-Caveat Lector- Dec 11, 1999 - 02:02 PM FBI Pursued Wen Ho Lee for Months After Doubts He Wasn't Chinese Spy By John Solomon Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON (AP) - Facing flaws in their evidence, FBI officials began to doubt more than a year ago that Los Alamos laboratory scientist Wen Ho Lee had given China one of America's most prized nuclear secrets as originally feared, according to government officials and documents. The agents wrote a memo alerting FBI Director Louis Freeh to their suspicions, officials told The Associated Press. But the pursuit of Lee continued for months - along with a barrage of news leaks implying he was a Chinese spy. Agents eventually built a lesser case against Lee alleging he removed a wide array of nuclear secrets from secured computers of the government weapons lab where he worked for two decades. He was indicted Friday, but the government offered no evidence that he passed secrets to China or any other country. The FBI abruptly shifted its espionage focus this fall to other individuals and other government facilities. The FBI concerns that it might have focused too narrowly on one espionage suspect are detailed in internal documents, stamped secret, that recently were turned over to the Justice Department and Congress. The documents were described to AP by law enforcement and other government officials. Because the memos are classified, the officials would only speak on condition of anonymity. They show the FBI office in Albuquerque, N.M., wrote headquarters on Jan. 22 that "it appears" that Lee was not responsible for providing China secret information about the W-88, the most advanced U.S nuclear submarine warhead, the officials said. A subsequent memo dated Jan. 29 and addressed to Freeh stated that the Albuquerque office "continues to insist" that Lee had not disclosed the W-88 secrets, the officials said. Freeh attended a briefing on the case in Albuquerque two months later, they said. FBI officials defend their continued pursuit of Lee, pointing to the indictment Friday. They added that agents developed fresh evidence that continued to warrant focusing on Lee, including that he failed a lie detector test and acted suspiciously during a sting. Government officials say intelligence that hasn't yet been made public also warranted continued scrutiny of Lee. But FBI officials acknowledge they are no closer today to proving Lee leaked any U.S. nuclear secrets to China or Taiwan. The emergence of the internal documents forced a top FBI official to alter testimony he gave in June. That testimony said that evidence gathered by the Energy Department's original inquiry against Lee made a "compelling case" to focus on the Los Alamos lab near Albuquerque as the likely source of Chinese espionage. "I believed then that these statements were accurate. ... I have subsequent to that testimony asked for and become aware of additional facts," Assistant FBI Director Neil J. Gallagher wrote in a letter to the Senate just last month. Gallagher, who oversees national security criminal cases, disclosed the Albuquerque office had written reports in November and December 1998 and again in January that "question the accuracy of certain representations and conclusions" about the original evidence against Lee. Gallagher acknowledged "these documents were sent to FBI headquarters" and that one was even included in the briefing book he used to prepare for his testimony. But he told the senators, "I was unaware of their existence before I testified." The emergence of the internal documents comes at a sensitive time for the FBI. The memos expressing doubts about Lee may be turned over to defense lawyers in Lee's case, and Congress is currently reviewing the FBI's conduct in a variety of cases including Waco and their mistaken focus on Richard Jewell as the Olympic Park bomber. The FBI's very public pursuit of Lee, his firing from his lab job, congressional testimony by top law enforcement officials and news media stories based on anonymous sources created a perception that the China espionage investigation was making significant strides earlier this year. A special congressional committee released a report accusing China of widespread espionage at U.S. nuclear labs that will allow Beijing to modernize its nuclear arsenal in the next few years. But the FBI documents show that months before the congressional report was released in May, FBI officials suspected the original evidence gathered against Lee was flawed, officials said. When the Energy Department conducted an administrative inquiry in 1996 that prompted the espionage case, investigators had narrowed the focus to one lab, Los Alamos, and 12 foreign-born scientists, including Lee, officials said. But in a fall 1998 interview, Lee's boss disclosed to the FBI that about 250 individuals on average each year had access to the W-88 information, including contractors and scientists at other nuclear labs that agents hadn't examined, the officials said. That fact weighed heavily in the subsequent analyses written by FBI supervisors in Albuquerque that re-examined the evidence and raised concerns that investigators had focused too narrowly on Lee, who had passed an Energy Department lie detector test, officials said. The analyses also reviewed the evidence that raised FBI suspicions about Lee, including that a foreign scientist had hugged him in public and that Lee had not fully divulged a contact he had with an FBI agent posing as a Chinese official, the sources said. During an August 1998 sting, an FBI agent posed as a Chinese national and offered his assistance if Lee got in any trouble over his work, the officials said. The undercover agent provided Lee with a beeper number and a hotel name. FBI agents were thwarted when Lee called the hotel and declined to meet the undercover agent. And Lee's wife, who also works at the Los Alamos lab, alerted Energy Department security officials that her husband had been contacted by a Chinese official offering assistance, the officials said. However, when Lee himself was questioned about the contact right after the sting, he was vague, failing to mention the beeper number or the hotel, the officials said. Lee later volunteered far more details about the sting in subsequent FBI interviews, officials said. The FBI continued to pursue Lee, reviewing his Energy Department lie detector test and reversing the conclusion that he had passed, officials said. FBI agents administered another lie detector that concluded that Lee failed on questions about contacts with foreign nationals and his handling of W-88 secrets. They searched his home in April, the officials said. Such evidence, however, did not bring the FBI closer to proving Lee had passed a single U.S. secret to China or Taiwan. And the FBI found more flaws in the original evidence. In August, a scientist who participated in the Energy Department review that led to the Lee allegations divulged to the FBI that he had disagreed with the conclusions, a fact kept from the investigation, officials said. DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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