DISPATCH: REQUEST FOR GUIDANCE IN RESPONDING TO NEWS MEDIA INQUIRIES

• Document Type: SPECIALCOLLECTION
• Collection: Records Related to the Assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 00355698
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 8
• Document Creation Date: June 6, 2025
• Document Release Date: June 12, 2025
• Publication Date: June 3, 1976

L104-10320-100011 1. As is apparent in the attached COPY Of a' New OZloans tine article, former District /Attorney Jim Garrison and his Ulan news media:.;,/,,, It is possible that, tacted'bY newemanfoor c assassination theories are enjoying a ' interest by local .,- , , , . *OliEe#$ "Picial the New .eans LO. be, con- light of recent disclosures' which . ' Ina" "ail' , ., Ole to the Warren Commission.' ,. In the absence of more specific Headquarters guidance we intend to respond to any such inquiries by saying, that; J. Garrison's charges of CIA involvement in the Kennedy assassination were false when he first rade them in 1966, and they �31r4 still absurd today,- and we prefer not to comment further. Iou may be able to suggest a better response than that, and if so we hope you will share your thoughts with us. , 2. We are somewhat more concerned about how we should respond to any direct questions concerning the Agency's relationship with Clay Maw, who as you knced was unsuccessfully poosecuted by Garrison for conspiring to assassinate President Kennedy. Shaw, whom Garrison refers to az, a CIA employee and who died about two years ago, was en active contact of Renter Leake's during the period 19118-1956, pre- sumably as a routine source of FPI. respite the 30 some-odd con- tacts recorded on Shaw's contact card, however, his local file contains only three pieces of innocuous correspondence. 3. Since we cannot determine the nature of DCD's relationship with Shaw from our files, we -would appreciate your summarizing it for us. We would also, of course, welcome your guidance in responding to any news media questions about our relations with Shaw,' should tagy materialize. PHouckhrs Attach. as stated E2 IMPDET CL BY 003820 ,14). A e *?) sAn J. WALT011 MOORE 05-07.-77 44 ,CIA HISTORICAL REVIEW PROGRAM .41,E t`Y TELEASE-IN FULL 1199a ii2441.1+10411 ' ,ISSE PREVIOUS EDITIONS � � f. 4Y:4 bAti.1.NAT1U.D1 14.1-T �Ub ONLY SECRE -Ei-b.eet4f-litITTTA UNCLASSIFIED n the soot-stained facade of an old brick budding In one of the seed- iest parts of downtown New Op, leans, scrawled in a barely legible but firm hand, stands the plaintive query: "Who killed Cock Robin?" Inside, in a modest second�floor office that he shares with a fellow attorney. Is the in- domitable investigator who has been claiming for nine years now to. have solved that riddle�former Orleans Par- ish District Attorney Jim Garrison. Jim Garrison is the man no one want- ed to believe. The crusading lawyer turned shady D.A. The self-styled Poi- rot reduced to Clouseau. The standup comic who overstepped the bounds of good taste. Another clown in Louisiana's embarrassing political circus. It was seven years ago that "The Jolly Green Giant," as he was sneeringly call- ed by the media, was laughed into near obscurity with his unsuccessful trial of Clay Shaw on charges of conspiring to murder President John F. Kennedy. And two years since the once-unbeatable prosecutor had been driven from office by charges of bribery and income tax evasion, charges of which he was even- tually exonerated. In those two years, Garrison has prac-� tically vanished from the news scene, becoming more reclusive and evasive than ever, refusing interviews, as he plunged into his private law practice and the business of earning a living after more than 12 years of regular income as a salaried district attorney. His disappearance from public view, broken last month by publication of his first novel, Star Spangled Contract (pre- dictably, a fictitious account of the as- sassination of a president by members of � the federal intelligence community), has been effected despite the fact that for two years in the late 1960s, Garrison dominated headlines and innumerable column inches of newsprint aroun,c1 the warld with his theory that Shaw, Os- wald and a. battalion of others, whom he claimed were all members of the federal intelligence Oommunity, conspired with elements of the U.S: military-industrial