The Accidental Spy

by Sean O'Driscoll

  On Thursday 12 April, 2001, they left Cape Coral at 9am.

  They drove across the country, spending the night in Knoxville, Tennessee. Again, David didn’t sleep.

  Early the next morning, he called Mark. The FBI was to call off its surveillance. He didn’t want the FBI anywhere near him or his family. He didn’t want to be under surveillance. Mark could see there were big problems with David’s mental health. “OK,” he said. “OK, David. That’s not a problem.”

  David and Maureen drove from Knoxville to Dorie’s house, arriving at 3pm. Just because David loved dogs, Maureen suggested they take Dorie’s puppy for a walk in the park.

  They stayed for four and a half hours, talking to Dorie and her boyfriend, Mike. By the time they left, Maureen was very worried about David. He looked exhausted, on the verge of collapse. He hadn’t slept in days.

  They decided to visit their old house outside Chicago. Along the way, they called on Dan from the bank, who greeted them as homecoming heroes.

  “Well, I’m so proud of you,” he said. “Now I know somebody who saved many lives.”

  They were both warmed by the visit. It gave David some perspective. Hero. A word he hadn’t heard since the papers outed him.

  While he collected some possessions from the old house, Maureen went to Sheer Designs, the hair salon she used to attend. Her hairdresser, Mary, hugged her as soon as she came in. The whole town was talking about nothing but Rupert, Rupert, Rupert. It was all over the Chicago papers.

  Mary sat her down for a haircut. A woman with an Irish accent had called three weeks ago, pretending to make an appointment but then asked, casually, if she could have Maureen Rupert’s number because she didn’t have it with her. Mary hung up the phone. The story made Maureen laugh. David picked her up and they drove to meet Mark at the Chicago office. The meeting with Dan had been the best possible tonic before Mark, tentatively, introduced the head of the FBI protection unit. He wasn’t there for surveillance, only protection. Maureen gripped David’s hand.

  “I understand,” David said.

  Mark went with them to her father’s house. He knew her father had been distraught that his daughter was in hiding, away from her family.

  Mark presented Mr Brennan with an FBI cap and mug. Everyone laughed. It was a little conspicuous to have family members wearing FBI caps when they were supposed to be in hiding.

  That night, David and Maureen went out to dinner with her father and Mark.

  FBI agents sat at tables near them and in a car outside. It was their first taste of this new world of close FBI protection.

  Mark was relieved to see that David was a little more relaxed, but he was getting very sick. All the stress and sleepless nights were showing. Maureen was concerned about him.

  They walked out of the restaurant and said goodbye to her father. They followed Mark’s FBI car, with another car behind them, to the Lake Lawn, Wisconsin’s most relaxing resort. Armed FBI agents were already at the resort, waiting for their arrival.

  CHAPTER 22

  A concierge led David and Maureen to their rooms. It was an entire suite, with a living room and a balcony overlooking the resort, with its long walks through the forests and a massage room and a swimming pool.

  Even Rupert, still sceptical and not sure if he was being kidnapped, was very impressed. “I thought it was just going to be a room, like everywhere else we stayed. This was more like a home. And the FBI were in apartments either side of us.”

  The FBI also reserved apartments for the two senior gardaí, Martin Callinan and Diarmuid O’Sullivan, who would be coming from Ireland in a few days.

  David and Maureen woke up to the sound of children playing outside. It was Easter Sunday and Chicago’s rich had booked into the resort for the weekend.

  Maureen was very excited. She went swimming in the pool.

  Later, she called her father and Dorie to wish them a happy Easter and to tell them excitedly about the resort and how much the FBI loved it too.

  Mark’s wife arrived with their three children, to make the best use of the resort while they had it. Maureen was struck by how beautiful they all were. She looked like the perfect glamour wife and the children were extremely well behaved. They even brought their dog, Suzie Q.

  David heard there was a bit of tension. Mark’s wife’s parents were upset with Mark for bringing the children to meet David Rupert. What if there was a terrorist attack? Had he thought about that?

