by Marc Ruskin
My faith in the efficacy of transmitters had not appreciated significantly since RUN-DMV, nearly two decades earlier. There would, however, be plenty of eyes fixed on Jean-Marc and Oakley. Chris ran through the checklist. Both audio and visual “danger signals” confirmed. The visual signal I had selected was clear, unequivocal, unmistakable. I would take off my short-brimmed French cap and toss it to the ground. Then the sparks would fly indeed. As always, I had limited confidence in the audio danger signal. (I’ve forgotten what it was.) The “take down” signal (deal completed, move in, please): I salute you for helping my country. I wasn’t particularly concerned as to whether they could be heard or not. Everyone would see Oakley and myself complete our exchange, break off and approach our respective cars, and know the deal was done.
Continuing down the list. My trusted ballistic panel portfolio with concealed weapon. Check. The Geiger counter that looked like a hair dryer (battery-powered), clearly visible in the portfolio, zipper deliberately open—no chance of Oakley’s mistaking it for something lethal. Check. A nylon flight bag containing 10,000 twenty-dollar bills in two sealed, transparent plastic bags. Check. (Chris pleaded: This is the way I got it from the bank. Please try to avoid Oakley tearing them open. Intact, they could be returned as is. Opened … well, he and a bank employee would have to count the entire $200,000. I would do my best, I promised. Chris had done right by me all the way.) Passive radiation detectors in pants and jacket pockets. Check. Car keys. Cell phone. Cap and gloves. Electronic devices activated. Check. Check. Check. Check.
And then they were gone. 8:30 a.m. Fifteen minutes left prior to my scheduled five-minute walk to the meet. Looking out the window, listening to my own breathing, no point in thinking about the meet. As with the last moments before a heavily prepared exam. Even with Sudan deleted, the DOJ attorneys had come up with a laundry list of questions and topics they wanted covered. Of course. With the focus and review that would follow what transpired today, it would not be judicious to follow my usual MO and blow them off. Reviewing my crib sheet was out of the question. With the video running, I had my reputation to uphold. Whatever was going to happen would happen. There were no options left to explore, no additional preparations, no fine-tuning.
Picking up the portfolio and flight bag, down the hallway, elevator, side-door exit, crunching the gravel as I approached the garage stairwell and up the four flights to the roof. The SWAT operators were not yet in place. They weren’t supposed to be. I emerged on the roof just as the car holding Oakley’s space pulled out and proceeded down the exit ramp. Perfect timing. The command post was moving the pieces like clockwork.
Opening the trunk of my standard-issue midsize rental sedan, preparked by Chris in the designated spot, I set the flight bag next to an open attaché case, which had been placed there at the instructions of Hal, the HAZMAT team leader. I was to tell Oakley to place the materials in the case and close it. Jean-Marc and the nuclear hardware would never come in physical contact.
Portfolio set on the closed trunk, I leaned against the car and looked toward the hotel. Listening to the roar of planes at the adjacent airport. Conscious of the multitude of observers, watching me in real time. In the hotel, instantaneously relayed to the offices in Oak Ridge, in Knoxville, in our nation’s capital.
A large gray Lincoln Town Car tore up the ramp, Oakley at the wheel, alone. Big and burly, he got out of the car. No greetings or pleasantries at all, straight to business as I approached with the Geiger counter, explaining the need to check him and the merchandise—there it was, on the front passenger seat—for radiation. Oakley scanned the area and then looked at Jean-Marc. What he saw and, maybe more important, didn’t see—confederates, lawmen, sources of danger—seemed to conform to his expectations. Astonishingly, he handed over a business card with his true name. I told him, in my heavily French-accented English, that I didn’t need to know it. He was unconcerned: “It’s all right as long as you don’t get caught before you get out of here.”
