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Dennis Salvatore Cassini


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John,

I'm skeptical that Nixon was "deeply shocked" by the Wallace assassination attempt. The setting up of Bremer has the usual earmarks of a sophisticated intelligence operation including mind control, not the work of freelancing dirty tricksters. If Nixon was deeply shocked or upset, it was probably because the assassination attempt failed and Wallace (depending on how badly he was hurt) might consequently get more votes than he would have before being shot.

On Hunt, it's incorrect to say that he refused to follow Colson's order to break into Bremer's apartment. In Undercover he wrote that he was concerned because of the presence of the FBI, and his wife urged him not to do it, but he intended to proceed as requested until Colson called it off. Hunt wrote, "I was glad to be off the hook. Moreover, I had responded affirmatively to another of Colson's requests, and I felt that I was continuing to justify the faith and confidence he had placed in me when almost a year ago he had brought me into the White House."

Ron

A few decades back when I first encountered this tale, I did some research on it.  It had been alleged that Cossini/Cassini died in Toronto [bUT, in a hotel room, not the trunk of a car].  As I lived in Toronto at the time, I hit the research library and conducted a search of the newpaper microfiche files for the pertinent period.  If he died in Toronto in the summer of 1972, there was no news story that I could find, nor did he merit an obituary in any of the three daily papers that published there.  When I couldn't find anything for July '72, I went through the papers for the two months prior to and after his alleged date of death. 

If he had been just another overdose in a hotel room, his passing should nevertheless have made the news.  That holds doubly true if he had OD'd and then been found in an automobile trunk, as that spelled foul play, not mere death by misadventure.

While it is conceivable that measures were taken to deep-six any reportage of his demise, I'm more inclined to think he either didn't die, or didn't die on or near that date, or didn't die in Toronto.

I am wondering if Dennis Cassini is related to Igor Cassini.

If my memory isn't failing me, RFK brought criminal charges against Igor. In April of 1963, Igor's wife Charlene committed suicide. Charlene's phone number was supposedly found in George DeMohrenschildt's phonebook. Charlene was the daughter of Charles Wrightsman, a powerful figure in his own right. Research on him will provide some interesting connections.

The Wrightsmans and the DeMohrenschidts blamed the Kennedys for Charlene's death. At the time of the suicide, George was associating with Oswald.

I am pretty sure that Igor was related to gown designer Oleg Cassini. Jackie Kennedy wore his garments on many occasions.

It sure would be interesting if Dennis and Igor were related though.

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From one of the articles John posted:

One of these individuals has been identified as Mr. Dennis Cassini. Before any officials could question Cassini after the murder attempt on Wallace, he was found dead of a heroin overdose, his body locked in the trunk of his automobile. The Milwaukee officials reported this incident to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. No attempt was made by the Federal authorities, then under the direction of L. Patrick Gray, to investigate this matter further

This certainly implies Cassini died in Milwaukee not Toronto.  That may be the answer to the fruitlessness of Mr. Charles-Dunne's search.

Irrespective of what might have been "implied," one doesn't undertake the effort that I went to unless it was reported that Cossini died in Toronto, as is clearly self-evident.

To wit, one such report:

"Tim Heinan, a Marquette University student who moonlighted as an undercover

agent for the Milwaukee Police Department's Special Assignment Squad, learned

that Arthur Bremer had ties to a CIA operative named Dennis Salvatore

Cossini, a federal "counter terrorist" who specialized in the infiltration

and control of radical organizations including the local SDS chapter the

gunman had joined. The agent was fired after Heinan confessed his links to

Bremer. Cossini headed for Toronto and was next seen dead, slouching in a

parked car with an overdose of heroin in his veins. One of the police

investigating the death mused: "Somebody gave him a hot shot."

SOURCE: Eric Norden, 'The Shooting of George Wallace-Who Really Wanted Him Dead,"

April 1984, pp. 2 1 ff.  [Though I suspect MY info came from Mae Brussell - likely her radio show, or perhaps her JFK/Nazi piece in Rebel mag.]

If there were contemporaneous reports that Cossini died in Milwaukee, I would expect somebody who was there at the time to have noticed.  A man's death under the circumstances alluded to shouldn't have been all that hard to find in the media.

