Deep in Deutch
York, Byron
D + + B eing director of the Central Intelligence Agency means putting up with all sorts of inconveniences most people don't have to face. You receive strange, threatening letters from maniacs...
...The second principle is simple consistency...
...This was very, very serious, he reminded Tenet, possibly rivaling well-known cases in which massive amounts of American intelligence had been betrayed to outsiders...
...Worried that the group might be planning a similar attack in the United States, the Justice Department went to the super-secret Foreign and Intelligence Surveillance Act Court and asked for permission to wiretap and search the homes of cult members in New York City...
...Deutch was never terribly enthusiastic about taking the CIA job...
...The attorney general was apparently deeply affected by allegations the department 30 July/August 2 o o o " The American Spectator was throwing the book at Lee, an Asian American, while soft-pedaling the ex-CIA director's offenses...
...Several were memos intended for the president and top cabinet officers only...
...And in early June, it informed Congress...
...There was plenty of evidence to support that view...
...One disk had i,o83 files erased and indicated the last activity occurred on December 20,1996, at 5:51 p.m., which was right during the time when CIA officials were trying to find out what Deutch had on his computers...
...You receive strange, threatening letters from maniacs who accuse you of beaming radio signals to them through their molars...
...Beyond that, in what must seem a surreal twist, he finds his name included among those of the country's most dangerous spies...
...But that argument evaporated a few weeks later, on February 2 4, when Reno told reporters that the Justice Department had reopened the Deutch investigation...
...In all, CIA investigators went through 17,ooo pages of material...
...tenure in the job-so satisfactory that on December 5, 1996, the day Deuteh announced he was leaving, he called a top administrator to his office and said he wanted to keep the computers...
...attorney's office in Miami...
...Of course, he might just as easily have said, look at the disparity in the facts...
...There cannot be a double standard Even though he is no longer a U.S...
...The lawyer didn't like the idea...
...In one instance, there is an intent to do harm to the United States," Tenet concluded...
...They always have a command post," says a former intelligence official familiar with such arrangements...
...This one hasn't...
...But that didn't happen...
...In the Washington Post, one un-named official cited "the constant specter of Wen Ho Lee in this picture...
...Although one might have expected Frederick Hitz, the CIA's normally aggressive inspector general, to jump ping mad...
...Once you've declined to prosecute, the bar is raised;' says Martin...
...Sever his contracts, yank the clearances, pull back the equipment, and make sure that John Deutch never sees another government secret for the rest of his life...
...In 1995, Richard Scruggs, a friend of Janet Reno's who was brought to Washington to head the Justice Department's intelligence division, leaked classified information to two reporters who were writing a book about the department...
...government official, is no longer under contract to the CIA, and no longer holds any security clearances, Deutch still might face criminal charges...
...Within three days, the agency sent technicians to Deutch's houses in Bethesda and Massachusetts, where they removed the computers and brought them back to headquarters...
...But I wouldn't--I wouldn't put the Deutch case in the same context as Pollard or Ames...
...BYRON YORK is The American Spectator's senior writer...
...As of this writing, there is no p r o o f - n o n e - t h a t any of the classified information found on Deutch's unsecure home computer was lost to anyone on the outside...
...Hitz was about to retire, and a new team would launch what quickly became an investigation of the investigation...
...Comparisons between the Lee and Deutch cases would be laughable if they were not being taken so seriously by the nation's highest law enforcement officials...
...Second, O'Neill, to whom Deutch had given the four PCMCIA cards, waited several weeks before reluctantly turning them over to the experts for examination...
...When they returned, O'Neill wanted to know whether they had used any extraordinary means to get the classified files...
...First, Deutch did not want to be interviewed by investigators from the agency's Special Investigations Branch, and top CIA officials chose not to force the issue...
...A couple of months later, in July, the new CIA inspector general finished his report which, in late August, was sent to the so-called "Group of Four"--the House and Senate intelligence committees and the two appropriations committees that control CIA funding...
...Both of them made similar mistakes," he said of the suspected Chinese spy and the former ClA director...
...Unauthorized disclosure or other mishandling of such information constitutes a matter ofgravest concern," Shelby wrote...
...It is a bi-partisan nightmare, meaning that John Deutch may find himself in the crosshairs for a long, long time...