Quite matter-of-fact, Oakley proceeded to detail the safeguarding provided to the stolen “product” by Oak Ridge. Upon entering and leaving the facility, he was obliged to change clothes. So as not to remove the dust—dust so secret that mere motes were capable of revealing the extraordinary nature of these highly prized materials he was selling Jean-Marc. Waving toward the zipper-lock bag containing his merchandise, he went on. The uranium enrichment fuel rods and tubes, originally twelve to fifteen feet in length, had been broken up by the team of laborers that he supervised. Twenty-two tons of tubes. Could he obtain more? Not any longer. Now, it was guarded: his men had been pulled out, armed guards brought in. To watch over tons of pulverized secret bits and pieces. The other buildings all had metal detectors.
“Where they had the most sensitive stuff … no metal detectors.”
This was progressing better than expected. Oakley had already convicted himself. Fully immersed in the role of Jean-Marc, I picked up the zipper-lock bag, holding it high as I examined the contents, providing my audience back in the Hilton and elsewhere with a clear and unobstructed view. What the hell was I doing?! Hubris. Rapidly, I dropped it back into his car.
Was he sure the hardware was secret?
“I know it was classified.” There had been briefings to that effect. Even talking about the materials outside the facility was forbidden.
The sound of a car in the background caused Oakley to spin suddenly, abruptly departing from his narrative, aware of his surroundings. Keeping the conversation moving, I assured him that there were just a few more points “my superiors” wanted me to clarify—information we would need to maximize the utility of our purchase. I removed the list of questions. That was a judgment call—but by this point, why not? We already had him dead to rights.… And how are they used?… His answers may not have been worthy of a physics professor, but they would certainly impress a federal judge. The Uranium 237 was converted to 235 (it may have been the other way around, neither one of us was an expert). The resulting product being radioactive, the stuff was used in bombs. How had he known “my country” would be interested? He said that the plant security people had told him, the French would love to get their hands on it.
Seeing the cash, Oakley visibly relaxed. Any thoughts of a rip-off firmly put to rest. If possible, he became more loquacious. At one point, he had second thoughts about the authentic business card he had presented and asked that I not hold onto it “for too long.” By letting the meet continue, I simply allowed him more opportunity to bury himself. Lest his future attorneys entertain thoughts of denying essential elements of the crime, I emphasized the high points. Having drawn from his own lips his very pronounced awareness of the contraband’s classified status … were there any concealment issues I should be aware of—such as setting off metal detectors—as I would “smuggle them … to my own country.”
We had been on the garage roof for over half an hour. The transaction had been concluded. Every conceivable incriminatory statement had been either volunteered or extracted. Also covered: when he stole the hardware, how he had concealed it, the absence of co-conspirators. The time had come to close the curtain.
“I salute you for helpeeng my countree.”
Shouting and rapid movement as the flurry of ninjas magically appeared. Indignant shouting by Jean-Marc. I am a tooreest! You have no right … I want to call the quonsulatte! A little over the top—it had been a long week. Chris: “Be quiet!” Silence.
Once I was “arrested” and inside the tinted-window SWAT SUV, Chris scanned me with the Geiger counter. I was now particularly concerned about my hand, but no clicking. One of the SWAT operators stuck his head in. He’s all secure. We found a pistol. In his right coat pocket. Looks like a .380. Ah, the pocket his right hand had been in throughout most of the meet. Until he saw the cash.
My Geiger counter didn’t pick up a single bad atom that afternoon. Oakley was arrested, detained, and then released. The judge, to the surprise of most, had set bond.
The indictment itself didn’t come down for six months, in July. A public record, it states that Oakley, “having possession of, access to and having been entrusted with sections of ‘barriers’ and associated hardware used for uranium enrichment through the process of gaseous diffusion … having reason to believe that such data would be utilized to injure the United States and secure an advantage to a foreign nation, did communicate, transmit and disclose such data to another person.”
