FEEL CIA INVOLVED, ASK PROBE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000400460039-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 8, 1999
• Sequence Number: 39
• Publication Date: August 2, 1969
• Content Type: NSPR

5pLtazed Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00149R(Op397 CLE
AU G
By
Azwl:"i'1I,4 t ': '1'tol\v
"f0r,lottC1l" e rick ">irouaUC,
elected, "cik pile the fact that
r to
deli raLeJy '..-,'led in orde g glorious One survived to tell what
lilC) '
Of tae. U.S. happened."
space program lily white? thIt istkno (lead Palmer Nv ote,
Sounds beep Ostcrous? family has been "extremely
unhal)I?y about many facets of
ack to a belie llutnl)er of death, including press
busks who believe. with a reports indicating he was rho
passion that the Dcccnhber, pilot of the plane which
1.67 piano "accident" was ?erashod, He was not at tkle1
delii e3 ately staged in order to ?? controls."
rid the pro`,ran of its Only llis widow; ivio i,. Barbara
Moot: p.:riicip:int. Lawrence, and motuer, Mrs.
,,he bill ,, was reit:forcckM Gwendolyn Duncan, have SCd whoa receat ~re:,the: 7 cl and about his tdeathith' ne wife s,?:
. His :.news nl;;;:a eulogies to
alt ctlau.s : filled in the space 11 mother, Mrs. Ida Cress, ex-,'
venture ee.ri'icd no inCtltlf33: of plained that it was a "com-and the
LavwrenCe'S na1i113. ~k+L )tkcai emotional of bitterness
publicly,
:blaciks were cspacia.ly la-ming the fact of.
ceased when President Nixon reOP(
(Lawrence's) death.
? fl1:P.,ait:ZCici rigor kited>>^.ir-..~ .
bearing the names ofr' tllrek "There seemed to be an''.
;. s +?: "v:l:o gave their'
livesaw effort to make it app
roared ear that
;lives" v,i3en lire : Bob was to-blame," Mrs.
through their shill anchored on
a lain Ail;g pad at Cape Cress is quoted as saying
I:~t1, ez y, would ha left on tklo', ? while speaking of reports that
he was piloting the plane at
d
"
An
1:10011. the time of the crash.
to obscure
Sp cuiatiun that the Cent1::3` why r have role they tried
in the space program?
-Intelligence A ;ency (CIA) I :Black boys and girls need the
was responsible for ?; 'kind of image that. Bob..'
Lawrence's death has been represented."
mounting mostly in Chicarg`o, c.
where the brilliant scientist-,: Flory, Palmer wrote, was
pilot grew up. Ishmael F'lorymore blunt.
director of organization for, "Certainty there is in the
Chicago's African-American Afro-Anlericall community a
iterti : al., has demanded -suspicion that Maj. Lawrence'
a full Gn ci'cumstwlces might ? have died from foul
of Lav:,'en.;e's death. play," Flory said. "Anc, .,s:
long as the nation can talk
According to press reports, . about the space program and,
Lawrence died when his plane those fvl:o . died for it, and
crashed on the runway during ignore a black U.S. citizen like',
a proficiency training flight. ; Lawrence, there will be
Another pilot, Maj. FtarveY J. further suspicion."
Royer, who was with him at
the time, survived the crash Palmer admits that the
but was injured. possibility of Maj. Lawrence's
Ho'.vcver, noted journalist having been deliberately slain,
L. F. ::ilmcr, in a recent is stretching the imagination'
column in the Chicago Daily and that chances of it being
mews, revealed that an Air 'admitted, if true, is "most
Force spokesman told him the unlikely." However, he
d
official probe shows that both ! -blames the of over ncent and
and ' ejected that before the crash hits anding out space program
and ? that t Lawrence's
parachute "did not open ''credits, for leaving the door
oppn to this kind of mistrust,
sufficiently,"
CPYRGHT
I'alnler said the spokesman ?
told him Lawrence's ccat`.3
was due to low cjcction; i3ut
TTC ' ~ ~ 1
rmation Gn the
f
i
o
n
s Were
wa Ik tlti.., at -h;oh thp. :liters
CPYRGHT
WEEKLY - 47,2'1'13
Sanitized - Approved For Release CIA-RDP75-00149R000400460039-9