AMERICAN SPY SUSPECT IS TOLD OF 'RIGHTS' UNDER SOVIET CODE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00001R000300370007-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 30, 1998
• Sequence Number: 7
• Content Type: NSPR

WASH LNGL'O '
A-RDP75-000
4Y Sanitized RUSSIQd For Release :'CI
American Spy Suspect Is Told
Of 'Rights' Under Soviet Code
By MARK' KAMINSKY
(As Told to Peter Hahn)
(Copyright, 1960, by North
American Newspaper Alliance, Inc.)
LAFAYETTE, Ind., Nov. 2
-I was sitting in the sound-
proof interrogation 'chamber
of the Russian secret police
headquarters at Kiev, stunned
by what my questioner, Col.
Lysenko, had just told me:
looked around. There was a
Mr. Kaminsky, who teaches the Rus- cast-iron cot, a rather ornate
sian language at Purdue University, affair with lion's claws holding
was lingering in a Russian jail a' the metal frame, a night table,
little over two weeks ago, wonderingr a stool and some shelves.
whether he would ever see a fellow: My inquiry about basic needs
American again. This is the fourtk was met with a silent gesture
of five articles by the first American, toward a crude bucket stand-
to return from Russia after being ing in a corner. But all told, the
tried and convicted of espionage. cell was clean.
1.-I had the "right" to an- Alone to Think and Worry
swer all questions. But no men-
I was suspected of having tion was made of a right to re-
violated Article 2 of the Soviet fuse an answer.
2.-I had the "right" to ad-
criminal code, dealing with. mit my guilt. When I asked
"especially dangerotfs crimes about the Fifth Amendment, or
against the state." ' a similar provision under So-
It was the article dealing', viet law, my question was
brushed off as "capitalist non-
with espionage. . sense."
I had just been flown to' 3.-I had the "right" to com-
Kiev "for further investiga plain about unfair treatment
The guard handed me two
bowls for food, a tea pot, and
a metal cup. He also gave me
a wooden spoon. Then he left,
closing the heavy steel door,
quietly behind him.
I was alone for the first time
since my detention. Alone t4
think, alone to worry, more
alone than I had ever been.
Moscow, the United States Em-
tion" of my case. The interro by the interrogators. But their bassy, my family, even Harvey
'previous attitudes already had Bennett, only a few miles away
gators wanted to find out more demonstrated how much good seemed hopelessly removed line of questioning had changed,
about why ?I had tried to take this "right" would do me. from the reality of this Soviet No longer tvas I being bullied.
th P. wrrma r.hprk-nnint. fei
leave the country, and why >; Own Counsel, They Say
had kept a note book and diary
I then asked about my right
during a month-long motor
r
trip through Western Russia. for counsel, and about my right
My friend and traveling com- to see a representative of the
panion, Harvey Bennett, was United States Embassy.
being held as a material wit- Lysenko answered: "You have
ness, confined to his hotel.a head on your shoulder. You
room. Are your own counsel in this
Now I was informed that the! investigation. And as for see- and tense as I swallowed a few down most of my mental re-
Soviet government had ordered ing someone of your Embassy, mouthfuls. sistance and left me
f
con
used.)
my arrest. the answer is-No!" Then I made my bed and Col. Lysenko and Col. Arak-
This opening exchange, and
Spoke in Russian a repitition of went to sleep. I surprised my- chayev knew that by now I had
tory, my personal his- self by sleeping l*' e a log-once addition to Col. Lysenko, all strictly for the rec- -once been made to feel guilty of of
ord, took up most of my first I had accustomed my eyes to crime I had not committed. j
a lieutenant colonel from the afternoon at KGB head- the glare of the 100-watt bulb And they started dangling the
Red Army's judge advocate quarters. glaring straight down. lure of a "glorious life" in the
general's office had been as- Later that night I was led I was awakened by a guard I Soviet Union before my eyes.
signed to investigate the "mili-,to the prison bathroom in an "You are a fine physical'
banging on my door and yell
adjoining building.It was R !speen,"
tary aspects" of my case. His large room with several metal ing "padyom!"--get up! ("O c e You they would say.
name was Arakchayev. He, too, shower stalls. When taking a: The prison routine never! to Soviet t e have society, why society, wh your debt
not stay
was present, together with an shower, the prisoner is locked varied: Wakening at daybreak, here? We shall provide you
interpreter named Adamski. inside a stall, handed a bar of toilet buckets emptied at 7 a.m. with a decent job. Wouldn't
GI soap, and the guards turn and 7 p.m., breakfast at 8, an you like to stay?"
My questioners asked me hour's exercise at 9-although l Alone
whether I wanted to speak on the water from the outside.
in my cell
awa
fr
,
y
om
my exercise was carried out in the
English or Russian during the After the shower, I was isolation from other prisoners, questioners and their tor-
ments, I could think only of
(During my entire detention
T
prison. f neat questioners
team, ' split into ~
Ten minutes later, a smallo
the bal
peephole 'was opened in thi. of fictional fact and emotional l
door and a woman asked mF attack skillfully back and forth'
for my food containers, re= between them-with me in the
turning them with a non. middle.
descript meal. I cannot remem-1 The nine-day ordeal with:
ber what I ate. I was nervous "Grindstone," my tormenter at
~ Uzhgorod, already had broken
"ever saw other victims of of see
anguage, and would , need an towels, and led back to the cell the KGB. But I heard them, Russia. Would I ever see
interpreter only for the clarifi-block. The guards opened one pac.i,ng above me at. night, my home town, my parents, my
cation of the fine points of of the padlocked doors, and I Sometimes, there would be a girl again?
Soviet law. stood inside the 6-by-10-foot thudding overhead, as if some- I en thought of suicide.
Lysenko said that 'what was hole which was to be my home one was banging furniture on 4 Then on Sunday, September
appening now' was an "official for the next 40 days: Cell No. the floor of a cell. And-II' after a 10-hour interrogation,
nquiry," and that everything 35, Voldamir street, third en- don't know whether I imagined Lysenko gae me electrifying
said from this moment on trance. them or not-hut at times 7 news: He told me that I was
ould be considered evidence The guard assigned to me, a thought I heard faint screams
id could be used against me surly individual, said: "We'fr'om nearby.).
Then, could be u Arakchayev pulled out don't expect any trouble froth
tray-bound copy of the -,o_ you." meaning you-stay-iu-linr_ No Longer Bullied
let criminal code," and began
o read to me my "rights" as
suspect. -Among them wen?:
to appear the next day before
the prosecutor who would "pre-
pare my case" and who would
decide whether I was to be tried
Each day there were cease- )the Soviet state: E, p onage.
less rounds of interrogation) and; (Next: My Trial and Convie-
. d,,Dtdsitinnc " But -71. 11-1
FOIAb3b
4
Sanitized - I~K96"Tor Release : CIA-RDP75-00001 R000300370007-8