REAGAN GRANTS MARTINEZ PARDON FOR WATERGATE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180034-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 19, 2010
• Sequence Number: 34
• Publication Date: May 14, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT ArRTIC' Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-
HF' WASHINGTON POST
Ol: PAGb / 14 M.ay 1983
Reagan Grants
Martinez Pardon
For' Watergate
,By David -Hoffman
Ow%mg a Pof J U welts
President-Reagan has pardoned
Eugenio Viartinez, one of those ar-
rested inside :.the Watergate office
building.in?the:.June 17,1972, bur-
glary of."Deiao tic National..Com-
mittee headquarters.. `
Administration 'officials _ said: Rea-
gan signed the-pardon on Wednes-
Martinez is? tartly the second per-
aon to be -pardoned in the 'Watergate
scandal The other :was former . pres-
ident Richard -?M -Nixon, who was
never charged with .a crime but re-
signed?on Aug. 9, 1974, and was par-
doned by his successor, President
Ford.
Martinez, 60, was sentenced to
one to four years in prison for his
role in the burglary that touched off
the Watergate scandal He pleaded
guilty to conspiracy, burglary and
wiretapping- -counts, and served 15
months at4a minimum-security pris-
on in Florida before being paroled in
January, 1974.A pardon would clear
his name and allow him to vote.
Martinez, who now works at a
Miami car dealership, told ABC last
night that.the-pardon-"is the end-of_-
an era, of a chapter in my life .... After
today, it will be over." ,
Saying that he feels that he was mere-
ly following the orders of his government,
Martinez said that nonetheless he now
will "be more than happy.to.give a better
name to my children and my grandch l-
dren."
Martinez also was convicted of con-
spiracy for his role in the Sept. 3, 1971,
break-in at the office of Dr. Lewis Fiel-
ding, the psychiatrist of Pentagon Papers
defendant Daniel Ellsberg. But that con-
viction was reversed.on appeal
Daniel E. Schultz, a lawyer here who
says be sought pardons for the four
Miami Cubans arrested in the Watergate
break-in, said last-night that the pardon
requests had lain dormant at the Justice
Department for several years. Schultz
said he had not been told of Reagan's
decisiorr.and didmotrknow why Martinez'
pardon had been. approved now.
The Whitt-House could offer no fur-
. ? then explanation le-*- night. It was an-
nounced yesterday, however, that Reagan
will make an appearance next Friday be-
fore a Cuban-American group in Miami.
Reagan's strong =stand against commu-
nism in Central America in general and
against Cuban President Fidel Castro in
-P ,icular bas :fag made him a popular
figure among the Cubans in Miami
Reagan has:beencourting Hispanics as
part of an effort to lay the groundwork
Ions possible 1984 reelection campaign.
Before the Vatergate break-in, Mar-
tinez had long bmn.active in CIA-spon-
sored covert efforts to overthrow the Cas-
tro regime. He maintained throughout
the Watergate and Ellsberg break-in
cases that be believed he was engaged in
legitimate national security operations.
'There -was absolutely no question that
the Miami Cubans had been -hoodw innked
and had good reason to believe" they
were engaged. in legitimate intelligence
activities, said Schultz, whosaid:he based
the pardon requests on this point and on
Martinez' long service to the government
in a 'covert. cap! ltz
"It was never in my mind to do any
wrongdoing," Martinez told U.S. District
Court Judge Gerhard A. Gesell at a 1974
sentencing hearing in the Ellsberg case.
There was no word from the admin-
istration last night about possible par-
dons for the other three Cubans arrested
at the Democratic National Committee
headquarters-Bernard L. Barker, Vir-
gilio Gonzalez and Frank Sturgis.
In 1977, President Carter commuted
the sentence of G. Gordon Liddy, the
mastermind of the break-in, enabling
him to be released from prison after serv-
ing four years and four months.
Schultz said he first filed a pardon I
request for -Martinez while Nixon was
still in office and resubmitted it in the
Ford administration. After. Martinez'
conviction in the Ellsberg case was re-
versed on appeal, the pardon request was
resubmitted again, he said.
There were seven,original defendants
in the Watergate break-in case. The oth-
ers were James McCord Jr. and E. How-
ard Hunt Jr.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180034-2