THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, November 2, 1994 TAG: 9411020035
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: LARRY MADDRY
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines
J. EDGAR HOOVER, THE late FBI director, once penned the following words on a memo about a fugitive: ``Watch the Borders.''
He meant that the typist who had prepared the memo had not left space in the margins for him to write his comments. Nevertheless, FBI agents believed they were following Hoover's instructions when they fanned out along the Mexican and Canadian borders.
Ronald Kessler uses that illustration to note, among other things, the power of an FBI director and the loyalty of FBI agents.
Kessler is the investigative reporter whose book ``The FBI'' (published in 1993 by Pocket Books) was directly responsible for the firing of FBI director William Sessions.
Kessler, who will speak to the Central Business Association of Virginia Beach on Friday, is an author with a journalism background.
He's a former investigative reporter for The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal whose highly acclaimed book ``Inside the CIA'' gave him the clout necessary to gain from Sessions permission to interview agents for a book about the FBI without clearance from above.
In the course of his investigation, Kessler learned - among other things - that agency personnel were put off by the ``surly way'' Sessions and his wife, Alice, treated them.
For instance, the director's wife routinely asked FBI security guards to park her car in the garage under the Hoover Building in D.C. And, when accompanying her husband to a speech in Baltimore, she had the FBI director divert the procession of bureau cars to an appliance plant so she could return a toaster.
More important, Kessler found that Alice Sessions had requested and received an FBI headquarters building pass that entitled her to special privileges accorded an assistant FBI director or above. She frequently brought friends into the building without having them cleared at a security desk - a routine procedure for others.
On June 24, 1992, Kessler requested an interview with Sessions in which he questioned those activities, including other practices that undermined agency morale and respect for the directorship. For instance, he learned that Sarah Munford, the director's longtime assistant, had lived in Virginia for nearly five years but continued to register her car in Texas - a clear violation of agency regulations. FBI agents had to follow the law and register cars in Virginia when moving to Washington from other parts of the country, therefore paying higher prices for their insurance.
Munford claimed she had been given permission by the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles to continue registering her car in Texas. But Kessler found a different view from Charles E. Murphy, the department's director of investigations in Richmond. Said Murphy: ``Even Jesus Christ doesn't have the authority to waive the laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia.'' In the letter, Kessler asked to see the document waiving Munford's necessity to have a Virginia registration.
Kessler's letter to the FBI's public affairs office requesting the interview with Sessions was turned over to the Justice Department, leading to the investigation of William Sessions and his firing by President Clinton.
The post of FBI director is corrupting, Kessler believes. He claims that William Webster was the only director who failed to abuse the office, at least prior to the appointment of the current director, former Judge Louis J. Freeh.
``Abuse really seems to be an occupational hazard,'' he said during a phone interview this week. ``It's an extremely powerful position and, in some ways, more powerful than the presidency. A director can order directly investigations that put people in jail or, at the least, intimidate.''
Kessler's talk on Friday to the Central Business Association of Virginia Beach will be at noon in the Holiday Inn Executive Center. Registration is required. Tickets for the luncheon are $16.50 each. Reservations can be made by calling 490-7812. The public is invited. by CNB