Court Recognizes Legitimacy of Pollard Petition:
Orders U.S. Government to Respond

Larry Dub, Esq. - October 14, 2000

May be reprinted

On October 12, 2000 the US District Court for the District of Columbia ordered the US Government to respond to Jonathan Pollard's new legal petition.

The Court Order signals the beginning of the end of 15 years of politically-driven lies and false allegations about Jonathan Pollard, sustained by a court-sanctioned veil of secrecy.

US officials relying on opinion not evidence, have relentlessly smeared Jonathan Pollard in the media since the inception of this case. These unsubstantiated charges are not made in a court of law where Pollard might exercise his constitutional right to see the evidence against him and to defend himself, but in the media where he is routinely tried in the court of public opinion.

For example, in a September 20, 2000 letter to Jonathan Pollard's attorneys, former chief prosecutor Joseph diGenova admits that the basis for his most recent damning accusation against Pollard - namely that Jonathan identified agents in the field - is not factual, nor is it based on hard evidence, but is simply his professional "opinion". Mr. diGenova seems not at all troubled by the fact that Jonathan was never accused, indicted or convicted of such an offense.

An article by Seymour Hersh [The New Yorker January 1999] provides a number of examples of US officials, usually anonymous, condemning Jonathan in print for crimes that he has never been accused of in a court of law.

Quotes of three US officials taken from the Hersh article illustrate this reprehensible practice. Note how each official admits that there is no evidence that Pollard committed these offenses; nevertheless it is his "viewpoint" that Pollard is guilty. The quotes speak for themselves:

1. The officials stressed the fact that they had no hard evidence -- no "smoking gun," in the form of a document from an Israeli or a Soviet archive -- to demonstrate the link between Pollard, Israel, and the Soviet Union, but they also said that the documents that Pollard had been directed by his Israeli handlers to betray led them to no other conclusion.

2. Robert Gates, who became deputy CIA director in April, 1986, told me that Casey had never indicated to him that he had specific information about the Pollard material arriving in Moscow. "The notion that the Russians may have gotten some of the stuff has always been a viewpoint," Gates said...

3. "The question," the official said, "was whether we could prove it was Pollard's material that went over the aqueduct. We couldn't get there, so we suggested [in the Weinberger affidavit, that it did.]"

Thus, it was on the basis of these unchallenged and purely speculative opinions that Pollard was condemned to life in prison - not by the facts of the case, but by the biased opinions of some powerful Intelligence bureaucrats who were able to hide their baseless allegations behind a judicially-upheld sealed record.

Remarkably, none of these US officials changed their opinions of Jonathan after the exposure of Aldrich Ames, the CIA official who was in fact the perpetrator of the crimes that Jonathan was blamed for.

Nor have these officials ever seen fit to explain what happened to all of the material that the US officially provided to Israel before, during and after the Pollard affair. Why was it not compromised as well? Their opinion that only the Pollard material was betrayed to the Soviets simply defies all logic.

So, in spite of Ames and the absence of any evidence linking Jonathan to the loss of any US intelligence to the Soviets, US officials continue to insist that their opinion alone should suffice to keep Jonathan in prison forever - in complete violation of his constitutional rights to due process.

Nor has there been any let-up in the railroading of Jonathan Pollard, as a willing, irresponsible media, in search of a "scoop" rather than the truth, continues to do the dirty work of the Government.

For example, shortly after Jonathan's new legal case was filed in US District Court in Washington (09/20/00), his wife was contacted by a reporter who had just been given some "hot tips" about Pollard by a CIA official. He asked Mrs. Pollard to comment.

The "hot tips" turned out to be the same unadulterated lies that US officials had leaked to Hersh in 1999 - all long since discredited. Mrs. Pollard rebutted the lies and offered the reporter factual, documented evidence. In spite of this, the reporter remained determined to print the "hot tips" that he had received from the CIA because he still considered it to be an exclusive "scoop"!

Americans were recently shocked by the railroading of a Chinese-American scientist, Wen Ho Lee. They were disgusted by the media's willingness to savage Lee publicly on nothing more than hearsay from US officials. The Government wantonly accused Wen Ho Lee of stealing the "crown jewels" of American nuclear secrets. This went on for 9 months, until a federal judge finally ordered the Government to produce the evidence. It could not, and 58 out of 59 counts against Lee were suddenly dropped. Lee was then released on a plea bargain - time served and one count only. The media quickly absolved itself of any responsibility in the smearing of Lee, insisting that it had been misled by Government officials.

The media's protestations of innocence ring hollow in light of its continued alliance with the Government in pillorying Jonathan Pollard. This unholy collaboration has gone unchallenged for so long that it has blinded both the Government and the media to the fact that the old lies are not effective any more.

The great leveler is Jonathan Pollard's new court case. It shows irrefutably that a travesty of justice has taken place and according to the American constitution Jonathan is entitled to relief. Moreover Jonathan's new case stands to restore the integrity of the American judicial system, which will benefit all Americans.

Now that the truth is out, and there is a Court Order to which the US Government must respond, all of the lies in the world are not going to stop the truth from setting Jonathan Pollard free.

Note: