by Joe Navarro
“Thank Agent Licht for the hundreds of leads he’s sent out and tracked, leads I regret to say that no other investigative agency involved in this case thought to pursue.”
Silence.
“Thank Marc Reeser for what I hope we all acknowledge is his remarkable talent for assimilating vast amounts of data and finding the links. For helping us find information and generating leads no one else has pursued since 1986.”
This, at least, gets a small nod from the FBIHQ contingent.
“Thank, for that matter, the surveillance team that has sacrificed so much, has spent their own money while awaiting reimbursement, has worked so hard, has been away from home for months at a time, and has never lost Rod Ramsay—”
“Correction,” says one of the minions from WFO. “I believe your crack surveillance team lost Ramsay just the other day. It’s a wonder—”
“You’re right, one time, we did lose him for about twenty hours. Have any of you here ever tried to do surveillance on a Yellow Cab in an airport taxi queue? Any of you?” I say, looking down the WFO line. “We’re lucky we lost him only that once. With all the leaks out of Washington, I’m frankly surprised we haven’t seen him being received in Moscow with a bouquet of flowers.”
Have I just gone off script? Maybe. But I recover gracefully—and I hope teach gratitude by example—by thanking the other offices and legal attachés present, the army folks for cooperating with us, the Swedes in absentia, even WFO for hosting this meeting even though we clearly should be holding the powwow in Tampa. And then I move on to the real points of my presentation: (a) the need to continue this investigation in Tampa, where we have the main suspect, the evidence, the thousands of pages of investigative materials, and the best testimony for a trial (as opposed to the WFO, where they have mostly petty jealousy and cheap vitriol to add to the mix); (b) the details of my testimony in Germany, so everyone in the room will know what I was required to let out of the bag; (c) the fact that, post-testimony, Jane Hein [nodding her way as she nods back to me] and I were able to corroborate Rod’s descriptions of multiple meeting sites in Austria, thus significantly bolstering the case against him; and (d) the final and inescapable fact that Rod Ramsay now represents a significant flight risk who needs to be arrested “before he runs, disappears, defects, and/or destroys evidence.”
“We have,” I conclude, “only a few days, maybe just hours, to act. We need to make a decision. Today. Here. Now.”
One of the Internal Security attorneys, no surprise, jumps on this: No decision, he says, will be made “today, here, now,” putting me in my place. Yet another representative from WFO says that as far as they’re concerned, the lead investigative office is still WFO and not Tampa. This, of course, is where the script has been headed all along, but instead of feeling that I’ve been kicked in the crotch, I’m feeling more like someone strong is pressing the palm of his hand with increasing pressure against my chest.
I drink water from the table, but that doesn’t seem to help. I’m actually beginning to feel dizzy, not just anxious, when Greg Kehoe stands up beside me, quietly suggests I take my seat, and clears his throat before turning to the crowded conference table. Greg is a perfect gentleman, good-looking, full of life, but he does not tolerate bullshit, and this meeting has become so thick with it they should be issuing waders. Time for him to break his silence.
“Gentlemen, ladies, this case isn’t about CI matters, secret meetings, or ‘equities.’ It’s about a criminal enterprise.” He says this with a smile, hoping to bring people down from their high horses, but in a voice that absolutely commands attention, even from the cuff shooters, maybe especially from them.
“It’s a very simple case—a case about criminals who violated the law, stole documents, sold them to a foreign power, put this nation and others at risk, and frankly we’re lucky to have at least one person and possibly more to put away here in the United States. Capisce?” I’ve heard Greg use that word hundreds of times, but something about the way he says it now, with a heavy Queens accent, seems to jolt everyone to attention. I can almost see their ears lifting, the way dogs pick up threatening sounds.
“Folks, you talk like this demitasse of secrets isn’t going to spill, that if we just sit on this long enough everything is going to be okay, and we’ll all get back to where we used to be. Well, I got news for you: That train has already left the station. The shit hit the fan way back when Zoltan Szabo got recruited and turned things over to Conrad. And if that isn’t bad enough, it gets turned over to Ramsay, who flips the whole damn thing into Secrets‘R’Us.”
