FILES SHOW FBI SOUGHT DEPORTATION OF JOHN LENNON

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000303620005-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 23, 2010
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: March 22, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/23: CIA-RDP90-00552R000303620005-4
ASSOCIATED PRESS
22 MARCH 1983
Files Show FBI Sought Deportation Of John Lennon
LOS ANGELES
The late FBI director J. Edgar Hoover hoped to arrest and deport John Lennon
on drug charges in 1972 because he thought the former Beatle would disrupt the
Republican National Convention, government documents show.
"In view of the subject's avowed intention to engage in disruptive activities
surrounding the convention), New York office will be responsible for closely
following his activities until time of actual deportation," Hoover wrote in an
April 1972 memorandum.
The bureau's voluminous file on Lennon, released under the Freedom of
Information Act, was requested by University of California-Irvine history
instructor Jon Wiener for a book he is writing on Lennon and the politics of the
1960s. He released portions of the file Monday.
The FBI hoped to arrest Lennon "if at all possible on narcotics charges" and
initiate exportation proceedings against him, according to a file memo dated
July 27, 1972, just three weeks before the Republican convention in Miami.
Lennon, who was shot to death outside his New York apartment in 1980, had
been identified with anti-war activists Rennie Davis, Jerry Rubin and others as
a leader of "New Left protest activities during the 1972 election year," the FBI
report said.
At the time, Lennon was already fighting deportation because of a marijuana
conviction in England.
While the files obtained by Wiener comprise a virtual log of Lennon's life
and activities - including lyrics from his anti-war songs, concert reviews, and
counter-culture publications linking him with Democratic presidential candidate
George McGovern - extensive passages were blacked out and only about a third of
the file was released at all.
The FBI believed it was doing the right thing in gathering the information,
Jim Hall, chief of the agency's Freedom of Information office, said Monday in
Washington.
"People have forgotten the riots, the burnings that transpired in those
days," he said.
"Because of our concern for riots and any similar related activity in 1970 to
'72, we did have a considerable number of those types of investigations going
on."
Hall said most of the information withheld from Wiener was to protect the
identities of FBI informants.
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Wiener and American Civil Liberties Union attorney Mark Rosenbaum, said they
intend to file suit in U.S. District Court tc force the federal government to
release the rest of the documents.
Yoko Ono, Lennon's widow, has declined to participate in the lawsuit.
"As far as Yoko feels, she views all those experiences as happening in the
past. She prefers to look to the future," said a friend, Elliot Mintz. "For her,
personally, this is very painful."
The file showed that FBI offices across the nation, along with White House
special assistant H.R. Haldeman, immigration authorities, the State Department
and the CIA, were privy to the FBI's efforts to arrest Lennon.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/23: CIA-RDP90-00552R000303620005-4