complex to kill Kennedy. If that didn't get enough chuckles, the motives he propounded for the assassina- tion did: that the military and benefit elements of the Central Intelligence Agency were distraught by the young president's policies toward Vietnam and Cuba. His theory had it that Oewald, Shaw and gp airline pilot named David Ferrie were CIA operatives involved in the execution of Kennedy. ' Oswald, himself murdered by the mysterious Dallas nightclub owner jack Ruby, and Ferrie, who allegedly com- mitted suicide at the height of the Gar- rison investigation, were unavailable for prosecution. So Garrison proceeded to Wel with the lone living defendant In the assassination case, Shaw. After a bizarre two-year fight by Garrison to bring him to trial, Shaw was acquitted In March, 1969 by a jury that delibe- rated less than an hour. And Garrison was mocked. He conceded defeat, but a year later released his own version of the Assassination investigation in the form of a book entitled A Heritage of Stone, in which he claimed his case against Shaw had been torpedoed by the ;federal government. The book was generally dismissed as a product of Garrison's ob- session with the case. Meanwhile, the strapping six-foot- five D.A. was fighting federal charges of bribery and income tax evasion in a case Garrison called "as confused as a Chi- nese laundry in a thunderstorm:* Claim- ing he was as certain of acquittal as he was that "King Kong likes big bananas," Garrison beat the rap. But the damage to his reputation was irreparable and two months later ha lost his bid for re- election. Following an unsuccessful campaign for a seat on the Louisiana Supreme Court, the Jolly Green Giant retired to private law practice. ; In the two year drice he*Oste'ntittow-- ly surrendered his office : to nick. Garrison' ha's' Waichet 47kt:tan' perhaps be excused the :Wrilgiadivii, the Nixon administration collapsed tin- der the weight of the Wateigatelscan- dals; as the FBI eeknoWledged,.4d� ingly. that it illegally tapPed the tele- phones of Vietnam War dissenters and opened the mail of American elf the CIA was forced to admit' liss involve- ment in assassination attempts, domestic espionage and surreptitious entry into the homes and private files of prominent Americans: and Hiegel involvement, in the domestic affairs of other nations. Yes, it was nine years ago that this impudent small-time " local prosecutor sullied the image of the United .States government with lurid tales of political Intrigue, murder, , and cloak-and- dagger exploits of the American intelli- gence And now the ihick- ens- have come home to roost. _ Yet the man who first advanced the notion that the government of the United States was involved in domestic espionage, the influencing of foreign elections and the murder of "undesir- able" leaders at home and abroad has been uncharacteristically silent. In an interview with this reporter earlier this year, Garrison broke that self-imposed silence, claiming it had been maintained first, because of the unfair treatment he had received from the media, and second, "because I don't have time." "One reason that I don't have time for interviews explaining the involvement of the federal intelligence community In the murder of Jack Kennedy," he ex- plains with frustration, "is that it's so ob- vious." His frustration turns to con- tempt. "It's very much as if I were to get into the habit of giving interviews to ex- plain that the sun rises in the east. It's nhvimic that it ricec in r�ste. cr. il,rrnr 1 '1(1 ''''' 1 if I. iii k.111,11 '11111111 ill , ro;�'II:1111111 111111111111111M 1 ill! ilf!I Iii IL1 . ,1,14.,,IiiiiI.411 ' ;I 1 Iiii!! ''' ,111111Imil . II. ;:i14: J1111101..2. � 111...,,'ill, tri' ..' ' ..., i''' ) .....ci 1 .1111111110illi1,11111 1). op. 010- � out: I'sjusts obvious that Garrison ad ereskmorilstiOnglY4 than ever to his thenryitthat .1Cen 641 I ntelli genes , � genekWei involved In the Kennedyai(J t?'SassinatiOn'and that recent about the; CIA's involvement � In foreign murder Plots haVi:OnliSCrved to fan the:, ernes Of hls-enthissiasm'about the case. , Garrisen'itares'it't he1orni.,Paintingi. that graces the Will Of his office. OW it SeCiiis iii'fit:theiA`fit-stark Winter riC.