. on March 8 interviewed without obtaining pertinent info.

  • Former commune known to include numerous Swarthmore College students at time of raid [of commune] by bureau agents October 1970 at 1442 W. Baltimore Pike, Media. “Efforts being made to determine any possible involvement these individuals.”

  • Eighty-nine pieces of [military] deserter mail reviewed. Six disclosed information relating to FBI confidential sources in telephone companies in Philadelphia, Conshohocken, a town west of Philadelphia, Raleigh, NC, and Wilmington, DE. More confidential phone company sources revealed later.

  • South Carolina Employment Security Commission furnished “confidential employment information.”

  • A state employment agency in Delaware also provided confidential employment information.

  A summary of those early efforts concluded, “All above could furnish no positive i
nformation.…Will maintain contact with sources on college campuses in area for any positive information.”

  An unusual news story came to the attention of the investigators. It surprised not only the FBI, but also the burglars. The Delaware County Daily Times, a newspaper in Chester, Pennsylvania, ran a story with this banner headline across the top of the front page on March 12: “Davidon Unveils Plot Against FBI.” A smaller headline on the story, “Reveals ransackers of office,” wasn’t true. On March 11, Davidon had given a talk at the Swarthmore Presbyterian Church prior to the showing of a film, The Holy Outlaw, about Daniel Berrigan. Davidon had been asked weeks earlier to speak at the event. According to the news story, Davidon read the group a release he said he had received from the Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI. It was the group’s announcement of the burglary, the one that John Raines read to a reporter the morning after the burglary. Until now it had not been reported by any news media. Davidon announced to the audience that he was reading this announcement of an important event “because no news media had carried word of it.” The story described the sixty-five people present at the forum as “startled” when Davidon read the “revelation.” As the leader of the burglars, Davidon often had advised his fellow burglars on the need to be silent about the burglary. After the burglary, it seemed at times, especially when he made these public remarks, that he was not taking his own advice and was skirting too close to danger.

  Public remarks by William Davidon about the burglary were reported in a front-page banner headline in a local newspaper just four days after the burglary. As guest speaker at a meeting of clergy in Swarthmore, he read the commission’s statement explaining why they broke into an FBI office. During the entire five-year investigation of the burglary, he was never questioned by FBI investigators.