...After more than two years of probing, John Deutch was back where he started...
...What no one on the outside knew at the time was that as Deutch was saying his goodbyes at the CLA, the experts who handle the agency's computer system were making a startling discovery about the outgoing director...
...And he didn't see any need to change the America Online Internet account he kept in his own name--identifying himself to the world as a Mac user, a scientist, and a resident of Bethesda, Maryland...
...Yet that is what she's doing, and some in Congress are urging her to keep up the pressure on Deutch...
...Tenet was certainly correct to point out that the Justice Department had chosen not to prosecute Deutch...
...IN The American Spectator _9 July~August 2000 31...
...According to a recently unclassified report by the CIA inspector general, this is what happened: When he first came to the CIA, Deutch instructed agency technicians to install Macs in his homes in Bethesda and in Belmont, Massachusetts, where he had been a professor at MIT...
...On one hand, it was hard for any CIA chief to get a grip on all the agencies that play a role in intel26 Juty/Augus t 2 o o o " The American Spectator ligence gathering...
...Chairman," Tenet said, "we cannot assure you of that fact...
...When you look at both of them and you think of presenting them before a jury," says John Martin, "which of these two cases presents criminal conduct...
...A formal investigation got under way in early January 1997, and CIA technicians spent the next two months going through every disk drive and memory card that Deutch had used...
...They wanted to question Deutch, report the situation to the Justice Department for possible criminal investigation, and discipline those involved...
...O'Neill called Deutch, who said he didn't know how classified information had gotten on the Mac's hard drive because he had always stored his data on removable disks known as PCMCIA cards...
...government or the president...
...You have an attorney general who failed to discipline one of her close associates for disclosing without authorization secret information while he held a position of trust in her office," says John Martin, "and she has to decide the case of John Deutch...
...Shelby, ready for a confrontation, summoned Tenet to testify the next day...
...Deutch was not home at the time and later told investigators he had not approved the visit...
...The discovery kicked the CIA into gear...
...He lied about it...
...Third, no one informed the Justice Department, the White House, or Congress about Deutch's problem...
...The classified documents on his computers were ones he had written while away from the office, not data he had secreted away from CIA headquarters for the purpose of transmitting elsewhere...
...Even as CIA experts worked to determine the breadth and scope of the Deutch case, an intense debate was raging about 28 J u l y / A u g u s t 2 o o o _9 The American Spectotor what to do next...
...All in all, not a great job...
...Instead, he asked the CIA to give him the latest version of his favorite computer, the Apple Macintosh...
...The command post is manned z 4 hours a day, seven days a week, which means that the CIA chief is never alone...
...They weren't documents taken from the CIA...
...Given the public acknowledgment of mistakes, and the knowledge of the statutes, it is totally unclear why there would not have been at least some effort at prosecution," Kyl says...
...The letter was not made public at the time it was written, and any more maneuvering between the Senate and the CIA stayed behind the scenes until February 1 of this year, when the New York Times published a front-page story headlined "CIA Inquiry of its Ex-Director Was Stalled at Top, Report Says...
...they could be recovered using a widely available utility program...
...On the other side were the agency's top officials, chief among them Michael O'Neill and another Deutch ally, Nora Slatkin, whom Deutch had brought to the CIA in the job of executive director...
...Allard was referring to the suspected Chinese spy who removed computer tapes containing nuclear secrets from the United States laboratory and refused to tell investigators what he did with them...
...But ifDeutch was trying to cover anything up, he didn't appear too nervous about it...
...In both the case of Ames and in the ease of Pollard," Tenet explained, "we can document the fact that a foreign power had direct access to significant material, including human assets...
...On the other hand, the director took the heat for the CIA's many controversial projects, past and present...
...Once that happened, the case gathered speed...
...That system was apparently satisfactory to Deutch during his ica Online...
...If they need to get classified material, they can get it there...
...On one side were those determined to treat Deutch like any other employee accused of mishandling classified information...
...No, sir, I can't give you a definitive statement to say it absolutely didn't happen...
...The story included many of the juiciest details from the inspector general's report...
...they asked...
...I don't think that's fair...
...when was the last time a subject of an investigation was not interviewed because he objected to talking to security officers and the executive director [Slatkin], a personal friend, used her position to short circuit an investigation...