�,1�Of',1eafleisFtreW9iii.'blacks' and No grays. : Garrison' doesn't see things in grays. Only blacks and whites. "I was sure 'about the CIA's Involve- � ment nine years ago .when I first re- . vealed it," he remindl,..,71 was dancing with the CIA. I wasn't gUessing. I knew the Central Intelligence Agency was In- ,�volved ,because they Were all over our office during the Investigation "I guess a few people would say that I'm vindicated, if you Want to use that word, because in 1967; I first brought out in public Interview the involvement of the Central Intelligence Agency In the � Murder of John Kennedy. That's a mat- ter:of record. "That's also about the time heavy in- terest in the assassination ceased down here, because such a concept was re- garded as so Insane, so impossible, that the national media stayed away in droves. � Garrison's suspicions about the media run deep. It was they, the great news organs, he rays, which portrayed him as a fool and a bully, and they did it all to protect themselves. � "Each element of the media has an in- dividual interest in its own survival," he rerzons, "and it will violate that Interest in survival if it takes an active part in showing the involvement of the United States government in the murder of John Kennedy. "It's black and white. They're part of the. establishment �the national estab- lisliMent� and too great a change thrC'atens their survival. From their point of view, the revelation that the CIA, even on the upper-medium or up- per-middle level, killed :he President of the United States, might bring on some form of revolution and certainly might destroy them financially. And they can't participate in that." Any mention of CBS television's re- cent series on the political assassinations and attempted assassinations of the Six- ties, brings a resonant chuckle from the deep recesses of Jim Garrison. -CBS went in the tank again," he growls. "onl., this time they did it a little differentlr. They repeated their faith in the Warren Commission as they did some years back, and then ac5ed, 'How- believe , ,ever;Trpstrixiou, ppearAno.we ere sFould be� acongressional Investigation tfi- 5114. 114 because ?.: eP)ainY4- :4(.4..:!gresSignallinVeSilgittioii, I any,:sv_iiy,4440ieett,OieNtiii eh' noses, nvo veme�t �f,th�ited ,Statesintelligence.4ageneies,,, especially ih.e:Pk.'11.1Pn';theYWei.eZdOWn.'hereiIi feWniOnthi.age;:to they can't get `siWit'Y from the fact that it has been put in their hinds": They had to take' Pretect!,,themSelve4-�,but theyre . Interested In' survival ind !n making irn:;4ey4nd.they�wouid,iiiither 'survive nor,Make'inOrierlflheirionght to push the CIA involvement theory too Backtracking a bit, ,GarrisOri explains that CBS sent down a researcher to dis- cuss with him the, CIA assassination theory. - , "He was rather ; bright.r. says Cirri- sors',,We talked. I tried Min 'IC"We's, 'CiiiiABG''ProPositiOn-IO': . , . . show ile,e relationship of Central 1;17.:, telligence:AgeneY;to the Mitrder, Of John, Kennedy to the point where the burden of proof shifted to the CIA to show that It was not involve � "I suggested that we go down to the Times-Picayune and get photocopies of the Shaw trial; because there, were at' least eight or nine solid 'witnesses who show. that Clay Shaw or David Ferrie were with Lee Oswald on a nuinber of different days in the town of C1Inton,_ La. Clay Shaw and David Ferrie. 'Now; I said, 'if those men turn auto he con- nected with. the ; federal intelligence establishnientmore speCificallY the CIA�then you have two men with Lee OiWald day after day who are with the: CIA.; Conversely, he's not with anybody during that 'time, who's not with the' CIA. And yet the FBI has told us he murdered the President of the United States. So the remaining part of the syl- logism is to see if these men were con- nected with the intelligence community as! said they were.'" CBS had taken Garrison's ramblings in stride. After all, the Shaw Connection had been examined over and ever again. But Garrison pointed out that new infor- mation about the former New Orleans business leader had been "unearthed:* It had come from Victor Marchetti, former CIA deputy director who resigned.from his job in 1969. "According to Marchetti," nays Garri- son, "he learned of Clay Shaw' s CIA connections during my investigation Of Shaw in 1967. Marchetti says he fre- quently attended morning sessions with high agency officials and these officials often voiced serious concern that Shaw's CIA contacts might be uncovered and made public by me. Marchetti made these same remarks on film for the Citi- zens Committee Of Inquiry; which has ,.. :en pressing tor new tiiv,eniptP,c.rCok ohnlik� Xenn�i e Thu'1n terms of spvtl�n # , � 1. � .R ci4Ae , '.commun photostat COPYof a cli 10"Heie'ii!