Published: February 9, 1998
Reno
Withholds Report
on CIA and Drugs
Reno
withholds inspector general report on CIA and drugs
By Michael J. Sniffen
Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) Over the Justice inspector general's objection, Attorney General Janet Reno ordered him Friday to keep secret indefinitely a report on how the department dealt with people and allegations described in a newspaper series on the CIA, Nicaraguan rebels and crack cocaine dealers.
It was the first time an attorney general had ever invoked provisions of the inspector general act that allow a report to be withheld from the public if its release would reveal sensitive information.
The 400-page report, "A CIA-Contra Crack Cocaine Controversy: A Review of the Justice Department's Investigations and Prosecutions,'' is the product of a 15-month investigation triggered by August 1996 articles in the San Jose, Calif., Mercury News, Inspector General Michael R. Bromwich said in a statement.
In a letter to Bromwich, Reno said her decision was prompted by "law enforcement concerns unrelated to the ultimate conclusions reached in your report.'' She did not elaborate on the reasons, but it was learned that department officials feared release might compromise an undercover operation that is expected to last an extended period.
"I disagree with her decision,'' Bromwich said in a statement. But he added, "It is her decision to make under the law. I must abide by it.''
The law allows her to restrict any inspector general activity involving sensitive information about civil or criminal investigations, undercover operations, the identity of confidential sources or protected witnesses, intelligence matters or data damaging to national security.
Reno said the report will remain secret "until I determine that the law enforcement concerns ... no longer warrant deferral of its public release.'' She did not estimate when that would be.
Both Reno and Bromwich said the report would not be altered.
Bromwich evaluated the potential risk of damage from public release of his document as less harmful than Reno believed and he objected because the open-ended secrecy "could last many months,'' said one Justice official, who requested anonymity.
The Mercury News series concluded that a San Francisco Bay area drug ring sold cocaine in South Central Los Angeles and funneled profits to the Nicaraguan Contra rebels for the better part of a decade. It traced the drugs to dealers who were also leaders of a CIA-run guerrilla army in Nicaragua during the 1980s.
The series prompted a separate investigation by the CIA inspector general. Although the CIA inspector general report also is still secret, a senior official said last month that it found no evidence CIA employees or agents colluded with allies of the Nicaraguan Contra rebels involved in crack cocaine sales in the United States.
A senior government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the CIA inspector general report found no link between the CIA and two Nicaraguan cocaine dealers, Danilo Blandon and Norwin Meneses. The newspaper series had said the two were civilian leaders of an anti-communist commando group formed and run by the CIA during the 1980s.
The newspaper articles traced the origin of the crack cocaine explosion in the United States to a crack dealer named Ricky Donnell Ross, saying he got his supply through Blandon and Meneses.
The CIA inspector general found "nothing to indicate that CIA people or people working for the CIA or on CIA's behalf had any dealings directly or indirectly with those people, Ross, Blandon or Meneses,'' the senior official said.
The newspaper series generated widespread anger in the black community toward the CIA, as well as federal investigations into whether the CIA took part in or countenanced the selling of crack to raise money for the Contras.
Several newspapers disputed the Mercury News report. In an open letter to readers in May, the Mercury News' executive editor, Jerry Ceppos, said the series had shortcomings.
Reporter Gary Webb, who produced the series, was transferred to a smaller bureau 10 months after it was published. He resigned from the newspaper last month.
Click Here to email this page to a friend |