  David and Maureen were getting a hint of what was coming for the rest of their lives.

  People would not call for family events, friends would make up excuses rather than let them into their homes. What if there was a terrorist attack? Weren’t the IRA known for making mistakes?

  As they talked in Mark’s room, David perceived a very big personality change in his friend. Mark was once the wild man, regaling David with his tales of excess. How he was changing. Now it was about God, and family, and American values. Mostly God. Mark had come in from his spiritual wilderness. He was blessed. David was bored.

  Mark said the FBI really wanted Rupert to testify. David was about to start on his rant about not getting paid when Mark came up with an offer – $12,000 a month, plus $9,000 a month for personal security, as David did not want the FBI around him. That was $21,000 a month, indefinitely, however he wanted to spend it. But that kind of money would only come if it was needed. He would hardly need $9,000 a month on security if he was simply passing on background information, rather than testifying, would he? There would also be a big bonus payment from M15 at the end of it.

  Just about $250,000 a year, indefinitely, “until the threat went away”, plus a settlement from MI5. He said he’d think it over, but that it was generous.

  Over dinner, Mark had some big news. He wasn’t sure how it would go down.

  James Smyth was no longer in an American prison. He had been deported back to Ireland.

  That was bad news.

  Rupert had betrayed the Real IRA’s best assassin, and he was back in Ireland, armed.

  Rupert couldn’t believe it.

  Smyth was not charged with terrorism, despite being videotaped bringing weapons and bomb components to Rupert’s room, because the Boston field office wanted nothing to do with IRA cases. One of their Irish American officers, John Connolly, was already in jail for acting as a double agent for IRA gun-runner and organised crime chief James “Whitey” Bulger. In a city as Irish as Boston, it was possible that someone with Smyth’s Irish and military background knew law enforcement officers. The Boston FBI was already drowning in internal and justice department investigations in the wake of the Connolly/Bulger scandal.

  Smyth, now barred from the US and his beloved girlfriend, was very, very angry. To Rupert, it was just more evidence that he couldn’t trust the FBI.

  The next day, Kathleen McChesney, the Special Agent in Charge at the Chicago office, and Pat Daly, another senior FBI officer, arrived at the resort.

  To other holidaymakers, they were just another group gathering to celebrate Easter week with facials, saunas and walks in the woods.

  If Maureen had a platonic crush on Mark, David had one on Kathleen. He was different around her. Less surly, more eager to please. She was pretty, Irish, intelligent and a redhead, just like Linda Vaughan. Maureen could pick up David’s sudden change in tone and wondered if she could use it to her advantage.

  Maureen had already emailed Kathleen about David’s Harley Davidson – she thought this would be a perfect time to raise it. Wouldn’t Kathleen agree that riding around on a motorbike was bad for security and could also lead to an accident, right when David was trying to decide whether he wanted the $21,000 a month to testify?

  Kathleen was primed. She told David that it was a very, very bad idea. He had very distinctive features and had lived in Florida before and he could be spotted. Kathleen said that the FBI would pay the difference between what he paid for the Harley and what he sold it for. She knew how to work him.


  David agreed to get rid of it.

  Maureen: “I couldn’t believe it. I’m after him to get rid of that thing and one word from Kathleen and it’s, ‘Oh yes, yes, yes, ma’am. Right away, ma’am.’”

  Kathleen had some other news and asked them not to be alarmed.

  Bernadette Sands McKevitt had asked Martin Galvin, the Real IRA-supporting New York lawyer, to start digging up dirt on David and Galvin had already hired a private detective.

  Rupert: “I had told stuff to McKevitt about the trucking world and all that and he was telling it to Bernie and his lawyer to get moving against me.”

  That evening, after dinner, they did a newspaper search on LexisNexis to see the press coverage for David Rupert – it brought up newspaper articles in nine countries just that day.

  David’s obsessive reading on the case continued. That day he checked online and found an article in the Irish Echo in New York. “FBI Denies Involvement in Informer Case,” it read.

