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Washington Bureau of The Dallas Morning News
July 28, 1999
FBI head says finance probe has expanded
Freeh also calls terrorism unlikely in TWA crash
By David Jackson
WASHINGTON — FBI Director Louis Freeh, breaking months of silence, said Sunday that his bureau's campaign finance investigation has grown and that evidence points to mechanical failure as the likely reason for last year's crash of TWA Flight 800.
The former prosecutor and federal judge also defended the embattled FBI lab, said there is no prime suspect in the Olympic park bombing and rejected suggestions that FBI snipers fired on Branch Davidians during the 1993 standoff near Waco. But he refused to comment on reports that he has recommended appointing an independent counsel to investigate questionable fund-raising practices during last year's presidential election.
The FBI director, who has been under attack from the White House, Congress and field agents, appeared on NBC's Meet The Press. He discounted reports that he would resign. "I've certainly thought about that, but my work in the FBI has been very satisfying," Mr. Freeh said. "I think my leadership is still effective, and I think the work we do is very important." Mr. Freeh declined to answer reporters questions after his television appearance, saying, "I'll be late for church if I stop."
One of the bureau's top priorities is investigating whether China and other nations tried to influence American elections with illegal campaign contributions. China denies such allegations. "Part of the overall inquiry is also national security issues, which would rise in our view above tine, legitimate lobbying efforts," Mr. Freeh said.
He said the grand jury investigation involves at least 38 FBI agents and about two dozen support personnel, Including computer and intelligence analysts. Both numbers are highs for the Justice Department task force in. investigatlon that began last year. At one point, the investigation involved no more than 25 FBI personnel Attorney General Janet Reno has resisted Republican calls for an in-dependent counsel to investigate campaign fund raising. Aides said Mr. Freeh has recommended such a step, a subject the director declined to discuss in detail. "I've given her [Ms. Reno] my recommendations, and she will ultimately be, as she is, responsible for making that decision," Mr. Freeh said.
White House aides have criticized him and the FBI for withholding national security information because of the investigation. Mr. Freeh said his staff is trying to balance the White House's need for information with investigators? need for confidentiality. "We have dual and sometimes competing responsibilities, but a primary responsibility has to be protection of the grand jury investigation, which I intend to do," Mr. Freeh said. The FBI is continuing its criminal investigation into whether terrorists brought down TWA Flight 800 off the coast of Long Island, killing all 230 people aboard. But Mr. Freeh said it is winding down the investigation amid evidence that mechanical failure produced the explosion that caused the crash. He said he hopes the investigation will be finished by late summer. "The evidence is certainly not moving in the direction of a terrorist attack," Mr. Freeh said. "It is, in fact, moving in the other direction."
Mr. Freeh's comments were in line with previous statements by FBI agents and National Transportation Safety Board members investigating the crash. Since the July 17 crash, they have investigated three things that could have brought the Boeing 747 plane down: a mechanical failure, a bomb or a missile. During the last several months, Justice Department and NTSB officials have said mechanical failure was more likely.
More than 90 percent of the plane has been recovered from the Atlantic Ocean floor. Officials are reconstructing the plane and say they have found no evidence of a bomb or a missile. As he has all along, NTSB Vice Chairman Robert Francis on Sunday minimized any differences between the two agencies.
‘This investigation has been, and continues to be, an unparalleled cooperative effort on the part of both agencies," Mr. Francis said in a prepared statement. ‘The FBI's leadership and expertise continue to be of extraordinary value to the investigation." The investigation of the Olympic bombing is more active, Mr. Freeh said. The FBI has been faulted for initially identifying security guard Richard Jewell as a suspect; the bureau later exonerated Mr. Jewell. Agents used a ruse to question Mr. Jewell, telling him he would be part of an FBI training film. Mr. Freeh said that FBI procedure permits such ruses but that agents erred by reading Mr. Jewell his constitutional rights as part of the trick.
The FBI is also in the process of overhauling its forensic lab. A Justice Department report said lab agents did sloppy work in cases that included the World Trade Center and Oklahoma City bombings. Mr. Freeh said that though he thinks the FBI lab remains the world's finest, there has been a "lack of management oversight."
"I don't think we had the right kind of openness in terms of peer review, but all those things are being put in place," Mr. Freeh said. Mr. Freeh, who became FBI director shortly after the ill-fated Branch Davidian standoff, also disputed a new movie that says agents fired on sect members before raiding them with tanks and tear gas.
"The overwhelming evidence clearly shows that no shots were fired," Mr. Freeh said. Mr. Freeh, whose 10-year FBI term would expire in 2003, said dealing with controversies are part of his job.
"This is a process of review and scrutiny which needs to go on and should go on," he said. "But I think we're doing great work as we speak."
© Washington Bureau of The Dallas Morning News, Inc.
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