MAGAZINE ACCUSES CO[ ] SERVICE OF OLD LINK

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01314R000100340003-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 30, 2006
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: July 9, 1977
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved For Release 2006/12/01 : CIA-RDFIl1314
dl.i'rCLL? APPEAR-ED
1 PAG,T 142
THE WASHINGTON POST
9 JULY 1977
BY George Lardner Jr.
washinston Post staff w. !ter
Penthouse magazine charged yester-
day that at..ieast 23 members of the,
Copley News'Service also worked se-:
cretlyfor;?,the Central Intelligence
:.Agency over a 20-year period in Latin
America.."
The authors of the article, Joe
Trento -and..: Dave Roman, said the,
clandestine- arrangement stemmed'
from a .1953 White House meeting
with President Eisenhower at which
the ]ate publisher James S. Copley of-,
fered the help of the news service he
was formir-g
Copley, `the magazine said, volun_
teered the news service as "the eyes'.
anti cars" . against. "the Communist
threat in Latin and Central America"'
for "our intelligence services."
The allegations. were made in the
forthcoming . August issue of Pent-
house. which added that the Copley
Press,.,which also publishes the Sail
Diego Union' and . Evening Tribune,-
ran a "little' FBI" that funneled hun
drecis of thousands of unpublished
words and pictures about antiwar and
black protest "movements to the bu-
reau.
'Spokesmen for the Copley News
Service: -(CNS)-~and the parent firm,
the Copley Press, denied the asser-
tions about clandestine ties with the
CIA.
Gerald Warren, the current editor
of the Union, 'and Herb Klein, a for-
s mer editor ` of the paper,, confirmed..
that memos were written about pro-
test groups! and passed on to execu-
tives of the company, but said they
'did not' know 'whether the memos`
were then passed on to the FBI.
The. CIA. and the FBI refused to
comment.
The article, financed in part' by the.
Fund for Investjgative Journalism,
said that Copley Press "provided ere-
dentials, information and placement
of stories for the CIA and the FBI; ex-
changed intelligence information with -
the CIA for 'scoops' and planted CIA'41
and FBI stories and editorials, [and]
hprbored CIA operatives on the pay-
roll of the Copley News Service and
fed stores to news-service clients at
the request of the CIA and the FBI."
Elaborating at a press conference:
here, Trento, '29, now a reporter for.
the Wilmington-(Del.) News-Journal,
Approved For Release
and Roman, 31,a former San Diego
college teacher and now a freelance
writer, said the 23. Copley employees,
most of them based in Latin America,
Trento refused to: name any of the
23 or even to describe .the nature of
the CIA payments: He said he had
promised his "sources" not to divulge
such detalls- - .
Richard G, , Capen Jr., senior vice
president of operations at Copley
Press, flatly denied the charges of sur-
reptitious CIA employment. _
.. We have been assured by
11.. the
highest levels within the CIA that no
employees of Copley., Newspapers or
CNS have been employees of the
agency," Capen said. ' -
Warren, former . deputy White
House press secretary under Presi-
dent Nixon, indicated in a telephone
interview that the assurances had
been provided to present publisher
Helen Copley about a year and a-half:
ago when the charges first began to
-surface. "I'm confident of the assur-
ances Helen got," he said.
Capen protested that the reports of
.
CIA involvement are essentially "old.
allegations that Copley _ `ewspapers
have repeatedly denied over the past
two years. One of the authors, Joe
Trento, has printed most of these
claims in a: mimeographed newsletter, _
San Diego'Confidential, and they have
been-repeatedly denied by us."
For their Penthouse' article, Trento,
and Roman said that they had exam-
ined still-secret White -House docu-
ments' in'. the possession of CIA
sources and that these documents con-
firmed, not only Copley's 103 "eyes
and cars" offer but also Eisenhower's
"actually fed information to ui.i-oper-
ative William Kelly in 1961 concern-
ing the forthcoming Bay of Pips inva-
sion." (They said at the press confer-
ence they had no evidence that Glan-
doni was paid by the CIA)
"Giandoni-- gladly- 'acceded--to-'the-
CIA's request. for secrecy, writing sto-
'Ties which downplayed the idea that
any invasion was in the-works at all
and proposed than such speculative
stories were false," the article said. In
response, Giandoni said he once ap-
plied for a job with the CIA in Mexico-,
Citybut " got a form letter back-
tell-ing me they had nothing available." '
Turning to-the FBI, Trento and Ro-
.man said Copley Press officials, regu-
larly' funneled reporters' memos and
news photographers, pictures about
antiwar and -other demonstrators to
the FBI. "MVlany reporters were asked
for a four-paragraph story and a five
page memo," Roman said of the sys-
tem.
Warren, who was city editor at the,
Union from'. 1963' through 1968, said In
a telephone interview that he could
recall "passing on memos to my supe-?
riors of reporters' views. of demonstra-.,
tors. Where those-memos. ended up, Z-l
really don't know.'
-- Warren indicated he had- his suspi-
dons but he-- added that,,--"I haver
learned that my' 'suspicions r eally_-
don't mean much."
Trento and Roman said they had no
evidence that any' of the secret'Copley-
response. News Service links with the CIA or
11 Eisenhower told Copley that ' the FBI were continuing. Roman sari
'your favors are appreciated by .the he believed most of the activity stop
country. and will be - reciprocated"
pest when [James] Copley died" oft
whenever , possible'," the -magazine "Oct. 6, 1973.. President Nixon praised
said. him at the time as "a close friend and
George Curtis, supervisory archivist adviser" and said the nation had lost,-,
of the Dwight Eisenhower Library in ` ' "a noble American; "
Abilene; Kan., told The Washington ; . According to Editor & Publisher, a
Post that' records there show a meet- trade publication,' Copley News Sei ]
ing between Eisenhower and Copley,
ice was startei3 in 1954 as a feature f
was held on April 25, 1953. Copley, ..service for the San Diego Union but
vice president William Shea also at-
tended the meeting, which had been soon began providing other clients
with its 'specialized coverage of Lauri
requested by Copley's Washington bu- America. At its heyday in the 1960s, it
reau chief, Robert W. Richards.Pent- supplied news copy by wire but. is notiv-I
house--identified Richards as a : for c.,
1ement9.=m,mcoe roperat'OA i
pp
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