  He was furious. It was more proof that the FBI was going to cut him loose, that the new contract wouldn’t materalise. It was 11pm. Mark was in his apartment next door with his family, asleep. He called Mark’s phone and left a message, demanding to know what was going on. David was still upset about it the next day, even as everyone else was enjoying themselves by the pool. He insisted Mark come over and read the article on his computer.

  Mark called Kathleen McChesney. She had a way of calming David that nobody else had. Kathleen called over to the room and explained, as patiently as she could, that the FBI never made a statement confirming it had an informer. It was better to say nothing, to keep the Real IRA guessing.

  They needed David in a good mood that day. Martin Callinan and Diarmuid O’Sullivan, the two senior anti-terrorism gardaí, were coming to the resort.

  They arrived two hours later. Callinan gave Maureen a kiss on the cheek. O’Sullivan, the more formal country man, shook her hand. “Martin is the kisser!” she recorded in her diary.

  O’Sullivan was very impressed by the resort.

  “I remember it very well. It was very salubrious to say the least. It was great comfort – I could have stayed there for a while but, unfortunately, we had a lot of work to do.”

  If Rupert was to testify, they had to convince him of all the security he could expect in Dublin and what he could expect from the court experience.

  O’Sullivan could sense that there was tension between Rupert and the FBI but was determined to stay out of it.

  “There was always an underlying fear in Rupert. I never delved into that much,” he said. “I certainly wasn’t going to get involved between him and FBI. The last thing I wanted was to add to the confusion.”

  Despite his heavy cold, Rupert spoke pointedly in his suite about how the gardaí had treated him.

  “He felt we weren’t serious about him. The fact that he had been positioned up in Leitrim in [the Drowes pub] and we hadn’t fulfilled our commitment to him.”

  This was by far the largest terrorist case in their lives. They couldn’t afford to fail, or to fall out with Rupert. They listened and tried to explain the importance of testifying.

  His meeting with the two Irish detectives began at 2pm. Below them, during the day, they could hear children splashing around in the pool and the chatter of families playing tennis and going for walks.

  Kathleen and Maureen sat by the pool with drinks and talked about life. Maureen liked her immediately. She asked her how many children she had. David always wanted to talk money and terrorism, Maureen always wanted to talk family. Kathleen said she had 800 children – all the FBI agents who worked for her. Maureen laughed. It led to a discussion about managing men – they had both managed dozens of them: Maureen in the truck plaza, Kathleen in the FBI.

  Maureen said they were as bad, if not worse, than women with workplace gossip and that women sometimes didn’t realise that. Kathleen complained about how needy her male agents were, constantly coming to her, looking for approval. “They’re exhausting in that respect,” she said.

  David didn’t finish with the Irish detectives until 2am and they needed him to start again early in the morning.

  He was sick and feverish but wanted to continue.

  By 8am the next morning, he was back in talks with them again, while Maureen went for breakfast.

  They finally finished at noon.

  David was feeling happier about the protection he would get in Ireland if he did testify. It was time to check out.

  The FBI was still trying to do all it could to placate him. Doug and Mark took David and Maureen’s bags and loaded them into the mini-van. “Well, end of lockdown,” said Mark.

  Maureen got a kiss goodbye from Martin and a handshake from Diarmuid. Mark told her to “take good care of the big guy”. “Only strained food for him, we don’t need him choking,” he said. “And no motorcycle,” said Maureen. They left on good terms and drove off.

  Mark called a few days later with a new media strategy. John McDonagh, the Radio Free Eireann host in New York, was denouncing Rupert on air as a “rat bastard”. The silence on the FBI/Rupert side would have to be filled. He had called Rupert’s friend, Dan the banker, and urged him to talk up “David the American hero” next time a reporter called. Galvin, John McDonagh, and Bernadette Sands McKevitt were spreading as many negative stories as they could. The FBI and the Ruperts would have to urge friends and family to spread a positive message when contacted.

  The stress of keeping David together was starting to show on Maureen. She went completely off her careful diet that day. She went to a Chinese buffet with her family and then to the fast food chain White Castle.