...Deutch's unclassified computer were not accessed from outside...
...Consider this: In the past few years, nearly every high-profile investigation of official misconduct has divided Washington along party lines...
...Although it has scarcely been reported, there is a significant disparity between the department's treatment of Deutch and its behavior in another sensitive case involving national secrets...
...a n d documents that you found on someone's computer who was working at home...
...Can you assure us that the classified files in Mr...
...He was angry that there had been no interview of Deutch...
...Just for the record, several sources familiar with the situation point out that Lee removed enormous amounts of highly technical files taken from top-secret government labs...
...You think you can't reassure us, can you...
...Deutch signed the contract on December i 3. Not everyone thought the new deal was proper...
...I'm certainly not persuaded that giving this man a security clearance is in the best interest of the U.S...
...All this was extremely classified, but reporters Brian Duffy and Jim McGee learned about the episode as they worked on their book Main Justice...
...Shelby promised that the Senate would do its own investigation...
...they could be recovered using a widely available utility program...
...The experts started looking through the files on the disks Deutch used to store his data...
...All that openness was not exactly what the CIA had in mind...
...now everyone knew about it...
...I don't think there's any--" "But we're talking about classified materials," Shelby interrupted again...
...But I cannot give yon assurance--" vices Committee...
...Shelby moved in...
...I can't tell you it has or has not occurred...
...Deutch, who came to the CIA from a top job at the Defense Department, told the agency he didn't want the in-house security...
...The issue made its way to CIA General Counsel Michael O'Neill, a close ally of Deutch's whom Deutch had brought into the agency...
...government official, is no longer under contract to the CIA, and no longer holds any security clearances, Deutch still might face criminal charges...
...Prosecuting the former CIA director would seem grossly inconsistent with Reno's actions in the Scruggs case...
...In May, it informed the President's Intelligence Oversight Board...
...Ever watchful of their turf, they were outraged not only because of the potential seriousness of Deutch's security lapses but because they had not been told about the problem earlier...
...on the morning of December 21, he paged a CIA technician to ask for advice because, he said, he was having trouble deleting files...
...In addition, there are two more factors that strongly argue against prosecuting Deutch...
...In the other instance, a similar legal iudgment was not made...
...It would be an understatement to say that lawmakers, especially those on the Senate Intelligence Committee, were hop"1 mean, geez, when was the last time a subject of an investigation was not interviewed because he objected to talking to security officers and the executive director, a personal friend, used her position to short circuit an investigation...
...Kyl's biggest question is why Reno chose not to take action against Deutch the first time around...
...That's a legal judgment that's been made...
...I mean, geez, on the Deutch case, Hitz instead chose to defer to higher authorities...
...He was frustrated by obstacles placed in investigators' way by Slatkin and O'Neill (both of whom left the CIA in the fall of 1997...
...Tenet was taken aback...
...Deuteh to the material disclosed by Mr...
...By all accounts, Scruggs discussed it with them--in violation of secrecy rules...
...There are many facts here that suggest possible avenues that the Department of Justice should have taken...
...And, although no one could know it at the time, Deutch's determination to avoid the confinements of top-level security foreshadowed the scandal that would arise when he left office--and continue to plague him today...
...And he assumed the inspector general's office was doing its own investigation...
...We are just reviewing every-thing to see whether there is any basis for further action," Reno said...
...Concerned that government property would be used for personal purposesDeutch had already used the CIA Macs for, among other things, his personal banking--the lawyer told the administrator he would discuss it with his superiors...
...Both of them made similar mistakes in the fact that they had information that was very important to this country on unsecured computers," Allard continued...
...In contrast, no one believes Deutch had any intent to do harm to the United States...
...The director had too little control and too much baggage, he told people...
...Not giving up, CIA officials tried to persuade him at least to accept a home alarm system and a safe in the closet offhis study...
...That was no big problem...
...On December 17, two CIA technicians and one security man entered Deutch's Bethesda home to inspect the computers...
...This does not rise to the level of a criminal ease...
...Put aside the spy cases from the past, Colorado Republican Wayne Allard told Tenet...
...But Deutch wasn't terribly popular in the Clinton White House and found himself eased out during the transition from the president's first to second The American Spectator " J~[y/Aug~s t ~ o o o 27 terms...