-a7 description ., newspaper of Clay Shaw's achy Rome; obviously for the CIAZ4iiirison.' "Clay Shaw, according b.C. siltimatelnad to leave '40,0tV,',',1kft cl actiVItY A- '"So,'we have the stateie�tsofMar, Ch, et, Of the ,G111; that Shaw: arid,FerrIe Were CIAri.,�-inil,We'll'aiVeithe'itiiiieirlen"' and formatiOn.bi'Ahe 'seri Shaii41V- fect,.engaged in clAsiiiiiViOir .high.leVel in Roni.,En.:;19.6.2..:.?..nd then we � have the testimony of a Mint nesses that. .Clay Shaw and' David Ferrie�and nobo4Y, !1:#11',1*.ttki Lee!..:}larvey:: Oswald .-daYrx.after 'day in -,Glintotit;Yo4, don't have to 14 Into all the. Other business of Who Shot: JOhn4Thet7;', enough to push the burden of proof onto the intelligence coMinunity., If our; news; media were objective. and not fearful,.' they would go on from there, not Into a general investigation, of Who 46(3'94: Kennedy. but why the intelligence cont;..; munity was involved In the .murder John Kennedy, and begin at the begin.' .ning. It would Save a lot of time. But the media can't afford to do that, and they won't do. that:" � Tree months after Garrison madei; that statement, the Senate intent.. gence Committee recommended that a new Investigation into the muss- �;-: sination of John Kennedy focus on the role of the U.S. Intelligence commuChy, in the life of Lee HarveY Oswald. But Garrison, never one to bite his tongue about his suspicions, believes that Kennedy was not the only victim ol the intelligence community's assassina- tion plots. � "By pattern, the evidence makes every I, one of the major assassinations, in my judgment, suspect of being products ofl After the assassination of John Kennedy, the American intelligence community] A the intelligence community was told by , the American social and political leader- I ship, in effect, "Kill whosoever }ou� want. We won't do anything about it." 1, They were given the same word by the I, FBI, which aPtively participated in I' covering up what the top command had i to know was a Central Intelligence Agency assassination. So the intelligence. community knew It ha.; :-. free hand and it proceeded to eliminate, at et time when It waa beginning to have trouble: with opponents of the Vietaam War, it began to eliminate oppoistnts of the -T-At ---- ctnam war so tney could Keep it; i ,it yas-41,11-ifrii.l.t.(44, Becaue interestpf, 1114.intOlria-41CAW13-ei'lr!'k-AT 1.'i' 'i'V'4401iiiii:nrk 9r-v4iiito, ;11;ithqi : - that going -,.i.tut .. �;-,:., 0, -',111co An' 7,- f 4mart111, lYilllitiTi-64tiilf t#1.ii?"d're io'e:11:1' ti to,),(2,i441 gv--, *iin ., In and-wairbecom n ere 'Shout, thec Vietnam Warethef.'gOti'rld of Bobby had just won a big' .OrYin....Californiiarid;,,Was onl`...the - ier ge of becoming the next President Of, the!, United -States. - He *cotild.;,. not Only:, have gotten tii out 'of Vietnam, judging by statements he - had -,b.4ti making for: several', years, :but he':'..Wptild,-,.obvieusly have initiated a serious InVestigation into lick Kennedy's inurclerAnci.jhen;'.thY had to 'shoot -WallacitoO;y1o"'reelect Nixon. beeause. Nixon; contrary ... to everything that poured out of Washing- ton at the time, was about to lose the 1 c ection. , . ...;',' � - ' Realizing such a broad' statement 1 ,. needs some amplification in view of ..%ison's landslide victory in 1972, Gard, sOn explains: �,It'ai matter of One and '' one making two. - Ten days -before the Wallace shooting, : the Gallup " poll showed Nixon had dropped to 44 per cent and McGovern had risen to 41 per amt. That meant if the trend continued, and Nixon dropped two more per cent and McGovern rose two more per cent, MeCovere was the next president of the United Sta. McGovern's main plank was to end the war in Vietnam. Con- - versely, Nixon was the warfare sector man. He was their man, so there wasn't much to hesitate about on that score." Linking the assassinations and at- tempted assassination of Wallace is just a matter of common sense as fir as Garri- son is concerned. ; "You have the same mechanics 'in every case," he explains. "You