by Mark Lane
We traveled together by train to Washington, and took a cab from Union Station to a House office building where I introduced him to members of the HSCA, staying only long enough to shake hands with the committee members. They talked to him and then hired him.
The FBI and the CIA acted at once. They asserted that they would investigate those Sprague wanted to employ and decide what documents they would make available. Sprague rejected their offers and stated that “We must get every relevant document from the FBI files here in Washington and from the CIA vaults in Langley, Virginia.” When asked by a reporter how he could hope to get classified documents that the FBI and CIA had denied to Senate and House Intelligence Committees, Sprague responded, “We are a congressional committee in form, but in substance we are investigating two homicides.”
Gaeton Fonzi was a dedicated and talented investigator working for the HSCA. He wrote, “After talking with Sprague I was now certain he planned to conduct a strong investigation and I was never more optimistic in my life.” He described the scope of the forthcoming efforts and concluded, “The Kennedy assassination would finally get the investigation it deserved and an honest democracy needed.”125
The implicated intelligence agencies apparently reached the same conclusion. The CIA refused to make information about its Mexico City story available and then insisted that Sprague sign an agreement with the CIA committing him to silence. Sprague said that House Resolution 222, which established the HSCA, authorized the committee to investigate the agencies of the United States government. He said that signing a secrecy agreement would be in direct conflict with the resolution. Sprague asked how he could “possibly sign an agreement with an agency I’m supposed to be investigating.”
The CIA–drafted agreement was the most onerous of the species. The signer is prevented from revealing any information he has become aware of in perpetuity. If he violated that agreement, he faced legal action against him and he would be required, after losing the case, to pay the cost of the legal action against him. Sprague declined and said that instead he would subpoena all relevant CIA records.
A campaign to remove Sprague was undertaken. Jeremiah O’Leary of the Washington Star, revealed to be one of several reporters on the asset list of the intelligence agencies, together with other CIA and FBI assets in the news media, led the charge. The FBI hired former agents to lobby with congress to fire Sprague. Some conservative members of congress demanded that if Sprague was not removed they would prevent any funds from being allocated to the HSCA. The committee was a select committee, not a standing committee, meaning that it was not financed annually or bi-annually, but sporadically. The CIA and the FBI targeted Sprague because he was moving in on the culprits. If he could be removed, the committee could be tamed.
One influential member of congress called me to explain the dilemma. She said if they did not fire him there would be no funding. She said that I had worked harder than anyone to form the committee. She said that no one wanted to fire him, but that they had no choice. She asked, “Can I say you agree?” I said that Sprague was a man of honor, which is why the CIA and FBI were afraid of him. I said that the members should stand up on the floor of congress and tell the American people the truth. I had hoped that they had once seen Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. I said, “You can say that I am certain that if you fire him you will replace him with a government agent who will sign a secrecy agreement, who will clear the FBI and CIA and who will not explore the Mexico City Scenario.” She said, “Mark, you just don’t know how things work here.” I said I knew how they worked; I just didn’t like it and I did not understand their fear.
That year another matter also occupied me. Jose Ramos-Horta, a founder of the Revolutionary Front for an Independent East Timor (FRETILIN), was in New York. He was going to address the United Nations Security Council about the brutal Indonesian occupation of East Timor. Later reports indicated that more than 100,000 East Timorese had died. He had recently been appointed Foreign Minister of the Democratic Republic of East Timor at the age of twenty-five. Indonesian troops invaded and began an indiscriminate slaughter of civilians. Ramos-Horta asked if I could meet with him to discuss the matter, including his efforts at the UN. I met the penniless young man. His passion and determination were obvious. I had not the slightest indication then that within a decade, he would become a Nobel Peace Prize recipient and later the president of his country. After several discussions of his forthcoming work at the UN, he called upon me again for another mission.
He explained that his country was suffering and that a dramatic act was required. I was intrigued and he had my full attention. He explained that there was a man in Australia who owned a schooner that he was making available for the trip. The trip was from Australia to East Timor through an Indonesian blockade. “To deliver supplies?” I asked. “No,” he replied, “to have on board distinguished people known for their commitment to humanity and their courage.” Dr. Benjamin Spock, he said, would probably be on the ship. “And,” he added, “perhaps you?” It was an honor to be asked, yet I had a few questions of my own. It was about the “courage” part. Well, it was really just one question. “What does the Indonesian government say about the voyage?” He answered quite calmly, “Well, of course they say they will blow the ship out of the water.” He paused and said, “We think they probably will not do that, it would be too embarrassing for them.” And, I thought, also somewhat inconvenient for those of us on the ship. “Us?” I asked myself. My only explanation for agreeing is that I was much younger at the time.