“Another person” was Jean-Marc. The “barriers” were devices “that play a crucial role in the production of highly enriched uranium … used in the manufacture of atomic weapons.” Oakley’s lawyer dismissed some of the material in question as “pieces of scrap” and downplayed the whole case as much ado about nothing. Which, after plea bargaining, translated into seven years federal time. The official redacted video of the meet on that garage roof is public record. In fact, I used it in presentations at Quantico as a case study in carefully orchestrated, successful undercover operations and apprehensions.
14
ALTERNATE BREACH
In late 2008—almost two years after the January 2007 takedown of Roy Lynn Oakley in Tennessee—the full-time gig with the Foreign Counterintelligence squad came to an unexpected conclusion. Without a word other than vague references to dollars and cents, the entire Group I op—well established, thoroughly backstopped, and consistently successful—was deep-sixed. I was astounded. In addition to the assortment of part-time False Flag cases like Roy Lynn Oakley’s (if less notorious) that were successfully concluded, my primary assignment had been this long-term op. Three UCs (two women and myself) on that detail were providing intel of value (or so we believed, and were led to believe) on a regular basis. For over three years, I had inhabited the FBI’s deliberately less-public side, the world of counterespionage, identifying foreign spies and foiling their plans. My activities must be related in the vaguest of terms. In the course of my (covert) workday, and in the evenings, I would cultivate relationships and build rapport with foreign nationals in order to gather information from them, which would later be documented and distributed to those within the Bureau who would be interested. Unlike the criminal UC work, a certain degree of socializing was acceptable, even encouraged in this very different arena. The people I was interacting with would never be arrested, never learn of my true identity. As with real-life professional and personal relationships, I would eventually drift out of their lives, simply moving on.
Specifically, I developed an acquaintance with an executive from a country historically hostile to the United Sates. Code name Victor, this executive engaged in two jobs: a cover job that I (and everyone else) was meant to believe was his true occupation, and that true occupation, which was intelligence officer. Over a period of six months, I had seen this gentleman frequently, maintaining a courteous but distant relationship. I waited for him to make the first move. Which he did. First with small talk, working up to occasional lunches (for which he invariably picked up the tab) and later, exchanges of personal confidences. The classic steps taken by an intel officer assessing a potential recruit. I was a “dangle.” A double agent pretending to take the bait. Once recruited, he would be my control officer, directing me to develop relationships with those in the know, collecting intel useful to his country. As a double agent, I would indeed provide intel. A careful blend of apparently useful (but insignificant) true information, salted with apparently useful (but false) information.
This one relationship continued after the counterintelligence op was officially shut down near the end of 2008. By early summer of 2009, we believed the “pitch” from the foreign intel officer was imminent. I was ready. I was stoked. From UC in heroin and Mafia cases in the dark side of the criminal world, to becoming a UC double agent on the dark side of espionage and counterespionage? I would have done it all. And then, on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, on July 9, on a country road in Connecticut, that case, too, went kaput. Where and how? On the back lanes of southern New England, while riding my classic Honda Valkyrie 1500cc touring bike.
I loved those New England backcountry byways that manage to retain all the charm and resonate with the tranquility of a less complex era. (I realize that some, maybe many people consider the big bikes outrageous offenders of peace and quiet, but most of the bikes have mufflers that make them as quiet as cars. Those bikers who substitute aftermarket exhaust pipes without baffles, simply in order to make a lot of macho noise, are jerks, to say the least.) Past village squares bordered by red-brick Federal-style buildings and balconied colonials, passing dairy farms and stables, I cruised with deep pleasure—for years, this had been my antidote to the world of crime, corruption, avarice, deceit—the zone whose parameters defined my day-to-day existence. On this sunny July afternoon, I crested a hill southbound on rural Route 202 heading toward New Preston, Connecticut, the two-lane, shoulderless road curving to the right, limiting my field of vision. At the approach of a northbound Harley, I turned my head to the left to exchange salutes. A slight turn to the right—and the impact was instantaneous. The face shield of my helmet ripped, my chest tearing along the trunk of the car that was stopped dead in the road at the end of the curve. Then the impact as my body hit the asphalt, landing like what I was, a bag of bones. Immobile, as the Harley driver—an EMT, who had heard the crash and immediately turned round—asked if I knew my name, what day it was, all the diagnostic first-responder questions. Never losing consciousness as the faces streamed past, wondering only if my ticket had finally been punched, not by a felon with a 9mm—that I could almost have accepted—but as a civilian motorist, inanimate, in the middle of the road. A banal traffic statistic.
