FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 3,
2006
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Mark S. Zaid, Esq.
(202) 454-2809 (o)
(202) 498-0011 (cell)
ZaidMS@aol.com
FORMER INTELLIGENCE
OFFICER SUES CIA TO CHALLENGE
EFFORT TO BLOCK
PUBLICATION OF HIS FORTHCOMING BOOK
CIA's Effort Reflects
New Policy To Hinder Efforts By Former/Current Employees To Publish Information
And Experiences Learned During Employment
WASHINGTON, D.C. --
A former CIA
Intelligence Officer, Thomas Waters, Jr., filed a lawsuit today before the U.S.
District Court for the District of
Columbia asserting his First Amendment rights are being
intentionally violated by the CIA. The CIA has threatened Waters with legal
penalties if he publishes significant portions of his book "Class 11:
Inside the CIA's First Post-9/11 Spy Class", which is currently scheduled
for publication on April 6, 2006 (and is available for advance purchase through
Amazon.com). Waters participated in
the first CIA training class that followed the tragic terrorist attacks of
September 11, 2001, and served at the CIA from 2002-2004. He is now
a senior intelligence contract analyst for the Department of
Defense.
Waters initially
submitted his manuscript for prepublication review, a requirement imposed on CIA
employees through their secrecy agreements, in May 2004. By late September 2004,
the CIA's Publications Review Board ("PRB"), which coordinates the
classification review of manuscripts, had approved for release the entire
manuscript except for requiring the deletion of four words (which was done).
Waters then sold his manuscript to Dutton, which is part of Penguin Group, in
December 2004. The CIA was aware of the dissemination and sale of the
manuscript.
In May and
September 2005, Waters submitted some additional minor modifications to the
manuscript, and supported all the changes through references to public source
documents or previously released materials. Although required to respond within
30 days of receiving the changes, no response was ever received. Suddenly, the
CIA notified Waters in December 2005 that he was not permitted to share the
manuscript with anyone. Two months later, and just weeks before the book is to
appear in bookstores, on February 15, 2006, the CIA notified Waters that
significant portions of the manuscript were considered classified -- the majority
of which had already been officially approved by the PRB for release in
September 2004.
"The CIA
continues to deliberately create a hostile environment for its former employees
who are seeking to do nothing other than publish nonsensitive, unclassified
information. Its actions are completely unconstitutional and designed to disable
the First Amendment," said Mark S. Zaid, Waters'
Washington, D.C. attorney who routinely handles First Amendment
litigation of this type. Zaid added that this latest effort against Waters is
further indicative of a pattern of behavior intended to dissuade CIA personnel
from ever speaking out publicly.
The publisher
describes the forthcoming book of the first post--9/11 CIA training class
as "the real story of how this band of everyday Americans joined together to
endure the challenge of a lifetime and serve their country. Against the backdrop
of Osama bin Laden's videotaped taunts; the Washington, D.C., sniper attacks;
and the loss of a CIA field officer in Afghanistan, Waters takes readers behind
the scenes, where the trainees learned methods of subterfuge, mastering
disguises, withstanding interrogations, and crossing into hostile territory
without being detected."
The CIA is also
refusing to permit Waters' counsel to have access to the allegedly classified
portions of his manuscript; a common tactic now utilized by intelligence
agencies. The CIA asserts that legal counsel have no "need-to-know" the contents
even when classification challenges are being litigated, and notwithstanding
counsel's willingness to execute secrecy/nondisclosure agreements. In a 2002
lawsuit, a U.S. Federal District Judge ruled in a similar prepublication review
case that this type of conduct "smacks of retaliation for the assertion
of First Amendment rights. Such a justification can not be said to be unrelated
to the suppression of free expression."
In response to
the CIA's actions, Mr. Zaid's firm has notified the CIA that they will no longer
execute secrecy agreements unless their client's relationship to the CIA is
itself classified, or an agreement is reached regarding the disclosure of
classified information. "It has become more than clear that rather than for the
purposes of ensuring the protection of classified information, the
Secrecy/Nondisclosure Agreements are being used by the CIA purely to interfere
with our ability to represent our clients and for the CIA to gain an advantage,
particularly in litigation, in contested employment matters," Zaid wrote in a
letter to the CIA's Office of General
Counsel.
In the weeks
following the attacks, the Central Intelligence Agency received over 150,000
resumés from people wanting to serve their nation as spies. More than one
hundred students were admitted to the CIA's Clandestine Service to become Class
11, the first post--9/11 CIA training class. It was the largest and most diverse
class in the agency's history. Joining Waters were a
World
Trade
Center victim's fiancée, an NFL
alumnus, a New York City comedian, a
college athletics coach, a hostage negotiator, and a single
mother.
Mr. Zaid serves
as the Managing Partner of Krieger & Zaid, PLLC, a
Washington, D.C. law firm that specializes in national security
cases. The firm has represented more CIA employees in the last decade than any
other law firm in the United
States. Mr. Zaid, who is a recognized expert on
security clearances and the Freedom of Information Act, has handled numerous
First Amendment prepublication review cases against the CIA and other
intelligence agencies. The most recent prepublication review case handled by the
firm, which remains active, is that of Gary Bernsten's book
Jawbreaker.
##
A copy of Waters' lawsuit
and relevant correspondence is available upon request.
The case is Waters v.
CIA, Civil Action No. 06-383 (D.D.C.)(RBW)