expose your- scapegoat - for all of about 15 seconds to the public, after, which the public rarely sees him again. And they virtually all leave diaries Which, al- though in their own handwritings, all say practically the same thing. So the in- telligence epparatus found many differ- ent ways to get people they wanted write whatever they told them to in their own handwritings. But if you read Sir- han Sirhan's diary and'Arthur Bremer's chary, after a while, you don't know which one you're reading. It's full of the false sponsor kind of thing: in other words, they leave an awful lot of materi- al pointing-in the other direction. "And Oswald, although he didn't leave a diary, fits Into the false-sponsor mold. Oswald was always with anti- Castro Cubans in New Orleans, and yet when he was arrested in Dallas, they had to bring up a big truck to take out torts of material which they had stored there, which was ostensibly his. Things ifk,e "Hurray for Revolution;" and "Viva Fidel," and books which he undoubtedly never saw in his entire life, but which ula ence s, corru 4 ' tANrire merit0 I'M OSS1 04.? .were stored therelinMK piles to make it.look: like he was 's( madman; which was � of the icenailO.14Miite,t1Fvouno juste firettY;:Straight lower-level, Intelligence _employee Who believed i�what his su- periors In the government told hirri-He did "what � theY�. told hint' to do and'. reward for Serving the. United States for '30 months in Russia was to be murdered and branded a madman. He believed in our country a little too much.' He didn't. realize we were not the country We pre- tended to be and that we had deVeloped into a state of fascisin?Which he .Was useful to as a scapegoat.': ; ack on the subject of the medlies Involvement in helping to cover the MAUI Hon up na Garrison shares his suspidons about freelance Journalists. -; � "A large number of freelanoe writers have been picked up in recent decades by the�CIA, he says. "When the CIA was formed, one of its chief objectives was to develop as much control as pos- sible over the media. I don't think it suc- ceeded in getting the control it wanted or else the question of its involvement in the assassination would 'not have been raised; although it was delayed; some-. what. However, one of the most' effec- tive pieces of machinery they have is the 'freelance agent,' who writes articles which are published to prove that jaek Ruby could not possibly have been con- nected with intelligence in any way. "As a matter of fact," Garrison ex- plains, "the evidence is overwhelming that Jack Ruby Was very active in 1958 until his death in obtaining ammunition and jeeps and weapons and supplies for anti-Castro forces :o be shipped to Miami and used in Cuba. And there's no great mystery abut the reasons for it, -because that part of the Mafia which is connected with� 'Meyer Lansky, who owned the Tropicana in Cuba, was a major ally of the CIA in its anti-Cuban activity. And that's the part of the CIA that's involved in the murder Of Jack Kennedy. That's why you're seeing indi- cations of the Mafia here and the Mafia there. "When you're looking into it, &seems confusing at first. But when you Under- stand that that part of the Mafia which was the ally in the late Fifties, early SIS- ties, of the CIA .is working , with the agency like it used to before, as Ruby was doing, actually the evidence Is over- whelming that he was working for the over kfIve.,7; intelligence xstommunitYNotasi,sigent NO'.4352;;;With'Sa gold b adge,i Meinberef the Mafia of-'Whietila beearne subservientle the CIA; "That was Rubi"a:InVOlVenieW fro why he was activelY:engagerfin:ifZis isissinitieti'...ife delivered one of the rIfle- men 'tii.the grassi,knollaS7OrieStliiels observed; although the government,' ilie FBI,-changed her qUently got the trtiatestimnnY"frnM,lier It's Up in Washington now. Apparel*, that's One Of the ways l they persuade Ruby. it was the better 'Part of %alor for him to be the one to remove Oswald.-' cruisi:: a few diys.'eaitiei livered a gunman to grassy kno�.. wasn't a case o saying,: 'Say.'