Was this how I was going to die, alone amid strangers? The responding state trooper ascertained I was a lawman—gun and creds were in my fanny pack—and made sure they pulled all the stops. I was medevaced via helicopter to a trauma center in Waterbury, where it was soon established that I would likely pull through. The butcher’s bill: two broken—shattered—elbows, a lacerated kidney, right knee damaged, upper lip torn open, miscellaneous abrasions and bruises all over. When I met the angel-of-mercy trooper, he explained. The car had stopped while waiting for a car in front to make a left turn. As there was no shoulder, that driver had not been able to pull around. After skidding and banging over the trunk, then the roof, I was airborne for twenty-five feet. When the momentum dictated by the laws of physics came to an end, I landed, plopped to the ground like that aforementioned bag of bones. No sliding along the asphalt. Even better—amazingly—my flight was not interrupted by a guardrail, lamppost, tree, or second car. To that good fortune alone did I owe my survival.
It would be four months, November, before I could return to work.
* * *
Nor was that counterintel sting the only one disrupted by the motorcycle wreck. I was also right in the middle of ALTERNATE BREACH and OXY BLUE, two ops I had been invited to join following the Bu’s abandonment of the counterintel op. When that decision came down at the end of 2008, I initially feared that I might now be assigned to “real cases” as an ordinary case agent, no longer the full-time undercover guy. Hoping to fend off any such development, I scoured Janus for UC roles, but my fears were largely unfounded. It turned out that I was now essentially the New York office’s éminence grise of undercover agents, enjoying upper management’s sub voce carte blanche to work any UC ops, whether in New York or elsewhere. With a highly unusual twist. Historically, I had worked cases arising out of the squad to which I was assigned—COMMCORR, RUN-DMV, INFRACEL, BLUE SCORE, and others not recounted in this tome—while being “loaned out” to other squads and field offices on an ad hoc basis. But now, going forward, I would be assigned for administrative purposes to the same counterintelligence squad for which I had been working. But my UC cases would have no connection to the squad. This was a significant gesture, because managers were allotted limited numbers of special agents, from whom they were expected to receive tangible, measurable results. The
managers’ own performance evaluations were dependent on the stats generated by the agents under their supervision. That’s the way all bureaucracies work.
With me, that counterintel squad was utilizing a valuable SA slot but with no return for their squad. The Bu might benefit, the NYO as a whole might see enhanced results, but for my specific chain of command, zip. I was truly a freelance UC, free to work any UC op that came my way, whether in New York or elsewhere. The only caveat was to keep myself busy, to periodically provide my supervisor with a rundown of the cases I was working. I owed this unique position to the benevolence of Phil Romano, my boss’s boss. Formerly the Chief Division Counsel, top lawyer for the New York office, he was now an Assistant Special Agent in Charge of that office. And for me, a guardian angel. The only other FBI UC agent I have known with similar freedom of movement and accountability was my pal Jack Garcia, the 350-pound New York UC (author of The Making of Jack Falcone). Once Jack retired in 2006, it was just yours truly.
The agents on ALTERNATE BREACH and OXY BLUE recruited me in early and late 2009, respectively. In both instances, I had accepted even though I was somewhat ill-informed. In fact, I had not performed any due diligence—a recurring error, no doubt a personality trait. As admitted earlier, I always assumed I could handle any case, and I always assumed that I should handle it because I was probably the best man for the UC job. Leaving TURKEY CLUB (the La Cosa Nostra op) before its final (positive) resolution was an aberration, brought on by internal conflicts and what I considered simply egregious errors of surveillance, backup, communication, and more, as related.