As he speaks, I can tell that most people in the room are frankly surprised by how much Greg knows about the case.
“Color me crazy,” Greg says, stepping out in front of the room with his arms palms-up, “but someone needs to go to jail. It’s that simple.
“People are going to look at this and ask: What did you do? What did you who are paid to protect us do? What are you going to say then, huh? Tell them you gave the case to the Germans out of the goodness of your hearts? Judicial hands across the sea—that kind of thing? Are you effing kidding me? That doesn’t pass the stink test, not even at the Fulton Fish Market, and lemme tell you, it’s pretty smelly there.”
Greg smiles as he says this, but trust me, no one he’s talking directly to is smiling back with him.
“Boys and girls, it’s up to us to put criminals in jail. Since when do we outsource justice, especially when it comes to spies? You tell me. Do we outsource that to the Germans? Do we outsource it to a Swedish detention facility with conjugal privileges?
“I don’t want to be a pimple on the butt of progress here, but all you’re trying to do is shine shit—excuse my language, Mrs. Moody and Jane—and you can’t shine shit no matter how much effort you put into it. A crime has been committed, for God’s sake, a serious one last time I checked. If we were at war, I’d be asking for the death penalty.”
Greg looks now directly at the DOJ-ISS representatives and speaks almost in a growl.
“And what are you going to tell the American public? That you in this room decided to keep this disjointed investigation going the way it is? That you couldn’t make a decision about an arrest that should have been made months ago? No, we have a duty to the American public, something you in the cloak-and-dagger arena seem to have forgotten.”
Greg walks over to his briefcase.
“Folks,” he says, lowering his voice, a technique he has mastered in court, “I’m leaving here shortly. But I can tell you this. We’re going to prosecute Rod and anyone else we can get our hands on. We’re going to run a grand jury in Tampa, in the little old Middle District of Florida, and we’re going to start papering the world with subpoenas,” he says, looking at me and Rich Licht, who’ll help prepare them, “and we’re going to lock in testimony because so far as Joe Navarro and I can tell, no one has bothered to think about that.”
As he says that, more than a few people in the room begin to squirm in their chairs—literally, not just figuratively.
“Yeah, somehow, you guys have forgotten about locking in testimony. What, you think that if someone said it, it will be there at the time of trial? Who the hell taught you about trial work? Perry Mason? You ever put a case together for court? It’s not testimony until we lock it in through a proper federal grand jury. All we have is what people have said, but that doesn’t mean crap at trial if we don’t lock them into their testimony, if we don’t subpoena records and make those available and ready for the court.”
Greg has begun gathering his things now, but he’s not quite through, and unlike earlier in the day, no one dares to interrupt—not even the senior managers from WFO, because Greg has few equals and certainly none in this room.
“Let me be perfectly clear,” he says. “Neither I nor the US attorney for the Middle District of Florida are going to shirk our responsibilities. I can tell you unequivocally that enough is enough. I will personally trample on anyone who obstructs justice or interfer
es. You seem to have forgotten the trust the American public places on us to exact justice, no matter how it comes to us, no matter how imperfect, and to put people in jail. We have a duty to the American people, and frankly we have no legitimate explanation for what we’ve done so far.”
By now, the DOJ guys are frozen in place, looking straight ahead. I can see the veins on their foreheads throbbing.
“Enough,” Greg concludes. “Get off your asses and make a decision. We’re impaneling a grand jury in Tampa, and we will indict. And you have my word on that. Good day, ladies, gentlemen.”
With that, Greg smiles at Moody, Licht, and Reeser, shakes my hand, and whispers in my ear just loud enough for those nearby to hear: “Don’t take any more shit from these lemmings. Got another meeting. See ya at the airport.” He’s walking out and sucking the air from the room with him when Jane rises from her seat, runs Greg down from the back, then shakes his hand and thanks him for coming all this way. The stares she gets for that tell me that Jane Hein has just become a traitor to her class.
