CLOSED HEARING SET ON CIA'S SPORKIN

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000403620017-2
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 27, 2012
• Sequence Number: 17
• Publication Date: October 4, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/02/28: CIA-RDP90-00965R000403620017-2
ARTICLE
ONP M
Closed Hearing Set on CIA's Sporkin
Agency's General Counsel in Line for Federal Judgeship
WASHINGTON POST
4 October 1985
By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
The Senate Judiciary Committee
has scheduled an unusual closed
hearing on the nomination of CIA
general counsel Stanley Sporkin to
a federal judgeship, saying it must
examine allegations involving sen-
sitive intelligence information.
Sporkin's nomination to the U.S.
District Court for the District of
Col! rnbia has been held up for 16
mon:hs, largely because of opposi-
tion from conservative senators
including Sen. Jeremiah Denton (R-
Ala.).
Sporkin is disliked by some con-
servatives because of his aggres-
sive tenure as enforcement chief of
the Securities and Exchange Com-
mission before he joined the CIA in
1981.
CIA Director William J. Casey
has offered to testify at the closed
Senate hearing scheduled for Oct.
21, and other CIA officials may also
he asked to testify, according to
sources.
The hearing will examine allega-
tions that Sporkin improperly inter-
vened in a Justice Department in-
vestigation of a leak of classified
CIA information to a Middle East
publication, the sources said.
They said it will question wheth-
er Sporkin alerted a former CIA
official to the leak investigation be-
fore advising him to hire a lawyer.
The official resigned last year after
the probe began.
Sporkin called the allegation
"nonsense" yesterday, saying:
"There's no question at all, no ev-
idence at all about my notifying
someone of an investigation."
Sporkin said he had not previous-
ly known the CIA official. The leak
investigation was already under
way when he learned of it and "went
and helped him get a lawyer," Spor-
kin said. He said this was part of his
job as the agency's counsel.
Sporkin said it was "very, both-
ersome" that his nomination has
been delayed while opponents "try
to impeach someone's integrity
.. It's important that we have a
hearing. I've got [to protect] my
reputation and my integrity .... "
Some committee Democrats
have urged Chairman Strom Thur.
mond (R-S.C.) to open the hearing,
as is usual in judicial confirmations.
But Mark Goodin, a spokesman for
Thurmond, said, The chairman
intends to have a closed hearing
because of the number of classified
documents involved ... and the
sensitivity of the documents."
Sporkin may also be questioned
about his 1983 role in ordering two
CIA agents to withdraw their mon-
ey from a Honolulu investment firm
that collapsed amid fraud charges
six months later.
Sporkin has said he knew nothing
of the firm's financial problems but
viewed the agents' investments as a
conflict of interest because the firm
had some ties to the CIA. Company
founder Ronald R. Rewald is on trial
for defrauding investors of $22 mil-
lion.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/02/28: CIA-RDP90-00965R000403620017-2