I did make plans, made sure my passport was in order and flew to San Francisco for a flight to Australia. The press in Australia evidently thought it was an event worth reporting. In looking through my files the other day I found a clipping from The Australian126 dated May 12, 1976. Stapled to it was a note saying “Jose (Jose Ramos-Horta) asked me to request that you let Mark Lane have a copy of the enclosed clipping.” The four-column headline read “Crusader fights to save Timor.” It began, “The crusading American lawyer Mark Lane has pledged his immediate future to the Timorese, a people he had not heard of six months ago.” It continued, “He has no qualms about facing a potentially dangerous situation in East Timor.” What could I have been thinking, I wondered as I recently read the article.
Perhaps there are some forces in the universe that protect people who have made reckless decisions. The first guardian angel in this case was the government of Australia, which was more concerned about a good relationship with the genocidal government of Indonesia than it was about those dying in a powerless little country. The government announced that it would not grant a visa to me to enter Australia. That became a major event since it led to a battle on the floor of the parliament. Threats of a vote of no confidence prevailed, the government relented, and the trip was on again.
Apparently the only person with a substantial financial stake in the matter, the owner of the schooner who had never volunteered to be a passenger, decided to withdraw his offer of the vessel. He had determined that if his ship was blown out of the water, his insurance company would not have considered it to be an “accident” as defined by the policy. With no alternative transportation available, the trip was off again.
Back in the slightly less frightening confines of the nation’s capital I met with Sprague over lunch at the Market Inn, a wonderful old Washington seafood place located close to the humble offices assigned to Sprague and his staff. He told me about Robert K. Tanenbaum and asked if I knew him. He added that he was going to ask Tanenbaum to run the investigation into the assassination of President Kennedy. I said that I knew he had a fine reputation and that I had never tried a case against him. Since then I have had the opportunity to learn about Tanenbaum.
Two young women, Janice Wylie and Emily Hoffert, were murdered in their Upper East Side apartment in Manhattan. Eight months later, police officers in Brooklyn, after a lengthy interrogation, obtained a sixty-three-page confession from George Whitmore and celeb
rated the fact that they had solved a case with great media attention and concomitant political pressure.
A young assistant district attorney in Manhattan, Melvin D. Glass, doubted the validity of the confession and conducted his own investigation causing anger among the police for seeking to open a closed case and to impugn their methods. Mel Glass persisted. The confession was proven to be false and eventually the real murderer, Ricky Robles, was arrested and convicted. That false confession was cited in the case establishing what is now called the Miranda Rule, requiring those in custody to be warned that statements they make may be used against them at trial, that they need not talk to authorities and that they are guaranteed the right to counsel. Mel worked for the legendary Frank Hogan. The modus operandi at that office was to seek justice, not merely to convict.
When Robert Tanenbaum joined the District Attorney’s Office, Mel Glass took him on a tour of the Tombs, a cramped, rancid-smelling prison attached to the courthouse. He told Tanenbaum if he ordered the arrest of a person, the prisoner, unless he could post bail, would likely end up there for a long time even before trial. He said be sure, not just beyond a reasonable doubt, but absolutely beyond any and all doubt that he is guilty and that you have admissible evidence to prove it. He also advised Tanenbaum not to request bail that was beyond the means of the prisoner.
Tanenbaum later became chief of homicide and bureau chief of the criminal Court where he was responsible for the intake of all cases, approximately 250 per day. Neither he nor Glass ever wavered from the high ethical standards established by Mr. Hogan. In the many years I practiced as a defense lawyer in Mr. Hogan’s courthouse, I never heard of even a hint of district attorney corruption nor did I see that office yield to political pressure. Those high and immutable standards were rarely shared by prosecutors in the other boroughs or elsewhere in the state or nation where I tried many cases.
Both Sprague and Tanenbaum were honest, intelligent and skillful lawyers committed to learning and publishing the truth. When both the CIA and the FBI, aided by powerful media allies, began the campaign to have Sprague fired, Rep. Harold Ford, a member of the HSCA, stated that “the FBI has hired former agents to lobby with Congress against the continuation of the Select Committee.”
Later I talked with Tanenbaum about George De Morhenschildt. I said that I had long believed that he was a viable suspect who had never been adequately questioned and whose testimony might be the Rosetta stone placing other relevant evidence in context. Sprague and Tanenbaum dispatched Gaeton Fonzi, their most experienced investigator, to meet with De Morhenschildt.
Events were moving quickly as Sprague and Tanenbaum were getting close to the truth. Phillips was on the verge of confessing that the entire story the CIA had told to the Warren Commission was a fabrication, that in fact Oswald had never been to Mexico City and that the story was created by the CIA to prevent Warren from conducting an honest investigation. Phillips later made those specific admissions in public. His confession demonstrated conclusively that the CIA, in September 1963, was falsely creating a fiction that could and would be used to implicate Oswald in a crime that would not be committed until November 1963; this guilty foreknowledge, known at the law as scienter, clearly demonstrated the CIA’s complicity, not merely as accessories after the fact, but as accessories before the fact. That difference is most significant.
In addition, De Morhenschildt was about to be seriously confronted with evidence of his involvement as the CIA agent assigned to control Oswald, his pre-assassination moves, as well as his previous efforts on behalf of the CIA and before that, his actions for foreign governments in assisting assassination plans against other heads of state.
