IN NEW JERSEY AT [] CIA ACTED REPU

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01315R000400070063-5
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 27, 2004
• Sequence Number: 63
• Publication Date: August 14, 1977
• Content Type: NSPR

AK77CLE Ap'PE':1-fi@pJoved For Release 2005/01/12: CIA-RDP88-01315R00?$
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By Art Carey
Is;n%rer Staff Writer
When thw news broke, it stirred
haunting visions of George Orwell's
Here was the CIA, bent on develop-
in or the ultimate means of mind con-
trol, secretly passing out funds to re-
seachers so that. they could study
drugs, hypnosis, shock treatment and
even magicians.
Y1~(CULTfZ2,~
cr2g~
A-11 t
tist knew that the CIA. was involved,
and that W'as' Dr. Carl, C. Pfeiffer,
then chief of the bureau's"neurophar-
macology section.
It was Dr. Pfeiffer who conceived
of the LSD project, sought research
funds and invited colleagues in' other
scientific disciplines to collaborate.
Highly respected in his field, Dr.
Pfeiffer is now director of the Brain
Bio Center in Princeton. In a state-
ment released after the disclosures
(he has' refused to be interviewed),
Dr. Pfeiffer labe,ed recent reports
about the experiments "a witch-
hunt" and insisted that the project
met modern ethical standards.
This claim is confirmed by state of
ficials and by. Dr. Pfeiffer's former'
colleagues. From them, a picture of
the project-its aims, scope and oper-
ation-has emerged. And it is a pie-
ture far less lurid and iniquitous
than the headlines and early news
accounts may have suggested.
At the time of the experiments
from 1962 to 1964-the Bureau of Re-
search, which closed in 1973, was in a
building on the grounds of the New
Jersey Neuropsychiatric Institute in
Skillman. Five days a week, inmates
from' the Bordentown. Reformatory
reported to the institute for an exper-
iment session for which they, were
paid S4 cents.
Scientists at'the bureau invited the
inmates to be subjects in an experi-
ment involving LSD that, among'
Among those whose work the CIA
funded were several New Jersey sci-
entists ".,vho. in the early -x960s, con-
ducted LSD experiments on inmates I
at the Bordentown Reformatory.
For those with active imaginations,
the disclosures of the last few weeks
have brought forth chilling scenarios
--- trench-coated CIA operatives 'slip-
ping envelopes full of cash to nervous I
scierttists in, dark parking lots; re-
searchers lacing the food of unwitting
prisoners with powerful doses of il-
licit, mind blowing drugs.
Great stuff for a'. movie or TV
drama, no doubt, but the reality of
the expcriments was. far less' dra-
matic and sinister, according to those
who worked on the project I5, years
ago at the New Jersey Bureau of Re-
.search in Neurology and Psychiatry.
First, the experiments. were con-
ducted with scrupulous care and fol-
lowed established and ethical proce-
dures, they say. The subjects: were ,
all adult volunteers who gave their
informed consent, and the results of
the studies Were published at the I
time in national scientific journals.
What's more,, the project was un-
dertaken:at a'4ime when both LSD
.and the CIA were regarded as beingl
far more benign than they are today.;
'tin 'today's post-'Watergate'-cli-
mate, everybody is ;iaranoid about
everything,"I said Dr. Bernard 'S:
Aaronson, 53, a California psycholo-
gist.-Who took part - in the experi-
ments. "But.iri those days, the-CIA
had a very . good reputation. I don't
believe anybody at the Bureau of Re-
`search zvas a CIA agent or as act-
ing with any sort of improprY
ethical motives."
In fact? apparently only o'ne scien
other things, was aimed at exploring 1
-holy the drug works 'and how it af-
fects perception and-behavior-
. After careful. screening to weed out
those with possible psychotic or vio-
lent tendencies, ages of 21 and 25
ivere 'chosen,. and each. signed a cod;,
sent contract before participating.
The project was ;approved by three
state. agencies as well as the refor-
matory's board of managers. A re-
port submitted to the State Depart-
ment of Corrections estimated that
OO1) and
ct would cost $35
h
,
e proje
t
family she said.
responsible
would be funded by the U.S. Public I I Ilk,
owerful drug that
is a very
ISD
"
p
,
.
i=
Health Service and a number of pr
t~ cuts . both ' ways," said. Ms. Cheek,
d Fit encles,~0 '~~o: A-'RD. tkl18t5 tt~lUe~bt 7M~6 modifi-
th
I-. ?~
t
N
-
europsy ua-
e .
catton program a
tric Institute. "It can have both posi-
tive and nenative effects" : : ;
UeN
"There is P -Fc?,c Fein ~,_J C
indicate al y
Corrections
..said.
secret tar's ec
(Ttnost cure
Scientists who worked with Dr.
Pfeiffer say that he supervised the
experiments with the utmost care
and precision and that he took the
drug himself 17 times.
"There was no surreptitious admin-
istration of drugs; -..no one was slip-
ping Hickeys into someone's drink"
said Dr. Henry B. Murphree, 49, then
assistant chief of the bureau's neuro-
pharmacology section and now acting
chairman of the, psychiatry. depart-
ment at Rutgers University Medical
"The. LSD' wag given only after
fully informed consent, and the sub-
ject could drop out any - time he
pleased, including in the middle of
the experiment."
With'one exception-and even that
is questionable-none of the subjects
seem to, have suffered any ill effects
from the LSD. "The doses Were too
minimal to have had any effect,"
said Dr. Aaronson, -who has written a
book on LSD. .
The one case-in which LSD may,
have .emotionally damaged a subject
was reported by. Fratices E. Cheek,
53,. a ,sociologist who. studied four of
the ..inmates _ for the, . effects of the
d rug ,om social 'interaction.
"One inmate began to develop
suspcions that his wife had taken a
lover and threatened to break out
and murder bar,'.: she:.wiote later in
the Journal of Nervous and Mental
Disease:
But ,.the drug produced favorable
results. with another inmate, Dr.
Cheek said recently. .Through LSD,
he envisioned himself killing someone
at some future date.' Apparently, the
experience was so frightening that he
ber,. "went straight" and became a
I