Morley v CIA

[William Kelly]

Morley v. CIA - Lesar's latest legal briefs.

JFKcountercoup

Morley v. CIA Update

Re: CIA Records of George Joannides

Here is a description of the case from the Assassination Archives and

Research Center - AARC:

This is the second trip to the United States Court of Appeals for the

District of Columbia in the Morley case. This is journalist Jefferson

Morley's effort to obtain records pertaining to George Joannides, the CIA

case officer for the DRE (Directorio Revoluciionario Estudantil), the Cuban

exile organization which had contacts with Lee Harvey Oswald in the months

prior to President Kennedy's assassination. The prior appeal was a landmark

decision which ruled that the CIA had to search its normally exempt

operational files for responsive records. As a result of this victory, it

was revealed that Joannides was working undercover when he was made the

CIA's liaison to the House Select Committee on assassinations. In that

capacity, Joannides never revealed to the HSCA that he had been DRE's case

officer when Oswald was in contact with it. Instead, he deflected the HSCA's

requests both for documents about DRE and for the identity of DRE's case

officer.

On remand to the District Court, operational files were searched and

additional information released. However, the CIA still withholds 295

documents in their entireties and has not located the monthly progress

reports detailing the funding of the DRE during the 17-month period when

Joannides was its case officer.

Here is the Appellant Brief:

http://tinyurl.com/6lpsgm4

Here is the CIA Brief:

http://tinyurl.com/7f289ls

Here is the Reply Brief for the Appellant:

http://tinyurl.com/6pubt7e

Brief for Appellant – U.S. Court of Appeals – D.C. cir. No. 10-5161

Jefferson Morley, Appellant, v. Central Intelligence Agency, Appellee

Oral Arguments were held on April 16, 2012

By James H. Lesar

GLOSSARY

AMBARB DRE psywar propaganda project in Latin America

AMHINT Project for support of DRE leaders in Latin America

AMHINT-2 DRE co-founder Juan Manuel Salvat

AMHINT-53 DRE Secretary General Luis Fernandez Rocha

AMSPELL Project in support of DRE headquarters in Miami

ARRB Assassination Records Review Board

CCC Cuban Coordinating Committee

Crozier, Ross DRE Chief os Station before Joannides;

Pseudonym: Harold W. Noemayr

DRE Directorate Revolutionary Estudantil, anti-Castro Cuban exile - organization funded by CIA

HSCA House Select Committee on Assassinations

JM/WAVE CIA Headquarters in Miami, also “WAVE”

KUBARK Central Intelligence Agency

MOB Military Operations Branch of DRE

Newby, Walter Pseudonym for George Joannides, aka “Howard” or “Mr. - Howard”

Noemayr, Harold Pseudonym for Ross Crozier

ODYOKE Code name for U.S.

PBRUMEN Code name for Cuba

SAS Special Affairs Staff

Shackley, Ted Andrew R. Reuiteman

STATEMENT OF THE CASE

A. Procedural History

On July 4, 2003, appellant Jefferson Morley (“Morley”) submitted a Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) request for records pertaining to George Joannides (“Joannides”), a CIA officer who in 1962-1964 served as case officer for the Directorio Revolcionario Estudantil (“DRE”), a CIA-financed anti-Castro Cuban exile organization whose members were in contact with alleged assassin Lee Harvey Oswald (“Oswald”) prior to the assassination of President Kennedy, and who immediately after the assassination used information obtained from their contacts with Oswald to propagate worldwide the first JFK assassination theory – that Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro was behind the crime.

Later, as a result of disclosures made under the President John F. Kennedy Assassinations Records Collection Act of 1992 (“JFK Act”), it was learned that in 1978 Joannides had been called out of retirement to act as liaison between the CIA and the House Select Committee on Assassinations (“HSCA”), which at that time was investigating the JFK assassination. In that role, he hid from Congress that he was the CIA case officer the committee wanted to question about the DRE’s pre-assassination contacts with Oswald, and he failed to turn over records on that association it had requested.

The CIA initially failed to respond to Morley’s FOIA request at all.

After four months of delay, it then claimed that the records he requested had been transferred to the National Archives and Records Administration (“NARA”) to be part of the JFK Records Act Collection….After Morley filed suit, the CIA invoked its “Glomar” defense, refusing to confirm or deny the existence of records pertaining to any “covert program, operation or assignment” regarding Joannides that was not previously acknowledged.

On cross-motions for summary judgment, the Court ruled in favor of the CIA. Morley appealed. This Court ruled that the CIA had to search the CIA’s operational files. It also ordered the CIA to provide Morley with responsive records that had been transferred to NARA, and it remanded the case to the district court for further substantiation on several search and exemption issues. On remand, the CIA conducted further searches, including a search of some operational files on Joannides.

In August 2008, it released 293 operational records from its Directorate of Support and National Clandestine Services files. In doing so, the CIA, employing a new affiant, now acknowledged Joannides’ “participation in two specific covert projects, operations, or assignments: JM/WAVE…from 1962 through 1964 and Joannides’ service as a CIA representative to the [HSCA] from 1978 to 1979.”

It also withheld 295 operational records in their entirety. It also advised that Joannides’ assignment as liaison to the HSCA was undertaken in a covert capacity.

After making disclosures, the CIA again moved for summary judgment. Morely cross-moved, and the District Court award judgment to the CIA. This appeal followed.