...That is the way things stood until February 1998 , when, during a meeting between an executive from the CIA's Office of Inspector General and an official from the Special Investigations Branch--a meeting on a completely unrelated topic--the investigator began to complain about how the Deutch case had been handled...
...Deutch said he used four of the cards and agreed to turn them over to O'Neill, which he did on DecemOn one of the memory cards, the engineer noticed that lots of files had been erased...
...You're dogged by leftists who blame you for Third World coups that ended 4 Q years ago...
...When the engineer restored the files, he saw that some of them had been labeled "Top Secret...
...He did it secretly, after hours and on weekends...
...We have no evidence that suggests that that has occurred," Tenet continued...
...Scruggs was given a mild rebuke-not even a formal reprimand--and is still a federal prosecutor, in the U.S...
...Everybody says it's a job I've been pushed out of," Deutch told the Washington Post on his departure, "but I would recall it's a job I was pushed into...
...In October 1999, committee chairman Richard Shelby, wrote a terse letter to George Tenet, Deutch's successor as CIA director...
...No, the technicians told him, we just started up Microsoft Word and there they were...
...As far as is known publicly, no such new evidence has surfaced since Reno made her decision in April 1999...
...Both cases were examined by the Justice Department, Tenet said, and in the Deutch case, proseSenator Shelby compared the Deutch case to those of notorious spies Aldrich Ames and Jonathan Pollard...
...Yes," replied Tenet...
...rather, most were copies of papers that Deutch had written while working at home or traveling...
...A Bope Net A Criminal What will the Justice Department do...
...Deutch also told the CIA that even though he often worked at home, he didn't want them to install one of those complicated computer systems designed to deal with classified information...
...He used other people's passwords to gain access to some data...
...3You really have to have a very good reason for proceeding with a prosecution, such as new evidence or perjury on the part of the prospective defendant...
...And on top of all that, your own agency insists on moving into your house...
...At the next step up the chain, another CIA lawyer suggested that the only way for Deutch to keep the computers would be for the agency to sign him on as a consultant to the CIA, and then lend him the Macs for official use only...
...So the investigation goes on...
...Slatkin, O'Neill, and top CIA officials had succeeded in keeping the Deutch case an in-house problem for 18 months...
...Deutch also received a CIA-purchased PowerBook laptop...
...In March 1998, the CIA reported the Deutch problem to the Justice Department...
...The analogy that I'm wondering is, how is it that we're treating Wen Ho Lee at Los Alamos...
...Where will it end...
...At issue was Aura Shin Rikyo, the Japanese terrorist cult that in March 1995 attacked the Tokyo subway here...
...you can't, sir," Tenet struggled...
...Chairman, we have to make a distinction between espionage cases where people were intending to harm the United States--" "I know that," Shelby interrupted...
...system with deadly sarin gas, killing 11 people and injuring more than 5,ooo others...
...I actually think there is a great difference in the two cases," Tenet responded patiently...
...Things were no better the next day, when Tenet returned to Capitol Hill, this time to testify before the Senate Armed Setcutors declined to take any action...
...Shelby asked, referring to the notorious spies Aldrich Ames and Jonathan Pollard...
...A+Re+, P++l~ed++ Lee Oeutch It did not take long before word of the Deutch investigation begat more investigations...
...Then why did Reno change her mind...
...They were surprised to find one, then two, then three, and finally six files that appeared to contain classified information...
...And he hasn't accounted for the information he took...
...Before the book came out in 1996, Scruggs told his superiors what he had done, setting off an investigation into his conduct...
...Deutch relented, but defeated the purpose of it all by keeping the safe emptyand open...
...What do we do now...
...Even though he is no longer a U.S...
...That's what we've been told...
...Over the years, it's been something CIA directors have simply tolerated --until John Deutch arrived in May 1995...
...Well, Mr...
...Now it was out...
...In this ease, we can't tell you that any damage has occurred...
...Too much of an invasion of privacy, he explained...
...As the contract took effect, the head of CIA administration directed agency technicians to do an inventory of Deutch's computers...
...When evaluating the scope of the information potentially compromised by Mr...
...And then he gave his regular housekeeper the code to de-activate the alarm system on the days she worked (she had the house key, too...