* * *
GREG NEARLY MISSES OUR flight back. Not until we’re strapped in and lifting off does he tell me that he went straight from our off-site meeting to the Justice Department itself to meet with Bob Mueller, who definitely has the attorney general’s ear.
“It’s over,” he says.
“Over?”
“The fighting. The delays. All the shit. The AG apparently called the Internal Security Section and told them to get the hell out of our way.”
“Son of a bitch” is all I can say. The case that will never end is finally going to trial.
“You know what happens next?” Greg asks.
“Sure, of course, the arresting document, arraignment . . . ”
“No, Joey, Joey,” sounding suddenly a lot like an extra in The Godfather, “dat’s next-next, ya know. I’m talking next.”
“Okay, I give up. What happens next?”
“Next,” Greg explains, “watch your back. The knives will come out when you least expect it.”
23
“DOES JOE NAVARRO KNOW ABOUT THIS?”
By the time we land in Tampa late on the night of June 5, I’m having trouble swallowing, maybe because of a lump that has appeared under my chin. It’s so sensitive I hold a cup of ice to it most of the flight, while Greg Kehoe snores lustily beside me. Just hauling my briefcase through the terminal and out to the car park leaves me short of breath.
The next day, June 6, 1990, the State Superior Court in Koblenz sentences Conrad to life plus six years, the longest sentence ever handed down in West Germany in an espionage case—proof that, in that country, at least, this really was the spy trial of the century. By noon on the sixth, the switchboard at our Tampa office is dangerously close to being overloaded. Newspapers and media outlets from all over the world are calling with questions about Rod Ramsay. Did he get immunity for his testimony? What are his trial dates? Where is he in custody? I want to shout back: “What immunity? What testimony? What trial and custody?” But what good would that do?
Instead, I labor down the two flights of stairs to Greg’s office and find him locked in an animated conversation.
“We have to pull the trigger now, this moment,” I say, leaning heavily against his doorjamb.
“Soon,” he tells me, covering the mouthpiece. “The pricks at ISS are dragging their heels.”
“Soon,” I say, “is too late,” and trudge back up the stairs, again feeling like I’m summiting Mount Everest, struggling for every breath.
My next move is to call Ihor. He doesn’t have the clout to make anything happen at the Internal Security Section, but as always, he has a close ear to the ground.
“Kehoe’s philippic the other day was like a Pennsylvania Avenue earthquake,” he tells me. “He rattled the shit out of the front office here, and the AG came down on them a few hours later like a ton of bricks. Something’s about to happen. Paper is heading your way. You didn’t hear it from me.”
Sure enough, Ihor’s “paper” arrives three hours later, with a cover communication from FBIHQ: “Attorney General has authorized arrest of Roderick James Ramsay by COB [close of business] June 7. Coordinate at once with First Assistant Gregory Kehoe, US Attorney’s Office, Middle District of Florida.”
* * *
MY FIRST CALL IS to Rod, who has phoned yet again, worried about his future, while I’ve been ranting away. He wants me to assure him, face-to-face, that the walls aren’t closing around him.
“Maybe you could come over tomorrow?” he suggests. “I could pick you up at the hotel. We could just ride and talk, or maybe get some lunch and eat it in the car like before.”
“No can do, Rod,” I tell him, “but I’ll tell you what. Why don’t you come over here tomorrow and let me put your mind at rest. I’ll cover the cost of gas. I’ve got a big surprise for you.”
“What?” he asks, clearly nervous about where this might be heading.
“She-Moody!”
“Terry?”
“Yup, she’s back from maternity leave. I know she’d like to see you. Say noon?”
Duplicitous? Hell yes, and even worse that I’ve used Terry for bait. I know these lies are eating away at me somewhere deep inside—it’s my Catholic background. But Rod seems happy to comply, and he now has Agent Moody’s company to look forward to, always a treat.
Next, I place another call to Ihor.
“Got it?” he asks.
“Yeah. And . . . ”
“And what?”
