C.I.A.-I.T.T. CONSPIRACY CHARGED AT HEARING

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP09T00207R001000030034-5
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 5, 2011
• Sequence Number: 34
• Publication Date: December 23, 1976
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2011/08/05: CIA-RDP09T00207RO01000030034-5
V,
C.I.A.- I.T.T. UUNNFIRAC
CHARGED AT HEARING,
Grand Jury Is" Told They Fabricated
Statements to Senate on Chile I
By SE'YMOUR M. HERSH
A Federal grand jury is hearing allega-
tions that high officials of the Central
Intelligence Agency and the International
Telephone and Telegraph Corporation
were involve., in a conspiracy to fabricate
and coordinate'the statements they made
to a 1973 Senate inquiry into I.T.T.'s role
in Chile, Justice Department sources said
yesterday.
The son :^c, who have first-hand
knowledge of the investigation, said that
'the grand jury was concentrating on the,
} activities of Richard Helms, the former
Director of Central Intelligence who re-,
cently resigned as Ambassador to Iran,
and:two I.T-.T. officials, Harold S.. Geneeiri,
the corporation's president, and John A.
McCone, a member of its board of -dice-
tors who also served as C I At chief, front,
1961 to 1965. ;
Mr. Helms was depicted by one-high!
level source as the current "primary tar-
get'' of the' jury, which is. meeting in
Washington and is not expected to corn-.
plete its investigation before the Carter
administration assumes office next month.
IX grand jury investigation is preliminary
to any indictment and does: not noes-
sarily result in one.
fir. Helms could not be reached yes-
terday. His attorney, i?u'ward Bennett
Williams of Washington, said he would
have no comment
At the offices of Mr. Geneen and Mr.
McCone, both were said to be out of
the country.
An em ph vice in Mr. McCone's Los Ange-
les bus ass office acknowledgev, how.-
ever, that the former C.I.A. chief had testi-
fied last month- before the grand jury in
connection wi : his Senate testimony.
Edward T. Gerrity, a senior I.T.T. vici^
president for corporate relations, said that
the concern had agreed with the Goverii-
ment prosecutors in the case "not to say
anything if they won't say anything."
Officials said that the renewed Justice
Department investigation has received
specific statements and allegations about
meetings at which participants from'f.T.T.
and the C.I.A. allegedly - discussed and
agreed upon testimony to be presented to
the multinational corporations subcom-
mittee of th Senate Foreign Relations
Exchanges Dented
That subcommittee, chaired by Senator
Frank Church, Democrat of Idaho, held
public hearings in March and April at
which officials from the C.I.A. and from
I.T.T. repeatedly testified that there had
been no exchanges of intelligence infor-
mation or other covert contacts between
the two about Chile.
Asked whether such. testimony had
been prearranged, one key Government
official said: "We have statements about
it, but there's a lot to be corroborated."
"I think it's there," he said of the
Government's pending conspiracy case.
In related testimony, Justice Depart- !
ment officials said, Mr. Geneen repeat- i
edly told the Senate committee that I.T.T. had not made any direct contributions
to any politician or political party before
Chile's '970 presidential electiors.
Contribution Indicated
The Senate Intelligence Committee re-
ported late last year t at it had learned
that I.T.T., after receiving direct advice
from the C.I.A. on how to proceed, for-
warded $350,000 in cash to a lea6ing con-
servative candidate before the ??lection.
" The Intelligence Committee has turned
over its records to the Justice Depart-
ment, sources said.
Mr. Geneen subsequently told a stock'
ti holder's meeting in May that 1350,000
"may have been sent to Chile" in 1970.
inforrnatiop" was. , pot consistent '. `.'with
my previous knowledge."' r. ; .
Mr. McCone,. asked a general' question
about corporate political contributions
during his testimony, deL.lared: "I think
multinational corporatiuns, ' operating
throughout the world, must be very very
careful not to involve themselves in'the'
local politics of the host country, and that
is the policy of I.T.T."
At the time of'the multinational cot
porations subcommittee hearings in 1973,',
it was not publicly knows that ? the
C.I.A. had initiated. a major secret opera-
tion of its own against the government
of Chilean President, Saivador' Allende
Gossen, spending more thin $8 million to
prep up' Mr. Allende's opponents. Mr.
Allende, a Marxist, whose election in 1970
was bitterly opposed by the United States
Government and American corporations,
died during a cop d'etat in September
1973..
Mr, Helms, who will leave his ambas-
sadorial post at the end of the year, has
been under intensive Justice Department
investigation for two years because of
his previous' Senate , testimony denying
that the C.I.A. had conducted domestic
intelligence and also denying that, the
agency had financially supported the. op-
ponents of Mr. Allende.
Prose uti.on in those inquiries was not
sought. in Hart because Mr. Helms sought
to "cF rec." so ne of his earlier testti-
mony thus blurring the record; Justice
Department officials -,arid. 'at the time.
The r?vitalized grand ; u' investigation was spurred, all sources agreed, by the
decision of Harold V. Pendrix, former
Miami newspaperman and I.T.T. political
operative, to cooperate with Government
prosecutors in return for being permitted
111111 to plead guilty to? a misdemeanor. charge
egu?
njgny before the 1973"Senate heaisring
An 1 endrix, of Coral Gables, Tla.,;re-
portedly. told, Justice Department investi-
gate s that he had. lied about the extent,
of. 11 and I.T.T.'s involvement with. the
C.I. ";during the hearings.
Ho. pleaded guilty, Nov. 5 to the 'mis-
demeanor charge ; of "withholding infor
matipn; from. Congress. and was sen-
tenced on Nov. 30 by a Federal court,
judg in; jvliaml to- a fine . of $1OQ and 1
three months of r}onreporting, probation.
Regti