A 2-YEAR CUSTODY BATTLE WITH THE CIA PAYS OFF

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000100330010-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 23, 2010
• Sequence Number: 10
• Publication Date: April 17, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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COLUMBIA DAILY SPECTATOR
Columbia University (NY)
17 April 1980
By CNRIS WELLISZ j
Spectator's ongoing efforts to ob-'
tain documents from the CIA about
clandestine operations at Colum-
bia began in September, 1977, after
the agency revealed that th-
university had been involved ir:
Project MK-ULTRA, a series of
top-secret mind control ex-
periments conducted in the 1950's
and early '60's.
That year, the CIA informed Col-
umbia that it was one of 80 univer-
sities at which "some portion" of
the experiments, which included
tests of the effects of LSD on unwit-
ting subjects, were conducted.
To obtain more information
about the CIA's secret affiliations
with Columbia, Spectator re-
quested all documents dealing with
the agency's involvement in cam-
pus research projects under the .
Freedom 'of Information Act
(FOIA). The FOIA, passed by Con-
gress in 1974, requires federal
agencies to release non-classified
information to those who request
it.
It soon became clear, however,
that the CIA would not immediate-
ly respond to the request. During
an exchange of correspondence
between the CIA and Spectator, the
agency acknowledged Spectator's
request but said it would be unable
to comply within 10 days, as
specified by law.
On March 3, 1978 the newspaper
filed an administrative appeal re-
questing a response within 20 days.
Although the CIA (lid not formally
deny the request, it failed to pro-
vide any of the materials asked
for. Arguing that the CIA's "lack of
a timely response" constituted a
denial of the newspaper's requst,
Spectator filed a civil complaint in
federal court to obtain the
materials it had requested.
The suit, brought in the U.S.
District Court for the Southern
District of New York, named the
Central Intelligence Agency and
its director, Adm. Stansfield
Turner, as defendants.
L11h
pay
Lawyers for Spectator said in
papers filed with the court that
"the plaintiff has exhausted its ad-
ministrative remedies under the
Freedom of Information Act" and i
asked for the release of informa-
tion, as originally requested from
the CIA, documenting "all past
and present contractual relation-
ships between the Central In-
telligence Agency. . . and Colum-
bia University in the City of New
York."
In particular, Spectator was
seeking information about "the
CIA's use of university facilities to
examine the effect of drugs on
human behavior and the CIA's
financial support of various
research projects conducted bye
university professors."
In addition, Grossman filed a
"Vaughn" motion asking for a
"list and index" of all CIA
documents relating to its activities
on campus.
That summer, the CIA filed a
motion with the federal district
court requesting a stay of all pro-
ceedings on the grounds that the
agency was responding to the re-
quest with "due diligence."
The CIA argued that because of
the thousands of requests for infor-
mation under the Freedom of In-
formation Act, which it handled on
a "first come, first-serve" basis, it
was impossible for the agency to
comply with Spectator's request
within the 30 days required by
FOIA. The law, however, grants
variances of the 30-day rule in "ex-
ceptional circumstances."
Spectator, however, countered
the agency's 'claims by arguing
that its system of handling claims
was arbitrary. The newspaper was
not assigned a response sequence
number until it filed the ad-
ministrative appeal, four months
after its original request.
Spectator also charged ar-
bitrariness by noting that the CIA
processed FOIA and Privacy Act
requests together, thus delaying
the FOIA requests. Lastly, the
newspaper contended that the CIA
failed to take into account Spec-
tator's status as a member of the
press. In its original request, Spec-
tator asked for the information to
help in its research for a series of
articles on CIA-Columbia rela-
tions.
But in March, 1979, William Con-
ner, the federal district judge, rul-
ed that the CIA would not have to
release a list and index of the
documents and granted the agen-
cy's request for a stay of the pro-
ceedings.
In his decision, Conner stated
that the "method employed by the
CIA for processing appeals is
orderly" and rejected the claim
that the agency had acted ar-
bitrarily by not promptly assigning
Spectator a response-sequence
number.
The CIA, Conner determined,
could have as much time as it liked
to process the request. Between
the time the original request was
filed and the administrative ap-
peal, the CIA had processed 1,700
other FOIA requests, according to
papers filed with the court.
Two years after Spectator's first
letter to the CIA, most of the re-
quested documents were finally
released on August 29, 1979. The
.1,131 released documents consisted
in large part of correspondence
between the CIA and officers of the
university. Fifteen documents
were denied to the newspaper.
.- But of the documents released,
most contained deletions; only 139
were provided in their entirety.
The magic-marker deletions were
made to conceal the names of
various university professors in- j
volved in CIA funded research pro-'
jects. The names of CIA agents and'
.classified information concerning
the Agency's relations with Colum-
bia were also withheld in part. A
list and index was provided. along
with the documents themselves.
Since the initial release of the
documents, Spectator and the CIA
have been involved in negotiations
for the release of redacted and
denied materal.
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According to Eric Freedman, at-
torney for Spectator, negotiations
are "80 per cent complete." Within
six weeks, he said, the newspaper
will pronounce itself "satisfied or
dissatisfied with regard to specific
documents," at which point litiga-
tion may be concluded.
On April 11 of this year, more
documents, including cor-
respondence between President
McGill and Adm. Turner, were
released in response to complaints
by Spectator of incomplete infor-
mation.
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