“Ihor, it’s four in the afternoon and we have until close of business tomorrow to arrest Ramsay. When are we going to get the charging complaint?”
“What charging complaint?”
“Wait a minute. That’s what your office does!”
“Not this time. You’re on your own.”
“What the fuck?”
“Joe,” he says, before hanging up, “the front office is dumping it on you guys.”
Instead of cursing at a mute hunk of black Bakelite, I hustle down as best I can to Greg’s office once again and tell him that ISS has put us on life support and we’ll have to draft the charging complaint ourselves. I then sit quietly while Greg questions out loud the paternity of everyone in the Internal Security Section and the relative chastity of their mothers. It takes him a couple minutes to calm down, but then he commands two legal pads from his secretary, and the two of us head off to his conference room and begin drafting the document that will officially charge Rod with violation of a federal law—and thus give us standing to arrest him. The document will also allow us to conduct a search at multiple locations—including Rod’s vehicle, his mother’s vehicle, where he currently lives, and his mother’s house—for evidence of espionage activity.
“When is Rod coming over?” Greg asks after we’ve been working maybe an hour.
“Tomorrow,” I tell him, “around noon.”
“You know, Joe,” he adds another ninety minutes later, as we’re putting the finishing touches on a first draft, “you gotta have a plan in place.”
“Oh, gee, Greg, you think?” I say. “I hadn’t considered that.” But as Greg well knows—since I’ve been stepping out of the conference room every twenty minutes or so to use his desk phone—I’ve been working on the plan almost as hard as we’re working on the affidavit. For starters, we’ll need added surveillance to watch the campground closely all night and follow Rod out when he leaves in the morning, a hotel room for the meeting (Moody’s job), and a command post somewhere else in the same hotel. Then there’s the arrest—where are we going to do it so it’s safe? and when?—and also the problem of other law-enforcement agencies that might just trip over us if we don’t give them advance warning. The US Marshals Service, for instance. We can’t let them be surprised that a major arrest is coming down. Nor can we just brush off the local police. US marshals are cowboys—piss them off and revenge is almost certain—but if a squad car of local cops happens upon a bunch of pl
ainclothes FBI agents with drawn guns, lead might start flying in all the wrong directions. We also have to set out over 160 initial interviews to be done worldwide within eight hours or sooner of Rod’s arrest. Thank God for Rich Licht and Susan Langford, who put the finishing touches on that project. There’s no FBI office that won’t be affected by what’s about to go down, and the ripples will be felt as well by many of our attachés in Sweden, Germany, Austria, and Japan—even Italy and the UK.
By now, it’s past eleven o’clock at night, and I’m rousting more agents from their beds to get everything set up for tomorrow. Midnight has come and gone when Greg finally finishes faxing our affidavit to the night-duty lawyer at ISS; it’s past one when the night lawyer faxes it back with dozens of nitpick edits that only a government attorney would ever think of inserting.
“Why didn’t he write the damn thing himself?” I ask Greg.
“Because that requires effort,” Greg says, his pencil busy checking through changes. “ ‘These are the timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.’ ”
“Where did that come from?”
“Teddy Roosevelt. Speech at the Sorbonne. 1910.”
“I would have thought they weren’t helping because now no one is going to pat them on the back when this is through.”
“That, too,” Greg says, diving back into the draft.
Months, even years, of work have now been reduced to writing the legal instrument that will initiate the judicial process, a critical document that will have to stand the test of time and the scrutiny of the courts. And there’s nobody I’d rather have at the other end of that editor’s pencil than Greg. Half an hour later, his head pops up again. “By the way, have you prepared something to send to the NSC so they can brief the president?”
“For crissake, let HQ worry about that, Greg.”
“You don’t want the president to be asked about a spy arrest in Tampa and have to say, ‘We’ll get back to you on that.’ Trust me, the White House wants to know—yesterday—and the National Security Council will be extremely pissed if they haven’t been alerted in advance. I’ve run into this with the Noriega case. Leave them out of the loop, and there’ll be hell to pay. You’ve got to brief State, too.”