.,Jad would you mind doing this little project for thr By the time.Sunday.after- sassination rolled around, they Were in position to say, 'Jack,. do you realize! what you did the other ciayr,'That'is, why he was crying the next few days2': He wasn't crying about the Paist0TO He was crying because he knew what h� had to do � ."The evidence is .plentiful that Ruby was one of a number yho Worked for the CIA. And that's why the FBI :/cver� seriously Investigated him., went 90 of their way to avoid It.. Thiby. was all over the place. He was every plece, Lep -`e � Harvey Oswald was at Ruby's_ placek,� He was there with one of his anti-Castro.A Latin associates from. New, Orlean4:' 'Ruby h so deeply Involved in everything , that it's necessary for the United States government intelligence community to hire somebody once in a while to say. Ruby couldn't possibly be connected with the CIA." Garrison's cynicism about the federal government is impos- ' sible for him to contain. It oozes from every pore. And the more he talks about the CIA connection, the more ap- parent his loathing becomes. "You hive to remember," he says, "that the United States government, - with regard to.this area, is as corrupt as a government of man is possible to be. It couldn't possibly be any more corrupt. It literally would go to into a hydrogen' war with China before It would allow', the people of the United States to learn the truth. That's how corrupt it is. And that shows you how far it's willing to go to keep the truth from coming out. And publishers know this, many people in news business know this, but le n't have 'c6vcra'ge and'le' ont o-a:Iittle comes ere and there; ut ereiSn'renOnghlathat it all conies coutsehstantiallyandconsistently,,And 'aboveTall,.'they're,..noebeing; given ..any elp,hythe'government,7a government that 'Would;:ratherjeeTmillion 'people 'estroyed man atomlcwar with Red hinabr Russia than allow people of e United States to learn the, truth about what happened to Jack Kennedy':', I'm satisfied that this ''COverep is being Continued even today by key people 're- maining in the government who re left over from those who ratified the murder of John Kennedy." .^44 Garrison does not shy away from the implications of such an indictment. He bluntly implies that 'even President Ford shares in the :blame for a less-than- thorough assassination Investigation._ "Ford was one of the major post-assas- sination conspirators." Garrison argues. r; "You have to understand that the War- ren Commission, of which Ford was a ? member, was not a committee to investi- .. gate, although it was mace to appear that way to the citizens. Actually, It was . a committee to reach an accord. Their , t ' function was to reach an accord as to what the proper and official fiction would be. There was never, at any time, a Sincere search for the truth. And one of the most active men of the Warren Com- mission working to fool the American people was Gerald Ford. "I don't pretend to know all the Ins and outs of the American federal mach- inery, but I would suspect his perform- ancet in helping to cover up the tracks of the CIA is not unrelated to the fact that he's president. That's one of his rewards. I'll put it conversely: had he been raising questions and said, 'It looks to me like the government is involved," he would not be president of the United States. In fact, he probably would not even be alive." Lying aside his pipe and staring blankly across his desk. Garri- son talks about his involvement in thi,assassination investigation in the two years since he left office. "I've been so busy trying to earn a ttod,e, t veasod tieing diutriet at. torney, that I've found I haven't had time to do much Investigating. So I guess the government knew what it was doing when it arrested me and helped me lose the election and put me in law practice, because I haven't had the time to devote to the investigation that I would like to. -But I have learned, thanks to Victor Marchetti, that Shaw and Ferrie were both CIA employees, which means that we were not wrong with regard to the trial of Shaw. It juct means that we 1404 to bring simPly�did,not haVe,;*bne'bf�the jniars ' '-- ed'hietift the,..jiiiinti*-fele.there:4eacriiiatiOINf- oCrhav ng established:��,t'al�consp raerl they just found there,Wasn ketiongh m� five': But ifive,'41been:ableTtO'ihithai Shaw and Ferite*erel members of the 4etiir43.4.1a, have Made all the difference in the World:. Mitt the, governmenelConCealellnforinatinn from us r,'''k'AliAlig***44110,141�41�- .c--"The other significant that I've learned that -I didn't appreciate the full- ness of and