...In fact, when they decided to revisit the investigation, Justice officials made no secret of the role the Lee ease played in their deliberations...
...Was it sensitive, more sensitive, or less sensitive...
...This episode represents a sad day for our nation, one we hope not to see repeated...
...Congressional committees demand that you reveal your most secret secrets...
...He didn't seem too bothered...
...Even though they had barely begun the computer check, the technicians decided to stop looking and call headquarters...
...And Deutch admitted his mistake...
...Mr...
...Department officials declined to comment for this article...
...She told the CIA that nothing in the ease merited an indictment, but she did make the entirely reasonable suggestion that the agency take a close look at whether Deutch should have any access to classified information in the future...
...On one of those cards, the engineer noticed that lots of files had been erased...
...As the probe dragged on, several investigators became convinced that Slatkin and O'Neill were covering up for Deutch...
...And some senators want to hnow why Reno didn't prosecute the first time...
...O'Neill told them to print out the files and come back to the office...
...Senator Allard likened geutch to Wen Ho Lee...
...In the Lee case, they brought criminal charges...
...That's right," Shelby nodded...
...Therefore, would it really be worthwhile to indict a former Director of Central Intelligence...
...It's a little room that they build into the house where they have a safe, a secure phone, a secure fax, all of that...
...Even though the indictment against him doesn't allege espionage, most investigators believe Lee intended to transmit the information to outsiders...
...They found 42 complete documents that were classified as secret...
...Ames or Pollard, how would you rate it...
...They also noticed that the Mac was connected to Deutch's bank and to the Internet via Amerber 23...
...And fourth, the CIA allowed Deutch to keep his security clearance while the investigation was going on...
...Deutch is a dope, not a criminal," says John L. Martin, a retired Justice Department official who for many years headed the Internal Security Section, the unit that investigates national security and espionage cases...
...The American Spectator _9 July~August 2000 29 "Director Tenet," the chairman began, "it's been reported that former Director Deutch placed highly classified materials on his unclassified home computer, a computer that was connected to the Internet, but that as far as can be determined, no outsider gained access to this material...
...But Deutch accepted when ~he president asked in May 199 S. And he did some good things at the CIA, like streamlining operations, declassifying needlessly secret information, and weeding out particularly disreputable or unnecessary informants on the agency's payroll...
...government...
...By August 1997 the probe was finished, and a frustrated GIA lawyer wrote a colleague the following memo: The investigation has been one in name only...
...So I don't think that's a fair comparison...
...Yet the case was re-opened...
...When the engineer restored the files, he saw that some of them had been labeled "Top Secret...
...Look at the disparity in results...
...The person who has to set the example to everyone else cannot be above the law," says Arizona Republican Senator John Kyl, a member of the Intelligence Committee...
...We don't exclude the possibility...
...But the chance conversation in February led to a new probe...
...The administrative chief also told his experts to find out whether any classified information was on the Macs' hard drives...
...O'Neill told his assistant to write up a contract for Deutch to become an unpaid consultant to the CIA, an arrangement that would allow him to keep two computers for a year...
...They discovered evidence that Deutch had been erasing files recently--by the hundreds...
...A few days later, an agency engineer discovered two more cards used by Deutch in an office at CIA headquarters...
...And just for good measure, the agency sometimes posts other guards outside the house...
...The Justice Department began a probe that lasted nearly a year before Attorney General Janet Reno decided, in April 1999, not to prosecute...
...Which leaves investigators with this: Yes, Deutch was careless in a way that could have led to a serious breach of security...
...Nearly every director in recent memory has turned over a portion of his home to CIA security men, who convert it into a miniature world spy headquarters...
...One is straight from the Justice Department's own procedures book--the section that deals with the question of re-opening an investigation after a decision not to prosecute has been made...
...Even though he clearly had revealed secrets, the Justice Department decided not to prosecute...
...Let's be honest with each other, this so-called investigation has been handled in a manner that was more designed not to upset friendships than to protect the interests of the U.S...
...There is no evidence the information was compromised...
...The administrator quick]y told a CIA lavo'er about Deutch's request...
...You can't confirm it and you can't deny it," Shelby responded, unconvinced...
...This should have been dealt with administratively...
...He was wrong...
...No problem...
Vol. 33 • July 2000 • No. 6