  The next day, Tuesday 24 April, Mark called again. John McDonagh had said on Radio Free Eireann that a major British TV current affairs show was in the US to do a big feature on David Rupert. McDonagh had probably already spoken to them.

  David went to his old doctor, who diagnosed him with high blood pressure and depression. He prescribed tranquilisers and said that he’d try him out on antidepressants.

  Rupert: “I started taking Paxil and anti-anxiety medicine. I still take antidepressants. It works. Life would be a bitch without it. I had an uncle and an uncle by marriage both commit suicide. Basically, I went overnight from being a spy to doing nothing. It was more stressful than anyone trying to shoot me.”

  The next day, another article about David appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times. He was stressed again and got in the car and headed west, just to drive somewhere.

  Yvonne, Maureen’s former hairdresser outside Chicago, told her that a woman with an Irish accent had called, looking for a number for Maureen Rupert. Then the woman asked what services the salon provided and if they did butt lifts. “She was a reporter, just looking for smut,” said Yvonne.

  Maureen could imagine the hoped-for article: “Maureen Rupert got hundreds of thousands of dollars from the FBI – then spent it on getting her buttocks shaped.”

  The media hunt never seemed to abate. The following Sunday, 29 April, David got a call from Suki, a former neighbour in Madrid. Five strangers were in town and had been in the coffee shop. They were wearing fishermen’s clothes and waders and she caught them taking photos of her house. Their back-story was that they were passing through on a fishing expedition and just wanted to see the town, but nobody believed them.

  The following day, Chris Fogarty, IFC member and Real IRA supporter, called another old friend of theirs in Wheatfield, Indiana, Jack, asking where they were and for details about Maureen’s father. David replied to Jack saying not to worry, that the FBI had the situation under control. Jack thanked him but said he was still checking under his car for bombs.

  That week, David and Maureen decided to stay ahead of the media and Real IRA hunt for them and go on a road trip to Canada. Maureen knew it would calm David’s nerves. They drove to Cornwall, Ontario.

  At the Best Western Hotel, Maureen spotted the actress Shirley MacLaine. She had never seen a celebrity befor
e and was really excited because MacLaine was in town to shoot a film with Kirstie Alley, one of Maureen’s favourites.

  She had to go find her: Shirley MacLaine would lead her to Kirstie.

  David tried to stop her.

  David: “Reporters from America, Ireland and the UK are on our tail every day, there is nothing they won’t do to find us and the Real IRA wouldn’t be far behind them.

  “My wife is trailing all over the hotel trying to run into celebrities. I knew they wanted their privacy and I didn’t want to draw attention to ourselves or let anyone know who were are, but Maureen was that determined.”

  Maureen drove to the Ramada Inn after dinner, looking for Kirstie Alley, but couldn’t find her.

  Then she insisted that they book out of the Comfort Inn and into the Best Western, where Shirley MacLaine was staying.

  Maureen hung out in the bar, hoping for a celebrity sighting. Shirley MacLaine and her dog, Teri, came into the bar. Shirley told Teri that it was “too early to be drinking”. Maureen followed her out to the corridor and was allowed to pet Teri. She was thrilled.

  The rest of her diary entry for the day is worth repeating in full, because it’s instructive about how their life was at that time:

  “Bud went to see Sheriff in Canton, NY about security factor. Betty called. Someone sent her raffle tickets for Friends of Irish Freedom [event] for 13 May. People’s Republic of China website article ‘American Infiltrates IRA’. Went to Ramada looking for Kirstie Alley. Saw male star. Don’t know his name.”

  Chris Fogarty was calling David’s friends and family, trying to find as much information as he could.

  On 8 May, Betty called. Fogarty called Joe, the school principal in New York, wanting information on Dale’s conviction and imprisonment for transporting cannabis.

  Then their friend Jack called and said he believed someone was following him.

  David was extremely annoyed. He called Mark, who was in Ireland planning the case. He wanted an FBI statement distancing him from his brother’s conviction. Mark pleaded with him to let it lie. “Someone needs to make a statement or we will,” said Rupert.