Sprague and his inquiry and De Mohrenschildt were loose ends. De Mohrenschildt had expressed remorse in his role and stated that he had been unfairly used by the CIA since that agency had originally assured him that his control of Oswald was not going to place Oswald in harm’s way.
Tanenbaum put it succinctly, “That was some evening. Fonzi was on his way to see De Morhenschildt; De Mohrenschildt was found dead. A shotgun blast had blown his head off in Florida. At the same time, Sprague was being told that the committee was dead if he remained.”
Early on, as the Kennedy investigation began, Tanenbaum received a phone call from Senator Richard Schweiker, asking to meet with him. Tanenbaum brought with him to the meeting Cliff Fenton, an African American police officer who had served as a mentor for Tanenbaum in the district attorney’s office and had accompanied him to Washington to assist with the investigation into the murder of JFK. With Senator Schweiker, were two members of his own staff. Schweiker asked Fenton and his own staff members to leave the room so that he could have a private talk with Tanenbaum. When they were alone Schweiker said, “I have a file I want you to read, and keep it in a secure place. All of the intelligence agencies will fight you tooth and nail during your investigation and they will also claim that they are cooperating.” Schweiker handed the report to Tanenbaum and said, “I believe the CIA was involved in the assassination of the president.” The two men shook hands and Tanenbaum and Fenton left.
They studied the report until 3:00 AM and Tanenbaum was stunned by its contents. Fenton was silent for a period. Then he turned to his friend and said, “Tanny, we’re in way over our heads here and there’s no Hogan here to protect you.”
The Hoover Memo
When I first met with Sprague, he asked two questions. “What is the single most important issue we should look at and who are the most important witnesses?” I suggested that an interview with George De Mohrenschildt, who apparently was Oswald’s babysitter for the CIA, would be a good place to start since De Mohrenschildt had been engaged in assassination planning in other countries. I also said to Sprague that crucial to the cover-up by the CIA was the false assertion by David Atlee Phillips about Oswald’s apocryphal trip to Mexico City. I suggested that David Atlee Phillips be called to testify about that matter.
The rivalry between the FBI and the CIA has been well documented. Hoover did not fully understand why he had been surreptitiously provided with information from other intelligence forces allowing him to be the first to declare that Oswald was the assassin and that there had been no conspiracy, but he had solved the case and he was eager for the credit. It was not unusual for him to rush to the press with pronouncements of guilt without adequate factual support and in this national crisis he thought it would escape notice that he had certified that Oswald had acted alone even before his investigation had begun. His judgment was largely vindicated when the news media offered his proclamations without critical comment or inquiry.
Hoover knew how to keep a secret. His undisclosed files were proof of that talent as he used that material to extort support even from his critics to ensure his record-breaking longevity as Director of the FBI for Life. He felt sufficiently secure to name his office SOG claiming that it was the permanent “Seat of Government” which remained constant while presidents and their administrations, considered to be transients by him, came and went.
He was outraged when evidence of the FBI contacts with Lee Harvey Oswald became known and he took immediate action against special agents of the FBI who had not adequately covered those tracks.
The agents were sufficiently terrified and took no action that might cause problems for them. Years ago, one special agent of the FBI confided in me that while driving through Los Angeles and in the company of another agent they saw a bank robbery taking place. They quickly analyzed their options. Call it in to local police or the FBI, charge into the scene to confront the criminals, or just drive by. They chose the non-involvement plan, reasoning that if some civilian was hurt or killed as the result of any action on their part, however reasonable, they would have committed the unforgivable sin of “embarrassing the bureau.” Funds maintained at banks are federally insured.
Of course, the agents never were sure what Hoover meant when he issued an order. He often would respond to a memorandum submitt
ed to him by scrawling a hand-written statement with a fountain pen across the document. In one instance a document regarding some criminal activity was enhanced by his demand that they “watch the borders.” The intimidated agents increased security at crossings from the United States to Canada and Mexico. Later, they realized that the director meant “margins” not “borders” and that he was incensed because there was not a space large enough for him to write a response on the memorandum.
Our small group of volunteers, mostly students, some, but not many, receiving credit from their university or college for their experiment in democracy or government, was inadequate to keep track of the hundreds of thousands of documents which we received and the newly declassified documents at the National Archives that were placed along with the previously available documents. I was a regular visitor at that building and often walked there from our office on Capitol Hill. Employees at the archives, one or two in leadership positions, called me from time to time to inform me that the document that I had requested was then available. I had not requested any specific document but I hurried to the building to see what was there. An archives assistant brought over a number of files, some several inches thick, and placed them on the desk I usually occupied. All the papers were interesting, but only one was of great significance. I never could credit those federal workers and leaders at the National Archives who had served their nation in this matter. Of course, they had violated no law, they never revealed any secrets to me of the many they must have seen; but I feared that their generous advice, if known, would have led to disciplinary action against them. In that spirit I now thank them for their service to our country.