Moreover, one wonders if Richard Sprague merely confused the above-cited "Tim Heinan" with the "J. Timothy Gratz" he alleged was affiliated with Bremer and Cossini.  Mistaken identity, perhaps?

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Actually although (highly?) unlikely it does raise a question whether this undercover agent named Tim Heinman might have assumed my identity.  Presumably no one knew about my involvement with Segretti until it came out in the newspapers following the Watergate Committee Report because I told no one about it until I was interviewed by the FBI.  But it is certainly interesting that a college student named Tim was investigating Bremer and Cassini's activities.

This is from "The Wallace Contract and the Watergate Connection" by Si Ross (Jed Morse Press, 1974)

Mr. Ross gives as his sources:

Timothy Heinan, "Stopping the Conspiracy of Silence," Review of the News, Sept. 27, 1972

Timothy Heinan, "Watergate and the Shooting of Wallace," Review of the News, July 11, 1973.

Alan Stang, "Arthur Bremer, the Communist Plot to Kill George Wallace," American Opinion, October 1973

Alan Stang, "Watergators, Some Tracks in the Dismal Swamp," American Opinion, September 1973

"Review of the News" and "American Opinion" were both publications of The John Birch Society.

Here is a summary of the information in this book, particularly concerning Cossini.

Ross gives the name as Dennis Salvatore Cossini, alias Kushmann, alias Cuzman, alias Cousins.

Timothy Heinan was a student back in November 1968, who was recruited by the Milwaukee Police Department "Special Assignment Squad" to infiltrate the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). The leader of his local chapter of SDS was Mike Coffman.

In November 1968 Bremer was observed on at least 3 occassions at SDS meetings - Heinan later recognized Bremer from published photos. He later joined with Alan Stang of JBS to research the Wallace attempted assassination.

Michael  McHale was general secretary of the Marquette SDS. He took over Arthur Bremer as his personal responsibility.

Michael D. Cullen, a member of the Milwaukee 13 who burned draft files, took Bremer under his wing

July 1971 Cullen met with Bremer at a Milwaukee bar. He referred to him by a code name of "the Dawn". The meeting was observed by a federal agent. Bremer overheard calling wallace a "hate-monger." Cullen told Bremer that  "being arrested is nothing to fear."

April 1972 Bremer seen with Cossini- appeared to be his boss. They were seen together by Earl S. Nunnery who ran the Milwaukee Stations of the C & O. Bremer told Cossini "I told you I know what to do."

Three separate agents identified Cossini as being connected to the CIA. Cossini was a member of the Weathermen, went to Cuba as a member of the Veceremos Brigade, was a member of the Mao-Communist Progressive Labor Party, a member of the Revolutionary Union.

Timothy Heinan noted that Cossini's ability to penetrate mutually exclusive groups is "typically the mark of an intelligence operative."

Less than 2 weeks after Stang began asking questions about Cossini he was found dead in a parked car in Toronto (not in the trunk). Overdose of heroin which he was never reported using. An undercover agent told Heinan "sombody have him a hot-shot." The body was picked up by 3 Americans believed to be CIA. On the body were draft cards under different aliases and a fake Wisconsin driver's license. Several phone numbers were found on the body. One was for John McLeary, a frequent California contact of Cossini. He died suddenly shortly thereafter.

A federal agent in Milwaukee received orders to remove every file which contained the name Dennis Cossini.

This does explain the reference to "leftists" in the Sprague book.  It is interesting information.

Quite sure I knew a Nunnery in the old days in Wisconsin.  He was a very prominent black Republican.  No idea of whether he was related to the Earl Nunnery mentioned in this post.

Wonder if it possible for anyone to locate this Timothy Heinan who was the undercover agent.

Apparently Heinan became active in the John Birch Society.

He wrote a book, punlished by the JBS in 1974, called "Local Police:  Why We Must Keep Them Independent".  He is also listed in something called "The Belmont Brotherhood" (from web-searches).

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Is there any documented evidence concerning the following questions:

1. That Michele Clark spent time in Milwaukee in late 1971 or early 1972?

2. That she was investigating the RFK assassination prior to her work on Watergate?

3. That she spent time in Cuba?

4. That she had any contact with Dennis Cossini?

5. That Dennis Cossini was a journalism student at Marquette University in 1971 or 1972?

6. That she had ever had any contact with Dr. William J. Bryan?

7. That Arthur Bremer's brother worked with Sirhan Sirhan at a Santa Anita racing stable?

8. That the stable in question had any connection with Dr. Bryan?

9. How exactly did John J. McCleary of Sacramento "drown in the Pacific Ocean" and who was he?

10. What was the nature of the friendship between Arthur Bremer and Dennis Cossini?

From the opposite side, is there any evidence that the premise of any of the above questions is false?

