TAKING A CRACK AT THE CIA

Suit Seeks Link Between Agency And Crack Epidemic

Oakland, Calif. attorneys William Simpich Jr. and Katya Komisaruk have
taken on their share of long-shot cases and won.

But their most recent -- a federal class action that would hold the Central
Intelligence Agency and the Department of Justice liable for the crack
cocaine epidemic of the 1980s -- makes their previous battles look easy.

Simpich and Komisaruk don't seem worried by the suggestion that they are
tilting at windmills.

"People said that about the tobacco litigation -- they said no one can sue
Philip Morris," Simpich says. But then damning private industry documents
were made public, he says, "and there was no stopping those suits. I think
the same thing can happen here."

The attorneys -- who are gearing up to file related tort claims -- compare
their cause to the civil rights struggles of the 1960s.

But others doubt that the suit will make it past the starting gate.

"I applaud their effort, but it would appear that they have an uphill
battle," says San Francisco attorney Karen Snell, whose practice includes
challenging federal agencies. She says the suit will inevitably come up
against CIA claims of immunity in areas that involve national security.

But Komisaruk insists the CIA is on shaky ground. Unlike the tobacco
litigants who had to dig for secret industry documents, she says, the
plaintiffs in this case already have their smoking gun: A previously secret
agreement forged with the Justice Department in 1982 that allowed the CIA
to remain quiet about drug smuggling by sources connected to the Nicaraguan
Contras.

In particular, the complaint focuses on a report released last fall by CIA
Inspector General Frederick Hitz that brought the agreement to light and
showed the agency did little or nothing to respond to allegations of drug
trafficking by the Contra rebels. Plaintiffs say the agreement violates a
federal law that requires any department or agency of the executive branch
to report any possible criminal activity by officers and employees of the
government.

A spokeswoman for the CIA says the agency does not comment on pending
litigation. But shortly after the publication of the Inspector General's
report last fall, the agency released a statement saying there is no
evidence that the CIA or its employees "conspired with, or assisted,
Contra-related organizations or individuals in drug trafficking."

Not Doing Its Part

But the plaintiffs say the CIA is liable regardless of whether it assisted
the Contras. They are asking for a declaration from the CIA admitting that
the secret agreement with the Justice Department was illegal and an order
requiring the agency to report any possible drug crimes to the DOJ. They
are also demanding money damages for "injuries suffered by the community as
a whole, such as: lack of safety, overburdened social services, loss of
local businesses and damages to the tax base."

Although the plaintiffs' attorneys have yet to put a price tag on damages
or to decide how the proceeds would be divided, Komisaruk says they plan to
rally support in inner city communities in Oakland and Los Angeles through
churches, unions and schools. "It will be like the voter registration
drives in the South but more so," she says.

Lyons v. CIA, 99-1205, has been assigned to U.S. District Judge Saundra
Brown Armstrong, a former police officer, state and federal prosecutor who
was appointed to the bench by President Bush. An identical suit has been
filed by plaintiffs in Los Angeles.

The name plaintiffs in Lyons are two elderly Oakland residents, Rosemary
Lyons and Olivia Woods, who say crack cocaine has degraded their
neighborhoods and torn apart their families.

"The CIA, who I trust to be watchdogs, didn't do their part in reporting
how the drugs were coming in [to the country]," says Woods, 71, who has
raised two of her grandchildren since her son died of a crack overdose and
her daughter-in-law succumbed to a serious addiction.

She says the crack epidemic could have been avoided or at least curbed if
the CIA had shared its information with local law enforcement agencies. She
hopes the suit will bring justice and money to rebuild the community.

The Inspector General's report at the root of the case was released in 1998
in the wake of controversy that followed a series of stories in 1996 by
reporter Gary Webb in the San Jose Mercury News on the Contra-cocaine
connection.

Webb's broad thesis, that the CIA encouraged and facilitated the drug
trafficking as a way to funnel money to the Contras, prompted an
overwhelmingly skeptical reaction. The New York Times and other newspapers
questioned his reporting in a series of unusual attacks on another paper.
Meanwhile, the CIA issued its own report refuting Webb's assertions.
However, African-American political leaders such as Rep. Maxine Waters,
D-Los Angeles, have used the report to question government activities.

Because of the controversy, the plaintiffs have been careful to stay away
from allegations that the CIA itself was peddling drugs or had targeted the
black community for destruction.

"We said exactly that in our lawsuit so as not to be hung on the same cross
as Gary Webb," Komisaruk says.

A Different League

Both Simpich and Komisaruk are experienced with handling politically
charged cases in the past.

They successfully defended operators of illegal needle-exchange programs
that provide clean syringes to drug users in Berkeley and Oakland.

Komisaruk recently defended one of three protestors arrested for throwing
pies in Mayor Willie Brown's face. The pie throwers, members of the
so-called Biotic Baking Brigade, were convicted of battery but acquitted of
a more serious charge of assault on a public official in January.

Simpich has made a name for himself with suits that challenge what he
considers Draconian drug laws. Last year he helped elderly Oakland
residents win a battle before U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, who ruled
the residents could not be evicted because their relatives or visitors had
been arrested for drug possession outside the building.

More recently he filed a suit, along with Kenneth Frucht, another
co-counsel in the CIA case, that would force state Attorney General Bill
Lockyer to take action against California district attorneys who disregard
Proposition 215 and prosecute medical marijuana cases.

Still, both attorneys admit that taking on the CIA and Janet Reno puts them
in a different league altogether. But Simpich says plaintiffs have had
success against the CIA in the past. For example, a 1988 suit that accused
the CIA of conducting mind control experiments on unsuspecting Canadian
citizens in the early 1950s settled in favor of the plaintiffs for $750,000.

Others who have taken on the CIA have found themselves in hot water. A U.S.
district judge in Miami slapped the Christic Institute -- a nonprofit,
legal advocacy group -- and two journalists with $1.1 million in costs and
legal fees after dismissing a 1986 suit. That case accused individual U.S.
officials, including Richard Secord and John Singlaub, of joining in a
Contra-led assassination plot that resulted in a deadly bombing in Nicaragua.

As for the expected immunity defense in Lyons, Simpich says the CIA won't
be able to hide behind it if the plaintiffs can show that officials acted
deliberately or with reckless indifference to the civil rights of U.S.
citizens. He claims that won't be difficult to prove considering that the
CIA report acknowledges the agency's disregard of its duty to protect
citizens from drug trafficking.

Komisaruk adds that the case will survive because it stands on
congressional testimony and government documents.

"The CIA itself has already admitted fault," she says. "Now we want to go
to court and say what the CIA has to do to make it better."