FORMER COUNCILMAN OPERATED CIA FRONT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000201160038-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 19, 2010
• Sequence Number: 38
• Publication Date: February 2, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201160038-0
STAT
`~ ARTICLE "APPEARED RICHMOND NEWS LEADER
ON PAGE--/
2 FEBRUARY 1,082
Former' cour~cilma1 I
ocs~rateci C;1~4 front
N
By, ANDREW PETKOFSKY. run..organizations than` poses as toun-
During the late 1950s and into 1960, dations in order to pay students and
one member of Richmond City Coun,, scholars to collect intelligence abroad.
cil augmented hiss. public duties- by,
working for the Central Intelligence 'WORKSHOP FOR AGENTS
Agency. Lawler said CIA officials also peri-
John Edward Lawler,-"a former,-odically used the Old Dominion office
'agent of the Federal Bureau of Inves- and the streets of Richmond as a
tigation. who, became' an immensely;,; workshop for training agents in spying
popular councilman, says he had beea&t- and other- undercover. techniques..
quietly associated with- the CIA, fon' t) The CIA, for its part, has declined to
some time when,he took his seat - o n 7 4rsay whether the- operations- in Rich-
council in 1956.. . -.?1 mond existed. But the- agency's re-
He began accepting assignriients spouse to The Richmond News Lead-
from- the then-fledgling intelligence - er's request='under the - federal
agency soon after he retired in 1950 as Freedom=of-Information Act does not
special agent in charge, of, the Rich- contradict Lawler's limitedrecollec-
mond FBI office. - - - tions of his undercover work., . '
As he sat ?a ' a glass table on the
PHONY RESEARCH FIRM - r glassed-in porch' behind' his house,
-One of Lawler's CIA jobs was rune Lawler, now 73, was not eager to di3-
?ning a phony research organization in ".cuss the details of his CIA service or
Richmond that served as a front fora ti< a history of Old Dominion Research.
CIA training and payroll operation. He He had agreed to an interview as a
continued that task during his=tenure ''-.necessary consequence of having do-
On council and after he stepped down Hated 'a large collection of personal.
in 1960 papers 'd documents to the Virginia.
"I did. it.as a patriotic citizen," he Commonwealth University library?, said. in an interview at his home on.
Riverside Drive in South Richmond.. APPLICATIONS FOR GRANTS
wrote. "YOU pit uapa ^ave glut LdKerl
sufficiently into account the fact that,
as a practicing lawyer whose career
has been temporarily interrupted at
least from a financial standpoint, your
status is-considerably different from
many other fellowship gr antees. sent
abroad under F_ulbright or other pro-'
grams. it is our desire that your
financial position will enable you to
entertain people at your home or else-
where." . Y.
A number of the- documents in the
folder are letters from other founda-
tions or 'consulting firms - asking
Lawler to sign letters and send them
on to whomever they are addressed.
Although Lawler recalled -colorful
anecdotes-,about his- crime-and-com-
munist-fighting days in the .FBI
(where he was an administrative as-
sistant to J. Edgar Hoover for several
years) and his years on City Council
(where he garnered more votes than
any other candidate in one campaign).
he maintained that .he never knew
much about what went on in Old Do-
minion Research's offices.
What he did .know, he insisted, he
since has forgotten.
The collection, comprising 102 fold-
If Old Dominion Research Co. (later 'VANISHES IN TIME'
the Old Dominion Research-Fund) was ens and filling five cubic-foot cartons; "It jusust vanishes in time;' Lawler
no includes one folder of documents con
reation of theCIA,it was b
a
s in ti
y
c
id an
- . sa w air e means'unique. Dozens of. foundations cerning the CIA front company: Most Y
and non-profit organizations that used of the papers in the folder are applica- . Nonetheless, in two interviews
tax money to pay students; scholars, .'_ tions for overseas research grants or more than a year apart, Lawler did
diplomats and news reporters to gath letters from- Lawler approving re-- not leave the impression that he is a
er information? .for'the spy agency search projects in Europe and the forgetful man. Short and trim, white-
were identified in articles and govern ,Middle East. i ,.? haired and dressed on the second visit
If they were `not identified as CIA _in sporty clothing accented with pow r
meet investigations in the-mid-19609. documents bLawler and in the table _ der blue socks and white patent :eath-
Although the Old Dominion organi= Y
Contents re aced b the shoes, Lawler appeared to bed
of
c . P P ._ Y he VCU li:
nation never was exposed as. a CIA-',,
front,, it fits the pattern of other CIA- brary staff -? and-by the inclusion in friendly, good-humored, sharp-witted
"r the same folder of a mid-1960s' news= and proud of the many turns his ca-
paper editorial commenting on then-: seers as. a-,law- enforcement, official;
;recent exposw -e of some foundations business executive and lawyer had"
as CIA fronts -- the precise nature of to Before he left for an'aEternoon'of
Lawler's files wouldn't be -obvious:--
$ome of the documents raise ques- card-playing at the Commonwealth
tions, however. Club one recent-snow'-morning, he
One 1959 letter from a George Can- showed off, an,,.extensive= and .neatly,
ron of the Hudson Research Society in-. - CQ
New York City advised Lawler that a
'revised purpose" had been chosen'for'
the organization.'-_t
"We can call this a-,'societyx fund,
foundation, council. association, etc
whinh~var vnn fnoi vnu n'n hnet en -
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201160038-0