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A reporter named Michele Clark is mentioned several times in Ray Mungo's 1970 memoir titled "Famous Long Ago" which is available on line. He was a co-founder of the Liberation News Service which provided material about the activities of various radical groups during the 1960s. He  apparently knew her while living in New York and Washington DC but first met her in Cuba. He says she was married to a New York film maker.

Can anyone expand on this?

http://sunrisedancer.com/radicalreader/lib...uslongago05.asp

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I've looking into the Wallace assassination attempt for some time and I think I have some answers to some of these questions:

From the opposite side, is there any evidence that the premise of any of the above questions is false?

5. That Dennis Cossini was a journalism student at Marquette University in 1971 or 1972?

No. I've logged some hours at the Marquette U. archives and there's no Dennis Cossini or Cassini on record as a student. There's a Denis Kuzma who was a journalism student and involved in some left-wing campus publications, sometimes writing as Rasputin Kuzma. I have a yearbook picture of him; this is not the same person who appears in the group photo on page 15 of the October 1972 Alan Stang article in American Opinion: "The Communist Plot to Kill George Wallace".

7. That Arthur Bremer's brother worked with Sirhan Sirhan at a Santa Anita racing stable?

I've seen a document on the Internet listing a Thomas Mark Bremer as working at the same stable as Sirhan Sirhan. Arthur has three brothers: Roger Dean Bremer, William Bremer Jr., and Theodore Bremer. A cousin maybe, but not a brother.

9. How exactly did John J. McCleary of Sacramento "drown in the Pacific Ocean" and who was he?

10. What was the nature of the friendship between Arthur Bremer and Dennis Cossini?

I think the better question here is if these things really have anything to do with Bremer. I think the original source of this information is the above listed Alan Stang article, which is also the origin of Dennis Cossini, whose address book McCleary's name supposedly appears. As one of the earlier posters has, I've combed the Toronto newspapers and there's no mention of Cossini or anyone else's body being found dead of an overdose. It also doesn't seem to have occurred in Milwaukee. Although there's no non-John Birch trace of this man in life or death whatsoever (besides the Earl Nunnery-C&O Car Ferry office story, which has it's own problems), are we to believe that his address book, chock full of sinister connections, happened to fall into the hands of Stang? I simply don't buy it.

After looking at this for a number of years, I come to think Dennis Cossini or Cushmann or Cassini or Kushman is smoke-screen invented by Stang and the Birchers as a way to tap into the Wallace vote for 1972 American Party candidate and staunch Bircher John G. Schmitz (and graduate of Marquette U). Notice how the Cossini story places the blame on both the Communists and Nixon's government for supposedly covering it up? Schmitz's stump speeches included a brief bit about the Wallace assassination, the "grey figure" supposedly in cahoots with Bremer, and the government's reluctance to investigate fully. He ended up getting a million votes in 1972...

There's a lot going on in that initial Stang article, too much to get into here (Heinan, Cullen, Milwaukee's notorious Red Squad, etc)

There are a couple of unanswered questions revolving around the Wallace assassination I'd like to throw out there:

1. The trip to Madison. On page 27 of the second part of his diary - the part published as An Assassin's Diary - Bremer compares his New York hotel room's price to one he had previously stayed at in Madison. When was this? Particularly interesting in light of all of that Segretti business explored on another post...

2. The post-assassination scene at Bremer's apartment. I've interviewed Rick Jenka, a Milwaukee Sentinel reporter at the time, and he has some interesting things to say about what happened here. Not to mention the conflicting stories of Hunt and Colson.

3. The November 1971 arrest in Fox Point. What exactly was he doing? I have a theory about him wanting to kill a co-worker named Ceal Myers (he talks about this in the first, unpublished diary), but all of the pieces aren't there yet.

4. Various travel details. The Earl Nunnery story doesn't seem to mesh with his timeline, Bremer's supposed appearance at Holiday Inn the night of Wisconsin primary, etc.

