From the Files - Freeh and Flight 800

[Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com>]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 13 Nov 1997 12:37:04 -0500
From: Marc Rotenberg <rotenberg@epic.org>
To: rotenberg@epic.org
Subject: From the Files - Freeh and Flight 800


Today the FBI ended the TWA Flight 800 criminal probe. The FBI's
lead investigator James Kallstrom said that the FBI found
"absolutely no evidence" that the tragedy was the result of
a criminal act.

But what was the FBI telling Congress after the incident
occurred? The following expert from CNN is worth saving.
Keep in mind that the FBI Director was simultaneously
lobbying the Judiciary Committee for expanded wiretap
authority.

Marc.


>From the CNN, July 20, 1996
[http://cnn.com/US/9607/20/twa.crash.probe/index.html]

U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, who was among members of Congress briefed
Friday by FBI Director Louis Freeh, said it looked "pretty darn conclusive"
that
either a bomb or a missile caused the explosion.

"We're looking at a criminal act," Hatch said. "We're looking at somebody who
either put a bomb on it or shot a missile, a surface-to-air missile."

Hatch, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, told CNN he came to his conclusions
after "various conversations" with government officials.

"I won't go so far as to say it was terrorism, but there was sabotage
here," Hatch
said. "It looks like that."

"It's very -- almost 100 percent unlikely -- that this was a mechanical
failure," he
said. "It looks pretty darn conclusive that it was an explosion caused either
internally or externally that was caused by a criminal act."

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