B. Critical Nature of the Issues Raised

The issues raised in this case were before the Court in Morley v. C.I.A., but they now come into focus in a context which has greatly increased the tension between the secrecy for reasons of national security and the people’s right to have access to information which enables public accountability of government agencies.

In its prior decision, this Court instructed the CIA to search its operational files for records on George Joannides, the CIA case officer whose activities are the subject of Morley’s FOIA request. As a result, the CIA acknowledged Joannides’ “participation in two specific covert projects, operations, or assignments. The revelation that Joannides was working in a covert capacity when he was the CIA’s liaison to the HSCA raises disturbing questions about the CIA’s use of a covert operative to subvert the integrity of a congressional committee’s investigation of the assassination of a president, since congressional committees are a hallmark of democratic accountability.

Professor G. Robert Blakey, who served as Chief Counsel and Staff Director of the HSCA, states that the CIA’s conduct in inserting Joannides “undercover” into the HSCA’s investigation “constituted not only a breach of the written memorandum of understanding the HSCA in good faith entered into with the Agency,…but a manifest, and hardly minor matter, a criminal violation of 18 U.S.C. & 1505”, which proscribes conduct that “’impedes….the due and proper exercise of the power of inquiry….of any committee of either House’)….”

Equally troubling, is the iron curtain which the CIA has erected around the 295 responsive operational records whose existence it has belatedly acknowledged. Thus, in reviewing its operational records on remand, the CIA has withheld 295 documents in their entirety, even though these records are nearly a half century old – or older – and are in form and substance and purpose intimately related to thousands of documents of the same nature which have been publicly disclosed and placed in the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection (“JFK Act Collection”) at the National Archives and Records Administration (“NARA”). Secrecy on a scale this vast, concerning records so old, on a subject of extreme public interest, represents a formidable assault on the FOIA.

In order to understand the context in which this frontal attack on the right of the public to obtain information about the JFK assassination occurs, it is necessary to sketch the relevant facts in some detail.

C. Factual Background

Morley’s FOIA inquiry concerns the relationship between Lee Harvey Oswald (“Oswald”) and the Directorate Revolucionario Estudantil (“DRE”), a CIA sponsored, CIA funded Cuban exile organization engaged in psychological warfare operations.

There was considerable tension in the DRE’s relationship with the Kennedy administration, particularly with its Military Operations Branch (“MOB”), a component which favored military action against Cuba. During the three and a half months preceding the assassination, Oswald was in contact with DRE representatives on several occasions. On November 19, 1963, the growing tension with DRE led the CIA to sever relations. Three days later, Kennedy was shot, allegedly by Oswald.

The complete story, as it is now known, is complex, but important to understand.

In April 1962, Joannides was transferred from Athens to the CIA station in Miami known as “JMWAVE” or “WAVE.” He was a New York lawyer who had worked for the CIA since 1950 and served as an active duty officer in the Directorate of Operations (“DO”) since 1958. In Miami, he became deputy director of the Psychological Warfare (PW) branch of JMWAVE, which had a budget of $2.4 million a year, approximately $14.4 million in 2009 dollars.

On August 24, 1962, members of DRE took credit for a cannon attack on a seaside hotel in Havana where Cuban communist leader Fidel Castro was thought to be visiting. The attack made front page headlines in the Washington Post and other major newspapers.

Continued:

JFKcountercoup: Morley v. CIA Continues

[William Kelly]

BUMP

Edited April 28, 2012 by William Kelly

[Michael Hogan]

"Without Jim, we wouldn’t know FOIA as we now know it. He fought some of the toughest cases, some of the longest. The country owes him a great debt." (Harold Weisberg)

"....Weisberg described how Lesar represented him in efforts to obtain classified documents from the government. Lesar litigated the case, even though Weisberg was “broke and in debt,” and took it to the U.S. Supreme Court. Although they lost the case, Weisberg viewed it as a great victory because Congress cited the decision as reason to amend the Freedom of Information Act’s clause on investigatory files exemption. As a result, many FBI and CIA records became accessible.

Lesar believes that one of his greatest achievements was the release of a January 1964 Warren Commission executive session transcript that showed the commission suspected the FBI was not conducting a proper investigation into the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

Lesar also played a crucial role in the passage of the JFK Records Act, a measure spurred by the groundswell of public opinion in the wake of the popular film, “JFK” against the lack of information forthcoming from government agencies regarding the Kennedy assassination. Lesar assisted those drafting the act in Congress to formulate language which ensures greater access and liberal disclosure provisions, and also testified on behalf of the act before Congress.

According to Lesar, legislation similar to the JFK Records Act is needed to complement the Freedom of Information Act, particularly in regard to historical documents.

Lesar has been at the center of virtually every major effort to uncover documents regarding the Kennedy and King assassinations. Professor David Wrone of the University of Wisconsin Department of History described his work as “invaluable to history and to the American people.” Wrone said that Lesar has frequently labored against heavy odds, and has often stood alone, with the Freedom of Information Act as his only weapon.

Such is Lesar’s dedication to freedom of information that for years he has spent nearly half his time doing voluntary legal work for the AARC. And throughout his career, he has provided free legal assistance to many private individuals utilizing the Freedom of Information Act.

James Lesar’s efforts have helped to preserve and enhance the rights of all Americans to seek and obtain access to government files."

(The above is excerpted from the Freedom Magazine article reproduced at the end of Bill Kelly's blog post Morley v. CIA Continues)

Jim Lesar has been doing what he does so well for forty long years. The elusive truth about President Kennedy's murder has had no greater ally.