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Thank you for adding this information on Dennis Cassini.

(1) Have you looked into the possibility that Cassini died in Toronto?

(2) According to David Wallechinsky & Irving Wallace (The People's Almanac, 1985) Cassini was "constantly in the company of several individuals just prior to the assassination attempt". The authors argue that one of these men was identified as Cossini. Interestingly, the authors also claimed that "Roger Gordon, a former member of the Secret Army Organization (SAO), a government intelligence agency, identified Bremer's ferry contact as a Mr. Anthony Ulasewicz, a White House operative who would become well-known in the Watergate hearings." Ulasewicz was also Tim Gratz contact.

(3) In an article published in Probe Magazine (May-June 1999) Lisa Pease argues:

Is there evidence of CIA involvement in the Wallace shooting? According to newspaperwoman Sybil Leek and lawyer-turned-investigative-reporter Bert Sugar, the answer is yes. According to Leek and Sugar, while Bremer was at the Lord Elgin hotel in Ottawa, he met with a Dennis Cassini. Famed conspiracy researcher Mae Brussell and Alan Stang identified Cassini as a CIA operative. Cassini was found dead from a massive heroin overdose in July, 1972, just two months after the Wallace shooting. Cassini had no history of drug use.

Cassini’s address book contained the phone number of a John J. McCleary. McCleary lived in Sacramento, California, and was employed by V & T International, an import-export firm. McCleary drowned in the Pacific ocean in the fall of 1972. His father, amazingly, drowned around the same time in Reno, Nevada.

If the CIA was somehow involved, that could explain both E. Howard Hunt’s immediate interest in the case, as well as the role of CBS in filming Bremer in the act of shooting. CBS and the CIA shared a particularly close relationship. CIA involvement might go far in explaining the following connections as well.

Bremer’s brother, William Bremer, was arrested shortly after the Wallace shooting for having bilked over 2,000 Miami matrons out of over $80,000 by signing them up for non-existant weight-loss sessions. Curiously, Bremer’s lawyer was none other than Ellis Rubin, the man who had defended many anti-Castro activists and who defended the CIA men who participated in the Watergate break-in.

Even more curious is Bremer’s half-sister Gail’s relationship with the Reverend Jerry Owen (ne Oliver Brindley Owen), who figures prominently in the RFK case. Owen’s bible-thumping show was cancelled from KCOP in Los Angeles when evidence surfaced showing he had a possibly sinister relationship with Sirhan Sirhan just prior to the assassination of Robert Kennedy. After the assassination, Owen had gone to the police with a strange tale of having picked Sirhan up as a hitchhiker. But other witnesses claimed Owen had given Sirhan cash, and had more of a relationship with Sirhan that he had admitted.

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  • 2 weeks later...

(3) In an article published in Probe Magazine (May-June 1999) Lisa Pease argues:

Is there evidence of CIA involvement in the Wallace shooting? According to newspaperwoman Sybil Leek and lawyer-turned-investigative-reporter Bert Sugar, the answer is yes. According to Leek and Sugar, while Bremer was at the Lord Elgin hotel in Ottawa, he met with a Dennis Cassini. Famed conspiracy researcher Mae Brussell and Alan Stang identified Cassini as a CIA operative. Cassini was found dead from a massive heroin overdose in July, 1972, just two months after the Wallace shooting. Cassini had no history of drug use.

Cassini’s address book contained the phone number of a John J. McCleary. McCleary lived in Sacramento, California, and was employed by V & T International, an import-export firm. McCleary drowned in the Pacific ocean in the fall of 1972. His father, amazingly, drowned around the same time in Reno, Nevada.

If the CIA was somehow involved, that could explain both E. Howard Hunt’s immediate interest in the case, as well as the role of CBS in filming Bremer in the act of shooting. CBS and the CIA shared a particularly close relationship. CIA involvement might go far in explaining the following connections as well.

Bremer’s brother, William Bremer, was arrested shortly after the Wallace shooting for having bilked over 2,000 Miami matrons out of over $80,000 by signing them up for non-existant weight-loss sessions. Curiously, Bremer’s lawyer was none other than Ellis Rubin, the man who had defended many anti-Castro activists and who defended the CIA men who participated in the Watergate break-in.

