CIA Area Chief Loses Post Over Drug Case Flap

WASHINGTON —  The CIA’s chief of Latin American espionage operations has been removed from his post after attempting to intervene on behalf of a boyhood friend who had been arrested on narcotics charges in the Dominican Republic, according to U.S. intelligence officials.

A lengthy investigation by CIA management determined that the chief of the Latin American division of the CIA’s Directorate of Operations had attempted to use his influence to aid the friend, who had also worked briefly for the CIA in the Dominican Republic. CIA management concluded that the intervention represented an abuse of the division chief’s senior position.

The decision to remove him, closely following allegations of CIA responsibility for crack cocaine traffic in Los Angeles, comes at a time of heightened sensitivity at the spy agency to any perception of a link between it and drug dealing.

At the same time, however, the action sparked criticism within the agency from those who believe the division chief was punished too harshly.

The Times agreed not to name the officer, who is still serving undercover after being reassigned to a non-management position. A 1982 law bans the publication of names of undercover agents if it could hurt U.S. espionage activities.

The CIA initially referred the case to the Justice Department to determine whether to launch a criminal investigation of the officer. Although Justice found no grounds for prosecution, a CIA management accountability board recommended that he be forced to step down from his senior management position. He was removed as Latin American division chief in November, roughly a year after he tried to come to the aid of his old friend.

The CIA has already notified both the House and Senate intelligence oversight committees about the decision. Its officials say congressional leaders have expressed support for their handling of the matter.

U.S. intelligence officials play down suggestions that the CIA’s decision to punish the officer was influenced by the intense political pressure on the agency that has grown out of published allegations of a CIA link to the spread of crack cocaine in Southern California.

Still, others familiar with the controversy surrounding the CIA’s division chief are convinced that the political heat played a role in the case.

The pressure stems from a controversial 1996 series in the San Jose Mercury-News that charged that during the 1980s, a California drug ring operating with CIA protection deliberately introduced crack to black neighborhoods in Los Angeles and sent millions of dollars in profits to the contra guerrillas fighting to overthrow the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

The allegations in the Mercury-News have since been widely debunked by other major news organizations, but the charges have nonetheless resonated among the CIA’s legion of critics, most notably within the African American community.

John Deutch, CIA director at the time, took the extraordinary step of attending a town meeting on the issue in Watts last November. Fending off angry hecklers during the 90-minute session, Deutch offered assurances that the CIA would fully investigate the charges, and the CIA’s inspector general is still conducting a wide-ranging probe.

U.S. intelligence officials stress that there is no evidence that the deposed Latin American division chief had any connections to narcotics trafficking. In fact, the officer had a track record as an able drug fighter, having previously served as deputy chief of the CIA’s counter-narcotics center.

“He has been heavily involved in counter-narcotics work, and the twist that this was somehow an act of condoning drugs is ridiculous,” said a senior U.S. intelligence official.

But U.S. intelligence officials insist that the officer’s judgment failed him when he tried to help his friend, who had been arrested in the Dominican Republic last fall for possessing 2 ounces of cocaine. The arrested man, who also faced an illegal weapon charge, had formerly worked for the CIA’s station in the Dominican Republic, acting in what the agency calls an “accommodations” role--setting up post office boxes and running other errands.

The CIA’s Latin American division chief, who had befriended the man during their boyhood in the Dominican Republic, was told by a mutual friend and by the CIA’s station chief in the Dominican Republic that many of his friend’s personal possessions had been confiscated at the time of his arrest.

“When [the division chief] learned of [the situation], he contacted our chief of station and asked him to talk to his contacts to make sure the individual was not mistreated,” a senior U.S. intelligence official said. “And he asked that if charges were dropped that his property be returned to him. [The division chief’s] motivation was built more out of friendship than anything else.”

U.S. intelligence officials emphasize that the division chief did not seek to win his friend’s release from prison, nor did he ask the CIA’s station chief to meddle in Dominican Republic legal proceedings. “At no time did he attempt to get the charges dropped,” said a senior U.S. intelligence official.

But once word of his actions reached the top ranks of the CIA, officials realized the division chief had acted inappropriately.

“We put an awful lot of trust in our folks, and especially in people in senior management positions,” observed a senior U.S. intelligence official. “His involvement of the station [in the Dominican Republic] was an error in judgment, and it created at least the perception of a misuse of his influence and power.”

The senior intelligence official added that the efforts to have the CIA’s station chief use his contacts in the local government on behalf of a man imprisoned on drug charges “could also be seen by the local government as a signal that the CIA was taking a position on the case. We thought that was totally inappropriate.”

Still, the CIA’s decision to punish the division chief, who was very popular with his subordinates, has sparked controversy within the spy agency. Many feel the agency is so tied down by legal and political pressures there is no longer any room for CIA officers to take the risks necessary to gather intelligence overseas.

“Maybe it would have been better if he had not asked the station chief to get involved, but this should not have evolved into a massive investigation and scandal,” said a former CIA official. “It just seems to me that it did not warrant all of the political and legal hand-wringing.”

Senior U.S. intelligence officials dismiss the argument that the current case reflects a growing aversion to risk at the CIA.

“It is true that there are a good number of people who are upset by this decision,” one said. “He is an officer who is extremely well respected and well liked. But even he recognizes that there was an error in judgment, that there was a perception issue that he should have been attentive to in such a senior post.”