Feeb Slants Feeb Slur

[anonymous@freezone.remailer]

FBI Probes Slant Allegations


Washington, September 14, 1995 (AP) -- The FBI says it
has reviewed more than 250 cases involving work done by
its crime lab after one of its agents alleged that his
colleagues slanted their testimony and fabricated
evidence to help prosecutors in high-profile cases.

"To date, no evidence tampering, evidence fabrication or
failure to report exculpatory evidence have been found,"
the FBI said in a statement Wednesday. "Any findings of
such misconduct will result in tough and swift action by
the FBI."

Special Agent Frederic Whitehurst, who made the
allegations and was interviewed Wednesday night on
ABC-TV's "Primetime Live" program, labeled the FBI
statement "garbage."

"I am obviously disagreeing with my superiors in this
matter. This report is garbage. ... It's garbage. I
personally know about the review of those 250 cases,"
Whitehurst said.

Whitehurst said he was under orders not to discuss
specific cases.

Defense lawyers want to call Whitehurst as a witness at
the O.J. Simpson murder trial in Los Angeles because he
has claimed that FBI agent Roger Martz, who gave
testimony damaging to Simpson, has slanted evidence in
testimony in other cases.

Asked if there had been evidence tampering at the FBI
lab, Whitehurst told ABC, "Yes, I believe there has been
evidence tampering."

He said he would testify at the Simpson trial "if the FBI
orders me to go."

Martz could not be reached for comment. There was no
answer at the office phones either Martz or Whitehurst
late Wednesday. Their home phone numbers could not be be
found.

The FBI said Whitehurst had, over the past several years,
raised "a variety of concerns about forensic protocols
and procedures employed in the FBI Laboratory," and that
the bureau or the inspector general's office of the
Justice Department, or both, had "vigorously
investigated" his concerns in all instances and were
continuing to do so.

The FBI said its laboratory examinations at trials are
"constantly subject to extraordinarily vigorous challenge
through cross-examination and the presentation of expert
testimony by defense witnesses."

Whitehurst told ABC he was speaking out because it was
his duty as an FBI agent.

"I swore to uphold the constitution of the United States,
and I swore to enforce the law. There was no caveat in
that swearing -- if I caught persons with badges I would
turn my back. I am an FBI agent. It's my duty," he said.

Whitehurst testified last month at the terrorism trial of
Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman and nine other Muslims accused of
plotting to bomb the United Nations building and other
New York City landmarks that he was pressured to distort
findings about the 1993 World Trade Center bombing to
favor prosecutors.

Citing a series of internal memos sent by Whitehurst to
his FBI supervisors, ABC said the agent listed "one
example after another of what he calls perjury, fraud,
even the fabrication of evidence" in cases at the crime
lab going back at least five years.

One of the cases, ABC said, involved a 1991 Georgia
mail-bombing that killed a federal judge and a civil
rights lawyer. It was investigated by Louis Freeh, now
the FBI director. Walter LeRoy Moody Jr. was convicted in
the deaths.

ABC said Whitehurst alleges that two agents in that case,
one of whom was Martz, slanted evidence by testifying
about tests that weren't done and scientific conclusions
they couldn't support.

The FBI lab was used to analyze blood evidence involving
Simpson. Martz, a toxicologist, was called by the
defense, but was declared a hostile witness. He testified
that blood on a sock from Simpson's bedroom and from the
crime scene showed only vague signs of a preservative.
Simpson's lawyers say the blood was planted and the
presence of the preservative proved it.

While testifying in New York Aug. 14, Whitehurst said
Martz was among several FBI investigators who concluded
the World Trade Center bomb was urea-nitrate-based even
though it was impossible to prove that scientifically
because the substance is so common.

After Whitehurst complained to his superiors, he said,
reports about the bomb were corrected. He said they were
accurate when they were introduced at last year's World
Trade Center trial, which resulted in convictions for
followers of Abdel-Rahman.

At the terror conspiracy trial, Whitehurst said when he
first told his supervisor about the errors, the
supervisor "advised us that he would now have to
embarrass his chemistry toxicology unit chief and that we
were never, ever again to do something like that to him."

Later, Whitehurst said, the supervisor told him he had
been instructed by his bosses to have Whitehurst change
his reports, and debates within the FBI about the
evidence continued throughout the year.

Whitehurst, the FBI's main explosives-residue analyst at
the time of the bombing, said he has since been demoted
and assigned to analyze paint for forensic evidence.

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