Even more curious is Bremer’s half-sister Gail’s relationship with the Reverend Jerry Owen (ne Oliver Brindley Owen), who figures prominently in the RFK case. Owen’s bible-thumping show was cancelled from KCOP in Los Angeles when evidence surfaced showing he had a possibly sinister relationship with Sirhan Sirhan just prior to the assassination of Robert Kennedy. After the assassination, Owen had gone to the police with a strange tale of having picked Sirhan up as a hitchhiker. But other witnesses claimed Owen had given Sirhan cash, and had more of a relationship with Sirhan that he had admitted.

The Lisa Pease article is a very good clearing house of all of the various conspiracy theories and strangeness in the Wallace shooting. I'm not inclined to give weight to some of the sources she uses. Example: The Sybil Leek/Burt Sugar book "The Assassination Chain" is an epic of non-documentation that plays very fast and loose with the facts. I'm still waiting for anyone to show me a shread of evidence that Dennis Cossini, Cassini, Cushman, Kushman was actually a real human being. The esteemed William Turner, in this article in the Government By Gunplay collection, wrote that he believed that Cossini was a strawman invented by Alan Stang.

Arthur's older half-sister Gail Aiken seems to have been a non-presence in his life, being 14 years old then him. Here are my notes about her as gathered from the Bremer-vs-State of Maryland trial transcript:

Sister: Gail Aiken

Born: May 11, 1936

Born out of wedlock to Sylvia in 1936. Father unknown, but adopted by William Sr. She reportedly left home at a very early age and moved to California. She had an illegitimate child at age 20, married and divorced, and has been living in California for many years. Visited brother Theodore in Milwaukee several times, but didn’t want to see the parents.

The Sirhan Sirhan connection is fascinating. I'd like to know more.

William Bremer Jr. is another fascinating person. Pease gets the order of events wrong; William was arrested before Arthur shot Wallace, maybe in April 1972. From my notes:

Already conceived when Sylvia and William Bremer got married, William Jr. also left home at a young age and became a “drifter” after serving in the military.

Again, the connection to Watergate is fascinating and I'd like to know if anyone has dug up the court records on William's scheme and if he's still alive.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I found this information on the Honest Media website. It suggests that he could have used the name of Gutman.

http://www.honestmediatoday.com/nixon_cabal.htm

At the time, Woodward was quick to report on the first page of the Washington Report that “there is no evidence whatsoever to indicate that Bremer was a hired killer.” Woodward noted that this was a story that “the FBI wanted out.”(24) Or was it simply a story that he and others (such as Felt at the FBI) wanted out – simply a planted story to stop people from investigating matters further? Investigative researches have shown that Dennis Cassini (Gutman), a CIA operative, met with Bremer at the Elgin Hotel before the attempted assassination. Prior to any chance of questioning Cassini about this, he was discovered dead. He had died of a heroin overdose, though he had no history of drug abuse. Compounding this mysterious scenario, Cassini’s corpse was discovered locked in the trunk of his car.(25) CIA operative Cassini’s unusual death and his relationship to Bremer certainly raises some unsettling questions. In any case, Wallace died a crippled man, and Bremer is still in prison and not allowed visitors. And while Nixon won the presidency, some wonder if Wallace himself might have pulled it off as a third-party candidate.

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  • 7 years later...

The following is a shameless plug but here goes:

I have written a political conspiracy novel called “Small Spiders” (written under the name J.T. Conroe) which is based to a large extent on information gathered from the Education Forum and Spartacus Educational, and which I hope might be both entertaining and interesting to some of the members. The plot is tied closely to verified and alleged facts surrounding the CIA’s MK Ultra program, the assassination attempt against George Wallace, the Watergate break-in, and the crash of United Flight 553. It is definitely a work of fiction, but I have attempted to produce a reasonably plausible scenario for the interlinking of these events. The main characters are Michele Clark, Howard Hunt, Arthur Bremer, Dennis Cossini, and Dorothy Hunt. Dr. William J. Bryan, Harold Metcalf, Richard Nixon, Frank Stanton, and “the girl in the polka-dot dress” also play important roles.

Although my novel “proves” nothing, I am hoping it will provoke some renewed interest in and scrutiny of the criminal behavior of the Nixon administration. It is available from Amazon at

http://www.amazon.com/Small-Spiders-J-T-Conroe/dp/1490352651/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1370953740&sr=1-1&keywords=

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